Fantom’s Staking Ratio Soars: Validator Requirements Lowered to 50,000 FTM

• Fantom (FTM) recently proposed changes to reduce the minimum validator staking requirement from 3.175 million FTM to 50,000 FTM or less.
• Validators are nodes that process transactions and maintain the blockchain’s integrity in the Fantom network, chosen through staking.
• The current staking ratio of Fantom stands at over 50%, indicating a significant portion of FTM holders participating as validators.

Fantom Proposes Change in Validator Staking Requirements

Fantom recently proposed changing validator staking requirements to as low as 50,000 FTM. Despite recent price declines, Fantom’s staking ratio is still over 50%. This change aims to make the process more accessible for interested validators and provide opportunities for greater decentralization on the platform.

Understanding Validators on the Fantom Network

In the Fantom network, validator staking is a key mechanism that helps ensure security and stability. Validators are chosen through staking where users can lock up their tokens to participate in the network as validators. Users stake their tokens by locking them up in a smart contract for a set period which helps validate transactions and secure the blockchain of the platform.

Current Staking Ratio on Fantom

According to data provided by Staking Rewards, the current staking ratio of Fantom stands at over 50%, indicating that a significant portion of FTM holders are actively participating in the network as validators. Furthermore, there has been an increase in new stakers joining with over 91,000 new ones joining within last 30 days alone . At press time, market cap of tokens was over $614 million and total value of platform stood at over $1 billion.

Impact of Proposed Changes

The tweaks to validator staking requirements will create an inclusive environment for interested validators who can join with a more attainable range of investment ranging from 50,000-100,000 FTM compared to previous requirement which was 3 million FTM ($200k). This is significantly lower than Ethereum which requires 32 ETH ($54k) for becoming a validator node on its network.

Conclusion

These changes made by Fantom will help open up opportunities for users looking to become part of their decentralized platform while simultaneously ensuring security and increasing decentralization levels on its blockchain network

IPOR Protocol Bridges the Gap between DeFi and TradFi with Bitget

• Bitget, the largest crypto copy trading platform, has announced the upcoming listing of IPOR in its Innovation Zone of the spot market.
• IPOR Protocol is a decentralized interest rate derivative exchange that utilizes the Inter Protocol Over-block Rate (IPOR) index and aims to bridge the gap between DeFi and TradFi.
• Bitget’s Managing Director commented that IPOR’s features will attract both DeFi and TradFi players, bringing DeFI to a wider audience.

BitGet Listing of IPOR

Bitget, the largest crypto copy trading platform, has announced the upcoming listing of IPOR in its Innovation Zone of the spot market. The deposit services for digital assets will be available from 7 AM on March 22nd, 2023 (UTC), with trading set to commence at 12 PM (UTC) on the same day.

Bridge Between DeFi and TradFi

IPOR Protocol is a decentralized interest rate derivative exchange that utilizes the Inter Protocol Over-block Rate (IPOR) index. It offers non-custodian on-chain interest rate swaps through the IPOR Index, IPOR AMM, liquidity pools, and Asset Management smart contracts. The protocol aims to bridge the gap between DeFi and TradFi by providing risk management tools such as interest rate derivatives and indices for emerging DeFi credit markets. This enhances stability and makes fixed-income investments more appealing to traditional finance players.

IPOR Team Experience

The IPOR team is composed of members who have been in the crypto industry since 2011 which give it important advantages. It includes three PhDs, quants with over 20 years of experience in fixed income, enterprise software developers with over 15 years of experience, and advisors for Cardano and founder of 1inch.

Interest Rate Derivative Market In Tradfi

The interest rate derivative market in tradfi is enormous between 450 – 600 trillion notional yet untapped in Defi. The IPOR protocol ranks as Top 5 derivative platform by TVL with over $40 million & top 2 on Ethereum.

Bitget 24H Trading Volume

According to coingecko bitgets 24H trading volume is around $845 million ranking 10th among all spot exchanges . The platform now supports over 460 coins with 529 trading pairs .

