News

Ethereum network fees plunged more than 9% this week to $22.1 million, the lowest level in nine months, according to data from blockchain analytics firm IntoTheBlock.

Ultrasound.money data shows that the supply of Ethereum’s native token, ETH, has been increasing as fewer tokens are being destroyed to validate transactions than are being created.

IntoTheBlock wrote in its report that this trend may put some pressure on ETH, as its supply has been growing over the past month, thus shifting from a deflationary to an inflationary trend.

Data monitored by The Data Nerd shows that Wintermute Trading transferred 8.3 trillion PEPE ($5.43 million) between multiple CEXs in the past 24 hours, and PEPE tokens continued to surge by 15% today.

In addition, the whale address starting with 0x9d5 withdrew 391 billion PEPE (USD 273,000) from Bitvavo, and a total of 776.9 billion PEPE (USD 579,000) was withdrawn within two weeks.Data monitored by The Data Nerd shows that Wintermute Trading transferred 8.3 trillion PEPE ($5.43 million) between multiple CEXs in the past 24 hours, and PEPE tokens continued to surge by 15% today.

In addition, the whale address starting with 0x9d5 withdrew 391 billion PEPE (USD 273,000) from Bitvavo, and a total of 776.9 billion PEPE (USD 579,000) was withdrawn within two weeks.

Data shows that approximately $3 billion in Bitcoin options and $1.8 billion in Ethereum options are set to expire on September 29.

Luuk Strijers, Chief Commercial Officer of Deribit, pointed out the similarities between the cryptocurrency market and traditional finance when approaching option expiry dates, especially quarterly expirations, which he noted can result in huge trading volumes and volatility.

While the Bitcoin Volatility Index, which tracks Bitcoin options traders’ views on volatility over the next 30 days, is hovering near all-time lows, it has risen over the past month, according to The Block’s data dashboard.

Max Keiser, senior adviser to El Salvador President Nayib Bukele, said people around the world are withdrawing from unsecured banknotes such as U.S. dollars and buying Bitcoin.

For millions of people in countries like Brazil, where access to banking services is difficult, Tether is an on-ramp. For millions of people, using Tether is easier than buying U.S. dollars, so Tether has become an alternative to the U.S. dollar.

The Washington, D.C., government officials I’ve spoken to (and the list goes on and on) tell me they see Tether as the dollar’s savior.

They are working to get more Washington, D.C., government officials to realize how bleak the U.S. dollar’s prospects for a large part of the global economy will be without Tether.

Tether is fighting for the dollar and only scammers and freedom haters would think otherwise.

India’s Ministry of Home Affairs has launched the Cryptocurrency Intelligence and Analysis Tool (CIAT) to combat the rising incidence of cryptocurrency scams.

The tool scans the dark web and targets cryptocurrency wallet addresses associated with suspicious activity. Additionally, it provides comprehensive transaction records, capturing details such as addresses, timestamps, dates, and the specific nature of the service.

CIAT also has a proactive alerting system that will send out alerts as soon as there are signs of suspicious crypto activity, such as when certain accounts exhibit suspicious behavior patterns or have unusually high transaction volumes.

Former SEC Internet Enforcement Office Director John Reed Stark said in his tweet that the NFT market is completely manipulated.

Stark criticizes venture capitalists and Wall Street players, claiming they are getting rich by promoting NFTs that promise decentralization, financial inclusion and instant wealth.

However, he asserted that many retail buyers ended up suffering financial losses while these financiers profited.

Stark’s criticism also spanned the entire crypto industry. He believes that cryptocurrencies fail as an investment due to a lack of regulation, transparency, consumer protection, insurance, licensing and net capital requirements.

Former U.S. Senator and Coinbase Global Advisory Committee member Pat Toomey said at a legal seminar on national security and digital assets.

While the digital asset industry desperately needs U.S. regulatory clarity and is in legal conflict with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) while waiting for answers, the congressional solution the industry has long awaited is not coming anytime soon.

