Ether.fi Launches NFTs Backed By Staked ETH

BTC, ETH and BNB Trade At A Premium On Binance.US After Court Orders Asset Freeze

This week, as the markets plunged on war fear and storms lashed the U.S. and the Canadian government clamped down on the financial accounts of protestors, we totally geeked out. Sometimes there’s just nothing better than rolling up your sleeves and diving into the mechanics of DeFi, right?

For starters, check out Camila Russo’s 

 white paper when he was just 19. Vitalik shares how Ethereum can “build a base layer for the global economy” without compromising decentralization.

Then check out Brady Dale’s deep dive on the looming demise of 

 fork that’s dissolving due to governance issues. It’s the kind of 

that The Defiant prides itself on. Sam Haig, meanwhile, continued his spot-on coverage of the 

 on the latest cohort of winning projects and how they’re poised to build out the DOT ecosystem — an important sleeper story in DeFi. Sam also turned his eye to 

against a little-known but fascinating problem in blockchain manipulation.

Not that we didn’t raise our heads and take note of what else is happening in the world… Owen Fernau unearthed a very cool market trend in 

 ecosystem has quietly assumed the No. 2 position in DeFi in terms of TVL. He also penned a scoop on Michael Patryn, aka Sifu, the doxxed QuadrigaCX co-founder, launching the $SIFU token. And Robin Schmidt and his crew produced awesome videos on how to 

The open economy is taking over the old one. Subscribe to keep up with this revolution. 

 (for $100/yr) or sub with fiat by clicking on the button below ($15/mo, $150/yr).

is the best of Web3 in a token. This methodology-first tokenized-index provides broad-market exposure to Web3. Its constituents represent roughly 70% of the ecosystem. 

, providing the fastest private transactions on Ethereum (90%+ hashrate). Trade better anywhere on Ethereum with Eden Rocket RPC.

Zerion is Mission Control for Web3: an intuitive DeFi portfolio manager, multichain tracking & trading and the best place to show off your NFT collection

List and trade any futures contracts based on popular cryptocurrencies, altcoins, indices, NFTs and real-world assets — you name it!

Check out and subscribe to DeFi Alpha, a weekly newsletter by The Defiant and DeFi Dad, packed with tutorials and tips on how to earn yield in DeFi

20% Fixed Yield On ETH and BTC Using 88mph + Yield Farming on Metis

Our Inbox Dump newsletter, which is exclusive to paid subscribers, is where we

 include the updates and announcements that flood our DMs each week and didn’t make it to The Defiant’s content platforms. 

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

🎙 Vitalik Buterin on Building a Base Layer for the Global Economy Without Compromising on Decentralization

 white paper when he was just 19. His aim was simple yet comprehensive, to create a ‘world computer’ that was designed to be a flexible base layer for all online applications without the need of any third party. Since its inception in 2015, Ethereum has become the most active and largest smart contracts platform, but has it achieved the ‘world computer’ goal?

Vitalik says yes and no. In this interview, it seemed like almost a given to Vitalik that Ethereum will achieve this goal. The bigger concern is not whether the network becomes a settlement layer and decentralized engine for smart contracts used globally, but how much value and impact applications running on top of it will bring.

The Defiant Weekly: BNB Chain – what were they thinking?

Real Vision vs. The Defiant: IS NOW THE TIME FOR MASS ADOPTION OF CRYPTO?

First Look: Leverage just got sexy | Gearbox Protocol

Tuesday Tutorial: Maximising Stablecoin Yield – Safe or Degen?

Another Fork Bites the Dust: The Looming Fall of Fortress DAO and the Perils of Off-Chain Governance

 goes deep into the travails of Fortress DAO, a small project with outsized implications for DAO governance and the Olympus DAO ecosystem.

Fortress DAO is doomed. The question is how it dies. The crux of the matter is that this particular decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) isn’t really decentralized at all, and its investors are paying the price for getting in on a governance token, FORT, that has power in rhetoric only.

Fortress is an also-ran fork of Olympus DAO running on the Avalanche blockchain with a mere $14M in its treasury (a shadow of the more than $500M+ still backing Olympus’s OHM), but feelings are running very high right now over what should happen with that money.

The problem is that the $14M isn’t really in its treasury anyway. It’s in a separate project, one that was funded by the Fortress DAO treasury, but is now completely in control of its chief technical officer, Avraham Eisenberg, who has shown no interest in giving it back.

Community members that spoke to The Defiant predicted the matter could very well find its way to court. But for now, code is very much law and that particular law is not on the Fortress DAO community’s side.

The Ultimate Beginners Guide To The Axie Infinity Game and Marketplace

 unpacks Axie Infinity’s gameplay, use of NFTs, and tokenomics.

The Axie Infinity game is one of the biggest and most well-known Web 3.0 platforms, built on a blockchain and making use of Non-Fungible Tokens (‘NFTs’). The use of the Axie Infinity ecosystem has skyrocketed in recent times.

 with a means of earning an income due to job displacement from the Covid-19 pandemic. They earned so much that the government declared that revenue generated from this platform was subject to 

With nearly three million daily active players and $3.6 billion traded through its in-house NFT marketplace (as per its 

), it’s worth looking into Axie Infinity for the gameplay and the potential return on investment.

