Community Responds: Which Ethereum Use Case Can Make ETH A $500 Billion Market Cap Asset?

Audy Castañeda
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Community Responds: Which Ethereum Use Case Can Make ETH A $500 Billion Market Cap Asset?

From universal trustless authentication to decentralized autonomous organizations, Redditors discussed which use cases can increase the value of Ether.

While the drop in the price of Ether (ETH) over the weekend may have left investors worried about the digital asset, members of the community on Reddit held a discussion about Ethereum use cases that could drive the price of the asset up.

On the Ethereum subreddit, a Reddit user asked members of the community about ETH use cases that they believe are capable of boosting the asset’s market capitalization to $500 billion. Criticizing smart contract use cases for real estate, the Redditor noted that they have not seen a convincing case that it can solidify the value of ETH in a similar way to how Bitcoin (BTC) is seen as a replacement for gold.

A Debate Opens

Responding to the thread, Redditor WarhorseLand offered a rebuttal to the thread’s author’s perspective on smart contracts and real estate. According to WarhorseLand, although there have been no applications yet, the real estate sector can avoid “closing day transfer fraud” thanks to the security offered by smart contracts.

Additionally, WarhorseLand argued that trustless universal authentication is “the best use case” for smart contracts. The Redditor believes that if a use case emerges that allows people to prove who they are without a shadow of a doubt, it can spur positive price action for the digital asset.

Participating in the discussion, Reddit user SgtHappyPants mentioned several use cases, such as decentralized certifications and financial contracts. Additionally, the Reddit user highlighted the importance of decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs). According to the Reddit user, Ethereum is a global interaction platform that enables a new class of organizations.

In response to the thread, another participant compared Ethereum to popular platforms like Craigslist and Ticketmaster. The Reddit user mentioned that Ethereum can enhance those platforms by replacing third parties with the blockchain, allowing for secure transactions with lower fees.

Vitalik Buterin Takes Debate Further

Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin recently shared his thoughts on Blockchain use cases. In a blog post, Buterin mentioned non-financial applications such as data storage and retrieval and trust and censorship resistance. Apart from this, the founder of Ethereum also shared his opinion on the voting mechanisms that are ideal.

He claimed that distributed ledger technology can help with “really important goals like trust and censorship resistance, but sometimes purely for convenience.” In the document, he stated that “Blockchains as data stores” could be quite important in the grand scheme of things and that he hopes they will be used for “cheap and reliable data retrieval.”

Another potential use case that was discussed was open source metrics, a still-nascent concept that would allow diversity and decentralization to be measured.

Vitalik, however, cautioned that he had, “a great deal of uncertainty as to what level of non-financial Blockchain use in each of these categories makes sense, but it seems clear that Blockchain as an enabling tool should not be dismissed.”

By Audy Castaneda

Nifty News: Christie’s NFT Expert to Lead CryptoPunks, Scammer Launches NFT Collection, and More

Audy Castañeda
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Nifty News: Christie’s NFT Expert to Lead CryptoPunks, Scammer Launches NFT Collection, and More

Noah Davis, the NFT expert at Christie’s auction house, said he does not intend to change CryptoPunks’ plan when he leads the project and has invited the owners for a one-on-one chat.

Noah Davis, the non-fungible token (NFT) specialist at Christie’s auction house, has said he will be leaving his position in July to take up a role as brand lead for CryptoPunks’ NFT collection with Yuga Labs.

Announcing the move Sunday in a Twitter thread, Davis tried to allay any anxieties owners had regarding the future of one of NFT’s oldest projects, saying he’s “not going to f**k punks.”

Davies to Lead CryptoPunks

He invited CryptoPunk owners to schedule a talk with him about the future of the project at the NYC NFT event and said the new position would not detract from his own NFT project.

Davis is responsible for the record-breaking Beeple’s Everydays: The First 5,000 Days NFT auction, which sold for more than $69 million in March 2021.

With the announcement of Davis’s move and the new terms taking effect shortly, some are alleging that insiders had prior knowledge of the information, citing the increasing sales volume of the collection.

