Round Tripping
a weekly recap of the crypto ecosystem
as always, thanks for reading and follow me here
program note: apologies for FTX induced delay; this issue of Round Tripping covers developments from last week & I’ll return to the regular weekend publishing this week
BTC dominance 37% | ETH dominance 17% | DeFi TVL $42.5B |
Total Crypto Market Cap $864B | Stablecoin Supply $145B |
musings:
It’s been another tough week throughout crypto as the fraud and massive levels of deceit that occurred by SBF and FTX continue to trickle out. The second and third order effects are also becoming clear as every day a new lender or exchange battles potential insolvency. Once again, everyone here at Page One sends our collective thoughts to all those impacted by FTX’s collapse.
I could write endlessly about the FTX topic, but instead I would highly recommend this thread from Jason Choi.
While FTX remains the negative headline story, and pundits once again claim its demise, crypto continues to advance without them. The positive outcomes that have developed since FTX’s fraud fueled collapse occurred include, but are not limited to:
Ledger, Trezor, Zengo, & Gnosis Safe (non-custodial solutions) explosive growth
SOL, and the ecosystem at large, disposing the predatory cloud of FTX/Alameda
Remaining CEXs taking a positive step through instituting proof of reserves
New users of Uniswap’s Web App reached a 2022 high
Macro — lower CPI, DYX and yields rolling over, Nasdaq +~8% last week
DeFi protocols experiencing an influx of user growth
DeFi once again worked without interruption as expected. Users of UNI, MKR, AAVE, COMP, and all other protocols were able to remove and trade their assets while it remains true that DeFi protocols, once properly audited and tested, fundamentally can’t defraud anyone.
Crypto doesn’t stop because a fraudulent “altruistic” sociopath steals individuals hard-earned money. Blocks across BTC, ETH, SOL, & all other chains continued to be produced and verified despite the recent failings of their centralized counterparts.
Despite the recent down markets and events, myself and Page One as a collective (@tervoooo , @MoonOverlord, @NinjaBoffin) remain incredibly bullish on the future of crypto. Page One isn’t going anywhere.
We’ve been publishing every week, for nine straight months, and that isn’t going to stop. Moving forward, you can expect Round Tripping in your inbox Sunday morning as we’ll continue to highlight the amazing builders, innovations, and growing trends that help to continually push this space forward. In the words of Chris Burniske, we’re “bullish from near the bottom, hope to see ya’ll at $10T.”
Within the next week, you can expect an article, Picking Up the Pieces, detailing and outlining all of the ongoing developments across the space that provide an insight to crypto’s bright future. Until then, as always, I sincerely appreciate your support and attention, and will see you this weekend for another edition of Round Tripping.
funding:
TRM Labs, a blockchain analytics company, raises $70M in series B extension
Ramp, crypto payments firm, raises $70M series B
Archax, digital asset exchange, brokerage, & custody, raises $28.5M series A
Fordefi, institutional DeFi wallet and security platform, raises $18M seed
Ping, freelancer-focused neobank incorporating crypto, raises $15M seed
Sepana, decentralized search startup for DAOs, NFTs, & more, raises $10M
Notifi, crypto communication infrastructure platform, raises $10M seed
Xternity, crypto gaming infrastructure company, raises $4.5M pre-seed
Eterlast, crypto gaming company incorporating NFTs to sports, raises $4.5M
news:
Genesis, crypto trading firm, gets $140M equity infusion from parent company Digital Currency Group as Genesis has ~$175M currently locked inside FTX
DeFiLlama releases their new CEX transparency dashboard
Energy giant Shell working on BTC mining/cooling solutions
Itau Asset, the investment arm of Latin America’s largest bank by AUM, partners with Galaxy Digital to offer a physically backed crypto ETF to be listed in Brazil
Space and Time, Microsoft backed crypto data warehousing and indexing company, joins Nvidia’s Inception startup program
Jump Crypto says “exposure to FTX was managed in accordance with our risk framework and we remain well capitalized”
BlockFi can “no longer operate its business as usual; pauses client withdrawals”
Google Cloud partners with Aptos (APT) for validator services
NY FED and several large banks along with Mastercard and Swift are testing a “regulated liability network” for tokenized debt issued by institutions
Bankrupt crypto lender Voyager reopens its bidding process amid FTX chaos
tokens:
STG/LZ — LayerZero Labs bought out FTX/Alameda of “100% of their equity position, token warrants, and any and all agreements between us”
TRX — Tron DAO purchases $1B of USDT announced & confirmed but H.E. Justin
SRM —token forked for safety of the ecosystem by SOL devs; is liquidity hub of SOL DeFi, developed by FTX, and one of FTX’s largest “semi-liquid” (lol) assets
StarkNet — ETH zk scaling L2 announces the StarkNet Foundation which will receive 50.1% of the coming StarkNet token for initiatives, grants, research, etc.
ATLAS/POLIS — gaming project on SOL loses half of runway to FTX collapse
reading:
“FTX Showed the Problems of Centralized Finance, & Proved the Need for DeFi”
As I wrote above, the importance and consistent functionality of DeFi protocols was yet again apparent this week. Amanda Cassatt makes this abundantly clear as she highlights FTX’s failures as a CeFi problem that emphasizes the importance of robust, decentralized protocols by saying,
“These are all centralized exchanges (CEXs) and centralized financed platforms (CeFi). Their business models are centuries old…but crucially, not root ownership, since they hold the keys to those assets…users may have seen their portfolio decrease in dollar value, but they never lost access to their assets…if that isn’t consumer protection, I don’t know what is…the FTX collapse was a failure of CeFi, not DeFi - and smart investors, builders, and users are already taking notice.“
around the ecosystem:
Cobie and Erik Voorhees digesting everything from the past week on Unchained
Hasseb’s thread outlining what’s next and where the industry goes from here
Nic Carter’s excellent ongoing and future crypto-policy thread after midterms
tweets:
