Crypto Scoop: The Slow But Definite "Cryptonization" Of The World

Crypto Scoop

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May, 15 2024

Crypto Scoop

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Several nations move towards crypto adoption as Binance sponsors the football championship, AFCON, and several crypto projects come into play.

Bitcoin began the year uncomfortably close to $40,000, but it was able to record price gains this week, bringing it closer to breaking past $45,000. Will bitcoin break through $45,000 in the coming weeks, or will the downward trend continue? For this edition of the crypto scoop, we will be reviewing:

  • Binance sponsorship of the AFCON 2022
  • Solana’s price gains and development as a cryptocurrency
  •  Tonga’s prospects of adopting bitcoin as a legal tender
  • Jack Dorsey’s announcement of a bitcoin legal fund
  • Kim Kardashian and George Mayweather’s pending lawsuit for promoting a cryptocurrency token inappropriately.

Binance, Official Crypto Sponsor For AFCON 2020

Crypto exchange platform, Binance is the official sponsor of the largest men's football championship series in Africa, AFCON. Binance entered a  partnership with the Confederation of African Football (CAF) and signed in as a sponsor for the African Cup Of Nations (AFCON) being hosted by Cameroon. With its partnership with CAF and sponsorship of the tournament, Binance has placed itself as the first and official crypto and blockchain sponsor for the event.

As part of the sponsorship, Binance would be promoting CAF's social media content which includes the assist of the day, week, and tournament. The Binance partnership with CAF is a moment for the crypto firm to pursue crypto adoption and provide financial services to Africans. Emmanuel Babalola, Binance's director for Africa, explained, "In Africa, football is the most popular sport." and he believes that the sponsorship will confirm Binance's objective to bring crypto mainstream across the continent.

Binance wasn't the only prominent firm pursuing crypto initiatives this week. Standard Bank, Africa's largest bank by assets, announced a partnership with Blockchain Research Institute (BRI), a global blockchain think tank. The alliance has launched BRI Africa, a platform that brings together academics, policymakers, entrepreneurs, and researchers to conduct groundbreaking blockchain research, with the institution now working on over 100 projects.

 The BRI will also offer an online course in conjunction with INSEAD, Europe's premier business school, and Coursera, the world's largest online education platform. While most financial institutions have been instructed not to support cryptocurrency transactions, financial institutions across Africa are aware of the potential of cryptocurrencies – and it's no surprise that Africa's largest bank by assets, Standard Bank is eager to harness the potential of crypto in Africa. According to BRI Africa, the initiative, which is now open to new founders in Egypt and Zimbabwe, provides resources to help them launch and scale their businesses.

Solana

Solana (Source: Beincrypto)

Solana: The Visa of Digital-Asset World

Since the start of the year, Solana's price has declined like several altcoins after recording record highs for most of 2021. However, many took it as a sign to buy the dip, and over the week, Solana has proved itself as a worthy cryptocurrency. The Bank of America, in a research note after hosting Solana Foundation member Lily Liu noted that Solana could be the next Visa of the Digital asset world. Since its premiere in 2020, Solana has seen rapid adoption. Analyst Alkesh Shah stated in a report that Solana has settled over 50 billion transactions, has more than $11 billion in total value locked, and has been used to produce more than 5.7 million non-fungible tokens (NFTs). Solana is designed for consumer use cases like micropayments and gaming, according to the bank.

Because of its low costs and fast transaction rates, the Solana protocol has been dubbed the "Visa of the digital asset ecosystem." According to the bank's analysts, it might even overtake Ethereum as the leader among smart contract-enabled blockchains. "Solana promotes scalability," says analyst Alkesh Shah, "but a less decentralized and safe blockchain has trade-offs, as evidenced by multiple network performance concerns since creation." In a tweet on Wednesday, Arthur Cheong, founder of Defiance Capital, stated, "It's interesting how the NFT ecosystem on  @solana is thriving now although it's built with features that are optimized for finance use cases (quick block time, low cost, fast finality)."

That's not all! Binance.US is establishing a presence in Portals, a Solana-based metaverse platform. Users can explore buildings and interactive rooms in Portals, which recreates a dense urban atmosphere. In a tweet to CoinDesk, Portals head of community and partnerships, Chris Lund said, "Binance.US is getting a place in Portals Downtown with a focus on bringing the latest news, charts, and events electronically."

Solana wasn't the only cryptocurrency that drew the attention of crypto enthusiasts this week; Shiba Inu, a popular meme coin, saw a 30 percent price increase after rumors of a listing on Robinhood. The canine-themed meme coin's 30% surge has started a bullish reversal pattern, and crypto enthusiasts speculate about what the new listing will mean for SHIB. 

Cryptocurrencies across the globe

The Slow but Definite "Cryptonization" of The World

Crypto adoption has risen around the world, as more businesses, institutions, and individuals see the value and potential of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology. El Salvador is the first and only country to legalize bitcoin as a form of payment. Nayib  Bukele, President of El Salvador on the other hand, recently forecasted the adoption of bitcoin as a legal tender by two additional countries, and his prognosis appears to be coming true. In a tweet, a former member of parliament stated that Tonga, an Oceania country, will soon adopt bitcoin as legal cash. Lord Fusitu'a revealed a five-point strategy for the country's adoption of bitcoin in a series of tweets, with the activation date set for November. In a follow-up statement, Fusitu'a stated that the law is "modeled on and nearly identical to the El Salvador bill."

