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That may be true, but neither have what ETH enjoys NOW....that's the no. 2 spot on the totem pole. That won't change anytime soon. XRP beats everyone absolutely EVERYONE, with fast cheap transactions. .00001 xrp...no one comes close.
This is nice news and all for ETH but we already have that with Layer 2 Polygon Matic. Takes seconds for transactions and it is dirt cheap.
Ethereum Layer 2 Service StarkNet Goes Live on Alchemy, Promises 100x Lower Gas Fees
By Jeff John Roberts
Mar 7, 2022
3 min read
StarkNet is the latest Layer 2 solution to arrive on the scene, promising to slash Ethereum gas costs.
In brief
* StarkNet relies on ZK technology to process masses of transactions
quickly and cheaply.
* A number of major crypto players, including Alchemy and Immutable, are
already using it.
Don't look now, but there are signs that Ethereum's high-gas-fee woes may be abating. Those high fees have long been a source of frustration for Ethereum users, but a series of so-called Layer 2 innovations have begun to offer a fix—the latest in the form of StarkNet, which is now integrated into crypto infrastructure giant Alchemy's development kit.
For those unfamiliar, the idea of Layer 2 solutions (aka "roll-ups") is to process big batches of transactions apart from Ethereum's core blockchain, and then periodically write a record of those activities to Ethereum itself. The idea is to produce high transaction volumes at a much lower cost, all while creating the same immutable records as Ethereum.
StarkNet was created by an Israeli company called StarkWare that's raised $173 million in funding. StarkNet is hardly the first to deploy its Layer 2 solution—other rollup options include the likes of Polygon, Optimism and Arbitrum, which have gained traction the past two years.
But StarkNet is getting buzz because it relies on a form of cryptography known as zero knowledge proofs (ZK in crypto speak). ZK entails showing something to be true without also disclosing other private information—akin to showing your driver's license to prove you are 21, but without also revealing your name or address.
And in terms of rollups, ZK-based computations are much faster than a competing technology known as optimistic rollups, which can take up to a week to clear. StarkNet describes its gas fees as "100x lower" than transactions on the Ethereum base layer.
"We're driving towards Vitalik’s vision of five-cent transactions," said Alchemy product manager, Mike Garland, referring to Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin.
Alchemy's integration of StarkNet is significant because the company provides behind-the-scenes support to a large swath of Web3, with customers ranging from banks to crypto exchanges. Alchemy clients now will have an option to build services using the low-cost StarkNet tools—a development that Garland suggests could supercharge Web3 app development.
"StarkNet’s utilization of Validity and ZK-rollups effectively solves core Web3 problems. Validity rollups increase scalability by bundling transactions together off-chain, and then verifying them on-chain with just a fraction of the cost," Alchemy said in a statement.
Alchemy isn't the only major crypto player to deploy StarkNet—Immutable, an NFT gaming startup that just raised $200 million, is counting on StarkNet to make its transaction-heavy operations affordable.
It's too soon to say if StarkNet—or the passel of other Layer 2 contenders—will rescue Ethereum users from sky-high transaction fees once and for all, but the technology certainly appears to be moving in that direction.
https://decrypt.co/94549/ethereum-alchemy-starknet
Haters gonna hate. I know what’s coming
Ethereum miners generated $1.19 billion in revenues during February
by Catarina Moura
March 4, 2022, 10:41AM EST · 1 min read
Ethereum miners brought in $1.19 billion in revenue in February.
Most of these revenues came from the block subsidy ($1.09 billion) and only a small portion from transaction fees ($109.77 million).
The numbers reveal a decrease in revenue totals for the third month in a row, with a month-over-month decrease of 15.3% between January and February.
Total revenues were $2.07 billion in November 2021 and have been going down since. They hit an all-time high in May 2021, with a total of $2.4 billion.
https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/136393/eth-ethereum-mining-february-data?utm_source=basicrss&utm_medium=rss
Andreessen Horowitz invests $70M in Ethereum staking protocol Lido
March 03 2022 - 03:15PM
Cointelegraph
The venture capital firm said Lido's liquid staking solution removes many "operational complexities" institutional investors have faced in staking ETH.
https://ih.advfn.com/stock-market/COIN/BTCUSD/crypto-news/87457273/andreessen-horowitz-invests-70m-in-ethereum-staki
SAM BOURGI
52 MINUTES AGO
Andreessen Horowitz invests $70M in Ethereum staking protocol Lido
The venture capital firm said Lido's liquid staking solution removes many "operational complexities" institutional investors have faced in staking ETH.
Ethereum staking solution Lido Finance has raised $70 million from venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz, marking the protocol’s first funding round since May 2021.