Toomey said the fact that the House Financial Services Committee has approved multiple crypto bills for a floor vote may not have any impact.

Even if the bills are approved by the full House, he said: “Regardless of the vote in the House, I don’t see a path forward in the Senate.”

Although Pat Toomey is pessimistic about legislation during the current U.S. administration, he believes the likelihood of legislation passing in the next Congress will increase.

According to CCData data, since the beginning of August, approximately 12,230 Bitcoins have flowed out of the Binance platform, worth approximately US$330 million.

According to researchers, there was also an outflow of approximately 198,200 Ethereum worth approximately $323 million. Binance’s spot market share has dropped to 33.9% from 56.9% in March, and Binance.US’s market share is also declining.

CCData research analyst Jacob Joseph said Binance’s trading volume has been steadily declining since it stopped its zero-fee trading promotion on the USDT currency pair in March.

The end of the zero-fee promotion isn’t the only reason, as current regulatory concerns surrounding Binance may prompt users to switch to other platforms.

Options data on September 22: 22,000 BTC options are about to expire, the put ratio is 1.00, the maximum pain point is $26,500, and the notional value is $590 million.

147,000 ETH options are expiring, with a put ratio of 0.94, a maximum pain point of $1,600, and a notional value of $230 million.

The proportion of put option positions has increased significantly this week. Market liquidity has deteriorated significantly recently, and investors are actively buying put options.

The recent trend of BTC is significantly stronger than that of ETH, and the BTC IV is also higher than the maturity of ETH, which makes the monthly Put of ETH more worthy of investment.

Greeks.live stated that last night, a total of 4,500 units of selling ETH-28JUN24-4000-C/buying ETH-29MAR24-1900-C were traded, with a nominal value of up to $15 million in diagonal spread block transactions.

Among the blocks compared this time, the long-term options expiring in March next year are particularly prominent. It is rare for such a large-scale transaction to occur in long-term options.

It is worth noting that 27OCT23-1700-C/29SEP23-1750-C, a total of more than 50,000 transactions with a nominal value of nearly US$100 million, appeared on the screen. It seems that whales intend to trade through the order book to avoid Open block order monitoring.

Comprehensive order flow information shows that whales are buying call options in large quantities across all major maturities. After buying $150 million in call options two days ago, they are buying call options in large quantities again.

Crypto service provider Matrixport said that historically, the last quarter of each year is Bitcoin’s strongest quarter, with average returns exceeding 35% over the past nine years.

Research director Markus Thielen writes that Bitcoin could reach $37,000 by the end of the year. October has been a particularly strong month for Bitcoin, with positive returns in seven of the past nine years, averaging 20%.

The report added that another potential catalyst in October is the second deadline for Bitcoin spot exchange-traded fund (ETF) applications, when the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will have to announce or delay a decision to approve these ETFs.

Data from DappRadar shows that between January 2022 and July 2023, NFT monthly transaction volume plummeted by 81%, and NFT monthly sales dropped by 61% during the same period.

In addition, the floor prices of blue-chip NFTs such as Bored Ape Yacht Club and CryptoPunks are at more than two-year lows, according to industry data tracking agency NFT Price Floor.

Cryptocurrency hedge fund Ouroboros Capital said that due to the increase in DAI supply and revenue.

MakerDAO’s MKR token price may continue to rise, with bullish technical chart patterns pointing towards a $1,600 price target.

Market data shows the cryptocurrency has gained nearly 5% in the past 24 hours to $1,320, close to its early August high of $1,366.

A move above this level would see prices hit a 16-month high.

Analyst James V. Straten noted that the percentage of Bitcoin supply on exchanges fell to 11.8%, back to year-to-date (YTD) lows.

The relevant metric here is Exchange Balance Percent, which tracks the total percentage of Bitcoin supply currently held in all centralized exchange wallets.

