A Somewhat Optimistic Day 📈
In today’s edition: 💰 MicroStrategy's big BTC acquisition, 📉 Trump NFT ETH cashout, 🚨 Levana hit by $1.1M hack, 💡 Vitalik's PoS simplification, and more!
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What’s Poppin’?
by Sage Young and Brandy Betz
Optimism’s Governance Token OP Reaches All-Time High
OP has had the eighth-largest growth in 2023, per CoinDesk Market Indices. Optimism’s total value locked has reached $5.65 billion.
MicroStrategy Increases Its Bitcoin Cache With 14,620 New Tokens
The software firm purchased the BTC over a month-long period for around $615.7 million.
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In 2023, the crypto industry began with post-FTX fallout such as Operation Chokepoint 2.0, the failures of banks serving the crypto industry and the SEC's Wells Notice against Coinbase.
Meanwhile, Bitcoin Ordinals brought innovation to the Bitcoin network, while Ethereum's Shanghai upgrade introduced new functionalities.
The criminal trial of Sam Bankman-Fried was the dramatic climax of the year, as lawmakers’ concerns about crypto being used for terrorist financing brought crypto into the mainstream conversation. The year ended with Binance's substantial settlement with the U.S. government and spot Bitcoin ETFs in the horizon, ushering in what looks like the beginnings of another bull market.
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Daily Bits…✍️✍️✍️
🔥 PancakeSwap's community overwhelmingly supported a proposal to reduce the supply of its CAKE token by 300 million, aiming to manage its tokenomics.
🖲️ Levana Protocol on the Osmosis blockchain suffered a $1.1 million exploit, losing 10% of its liquidity pools due to a combined congestion attack and code vulnerabilities.
🛠️ Ethereum cofounder Vitalik Buterin proposed three methods to simplify Ethereum's proof-of-stake mechanism, aiming to reduce systemic complexity.
🌏 Worldcoin launched in Singapore after pausing verification operations in India, Brazil, and France.
💸 A crypto portfolio linked to Donald Trump reportedly sold ether worth $2.4 million, following months of accumulating Trump NFT royalties.
🚨 Cryptocurrency users suffered losses of nearly $2 billion due to hacks and scams in 2023, a significant decrease from the previous year's figures.
💰 Crypto airdrop hunters invested $345 million in Manta Network's Ethereum layer 2 blockchain, Manta Pacific. Also, Blast garnered over $1.1 billion in deposits ahead of its launch, boosted by an upcoming airdrop.
💧 Swell's liquid staking protocol attracted over $125 million of inflows in December, doubling its total value locked and becoming the fourth largest in its category.
🏦 Hong Kong Monetary Authority's chief suggested stablecoins could bridge traditional finance and crypto, amidst regulatory proposals for stablecoin issuers.
🔒 Indonesia mandates crypto exchanges to register with the national crypto bourse, aiming to enhance ecosystem safety and facilitate transaction tracking for tax purposes.
📈 Nigeria's reversal of its ban on bank services for crypto firms is expected to greatly increase cryptocurrency usage and adoption in the country.
Today in Crypto Adoption...
🌉 IOTA’s ShimmerEVM integrated LayerZero's technology, enabling cross-chain interactions and transactions across multiple blockchain networks.
What Do You Meme?
Recommended Reads
DL News on the crypto cases to watch out for in 2024
Forbes’ Billy Bambrough on Arthur Hayes’ hot ETF take - “If ETFs managed by TradFi asset managers are too successful, they will completely destroy Bitcoin.”
Unchained: What Is the Cancun-Deneb (Dencun) Update on Ethereum?
📈 Your Market Update 📉
BTC is up 0.1%, trading at $43,195
ETH is up 5.7%, trading at $2,405
BTC dominance: 47.64%
Crypto market cap: $1.77T
*All data as of today, 06:00 am ET
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