Andreessen Horowitz’s investment in Lido is intended to further support the adoption of decentralized staking solutions for Ethereum 2.0, a spokesperson for the venture capital firm said. Ethereum 2.0 marks a significant shift in the network’s consensus algorithm by ushering in the adoption of proof-of-stake (PoS) and other upgrades that could enhance scalability and reduce fees. The transition to Ethereum 2.0, which began in November 2020, is still ongoing.
According to Andreessen, staking Ether (ETH) has significant barriers due to the high threshold for operating a node. To become a full validator, users must be able to stake at least 32 ETH, which is worth over $90,000 at current prices.
In addition to investing in Lido, Andreessen said it’s staking a portion of its ETH holdings on the BNB Beacon Chain through the protocol. “Staking with Lido removes many of the operational complexities that institutional investors have faced,” the venture firm said.
Ethereum's BNB Beacon Chain recently registered its 300,000th validator, according to industry data. At the time of writing, nearly 9.7 million ETH had been staked for a total value of over $27.1 billion.
Although terms like Ethereum 2.0 and Eth2 are still widely used in the industry, the Ethereum Foundation announced in January it would ditch such terminology. Instead, it now refers to the original Ethereum blockchain as the "execution layer" and the PoS chain as the "consensus layer."
Founded in 2020, Lido Finance offers a liquid staking solution for Ethereum 2.0, allowing users to stake their ETH with no lockups or minimum deposits. As Cointelegraph reported, Lido also supports other tokens, having only recently added Kusama liquid staking.
Lido concluded a $73 million funding round in May 2021 that was led by crypto venture capital firm Paradigm. Three Arrows Capital, Alameda Research, Digital Currency Group and Alameda Research also contributed.
https://cointelegraph.com/news/andreessen-horowitz-invests-70m-in-ethereum-staking-protocol-lido
KPMG Canada Buys World of Women Ethereum NFT, ENS Domain Name
The company paid 25 ETH ($70,000) for Woman #2681, calling the purchase its "first foray into this rapidly growing asset class."
By Kate Irwin
Feb 28, 2022
2 min read
The Canadian outpost of the global accounting firm KPMG has purchased a World of Women (WoW) NFT and an Ethereum Name Service domain name just weeks after adding Bitcoin and Ethereum to its corporate treasury.
NFTs are unique blockchain tokens that signify ownership over an asset, like an image or a domain name. KPMG Canada has purchased two NFTs so far: It bought World of Women #2681 and minted kpmgca.eth. It paid 25 ETH ($70,000) for Woman #2681, who has blue skin and wavy hair.
“Women are underrepresented in the world of all things crypto, which makes us proud to make our first NFT acquisition in a collection that supports women,” KPMG Partner and National Risk Consulting Leader Nancy Chase said in a statement.
KPMG’s Cryptoassets and Blockchain Services co-leader Kareem Sadek believes NFTs have "numerous use cases," citing marketing, talent recruitment, philanthropy, and connecting with customers.
Not only does KPMG Canada believe in “the continued growth of NFTs,” but the firm also wants to help clients build corporate strategies around NFT acquisition and storage.
As to whether KPMG will purchase more NFTs in the future, Sadek told Decrypt that the company will look into NFT collections that “align with KPMG in Canada’s values and brand, and we will look for creative ways to invest in the space and support the right causes.”
https://decrypt.co/94027/kpmg-canada-buys-world-of-women-ethereum-nft-ens-domain-name
Leading English-language newspaper in Ukraine launches crypto donations
by Kollen Post
February 28, 2022, 11:13AM EST · 1 min read
One of Ukraine's main English-language news outlets has begun soliciting cryptocurrency donations to fund its work.
https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/135632/leading-english-language-newspaper-in-ukraine-launches-crypto-donations?utm_source=basicrss&utm_medium=rss
Ukraine Crypto Crowdfunding Effort Hits $20 Million: Report
Cryptocurrency donations sent to Ukraine following Russia’s invasion have exceeded $20 million, according to blockchain analytics platform Elliptic.
By Scott Chipolina
Feb 28, 2022
2 min read
https://decrypt.co/93990/ukraine-crypto-crowdfunding-effort-hits-20-million-report
Ukraine's official Twitter account posts pleas for crypto donations amid Russian invasion
by Michael McSweeney
February 26, 2022, 11:36AM EST · 3 min read
https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/135569/ukraines-official-twitter-account-posts-pleas-for-crypto-donations-amid-russian-invasion?utm_source=basicrss&utm_medium=rss
Ethereum Mining Pool Flexpool Halts All Services to Russia in Wake of Ukraine Invasion
The pool is possibly the first of its kind to cut services to Russian users.