When the value of this indicator rises, it means that investors are depositing net amounts of cryptocurrency into these platforms.

On the other hand, a decrease in the value of this metric means that holders are moving their coins to their self-custodial addresses.

U.S. Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy spoke at an industry conference and stated that he planned to release a comprehensive cryptocurrency policy framework before the U.S. Thanksgiving Day.

Ramaswamy painted an overall optimistic outlook for blockchain technology and made a scathing indictment of the SEC’s enforcement practices.

He expressed a relatively strong view on what the future of government interaction with cryptocurrencies should look like, with a focus on regulators.

A newly released poll shows Vivek Ramaswamy trailing behind Donald Trump in the race for the nomination and ahead of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who is widely considered Trump’s main rival early in the campaign.

Citigroup Inc. announced the launch of Citi Token Services. The new product converts customer deposits into digital tokens that can be sent instantly to anywhere in the world.

The service is provided by Citi’s Treasury and Trade Solutions division, which has so far been using the service to improve cash management and trade finance capabilities.

For Citigroup’s new products, the company will rely on a private blockchain owned and managed by the bank, the statement said. Customers do not need to set up their own digital wallets, but can access the service through the bank’s existing systems.

Data from CCData shows that in August, Binance.US’s monthly trading volume dropped 98% from January 2022, and is expected to decline further in September.

According to CCData, from the beginning of September to September 15, Binance.US had a turnover of $115.7 million, while the volume in August exceeded $286 million.

Most of the decline has occurred since March, when the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission accused Binance of violations.

The SEC sued Binance.US, CZ and Binance in June, accusing them of a series of violations, including misrepresenting trading controls and supervision on the Binance.US platform. The SEC accused Binance.US in a filing on Monday of failing to clarify the facts.

Bitcoin market dominance (BTC’s share of the overall digital asset market) rose to 50.2% earlier in the day, its highest level in a month and close to the 26-month high of 52% reached in late June.

Markus Thielen, head of research at crypto service provider Matrixport, said that BTC is enjoying greater potential buying power due to ETF news, while altcoins may be on the verge of falling.

Hopes for a spot Bitcoin ETF and the latest regulatory actions could serve as catalysts for further rise in BTC dominance.

Well-known analyst PlanB tweeted: Some people believe that the 10,000-fold rise in Bitcoin prices is caused by macro/interest rates, but macro/interest rates are one of the waves driving the rise. Gold and the S&P 500 rose 10,000 in Bitcoin times has barely changed over the same period.

Therefore, in my opinion, it is not macro factors that drive BTC prices, but the scarcity/halving/S2F model.

As of now, at least 3 NFT markets have restricted the trading of the NFT series Stoner Cats. Each market has taken a different approach to limiting Stoner Cats.

OpenSea and Blur continue to showcase items from the collection, but both block transactions by hiding listings and offers under a single NFT page.

An OpenSea spokesperson confirmed that Stoner Cats cannot be bought, sold or transferred on the platform, but said the series has not been delisted or removed.

In addition, Rarible has hidden the entire collection of Stoner Cats, and Rarible’s official website assures users that they still own the relevant NFTs.

Like most NFTs, these items can circulate freely on the blockchain or be traded on other compatible marketplaces. Rarible responded by saying that based on its market monitoring of recent events, it has blocked access to Stoner Cats.

According to previous news, the US SEC accused Stoner Cats 2 LLC (SC2) of conducting an unregistered crypto asset securities issuance in the form of NFT, raising approximately US$8 million to fund an animated web series called Stoner.

The National Bank of the Republic of Kazakhstan (NBK) has established an independent entity to lead the development and implementation of a central bank digital currency (CBDC) – the digital tenge.

According to an official statement on September 15, the National Payments Corporation (NPC) will be formed on the basis of the former Kazakhstan Interbank Payment Center.

The new agency will oversee the national payments system, including interbank clearing services, money transfers and digital identification. The National Payments Company will also be responsible for the development of digital financial infrastructure, including the implementation of the digital tenge.

