Issue 009: Weekly Web3 Newsletter by Sujith Godavarthi

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This Week in Web3

1. Social interest in Bitcoin hit a 2 month high this week. Among crypto’s top 100 assets, BTC is the topic in 26% of discussions for the first time since mid-July. Do you belong to that 26%? By the way, most of the discussions share pessimistic views on Bitcoin. What about you? [Cryptopress]

2. We know that there is a legal battle (it started in late 2020 with a complaint from the SEC that Ripple has conducted illegal security offering from one of the XRP digital assets) going on between Ripple and the SEC. Recently, the CEO of Ripple claimed that SEC is a bully ‘trying to regulate through enforcement.’ Adding on that, he said, “That’s a super inefficient way to do this, as opposed to ‘let’s do the work, let’s provide the clarity”. [Finbold]

3. Crypto exchange app hi launched the world’s first NFT Customizable Card with Mastercard. “NFT customization for Gold members and above enabling the personalization of the face of the card with an NFT avatar which you verifiably own, provided that it meets Mastercard’s card design standards.” [Mastercard]

4. Walmart enters the Metaverse with Roblox via two experiences: Walmart Land and Walmart’s Universe of Play. This is an experiment by this multinational retail corporation to find new ways to reach shoppers. [CNBC]

5. Robinhood had released a beta version of web3 wallet to 10,000 users. This polygon based wallet will allow users to trade over 20 cryptocurrencies without fees. [Coindesk]

6. Big NFT Sales of the Week: a Mega Mutant (MAYC collection – part of BAYC family) sold for 1000 WETH ($1.3M), a Cryptopunk sold for 3,300 ETH ($4.4M), a Bored Ape sold for 77 ETH ($1M). Do you know that the punk that sold for $4.4M this week was sold for $1400, 5 years ago?

7. Vitalik Buterin releases Proof Of Stake book. That’s it! That’s the news.

8. An MEV bot operator made 800 ETH in a single transaction on Sept. 28, and then lost a whopping 1,100 ETH an hour later. [Tweet Thread]

9. NFT trading volumes collapse 97% from January peak. Are NFTs dead? Now, they are just down bad. How bad? From $17B in January to $466M in September. [Bloomberg]

10. Circle announces plans to launch $USDC on Polkadot, Arbitrum, NEAR, Cosmos, and Optimism networks. Nice! [Tweet]

11. Crypto lender Voyager (which filed for bankruptcy in July) accepted a bid from FTX of $1.4 billion. FTX now owns all of Voyager’s digital assets. Michael Saylor buys Bitcoins. SBF buys bankrupt companies. I buy NFTs that never moon. We are not the same!

12. Crypto CEOs Jesse Powell (Kraken), Michael Moro (Genesis), Brett Harrison (FTX US), Alex Mashinsky (Celsius), Sam Trabucco (Alameda), and also Bitcoin’s CEO Michael Saylor, all of them stepped down from their CEO positions. And all of this happened in a very short amount of time. What’s happening? While Michael said that he did that move to focus more on acquiring bitcoin, when it comes to others, the legend has it that they all left the thrones to avoid the regulation heat that is about to come from the government. The storm is coming?

13. The Do Kwon drama still continues. Authorities in South Korea are seeking to freeze $67 million in Bitcoin with potential ties to Do Kwon and Terra. Both Do Kwon & The Luna Foundation Guard (LFG) denied those claims. By the way, a red Interpol notice was issued for his arrest and his location remains unknown currently.

14. NFT lending in action. 1000 ETH was borrowed against two mega mutants. The loan repayment terms are 1,044 ETH in 90 days at an 18% APY. And the borrower bought any additional Mutant with that loan. Betting big on Bored Apes!! [Tweet, Decrypt]

15. Solana blockchain was down again! A blockchain should process transactions all the time. That should be one of its core functions. This is the 8th time Solana has gone down in the past 1 year. [Tweet, Tweet]

16. PUBG creator Brendan Greene has revealed his next game ‘Artemis’ which will feature NFTs, the metaverse, and blockchain. [IGN]

17. US Instagram and Facebook users can now share NFTs. Currently, the platform supports Ethereum, Polygon, and Flow blockchains. [Tweet]

18. OpenSea rewards two white hat hackers with $200k ($100k each) for discovering critical vulnerabilities. [BlockchainReporter]

19. Gross Metaverse Product? “Gross metaverse product will be able to create billions of dollars in returns for Dubai without people being physically in the emirate but experiencing it in the metaverse,” Al Olama said at the Museum of the Future in Dubai. [Blockworks]

20. Tyler Hobbs (creator of Fidenza NFTs) made ~$17M on his new NFT collection’s launch, QQL. Currently, the floor price on OpenSea is currently sitting at 16+ ETH. The mint price was 14 ETH.

21. Euro and Pound HODLers are turning towards Bitcoin to protect their purchasing power. Yes, Bitcoin as a hedge against inflation narrative didn’t work well for many, but in times of crisis like this, Bitcoin is the way? [Tweet Thread]

22. Disney’s web3 plans: It plans to hire a corporate lawyer for NFTs and metaverse

23. LUNA Classic up 33%!! But why? Binance will burn trading fees on Luna classic (LUNC) as the Terra governance token holders voted to implement a 1.2% tax for on-chain transactions to limit the token’s rapidly-rising supply. Fees will be converted to LUNC and then will be sent to a burn address thereyby reducing the supply. [Blockworks]

24. Indian Crypto Exchange WazirX laid off 40% of its employees. If you are unemployed, nobody can fire you. Just saying. NLA. Not Life Advice. [Coindesk]

Interesting Reads

Do You Know?

Approximately 10 years ago, Coinbase raised $600k. It now trades $500,000,000 in Bitcoin a day. [Tweet]

Meme Of The Week 😂

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