Warm-up: Soneium and Astar join hands in layout

In order to welcome the upcoming launch of the Soneium mainnet, the community has recently launched a wave of "Astar Surge" pre-heating activities. This move is not directly carried out by the official or the foundation, but is spontaneously promoted by the ecological project. Through the lock-up mechanism on Astar EVM in advance, users who hold $ASTR or $vASTR can earn "points". It can be exchanged for the project token at the Token Generation Event (TGE) of each project. It is worth noting that the five protocols participating this time all belong to the Soneium ecosystem, which is equivalent to using Astar to lock up the Soneium token airdrop opportunity in advance.

Bitcoin's price fluctuations have long shown two distinctly different trends compared to traditional financial markets, driven by two completely different narratives: as a risky asset, during heightened market sentiment and increased risk appetite, Bitcoin's performance often aligns with U.S. stocks, exhibiting a high positive correlation. This is primarily due to increased participation from institutional investors, making its capital flow patterns similar to other high-risk assets. However, during market panic or risk events, Bitcoin is viewed as a safe-haven asset, decoupling from U.S. stock trends, and sometimes exhibiting negative correlation, especially when investors lose confidence in the traditional financial system.

Finally finished testing, the mainnet is scheduled to launch in Q1 next year.

Recently, the Pi Network team released significant information again: after months of testing, it is expected to officially promote the 'Open Network' mainnet version in the first quarter of 2025. The Pi Network development team emphasized that after multiple rounds of testing last year, the platform has successfully processed over 50 million transactions and has addressed various potential scalability and security concerns. The team stated that this mainnet launch will no longer be in test mode but will open full functionality to users, urging participants who have not completed KYC to expedite their progress to avoid missing out on various application scenarios after the mainnet opens.

2024 is almost over. At the end of 2024, the airdrop of Magic Eden’s token $ME and the collective recovery of Ethereum’s “old blue chip”, especially the sunny airdrop of Pudgy Penguins’ token $PENGU, have brought real wealth effects to NFT. It has gained market attention for a long time.

What kind of year has it been for NFTs? Rhythm BlockBeats reviews the NFT market over the past 12 months for you. After reviewing the NFT market in 2024 with us, how would you rate the performance of the NFT market in 2024?

January: The world is divided into three parts, and the end of the "hexagonal head"

2024 Cryptocurrency Circle Review: 69 Ridiculous and Funny Events

2024 is coming to an end! This year the cryptocurrency market has gone from trough to all-time highs, with great progress in terms of institutional adoption and political changes. However, the advent of the meme currency super cycle and the birth of rapid currency issuance tools such as Pump.fum have given rise to the most ridiculous events in history. year.

The currency circle foreign media (Decrypt) recently compiled 69 absurd events in the currency circle in 2024, most of which are related to meme coins. Let’s take a look at the absurd and funny events in the currency circle this year!

Since the beginning of this year, Asian stock markets have shown mixed performance against the backdrop of a strong dollar.

Among them, some achieved a bull market in their domestic currency at the expense of currency depreciation, while others sacrificed part of their stock market gains for a relatively stable exchange rate.

Only South Korea is an exception:

Measured in won, South Korea's composite index KSOPI has fallen by 10.0% this year. Considering the depreciation of the won, the dollar-denominated KSOPI has fallen by 18.9%, both being the weakest in Asia.

Source: Wall Street Journal

Most of the declines occurred in the second half of the year. The 24H1KSOPI once rose nearly 20%, but the gains were wiped out in the second half.

Internal pressure and external controversies

El Salvador's latest Bitcoin purchase has once again attracted global attention. According to data from the country's national Bitcoin office, El Salvador's treasury now holds a total of 6,000.77 Bitcoins, with an estimated market value of $561 million. Despite strong pressure from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the country shows no signs of backing off and continues to push forward with its crypto asset policies.

Image source: Bitcoin Office

The El Salvador government announced a plan to 'buy one Bitcoin daily' in 2022, and now holds the sixth-largest government Bitcoin reserves in the world, following the United States, China, the United Kingdom, Ukraine, and Bhutan. Although the IMF and some traditional financial institutions continue to express concerns that Bitcoin's volatility may pose risks to the country's financial stability, President Bukele clearly has no intention of letting these doubts shake his position.

MicroStrategy's Bitcoin holdings are once again in the spotlight.

As the end of 2024 approaches, the enterprise software company MicroStrategy seems to be making significant moves again. The company's executive chairman, Michael Saylor, recently posted on social media, hinting at the possibility of a final Bitcoin purchase this year, sparking strong speculation in the market. According to data from SaylorTracker, MicroStrategy's Bitcoin reserves have reached 444,262 coins, with a total purchase cost of approximately $27.7 billion and an average buying price of around $62,226.34. Since this holding has already exceeded the expected total output of 328,125 coins during the next Bitcoin halving cycle (2028-2032), external parties are starting to speculate on its next strategic intentions.

What happened?

The real-world asset tokenization (RWA) platform Agridex recently completed its first 'on-chain coffee transaction.'

This transaction involved exporting coffee from the UK to South Africa, and through on-chain transactions, not only are the fees far lower than traditional cross-border agricultural commodity transactions, but it also enables instant settlement.

Agridex focuses on tokenizing agricultural products with the aim of helping investors, farmers, and governments reduce costs and increase profitability.

Click here to learn more about 'What is RWA?'

Agridex completes its first on-chain coffee transaction.

The real-world asset tokenization (RWA) platform Agridex on the Solana blockchain has completed its first on-chain coffee transaction. The purpose of this transaction is to export coffee from the UK coffee brand Tiki Tonga Coffee to South Africa, where the buyer pays for the goods in the local currency, South African Rand ($ZAR), and finally settles in GBP to Tiki Tonga Coffee on the Agridex platform.

