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3AC, GBTC & LUNA:

Leverage, risk management, and the above three entities combined to result in BTC registering one of its worst months ever. BTC closed the month down ~39.5% while ETH fell another 46% in June. Retracing our steps leads us back to LUNA’s collapse, the cascading pressure that applied to 3AC and finally the lenders that enabled them.

3AC was invested deep throughout the LUNA ecosystem through executing the once popular “UST carry trade” and previously deploying $200M+ to LUNA tokens in the LFG’s most recent funding round back in February. Obviously, the tokens became essentially worthless and the heavily performed carry trade resulting in “free” double-digit yields evaporated. 3AC was battered, but alive. Large, levered and relatively illiquid positions are the last place to be in a liquidity crunch, and 3AC’s positions in GBTC, stETH, and various other vesting/venture bets lead to their demise as the LUNA fallout sent any potential collateral they could post spiraling.

Voyager Digital, Celsius, Blockfi and Babel emerged this month as troubled lenders caught up in the story 3AC sold. While many of the involved parties have remained silent, details have trickled out as billions vanished. Voyager was one of the worst hit as they somehow lent an unsecured 15,250 BTC and $350M worth of USDC to 3AC that remains unaccounted for. Voyager has since issued a notice of default and regulators in the British Virgin Islands have appointed advisory firm Teneo to handle 3AC’s liquidation process.

BlockFi and Celsius continue to freeze customer withdraws and have looked to FTX for rescue. Celsius unfortunately has had their potential lifeline from FTX withdrawn as FTX’s look into their financials revealed a glaring $2B hole in its balance sheet. BlockFi on the other hand, was rumored to be purchased by FTX for $275M until BlockFi’s CEO declared the information false on Twitter.

While potentially critically wounded lenders (and our tokens) lick their wounds, FTX continues to pick up the broken pieces and adding to their empire. Fortunately, the execution of DeFi protocols such as MKR, UNI, AAVE, and COMP once again operated as they were designed and coded in the face of extreme market conditions while always displaying out standing debt and allowing users to withdraw as they wished.

Funding & News:

while this is not a comprehensive list of every announcement, the capital deployed to the below sectors are common themes across ecosystem in June and totals ~$3.44B

General Funding:

• Exchange Huobi Global launches Ivy Blocks fund with $1B+ to deploy

• Binance VC arm raises $500M for incubation, early-stage, and late-stage

• Foresight Ventures launches $200M fund for private-round liquidity

• Ledger Cathay Capital launched, a $110M crypto fund for early-stage

• Felix Capital raises $600M web3 fund

• OP Crypto targeting $100M fund for backing early-stage fund managers

NFTs & GameFi:

• Magic Eden, NFT marketplace on SOL, raises $130M @ $1.6B valuation

• 1Confirmation launches $100M, 10-year life NFT fund

• NFTPort, NFT infrastructure developer, raises $26M

• Wildcard Alliance raises $46M for Polygon based gaming venture

• Akatsuki, Japanese gaming firm, raises $20M for NFT & GameFi investments

• Calaxy, social token and media platform, raises $26M

• PartyDAO, collaborative NFT bidding platform, raises $16.4M

• Shopify releases Tokengated Experiences enabling merchants and users to connect noncustodial wallets for exclusive drops, merch, experiences, etc.

• eBay acquires NFT marketplace KnownOrigin

• MoonPay, crypto payments firm, launches HyperMint allowing brands and creators to safely mint NFTs — launch partners include Fox Corporation, Universal Pictures, FaZe Clan, Death Row Records and others

• Salesforce piloting NFT Cloud, platform for minting, selling, & managing NFTs

Infrastructure

• Prime Trust, crypto infrastructure firm, raises $107M to expand products

• Kaiko, blockchain analytics firm, raises $53M

• PolySign, crypto infrastructure & custody firm, raises $53M

• Coinhouse, crypto service provider, raises $42.5M to expand offerings

• SoftBank leads $66M series B in blockchain infrastructure provider InfStones

• Entropy, decentralized crypto custodian, raises $25M seed round

• Indonesian crypto exchange Pintu raises $113M

• Kyve Network, decentralized data storage, raises $9M valuation @ $100M

• Citadel Securities & Virtu Financial partner to build crypto trading platform

• Wintermute, crypto market making giant, to launch Bebop DEX aggregator

Tokens

• $IMX launches $500M developer and venture fund for NFT and gamefi builders

• Solana Ventures launches $100M fund for South Korean web3 startups

• Orderly Network, DEX built on NEAR, raises $20M in strategic funding

• Euler, DeFi lending and borrowing on ETH, raises $32M

• Arrington capital and Moonbeam Foundation launch $100M growth fund for the EVM compatible Polkadot parachain Moonbeam

General News:

