Issue #28

Market Overview

As of the time of writing (Monday 5pm), the total market cap of the crypto asset market is $US1.06T, down 2.9% from last week.

Below is the weekly performance of the top crypto and NFT assets. 

News Headline Highlights

• Kraken, the Californian headquartered cryptocurrency exchange, has been charged by the SEC with offering unregistered securities via its staking-as-a-service program. Kraken has agreed to a settlement of $30 million and to discontinue the business unit in the United States as part of the settlement. The same day as the announcement, SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce published a well-articulated dissenting opinion.
• Bank of New York Mellon's head of advanced solutions Michael Demissie indicates strong client interest in crypto products, stating "What we see is clients are absolutely interested in digital assets, broadly," at Afore Consulting's 7th Annual FinTech and Regulation Conference.
• Binance has temporarily suspended US Dollar bank transfers. The suspension will not affect Binance US, a unit of the company that’s regulated by the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network.
• The Bank of England and the U.K.’s finance ministry announced plans for a central bank digital currency. Under the current proposal, a digital pound could enter circulation within 5 years. Brits would be limited to 20,000 digital pounds each if the country goes ahead with a digital currency.
• Payments giant Visa has begun testing large value USDC payments on Ethereum. Cuy Sheffield, head of crypto at Visa, commented “We’ve been testing how to actually accept settlement payments from issuers in USDC starting on Ethereum and paying out in USDC on Ethereum”.
• The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has told crypto firm Paxos Trust that it plans to sue the company for violating investor protection laws.
• Genesis Global Holdco reached an agreement in principle among Digital Currency Group (DCG) and the ad hoc groups of creditors of Genesis Global Capital who hold more than $2B in asserted claims. Under the terms of the agreement, DCG would exchange its $1.1B note due in 2032 for convertible preferred stock and refinance its existing 2023 term loans through a new, junior secured term loan in two tranches made payable to creditors in the aggregate total value of approximately $500 million. In addition, as part of the agreement, Gemini has agreed to contribute up to $100 million in additional funds to Earn users as part of the Plan.

 Crypto Asset Project Updates

• Tether, the company responsible for issuing USDT, the largest stablecoin by circulating supply ($66B worth), reported earnings of over $700m in Q4 2022. Per the attestation, 82% of what backs USDT was: $39.2 billion in US Treasurys, $7 billion in money market funds, $5 billion in cash and bank deposits, $3 billion in reverse repurchase agreements and nearly $94 million in non-US Treasurys.
• Sandbox has entered into an MOU with the government of Saudi Arabia for future metaverse development. Saudi Arabia Digital Government Authority (DGA) are reported to have partnered with Sandbox for the purpose of “exploring, advising and supporting” metaverse development.
• Yuga Labs’ Dookey Dash mini-game has come to a close, generating over $70m in trade volume for game passes in its 3 weeks of operation. The game generated buzz and excitement within gaming communities, including from several notable pro gamers that were attracted to partake in efforts to generate a top score. During Dookey Dash, 25,525 pass holders clocked a cumulative total of 7,487,850 runs and 706,436 hours. Most positively, the Dookey Dash grew the BAYC ecosystem by 40%.
• Cowswap, a decentralised exchange aggregator, was hacked this week to the tune of $180,000.

The Weekly Deal Room

• Carbonplace, a carbon credit transaction network, raised $45m in its latest funding round to launch its voluntary CO2 offset trading.
• Coincover, a digital asset protection and insurance start-up, raised $30m in a funding round led by Foundation Capital.
• Elementus, a blockchain analytics company, raised $10m at a $160m valuation in a funding round led by ParaFi Capital.
• Space ID, a startup building a universal name network for decentralised identities, raised $10m in a strategic funding round led by Polychain and dao5.
• Cenoa, a fintech startup that improves access to dollar based products (e.g. USDC) in emerging markets, raised $7m in their Seed Round led by Quiet Capital.
• C3, a decentralised and non-custodial cryptocurrency exchange, raised $6m in a Seed Round led by Two Sigma ventures.
• Ajuna Network, a decentralised gaming platform, raised $5m in a private funding round led by CMCC Global.
• Sesame Labs, a Web3 marketing platform, raised $4.5m in a Seed Round led by Wing Venture Capital and Patron.
• Vault, a digital music collectible (DMC) company, raised $4m in a Series A led by Placeholder VC.
• Webacy, a startup focused on making self-custodial wallets more secure, raised $4m in a Seed Round led by Web3-focused investment firm gmjp.
• Gammaswap, a decentralised protocol for swapping volatility, raised $1.7m in a Seed Round led by Skycatcher.

Metric of the Week

The cumulative number of all-time blockchain developers is around 44,900. The chart below demonstrates how the interest from the developer community has grown throughout the years.

In 2022, over 11,000 developers entered Web 3.0, a very large portion in comparison with the cumulative number.

Source: Coinfeeds