Currently, Kazakhstan’s CBDC pilot is in the pilot phase using a controlled environment, real consumers and merchants.

One of the main partners in the project is Binance, which supports the pilot through its technology solution BNB Chain.

According to official news, recently, the total pledged amount of stUSDT, the world’s first rebase-based RWA protocol, has exceeded 1.78 billion USDT.

As of now, the product APY is 4.22%, and the cumulative revenue distributed to users exceeds 4.64 million US dollars.

It is reported that stUSDT is the world’s first rebase-based RWA protocol. It was officially launched on July 3. It is now run through the decentralized platform JustLend and now officially supports the Ethereum network.

The stUSDT platform is committed to building a bridge between individual and institutional investors, the crypto world and the real world through smart contracts, providing a fairer RWA investment channel for everyone.

On the day the US SEC announced charges against the creators of Stoner Cats NFT, encryption lawyer Bill Morgan pointed out that although such cases did not establish a legal precedent, they did help to fuel the SEC’s influence on the encryption industry.

He emphasized the importance of Ripple Labs’ ongoing legal dispute with the SEC and said that if Ripple had not taken the SEC to court, all cryptocurrencies except Bitcoin might now be automatically classified as securities.

Morgan shared further thoughts on Judge Torres’ July 13 ruling regarding XRP. Morgan noted that although XRP is not considered a security, the regulatory outlook for its sale or use remains unclear due to the SEC’s appeal plans.

Until that legal case and subsequent appeals are fully resolved, it remains unclear whether Ripple and its customers will feel safe under SEC regulation.

According to community governance platform Snapshot information, Animoca Brands founder and chairman Yat Siu has launched a new ApeCoin proposal AIP-297.

Aiming to create a sister DAO and be responsible for managing a community-controlled NFT vault within the ApeCoin DAO ecosystem, which will promote cross-community collaboration and demonstrate support for different NFT communities.

Yat Siu also requested ApeCoin DAO to allocate 750,000 APE (approximately $825,000) to the vault for the purchase of 8 boring apes BAYC, 12 mutant apes MAYC, 15 BAKC Dog, 15 Mocaverse Mocas, and 15 Cool Cats, 15 World of Women NFTs, 12 Pudgy Penguins, 12 Kodas, 15 Otherdeeds and 20 The Sandbox virtual plots.

The proposal will end voting on September 21 and has received 73.87% support so far.

Europol, the European Union’s law enforcement cooperation agency, recently published a European financial and economic crime threat assessment.

The report highlights the complexity of financial and economic crime affecting the EU, such as money laundering, corruption, fraud, intellectual property crime and counterfeiting.

The report states that decentralized finance (DeFi) based on blockchain technology is expected to bring greater independence and security.

However, the lack of regulation in this area leaves room for economic crime as criminals store illegal assets on DeFi platforms. Highly volatile cryptocurrencies are also targets of fraud schemes and money laundering activities.

NFTs are growing in popularity, but also attract fraudsters due to their instant transaction capabilities. Given the cross-border transaction characteristics of NFT, there is a huge risk of money laundering.

Furthermore, the emergence of the Metaverse (a digital space for various activities) has been adopted by the financial sector and provides new opportunities for criminals. Cases of fraud and theft have been reported in the virtual universe, indicating an underlying trend of organized crime in this virtual environment.

In the face of these evolving financial and economic crimes, Europol emphasizes the need for proactive measures, international cooperation and leading criminal innovation to ensure the security and stability of the EU.

Anonymous analyst BitQuant said that Bitcoin will hit an all-time high before the halving in 2024, with a pre-halving target price above $69,000.

Analysts also believe that Bitcoin will not only break the current record set in 2021 by April next year, but that the price per Bitcoin will continue to reach $250,000 after the next halving cycle begins.

On-chain data shows that 640,000 ETH worth just over $1 billion was added to the liquid pledged derivatives platform in the past 20 days.

