1.QCP Capital: Market macro sentiment has improved and remains optimistic before the end of the year
QCP Capital made the following comments on the market this week: The current market macro sentiment has improved, and the slowdown in US inflation has boosted market confidence and pushed the stock market back to historical highs. The continued interest rate cuts by major central banks such as the Reserve Bank of New Zealand have reinforced the global wave of monetary easing; the market is still concerned about the possible selling pressure from the US government address, and the US government transferred 10,000 BTC (about US$591 million) related to the Silk Road law enforcement action to the Coinbase wallet. Although the sale has not been confirmed, the market remains wary of the remaining 203,200 BTC and other crypto assets in the wallet; Musk did not discuss cryptocurrencies at all in his 2-hour interview with Trump, which disappointed the market.
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2. Vitalik Buterin registered a new ENS domain name dacc.eth today
DACC stands for "defensive accelerationism" (d/acc), which contrasts with the "effective accelerationism" (e/acc) hotly debated in Silicon Valley. e/acc advocates accelerating social welfare through technological progress, while d/acc advocates promoting technological development in areas such as cybersecurity and privacy protection to deal with potential threats. Vitalik once wrote a long article discussing technological optimism, arguing that a world that prioritizes defense is not only safer, but also promotes healthier and freer governance.
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3. Financial lawyer Scott Johnsson: The US government may be selling Bitcoin
According to the service agreement signed between USMS and Coinbase in June, USMS has been sending Bitcoin to the custody address required by the agreement. Given that the agreement requires USMS's assets to remain completely isolated, once the transfer finally reaches Coinbase Prime (or other mixed transaction addresses), it can be determined that USMS has sold or is about to sell these Bitcoins. Formal confirmation will be confirmed at the latest in the report of the Department of Justice's asset forfeiture program in fiscal year 2024. Previously, the US government transferred nearly $600 million worth of Bitcoin to Coinbase Prime.
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4. BlackRock’s crypto ETF holdings surpass Grayscale for the first time
BlackRock’s two funds (IBIT and ETHA) have combined assets under management (AUM) of $21.6 billion, slightly ahead of the $21.3 billion held by Grayscale’s four funds (GBTC, BTC Mini, ETHE, and ETH mini). BlackRock’s crypto ETF is now the largest in terms of holdings among all providers. Nate Geraci, president of ETF Store, noted that BlackRock’s IBIT spot Bitcoin ETF has only seen one day of net outflows since its launch.
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5. Optimism Foundation disables permissionless fraud proofs and plans to hard fork after security audit
The Optimism Foundation announced that it has restored the network to a permissioned state after a "community-driven audit" found a large number of errors of varying severity. Previously, Optimism launched a permissionless fraud proof. In addition, Optimism contributor OP Labs proposed an upgrade called Granite, which includes a hard fork of Optimism's Layer-2 network.
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6. Hot project news of the week: WBTC faces trust crisis, Arbitrum will enable ARB staking in the future, Grayscale launches MKR Trust, etc. (0811-0817)
1. Bitgo announces plans to transfer control of WBTC product to joint venture with BiT Global link
BA labs published a paper on Makerdao stating that Bitgo announced plans to transfer control of the WBTC product to a joint venture with BiT Global. Custody rights are dispersed from the United States to Hong Kong, Singapore and other places. Justin Sun will have significant influence or control over the joint venture that manages WBTC. BA Labs proposed emergency actions to limit the growth of WBTC exposure.
Justin Sun responded that WBTC has not changed compared to before. Audits are conducted in real time, and personal participation in WBTC is purely strategic. They do not control the private keys of WBTC reserves, nor can they move any BTC reserves. Bitglobal and Bitgo will not sign any unaudited transactions. Keys are still protected using the same Bitgo cold wallet technology and offline keys, and are backed up in multiple countries and regions.
