CFTC Sees ‘Significant Risks’ From Digital Assets 

Rocket Pool Launches rETH On zkSync Era

Sometimes announcements here didn’t meet the bar to become a news story, sometimes they may have slipped through the cracks, or they came late and we haven’t had a chance to cover.

At The Defiant we cover the most important DeFi-related news and developments but we know many of you are hunting for projects before they are fully developed and before they are newsworthy. Our goal with this installment of the newsletter is to help you find them. 

Look at this as the starting point to DYOR

We also include a compilation of DeFi and crypto funding rounds in the past week so you have these in one handy place.

Keep in mind these have been unedited. With that—here we go!

Place any limit orders as flexibly as you would on a centralized exchange but with all the benefits of decentralized trading. Use the same crypto balance to place many orders at once, manage orders without paying fees, enjoy full protection from MEV while keeping any price improvement for you.

Leading Web3 Investment Firm CoinFund Calls for Regulation of Centralized Intermediaries and Safe Harbor Programs

NEW YORK, April 20th – CoinFund, a leading web3 investment firm, announces the publication of Better Technology, Better System, a whitepaper that outlines the way forward for crypto regulation in the United States with 10 clear regulatory principles. The paper is authored by Christopher Perkins, President of CoinFund, and Member of the CFTC’s Global Markets Advisory Committee (GMAC).

Trezor announces coinjoin in collaboration with Wasabi

Coinjoin enables users to send their bitcoin as part of a large collaborative transaction and receive the same amount back, but with the transaction history obscured. Users’ balances and transaction history are then hard to track on the otherwise fully-transparent bitcoin blockchain.

DeFi Platform JustLend DAO Unveils Staked TRX and Energy Rental Features

Singapore, April 19th — JustLend DAO announced the launch of two new features – “Staked TRX” and “Energy Rental,” aimed at providing users with more flexible and streamlined options while reducing energy rental costs. This major upgrade, released on April 16, expands the reach of JustLend DAO’s capability to multiply users’ benefits by putting their assets into active use.

BITCOIN STAMPS ARE ATTRACTING COLLECTORS AND CREATORS WITH BLOCKCHAIN PERMANENCE

APR 19, 2023, Bitcoin Stamps seek to offer greater permanence and security on the blockchain, attracting collectors and creators. The Rare Stamp platform, launched on April 6, 2023, indexes all Stamp data such as prices, last sales, and other relevant data.

MOOI Network lists on MEXC, increasing accessibility for its ecosystem

MOOI Network, the blockchain ecosystem for game projects, announced the listing of its governance token MOOI on MEXC Global, a prominent cryptocurrency exchange. The listing is scheduled for April 25 and reflects MOOI´s commitment to lowering barriers for new users and engagement within its ecosystem.

peaq and Fetch.ai bring AI agents to the Polkadot and Kusama ecosystems

April 17 — peaq, the Web3 network powering the Economy of Things, unveils an integration with Fetch.ai, an innovative platform that powers peer-to-peer applications with automation and AI capabilities.

Telehealth App BlockAI.Care Launches AI-Powered Mobile Health Tracking Platform

Singapore, April 19th — Oraichain, the Artificial Intelligence-powered oracle and blockchain ecosystem supplier, launches a cutting-edge healthcare platform BlockAI.Care, on its ecosystem. The application integrates multiple, AI-powered models to provide an all-in-one platform for people to keep track of their health.

Carbon Aims to Bring the Next Wave of Traders On-Chain With New Programmable DEX Liquidity Model

Bancor is launching a new on-chain trading protocol called Carbon, which makes automated on-chain trading easier and more advanced than ever before.

Shade Protocol launches private DeFi For Cosmos ecosystem

Introducing Shade Protocol, the next-generation decentralized finance platform that puts user privacy first. The revolutionary platform offers a comprehensive suite of products including lending, stablecoins, bridging, and decentralized exchanges, all while maintaining financial privacy.

Web3 Tales – first Web3 conference in Zagreb and women are leading the charge

Web3 Tales conference is taking place 1-2 June in Zagreb’s Museum of contemporary art, set to be an unforgettable event that combines art and technology. If you are an industry professional looking to connect with experts in the blockchain and Web3 industries, this is an event you don’t want to miss.

Hashgraph Association Launches Enterprise Program for Hedera Development

[Switzerland] The Hashgraph Association, a non-profit organization that promotes the adoption of the Hedera network and supports enterprise transformation to build Web3 use cases and institutional-grade solutions on the Hedera network, has launched the Hashgraph Enterprise Program (HEP).