By Eliza Gkritsi
Feb 25, 2022 at 5:38 a.m. EST
Updated Feb 25, 2022 at 2:11 p.m. EST
https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/02/25/ethereum-mining-pool-flexpool-halts-all-services-to-russia-in-wake-of-ukraine-invasion/
BUIDLing Among the Chaos: What Devs Discussed at ETHDenver
Tracy Wang
Feb 23, 2022
High school students, Web 2 converts and crypto founders spent a week building the future of finance in a jam-packed venue. What comes next?
The 10-day ETHDenver conference wrapped up Sunday afternoon with Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin donning a furry buffalo-unicorn costume on stage as he judged the conference’s hackathon finalists.
This year, ETHDenver drew thousands of developers – known as “BUIDLers” in cryptoland – to the Mile High City, despite ETH prices that dipped and dipped some more over the course of the week.
While the usual crypto conference debauchery occurred in Denver, this year’s conference stood out due to the sheer amount of actual building that occurred. Legions of T-shirt clad engineers were littered about hotel conference rooms, word-of-mouth hacker houses or the oversized bean bag chairs scattered throughout The Castle, an antiquated Chrysler showroom turned event space that hosted the majority of the show.
“ETHDenver is one of my favorite conferences because it’s super developer-focused,” said jacobc.eth, an operations lead at crypto wallet firm MetaMask and a guest judge for the ETHDenver hackathon. “Most crypto conferences are just people shilling their project’s token.” This one was for the hackers.
In this context, the term “hacking” means coding, a tongue-in-cheek reference to the word’s more internet-native definition: “exercising skill to the limit,” as hackathon projects are typically churned out in a span of mere hours or days.
“The culture at ETHDenver is around people building in an open source way that is really fun and celebratory,” jacobc.eth told CoinDesk in an interview at the conference.
CoinDesk spoke to a variety of attendees ranging from protocol founders to high school students, from Web 2 defectors to female code-shippers.
Full of starry-eyed optimism for the future of Web 3 and crypto, simply put, they came to Denver to BUIDL.
Meet the BUIDLers
It’s been over two years since Illia Polosukhin, co-founder of the $5.5 billion Near Protocol, says he’s seen his co-founder, Alex Skidanov, in person. The two finally crossed paths last week at ETHDenver and spent a few hours hacking together, just like old times.
“It brought us back to the days when we started Near in a room with a whiteboard,” Polosukhin told CoinDesk.
Polosukhin wasn’t the only prominent founder in attendance – Ethereum’s own Vitalik Buterin was spotted aiding developer teams, visiting hacker houses and even voicing his view on the Canadian trucker fiasco. (His fashion also made headlines.)
“I got to speak with Vitalik,” said Byeongjun Moon, a high school hacker and founder of PadawanDAO, a decentralized autonomous organization that sponsors budding crypto enthusiasts (who must be under 25 years old) to attend blockchain conferences.
“We sent about 70 young people to ETHDenver this year,” Moon, 16, told CoinDesk. The conference helped him “realize the importance of diverse perspectives in moving Ethereum forward.” Moon says he’s been involved with Ethereum since 2014, when he was just 9 years old.
Another developer, Konrad Gnat, came to ETHDenver seeking a new challenge after working for years in Web 2. He says this is the 10th Ethereum-related hackathon (including virtual ones) he’s attended since May 2021.
“I’ve built up a skill set in Web 2 already where now I feel confident building whatever I want,” he told CoinDesk at the post-conference ski retreat in Breckenridge. “In Web 3, you’re only limited by your imagination. It’s about skating to where the puck will be, not where it is.”
In-person networking
With February also marking the two-year anniversary of the coronavirus pandemic, the conference also marked the first time many project contributors have met their virtual collaborators in real life.
“Remote work has its benefits, but the iteration is slower,” said Near’s Polosukhin. “These types of events are important. It brings a bunch of creative people together.”
In addition to in-person collaboration, many attendees touted the importance of face-to-face networking. Despite the jam-packed days of panels and workshops, many attendees made time to attend a myriad of side events.
“ETH Denver was like next-level networking and bonding,” said Thy-Diep “Yip” Ta, co-founder of Unit Network, who participated in the hackathon as a delegate from the all-women H.E.R. DAO and also received a sponsorship from the team behind the Harmony blockchain.
The events are typically co-hosted by crypto exchanges, blockchain projects, DAOs, protocols or venture capital firms, and vary in scope from unassuming cocktail parties to nightclub raves featuring artists such as Tiesto (sponsored this year, somewhat improbably, by Bacon Coin).
Ta’s hackathon submission, Proof of Meditation, is a decentralized application (dapp) that takes a user’s heart rate during meditation sessions to generate unique pixel art NFTs. It won a prize in the “Impact” category.
