Coin360 Daily Dispatch | Crypto Market Updates & Highlights | April 3, 2024

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Crypto Market Update

Table of Contents

Market Updates

• Bitcoin Claws Back Despite Treasury Pressure
• Ethereum: VC Pullouts and Q1 Earnings Surge
• Memecoins: Solana's Dip and Base's Surprising Surge
• Binance's Nigerian Legal Conundrum

Platform and Exchange News

• Wormhole's W Token: A New Crypto Bridge
• Staking Snafu: Solana Holders in Limbo
• April's Crypto Unlocking: A Market Mover?
• KuCoin's Market Share Halved by Legal Woes
• Bitfinex's Bold Move: Volatility Futures Trading

Regulatory and Compliance Developments

• VanEck Ventures into Stablecoin Arena
• Goldman Sachs: Unmoved by Crypto's Allure
• Stablecoin Yield Warnings from Fantom's Founder

Innovations and Launches

• IoTeX Secures $50M for DePIN Growth
• Hytopia: A Pre-Beta Splash in Web3 Gaming
• Binance Inscription: A New Crypto Trading Phase
• OpenSea Champions Programmable Earnings for NFTs

Bitcoin Claws Back Despite Treasury Pressure

Bitcoin is trading around $66,000 as rising treasury yields dampened investor interest, despite recent market recoveries. But at least it posted a rebound from the $64,867 dip yesterday. The U.S. government's sell-off of seized Bitcoin, including a significant transaction from the Silk Road case, seemingly had little impact on the market's recovery momentum, because their prior sales often coincided with local price bottoms. Analysis suggests that large institutional investors might be moving their BTC holdings for diversification or into other investment vehicles, potentially indicating a bullish outlook. 

Concurrently, significant capital inflows into the asset class have been observed, with the Bitcoin realized cap reaching new heights, suggesting fresh investor participation. However, investors should pay attention to the newly minted USDT that are being moved to exchanges, showing buying signal from big players (often during sell-offs).

Ethereum: VC Pullouts and Q1 Earnings Surge

In Ethereum's recent dynamics, significant VC withdrawals were observed, with Fenbushi Capital and Galaxy Digital withdrawing a total of 11,207.4 ETH, valued at approximately $37 million, from Binance. This action coincides with Ethereum's price drop to $3,315, down by 7.25% over the last week, amid broader market downturns. However, these actions may not necessarily signal immediate sell-offs, potentially indicating strategic investment or participation in DeFi protocols. 

Meanwhile, Ethereum's Q1 2024 financials showed a robust performance, tripling earnings to $370 million with a 155% increase in transaction fee revenue, totaling $1.2 billion. The network saw increased usage, with total transactions rising by 8.4% to over 107 million, and the total value locked in DeFi surging by 86% to $55.9 billion. 

Memecoins: Solana's Dip and Base's Surprising Wins

The memecoins on Solana and Coinbase's Ethereum layer-2 Base experienced a significant decline, with a 12% and 19% drop in market caps respectively, influenced by Bitcoin's 4.94% decrease. Solana-based meme token dogwifhat (WIF) faced a 9% market cap decline, losing $3.9 billion, and saw $2.29 million in liquidations. Conversely, Solana's stablecoin supply surpassed $3 billion, with USDC leading, indicating big interest in tokens and activities in its ecosystem. 

In other memecoin stories, the Solana memecoin Catwifhat (CIF) remarkably survived two rug pulls within 12 days, maintaining a market cap of about $1.4 million despite the developer dumping all tokens early on.  On April 3, a trader turned $13,000 into over $2 million within an hour by investing in the memecoin donotfomoew (MOEW) on the Base blockchain. The surge in value of this cat-themed meme token led to a market cap of $31 million. 

Binance's Nigerian Legal Conundrum

Nigeria and Interpol are working together to extradite a Binance executive linked to money laundering allegations, with no detailed content provided from the first source. Meanwhile, Binance defends its detained compliance chief in Nigeria, emphasizing that Tigran Gambaryan, who is without decision-making authority in the company, should not be held accountable during discussions with Nigerian authorities. Gambaryan and Binance’s Regional Manager for Africa, Nadeem Anjarwalla, were detained by Nigerian authorities, with Anjarwalla later fleeing the country. 

Despite facing charges of manipulating exchange rates and tax evasion, Binance highlights Gambaryan's contributions to assisting Nigerian officials in over 600 requests related to crimes like fraud and money laundering, including educational workshops for Nigerian EFCC officials.

