Fundraisings of the Week
Crypto Lender SALT Raises $64.4M to Resume Operations
Carbon Credit Platform Carbonplace Gets $45M From Large Banks
Coincover raises USD 30 million to protect the crypto ecosystem
Mino Games raises $15M to create Dimensionals Web3 game
Elementus Raises $10 Million to Bring Clear Blockchain Analytics to Institutional Customers
Decentralized Identity Network Space ID Raises $10M
Cenoa Raises US$7M in Seed Funding
Dymension Fundraises $6.7M for Scaling the Cosmos Ecosystem
Mawari raises $6.5M to speed 3D content delivery for the metaverse
Crypto Exchange C3 Raises $6M to Offer FTX Alternative
DeFi
[Weekly TVL] Gross: ⬇️$46.93B
Top 3 Apps: Lido ⬇️($7.87B), MakerDAO ⬇️($7.04B), Curve ⬇️($4.78B)
Top 3 Chains: ETH ⬇️($27.77B), TRON ⬇️($4.93B), BSC ⬇️($4.85B)
Top 7D Change 📈: Community Driven Exchange on Arbitrum — Zyberswap (+1485%, $89.79m)
DeFi News
[Aave GHO on Testnet] Aave launched its stablecoin GHO on the Ethereum testnet Goerli. The GHO code has been audited and is available on Github.
[Kraken Discontinues Staking Service] The SEC charged Kraken staking program with an illegal offer and sale of securities. Kraken entities agreed to cease offering its staking programs and pay $30m to settle SEC charges.
[Trader Joe Integrates LayerZero] Trader Joe has integrated with LayerZero, and JOE is now an ‘omnichain fungible token’ (OFT), meaning users can bridge JOE across Avalanche, Arbitrum, BnB, and more chains to be supported.
NFT
Top 10 Collections by Weekly Volume
NFT News
Feb. 13, Parisian art museum Centre Pompidou to showcase NFTs. “Centre Pompidou announced plans for a new exhibition examining the relationship between art and the blockchain that will feature NFTs from the valuable CryptoPunks and Autoglyphs projects, among works by 12 other digital artists.” [Source: Decrypt]
Feb. 13, NFT company Limit Break showcases founder’s Twitter QR on Super Bowl ad. “The animated commercial was built around a persistent QR code, which the ad claimed would let viewers mint (or generate and claim) a free NFT for the game after scanning it.” [Source: Decrypt]
Feb. 9, Crypto payment company MoonPay partners with LooksRare. “With the upcoming NFT Checkout integration, LooksRare users will be able to easily purchase an NFT using a debit or credit card, sidestepping the need to first acquire cryptocurrency.” [Source: MoonPay Website]
Feb. 8, Hermes reaches settlement on MetaBirkin NFT trademark lawsuit. “Luxury brand Hermès International SA won its lawsuit against the digital artist behind “MetaBirkin” nonfungible tokens after convincing a Manhattan federal jury that Mason Rothschild’s sale of the NFTs violated Hermès’ rights to the “Birkin” trademark.” [Source: Bloomberg Law]
Feb. 7, OpenSea starts aggregating listings on Seaport. “Starting today, we will begin an experimental program to aggregate listings from marketplaces & projects built on top of Seaport — starting with Ens.vision, Sansa, & Sound!” [Source: OpenSea Twitter]
Feb. 7, File sharing company WeTransfer launches NFT minting service on Minima. “This partnership will explore the practical use of NFT technology, and be a test case to demonstrate the potential of wider adoption of this innovative digital tool” [Source: The Block]
Feb. 6, Yuga Labs reaches settlement on BAYC NFT trademark lawsuit. “The suit involved the developer of websites and a smart contract to sell “misleading” RR/BAYC NFTs. There are separate ongoing cases regarding Ryder Ripps’ use of Bored Apes’ imagery.” [Source: Coindesk]
GameFi & Metaverse
[Tower Pop raises $2.1M for Web3 battle royale and tower defense game Omega Royale] Tower Pop has raised $2.1 million in funding for its Web3 battle royale and tower defense game Omega Royale. The firm aims to use a novel play-to-mint model, where players who are dedicated to the game and rank the highest can mint the collectible NFTs in the game. In that way, the company hopes to bring successful NFTs to mobile games.
[Mino Games raises $15M to create Dimensionals Web3 game] Mino Games has raised $15 million to create its Dimensionals collectible character game with Web3 features. Mino Games previously scored big hits with its Mino Monsters series of free-to-play games and titles such as Cat Game and Dog Game. Now the character-driven gaming company is transitioning into Web3 games with the new Dimensionals franchise.
