General news about blockchain & cryptocurrency – May 24
Ethereum spot ETF officially approved by SEC
On the morning of May 24, 2024, the US Securities Commission (SEC) officially approved 8 Ethereum spot ETFs, marking a major change in the SEC's policy on cryptocurrency-related products. Approved ETFs include Grayscale, Bitwise, iShares, VanEck, ARK/21 Shares, Invesco, Fidelity and Franklin Templeton.
However, this approval is only a 19b-4 filing approval, companies still need to complete the S-1 filing before they can begin trading. According to experts, this process can take several weeks or even longer.
In addition, the SEC also officially recognized Ethereum as a “commodity asset”, contrary to the SEC's previous position of considering Ethereum as a security. This opens up many new opportunities for the development of the cryptocurrency market.
The news of the Ethereum spot ETF approval is considered a big step forward by the SEC, and also shows the careful preparation of companies to achieve this "nod" from the SEC. Firms such as Grayscale, Fidelity and ARK Invest quickly adjusted their filings to meet the SEC's request.
Grayscale launches investment trusts for Stacks and Near
Asset management firm Grayscale has just announced the launch of two new investment trusts, giving certain investors exposure to Bitcoin layer-2 Stacks and Near Protocol. These funds are available only to accredited investors and will complement Grayscale's existing portfolio of trusts.
Stacks is Bitcoin's layer-2 network, integrating smart contract functionality into Bitcoin, allowing the development of DeFi applications on the oldest cryptocurrency network platform. Meanwhile, Near Protocol was chosen because the development team clearly expressed "the desire to build an 'all-in-one' platform including areas such as AI, SocialFi, ZK, Data Availability and cross-chain" .
Sharing about this decision, a Grayscale representative said that this is an effort to create separate solutions to solve the scalability challenges of blockchain, thereby promoting widespread adoption and system development. crypto ecology. Grayscale's ultimate goal is to list its trusts on the stock exchange.
Fantom (FTM) introduces Sonic Foundation, announcing a capital call of 10 million USD
On May 23, 2024, Fantom Foundation announced plans to establish Sonic Foundation and Sonic Labs, before officially launching the new Sonic blockchain. Sonic Foundation will be responsible for treasury management and governance, while Sonic Labs is in charge of developing dApps on the network.
Sonic Network is a new layer-1 blockchain based on Sonic technology, replacing the old Opera version. The project will issue S tokens, which can be converted 1:1 with FTM, but users can still keep FTM if they do not want to convert. The old version of Opera is still maintained under the management of the Fantom Foundation.
Fantom also successfully raised $10 million in a strategic funding round, led by the Hashed fund. The new capital will be used to develop the ecosystem, increase liquidity for blue-chip pools, and attract users from Ethereum and other layer-2.
Sonic is expected to launch in early Q3 2024, with a processing speed of 2,000 transactions/second and the ability to airdrop S tokens in the future.
Phantom Wallet beats PayPal, ranked 2nd on Google Play
Phantom Wallet has defeated many major financial applications such as PayPal, Venmo, Zelle and became the 2nd ranked free financial application on Google Play as of the morning of May 24, 2024. Phantom Wallet currently has more than 5 million downloads and ranks 14th among total applications on Google Play, surpassing major platforms such as Indeed, Meta's Threads and streaming services.
In addition to expanding to Ethereum and Polygon, Phantom will also add integration with Bitcoin, Bitcoin Ordinals, and the BRC-20 token standard by the end of 2023. Recently, Phantom announced the acquisition of wallet platform Bitski, which is backed by many large investment fund. Previously, Phantom successfully raised $109 million in Series B round in January 2022, bringing a unicorn valuation of $1.2 billion to the company.
