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Ethereum’s Gaming Activity Slumped as Gas Fees Declined

• Ethereum’s average daily active players in the gaming sector declined drastically
• The high gas fees have forced many users and gamers to opt for alternative chains
• Interest in staking ETH declined over the past few weeks

Decline in Ethereum Network Gaming Activity

The Ethereum network has seen a considerable decline in gaming activity recently. Gas fees have increased by a significant margin, but have since gone back down. The cryptocurrency space has been driving users to multiple networks over the last few months, but Ethereum was not one of them. Data provided by Delphi Digital shows that the number of active gamers on the Ethereum network is negligible compared to other networks such as BNB and Polygon.

Cause of Decline

The cause of this decline is likely due to the high gas fees which have caused users to look elsewhere for better options. However, Dune Analytics‘ data shows that overall gas fees on Ethereum are actually lower than they were during February 2020. Furthermore, whale interest appears to be decreasing based on glassnode’s data which shows that addresses holding more than 1,000 ETH has reached a 3-month low of 6,497.

Impact of Shanghai Hardfork

The Shanghai Hardfork will go live on 28 February at epoch 56832 and enable holders to withdraw their staked ETH from the beacon chain. It remains unclear how much impact this will have on gas fees or whale interest but it’s likely that it won’t make too much difference considering current trends.

Current Price

At press time, ETH was trading at $1,671 with a 0.61% decline over the last day.

Conclusion

In conclusion, despite its current issues with gaming activity and gas fees, Ethereum’s network remains resilient overall. Whether or not this resilience can hold against current trends remains uncertain but only time will tell what direction things will take for Ethereum in the near future.

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SEC Charges Do Kwon, Terraform Labs for $60B Crypto Fraud

• The US SEC has charged Do Kwon and Terraform Labs with securities fraud for the collapse of their algorithmic stablecoin, TerraUSD (UST).
•The SEC alleges that the defendants misled investors about the stability of UST and its relationship to Chai payments.
• The regulatory body is seeking a permanent injunction restraining and enjoining Defendants from again violating the federal securities laws.

SEC Charges Do Kwon and Terraform Labs

The United States Securities and Exchanges Commission (SEC) has filed a securities fraud lawsuit against Terraform Labs and its founder – Do Hyeong Kwon. The lawsuit alleges that from April 2018 through May 2022 („Relevant Period“), Terraform and Kwon offered and sold crypto asset securities in unregistered transactions and perpetrated a fraudulent scheme that led to the loss of at least $40 billion of market value, including devastating losses for U.S. retail and institutional investors.

Promotion of Anchor Protocol

The SEC noted that both LUNA and UST were labeled as securities by them in their filing against Do Kwon & Terraform Labs. They have alleged that both defendants were involved in the promotion of Anchor Protocol, which promised a return of 19-20% interest rate on investments made by investors in this protocol.

False Claims Regarding Chai Payments

In addition, the commission has also accused them of falsely claiming that popular Korean electronic mobile payment application called „Chai“ employed the Terraform blockchain network to process transactions when in reality it was not using this blockchain network for any such purpose. Furthermore, they have been accused of replicating Chai transactions to make it seem like their blockchain was being used for commercial purposes when it was not.

Misleading Investors About UST Stability

The SEC claimed that Do Kwon & Terraform Labs had also misled investors about the stability of UST, which is pegged to LUNA tokens. This resulted in an infamous de-pegging event which wiped off more than $60 billion from the market, causing several U.S retail investors to lose their life savings while institutional investors took huge losses amounting into billions of dollars.

Court’s Final Judgment

The SEC is seeking a final judgment ordering permanent injunctions restraining and enjoining Defendants from again violating the federal securities laws described by them in their lawsuit against Do Kwon & Terraform Labs

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Apecoin [APE] Price Slumps 14%: Will the Selling Pressure End?

• ApeCoin [APE] experienced a 14% decline in its price over the last seven days.
• Investors were buying APE when it was trading at a low price.
• Despite bullish indicators, APE’s daily chart showed some signs of bearish pressure.

ApeCoin [APE] Price Analysis

ApeCoin [APE] has been experiencing selling pressure for quite a few days, as was evident from its recent price action. According to CoinMarketCap, APE registered over 14% decline in its price over the last seven days, and at the time of writing, it was trading at $5.05 with a market capitalization of over $1.86 billion.

Staking Activity on the Rise

Interestingly, Lookonchain revealed that APE’s buying and staking were on the rise since the collusion months of 2022. The largest $APE staking address received 300,000 $APE ($1.7M) from #Binance 1 hour ago. And currently staked a total of 2.29M $APE ($13M).

Are Investors Accumulating?

As per Santiment’s data, APE’s supply held by top addresses registered an uptick in the last week, which showed that the investors were accumulating APE when its price was lucrative.

Bearish Pressure Still Remains

Despite bullish indicators, APE’s daily chart showcased some concerns like RSI registering a downtick which is in favor of bears.

Conclusion

Though there were some positive developments like staking activity and exchange outflow increasing significantly but bearish pressure still remains as evidenced by RSI registering a downtick.

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Algorand [ALGO] Set to Rally 25% – FIFA World Cup Boosts Prices

• Algorand (ALGO) saw a 6% rally to a two-month high over the last week.
• ALGO is touted as an effective proof-of-stake (PoS) blockchain, with numerous initiatives for retail clients and traditional institutional circles.
• The anticipation of the forthcoming FIFA World Cup and its network’s most recent upgrade have been major factors in the coin’s recent strong performance.

Algorand Price Analysis

Algorand (ALGO) witnessed a 6% surge to a two-month high, trading at $0.2688 at press time. If certain market conditions are met, ALGO could rally by up to 25%. The scalable blockchain token has seen increased DeFi TVL during the past week, which seems to be changing the narrative surrounding it for the better.

Algorand Initiatives

The Algorand Foundation has been focusing on developing blockchain applications that have the potential to influence society and change the world as a whole. It supports decentralized finance projects such as decentralized lending and trading, stablecoins, and other cryptocurrencies. Its open source ecosystem, decentralized governance, and sound monetary supply economics are helping realize its worldwide potential in technology.

Impact of FIFA World Cup

The anticipation of the upcoming FIFA World Cup has been one of the major factors driving up ALGO’s price recently due to its status as one of its sponsors for this event. It will start from 20th November and go on till 18th December 2021.

Network Upgrade

Apart from this sponsorship deal, ALGO’s winning run can also be attributed its network’s most recent upgrade which enhanced speed among other things significantly . However , due to market sentiment taking over all positive developments , increase in coin values seem to have slowed down .

Conclusion

With increasing DeFi TVLs on Algorand’s platform along with multiple initiatives both for retail clients and traditional institutional circles being taken by Algorand foundation , Algo appears well positioned to take advantage of these bullish crypto markets . Furthermore , with FIFA world cup sponsorship deal in place along with necessary upgrades being done on their system ; it could potentially see another significant rally if certain market conditions are met .