[Xterio invests $2.5M in multiplayer RPG studio Overworld] Blockchain gaming publisher Xterio has invested $2.5 million in Overworld, a new partner game studio that will make multiplayer role-playing games with digital collectibles. Overworld will develop cross-platform, free-to-play games with features such as player ownership and digital collectibles.
[New music format Vault announces $4M Series A funding] Vault, the mobile-friendly Digital Music Collectible (DMC) format created by the co-founders of sports betting market leader FanDuel, announced that it has raised $4 million in Series A funding following a breakthrough in which fans purchased over 3,000 DMCs from FLETCHER, the critically lauded singer-songwriter and fast-rising queer icon.
[Web3 gaming platform Ajuna raises $5M in private financing] Decentralized gaming platform Ajuna Network has raised $5 million in a new private funding round led by blockchain-focused venture capital firm CMCC Global. The gaming platform previously raised $2 million in a seed round led by Fundamental Labs. Other investors for that funding round included OKX Blockdream Ventures, Signum Capital, and Animoca Brands.
[Hardball Games raised £4.3M in seed funding] Game studio Hardball Games raised £4.3M to accelerate the development of its multiplayer IP. Led by Griffin Gaming Partners, the seed funding allows Hardball Games to ramp up the development of their playable prototype. Founded in January 2022, Hardball Games is creating an innovative massively multiplayer, free-to-play, fighting game by building out a best-in-class, creative studio based in UK.
[Mawari raises $6.5M in seed funding] Mawari, a CA-based company providing XR streaming technology, raised $6.5M in seed funding. The round was led by Blockchange Ventures and Decasonic, with participation from Abies Ventures, Accord Ventures, Anfield, Outlier Ventures, and Primal Capital. The company intends to use the funds to expand its existing R&D team and to accelerate the launch of its network.
[NFTICALLY raises $1M in funding led by Spartan Group and Polygon Ventures] NFTICALLY raises investments from Spartan Group, Polygon Ventures, Blockchain Founders Capital, Blockchain Founders Fund, Mafatlal family office, and Bollywood producer Subhash Ghai in the equity round. It has onboarded brands such as Polygon, CEAT, Metro Brands, Zipmex, BollyCoin, and Zee Studios.
DAO
[Uniswap V3 on BNB Chain Proposal approved at 65.89% ] This is the most controversial proposal that happened in the Uniswap community where A16Z has deployed all 15M to vote against the proposal, however it passed with the support from Consensys, Robert Leshner and Compound Finance.
[Optimism announces token airdrop round 2 for eligible contributors ] The airdrop was designed to reward delegated governance staker and gas consumers. There are 307,965 unique addresses qualifying for a total reward of 11,742,277.10 OP.
[Umami Finance transit to DAO governance as the protocol CEO’s token disposition] The team quickly responded to CEO’s reaction of dumping all his $UMAMI by removing him from the governance of the protocol. Through an open and direct announcement in the discord channel, the current team calls for DAO governance for the protocol.
[The regenesis for zkSync 2.0 testnet is complete] The regenesis is in preparation for the Fair Onboarding for the ecosystem. zkSync earlier announced a full security measure as Openzepplin is providing a comprehensive monitoring system with alerts. The protocol itself was planning to adopt a withdrawal limit of 10% TVL per day.
[Rabbithole introducing the Quest Protocol] The Rabbithole is enabling projects to reward new users in a fully on-chain and autonomous way. Projects can permissionless deploy smart contracts and predefine allowlists and rules to incentivize users.
[Altlayer unveiled “100 Flash Layer” to deploy custom rollup] The campaign will allow 100 selected developers to test access and deploy their own flash layer.
Regulation & Adoption
- 06/02/2023: (🇧🇸) FTX’s new CEO made 690k USD in 2 months of work.
- 08/02/2023: (🇹🇷) Binance to airdrop 100 USD to users in Turkey quakes regions.
- 10/02/2023: (🇺🇸) PayPal held 604M USD in BTC by the end of 2022
- 10/02/2023: (🇪🇸) Bit2Me and Mastercard launch a crypto settlement debit card.
- 12/02/2023: (🇰🇿) Kazakhstan to impose 75% revenue sale from crypto mining for tax purposes.
Macro
- The Bank of Russia keeps interest rates at 7.5% for the third time.
- IMF to delay dollar bailout in Pakistan.
- Russia to cut oil production by 500k BPD in March.
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