She says she started each day with either a morning swim at 6:15 a.m. or a yoga meditation session at the H.E.R. DAO hacker house.
“The well-being sessions were super vital to keep the calm amidst the chaos,” Ta told CoinDesk.
Big incentives
Sponsorship recipients like Ta typically receive free airfare and accommodations from the sponsoring entity (typically a well-capitalized layer 1 blockchain) to attend the conference.
Skale, an Ethereum scaling solution, announced a $100 million ecosystem fund last Friday, a testament to the big incentives blockchain projects use to lure developers into building projects in their ecosystems.
“Our hackers are grinding,” Skale co-founder Jack O’Holleran told CoinDesk in an interview during the conference. “So far, they’ve made over 20 submissions on Skale.”
Last Thursday, data-querying project The Graph announced a similar $205 million ecosystem fund to support dapp development using its technology.
One day later, the Algorand Foundation announced it would award $20 million to developers building Ethereum-compatibility solutions or developer tooling for Algorand.
“The job of the foundation is to build good fertile ground for people to get involved with Algorand,” said Staci Warden, CEO of the Algorand Foundation. “That means grant-giving and providing assistance, including technical assistance.”
That’s up to folks like Ryan Fox, a member of Algorand’s developer relations, or “DevRel,” team. They’re more-extroverted builders (“developers who also like to talk to people,” per Near’s Polosukhin) who crucially serve as a project’s brand evangelists, fielding technical questions at booths or providing on-site technical assistance to builders during the hackathon.
“We had incredible engagement with devs using Reach to design and deploy their smart contracts to both Algorand and Ethereum simultaneously,” Fox told CoinDesk. “Beyond Web 3, the buzz focused on interoperability.”
Reach is a programming language that allows developers to use a few lines of JavaScript code to write Solidity smart contracts, the technical underpinnings of everything from non-fungible tokens (NFTs) to decentralized exchanges.
Near launched its new Web 3 startup platform Pagoda on Sunday. Pagoda is a set of tools to help developers more easily develop applications for Near.
“With Pagoda, we’re opening Near up to JavaScript developers,” said Marieke Flament, CEO of the Near Foundation. “We believe that’s what opens the door to be mainstream and increase the overall pool of talent.”
A ‘growth flywheel’
Many prominent developers compared the energy of the conference to the early days of Web 2, a term that refers to the reigning tech giants such as Google, Facebook or Amazon.
For many projects, that meant new product launches aimed at integrations or tools that streamlined the development process for engineers.
Jacobc.eth said MetaMask’s new Snaps system was inspired by a strategy used by Google Chrome, which he claimed provided the best developer tools to build websites during the rise of Web 2. As a result, many of today’s most popular websites were built on Chrome.
“It just created a growth flywheel,” he told CoinDesk.
Launched last week, MetaMask Snaps, available only on the developer build of MetaMask, allows third-party projects, such as Solana or Cosmos, to create their own application programming interfaces (APIs) for for the popular Ethereum wallet.
“There are a lot of teams here building using Snaps,” said jacobc.eth. “Some are being built by third-party teams, some by anonymous devs, some are being built in-house by our own team.”
On Tuesday, Ethereum sidechain Polygon announced the launch of Finity, a user interface (UI) development tool that offers Polygon developers a suite of “tried-and-tested assets, elements, and templates, with a focus on 3D design,” according to a press release.
“It’s wild right now,” said Skale’s O’Holleran. “There’s so many people building in Web 3 – everyone from the brilliant hackers in a college dorm room to the largest corporations.”
https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2022/02/23/buidling-among-the-chaos-what-devs-discussed-at-ethdenver/
Grabbed a cool $500 worth. Expecting it pulls back more though
You Will Not Have My Average! $ETHE @7.75 Pay Me! Add More $ETH Premium Ark World Computer! Metaverse @Facebook @Grayscale @Decentraland Professional 3!
I’d like to see this come down a bit more
Buying anything under $3000. Mark this Post.
YEP, as of Sept. 9 and 6 times thereafter.
Love my shiba;)
:p any of u guys in shiba aswell
Yeah right man lol $ETH $ETHE Premium Low Average Bulls Keep Adding More! World Computer @SaturnProtocol I’m A Professional! RSI + MACD
U had luck from Russia lol
I’m not usually wrong when it comes to stocks buddy
Well we did lol
She’s starting to creep back into the buy zone
Ethereum scaling startup Optimism discloses ‘critical bug’ fix
by Michael McSweeney
February 10, 2022, 2:59PM EST · 1 min read
Developers for the Ethereum scaling project Optimism said Thursday that it patched a “critical bug” earlier this month.
