Web3: DeFi roboadvisor Exponential gets $14MM from Paradigm; Jack Dorsey's TBD partners with Circle; 17MM+ notification Push Protocol on Polygon
Gm Fintech Futurists —
Welcome to our Web3 newsletter, covering DeFi, digital assets, NFTs, and the emergence of the financial metaverse. Today we highlight the following:
DEFI & DIGITAL ASSETS: Investment platform Exponential raised $14MM in its Seed Round, led by Paradigm
DEFI & DIGITAL ASSETS: Jack Dorsey’s TBD Teams Up With Circle To Take US Dollar Stablecoin Savings And Remittances Global
CRYPTOECONOMICS & PROTOCOLS: Polygon Onboards New Web3 Native Communication Network
FINTECH & INSTITUTIONS: Upstart Crypto Carbon Credits Platform
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DeFi Protocols And Digital Assets
⭐Take The Mystery Out Of DeFi With Exponential - Exponential
Investment platform Exponential raised $14MM in its Seed Round, led by Paradigm. Exponential lets users assess and invest in DeFi yield opportunities. The current process requires finding non-fraudulent projects, moving funds across chains (e.g., $2B of crypto has been stolen via cross-chain bridge exploits), tracking performance, and filing taxes — pretty complicated.
Exponential claims to make this easier by offering the following features —
(1) "Rate My Wallet," which analyses the risk of current investments. The rating system, ranging from A-F, analyzes protocols and chain designs, past issues, and dependencies; (2) Liquidity pool search using filters such as risk rating, annual percentage yield (APY), and total value locked (TVL), and (3) an upcoming custodial platform, thereby "No more interaction with obscure protocols. No more risky bridging across chains. No more opaque DeFi high-yield accounts."
We think this investment is really about the team, with experience at Uber and Amazon, and not about a DeFi based roboadvisor with no pre-existing distribution and centralized custody. The standalone product would have competition from Zerion, Coinbase, MetaMask, and Betterment in its current market position.
⭐Jack Dorsey’s TBD Teams Up With Circle To Take US Dollar Stablecoin Savings And Remittances Global - CoinDesk
USDC issuer Circle has partnered with TBD, the bitcoin-focused subsidiary of Block / Square, to bring cross-border dollar-linked stablecoin transfers and savings.
🛰We’re partnering with @circlepay to solve some of our biggest money challenges, including decentralized, global on-and-off-ramps between fiat and crypto worlds that can power global use cases from cross-border remittances to self-custody of stablecoins developer.tbd.website/blog/tbd-circl…TBD and Circle build on- and off-ramps between fiat and blockchain-based digital currencies, with potential for lower-cost remittances and to self-custody wallets USD denominated stablecoins. The offering is similar to that of Masref, which provides users in countries such as Venezuela and Lebanon with a free USD bank account in Switzerland. This year, people living in countries with depreciating currencies (e.g., Argentina, and also lol the United Kingdrom) have fled to USD stablecoins, which have grown as an alternative for savings and remittances.
Circle CEO Allaire: It’s Highly Unlikely We’ll Be Using Bitcoin in 5 or 10 Years coinjournal.net/circle-ceo-all… via @CoinJournalThe reaction has been mixed given the complicated relationship between the Bitcoin ecosystem (maxinally decentralized, want fiat to burn) and the USD ecosystem (needs fiat, is regulated), as demonstrated by Jeremy Allaire’s comments above. As additional context, TBD has been working on a decentralized crypto exchange called TBDex and its Web5 initiative. Circle, on the other hand, has announced, that USDC will be available on five additional blockchains, including Arbitrum, Cosmos, NEAR, Optimism, and Polkadot. Will Bitcoin?
Native USDC On Cosmos To Fill Vacuum Left By Terra’s UST Stablecoin - CoinDesk
Long Line of Bidders 'Expected' For Crypto Lender Celsius' Assets: Court Filing - Decrypt
Circle Announces Next Wave Of USDC Support For Multi-Chain Ecosystem - Circle
Wisdom Tree Set To Launch Digital Fund With Real-World Focus - Blockworks
Cryptoeconomics And Blockchain Protocols
⭐ Polygon Onboards New Web3 Native Communication Network - Blockworks
Push Protocol, a communication protocol previously known as Ethereum Push Notification Service (EPNS), has launched on Polygon, enabling communication to Polygon wallets, 37,000 dApps, and plugins. Since Push’s mainnet launch in January 2022, it has powered 17MM+ notifications on over 100 channels to 60,000 subscribers.
Last week, Push Protocol announced its launch on @0xPolygon’s mainnet 🙌 Today, we’re excited to announce the first launch partner on Polygon: @LensProtocol! 🌿💜🔔 (1/7)Push Protocol retains the push notification capability of EPNS and lays the groundwork for multi-chain, general-purpose communication. Push uses Push Nodes that (1) listen to Push Protocol smart contracts on every blockchain and enable off-chain or direct communication via API calls from dApps; (2) validate that check if the channel exists, is not spamming, is cross-chain verified; and (3) dispatch a display of Web3 notification in Web2 apps. See here to read the Push Protocol Whitepaper.