As of September 15, 2023, the number of Ethereums pledged in such protocols has reached nearly 12 million.

Among the 23 different liquidity staking protocols, the top five TVL protocols all recorded 30-day increases, and Lido’s 30-day increase was approximately 6.32%.

Coinbase’s liquidity staking protocol has increased by 5.57% in 30 days, Rocket Pool has increased by 5.91% from the previous month, Binance’s liquidity staking derivatives platform has increased by as much as 377%, and the fifth place is Frax, which has increased in 30 days 3.73%.

Ethereum executed the beacon chain merger on September 15, 2022, and today is the first anniversary of the merger.

According to on-chain data provider Ultrasound.money, the Ethereum supply has been reduced by 299,722.81 ETH since the merger, leaving Ethereum in a state of deflation.

In addition, the amount of ETH destroyed since the merger reached 981,698.48 pieces, worth approximately US$1,655,780,441.

Regarding the 2023 Global Cryptocurrency Adoption Index Report released by Chainalysis, Chainaanalysis Research Director Kim Grauer expressed his views based on the report. Grauer said, We have always been surprised by the scale of global cryptocurrency adoption.

According to statistics, almost every country has massive adoption of cryptocurrencies. Grassroots adoption of cryptocurrencies may not have reached its peak yet, but the striking trend is increasing adoption in low- and middle-income countries.

Given the variety of ways countries are embracing cryptocurrencies, regulators must take a nuanced view of the issue. This requires a deep understanding, and it will inevitably affect every region.

The data highlights the undeniable shift towards digital financial systems, with the most important revelation being the rise in low-income countries accounting for a sizable share of global cryptocurrency adoption.

Bank of America recently cited RWA tokenization as a key driver of digital asset adoption. According to a Bank of America report, the tokenized gold market has attracted over $1 billion in investment.

Demand for tokenized U.S. Treasuries is also growing, with the total market value of tokenized money market funds approaching $500 million, according to data compiled by CoinDesk.

Global business consulting firm Boston Consulting Group predicts that the market for tokenized assets could surge to $16 trillion by 2030.

Joe Burnett, an analyst at Blockware Solutions, said that Bitcoin, unlike every other commodity on the planet, does not have a natural supply response when its price rises.

Typically when prices rise, the market finds new supplies (oil, wheat, gold, etc.) and sells these new supplies to buyers.

But with Bitcoin, there is no more supply and buyers can only buy from existing holders, which is why when Bitcoin starts in a bull market, they start to develop like parabolic price increases that happen again and again.

PINS, the first project after LBank restarted Launchpad, is now trading at $0.0100149, an increase of 25% in 24 hours.

Since its launch on September 1, the total increase has reached 2003%.

Based on the hard-top individual subscription of Launchpad of US$1,000, early investors who participated in Launchpad subscription have received a maximum profit of over US$20,000.

PINs Network is a content social network that uses multi-role play to create a plot-driven metaverse. Its total token supply of PINS is 10 billion, of which 2% is distributed through Launchpad.

A research report by web3 security experts Forta Network and Blockfence shows that since December 2022, an NFT scam called sleepdropping targeting Ethereum users has affected thousands of people and caused more than $11.5 million in losses.

The scam works by sending unsuspecting users what appear to be real ERC-1155 tokens (usually NFTs).

This tactic lures users to deceptive websites, tricking them into authorizing transactions and inadvertently transferring their assets into the hands of scammers. The organization behind the operation remains unknown.

The report states that more than 500,000 addresses have become recipients of these misleading token airdrops, and currently, more than 20,000 users have been confirmed to be victims.

Data from Tronscan shows that Justin Sun’s address minted $815 million in TUSD on the Tron blockchain.

Starting at 11:45 AM, $815 million in TUSD was minted to the Tron blockchain through a series of 10 transactions.