According to OpenSea, there have been 39 sales of the CryptoPunks collection since the announcement, with 101 sales in total on Sunday, compared to just 19 sold the day before, on Saturday.

Convicted Scammer “Reinvents” herself with NFTs

Convicted fraudster and swindler Anna Sorokin, who between 2013 and 2017 posed as wealthy German heiress “Anna Delvey” to swindle acquaintances and businesses out of more than $275,000, has started a collection of NFTs.

Entitled Reinventing Anna, the collection boasts 2,000 NFTs for 0.1 Ether (ETH) each or about $110 at the time of writing. It is marketed as a way for “fans to interact with Anna” and access to private “ask me anything” with Sorokin.

The collection will feature 20 “gold edition cards,” granting owners the chance for a phone call or in-person visit with the so-called “renowned socialite.”

The name of the collection is a pun on the Netflix drama miniseries Inventing Anna, released earlier this year, whose theme is inspired by Sorokin’s story.

Duppies Followers Target Phishing Scam

Duppies, an upcoming Solana NFT project from the same team as the popular “DeGods” collection, had its Twitter account hacked on Saturday, in which the attackers tweeted a link to a “stealth minting” of NFTs.

The link was a phishing website, and users who connected their wallets and attempted to mint the NFTs had all their funds emptied from their wallets. One Twitter user wrote that he had lost 650 solanas (SOL), worth about $18,850, to the attack.

More Nifty News

Watchmaker TAG Heuer has released a watch that can be paired with a smartphone to display NFTs on the watch face and also connect to the Blockchain to verify that the NFT is owned by the user.

Despite warnings from the country’s authorities, the number of NFT platforms and digital collectibles in China has quintupled since February 2022, from just over 100 to more than 500, according to local state media.

By Audy Castaneda

Binance USD Might Become the Next Leading Stablecoin in the Crypto Market

Alexander Salazar
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Binance USD Might Become the Next Leading Stablecoin in the Crypto Market

The market capitalization of BUSD has dropped from USD 18.57 billion to USD 17.61 billion, a drop of about 5%, in about one month. The transparency of the USD Coin has created a great wave of adoption that has helped its market capitalization reach new all-time highs.

Stablecoins usually have parity with a real-world asset like a fiat currency, a commodity, or a financial instrument. They aim to serve as an alternative to volatile cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (TH).

After the price crash in the overall crypto market, stablecoins seem to be the only winners. For example, Binance USD (BUSD) has climbed into the top ten leading coins by market capitalization.

BUSD is trading at USD 1 and has accumulated a 0,6% loss over the last week. While its daily trading volume is above USD 4.99 billion, its market capitalization is about USD 17.22 billion. It occupies 6th place in the cryptocurrency ranking above Cardano (ADA), Ripple (XRP), and Solana (SOL), according to CoinGecko.

Many traders and investors liquidating their positions amid this bearish tide keep their capital in stablecoins. That has recently allowed those coins to climb in the top ten with a barely affected market capitalization.

The Market Capitalization of BUSD Has Held Up

The market capitalization of Binance USD (BUSD) has fallen slightly but does not compare to the decline in the overall crypto ecosystem. It has gone from USD 18.57 billion on May 20th to USD 17.61 billion, a drop of about 5%.

Besides investors searching for temporary shelter, that coin has benefited from the collapse of the stablecoin Terra (LUNA) and the mistrust of Tether (USDT).

USDT, the largest stablecoin by market capitalization, has not emerged very victorious from the market crash. Tether has suffered from many negative rumors like the alleged tie-in with Celsius and news that Chinese paper backed 85% of its paper trading portfolio.

Tether has gone from having a capitalization of USD 83.21 billion in early May to around USD 67.44 billion. That has represented a drop of about 18.95% in one and a half months.

The Winning Stablecoin in the Crypto market Is USDC

The transparency of the stablecoin USD Coin has created a great wave of adoption of that coin. This situation happens when trust is the most valuable within the crypto ecosystem.

USDC is trading at around USD 1 and has accumulated a 0.3% loss over the last week. While its daily trading volume is above USD 5.08 billion, its market capitalization is about USD 55.82 billion. It occupies 4th place in the cryptocurrency ranking above USDT, according to CoinGecko.