MakerDAO plans to launch a proposal to "reduce the size of WBTC collateral" in the executive vote on August 12 to deal with the potential risks of changes in custody rights. In terms of the core vault, the proposal is to reduce the WBTC-A DC-IAM quota (maximum collateral amount) from 500M to 0; reduce the WBTC-B DC-IAM quota (maximum collateral amount) from 250M to 0; and reduce the WBTC-C DC-IAM quota (maximum collateral amount) from 500M to 0. SparkLend: Prohibit borrowing WBTC; reduce the loan collateral ratio of WBTC from 74% to 0%. BA Labs, a crypto risk analysis and assessment agency, said that the above actions were taken to limit the growth of WBTC exposure and to deal with the potential risks brought about by changes in WBTC custody rights.
BitGo CEO Mike Belshe downplayed Sun Yuchen's involvement in the joint venture in an interview with The Block, emphasizing BitGo's long-standing commitment to security, saying that there is a full team at BiT Global responsible for managing multiple customer accounts and ensuring the safekeeping of assets. They cannot lend them out, nor can they give them to Sun Yuchen or me or anyone else at will without violating the law and facing imprisonment; in terms of certification, we have always had wbtc network, and it will continue to operate. In addition, Belshe also pointed out that some decentralized alternatives to WBTC are risky and the structures created may not be legally allowed to do so, while having higher operating costs. Regarding Maker DAO, Belshe said he is willing to assist in due diligence to eliminate any doubts.
2. Coinbase may launch cbBTC and build a Bitcoin economic system on the Base network link
Coinbase tweeted "cbBTC" and said it will be launched soon, but no specific information has been disclosed. Jesse Pollak, head of the Base protocol of the L2 network supported by Coinbase, said: "I love Bitcoin and am very grateful for its pioneering role in the cryptocurrency field. We will build a huge Bitcoin economy on Base."
3. Worldcoin partners with MIMOS to integrate its technology into Malaysia’s digital infrastructure link
The Worldcoin Foundation, Tools for Humanity (TFH), and MyEG have signed a memorandum of understanding with MIMOS Berhad, the Malaysian government’s applied research and development arm, to integrate Worldcoin technology into the country’s digital infrastructure. The collaboration will leverage the Worldcoin protocol and TFH technology to improve digital credential-related efforts, and new Worldcoin businesses in Malaysia will allow individuals to conduct personal human verification using iris imaging technology developed by TFH for Worldcoin.
4. EigenLayer sparked controversy as its employees received a large number of tokens in ecosystem project airdrops link
The re-staking protocol EigenLayer has sparked controversy because its employees received a large number of tokens in the airdrops of ecosystem projects. Eigen Labs, the developer of EigenLayer, has provided a list of employee wallet addresses to some projects preparing to issue tokens, including Ether.Fi, Renzo, and AltLayer. Some project teams claimed that they had actively requested the list, while at least one team said that they did not request this information, but felt forced to issue tokens to Eigen Labs employees. It is reported that Eigen Labs employees received up to nearly $5 million in tokens through these airdrops. Eigen Labs and the Eigen Foundation banned employees from accepting such airdrops in May this year and implemented stricter internal policies to prevent conflicts of interest or similar issues from happening again.
EigenLayer officially stated that there is no discovery or evidence that any employee of Eigen Labs has put pressure on any team to improperly benefit the Eigen Labs corporate entity or its employees. EigenLayer pointed out that it had changed its internal policies in May to eliminate any incentive imbalance for Eigen Labs employees in future airdrops. Eigen Labs employees cannot receive future airdrops, and projects can only be airdropped to the company.
According to information provided by CoinDesk, Wu said analyst @defioasis found 51 suspected Eigen Labs employee addresses through on-chain investigation, which received a total of 487,933 ETHFI, 1,964,838 ALT and 1,335,090 REZ, with a peak value of more than $5.5 million. The sales rate of ETHFI, ALT and REZ airdrops for these addresses was about 40%. In the comparison between the results of the investigation and the CoinDesk investigation, the number of ETHFI airdrops obtained by the suspected Eigen Labs employees was basically the same, with more ALT and less REZ.