As noted in a disclosure blog post, the team said that the bug was discovered in the project’s fork of Geth, the popular Ethereum implementation. “The bug made it possible to create ETH on Optimism by repeatedly triggering the SELFDESTRUCT opcode on a contract that held an ETH balance.”
A bug bounty of $2,000,042 was awarded to developer Jay Freeman, who penned a separate blog post about the issue after identifying the bug. The bug was reported to the Optimism team on February 2.
The team said that, according to its analysis, “the bug was not exploited” save for an accidental activation by a staffer at Ethereum data startup Etherscan.
“A fix for the issue was tested and deployed to Optimism’s Kovan and Mainnet networks (including all infrastructure providers) within hours of confirmation. We’d like to thank Infura, QuickNode, and Alchemy for their fast response times,” the team wrote. “We also alerted multiple vulnerable Optimism forks and bridge providers to the presence of the issue. These projects have all applied the required fix.”
Optimism is focused on the development of optimistic rollups, which operate at the so-called second layer and aggregate transactions outside of the Ethereum blockchain, where transactions are ultimately settled, with the goal of reducing the cost of transacting on the network. But as today’s disclosure demonstrates, layer-two protocols are subject to potentially risky security issues.
A number of optimistic rollups are in operation today, encompassing more than $5 billion in total value locked (referring to the funds contained therein). Optimism’s own rollup had roughly $530 million in locked ETH and ERC-20 tokens as of February 10, according to data collected by The Block Research.
https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/133846/ethereum-scaling-startup-optimism-discloses-critical-bug-fix
Ethereum Beats Out Walmart, Mastercard To Be 25th Largest Asset In The World
by Best Owie 8 hours ago in Ethereum Reading Time: 3 mins read
Ethereum has been up with the recovery in the market, growing as fast as bitcoin in the space. This has seen the market cap of the cryptocurrency rise rapidly. While it had lost its footing in the list of top assets by market cap in the world following the price crash, it has since gained back enough of its previous value to put the digital asset above some of the largest companies on the list.
Ethereum Is Bigger Than Walmart
With a recovery above $3,200, Ethereum has once again solidified its place as one of the most valuable assets in the financial sector. Although it is only half a decade old, it continues to compete with companies that have been in operation for decades, boasting a higher market cap than others despite their widespread use around the world.
After losing about $100 billion of its market cap following the crash that saw its fallen crumble from above $4,000 to below $3,000, it has begun to claw its way back up. At its current price, atheneum’s market cap is back up at $382.34 billion. It’s a long way from its all-time high but a significant value nonetheless, one that puts it ahead of giants like Walmart and Mastercard.
The digital asset is now sitting at 25th place on the list of the most valuable assets in the world. While this number may seem a bit low, a look through the list helps put in perspective just how large the cryptocurrency has gotten.
Ethereum sits ahead of world-class names and brands on the list. Most of these are households names and are leaders in their various industries. Besides Walmart and Mastercard, the digital asset boasts a larger market cap than the likes of Home Depot, Alibaba, Disney, Coca-Cola, Pepsico, among others.
Where Does Bitcoin Sit?
Bitcoin is the most valuable cryptocurrency in the crypto space. Its market cap is twice as large as that of ethereum, which holds the spot for the second-largest. With a market cap of $839.60 billion, bitcoin sits considerably higher on the list compared to the number 2 cryptocurrency.
Presently, bitcoin’s market cap places it at 9th place on the list of most valuable assets in the world. It comes out ahead of social media giant Meta (formerly Facebook), payments giant Visa, legendary investment firm Berkshire Hathaway, among a slew of others.
It is truly remarkable what assets in the crypto space have been able to achieve despite the industry being a little over a decade old. The more the space grows, the higher they will move up on the list.
https://ih.advfn.com/stock-market/COIN/ETHUSD/crypto-news/87247872/ethereum-beats-out-walmart-mastercard-to-be-25th
https://www.newsbtc.com/news/ethereum/ethereum-beats-out-walmart-mastercard-to-be-25th-largest-asset-in-the-world/
Nice, I've heard NEXO is pretty good. Thinking about putting some matic there. I've got some ETH staked on coinbase at the moment.
understood, not sure how they harvested my email. Mine are safely staked at NEXO over a year now.
That website and staking return rate look a little suspect. Typical rates are 4-5%. Be careful out there, lots of scams.
Correct, I got it in an email, clicked this in the email and it seems like a place advertising you to stake ETH there.
https://staking-ethereum.org/en/eth2/staking/
I would forward the email to you if there was a way to do it. Posted most of the text.
Nah, very earliest is mid year for ETH2.
25%APY for staking? I couldn't find any info on the official ethereum website. Would you please post a link for that snippet? Thanks
Lawmaker Takes Aim at Puerto Rico as Crypto Tax Haven
Rep. Nydia Velaquez called for tougher action against crypto millionaires using Puerto Rico as a tax shelter.