Each mint is sent to a new address, which then immediately sends the funds to the Huobi 2 hot wallet. Prior to these transactions, the last time TUSD was minted to Tron was 7 days ago.

Shortly after these deposits, approximately $815 million in TUSD from the Huobi 2 address was sent to an address managed by Justin Sun, which was subsequently transferred to an unmarked minterproxy contract, which sent $865 million in TUSD to another address and burned.

The burning of TUSD happened to coincide almost exactly with the minting of stUSDT, with $865 million worth of stUSDT being minted to Sun’s address through 10 transactions, and Sun depositing stUSDT into the Tron-based lending platform JustLend through six transactions.

Deposits currently account for half of Sun’s $1.5 billion JustLend position, according to Tronscan data.

On-chain data shows that 640,000 ETH worth just over $1 billion was added to the liquid pledged derivatives platform in the past 20 days.

As of September 15, 2023, the number of Ethereums pledged in such protocols has reached nearly 12 million.

Among the 23 different liquidity staking protocols, the top five TVL protocols all recorded 30-day increases, and Lido’s 30-day increase was approximately 6.32%.

Coinbase’s liquidity staking protocol has increased by 5.57% in 30 days, Rocket Pool has increased by 5.91% from the previous month, Binance’s liquidity staking derivatives platform has increased by as much as 377%, and the fifth place is Frax, which has increased in 30 days 3.73%.

According to Glassnode data, Tether’s share of the stablecoin market has shown significant growth. USDT currently accounts for 69% of the stablecoin market, an increase of 25% compared with the low of 44% of the market share set in June 2022.

BUSD’s dominance dropped to 2.1%, with USDC accounting for just 21.7%, a significant drop from the peak of 38% reached just over a year ago.

Since hitting this cycle low in November 2022, the supply of USDT has actually increased by $13.3 billion.

USDC’s decline was almost the opposite, at -$16.7 billion, which may be partly due to U.S. institutions moving funds to markets with higher interest rates.

BUSD fell sharply by $20.4 billion (-89%), largely due to issuer Paxos switching to redemption-only mode following SEC enforcement.

Since the highs reached in March 2022, a total of $43 billion in stablecoins have been redeemed, with the total value falling by 26%.

Peter Gaffney, research director of Security Token Advisors, said in an article that the scale of RWA (Real World Assets tokenization) will reach US$16 trillion in 2030.

Gaffney stated in the article that on-chain analysis shows that $3 billion in assets have been tokenized, and that we have seen large companies (Bank of New York Mellon, JPMorgan Chase, and BlackRock) launch tokenization projects and recognize that The efficiencies they can bring from a payments and settlement perspective.

Nonetheless, the more important potential of tokenized investments lies in their ability to democratize finance and bring wider investment opportunities to ordinary people through “diversified” investment in global opportunities.

According to a report released by cryptocurrency exchange Bitfinex, crypto market outflows reached $55 billion in August.

The analysis is based on the Total Realized Value metric, which measures the realized value of Bitcoin and Ethereum and the total supply of the top five stablecoins Tether, USDC, BUSD, DAI and TrueUSD (TUSD).

The report pointed out that an in-depth study of the data revealed a general trend: the industry began to experience capital outflows in early August, and lost approximately US$55 billion in the past month.

Capital outflows not only affect Bitcoin, but also the liquidity of Ethereum and stablecoins. Bitfinex said: “According to Bitfinex data, August was BTC’s largest monthly closing decline of 11.29% since the bear market bottom was formed in November 2022.”

Options data: 22,000 BTC options are about to expire, with a put ratio of 0.74, a maximum pain point of $26,000, and a notional value of $560 million.

156,000 ETH options are about to expire, with a put ratio of 1.09, a maximum pain point of $1,650, and a nominal value of $250 million.

Greeks.live stated that the intraday fluctuations of BTC and ETH were very small, with only significant fluctuations around Tuesday. It is common for recent fluctuations to be concentrated on only one or two days a week, and the market hot spots are relatively small. There is almost no valid news for Token 2049.