Digital Asset Research’s FTSE DAR Pricing and Exchange Vetting To Serve As the Foundation for Eurex’s Bitcoin Index Futures

Digital Asset Research (DAR), a leading provider of highest quality crypto market data and insights, today announced DAR’s Exchange Vetting methodology and resulting “clean” FTSE DAR pricing will provide the institutional-grade underpinning for Eurex’s new Bitcoin index futures.

Decred Launches DCRDEX 0.6, Offering New Levels of Privacy and Security for Cross-Chain Swaps

[Chicago, April 17] Decred (DCR), a sovereignty and privacy maximizing currency, today released the latest version of its decentralized exchange. DCRDEX 0.6 offers direct peer-to-peer cross-chain swaps without any kind of intermediaries, solving key problems around privacy and security.

IMPOSSIBLE CLOUD LAUNCHES GENERAL AVAILABILITY OF CLOUD STORAGE SOLUTION, DELIVERING ENTERPRISE-GRADE OBJECT STORAGE AT FRACTION OF COST

Germany, April 17 – Impossible Cloud, the cloud platform that offers decentralized, multi-service cloud solutions, announced the general availability of its enterprise-grade, native cloud storage solution which delivers all the capabilities of traditional cloud storage along with the benefits of decentralized web3 technology.

Nukkleus Reports Year End Financial Results and Continues Focus on SPAC Merger with Brilliant Acquisition Corp.

New York, April 17 – Nukkleus Inc (OTC: NUKK) filed its annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended September 30, 2022, with the Securities and Exchange Commission and continues to focus its efforts on completing its previously announced merger with Brilliant Acquisition Corp.

Bitget Partners with Core DAO to Launch a $200 Million Ecosystem Fund

Seychelles, April 18th — Bitget, top crypto derivatives, and copy trading platform, partnered with Core DAO, the organization developing the Satoshi Plus ecosystem. The collaboration will entail a $200 million ecosystem fund focusing on the support of decentralized applications (DApps) built on Core Network Layer-1 blockchain.

DeFi-Focused Layer 1 Berachain Raises $42M Series A at $420.69M Valuation

The round was led by Polychain Capital and included participation from venture capital firms Hack VC, dao5, Tribe Capital, Shima Capital, CitizenX and Robot Ventures.

Aleph Zero Announces Its First $50 Million Ecosystem Funding Program 

The program consists of grants, incubation, and acceleration across all stages of product development, and is dedicated to supporting developer teams to build on Aleph Zero. Interested parties can apply at alephzero.org/EFP.

Karate Combat raises $18 million in funding for Web3, mixed reality live sports

The investment was led by Bitkraft Ventures, with further funding from Delphi Digital, The Operating Group, Alpha Wave Global, Hashkey. Lattice, M13, Santiago Santos and RoozieXBT.

MetaGravity Closes $9.5M Seed Funding Round

The round saw participation from Sino Global Capital, Spartan Group, Market One Capital, Gravity Fund, Perridon Holdings, Pancasila, Ex-Capital, Mulana, Cogitent Ventures, Agrippa Capital, K5 Global Ventures, Moonpay and Project Godijra.

INTMAX Raises $5M Seed Round to Build a Stateless zkRollup

About the Investors (in no particular order): HashKey Capital, Bitscale Capital, B Dash Ventures, SNZ, Antalpha Ventures, Scroll, Mask Network, Dora Hacks, East Ventures, among others.

Swaap Closes $4.5M Seed Round, Led by Signature Ventures

The seed funding round was led by Signature Ventures with participation from New Form Capital, C² Ventures, Kima Ventures, Pareto Ventures, Entrepreneur First, and renowned business angels like Julien Bouteloup (Stake Capital), Pascal Gauthier (Ledger CEO), among others.

Shiba Inu Rival Love Hate Inu Raises $4.4m – Launches Viral Love-Hate Andrew Tate $10k Voting Competition

Monday April 17th, 2023 – Viral vote-to-earn meme coin Love Hate Inu has raised $4.4 million from investors and to celebrate that success has launched a demo vote competition.

Yoz Labs Raises $3.5M to Build Web3 Notification System

Led by early-stage venture firm Electric Capital, the funding round included several Web3 investors and angels such as Collab+Currency, Coinbase Ventures, Dapper Labs, Form Capital, North Island, Mike Krieger and Naval Ravikant.

Flow Secures $3M Seed Funding To Build A Rollup Centric NFT Ecosystem

With a $3M seed funding round led by Nima Capital and participation from Shima Capital and other industry heavyweights, Flow is poised to take the NFT world by storm.

Sometimes announcements here didn’t meet the bar to become a news story, sometimes they may have slipped through the cracks, or they came late and we haven’t had a chance to cover.

At The Defiant we cover the most important DeFi-related news and developme...

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