Web3: Avalanche and Grimes $100M creator fund; Polygon ZK scaling; Eye-scanning Worldcoin gets $100MM; Blockchain for farming insurance; Grayscale alternate L1s fund loves Cardano

Mar 29

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NFT, Metaverse, and Gaming

⭐ Avalanche Launches $100 Million Creator Fund with Grimes and Web3 Platform Op3n - The Block, March 25

Source - The Culture Catalyst Project announced at the Avalanche Barcelona summit

Avalanche’s subnet infrastructure is well suited for blockchain gaming and NFT development. Custom built gaming subnets can facilitate validators with advanced computing hardware enabling them to overcome network latency issues found on other blockchains.

Bored Ape and CryptoPunk NFTs Owner Yuga Labs Raises $450M at $4B Valuation - Decrypt, March 22 (Read our Long Take here)

Billion-Dollar Gaming Firm Krafton Pens Business Deal With Solana Labs - The Block, March 23

Polychain Capital Leads $22M Investment in NFT Appraisal Protocol Upshot - CoinDesk, March 22

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DeFi and Stablecoins

⭐ Polkadot Parachains and Venture Funds Team Up to Launch $250 Million ‘aUSD Ecosystem Fund’ to Grow Polkadot’s Native Stablecoin, Acala USD - Dan Reecer, March 23

Acala @AcalaNetwork

Acala, nine parachain teams, and a group of venture funds have launched the $250 million 'aUSD Ecosystem Fund' 🅰️💸 The fund is seeking early-stage projects from any @Polkadot or @kusamanetwork parachain with strong $aUSD stablecoin use cases 🚀 medium.com/acalanetwork/p…

Stargate Finance Attracts $1.9B In Six Days - Coin Telegraph, March 24

Anchor Protocol Will Readjust Interest Rates Each Month, ANC Falls by 5% - CoinDesk, March 25

Fireblocks and ANZ Create AUD Stablecoin - CoinDesk, March 24

Paradigm Invests $8.8M in DeFi’s Ribbon Finance - CoinDesk, March 22

Public Blockchains

⭐ Polygon: A Multi-Sided Approach to ZK Scaling - Messari, March 23

Source - Difference in average transaction costs on Polygon vs Ethereum

Will Polygon become obsolete following Ethereum’s merge to PoS? Check out our Podcast Conversation with Polygon COO Sandeep Nailwal to find out more. Let us know your thoughts on our Discord.

Ethereum Classic Continues To Spike: Is Mining Mania Behind Recent Surge In 'Cheaper Alternative?' - Benzinga, March 22

The Decomposition of Attention - The Knower, March 23

Near Ecosystem Deep Dive & Opportunities - Alen, March 23

Coinbase Adds Cardano Staking Rewards - Decrypt, March 24

Enterprise Chains and CBDCs

⭐ Eye-Scanning Crypto Project Worldcoin Set For $100 Million Raise: Report - Decrypt, March 23

Source - ‘The Orb’ eye-scanning technology

The biometric data from the scan is converted to code that will be used to grant access to a free share of Worldcoin, which aims to be the leading global currency. An ambitious project but definitely one to keep your eye on.

Unilever Unveils Blockchain Supply Chain Tracking Solution To Increase Palm Oil Transparency - Global Cosmetics News, March 24

Volvo's Parent Company Establishes Blockchain Joint Venture Headquarters in Wuxi, China - Coin Telegraph, March 22

Crypto Carbon: Can Blockchain Networks Fix Carbon Offsets? - CoinDesk, March 27

DAOs and Token Engineering

⭐ How Blockchain Can Ensure Economic Prosperity for African Farmers - BeInCrypto, March 22

Source - percentage of uninsured subsistence farmers across developing regions

Blockchain oracle networks – like Chainlink – enable external off-chain weather data to be delivered on-chain. The execution of the insurance contract for the farmer is determined by input weather data compared with predetermined rules of the smart contract. Payouts can now be determined through code rather than claim departments.

Larry Ellison’s SailGP to Launch Sports Team DAO - Ledger Insights, March 25

Mango DAO Embraces SOL, Rejects BTC With $1M Treasury Investment - CoinDesk, March 22

Crypto, Fintech and Institutional

⭐ Grayscale Investments Creates Smart Contract Fund for Solana, Avalanche Polygon, Cardano - Decrypt, March 22

Grayscale @Grayscale

🧵As of inception on 3/16, #GSCPxE’s holdings were: #Cardano $ADA, 24.63% #Solana $SOL, 24.27% #Avalanche $AVAX, 16.96% #Polkadot $DOT, 16.16% #Polygon $MATIC, 9.65% #Algorand $ALGO, 4.27% #Stellar $XLM, 4.06% Holdings are subject to change. Learn more: gryscl.co/3ukAiKU

Katie Haun’s Crypto Venture Capital Funds Break Records - Wall Street Journal (Read our Short Take here)

Crypto.com Picked As An Official FIFA World Cup Sponsor - The Block, March 22

BlackRock CEO: Ukraine War Could Speed Digital Currency Adoption - Blockworks, March 24

Cryptoeconomic Research

We partner with the ConsenSys Cryptoeconomics team to share DeFi analysis, fundamental protocol research, token engineering, and DAO design.

⭐ Reserve Protocol: A Platform for Decentralized Stablecoins
Reserve has deployed their basic stablecoin ($RSV) on Ethereum made up of fiat-backed USD tokens, non-functional governance token ($RSR) and the Reserve app which has gained significant usage in some hyperinflationary economies. However, the launch of the full reserve protocol on Ethereum mainnet is planned for this year and its progress can be viewed on their current dashboard. As the protocol is yet to be “live” on mainnet, we’ll be reviewing the intended behavior and expected outcome of their platform.

⭐ Stargate: a Fully Composable Cross-Chain Bridge
Stargate is a fully composable cross-chain bridge protocol built on LayerZero that enables native asset transfers between different blockchain networks. A major shortcoming of most current bridges is that they are unable to send native assets from one chain to another. Instead, they rely on the use of a wrapped or “intermediate” token to complete the bridging process. The problem with this approach is that it is extremely inefficient and makes the user experience onerous. Stargate is designed specifically to remove the need for wrapped tokens and lets users send native tokens directly to non-native chains.

⭐ DeFi Protocol Governance Report | March 2022 | Week 4
This week’s governance report covers the latest governance proposals on Compound and Uniswap. Compound cuts rewards generated by COMP rewards program, Uniswap adds 1bp fee tier to Polygon, and more!

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