Market Massacre… But There’s Hope

With this inaugural Friday edition and in the editions to come, we will provide you with guidance on navigating the markets and uncovering the current trends in fund flow. What a week it’s been, Let’s get to it!

Top Stories Of The Week

• SBF trial updates include allegations of BTC price suppression, deceptive financials, $1B bribe, more missing funds, and political donations for gains! Be sure to read our report coming out tomorrow for a comprehensive overview of the case

• JPMorgan has successfully executed its first blockchain collateral settlement, utilizing its Tokenized Collateral Network in a BlackRock-Barclays trade. The institutions are here and are not going anywhere, the next bull market will be unlike anything before

• The Ethereum Foundation offloaded 1.7K ETH this week, causing concern among investors due to their historical knack for selling just before price declines

• Trader Joe's grocery chain has filed a lawsuit against the popular DEX Trader Joe and its co-founder, alleging that the platform intentionally chose a name similar to the supermarket's and used branding elements closely associated with the supermarket

• The volume of crypto VC transactions and investments has decreased by approximately 90% from its highest point. Valuations have seen an even steeper decline

• USDR, a stablecoin backed by real estate, experienced a significant depegging, resulting in a rapid decline in value from $0.996 to $0.50. Incidents like this one pose challenges to the integration of RWAs, but also serve as rigorous tests for protocols

• Investor sentiment has been predominantly neutral to bearish for some time, coinciding with a rise in BTC dominance, signaling reduced confidence in other crypto assets

Narrative of the week: SocialFi and RWA Dominate

SocialFi and RWAs have recently taken center stage in the crypto narrative, offering new sources of yield and reviving market interest

• RWA tokens have been on the rise, bringing traditional assets to the blockchain. Top RWA protocols like stUSDT and Ondo have shown significant growth in their TVL

• The success of Friend.tech led to the emergence of competitors across different blockchain chains, such as Post.tech on Arbitrum, FanTech on Mantle, StarsArena on Avalanche, and Hub3 on Solana. Users should keep their eyes on Cipher.fan the latest SocialFi protocol to launch on Arbitrum

Top Raises Of The Week

• Membrane Labs, a technology platform offering crypto trading and lending applications, along with a custody-agnostic settlement network, raised $20M

• Untangled Finance, specializing in digital securitization and linking real-world assets to DeFi, raised $13.5M

• Republik, focused on providing unique toolsets for creators, secured $6M in funding

• Game of Silks, which digitizes every thoroughbred horse born since 2021. Owners have the freedom to customize their silks, establish racing stables, and earn real money through race results. The project has successfully raised $5M in funding

• Galaxy Ventures to lead $4M funding round for Parsec Finance, a next generation on-chain analytics platform

Project Of The Week: Entangle Finance

Entangle Finance is addressing DeFi's liquidity challenges by establishing an interoperable layer that connects various blockchains and protocols, utilizing Liquid Staked Derivatives for enhanced yield potential and cross-chain liquidity access

• Entangle has strategically integrated with Scroll, to address the challenges of high transaction costs, slow speeds, and limited scalability

• Seier Capital and Zephyrus have invested in the project and funded the initial rounds

Blue Chip Overview

• DYdX has witnessed remarkable growth in trading volume, outpacing numerous centralized exchanges. This surge is credited to its Layer 2 scaling solution, which boosts transaction speeds and cuts costs. Take note as this positions DYdX and its token favorably for potential success in the upcoming bull market

• Institutions continue to accumulate $LINK, one entity using 81 new wallets, recently acquired $575,632 worth of $LINK ($4.2M) following a drop in the $LINK price. This accumulation brings their total $LINK holdings to 7.66 million $LINK ($56M)

• MakerDAO paved the way by bringing treasury yield on-chain, lending DAI to groups that invest in T-bills. This move boosted MKR's price from $830 to $1,530 in Q3, signaling success

• Bancor 3 voted on a proposal to decide if 100% of the fees generated in Bancor 3 can be used to buy BNT from the market. The rationale behind this change is to ensure that all BNT holders, regardless of where they have staked their tokens, receive equal benefits

Degen Watchlist

• Coinlist and Teleport DAO have announced their Ecosystem Reward Program, while the bear conditions continue partaking in notable programs like this could pay dividend later

• Vaultka has set its IDO starting from October 16th at 12pm UTC and concluding on October 19th at 12pm UTC

• Rollbit has carved a niche for itself within the crypto industryIts multi-chain approach allows users to engage in a wide range of crypto gambling activities. Rollbit's activities can be closely monitored and analyzed through the user-friendly Dune dashboard

• Radiant Capital already has $1B in TVL, this platform facilitates borrowing and lending across various blockchains. It has upcoming catalysts, including the mainnet launch, Arbitrum incentive program, and Layer Zero airdrop, positioning it for potential growth

• $LQTY has surged by +72.55% in the last 30 days, closely linked to on-chain growth. Demand for $LQTY correlates with the desire to mint $LUSD, driven by higher rewards and yield opportunities

News

• Spencer Ventures, an institutional NFT fund, has revealed its intention to acquire 144 Pudgy Penguins from the 3AC collection

• Polygon Labs co-founder Sandeep Nailwal has put forth a proposal for the development of "ApeChain," a dedicated L2 network powered by the ApeCoin DAO

• Blur has unveiled plans to conduct an airdrop of 300M $BLUR tokens, equivalent to 10% of its total supply and valued at approximately $49.2M at the current rate, as part of Season 2 on November 20th

• Immutable has partnered with Amazon Web Services to facilitate the development of infrastructure solutions aimed at simplifying the launch and scalability of blockchain games for developers

• Despite the challenges in both the crypto and gaming markets, the blockchain gaming industry attracted approximately $600M in Q3 2023

• In September, NFT trading volume hit a two-year low at $224M, experiencing a 37% decline month-over-month, marking the seventh consecutive month of decreasing volume

Project Of The Week: Big Time

Despite the ongoing bearish trend in the crypto market, gaming token Big Time has experienced a remarkable 320% price surge, reaching $0.2744

• This has been primarily driven by its recent listings on Coinbase and OKX, making it one of the top-performing altcoins this week

• Big Time stands out in the gaming industry as a multiplayer action RPG for PCs with an innovative approach to the open game economy and strong community support, having raised up to $10M in funding and successfully launching NFT collections on Binance

Blue Chip Overview

Do PFP NFTs have a future? It's looking bleak! NFT values are on the decline, with the only notable highlight being the debut of Pudgy Penguin merchandise at Walmart. While it seems the focus has shifted to gaming recently in terms of funding and price action as seen with Big Time

Degen Watchlist

• Delving into NFT stamp collection might tap into an undiscovered market. Worth a look, perhaps? Begin your exploration with these pages: cryptophilately, crypto-stamps, cypherstamps and the digitalphilatelist

• Age of Dino recently secured $8M in funding and has integrated with the game opBNB. Make sure to mint MechPal, a special NFT collection for early supporters

• $WINR is a promising bet in the gaming sector due to several reasons. It offers gaming infrastructure for protocols to deploy on and is the first L3 app chain on Arbitrum. Impressively, it has generated over $62M in volume from 15 games within just four months. Its recognition by Binance Research adds to its credibility as a noteworthy gaming project

• Despite a notable decline in NFT market activity and volume, Solana has stood out as a hub of increased activity, attracting smart money buyers who are actively trading collections within its ecosystem. Projects such as King Royal, Madlads and JellyRascals have been generating impressive volume