The above situation has led to a sharp decline in the bullish positions of BTC for delivery this week, a significant increase in the bearish positions of ETH, and Skew has gradually returned to near zero, continuing to bet on the continuation of low fluctuations, but the trading intensity has declined this week.

According to Bitrace’s on-chain fund audit, addresses related to the virtual trading platform JPEX have suffered serious fund contamination. One of its hot wallet recharge addresses has seen an inflow of more than 190 million USDT at risk in the past 20 months.

Bitrace conducted a fund audit on five JPEX Tron hot wallet recharge addresses. This article selects one of the more representative objects for disclosure.

Among them, the TLGiN6 address has interacted 189,133 times with 30,585 users in the past 20 months, with a total inflow of 687,002,533 USDT, of which 151,415,358 were risk funds, accounting for 22.04%.

Recently, the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission warned that JPEX is an unregulated virtual trading platform and clarified that none of the entities under the JPEX Group have applied for a license from the Securities and Futures Commission to operate a virtual asset trading platform in Hong Kong.

As of now, the public JPEX hot wallet addresses for withdrawing coins have stopped normal withdrawal activities.

MakerDAO co-founder Rune Christensen expressed his thoughts on the future of decentralized stablecoins such as Dai and their role in the broader crypto economy at the Token 2049 conference in Singapore.

Christensen said interest-bearing stablecoins could capture 30% of the market within two years, and decentralized stablecoins could eventually dominate the stablecoin market as long as cryptocurrencies finally reach their potential.

If cryptocurrencies materialize and become regulated, centralized stablecoins will become mainstream. However, the real potential lies in decentralized stablecoins.

A U.S. House Financial Services Committee hearing focused on three bills that, if passed, would limit the Federal Reserve’s ability to operate a CBDC.

Rep. French Hill, who chairs the House Financial Services Committee’s subcommittee on digital assets, rejected a possible CBDC at the start of the hearing.

Hill said, “Let me make it clear to the audience here: Congress does not support CBDC.” For Republicans and several witnesses, concerns about CBDCs are multifaceted.

One concern is the impact a digital dollar could have on traditional banking, and another is that CDBCs could crowd out the stablecoin market.

Stablecoins are digital assets issued by private companies that are pegged to fiat currencies such as the U.S. dollar, allowing traders to enter or exit positions without touching fiat currencies.

According to a report from Glassnode, the encryption market is currently experiencing a severe liquidity crunch, with both on-chain and off-chain transaction volumes falling to historical lows.

Glassnode analysts said that while Bitcoin and Ethereum saw net inflows at the beginning of the year, they have returned to neutral or negative inflows since the end of August, indicating stagnation and uncertainty.

Glassnode on-chain metrics show that total U.S. dollar volume traded on Bitcoin has dropped to a daily average of $2.44 billion, the same level as in October 2020.

In the off-chain derivatives market, Bitcoin’s daily trading volume also reached historically low levels, falling to $12 billion for the first time since the 2022 lows.

Glassnode said that despite the market downturn, the currency holding trend remains strong. Glassnode defines long-term holders as on-chain entities that hold tokens for more than 155 days, and their holdings reached an all-time high of 14.7 million Bitcoins. Meanwhile, short-term holders have fallen to their lowest levels since 2011.

Vitalik Buterin, co-founder of the Ethereum blockchain, said at the Permissionless conference that he has observed the growing influence of Asian development teams on crypto.

This is a marked departure from the past, when most development was in the West.

“Five years ago, the exchanges and the mining industry in East Asia seemed great, but you know, they contributed very little to the development and research side. I feel like there’s been a really big shift,” he said.

Buterin said he has been traveling in East Asia over the past month and has been in contact with four or maybe five teams who are building some kind of account abstraction wallet.

U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge John Dorsey of the District of Delaware ruled that cryptocurrency exchange FTX can sell and invest its cryptocurrency holdings to repay creditors.