Wormhole's W Token: A New Crypto Bridge

Wormhole's W token debuted at $1.66, dropped to $1.31 with a $2.4 billion market cap. The airdrop targets over 400,000 wallets, distributing 1.8 billion tokens, with 617.3 million allocated initially. 500 million tokens go to users across 30 eligible chains like Ethereum and Solana. Wormhole bridges crypto across different blockchains, offering cross-chain functionality.  

Staking Snafu: Solana Holders in Limbo

$24 million in staked Solana tokens remain trapped on Lido due to a flawed smart contract, affecting 31,588 holders. The platform was discontinued in October 2023 due to financial issues. Users struggled to unstake via a complex command line interface, prompting efforts to fix the contract. Resolutions are underway, with no definitive timeline provided yet.  

April's Crypto Unlocking: A Market Mover?

In April, Aptos, Starknet, and Arbitrum are scheduled for significant token unlocks, with Aptos releasing 24.84 million APT tokens (6.2% of its circulation), valued at $370 million, Starknet releasing 64 million STRK tokens (8.8% of its total), worth $124 million, and Arbitrum unlocking 92.69 million ARB tokens (3.5% of circulation), valued at around $135 million.  

KuCoin's Market Share Halved by Legal Woes

KuCoin's market share has plummeted by 50% post-DOJ and CFTC charges, with daily trading volume dropping to $520 million. Users withdrew assets, triggering a 25.4% decrease in Bitcoin holdings and a 22% decline in Ethereum and Tether balances. Despite outflows, the exchange maintains full asset backing per its proof-of-reserves certificate.  

Bitfinex's Bold Move: Volatility Futures Trading

Bitfinex Derivatives launches Bitcoin and Ether volatility futures based on Volmex Implied Volatility indexes. Perpetual futures introduce a no-expiry-date trading format for retail and institutional investors, diversifying Bitfinex's offerings. Implied volatility indicates market expectations amid rising crypto prices. The CVI peaked at 85 points as Bitcoin hit $73,000, emphasizing the market's heightened volatility.  

VanEck Ventures into Stablecoin Arena

VanEck will manage the reserve fund for the Agora Dollar (AUSD) stablecoin following a $12 million funding round led by Dragonfly. AUSD aims to prioritize regulatory compliance and treat digital dollars as public goods. The stablecoin sector has seen significant growth, with Tether's USDT dominating the market, and newcomers like Ethena's USDe gaining attention with their yield model.   

Goldman Sachs: Unmoved by Crypto's Allure

Goldman Sachs, led by Chief Investment Officer Sharmin Mossavar-Rahmani, remains skeptical about cryptocurrencies, citing their lack of intrinsic value. They criticize the industry for valuation challenges and governance contradictions. While rivals like J.P. Morgan Chase and Citigroup explore blockchain and crypto, Goldman Sachs maintains a cautious stance, prioritizing valuation and governance concerns.  

Stablecoin Yield Warnings from Fantom's Founder

Fantom founder Andre Cronje expressed concerns about negative funding rates leading to an "unbacked asset" amidst Ethena Labs' USDe stablecoin yield, which drew attention with a 27.6% APY. This raised comparisons to the failed TerraUSD (UST) on the Anchor protocol and prompted debates about sustainable yield and risk management in decentralized finance (DeFi).  

IoTeX Secures $50M for DePIN Growth

IoTeX secures $50M investment to expand DePIN ecosystem. Led by VCs like SNZ Capital and Borderless Capital, IoTeX focuses on real-world data integration and DePIN projects. Strategic partnerships, a $5M accelerator program, and emphasis on modular infrastructure highlight IoTeX's commitment to fostering innovation within the growing DePIN ecosystem, anticipating significant industry growth. 

Hytopia: A Pre-Beta Splash in Web3 Gaming

Hytopia, formerly NFT Worlds, is poised for a closed beta launch after an $8 million node sale for its Ethereum layer-2 network, Hychain. The sale secured 2,098 ETH, and 250 million TOPIA tokens, valued at approximately $17.5 million, will be distributed to node operators. The game amassed 1.25 million pre-registrations and aims to revolutionize Web3 gaming.  

Binance Inscription: A New Crypto Trading Phase

Binance Inscription Marketplace now supports ARC-20 tokens, facilitating trading and transfers via the Atomicals Market API, enhancing user accessibility within the Binance app. The inclusion of zero service fees for ARC-20 trading until June 2, 2024, and the addition of Taproot address support on the Web3 wallet empower users to explore new opportunities in the crypto landscape.