5. Optimism introduces native interoperability between Layer 2 chains in the ecosystem link
Optimism developers have unveiled a roadmap plan to introduce native interoperability between Layer 2 chains in the ecosystem, including OP Mainnet, Zora, Base, and more. This will involve messaging protocols, a universal token standard (SuperchainERC20), and an error-proofing system for secure asset transfers. The goal of the interoperability solution is to make superchains operate like a single blockchain — allowing users, assets, and developers to move seamlessly across networks.
6. Arbitrum community votes to enable ARB staking and adjust governance proposals link
The Arbitrum community voted to enable ARB staking and adjust governance with a 91.54% approval rate. The proposal proposes to unlock ARB utility by enabling ARB staking and improve the governance and security of the Arbitrum protocol, but will not enable the distribution of fees to token holders for the time being. Through ARB staking, token holders will be able to capture value by delegating tokens to users who actively participate in governance. The proposal will also implement a liquidity-staking ARB token (stARB) through the Tally protocol, which can automatically compound future rewards, can be (re)staked, and is compatible with DeFi.
According to the planned schedule, this vote is a preliminary review on Snapshot. If passed, an on-chain proposal will be published on Tally this month to apply for funds and start development. The smart contract will be submitted for review in September, and an on-chain proposal containing a complete ARB staking implementation will be submitted on Tally in October.
7. Grayscale announces new single-asset fund for MakerDAO governance token MKR link
Asset management company Grayscale has announced the launch of a new single-asset fund for MakerDAO’s governance token MKR. The closed-end fund is open to qualified individual and institutional accredited investors and, like Grayscale’s other single-asset trust structures, is not directly withdrawn, which could result in price deviations between the secondary market share and the underlying asset. The launch follows Grayscale’s launch of single-asset funds for decentralized AI project Bittensor’s TAO token and L1 blockchain Sui (SUI) last week.
8. dYdX Chain will release major updates in the fall, including permissionless markets and the introduction of MegaVault link
dYdX Chain announced that it will release its biggest upgrade since its launch this fall. New features include: permissionless market listing, users will be able to instantly list almost any market on dYdX Chain without the need for governance approval; introduction of MegaVault, users can provide liquidity on dYdX through MegaVault and participate in the profits; promotion plan; license key, providing a safer and more customizable environment for institutions and high-value traders.
9. DOGS released token economics in the Telegram community link
Telegram native meme project DOGS released its token economics in the Telegram community, with a total supply of 550 billion, 81.5% of the tokens allocated to the community, 73% of which are allocated to Telegram OGs; 10% for the team and future development, and 8.5% reserved for liquidity and listing activities. In the coming weeks, $DOGS will also launch on-chain emojis that can be minted and traded.
According to official data, a total of 42.2 million users are eligible to receive the airdrop, with an average airdrop of 9,500 DOGS. DOGS will be available for redemption on August 16, and tokens can be redeemed to Telegram wallets or CEX. OKX has recently announced that it will launch DOGS spot trading.
10. UniSat founder: Fractal reset OP_CAT on the testnet today and plans to activate it on the mainnet on September 1 link
UniSat founder Lorenzo wrote that Fractal, a Bitcoin scaling solution, has reset OP_CAT on the testnet and will activate OP_CAT on the mainnet on the first day of September. It is currently developing 3-5 methods of cross-chain bridges to cross assets from the Bitcoin mainnet to Fractal. Fractal will have a developer program that may be much larger than any form of airdrop, which will be aimed at projects that have an impact on the real-world adoption of Bitcoin scaling. It will support BRC-20, Runes, and some other natively supported Bitcoin protocols, and use a modular approach to make them interoperable. It will gradually enable an advanced Bitcoin virtual machine to enable applications to be built within TapRoot. It has also tried an off-chain execution model in BRC-20-Swap, which will become Fractal Swap or possibly PizzaSwap.
