⬇️Weekly Recap: Digital Assets Shrug Off German BTC Sales

Happy weekend Defiers!

Digital assets rebounded throughout most of the week after suffering a violent weekend sell-off in response to Mt. Gox’s long-awaited creditor repayments commencing.

Crypto investors had much to celebrate throughout the week, with U.S. inflation sinking to a three-year low after the Federal Reserve chairman cautioned against prolonging high interest rates, and spot Bitcoin ETFs posting their strongest inflow in five weeks.

The recovery came in spite of heavy selling from German authorities, which offloaded $2.2 billion worth of BTC in the past five days. The German government now holds just 0.004 BTC, down from 50,000 on June 19.

The U.S. regulatory climate for digital assets may be improving, with Rostin Behnam, the chair of the CFTC, telling U.S. senators that at least 70% of cryptocurrencies are not securities. However, the CFTC requested greater authority over the digital asset sector, including spot markets.

Donald Trump is doubling down on his pro-crypto pivot with backing from the Republican Party. The party published its policy platform, pledging to champion web3 innovation and upend the Democrat’s alleged crypto crackdown.

More than 120 DeFi front-end interfaces were placed at risk of domain name server (DNS) attacks as Google migrated its domain business to Squarespace. The websites for Compound, Celer, and Pendle were briefly compromised after the incident caused the two-factor authentication securing websites to be disabled.

Grayscale is targeting July 18 to convert its Ethereum Trust into a spot Ether ETF. Analysts are tipping that the SEC will give final approval to the prospective funds next week.

Solana’s flagship DEX, Raydium overtook Ethereum’s Uniswap by revenue. Solana’s liquid staking sector has also ballooned to represent 7% of SOL’s market cap.

Tokenized real-world assets continue to gather momentum, with BlackRock’s on-chain U.S. treasuries fund, BUIDL, becoming the first of its kind to surpass $500 million in assets under management less than four months after launching. The milestone coincides with on-chain treasuries growing by 130% this year.

Plus, Terraform Labs to sell four businesses amid bankruptcy proceedings, Starkware proposes STRK staking mechanism, Curve Finance hosts record CRV locks, and the SEC abandons its investigation into Paxos and BUSD.

Plus, check out our podcast with the famed technologist, Noah Seidman, to get his take on the crypto sector.

Enjoy!

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PODCAST & INTERVIEWS

The Most Rational View on Crypto with Noah Seidman, AKA Captain Rational

In this week’s podcast, Tegan Kline was joined by Noah Seidman, a technologist with two decades of experience who has been contemplating cryptocurrency with a long-term perspective.

The conversation dives into Seidman’s entrance and macro perspective on crypto, Bitcoin’s position as a reserve currency within the sector, web3 investment strategies, and his tips for staying on top of market news.

Dubai: The New Epicenter of Crypto | Dubai Blockchain Center CEO Dr. Marwan Al Zarouni

The Defiant spoke to Al Zarouni, the CEO of the Dubai Blockchain Center and a strategic advisor on blockchain technology to Dubai's government.

Zarouni offers insights into Dubai’s bid to establish itself as a global hub for blockchain and distributed ledger technology, including investment, regulation, and education.

Friday

• Usual Money Releases Public Mainnet and Incentives Program Usual’s RWA-backed stablecoin has quickly made its way into the top 25 rankings after launching a points campaign.
• Bitcoin Price Dips As Germany Offloads $2B Of BTC In One Week The German government appears to have offloaded 92% of its BTC holdings since June 19.
• More Than 120 DeFi Front-End Could Be Vulnerable To DNS Attacks The migration of Google’s domain registrar to Squarespace resulted in more than 120 DeFi domains becoming vulnerable to DNS attacks.

Thursday

• MOCA Token Soars to $800M Fully-Diluted Valuation as Mocaverse NFTs Crater MOCA’s price doubled since debuting while Mocaverse NFTs’ floor price crashed 47%.
• Malaysian Government Blames Bitcoin Mining for Electricity Theft Malaysia’s Minister of Energy and Water said the country lost $682 million since 2018.
• SEC Drops Investigation into Stablecoin Issuer Paxos The move comes just two weeks after a U.S. federal judge ruled that BUSD does not comprise a security.
• Crypto Markets Surge On Inflation Hitting Three-Year Low Investors anticipate the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates later this year in response to inflation dipping.
• CFTC Chair Asserts At Least 70% of Crypto Assets Are Not Securities Behnam claimed the vast majority of cryptocurrencies aren’t securities and urged Congress to grant the agency more authority over digital assets, including spot markets.
• BitMEX Pleads Guilty to Bank Secrecy Act Violations The company admitted to failing to establish an adequate anti-money laundering (AML) program.

