Bitfinity Weekly: Bitcoin's Billionth Transaction

Welcome to Issue #105 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

Billions Must Transact: The Bitcoin network hit a major milestone this week, reaching 1 billion transactions in its 15 years of operation. The excitement around last month's Halving as well as BRC-20 and Runes fervor this year has certainly led to a surge in network activity over the past few months. Although April saw the highest single-day transaction record (926k tx), Bitcoin continues to see large numbers, and is averaging over 600k tx per day so far in the month of May.

A Decent Proposal: Ethereum developers proposed EIP-7702 this week in order to enhance EOAs (Externally Owned Accounts) by introducing a new transaction type that temporarily converts EOAs into smart contract wallets, also offering functionalities like tx batching and sponsored transactions. This new proposal aims to improve the usability and security, providing an alternative to existing standards like EIP-3074.

Well Well Wells: Popular stock and crypto trading app RobinHood received a Wells notice from the SEC just days before the company reported its quarterly earnings. A Wells notice is a formal notification sent to inform an entity that they are part of a regulatory investigation, giving them the time to address the investigation before a formal decision is made. RobinHood released a statement early this week confirming receipt of the Wells notice, and noted that it was part of a previously disclosed SEC investigation regarding the company's cryptocurrency listings, custory and platform operations, among other topics.

Monero Moves: Cypherpunk and privacy advocates are raising the alarms as more crypto privacy services continue close down in recent months. The latest to fall is p2p service LocalMonero, which had been in operation for seven years. The site will completely shut down on Nov. 7th, at which point unclaimed funds may be considered abandoned. The LocalMonero team added that the imminent launch of privacy-centered initiatives on DEXs such as Serai leaves them confidence for the future of the privacy-centric coin.

This Week in our Blog

Runes protocol has added a new dimension to the nascent Bitcoin ecosystem. As interest in Runes has died down comparatively to the height of pre-Runes frenzy, this is the perfect time to dive into this new asset class and learn about what makes Runes so different from BRC-20s and Ordinals.

Exploring the Bitcoin Runes Ecosystem: Wallets, Tools, and Opportunities

For those seeking to gain a deeper understanding of the Runes ecosystem before the masses flock to the Bitcoin blockchain for minting and etching, this concise guide has aimed to highlight the most prominent applications for engaging with Runes.

Bitfinity BlogHans

NFT Market Bytes

Fantasy Fans: Fantasy.top, a trading card NFT game built on Ethereum L2 Blast, has quickly become one of the most profitable Web3 apps, ranking 8th in generated revenue over the past week. The game's concept involves turning known CT (CryptoTwitter) personalities into trading card characters, as well as incentivizing those public figures to market themselves (as they receive a percentage of trading fees). So far, over $1m worth of Ethereum has been paid out to top influencers participating in the game.

New Reflections: Web3 publishing dApp Paragraph acquired its largest competitor, Mirror. Mirror will continue to operate independently before it is merged with Paragraph. The merge will result in a shift in focus, as well as an ecosystem change. Mirror, which leverages the Optimism network, will be part of a new web3 social media app called 'Kiosk', to be built on the Farcaster Protocol. Kiosk's intention is to create a social space that combines microblogging with the ability to track and trade digital assets natively within the dApp.

Return of DeGods: DeGods and y00ts have made their return back to their home chain, Solana. The NFT collections, both which fall under the same management team, attempted cross-chain migrations in the past with little success. Their return to Solana was not received well by the existing community, though a price surge seems to indicate that traders don't share the same sentiment.

Tweet of the Week

Meme Time

A Matter of Opinion

This has been yet another volatile week for the larger crypto world as major tokens' prices continues to fluctuate midst news about a possible Ethereum ETF rejection by the SEC (--no doubt, Grayscale's decision to withdraw their Eth futures ETF application early in the week has fanned the speculative flames).

Nonetheless, Bitcoin's billionth transaction is a big event to celebrate, and continued on-chain tx activity shows that many crypto natives are undeterred by bad news, for the most part. Another statistic that demonstrates the community's confidence in Bitcoin? The chain has an average rate of 178k tx per day over the past fifteen years of its existence, while May's tx average is on pace to stay at over 600k transactions per day.

Ethereum and its various L2s also show little signs of slowing down, at least when it comes to ecosystem development; Omni Network and other interop solutions are deep in their efforts to unify rollups, and it seems that some of the most currently hyped SocialFi projects are being built on Eth L2s such as Blast and Base. The same can be said for even for memecoins such as Doge--which has lagged behind in infrastructure comparatively to newer, more serious chains, but is now showing signs of emerging marketplaces and even its own L2s.

What will come of these developments is anyone's guess, but one thing is for sure, the builders and crypto natives are ready to weather the storm.

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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.