October 25, 2022 / Unchained Daily / Laura Shin
What’s Poppin’?
MakerDAO Partners With Coinbase Amid Centralization Concerns
Coinbase Prime, the institutional arm of crypto exchange Coinbase, will custody $1.6 billion worth of USDC for MakerDAO. However, not everyone agrees with this decision.
Trojan Horse of NFTs? Reddit Onboards 3M Wallets as Trading Volume Soars
Reddit NFTs have onboarded millions of new crypto users – a vast majority of which appear to be unaware of their participation in the market.
QuickSwap Lend Shuts Down After $220K Exploit
by Samyuktha Sriram
Polygon-based DEX QuickSwap is closing its lending market after a $220,000 flash loan exploit on Market XYZ.
NEAR Stablecoin USN Winds Down After ‘Recent Issues’
by Samyuktha Sriram
NEAR-native USN, a once partially algorithmic stablecoin, is winding down after it faced under-collateralization risks over the last few months.
Axie Infinity Token Unlock Will Release $200M On Tuesday
by Samyuktha Sriram
Nearly 22 million AXS tokens will be released in a token unlock that will distribute 8% of Axie Infinity’s vested token supply.
In Other News… ✍️✍️✍️
- Binance is “narrowing down” the identity of the hacker who stole $570 million worth of BNB tokens from a cross-chain bridge.
- Community members of MakerDAO voted to support the founder’s ‘endgame’ plan, overruling opposition from a16z.
- Bitcoin mining difficulty keeps increasing as it hits a new all-time high.
- Commodity Futures Trading Commission Chair Rostin Behnam said that ETH is a commodity, disagreeing with SEC Chair Gary Gensler.
- Popular trading app Robinhood listed the tokens of layer 1 blockchain Tezos and DeFi lending protocol Aave.
- DeFi protocol Aave launched a Lido Staked Ethereum earn strategy through Oasis.app, the frontend for borrowing DAI.
- The judge overseeing the bankruptcy case of crypto lender Celsius appointed a consumer privacy ombudsman after the company revealed customer information earlier this month and also approved Celsius’ bidding procedure plans.
- Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler claimed there is centralization in the crypto market.
- South Korean authorities are investigating the role of stablecoins in money laundering.
Today in Crypto Adoption…
- Digital assets security platform Fireblocks launched a tool to facilitate the integration of businesses with crypto payments.
The $$$ Corner
- Cryptocurrency exchange Bybit invested $3.8 million in T-Scientific, the third-largest shareholder in South Korean crypto exchange Bithumb.
- Web3 publishing platform Paragraph raised $1.7 million in a round led by Lemniscap.
What Do You Meme?
Recommended Reads
- Thor Hartvigsen, blockchain and DeFi researcher, on GNS
- Alliance DAO on the DCCPA bill
- Ashu Pareek, research analyst at Messari, on Yearn tokenomics
On The Pod…
Eric Wall, crypto blogger and investor, and Udi Wertheimer, a recovering Bitcoin maxi, discuss everything about Bitcoin Maximalism, whether BTC can survive, and whether Ethereum constitutes a threat to Bitcoin. Show highlights:
- how Eric and Udi got involved with Bitcoin
- what Bitcoin was like in the first days
- how Bitcoin maxis appear to have a script to engage in discussions
- the philosophy behind Bitcoin maximalism
- why Eric believes Bitcoin maximalism is like a “weird cult”
- how Eric thinks that the BTC community has an unspoken rule forbidding criticisms
- whether Bitcoin has lost intellectual power
- why people have recently been turning away from Bitcoin maximalism
- why the poor Bitcoin culture doesn’t mean it’s the end for Bitcoin, according to Eric
- the perception of the Lightning network and how people are not interested in faster blockchains
- whether Bitcoin should increase the use cases of the blockchain, like DeFi, NFTs, and stablecoins
- El Salvador’s adoption of BTC and whether it had an impact
- what happens to internet subcultures and how the behavior of Bitcoiners could be predicted
- whether Ethereum is a threat to Bitcoin
Book Update
My book, The Cryptopians: Idealism, Greed, Lies, and the Making of the First Big Cryptocurrency Craze, which is all about Ethereum and the 2017 ICO mania, is now available!
You can purchase it here: https://amzn.to/3CvfrbE