Wednesday

• Lyra Finance Offers Leveraged Exposure to ETH Through Ethena The platform launched its sUSDeBULL vault, providing depositors with leveraged exposure to Ethena’s yield-bearing stablecoin.
• Starkware Introduces Proposal For Staking on Starknet by End of Year Starkware plans to progressively roll out staking services for STRK holders.
• Terraform Labs To Sell Four Businesses Amid Bankruptcy Proceedings Terraform Labs is looking to offload its businesses Pulsar, Station, Warp, and Enterprise as part of its bankruptcy process.
• Messi-Promoted Memecoin Faces Backlash Over Alleged Hefty Insider Allocations On-chain analysts believe roughly one dozen wallets control more than one-third of WATER’s supply.
• Crypto Markets Rally as Fed Chair Cautions Against Prolonged High Interest Rates Digital assets continue to recover following the heavy weekend sell-off.
• Filecoin Foundation Partners With Theoriq To Build Smart AI Agents Filecoin is looking to foster AI agents to help users explore its decentralized database amid a push into artificial intelligence.

Tuesday

• Curve Finance Users are Locking Record Amounts of CRV Tokens in the DEX Users locked 51 million CRV in one week, surpassing the previous record of 24 million from October 2022.
• Grayscale Targets July 18 for Potential ETH ETF Creation Grayscale is aiming to convert the Grayscale Ethereum Trust into a spot ETF on July 18.
• Liquid Staking on Solana Soars To All-Time High Liquid staking tokens now account for 7% of SOL’s market cap after growing 127% since the start of the year.
• Crypto Markets Rally as Spot Bitcoin ETFs Record Highest Inflows Since June 6 Spot Bitcoin ETFs hosted their strongest week inflow in five weeks.
• Paxful's Co-Founder Pleads Guilty to Anti-Money Laundering Charges Schaback faces up to five years in prison and will face sentencing on Nov. 4.
• Trump Doubles Down On Pro-Crypto Pivot In RNC-Backed Policy Doc The Republican policy platform pledges to champion innovation in the web3 sector.
• Blackrock’s Tokenized Treasuries Fund BUIDL Tops $500M The on-chain U.S. Treasuries sector has grown by 133% in 2024 to tag $1.8 billion.

Monday

• Solana DEX Raydium Flips Uniswap in Weekly Fees Millions of spam transactions on Solana are bolstering Raydium’s fee income.
• Crypto Markets Roiled as Mt. Gox’s Multi-Billion Payouts Start Mt. Gox, the failed pioneering crypto exchange, began paying out its creditors after a decade-long wait.
• Zircuit Loses Half a Billion in TVL as Phase Two of Rewards Program Kicks Off Zircuit’s TVL dropped nearly 20% to $2.1 billion in one week, and peaked at $3.5 billion in early May.
• Friend.Tech Plummets After Abandoning FriendChain FRIEND plummeted to new lows after Friend.Tech bailed on its plans to launch a native blockchain.
• Nuklai and Filecoin Team Up To Decentralize Data For Training AI Models The partnership comes after web3 AI tokens suffered heavy drawdowns in recent weeks.
• Will Spot Ethereum ETFs Live Up to the Hype? Analysts Weigh In The Defiant spoke to experts to get their take on the impact of impending spot Ethereum ETFs entering the market.

TRENDING

• CFTC Chair Asserts At Least 70% of Crypto Assets Are Not Securities
• Lyra Finance Offers Leveraged Exposure to ETH Through Ethena
• Terraform Labs To Sell Four Businesses Amid Bankruptcy Proceedings
• Messi-Promoted Memecoin Faces Backlash Over Alleged Hefty Insider Allocations
• Crypto Markets Rally as Fed Chair Cautions Against Prolonged High Interest Rates
• Filecoin Foundation Partners With Theoriq To Build Smart AI Agents
• Curve Finance Users are Locking Record Amounts of CRV Tokens in the DEX
• Grayscale Targets July 18 for Potential ETH ETF Creation
• Liquid Staking on Solana Soars To All-Time High
• Crypto Markets Rally as Spot Bitcoin ETFs Record Highest Inflows Since June 6
• Paxful's Co-Founder Pleads Guilty to Anti-Money Laundering Charges
• Trump Doubles Down On Pro-Crypto Pivot In RNC-Backed Policy Doc
• Blackrock’s Tokenized Treasuries Fund BUIDL Tops $500M
• Solana DEX Raydium Flips Uniswap in Weekly Fees
• Crypto Markets Roiled as Mt. Gox’s Multi-Billion Payouts Start