All the other participants in the crypto market suffered losses during the market crash. However, even the market capitalization of that stablecoin has grown, reaching new all-time highs day after day.

In the short-to-medium term, there might be a new leading stablecoin in the crypto market. It is only a matter of seeing how the market behaves before affirming USDC or BUSD will dethrone USDT.

By Alexander Salazar

Elon Musk Plans to Incorporate Cryptocurrencies into Twitter and Change Security

Alexander Salazar
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Elon Musk Plans to Incorporate Cryptocurrencies into Twitter and Change Security

Musk also stated that he seeks to eliminate cryptocurrency scams on the social network, saying that many malicious actors are still present. He demanded data to determine how legitimate Twitter activity is, suggesting he would buy if under 5% of the accounts were fake.

At a meeting with Twitter employees, Elon Musk hinted that he would implement cryptocurrencies on the platform and proposed changes in security.

The billionaire businessman stated he could incorporate the cryptocurrency payment feature into Twitter. He considers that this would make it easy to send and receive money whenever people find it useful.

In 2021, Twitter implemented Bitcoins tips on the platform, but Musk said he seeks to maximize the usefulness of the social network. He added that money is fundamentally digital at the moment, which justifies his plan to implement cryptocurrencies.

Although Elon Musk has previously hinted at implementing cryptocurrency payments on Twitter, he never detailed the plan.

Musk Says He Wants to Eliminate Cryptocurrency Scams on Twitter

Besides implementing cryptocurrency payments, Elon Musk sought to eliminate cryptocurrency scams on the social network.

He explained that they must face a challenge with bot and spam accounts and many cryptocurrency scams on Twitter. He said the social network has improved, but those actors are still present.

The goal of Musk is to make anti-bot algorithms of Twitter publicly and transparently open for review. He also plans to add a paid service through which people can check their authenticity. He thinks this would allow them to have a designation indicating they are not bots or someone operating 100 accounts.

Given that Elon Musk is a celebrity, he has been a frequent target of phishing on Twitter. A massive scam in 2020, resulting in losses of 12.8 BTC (about USD 118,000 at the time), affected his account, among others.

The CEO of Binance Supports the Purchase of Twitter by Elon Musk

Changpeng Zhao, the current CEO of Binance, has reiterated his support for the acquisition of Twitter by Elon Musk. He recently said they would follow Musk if he went all the way but would withdraw if he voided the transaction.

In May, Binance said that it would fund Musk with USD 500 million for his purchase of Twitter. He has commented that the platform is the most important free speech platform worldwide.

Twitter and Elon Musk have not signed the agreement yet, but the deal is still standing.

They suspended the buyout of Twitter in May when Musk demanded more data to determine how much Twitter activity is legitimate. At the time, the tycoon suggested that he would make the deal only if under 5% of the accounts were fake.

Twitter stated it would comply with the demands of Elon Musk and provide him with data, implying that the agreement would proceed.

If they close the deal, Musk must pay USD 44 billion for Twitter, equivalent to 20% of his fortune. According to Forbes magazine, Elon Musk has nearly USD 219 billion, making him the wealthiest man on earth.

By Alexander Salazar

El Salvador President Addresses Bear Market Concerns with Bitcoin Hopium

Audy Castañeda
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El Salvador President Addresses Bear Market Concerns with Bitcoin Hopium

As tensions rise over falling Bitcoin prices, President Nayib Bukele decided to share advice for BTC investors who may be worried about the prolonged bear market.

El Salvador introduced BTC as legal tender on September 7, 2021, when its market price was around $50,000. Since then, the Bukele government made significant profits from its initial investments in BTC when the price of Bitcoin reached its all-time high of $69,000, with profits redirected to the country’s various infrastructure development initiatives.

However, as tensions rise amid falling BTC prices, Bukele decided to share advice for fellow Bitcoin investors who may be worried about the prolonged bear market.

Bukele in regards to BTC

Nayib Bukele, the president who helped get Bitcoin (BTC) legal tender status in El Salvador, addressed growing investor concerns as the price of BTC began trading below $20,000 for the first time in 18 months.