Axie Infinity is a Play-To-Earn game, built on a distributed ledger (aka a blockchain), where Axies are represented as NFTs, which are stored on a blockchain. Axies can be sold through the in-house peer-to-peer marketplace. The Axie game is built on the Ethereum blockchain, and the Axies are priced in ETH, the native cryptocurrency for Ethereum.

Buying Real World Assets By Leveraging Crypto

A lot of people say crypto has no “real-world use cases”. “What can you buy with it?” someone will ask, at which point the other person will shrug back “JPEGs on the internet?”

The truth is, you can use crypto to buy anything you want in the material world. You can even enjoy the same tax perks used by the wealthy when they buy things, by borrowing against your assets instead of selling them.

In this article, I’m going to show you how you can use all sorts of crypto assets to make real-world purchases while staying invested, minimizing your tax bill and generating cash flow. Does it really work? Yes, it does, and I’ll show you how.

Cosmos Ecosystem Quietly Surges to $17B in TVL in Challenge to Ethereum Layer 2s

This was supposed to be the Cosmos’ ecosystem banner year. And in a way, it already is. By itself Terra, a blockchain built using the 

 (software development kit), is the No. 3 ranking chain in total value locked (TVL) terms at $17.32B as of Feb. 16, according to 

Winners in Second Round of Polkadot Parachains Poised to Add Mojo to Expanding DOT Ecosystem

Bidding for Polkadot’s tenth parachain lease auction has 

, with teams competing for an early seat at the table in building out Polkadot’s burgeoning ecosystem.

DEX Takes Aim at Protecting Blockchains from Manipulation and ‘Slippage’

Hashflow, a decentralized exchange offering protection from MEV, has launched on Ethereum’s leading Layer 2, Arbitrum.

What’s Sifu Up To? Eponymous Token May Foreshadow New Project 

-led network of DeFi projects, has now launched a token. The ticker? 

Sequoia Capital is launching a $500-600 million crypto fund to invest in tokens: The Block

The Graph Backers Launch $205M Ecosystem Fund to Provide Grants to Dapp Builders: CoinDesk

Circle valued at $9 billion under revamped SPAC deal terms: The Block

Terra, CEO Do Kwon Ordered to Comply With SEC Subpoena Related to Mirror Protocol Investigation: CoinDesk

You’re not going to want to miss @saraareynolds’ keynote at Opening Ceremonies tonight on how we can build Web3 to create sustainable, transformative impact: Uniswap

Stop by the Infinity Stage tomorrow at 1:40pm to see Facu Ameal talk about “How to Become a Mighty Strategist” : Yearn Finance

Upstart’s Vampire Attack on OpenSea Fizzles After Technical Issues and Criticism 

OpenSea, the Leading NFT marketplace, is again under vampire attack, this time from new rival, x2y2. But the assault quickly stalled after a number of technical glitches halted an airdrop and triggered accusations that the project was manipulating the price of its token.

Stablecoin Supply’s Steady Rise Shows ‘Increased Belief’ in Digital Assets Despite Market Rout

Anyone paying attention to crypto in the last three months knows it has been anything but calm. There’s been jaw-dropping 

, all while the market has lost a staggering $1T in value since November.

Influential Policy Body Warns that DeFi May Shake Stability of Global Financial System

The TradFi eestablishment has taken a long, hard look at DeFi. And it does not like what it sees. The Financial Stability Board (FSB), an international body that helps shape policy in the world’s biggest nations, said yesterday that DeFi protocols could undermine confidence in the global financial system.

Canada Sanctions 34 Crypto Wallets Tied to Trucker ‘Freedom Convoy’: CoinDesk

Coalition of US crypto firms unveils travel rule compliance platform, TRUST: The Block

THE NEXT MEGA-TRADE HAS BEGUN: Pantera Capital

Castle Island Ventures announces new $250 million fund for web3 investments: The Block

The source of funds for the winning bid in Melania Trump’s first NFT auction appears to be the creators of the project themselves: Bloomberg

Ok, my last post prompted me to do a survey. I have no vested interest (not promoting any alternative but listening).

LooksRare Team Reaps $31M Windfall as Token Plunges 70% From All-Time High

LooksRare’s rise has been so meteoric that in just a few weeks its trading volume has outpaced mighty OpenSea. Now it appears the LooksRare team transferred roughly 10,500 wrapped ETH (wETH), worth more than $31M, to personal wallets, according to 

Reversal in NFT Market Triggers Plunge in Ethereum Burn Rate

Declining activity in the NFT markets led to a plunge in Ethereum’s burn rate in February, according to 

, a data aggregator tracking activity on the Ethereum network.

How to Guide: Buying Real World Assets By Leveraging Crypto

A DAO that funds students to attend crypto events loses half its budget to risky management: The Block

ARK Analysts call $1M BTC, $180K ETH | Bullish Crypto Price Predictions: Bankless

SEC Enforcement Against Wonderland Could Mean Trouble for DeFi: CoinDesk

Why Larry David was the perfect ‘anti-sponsor’ of FTX’s Super Bowl ad, according to Jeff Schaffer: The Block

Hey #LUNAtics, let’s prepare for the upcoming launch of @SuberraProtocol, Recurring Payments Protocol for Web 3.0 built on @terra_money: Terra Daily

Hello Defiers! Happy weekend!

This week, as the markets plunged on war fear and storms lashed the U.S. and the Canadian government clamped down on the financial accounts of protestors, we totally geeked out. Sometimes there’s just nothing better than roll...

🦄 Recap: DeFi Week of Feb. 13