Market Summary

Bitcoin Price: US$ 46,407.35 (+1.30%)
Ethereum Price: US$ 3,521.91 (+2.27%)

Goodbye Q1, You Won’t Be Missed

• The crypto market has been showing signs of strength as we close the books on a volatile Q1. For context, BTC still remains within its $30K trading range, oscillating between $32K-$62K. As Q1 comes to a close, let’s revisit the weekly market structure for Bitcoin to see where we find ourselves.
• BTC is ending the quarter in a much better place than where it started the month. Quarterly closes are important because they’re often scrutinized by many types of market participants. A strong monthly or quarterly close can inform a bullish bias for traders and investors with longer time horizons. Algorithmic traders can also use quarterly (or monthly or weekly) closes as triggers for certain trend or momentum-based strategies.
• Despite the strong end to Q1, BTC’s price appears to be heading into some resistance at the time of writing. Notably, BTC also finds itself at the midpoint of the weekly market structure.
• In addition, BTC also finds itself above the high volume node boundary located around $42-$44K. Keep an eye on this area should price revisit it in the coming days. As of now, the weekly market structure looks prime for a trend shift, barring any drastic turn in market sentiment. Continue on Delphi…

Record music streaming profits highlight how NFTs will empower content creators

• The music sector hit record revenues at $25.9 billion in 2021, which amounts to an 18.5% growth from 2020, according to IFPI’s “Global Music Report.” Of these nearly $26 billion, streaming drove the bulk of the growth, with a 24.3% increase relative to 2020. These patterns constitute great news for the emerging class of NFT musicians and highlight the demand for audio and video content.
• Even if the way that streaming is done changes — moving from centralized platforms, like Spotify to decentralized NFT marketplaces — streaming is here to stay. The rise in streaming is part of a broader transformation in media and entertainment towards digital content — print media is quickly fading. Digital media began replacing print media years ago with profound effects on the sector. Economists find that the move toward national digital media is linked with the decline in local newspapers and partially explains the focus on national topics and heightened politicization.
• While there has been some talk of buying music-related NFTs in the Metaverse — most notably for fashion — imagine if creators came together in the Metaverse to create immersive digital experiences that combine audio, visual, and potentially other forms of content simultaneously. The creative options are limitless, and the NFTs can be used to facilitate more than just leisure activities — such immersive experiences can also directly advance educational and training needs.

(DARWINIA NETWORK) Wormhole to officially rebrand as Helix in pursuit of being a safe community tool for cross-chain assets

• Wormhole is pleased to announce that from now on, Wormhole shall be known as Helix! UI will update within 1 week!
• Wormhole was initially positioned to cross-chain token bridge services between heterogeneous chains. With more research and countless discussions, we believe that we should separate the message passing framework and token asset management. This was done to reduce the complexity of Wormhole’s design and improve the security of user assets. For this reason, Wormhole has decided to upgrade the brand to Helix.
• Helix will maintain the concept of open cooperation, integrating the industry’s best bridge applications for a better user experience. At the same time, Helix will be committed to deep technical research in the cross-chain bridge field to provide users with more secure, reliable, and economical cross-chain bridge services.

Bitcoin network difficulty reaches all-time high as miners pursue 2M BTC

• Just when the Bitcoin (BTC) miners helped release the 19th millionth BTC in circulation on Friday, the BTC network’s mining difficulty reciprocated by reaching an all-time high of 28.587 trillion. 
• Bitcoin’s network difficulty correlates to the computational power required to mine BTC blocks, which currently demands an estimated hash rate of 201.84 exahash per second (EH/s), according to data from Blockchain.com.
• Supporting the spike in the network difficulty, Bitcoin’s hash rate maintained a stronghold throughout the year while breaking into an all-time high of 248.11 EH/s on Feb. 13.
• A higher hash rate ensures resilience against double-spending attacks, which is the process of reversing BTC transactions over the blockchain by contributing to at least 51% of the Bitcoin hash rate. 
• With just 2 million BTC left to mine as rewards and an influx of Bitcoin miners from across the world, the BTC network is expected to increasingly grow stronger as it supports the thriving community. it is estimated that the remaining 2 million BTC (out of the total supply of 21 million) will be eventually mined roughly by the year 2140 owing to factors including halving. 

SEC rejects ARK 21Shares spot Bitcoin ETF application

• The United States Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, has officially disapproved the application for the ARK 21Shares Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF).
• In a Thursday filing, the SEC rejected a proposed rule change from the Chicago Board Options Exchange, or Cboe, BZX Exchange to list and trade shares of the ARK 21Shares Bitcoin (BTC) ETF. The SEC said the proposed rule change, originally published for comment in the Federal Register in August 2021, would not be “‘designed to prevent fraudulent and manipulative acts and practices” nor “protect investors and the public interest.”
• The SEC said that the Cboe BZX Exchange had not met the requirements of listing a financial product under its rules of practice as well as those of the Exchange Act. Under these restrictions, exchanges seeking to list a Bitcoin ETF need to have “a comprehensive surveillance-sharing agreement with a regulated market of significant size related to the underlying or reference Bitcoin assets.”

Crypto industry fires back after EU vote to block ‘unhosted’ wallets

• The crypto industry has reacted strongly against a European Union Parliament committee voting in favor of a regulatory package for tighter Know Your Customer (KYC) and Anti-Money Laundering (AML) rules for ”unhosted” private wallets.
• The new guidelines would require crypto service providers — most common exchanges — to verify the identity of every individual behind an unhosted wallet that interacts with them, while any transaction greater than 1,000 euros, or $1,100, would need to be reported to authorities.
• Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong vented his frustrations against the move via Twitter, drawing comparisons with fiat to highlight the absurdity of reporting and verifying a 1,000 euro transaction:
• “Imagine if the EU required your bank to report you to the authorities every time you paid your rent merely because the transaction was over 1,000 euros. Or if you sent money to your cousin to help with groceries, the EU required your bank to collect and verify private information about your cousin before allowing you to send the funds.”
• The proposal was part of an amendment to the Transfer of Funds Regulation that was voted through by the Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON) and Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) on Thursday.
• For the new rules to be enacted, they must be passed via trialogue negotiations between the EU Parliament, European Council and the European Commission and if they remain unopposed, it would give the crypto industry nine to 18 months to come in full compliance with the legislation.

VanEck says Bitcoin could hit $4.8M if it became the global reserve asset

• American investment firm VanEck believes that Bitcoin (BTC) has double the upside of gold and could be worth as much as $4.8 million per coin if it becomes the global reserve asset.
• That’s a big “if” of course, and VanEck thinks the Chinese yuan is a more likely contender.
• The lofty assessment for BTC came in a Thursday insights piece written by VanEck’s head of active EM debt Eric Fine and chief economist Natalia Gurushina, who attempted to compare the price implications for gold and Bitcoin if either were to be adopted as the backing for global currency regimes.
• VanEck’s analysis found that the implied price for BTC ranged from $1.3 million to $4.8 million. The lower prediction was based on BTC as a monetary base (M0), which investment database Investopedia says includes all circulating supply of a currency and bank deposits but is not a common marker for economists to look at.