Coin360 Daily Dispatch | Crypto Market Updates & Highlights | January 1, 2024

Crypto Market's Roller Coaster Ride in Late 2023

In late 2023 and early 2024, the crypto market experienced notable shifts. A year-end dip followed December's bullish trend, with discussions about a US Bitcoin ETF stirring the pot. Ethereum, XRP, Tron, and Binance Coin saw modest gains, while Avalanche, Solana, and others faced losses. The new year kicked off with $225 million in market liquidations. 

Bitcoin started 2024 160% higher than the previous year, with anticipation building for the US spot price exchange-traded fund (ETF) decision. Bitcoin miners smashed records, earning $1.51 billion in December, highlighting the increasing significance of transaction fees and sparking debates about its influence on Bitcoin's price.

SEC's Decision on U.S. Bitcoin ETFs Looms

The SEC is poised to decide on the U.S.'s first spot bitcoin ETFs, with firms like Blackrock and Fidelity in the fray. Initial fees range from 0.39% to 0.80%, with Bitwise and Blackrock seeding their ETFs with $200 million and $10 million, respectively. VanEck's Gabor Gurbacs predicts a modest start but foresees trillions flowing in long-term, drawing parallels to gold ETFs' impact. He highlights the potential for Bitcoin ETFs to gain legitimacy and attract institutional investors.

Orbit Chain's New Year's Eve Security Breach

Orbit Chain, a cross-chain project, suffered a significant breach on New Year's Eve, resulting in a loss of approximately $81 million. Hackers accessed seven out of ten multisig signers, compromising various cryptocurrencies including 30 million USDT, 10 million USDC, 10 million DAI, 230.879 WBTC, and 9500 ETH. 

The breach led to a nearly 20% drop in the price of Orbit Chain's native token, ORC. Orbit Chain is conducting a thorough investigation to identify the hack's root cause and is collaborating with international law enforcement. Additionally, users are cautioned against scam repayment offers circulating on social media, impersonating Orbit Chain.

Vitalik Buterin Unveils Ethereum's 2024 Roadmap

Vitalik Buterin's 2024 Ethereum roadmap, focusing on six key components - The Merge, The Surge, The Scourge, The Verge, The Purge, and The Splurge, aims to enhance Ethereum's scalability, security, and efficiency. The Merge solidifies the transition to proof-of-stake, reducing energy consumption. 

The Surge introduces data sharding for faster processing, while The Scourge improves network robustness and smart contract security. The Verge streamlines user experiences, and The Purge removes outdated code. The Splurge invests in emerging technologies like zk-SNARKs. Buterin emphasizes reclaiming Ethereum's cypherpunk roots, integrating privacy technologies like rollups and zero-knowledge proofs. 

Tellor's Wild Price Swings Spark Concerns

The Tellor (TRB) cryptocurrency experienced a dramatic price fluctuation, initially surging from $200 to over $600, then plummeting to $155. This volatility resulted in over $60 million in TRB contract liquidations, marking it as the crypto with the highest liquidation in both 12 and 24-hour frames. 

Analysts have raised concerns about potential market manipulation, especially following a 2000% price increase in the last quarter of 2024, driven by strong whale activity. The Cilinix Crypto YouTube channel's analyst highlighted Tellor's rapid price changes, suggesting possible manipulation. Tellor, a decentralized oracle protocol, is crucial for updating off-chain data for on-chain smart contracts, with data reporters competing for TRB tokens.

Token Unlocks to Inject $600M into Crypto Market

In January 2024, the crypto market will see over $600 million in liquidity from token unlocks of major projects like Aptos (APT), Injective (INJ), and Optimism (OP). Aptos leads with a $235 million unlock, comprising 24.84 million APT tokens, impacting various stakeholders including the foundation, core contributors, investors, and the community. 

Injective's final unlock involves 3.67 million INJ tokens valued at $136.73 million, allocated to advisors and the team. Optimism plans to release 24.16 million OP tokens worth $87.70 million, with a daily linear unlock over 90 days.

XRP Ledger Hits Transaction Milestone

The XRP Ledger (XRPL) experienced a record-breaking surge in transactions, peaking at 6.8 million per day on December 30. This spike surpassed the previous high of nearly 5 million daily transactions in November 2021. The surge is attributed to the growing utility of XRPL and recent ecosystem developments, including the "XRP Script" project. 

This project, which began on December 26, led to a significant increase in transactions and new account activations by enabling users to inscribe arbitrary data on XRP drops. The XRPL mainnet also underwent a free transactions per second (TPS) test due to network congestion caused by these inscriptions.

Top Altcoin Gainers and Losers

Gainers:

Filecoin FIL (+11.92%)

Bitcoin SV BSV (+8.13%)

WEMIX WEMIX (+7.76%)

Losers:

Ordinals ORDI (-5.69%)

Oasis Network ROSE (-5.71%)

XDC Network XDC (-4.96%)