Jeff John Roberts
By Jeff John Roberts
Feb 8, 2022
3 min read
In brief
* A Congresswoman's comments reveal growing hostility to Puerto Rico's crypto millionaires.
* But it's unlikely that policy change will follow anytime soon.
Stories about crypto millionaires decamping to Puerto Rico have become commonplace in recent years. The island's attraction lies in its sandy beaches, mild climate—and its reputation as a place for U.S. residents to avoid paying taxes.
But not everyone is happy about this. On Tuesday, Brooklyn lawmaker Nydia Velazquez (D-NY) complained that Puerto Rico has become a haven for rich crypto speculators from the mainland—and asked a Treasury Department official if Congress could help "go after crypto investors trying to use Puerto Rico as a tax shelter."
Velazquez's comments came during a hearing of the House Financial Services Committee, which was examining the broader topic of stablecoins. The Congresswoman is originally from Puerto Rico and, like many who live in her New York City district, maintains strong ties with the island.
Her remarks elicited a strong reaction on Twitter, where many applauded her desire to go after people they portrayed as wealthy and unwanted interlopers. One attorney with a Puerto Rican flag in his profile complained of a "white supremacist fantasy of Puerto Rico without Puerto Ricans":
Others offered more nuanced takes, pointing out that the law attracting millionaires to Puerto Rico doesn't favor only crypto holders, but those looking for a tax shelter in general.
The law in question allows investors to claim no tax on capital gains—a huge potential benefit for Americans who live on the mainland and can face federal capital gains rates as high as 37 percent. But as some pointed out, taking advantage of the law involves more than just turning up in Puerto Rico:
Others have voiced similar cautions. In a recent essay, a Boston law firm points out that simply owning property in Puerto Rico is not enough to claim the tax exemptions and that, in any case, the law only applies to capital gains earned after a person moves to the island—meaning that someone who moved there in January would not be able to avoid taxes on crypto profits accrued during the boom of 2021. Meanwhile, Puerto Rico's governor approved a 2020 law that makes applying for the tax exemption more expensive.
It's unclear if Velazquez's comments will have any impact on U.S. or Puerto Rico tax policy, especially as the focus of Tuesday's hearing did not relate to Puerto Rico. But it could serve to warn wealthy crypto investors that the tax benefit may not exist forever—and that many on the island may not want them there in the first place.
https://decrypt.co/92437/puerto-rico-crypto-tax
Gotta go back to 28 first
Looks like ETH 2.0 is rolling out now??
The open-source roots of Ethereum have led to the growth of an interesting new fundraising model: quadratic funding. This has the potential to improve the way we fund all types of public goods in the future.
Quadratic funding makes sure that the projects that receive the most funding are those with the most unique demand. In other words, projects that stand to improve the lives of most people. Investing back into the community while bringing forth Ethereum 2.0 sooner fits perfectly along with those ideals.
Truly yours,
V. Buterin
Bud Light partners with Nouns DAO for its upcoming Super Bowl ad
by Anushree Dave
February 7, 2022, 6:00AM EST · 1 min read
Beer giant Anheuser-Busch's Bud Light has partnered with Nouns DAO (a decentralized autonomous organization) for its Super Bowl ad airing on Sunday.
Bud Light's senior director of digital Corey Brown told The Block that the partnership will help the beer brand further authenticate itself in the NFT space. "As part of the partnership, Nouns has gifted Bud Light NEXT with a Nouns NFT in exchange for the famous Nouns glasses to be featured in our Super Bowl commercial," said Brown.
Nouns DAO is a generative NFT project on the Ethereum blockchain. Its avatars are based on nouns: people, places, and things.
The ad will be for Bud Light NEXT, Bud Light's new no-carb beer. Last month, the brand launched its first NFT project, Bud Light N3XT, featuring 12,722 unique tokens.
Working with the DAO will allow Bud Light to meet consumers where they are, according to Brown. "Similar to how Bud Light NEXT will provide us the opportunity to bring more fans into the Bud Light portfolio, the Bud Light N3XT Collection, our partnership with Nouns DAO and entry into the NFT space will allow us to engage with established and new fans in an entirely different way," he said.
https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/133113/bud-light-partners-with-nouns-dao-for-its-upcoming-super-bowl-ad?
CryptoPunks Controversy: Creators Apologize for 'V1' Ethereum NFT Sales
Larva Labs attracts fresh criticism around CryptoPunks after selling NFTs from a scrapped contract—and suggesting potential legal action.
