Get your daily, bite-sized digest of cryptoasset and blockchain-related news – investigating the stories flying under the radar of today’s crypto news.
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Investments news
- Ethereum (ETH) scaling platform Polygon (MATIC) announced a USD 400m deal with zero-knowledge (ZK) startup Mir in an attempt to scale Ethereum further and “bring millions of users to Web 3.0.” The structure of the acquisition was not specified. ZK proofs are a scaling solution because it allows many Ethereum transactions to be verified with a single tiny proof. “But until now, generating ZK proofs has been slow and inefficient. Mir has solved this problem by generating recursive proofs faster than ever before,” according to Polygon. (Watch: Polygon’s Co-founder On ‘Holy Grail’ of Scaling, Ethereum Merge, NFTs, and More)
- The managing director of SoftBank’s Latin America Fund, Paulo Passoni, stated that approximately 10% of one of the firm’s USD 5bn funds is invested in cryptoassets, which is a strategy he supports even if some tokens are overvalued, per Bloomberg. He was quoted as saying that the crypto market is “the most relevant thing going on around the globe right now.”
- Programmable liquidity mining protocol izumi announced it has closed its Series A fundraising round of USD 3.5m. The funds are going to facilitate izumi’s native token (iZi) launch, which will happen on December 20th, and will be followed by the launch of the izumi “LiquidBox” platform on December 21, they said.
- Crypto derivatives firm Paradigm has closed a USD 35m Series A funding round, which values the company at USD 400m. It was co-led by Jump Capital and Alameda Ventures, with over 25 investors participating. Per the press release, the company works with over 600 institutions, while trading volumes on the network have increased upwards of 1,300% year-over-year to USD 10m in total volume traded per month.
NFTs news
- Global soft drink giant Pepsi announced its first non-fungible token (NFT) series called the Pepsi Mic Drop genesis collection. Pepsi is creating 1,893 (to mark the year Pepsi was ‘born’) unique generative-style NFTs that will go live on the Ethereum blockchain on Friday, December 10, free for users (outside of gas fees).
- The Ross Ulbricht Genesis Collection NFT auction raised ETH 1446 (USD 6.27m), while the auction winner was FreeRossDAO, a group that says they are supporters of Ross Ulbricht and prison reform. All proceeds raised from the auction will not be owned by Ulbricht or his family, but by a legally separate entity that will redistribute proceeds towards the Art4Giving fund, as well as towards the efforts to free Ulbricht by new legal proceedings, raising awareness, and more.
Adoption news
- Social media platform Reddit has launched a waitlist for the upcoming site-wide expansion of its Ethereum-based “Community Points” token rewards program, as well as a dedicated website. Redditors will be able to earn Community Points by making contributions to a subreddit, such as creating and uploading valuable content, or volunteering to moderate the community, while selling, exchanging or trading the points are against the site’s rules.
- Crowdfunding platform Kickstarter said it will be launching a new company that will eventually see its website move to a blockchain-based system on Celo (CELO).
- Ava Labs, the developer of Avalanche (AVAX), has been selected to join Mastercard Start Path Crypto, a startup engagement program dedicated to exploring blockchain technology. Ava Labs will connect with Mastercard’s ecosystem of partners and digital players across the globe to expand and accelerate blockchain technology innovation, they said.
- Binance Charity, the blockchain-enabled donation platform, said it has partnered with Code To Inspire in oder to launch a three-month pilot project. The program aims to fund and support 100 young women in Afghanistan, who have lost their jobs as a result of the Taliban takeover, through computer education. Binance Charity will open Trust Wallets for each student, to which the binance USD (BUSD) stablecoin will be directly transferred. Students can convert BUSD to local currency at local money exchanges.
Exchanges news
- Bybit said its user base increased 77% in the third quarter this year, compared with the second quarter, reaching around 4.8 million users globally. The platform also said it saw more than USD 1.7trn worth of cryptoasset transactions in the third quarter, compared with USD 1trn in the first quarter of this year.
Career news
- Decentralized exchange SushiSwap (SUSHI) Chief Technology Officer Joseph Delong announced that he is stepping away from the project “effective immediately.” He stated that the current problems that the protocol is facing are “unlikely” to result in an acceptable resolution, and warned the community to be “wary of any self-proclaimed leaders arising from the current core team.”
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