Previously released documents showed the assets were worth more than $3.4 billion as of August 31.

It has been reported that FTX revealed earlier this week that it holds Solana (SOL) tokens worth $1.16 billion, accounting for about 16% of the token’s circulating supply, as well as Bitcoin worth about $560 million, and some The assets consist of less liquid altcoins.

FTX Debtors submitted a proposed plan in August, under which token sales would be guided by financial advisors and weekly sales of most tokens would be capped at $100 million, although the cap could be raised to $200 million.

According to a report by CoinGecko, Sweden and Canada lead the way in cryptocurrency ETPs.

Data as of September 11 shows that the largest crypto ETPs currently are Bitcoin Tracker One (COINXBT) and Ethereum Tracker One (COINETH) from Swedish XBT provider.

The assets under management are approximately US$4.4 billion and US$2.6 billion respectively, far ahead of Brazil’s third-ranked Hashdex Nasdaq Crypto Index Fund, which manages nearly US$1.1 billion in assets.

The ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF (BITO), launched in the United States in October 2021, has $915 million in assets under management, while Canada’s Purpose Bitcoin ETF ranks fifth with $819 million.

CoinGecko data shows that 6 of the top 25 largest ETPs in the world are located in Canada.

According to data from The Tie, the announcement of the spot Ethereum ETF application did not cause a noticeable shift in social media sentiment on Ethereum.

Even so, Sacha Ghebali, director of strategy at The Tie, believes social media is very important in shaping cryptocurrency market dynamics.

While there have been no major swings in short-term sentiment, social media remains a valuable gauge of a project’s potential for mainstream acceptance, which in turn can impact the asset’s price.

As for the market outlook for the rest of the year, analysts warn that the current low-liquidity environment makes short-term price predictions particularly challenging.

Ethereum Foundation researcher Dankrad Feist said during a Permissionless panel discussion in Austin, Texas, that the term data availability is confusing and the industry should consider data publishing as an alternative to the practice. .

Data availability refers to the fact that blockchain can work faster when the function of storing data is handled separately from the work of processing and confirming transactions, and the data can then be independently verified or downloaded when the user needs it.

It is reported that Ethereum developers are developing a blockchain data storage solution called Danksharding, named after Feist.

Feist holds a PhD in theoretical physics and applied mathematics from the University of Cambridge, according to his LinkedIn page.

Messari posted on social media that FTX liquidators hold approximately $1.3 billion in liquid crypto assets (excluding stablecoins).

The relevant number is not the absolute value of the token held, but its amount relative to the active trading volume of each asset.

For example, FTX/Alameda’s BTC holdings ($353 million) represent approximately 1% of BTC’s weekly trading volume, which means that the market can absorb most of the sell-off, and the same is true for ETH.

However, for less liquid assets such as DOGE, TRX, and MATIC, the amount held by FTX accounts for 6-12% of the weekly trading volume, which has a much greater impact on the market.

While SOL and APT have considerable dollar value and relative market capacity, these assets are held by Alameda and venture capital investors and are primarily composed of vested tokens that are not immediately liquid on the open market.

Only 9.2 million SOL is unlocked each month, which significantly reduces the liquidation impact, making it more manageable similar to BTC and ETH liquidations.

Fireblocks CEO and co-founder Michael Shaulov said institutions are still risk-averse from cryptocurrencies, and for large, household-name companies, launching a successful Web3 enterprise has become more complicated.

He cited a recent Coinbase survey that found that 52% of Fortune 100 companies have some kind of Web3 or cryptocurrency-related plan since 2020.

Looking at the numbers alone, adoption looks promising, but Shaulov said he believes fewer than 50 established brands have launched repeatable major Web3 initiatives.

Shaulov said this is simply because the risks are too great, mainly on the regulatory side.

The confusion companies face boils down to basic questions like how to structure a balance sheet when cryptocurrencies are involved.