🪂 Hamster Kombat Under Fire Over Airdrop Allocations

GM Defiers!

Hamster Kombat is facing backlash over its highly-anticipated Season 1 airdrop. Only 43% of Hamster Kombat’s 300 million players are eligible for the drop. The news comes after Catizen attracted pushback for its airdrop last week.

Kamala Harris has finally mentioned cryptocurrency in public, with the Democratic presidential candidate claiming she will support digital assets during a fundraising event.

Markets continued to rally on Monday, with ETH outperforming BTC since last week’s rate cut. ETH briefly traded above $2700 overnight, while SOL dipped 1% and DOT climbed 1%.

The founders of Samourai Wallet are facing trial in New York. The Department of Justice charged Samourai with conspiracy to commit money laundering and operate an unlicensed money-transmitting business in April.

Plus, Ethereum researchers warn node operators can be deanonymized, Sky floats Solana expansion, Zeta Markets announces Solana L2, TAO rallies ahead of smart contract rollout, Aptos partners with Nvidia-backed AI initiative, Iggy Azalea unveils crypto casino, and Fractal Bitcoin craters.

✍️ In today’s newsletter:

Hamster Kombat airdrop controversy
Kamala Harris says she will support digital assets
Markets rally as Fed cut spurs inflows
Samourai Wallet founders face trial
Ethereum researchers deanonymize validators
Sky plots Solana expansion
CATI airdrop falls flat
Zeta Markets unveils Solana L2
TAO surges ahead of upgrades
Aptos Foundation teams up with Ignition AI
Iggy Azalea to launch online casino
Fractal Bitcoin’s FB pulls back

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Goat Network is the first BTC L2 to offer sustainable BTC yield

DIA launches ‘Lumina’ – a brand-new trustless oracle network. Its modular, rollup-based design enables the verifiable sourcing and delivery of any data to any blockchain. Fully decentralized and permissionless.

🔥 Hamster Kombat Faces Backlash For Excluding 57% Of Users From Airdrop

Hamster Kombat is facing backlash over its highly-anticipated airdrop, with only 43% of users qualifying for the drop and many players claiming they were wrongfully excluded. Users will receive 60% of the token’s supply, with an additional 15% earmarked for its Season 2 distribution.

🇺🇸 Kamala Harris Pledges To Support Digital Asset Industry In First Public Crypto Comments

Kamala Harris publicly commented on cryptocurrency for the first time, telling a fundraising event that she will “encourage” innovation in digital assets “while protecting consumers.” However, many in the crypto community are skeptical, theorizing that DeFi and web3 may not find support from a Harris presidency.

🚀Crypto Markets Rally as Fed Cut Spurs Institutional Inflows

Cryptocurrency markets continued to rally on Monday after the Federal Reserve's decision to lower interest rates by 0.50% last week triggered inflows into digital asset investment products. Ether has outperformed Bitcoin since the rate cut even as investment products linked to the second-largest cryptocurrency continue to bleed assets.

🗡️ Samourai Wallet Founders Face Judge Over Money Laundering Charges

The founders of Samourai Wallet are under trial in New York in a landmark case for crypto and privacy. The U.S. Department of Justice alleges the pair conspired to commit money laundering and operate as an unlicensed money-transmitting business.

👀 Ethereum Researchers Warn Node Operators Can Be Deanonymized

Five Ethereum researchers published a paper claiming they were able to deanonymize more than 15% of validators after operating four nodes for three days. The paper notes three other research papers using similar techniques to deanonymize nodes and offers strategies for combating the attack.

🌈 Sky Preps for Solana Expansion

Sky (formerly MakerDAO) announced plans to expand its newly launched tokens onto Solana using the Wormhole bridge. The news was revealed during the Solana Breakpoint conference, with Jump Crypto announcing the testnet deployment of its Firedancer client at the same event.

🌐 Zeta Markets Plots Solana L2 Despite Ecosystem Opposition

Zeta Markets also made new product announcements during Solana Breakpoint, with the project announcing plans for a Solana-based Layer 2 network. The move comes despite L2 scaling being a contentious subject within the Solana community.

🐈 Swipe-to-Earn Telegram Game ‘Catizen’ Airdrops CATI Token

Catizen completed its long-awaited airdrop last week, distributing 34% of CATI’s supply to more than 2 million users. However, the drop frustrated recipients when Catizen suddenly announced a reduced community allocation on the eve of the drop.

🚀 Bittensor’s TAO Rallies Ahead of Smart Contracts Launch

The price of Bittensor’s TAO token has doubled in two weeks as the project readies to launch smart contract functionality. TAO also benefited from a broader alt Layer 1 comeback, with L1s among the strongest performing top 100 cryptocurrencies last week.

🌍 ELSEWHERE

Hong Kong monetary regulator launches second phase of CBDC project (CryptoSlate)
Bitfarms and Riot Platforms reach settlement agreement in takeover saga (The Block)
Canada Moves Away From Retail CBDC, Shifts Focus to Broader Payments (CoinDesk)
PYTH Stakers Get Carrots and Sticks as Douro Labs Rejigs Staking Mechanism (Unchained)