• Solana announces mobile platform and reveals Android smartphone

• $IMX enters strategic partnership with Turner Sports (TNT, TBS, Bleacher Report) to build gamefi for “premier sports” powered by StarkWare (L2 ZKR)

• Circle (USDC creators) launches Euro backed stablecoin EUROC

• Japan passes stablecoin bill ensuring redemption/backing at face value

• Crusoe Energy, flared gas BTC mining, previously raised $350M in April and this week announced expansion to Middle East countries Abu Dhabi & Oman

• Checkout.com, $40B payments giant, to partner with Fireblocks to allow 24/7 merchant settlements through stablecoin USDC

• Mastercard widening access to NFT commerce through partnerships with $IMX, Candy Digital, Sandbox (SAND), Mintable, Nifty Gateway, and Moonpay

• American Express announces launch of their first crypto rewards credit card

• ConsenSys & StarkWare partner to bring ZK rollups to MetaMask & Infura

• FTX passes Coinbase in CEX spot marketshare

Token Developments:

• ETH Gray Glacier hard fork delaying difficulty bomb to September is finished, roughly aligning with common consensus for merge in mid September

• dYdX announces V4 moves the protocol from ETH to standalone Cosmos chain

• Cosmos (ATOM) enabling Interchain Security between August & September allowing app specific chains to secure themselves through ATOM validators

• Compound (COMP) releases code for COMP III, a multi-chain lending protocol

• Polygon (MATIC) announces Avail, a custom scaling solution for EVM chains

• Ava Labs (AVAX) launches Core, a noncustodial wallet for AVAX ecosystem that includes a direct BTC bridge

• Uniswap (UNI) acquires NFT aggregator genie and will rollout direct NFT buying and selling on Uniswap “this fall” — Uniswap also providing USDC airdrop to users who held a Genie Genesis NFT or used genie multiple times before April 15th

• THORChain (RUNE) rallies with mainnet launching on seven different networks

• Helium (HNT), HIP51, and the launch of “Network of Networks”

  • Helium is expanding their services introducing two new tokens MOBILE (this month) and IOT (~August) with corresponding sub-DAOs to advance their coverage and 5G network capabilities

• Aura Finance is live with auraBAL deposits, Aura locking, and airdrop claims

• Aurory (AURY), gamefi on SOL, releases updated developments and patches

• OP (Optimism) token launches — currently ~$0.53 with $2.3B FDV

• BTRFLY releases Pirex, a futures marketplaces for yield generating tokens

• Chainlink (LINK) announces their plans and roadmap to implement staking

• Frax (FXS) proposal to buyback $20M worth of $FXS using Fraxswap passes

• Merit Circle (MC) announces Sphere, a gaming & NFT asset marketplace

• Axie (AXS) reopens Ronin ETH bridge after $600M hack on March 29th

• LOOKS — launched conditional listing & Coinbase Wallet integration

NFT Review:

This is by no means a comprehensive list of the ongoings in NFT land. These projects are covered in more depth throughout past Page One posts, so find more info on all of these there.

Familiar Faces:

• Art Blocks collectors are enjoying lower prices on some favorites

• Bored Apes top volume charts, Yuga sues Ryder Ripps

• CryptoPunks’ future plans will be led by new Brand Lead Noah David

• Degenz Access Pass, new utility token, airdropped to Degenz/Re-Genz

• Doodles announce Doodles 2, Dooplicators reveal, Genesis Box sale

• Floor, portfolio tracking app for iOS, announced their first fund raise

• goblintown gives goblins free burgers for future use

• Murakami.Flowers holders were airdropped a Lucky Cat Coin Bank

• Mfers founder Sartoshi peaces out after releasing end of sartoshi

New Entrants:

• EY3K0N hopes their experience will help build an immersive sci-fi series

• For The Culture paid everyone 0.01Ξ to mint

• GODA Mint Pass sees traditional artists move into Web3, led by Pharrell

• Gossamer World has an ambitious vision for a multimedia fantasy universe

• Karma Monkey brings 20k new monkeys into the OnChainMonkey ecosystem

• Lacoste dives into NFTs with UNDW3

• Lonely Pop persevered after a rough Dutch auction and sold out

• The Possessed released at the end of the month

• RENGA airdropped Black Boxes to The Art of Seasons holders

• We Are All Going to Die captured attention with their fantasy-style story

Market News and Announcements

• Epic Games Store to launch its first NFT game in partnership with Gala Games

• Former OpenSea employee Nate Chastain charged with insider trading

• Gem launches Collection Activity and Live Mints features

• OpenSea rolls out new marketplace contract, Seaport

• Uniswap acquires NFT marketplace aggregator Genie

• Salesforce introduces NFT Cloud, allowing clients to mint and sell NFTs

• Shopify allows merchants to create NFT-gated options

• Solana announces crypto-intergrated smartphone

• Starry Night Capital’s future in doubt after 3AC goes down