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Dark Pools Dominate Ethereum |
A growing number of sophisticated Ethereum users are choosing to transact privately on the blockchain – relying on so-called dark pools to avoid trading bots set up to front-run transactions, but potentially obscuring the openness and transparency that are supposed to be hallmarks of decentralized public networks. That's according to new research compiled by Blocknative, a company that specializes in preventing or minimizing the impact of MEV, which stands for "maximal extractable value" – the profits that can be siphoned off by fast-moving software bots that can quickly enter into trades to skim margin off of transactions that are sitting in the network's public queue, waiting to be processed. Private transactions, which are sent directly to validators or block proposers, instead of public mempools, now account for about half of the total on Ethereum, in terms of the total gas usage – reflecting the computational power required to process transactions. The percentage was about 7% in September 2022 when Ethereum transitioned into a proof-of-stake network, but it's taken off this year, jumping from about 15% since the start of 2024. |
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Crypto traders speculating on how the impending U.S. elections might affect the digital assets industry have locked millions in bitcoin (BTC) options tied to the event. The so-called election expiry options, due for settlement four days after the Nov. 4 elections, began trading on Deribit a month ago. As of writing, the notional open interest or the dollar value of the number of active options contracts was $345.83 million, according to data source Amberdata. Call options, which offer an unlimited upside payoff potential at the expense of limited loss, accounted for 67% of the total open interest. The rest came from put options, which offer protection against price drops, amounting to a put-call ratio of less than 0.50. |
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Gamers, Live-Streamers Get a Tokenomic Boost New platform Soulbound tailors an interactive social solution to the Web3-native generation. In Wall Street parlance, “DRIP” stands for “dividend reinvestment plan.” In the Gen Z lexicon, though, “drip” is the style one exudes. It’s from this usage that Soulbound named its reputation points token. By offering gamers and community members DRIP tokens, gamer IDs and content bounties, Soulbound is pursuing its goal of empowering the new creator economy. Soulbound’s whole mission is to give creators – of games, of streaming content, of digital art – a medium through which they can earn a living doing what they love. Continue reading |
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Meme coin Floki's FLOKI token and Valhalla game will feature on various English Premier League (EPL) properties as part of an initial one-year contract to help boost visibility for the $1.2 billion capitalization token. The English Premier League sit on the top tier of England's football pyramid, and features twenty local teams. It is the most-valued football league as per sports data site Transfermarkt. Floki has been steadily trying to move away from its meme status, building the metaverse game Valhalla, real-world asset tokenization platform TokenFi, and introducing staking and banking features to boost appeal for the FLOKI token. FLOKI tokens will be the cryptocurrency partner for Nottingham Forest. Their upcoming game Valhalla will feature on the back of the Sunderland AFC jersey, and will additionally be displayed as on-screen ads throughout all league games. |
Street Streets Goes With Taurus |
State Street, the global custody bank with $44.3 trillion in assets under its watch, chose cryptocurrency custody and tokenization specialist Taurus to provide digital assets services in anticipation of a more congenial regulatory climate in the U.S. The bank's initial focus is to go live with tokenized versions of traditional assets, with the first client named shortly afterward, State Street said. A natural role for a custody specialist like State Street would be to look after digital assets, but banks in the U.S. have been faced with a major hurdle in the form of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) proposed Staff Accounting Bulletin 121 (SAB 121), which imposes restrictions on companies that want to hold their customer's crypto assets. State Street has been “very vocal” about the need to change SAB 121, which could force banks seeking to hold crypto to maintain an onerous amount of capital to compensate for the risk, said Donna Milrod, State Street’s chief product officer and head of Digital Asset Solutions. |
The Takeaway: About That Gensler Story |
Yesterday, a publication called the Washington Reporter released a bombshell story saying that Kamala Harris was “likely to nominate Gary Gensler as Treasury Secretary if elected.” Based on unnamed sources, the lede confidently ran: “While publicly, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) chairman Gary Gensler hasn’t expressed desire to leave his current role, multiple senior Senate staffers are telling the Washington Reporter that if Vice President Kamala Harris wins in November, she plans to nominate Gensler as her Treasury Secretary.”
If true, this would certainly be a big deal for the crypto industry and beyond. Gary Gensler is (let’s just say it) universally disliked in crypto for the SEC’s frequent aggressive “enforcement actions” and for his unwillingness to be clear about what is and what isn’t legally permissible when it comes to digital assets. But is the story true? Let’s take a look at the evidence, and how this “story” may have come about. It may be true that “multiple senior Senate staffers” believe Gensler could be Treasury Secretary in a Harris administration. Gensler is long believed to have coveted that job and he would certainly be well-qualified: he worked on Wall Street (Goldman Sachs), he’s led both of the country's primary markets regulators (the SEC and Commodity Futures Trading Commission), and he was a professor at MIT. He’s a well-rounded, experienced economic public servant; why wouldn’t he be considered as a Treasury Secretary candidate? Putting aside that Harris needs to win the presidency, a Senate majority and persuade both Democratic and Republican Senators to support his nomination … it’s certainly possible Gensler could get the job next year. But, according to most experts, that is unlikely. But the story is filled with red flags that any decent editor would immediately mark up with red ink. For example: “Those rumors corroborate what top Republicans have also told the Reporter on the record.” Rumors don’t corroborate anything. And there’s nothing close to a quote from someone close to the Harris camp; the “likely” in the headline all comes from those Senate staffers. CoinDesk ignored the “story” because it didn’t meet our standards. It contained no on-the-record reporting and nothing from the people who were said to be doing the thing it said they were doing (nominating Gensler). Moreover, many well-placed folks were immediately suspicious and dismissive. So, what is this Washington Reporter? It looks and appears like a venerable publication. But read the website a little and you find that it was started by Republican political operatives and its stated objective is this: “We cover stories pushed by interested parties – including lobbyists or operatives with clients – as long as the content is true, fair, and insightful,” the site says. Whatever that means in plain English, it’s clear that the Washington Reporter isn’t journalism. (Axios described its origins here.) The Gensler-for-Treasury story was certainly compelling, though. And the thing about compelling stories is that they have a way of becoming true even when there’s no truth to them. For instance, The Block, which does solid work daily, picked up the thread and ran a straight “Gensler is being considered for Treasury Secretary” headline. Other well-known reporters tweeted about it (including Unchained’s Laura Shin, for one). Whatever the merits, the story was rapidly becoming true in the retelling. So, who benefits from all this? Well, last week, crypto-friendly Democrats made a concerted push to say they could be trusted on crypto policy. Senate leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) promised to pass a crypto bill through the Senate before the end of the year. It looked like Democrats who support crypto might have a home in November. But what’s the one thing that might stop these crypto people from voting Democrat? Nominating Gary Gensler as Treasury Secretary – just the sort of rumor a political operative might want to spread. --Benjamin Schiller |
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