Bitfinity Weekly: Post-Runes
Welcome to Issue #103 of Bitfinity Weekly for our #BITFINIANS community. If this newsletter was forwarded to you, sign up here.
What's in Today's Email?
- Global Crypto News
- This Week in our Blog
- NFT Market Bytes
- Tweet of the Week
- Meme Time
- A Matter of Opinion
Global Crypto News
⚖️ Faulty Systems: Two SEC (U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission) lawyers resigned after a Utah judge reprimanded them for a "gross abuse" of power. The judge, who was overseeing a case regarding the crypto platform Debt Box, said that the case was "marred by false statements and misrepresentations". To the SEC's credit, the agency had already moved to dismiss the case, and the two lawyers in question were slated to be fired.
🫠 One Big Hederache: A miscommunication regarding BlackRock's involvement with Hedera ($HBAR) earlier this week lead to an immediate price surge of the token, rocketing more than 110% in less than twelve hours of the announcement. One of BlackRock's partners, Archax, is working to tokenize funds on Hedera (along with an extended range of tokenized fund shares); speculators were disappointed to find out that BlackRock has no direct involvement with Hedera.
🏛️ Reaching Consensys: Consensys, an Ethereum software giant behind MetaMask and Infura, filed a suit against the SEC this Thursday, alleging that the regulatory body plans to designated Ethereum as a security and is trying to "seize control over the future of cryptocurrency". The 34-page filed complaint reads that in 2018, an agency official had purportedly said that ETH should not be treated as a security. Futhermore, other U.S. regulators such as the CFTC have declared Ethereum as a commodity.
🌪️ Another One: The two founders of Bitcoin self-custody wallet and privacy service Samourai Wallet were arrested on Wednesday, under charges of conspiracy to commit money laundering. Keonne Rodriguez and William Lonergan Hill were charged with operating "a cryptocurrency mixer that executed over $2b in unlawful transactions" and arrested, and Samourai's server and web domain have been seized. The crypto community's sentiment, including that of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, seems to be that privacy should not be considered a crime.
This Week in our Blog
Runes was one of the most highly anticipated events to happen on Bitcoin. But what are Runes, how do they work, and how will they shape the emerging Bitcoin ecosystem? We a take a deep dive into everything Runes:
Fred
NFT Market Bytes
🧥 Via Luxury: French fashion house Louis Vuitton and artist Pharrell Williams announced the release of a new Via NFT varsity jacket. The Western inspired piece is a part of LV's ongoing blockchain initiative 'Via'; it is priced at $8,450 USD and paired with a digital 'twin' collectible item. The jacket is limited to a production run of 200 pieces and only available for purchase by holders of the Louis Vuitton phygital 'Treasure Trunks'.
🎮 Symbiosis: Animoca Brands Japan and Square Enix are partnering together to globally market Symbiogenesis, an NFT project that features 10,000 fantasy-themed characters that can serve as game assets and avatars. Square Enix is a Japanese video game giant best known for the Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts franchises.
⚡ Fair Weather Gods: DeGods, an established NFT collection that first made its name by skyrocketing to popularity on the Solana chain, is on the move again. Though they rose to meteoric success in 2022 on Solana, due to the residual effects of FTX's collapse, DeGods migrated to Ethereum, supposedly in pursuit of better opportunities. On Monday, founder Rohun "Frank" Vora tweeted a hint about a potential move back to Solana, garnering some negative feedback about yet another migration.
Tweet of the Week
Following a sharp spike at the time of the Halving, fees on BTC have dropped significantly.
— Bitfinity Network (@bitfinitynet) April 26, 2024
Increased fees have highlighted the need for a solution, #Bitfinity will make low transaction fees on #BTC a reality.
Following the halving & introduction of #Runes Protocol, fees for… pic.twitter.com/buLaEz2h5U
Meme Time
A Matter of Opinion
Runes mania seems to have slowed down significantly, along with the high rates of gas fees we've seen on Bitcoin mainnet over the past few weeks leading up to last week's halving. Still, though trading fervor seems to have simmered down, the interest in Runes and what's possible through this new fungible token category seems to be chugging along steadily.
For example, this weekend we saw Rune activity spiking modestly as some creative individuals decided to 'etch' unique 1 of 1 Runes for every single CryptoPunk in existence. CryptoPunks, which are considered 'Blue Chip' NFTs, were originally issued on the Ethereum blockchain though their cultural relevancy seems to be universal across all blockchains, both old and new.
While it's hard to say whether the CryptoPunk runes will catch on (indeed, the nature of Rune categorization as it currently is, means that each etched rune will be in its own category of tokens on marketplaces, leading to highly fragmented liquidity). However, it's exciting to see people experimenting with what's possible. We often seem to forget that we are actively participating in history, not simply participating in financial games.
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*Important Disclaimer: While every effort is made on this website to provide accurate information, any opinions expressed or information disseminated do not necessarily reflect the views of Bitfinity itself. The information provided here is for general informational purposes only and should not be considered as financial advice.
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