1. Market Wrap: Bitcoin Slides as US Lawmakers Wrangle Over Crypto Tax Proposal
Analysts said the market doesn’t have much of an appetite now for bitcoin above $46,000 or for a massive selloff.
Bitcoin (BTC) was lower for a third straight day, slipping toward $44,000 after the largest cryptocurrency by market value reached a three-month high of nearly $46,800 earlier this week.
“There just isn’t much of an appetite right now for bitcoin (BTC, -2.65%) above $46,000, but you’re not seeing a massive sell-off either,” Matt Blom, head of trading at the digital-asset firm Eqonex, said Thursday in a Zoom interview.
Prices for ether (ETH, -3.85%) (ETH), the native cryptocurrency of the Ethereum blockchain and the second-biggest crypto overall by market cap, were also down, holding just above the $3,000 mark as of press time.
“The crypto market is taking a breather after a week of positive price performance,” investment-research firm FundStrat wrote in an emailed note.
Latest prices
Cryptocurrencies:
Bitcoin (BTC) $44475.6, -4.54%
Ether (ETH) $3063, -6.04%
Traditional markets:
S&P 500: 4460.8, +0.3%
Gold: $1753.5, +0.15%
10-year Treasury yield closed at 1.372%, compared with 1.341% on Wednesday.
Developments on the regulatory front continued Thursday as U.S. Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.) asked House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to amend the crypto tax provision that was in the Senate’s infrastructure bill in an open letter.
2. Ethereum Miners Make Multimillion-Dollar Bet on Upgrade Delay
Major mining machine makers like Bitmain are building more specialized machines for Ethereum mining.
Major bitcoin (BTC, -2.89%) mining firms and miner manufacturers are increasing their investments in ethereum (ETH, -4.08%) mining despite the second network’s impending switch to proof-of-stake.
Public bitcoin mining companies Hut 8 and Hive are increasing their capacities to mine the second-largest cryptocurrency by market cap. In the meantime, miner makers like Bitmain and Innosilicon are set to release new ethereum mining machines later this year.
This investment may seem strange, given that the Ethereum system is anticipated to migrate from proof-of-work (POW) to proof-of-stake (POS) in five months, and POS mining does not require such advanced machines. The rising demand might be attributed to expectations that the migration will be delayed, industry pros said.
3. Polygon’s New Gaming Studio Launches With Cricket NFT Platform
Rario already has a pair of international cricket leagues signed on.
Non-fungible token (NFT) trading cards and memorabilia seem to have cropped up in every major sport, from football to soccer to basketball. Cricket aficionados rejoice: Your time has finally come.
Rario, an officially licensed cricket NFT platform that will allow fans to collect and trade iconic moments from cricket history, announced its launch on Thursday. The platform will be integrated with Polygon, a layer 2 Ethereum scaling solution.
Rario is the first project to be launched with support from Polygon Studios, Polygon’s new NFT and gaming hub.
The platform is already partnered with cricket leagues around the world, including the Lanka Premier League and the Caribbean Premier League, as well as cricket stars like former Indian cricketer Zaheer Khan and South African cricketer Faf Du Plesis. One could think of Rario as trying to become what Sorare is for international soccer.
Sports NFT platforms are booming, with Dapper Labs’ NBA Top Shot doing over $700 million in sales in less than a year of operations. Cricket’s international popularity and 2.5 billion-strong audience makes it a ripe market for NFTs.
“We believe Rario is laying down the foundations for making digital collectibles the most prized asset for sports fans in India and across the world,” Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal said in a press statement. “Polygon Studios is thrilled to be on this pioneering journey with the Rario team.”
4. FTX.US Aiming to Offer Crypto Derivatives Trading in Less Than a Year
FTX’s U.S. affiliate has limited offerings, compared with its international counterpart.
FTX.US, the U.S. affiliate of crypto exchange FTX, intends to offer cryptocurrency derivative trading in less than a year.
The exchange sees two ways to achieve that goal — either by launching its own service, which would require a license, or by acquiring a company, FTX.US President Brett Harrison said in an interview with Business Insider.
FTX.US has a limited range of offerings compared with its international counterpart, FTX.
“We definitely hope to be able to offer them inside of a year,” Harrison told the publication. “Quite frankly, we could have or should have started a long time ago, but we’re definitely interested in going through the process and collaborating with the [Commodity Futures Trading Commission] to be able to offer those products in the U.S.” The CFTC regulates derivatives.
In June, FTX launched two perpetual futures products licensed on VanEck’s subsidiary, MV Index Solutions GmbH (MVIS) Indices, with market data provided by CryptoCompare.
5. Leading Latin American Venture Firm Kaszek Makes First DeFi Investment
The fund led a $3 million investment in Exactly, a startup building a decentralized credit protocol.
Kaszek, a leading Latin American venture capital fund, made its first DeFi investment, leading a $3 million round in Exactly, a startup that is building an open source, non-custodial credit protocol on the Ethereum platform.
“We see a gigantic emerging opportunity in DeFi, which will change the financial landscape in unimaginable ways in the years to come,” Hernán Kazah, Kaszek’s co-founder and managing partner, said in a statement, adding that the investment is part of two recently raised funds totaling $1 billion.
This is Kaszek’s second investment in the crypto ecosystem. In December 2020, the firm co-led with QED a $62 million Series B round in Mexican exchange Bitso and joined a $250 million C round in Bitso in May.
Exactly CEO Gabriel Gruber told CoinDesk that the firm will use the funds to build the protocol and team, which includes hiring smart contract engineers.
According to Gruber, Exactly’s platform will enable lenders and borrowers to access fixed income solutions as a first step, and longer term, help connect DeFi to traditional financial institutions.
In addition to Kaszek, the round also included 6th Man Ventures, Maker Growth, Baires DAO, 11–11 DG Partners, Newtopia VC, NXTP Ventures and Sur Ventures.
Marcos Galperin, the founder of Latin America’s largest online marketplace, Mercado Libre, participated as an angel investor along with JP Thieriot (Uphold) and Matias Woloski (Auth0), among others.
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August 13, 2021