Andrew Hayward
By Andrew Hayward
Feb 4, 2022
9 min read
In brief
* CryptoPunks creators Larva Labs apologized for selling old “V1”
CryptoPunks NFTs from a scrapped smart contract.
* The firm suggested potential legal action against the community-led
project, which “wraps” the discarded NFTs to make them functional.
Larva Labs’ CryptoPunks are considered by many to be the gold standard of Ethereum NFT profile pictures, with the collection generating billions of dollars in sales as Crypto Twitter’s preferred status symbol. However, its star may be fading somewhat due to recent events, and now Larva Labs is facing fresh scrutiny for its own actions.
When the CryptoPunks were first minted in 2017, a glitch in the original smart contract—the code that programs NFT collections and decentralized applications—prompted Larva Labs to scrap the first edition and reissue the NFTs. The second edition eventually became crypto-famous, with some $2 billion in trading volume to date, per CryptoSlam.
However, some of those “V1 CryptoPunks” NFTs have been “wrapped” via a community-made smart contract and reissued as ERC-721 Ethereum tokens, each with a different background color than the standard Punks. That makes it possible to sell the NFTs as historical relics—with interest and prices rising of late.
“This recovery of the original Punks smart contract is a community-led and rapidly-growing phenomenon consisting of original Punk claimants, NFT historians, digital archeologists, and extremely talented developers,” reads the unofficial V1 Punks website.
Larva Labs recently went on the offensive, suggesting that they weren’t “real” CryptoPunks NFTs. However, the creators were sending mixed messages, selling off dozens of their own V1 Punks while claiming that they shouldn’t be considered legitimate CryptoPunks.
“PSA: ‘V1 Punks’ are not official CryptoPunks,” Larva Labs tweeted on January 25. “We don't like them, and we've got 1,000 of them... so draw your own conclusions. Any proceeds will be used to purchase real CryptoPunks!”
On Wednesday, in a statement posted to the official Larva Labs discord, co-founder Matt Hall apologized for selling its own V1 Punks, calling the move “stupid” and a “bad decision.”
“We made a mistake by interacting with this contract,” Hall said of wrapping and selling the V1 CryptoPunks. “We thought that by announcing our intentions and selling some of the tokens, we would signal our distaste for it, and maybe others would follow. That was a bad decision. We regret it, and we apologize to the community.”
Hall said that Larva Labs generated 210 ETH (about $622,000 today) from the V1 NFT sales and used some of it to purchase one of the standard (V2) CryptoPunks. The team plans to spend the rest of the funds buying back additional CryptoPunks NFTs, and will also match the amount with a further 210 ETH donation to The Rainforest Foundation.
“We feel like we’ve had a well-principled approach to the CryptoPunks project from the very beginning up until the moment we did this stupid thing,” Hall added. “We’ve learned a hard lesson, but hope something good can come of it via this donation.”
CryptoPunks collapse?
Reactions to Larva Labs’ announcement have been widely negative. That continues a growing trend among some holders of the 10,000 CryptoPunks NFTs, as the community reckons with their place in the evolving NFT space, what utility (if any) they should provide, and what Larva Labs’ role should be in their future ahead.
In recent months, some CryptoPunks holders have complained about the state of the project, particularly the still-unclear extent to which holders can commercialize their owned image(s). Other complaints have come regarding Larva Labs’ increasingly hands-off approach, which stands in stark contrast to some newer, popular profile picture (PFP) projects.
The Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) has rapidly become the other giant in the NFT space, and the differences between them are significant.
Bored Ape holders can use their owned images for any purpose—including merchandise, metaverse bands, and brand promotion—plus Yuga Labs has provided holders with additional free NFTs, exclusive merchandise and events, and more. It’s a private club loaded with perks and a public-facing avatar for social media cachet, no less.
Celebrities have recently flooded into the Bored Ape Yacht Club, as well, raising the NFTs’ mainstream profile—and quite likely their asking price too. In December, the floor price (or cheapest available NFT) for Bored Apes passed that of CryptoPunks for the first time, and the gap has only widened of late.
As of this writing, the Bored Ape floor sits above 100 ETH ($294,000) compared to CryptoPunks at 69 ETH ($203,000). CryptoPunks trading volume also dropped 28% from December 2020 to January 2021, per data from CryptoSlam, despite a wider NFT market upswing.
Also in December, notable NFT collector and Nouns project co-creator 4156 sold his namesake CryptoPunks NFT for $10.26 million worth of ETH. He decided to exit the project due to Larva Labs’ handling of the IP rights situation, including attempts to remove unofficial derivative projects via DMCA takedown requests—such as the reverse-facing CryptoPhunks.
Larva strikes back
That last detail is key, because in yesterday’s statement, Hall hinted that Larva Labs will pursue some kind of legal action around the Wrapped V1 CryptoPunks.
