Bitcoin Price: US$ 43,495.44 (-1.98%)
Ethereum Price: US$ 3,072.49 (-5.29%)
Metaverse Land Attracts, Keeping Wallets $SAFE, & Rust’s TVL Rises
- Land prices in both Sandbox and Decentraland have risen considerably since Facebook’s Meta rebrand announcement on Oct 28th, which sparked a buying frenzy into metaverse-related assets, including SAND and MANA.
- Sandbox land prices increased ~445% between October 2021 and January 2022. A significant part of this is related to SAND token price appreciation (SAND surged 320% over the same period) since new public land sales are denominated in a fixed amount of SAND (1,011 SAND for a regular 1×1 land plot).
- Interestingly, land price lags behind token price appreciation (Decentraland land prices increased ~36%, while MANA is +175% over the same period). All land has been minted and can only be purchased via secondary sales.
- Sandbox is currently the most popular virtual land metaverse, which is reflected in its consistently higher trading volumes. Sandbox has seen roughly 3X the volume of Decentraland in the past three months.
- MVRV, or the ratio of Market Value to Realized Value, is an on-chain metric that serves as a rough proxy of average profit and loss of BTC holders in aggregate. Short Term Holder MVRV (STH-MVRV) attempts to make the traditional metric more representative of shorter-term time frames and speculators and where their behaviors may be overly aggressive or not. Breaching through the “1 line” has historically been a good indication for market reversals.
- STH-MVRV often suggests BTC is approaching an “opportunity zone.”
- Gnosis Safe is a smart contract multi-sig wallet that allows users to increase wallet management security. Users can add modules to that smart contract wallets (e.g. implementing spending limits and automating transactions). Gnosis Safe is currently securing over $100B worth of assets.
- With the increase in crypto adoption last year, safe creation has been on a consistent uptrend. Daily active safes have increased tenfold from 60 to 600 today. Total Safes created also increased from 12k to 45k today. However, compared to MetaMask’s 21 million users, it seems like not many users are actively using this multi-sig function to increase their wallet security.
- Gnosis proposed to create a SAFE Token to govern the Gnosis Safe ecosystem and infrastructure through the establishment of an independent SafeDAO. This is a spinoff from GnosisDAO, similar to what happened with CowSwap.
- EVM-compatible programming languages like Solidity and Vyper have dominated DeFi space as it is what most applications are built on.
- However, as other L1s grow, they’ve created another standard for DeFi. Cosmos-ecosystem chains like (Terra, Secret, Juno) and Solana were all built using Rust. This has led to Rust increasing their TVL dominance to 11% from basically nothing the past year.
- This can also be an indicator of what programming language coders should learn to be exposed to the most money.
AXS, RON and SLP surge after Axie Infinity developers revamp the project’s tokenomics
- Since launching in 2018, Axie Infinity has amassed over 2 million daily active users (DAUs) and its decentralized exchange, Katana, has a market cap of $5.5 billion, but this growth has not come without challenges.
- Axie Infinity’s in-game token, Smooth Love Potion (SLP) decreased nearly 93% from it’s all-time high in July 13, 2021 of $0.39 as it faces uncontrollable inflation. As such, the team has announced it will significantly remove SLP issuance from the game, making it harder to farm.
- Gamers and guilds will, in turn, focus their attention on their strategic competitive edge and the potentially increased price of SLP will inevitably result in the increased price of Axies as the cost to breed would increase all the same.
Canadian MP introduces bill aimed at encouraging growth in crypto sector
- Michelle Rempel Garner, a member of the House of Commons of Canada, has introduced a bill proposing the government set up a framework to encourage the growth of the cryptocurrency sector in the country.
- In the first reading of Bill C-249 in the House of Commons on Wednesday, Garner proposed having Canada’s Minister of Finance — currently Chrystia Freeland, a member of the country’s Liberal Party — consult with industry experts to develop a regulatory framework aimed at boosting innovation around cryptocurrencies. The bill, titled the “Encouraging the Growth of the Cryptoasset Sector Act,” would also require the Finance Minister to report on the framework and introduce legislation within three years of passage.
- “Cryptoassets have significant economic and innovative potential for Canada,” said the bill. “The framework must, among other things, focus on lowering barriers to entry into the cryptoasset sector while protecting those working in the sector and minimizing the administrative burden.”
EOS Network Foundation reveals plans to pursue a $4.1B lawsuit against Block.one
- In a new chapter of the EOS community versus creators saga, the EOS Network Foundation’s (ENF) founder and “community-elected CEO,” Yves La Rose, revealed that they are preparing for a legal “war” against EOS creators Block.one.
- According to La Rose, they are reviewing any potential legal action “to seek $4.1B in damages.” Currently, the EOS leader mentioned that a Canadian law firm is working with them to explore what legal action they can take against the original developers of EOS.
- In a blog post, the Foundation announced that many members of the EOS community are very dissatisfied with Block.one.
- “Block.one has not kept its word regarding past promises and that both the community and individual EOS users have been harmed as a result.”
New Hampshire Governor issues executive order establishing commission to study crypto
- Chris Sununu, who has served as the governor of New Hampshire since 2017, has established a commission aimed at investigating the technology and laws around digital assets in addition to recommending new legislation.
- On Wednesday, the New Hampshire Governor’s office announced it would be issuing Executive Order 2022-1 to create the Governor’s Commission on Cryptocurrencies and Digital Assets. Governor Sununu cited the “rising use and acceptance” of crypto as well as the growth of distributed ledger and blockchain technologies in his decision to establish the commission.
- According to the executive order, the crypto commission will have 180 days — until Aug. 8 — to submit a report to officials within the New Hampshire state government consisting of a “review and investigation regarding the current status of the cryptocurrency and digital asset industry” as well as on applicable laws in the United States and abroad. The commission will have the authority to hold public hearings to hear from industry and regulatory experts, and “make findings and determinations regarding the role and effectiveness of current state laws and regulations governing cryptocurrencies and other digital assets” while balancing economic competitiveness, the possible impacts on the financial system, and privacy concerns.
Top Latin American exchange Bitso officially expands to Colombia
- Bitso, a major Latin American cryptocurrency exchange and El Salvador’s crypto wallet assistant firm, has announced its formal launch in Colombia.
- As part of Bitso’s development strategy in Colombia, the exchange has hired former Mastercard executive Emilio Pardo as new country manager, the firm announced to Cointelegraph on Thursday.
- Pardo is former head of business development for the Andean Region at Mastercard, where he focused on fintech issues like instant and cross-border financial transactions and open banking. He will now be responsible for developing Bitso’s strategy in Colombia to increase the local crypto adoption and financial inclusion, focusing on Bitso’s strategic basics including education and security.
- According to Pardo, Latin America is now going through one of the most important moments in the adoption of cryptocurrencies, and Colombia is not an exception. The growing crypto adoption will not only benefit Colombia’s financial ecosystem, but will also help educate and address the needs of our customers and fellow citizens, he noted.