On Twitter, Bukele posted that, “I see that some people are worried or anxious about the #Bitcoin market price. My advice: stop looking at the graph and enjoy life. If you invested in #BTC your investment is safe and its value will immensely grow after the bear market. Patience is the key.”

Reactions to Bukele’s Advice

Bukele’s advice caused mixed reactions from the community, with many pointing to the fact that El Salvador acquired most of its BTC at a much higher price than current market value. While critics expect BTC and other cryptocurrencies to continue the downward trend, on-chain analysis points to the price of Bitcoin returning to its former glory.

Some of the popular suggestions to Bukele from the cryptocurrency community in the midst of the bear market include the launch of Bitcoin Bonuses, as noted via Twitter: “If I might make a humble suggestion. Great time to launch your #Bitcoin bonds.”

As the world tracks down El Salvador’s Bitcoin Economy, Alejandro Zelaya, El Salvador’s Minister of Finance, dismissed the accusations of the country losing more than $40 million, stating that, “I have said it repeatedly: An alleged $40 million loss has not occurred because we have not sold the coins.”

In response to a journalist’s question about El Salvador’s reaction to the sharp drop in the price of Bitcoin, Zelaya responded by saying that “There is a clear criticism of Bitcoin as such, not of El Salvador’s strategy.”

Zelaya also dismissed assumptions about high fiscal risk as humorous and ignorant, while calling the risk “extremely minimal.”

I should be noted that El Salvador owns 2,301 Bitcoins, which is equivalent to about USD 50 million. In fiat equivalent, that’s less than half the money the nation has invested in Bitcoin through its purchases in October 2021 and May 2022, when BTC was worth $30,700.

Like the cryptocurrency market in general, BTC has been declining from its all-time high in November 2021 (around $69,000) with the downward trend accelerating over the past month and a half after a series of incidents such as the crash of Terra and the Celsius fiasco, as well as the increase in world inflation.

By Audy Castaneda

Miners Sell Bitcoin (BTC) and Increase Market Pressure

Audy Castañeda
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Miners Sell Bitcoin (BTC) and Increase Market Pressure

In May 2022, public mining companies sold 4,411 BTC. Cryptocurrency mining companies are on the brink of survival. Businesses are forced to exchange BTC for fiat to pay for electricity as well as employee salaries.

Amid the crypto market crash, miners sell Bitcoin (BTC) to survive the crisis.

The financial statements of public mining companies showed that they had to quadruple cryptocurrency sales to make ends meet.

In May 2022, public mining companies sold 4,411 BTC. This is four times more than the average for the month of January to April 2022. This is demonstrated by the financial statements that public companies deliver to the regulator.

Public Mining Companies Increase Sale of Bitcoin

Data from analytics firm CoinMetrics also confirms that miners have started moving coins to cryptocurrency exchange wallets.

Despite the lack of reliable information on the movement of miner-owned coins, it is quite obvious that cryptocurrency mining companies are on the brink of survival.

Initially, miners received 50 BTC for each block mined. But every four years the amount of remuneration has been reduced by half (halving).

Now they are paid 6.25 BTC. A new block appears every 10 minutes on average, which means around 900 BTC are created per day. In addition, they receive a commission for processing transactions.

In good times, miners have enough money to pay for electricity and to cover other operating expenses, so they prefer to save coins.

Currently, though, the situation is different: electricity prices are rising and miners’ profits are falling along with cryptocurrency rates.

Under these conditions, companies are forced to exchange BTC for fiat to pay for electricity and employee salaries.

Miners: Business Reduction

At the end of May, around 46,500 BTC (worth $1.5 billion at the time) were stored in the wallets of public miners. Companies will likely have to increase Bitcoin sales to fund their operating activities.

Miner sales will increase the volume of coins in circulation and increase the downward pressure on the market.

At press time, the top cryptocurrency is trading at $19,900. Previously, the cryptocurrency fell to $18,700, this is the lowest value since December 2020.

The digital asset market capitalization fell to $880 billion, losing more than $500 billion in a week.

By Audy Castaneda

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