“We originally didn’t go after the V1 project for copyright infringement of both the art and the CryptoPunks name, because we didn’t want to give it any additional attention,” he wrote, “but now many CryptoPunks owners have called for us to take action, and we agree with them.”
“Let there be no confusion about the legitimacy of this ‘V1’ project,” Hall continued. “It has no right to use the art or the name. We will be taking appropriate steps in the coming days.”
What that move might look like is currently unclear. Larva Labs could potentially issue DMCA takedown notices against marketplaces OpenSea and LooksRare for letting users trade the NFTs, for example, or target the V1 Punks marketplace website or that of the smart contract used to wrap V1 Punks. Decrypt reached out to Larva Labs for comment, but we did not hear back.
Hall’s announcement regarding the V1 project—particularly with the suggestion of legal action after Larva itself sold wrapped NFTs from it—has been met with vocal criticism from holders. Some see the move as being anti-community, anti-blockchain, and anti-decentralization, continuing some of the other recent debates around CryptoPunks.
“I have never seen any team bungle a project with such desirable IP as Larva Labs has done with CryptoPunks,” collector DCinvestor tweeted. “At this point, I do think the move is to convey individual IP rights to ‘official’ Punk NFT holders à la BAYC. That’d nullify most of the mess they’ve created.”
Another prominent NFT collector, Anonymoux, tweeted a thread about their own personal saga with CryptoPunks—and the decision to sell and move on following Larva Labs’ disclosure. Anonymoux wrote that they had felt “anxiety” around the project recently, but that it “melted away” after choosing to depart the CryptoPunks collective.
“It is time to sell Punk #2311,” they wrote. “I wouldn't own stock in a company where the executives constantly tripped over their own feet. Not going to do it here either. Thank you Punks for playing a large part in my NFT journey.”
Will V1 thrive?
What about the Wrapped V1 CryptoPunks then? Larva Labs’ next moves are currently unclear, but the V1 NFTs remain available for purchase from marketplaces—and some collectors have made bets on their sustained or potentially expanding value ahead.
On Wednesday, prior to Larva Labs’ announcement, NFT investment fund Meta4 Capital announced that it purchased a pair of V1 CryptoPunks: one for 1,000 ETH (almost $2.8 million) and another for 200 ETH (about $556,000). Meta4 tweeted that the prices reflected an offer worth one-quarter of the estimated value for the “real” or V2 version of each Punk.
Meta4 Capital Managing Partner Brandon Buchanan told Decrypt via email on Thursday that he respects Larva Labs and its co-founders, Hall and John Watkinson, and their need to protect the IP and oversee the CryptoPunks ecosystem. He called them “thoughtful and innovative in a nascent asset class wherein rules and standards are mostly being made on the fly.”
Still, Buchanan doesn’t think the creators “should be concerned with being the arbiter of taste; let the market dictate taste or distaste as it may be.” Instead, he suggested that Larva Labs should focus on driving value to NFT holders and listening to the community. “Once Larva Labs and its holders are fully aligned, I think more value will be unlocked,” he added.
In its original Twitter thread, Meta4 Capital pointed to the history of defective versions of products commanding a premium on secondary markets. The V1 Punks are based on code that Larva Labs deployed to an immutable blockchain platform—it’s not a knockoff, even if Larva takes exception with the way that they’ve been brought back to life.
“This isn't really a copyright issue,” Buchanan suggested, “as they're trying to police secondary markets for an asset that had already been distributed and claimed.”
“There's a long history of collectibles (like comic books) having errors or being recalled, and they being sold on secondary markets,” he continued. “I view V1 Punks in that same sort of mode. I actually think this is an exciting development for Larva Labs, and the history/lineage should be embraced rather than repelled.”
Matt Sanders (a.k.a. M. Shadows), the singer of metal band Avenged Sevenfold and creator of the Deathbats Club NFT collection, likewise told Decrypt that he believes that both V1 and V2 CryptoPunks are “authentic and valuable in their own ways.” Like Meta4, he owns both V1 and V2 CryptoPunks.
Sanders likened the V1 Punks to a band’s demo recordings, which can help provide a historical record of art and develop the narrative around it. Some fans or collectors might even find the V1 or “demo” versions more meaningful, he said—but as a creator himself, he suggested that Larva Labs’ perspective on what constitutes “real” CryptoPunks should be honored.
“Most collectors will prefer the ‘official’ seal of authenticity of V2, which is what the original creators intended to be the final, published product,” said Sanders. “That distinction matters: it was the creators’ intention, which rightfully confers a certain status.”
https://decrypt.co/92155/cryptopunks-controversy-creators-apologize-v1-ethereum-nft?
Ethereum will always be big because of NFTs
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