Dogecoin: Bulls Willing to Push, But Will Bears Keep Winning?

• Dogecoin registered gains of 9.4% in the 12 hours before writing, bringing it into a zone of resistance.
• The market structure remains bearish on a daily timeframe and DOGE has broken beneath the bullish order block at $0.066.
• Despite recent gains, the AO showed bearish momentum remained strong and weighted sentiment was positive on social media.

Dogecoin’s Price Movement

Dogecoin (DOGE) registered gains of 9.4% over the 12 hours preceding this article’s publication, which brought many altcoins right into a zone of resistance – including DOGE itself. Despite the recent rally, however, the market structure still appears to be bearish on a daily timeframe; with DOGE having broken beneath its bullish order block at $0.066 and forming a new lower low at $0.065.

Technical Analysis

At the time of writing, an imbalance (white) that DOGE had left on its charts had been filled but prices were yet to close above their respective breaker (red). If they do move past this level however, bulls could take heart as they would have beaten their recent lower high at $0.076 – giving them more room to maneuver in their uptrending trajectory towards higher levels of resistance. On a technical level, both the Awesome Oscillator (AO) and Chaikin Money Flow (CMF) indicators are showing that bearish momentum remains strong despite current gains; while also indicating that capital inflow into DOGE’s markets may not be significant enough to sustain any further rallies in price action for now.

Social Media Sentiment

Weighted sentiment behind Dogecoin is currently quite positive; likely due to its recent surge in price action over the past few hours prior to writing this article. Additionally, mean coin age remains flat – suggesting that investors are not currently selling off or exchanging large amounts of their existing holdings – which could be interpreted as either an indication that holders have faith in Dogecoin’s long-term potential or simply just holding out for short-term profits through intraday trading activities instead.

Conclusion

In conclusion, it appears that although Dogecoin has seen some bullish activity recently it is still too early to tell whether or not these gains are sustainable or if they will eventually fade away again soon after making another attempt at breaking through key levels of resistance like those found near $0.0715 and beyond . Only time will tell how much 1, 10 or 100 DOGEs are actually worth today but regardless investors should always remain aware of how market conditions can change very quickly over shorter periods of time so as to minimize risk exposure as much as possible when investing any amount into cryptocurrency trading activities going forward!

ZK-Rollups: Ethereum’s Hope for Speedy Transactions in 2023

• Several Ethereum [ETH] scaling solutions have been developed to help improve the blockchain’s lagging transaction speed without compromising its security and decentralization.
• Zero-knowledge (ZK) rollups are part of these scaling solutions, but they have not been able to gain as much attention as their Optimistic counterparts.
• ZK Ethereum Virtual Machines (zkEVMs) can help execute smart contract transactions in a compatible way with zk proofs existing on the Ethereum infrastructure, and there has been recent development that could change the course of the scaling race.

Ethereum Scaling Solutions

For most of 2022, several Ethereum [ETH] scaling solutions rose to the occasion to help out the blockchain’s lagging transaction speed. This happened without compromising its security and decentralization. And yet, it was for this reason that Optimistic roll-ups including Optimism [OP] and Arbitrum were able to gain widespread adoption.

ZK Rollups

Zero-knowledge (ZK) rollups have also been part of these scaling solutions developed to solve the inherent scalability issue; however, they have not been able to gain attention like their Optimistic counterparts. The Total Value Locked (TVL) factor is one of the main reasons why these projects haven’t gained more traction – none of them have been able to overthrow either Arbitrum or Optimism in terms of TVL metric. The biggest ZK rollup dYdX had only a TVL of $360 million which is far below what their competitors are at.

zkEVMs

The ZK Ethereum Virtual Machines (zkEVMs) can help execute smart contract transactions in a compatible way with zk proofs existing on the Ethereum infrastructure; thereby leading to customizable off-chain and on-chain scaling. Bankless noted that there is possibility that these zkEVMs could replicate what their optimistic counterparts did in 2022; however, it remains uncertain whether they will be able to reach their potential due to lack of liquidity deposits directed towards them so far.