Iran is also said to be exploring ways for importers and exporters to use cryptocurrency in international transactions. According to the Mehr News Agency, the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) and the Ministry of Trading have struck an agreement to link the CBI's payment platform to a trading system that will allow businesses to settle payments using cryptocurrency.

Reuters reports that falling the increased inflation in Turkey despite the crypto ban, turkey crypto trades have soared over a million a day. As Turks scramble to get rid of their national currency, crypto trade volumes using the lira hit a 15-month high. The Turkish lira's instability is encouraging Turks to use cryptocurrency as a form of payment and a store of wealth. Turkey is reeling from severe inflation, which has brought its national currency to its knees, after nearly two decades of unrestrained expansion. Since September 2021, the country's currency has lost 40% of its value versus the dollar, prompting many to turn to Bitcoin and Tether as alternatives.

Despite the country's long-standing anti-crypto trading legislation, which were initially declared in 2017, interest in cryptocurrency has been growing in Morocco, according to the research report. Morocco has become one of Africa's top four crypto hubs. According to the most recent data from crypto payments provider Triplea, Morocco's crypto transaction volume of $6 million was enough to place it as the top cryptocurrency trading nation in North Africa in 2021.

Arkansas, a state in the United States, has also announced that it is looking for tech professionals and entrepreneurs to migrate to its Northwestern region. The Northwest Arkansas Council has announced that it will begin awarding $10,000 in Bitcoin to tech professionals and entrepreneurs interested in relocating to the area. This is part of the non-profit bitcoin initiative, "Bitcoin and a Bike," which aims to boost the region's tech economy. Northwest Arkansas is the first region in the US to offer cryptocurrency incentives to anyone considering relocating. This year, the Central American country has great goals, the majority of them revolve around expanding its burgeoning blockchain industry.

Jack Dorsey announces Bitcoin Legal Defense Fund.

Former Twitter CEO and Block co-founder Jack Dorsey revealed plans to form a "Bitcoin Legal Defense Fund" with Chaincode Labs co-founder Alex Morcos and Martin White, a University of Sussex academic. A team of volunteers and part-time lawyers will help offer legal defense for Bitcoin developers through the Fund. At 13:45 UTC on Wednesday, an email address that appeared to belong to Dorsey was submitted to the bitcoin-dev mailing list for Bitcoin engineers. The Bitcoin Legal Defense Fund is a "nonprofit entity that attempts to minimize legal difficulties that dissuade software engineers from actively developing Bitcoin and similar projects," according to the statement.

Although the email claims that the board of the Fund will be responsible for choosing which actions and defendants it will help fight, the Fund will include volunteers and part-time lawyers for developers to take advantage of if they so wish." The Fund's first project, according to the email, will be to take up Ramona Ang's "Tulip Trading Lawsuit" against developers for suspected misconduct regarding access to a Bitcoin (BTC) fortune.

Speaking on lawsuits, Kim Kardashian and Floyd Mayweather are being sued for promoting cryptocurrency tokens in an inappropriate manner. A class-action lawsuit has been filed against reality TV star Kim Kardashian and boxing icon Floyd Mayweather Jr. for their promotion of Ethereummax and the EMAX cryptocurrency token. The lawsuit claims that the celebrities' "inappropriate promotional efforts generated the trading volume required for all defendants to unload their EMAX tokens onto unsuspecting investors." Kardashian pushed Ethereummax to her 250 million Instagram followers in a June 2021 post. According to the lawsuit, Kardashian's Instagram post had the #AD hashtag "tucked in the very bottom right of the picture" to indicate that it is a paid advertisement, and she "routinely gets paid between $300,000 and $1 million for most promotional postings."

Mayweather pushed Ethereummax in a variety of ways, including wearing EMAX tokens on his boxing trunks during a high-profile fight with Youtube star Logan Paul in June and offering supporters incentives to buy online tickets using EMAX tokens. Following its debut in May, the price of EMAX skyrocketed by 1,370 percent.

LooksRare Hosts $105 Million in Trading Volume Under 24 Hours

NFT platform, OpenSea seems to have found a worthy competitor in LooksRare. According to a Dune Analytics dashboard, the budding non-fungible token marketplace saw $105 million in trade volume in 24 hours, producing 613 ETH (almost $2 million) in platform fees, which will be paid to LOOKS token holders according to its co-founder Zodd. LooksRare, the new NFT trading platform, has already made waves just days after its launch, with sales exceeding $394 million.

A restaurant in New York City has also announced that it will exclusively serve NFT holders. Despite the fact that the restaurant will not open its doors until 2023, two types of memberships are presently available in Ether. The VCR Group, a hospitality company created by entrepreneur Gary Vaynerchuk, has announced the live token sale of Flyfish Club, its newest members-only private dining club in New York City. Members of the seafood restaurant must buy their membership on the blockchain, which is marketed as a nonfungible token (NFT).

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