Coinbase announces suspension of BUSD trading beginning March 13 (2 minute read)
Coinbase announced that it will suspend trading of Binance USD (BUSD) on March 13, citing its "listing standards" as the reason behind the decision. The suspension will apply to all Coinbase services, and users will still have access to their funds. The decision follows reports earlier in the month of a Wells Notice by the SEC and an order from the New York State Department of Financial Services to Paxos to stop issuing BUSD. Paxos is now apparently in constructive talks with the SEC.
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NFT Weekly Trading Volume on Ethereum Rises to Highest Level Since May (2 minute read)
With arguably some of the best buy-side liquidity the NFT ecosystem has seen to date, NFT trading volume on ETH hit its highest level since May this past week. This spike in volume comes on the heels of Blur’s token drop in mid-February, which rewarded activity on its platform. With another tranche of 300 million BLUR tokens to drop at some point, Blur has been dominating NFT trading volume since the airdrop. One of the main incentive mechanisms Blur is leveraging is bidding activity. This has led to unprecedented liquidity in NFT order books. One trading firm, Degenz Finance, took advantage of this liquidity last week, cashing out 72 BAYCs for ~$9.25m in a move that would have been nearly impossible before this bidding liquidity injection.
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Scroll’s zk-EVM Layer 2 Goes Live on Ethereum’s Goerli Testnet (4 minute read)
Scroll has launched its zk-EVM on the Goerli testnet in an alpha testing phase ahead of a planned mainnet launch late this year. The network uses zero-knowledge proofs to achieve scalability, while maintaining EVM compatibility, making it easy for developers to port applications over to the network. There are two main ways to develop zk-EVMs: leveraging a programming language designed for zero-knowledge proofs or using Solidity. Those that are built with zk-native languages are easier to build but make it more difficult for developers to port to. zk-EVMs built with Solidity are harder to develop initially but make it much easier for projects to port over to. Scroll hopes that by using the latter approach, they will achieve greater adoption. Scroll is one of several projects competing for zk-EVM adoption, but Scroll believes there is room for co-existence between these competitors.
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Mitsubishi, Fujitsu and Other Tech Firms to Create ‘Japan Metaverse Economic Zone’ (1 minute read)
Nine Japanese companies, including Fujitsu, Mitsubishi and Mizuho, have teamed up to create RYUGUKOKU (TBD) - an interoperable metaverse structure - to help build the framework for corporations to adopt Web3 services. The platform will implement Auto-Learning Avatars, the Pegasus World Kit, and the Multi-Magic Passport to enable a personalized metaverse experience with identification and payment methods. The move is part of the Japanese government's digital transformation plan, which includes forays into NFTs and the metaverse.
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Binance Smart Chain: Sleeping Giant (4 minute read)
Binance Smart Chain is the most active smart contract platform and has the most users and developers, yet it has little mindshare in the crypto community and relatively few DeFi applications. This could be due to the low quality of protocols on the chain. Its lack of mindshare could also be due to Westerners not being quite as familiar with the chain and its protocols. Even so, user count and developer activity has remained incredibly high even in the bear market, suggesting the potential that exists there. This deep dive highlights some of the surprising levels of activity on the chain and why BSC may be a sleeping giant.
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A Guide to the Upcoming Shanghai Upgrade and What it Means for Staking and DeFi (4 minute read)
The upcoming Shanghai Upgrade will allow validators to withdraw their staked ETH from the Beacon Chain, which could have a significant impact on withdrawal mechanics, staking derivatives, and DeFi markets. This thread dives into a few of the potential effects this could have on the markets. The upgrade could lead to increased participation in derivatives and ETH staking, improved liquidity for staking derivatives, and more profitable borrowing strategies. While this thread lays out some bullish dynamics for LSDs and how the upgrade could increase capital efficiency for DeFi users, macro sentiment will likely still play a large part in whether ETH stakers are looking to get risk-on or stay risk-off.
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Some personal user experiences by Vitalik (8 minute read)
In this short essay, Vitalk walks through some of the UX issues he has faced as a crypto consumer over time. He’s experienced it all: unreliable internet, UI glitches, broken social-recovery systems, confusing gas limits, and much, much more. Solutions such as EIP-1559 and Merge have been implemented to improve the user experience and increase decentralization, but there is still quite a bit left to be desired in crypto when it comes to user experience. While crypto natives are accustomed to these headaches, these issues can be extremely frustrating for non-crypto natives. Furthermore, Vitalik points out that good UX is not even about the average case but about the worst case, so even if only a small portion of users face UX issues, it could create meaningful roadblocks in terms of user adoption.
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Don’t Call It ‘Crypto’: How Some Blockchain and NFT Projects are Rebranding (6 minute read)
Crypto and associated buzzwords like “NFT” and “blockchain” have developed a negative connotation to some, so some companies are rebranding to more mainstream terms like “Digital Collectibles”. Even if under a different name, Instagram, Square Enix, Riot Platforms and Reddit are still embracing these technologies, and experts believe that as people become more accustomed to them, the negative sentiment will subside. The article claims that in the long run, it will not matter what the technology is called. The crux of the matter is that while rebranding efforts can help, the key lies in informing and educating the public on the technology’s value propositions.
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