Development Progress

On a brighter side though, type 1 – type 4 zkEVMs seem ready for compatibility with Ethereum applications as Starknet has already reached stage 3 while zkSync launched its Mainnet form earlier this year itself. These developments could lead an improvement in acceptance in 2023 if everything falls into place correctly; however, it is important that developers keep working on further progress despite current limitations such as TVL holding them back from reaching their true potentials when compared against other protocols such as Optimism & Arbitrum etc..

Conclusion

Despite encountering some limitations so far, Zero-knowledge (ZK) rollups still hold great potential when it comes down improving upon scalability issues within ETH network without sacrificing any security/decentralization aspects at all – which is why we should be hopeful about seeing some major changes happening by 2023 if developers continue working hard enough!

REN Rises 25.93% as Whale and Shark Investors Uptick Holdings

• REN tokens rose 25.93% in the last 24 hours, with large “whale” and “shark” addresses increasing their holdings by 4.73%.
• Trading volume also jumped to over $200 million as traders were confident in the trend of REN.
• The network growth was decreasing while the weighted sentiment was increasing, showing investor perception of the asset was positive.

REN Price Increase

CoinMarketCap showed that Republic Protocol [REN]’s price had increased 25.93% in the last 24 hours. Santiment reported that addresses holding between 10000 – 1000000 REN had upped their bags by 4.73%.

Trading Volume

The trading volume for REN had jumped to over $200 million, reflecting an increase in investor participation in the market with traders being confident with the trend of REN.

Network Growth

The network growth revealed a decrease from 18.60 to 22 which implied that most of the investors involved were short and long-term holders rather than day traders.

Weighted Sentiment

The weighted sentiment showed a move away from below equilibrium at 0.025, implying that there was a high unique social volume and majority of messages were positive regarding the value of REN tokens.

MVRV Ratio

On-chain data showed that Market Value to Realized Value (MVRV) ratio suggested caution as it had jumped above 1; any MVRV ratio above 1 means investors are likely to take profits soon after investing heavily into an asset before its price rise period ends abruptly

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.

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

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.

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 .

MakerDAO Proposes 300% Increase in Compound V2 D3M Debt Ceiling

1. MakerDAO has proposed a new measure to increase the maximum debt ceiling of its Compound V2 D3M by 300% and set the Target Available Debt to 5 million DAI.
2. The DAI Direct Deposit Module (D3M) was deployed on Compound Finance in December 2022 with a DAI supply of 5 million DAI and a maximum debt ceiling of 5 million DAI.
3. The proposed Executive Vote seeks to raise the Compound D3M Debt Ceiling from 5 million DAI to 20 million DAI.

Decentralized finance platform MakerDAO recently proposed a measure to increase the maximum debt ceiling of its Compound V2 D3M from 5 million DAI to 20 million DAI. This proposal seeks to raise the Target Available Debt on the same vault to 5 million DAI.

In December 2022, MakerDAO deployed its DAI Direct Deposit Module (D3M) on Compound Finance with a DAI supply of 5 million DAI. The maximum debt ceiling was also set at 5 million DAI. This module enables the creation and deposit of DAI into other lending protocols on the Ethereum blockchain in exchange for a deposit/collateral token from those protocols.

The new Executive Vote proposed by MakerDAO would increase the maximum debt ceiling of its Compound V2 D3M by 300%, allowing for a maximum of 20 million DAI to be generated as DAI on the platform. The proposed measure also seeks to raise the Target Available Debt on the same vault to 5 million DAI. This would enable MakerDAO to distribute newly minted DAI through other lending protocols while maintaining a full backing of DAI.

The measure is currently awaiting community approval and MakerDAO is confident that it will be approved. If enacted, the new measure would provide MakerDAO with a much needed boost in buying pressure, as well as the ability to distribute freshly minted DAI through other lending protocols. This would ensure the stability of the platform and provide MakerDAO with the necessary tools to expand its reach in the decentralized finance space.