Solana co-founder Stephen Akridge and his ex-wife Elisa Rossi are in court over a financial dispute. Elisa Rossi accuses Stephen Akridge of illegally appropriating and staking her Solana cryptocurrency $SOL from her crypto wallet, but he did not give her a single cent of the nearly millions of dollars in staking rewards.

Elisa Rossi is Italian, currently living in Rome, and has been married to Akridge for nearly 10 years. According to a lawsuit filed in California court on Tuesday, Solana's co-founder withheld millions of dollars in reward tokens from his ex-wife. Elisa Rossi is suing Stephen Akridge to recover the proceeds.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has introduced new regulations requiring decentralized finance (DeFi) brokers to collect and report user transaction data, including the total gains from digital asset transactions. This initiative aims to strengthen tax compliance in the emerging DeFi industry.

According to the updated rules, DeFi brokers must provide clients with a 1099-DA form, which contains key details of the transactions, such as name, wallet address, and transaction amount. This positions DeFi service providers on par with traditional securities brokers regarding tax reporting obligations, representing a significant shift in regulatory oversight.

Why is it important to pay attention to token unlocks?

Are you unfamiliar with the term 'unlock' in the cryptocurrency market? If you plan to delve deeper into the market, the potential impact of unlocks on token prices is an event you must closely monitor.

What is a token unlock? When each project issues its native tokens, they are usually allocated to developers, early investors, etc., according to a ratio. This is the token distribution model. To avoid significant selling pressure on tokens when the project starts, many projects set a 'lock-up period' to lock the tokens held by relevant parties for a period of time, preventing immediate trading. Subsequently, at specific time points, these tokens will be partially unlocked, allowing holders to trade freely.

Bitcoin falls below $94,000, analysts warn of a potential deep correction

Since surging to a new high of $108,000 in mid-December, Bitcoin has been in a continuous correction and consolidation, having fallen below $94,000 as of today (12/30).

After experiencing a historic bull market in November and December, Bitcoin is currently consolidating between $92,000 and $99,000. During the year-end period in Europe and the U.S., trading activity in the stock market and cryptocurrency market has become relatively thin.

Since October 2024, Bitcoin has remained above the 200-day exponential moving average (EMA), which many analysts view as a 'bull-bear support line'; remaining above this line indicates that the uptrend is still ongoing, while falling below it signifies the initiation of a downtrend.

Pacific Meta investment! What kind of game is Domenation?

The Asian Web3 accelerator Pacific Meta recently announced its investment in the next-generation shooting game (Domenation) developed by Spanish game studio Blackmouth Games, which is currently in testing phase and not yet officially launched. The game combines traditional shooting games with blockchain technology to create an innovative Web3 gaming ecosystem.

Blackmouth Games was established in 2017 and successfully developed Europe's first real-time battle royale system in 2019. They have collaborated with top technology providers in the gaming industry, such as Improbable, Amazon Web Services, and Epic Games, using the latest technology to create a gaming environment that can accommodate thousands of players online simultaneously.

In the context of the growing popularity of blockchain technology, the cryptocurrency trading ecosystem is rapidly expanding its capabilities. Decentralized exchanges (DEXs) have become important platforms for digital asset trading due to their advantages of disintermediation and transparency. As the market matures, various automated trading tools have emerged. MEV (Maximal Extractable Value) bots are automated programs used to execute strategies and other trading tactics on blockchain networks. They extract maximum value by rearranging, inserting, or delaying blockchain transactions. This article will delve into the definition, principles, implementation methods, determining factors, and optimization directions of sandwich bots.

Source: Deep Tide TechFlow

Thank you

Special thanks to Stratus and Snats for their meticulous proofreading of this article.

Preface

Whether in the crypto community or other groups, people have long been accustomed to creating a false sense of unity through superficial signals rather than based on shared values or goals.

Once, memes were tools for spreading culture, but now they are mistakenly regarded as culture itself.

The community is losing its way, losing true identity. We have replaced deep mutual understanding with shallow signals of belonging.

This phenomenon, which was once just a 'minor issue' within the crypto circle, has now spread to a broader society, and it can even be said that this pathology has reached an 'incurable' stage.

The founder’s words are hotly discussed in the community

Recently, the cryptocurrency circle has once again staged a "Versailles-style" topic. Billy Markus, the co-founder of Dogecoin, recently posted a sarcastic post on the social platform: "I’m pre-rich. (I am already rich)", sparking discussion among fans. Since he often responds to hotly debated topics with sarcasm and humor, this sentence was immediately interpreted by netizens as another classic example of "Versailles" (meaning to show one's superiority in an inadvertent way).

Source:

Memecoins aren’t useless: they bypass securities laws, don’t benefit venture capitalists, and are also pretty fun.

Memes are the essence of cryptocurrency: social trends, wry humor, and the lure of absurd profits, all wrapped up in a functionless token. They're not for Warren Buffett, but they are for legions of ordinary people looking for fun, community, and a break from the fringes of their surroundings.

“Memes are leading indicators,” says Danny Yang, founder of OnChainMonkey, referring to crazy returns relative to other indicators. Meme coins gamify the investing process, with investors flocking to follow invisible trends from election results or joining the latest coin launch within ten minutes of the arrest of a UnitedHealthcare CEO shooting suspect. This is very similar to 4Chan’s style.

Chunjiang Plumbing Duck Prophet believes that the financing information of the project is an important signal of market development. It not only reflects the competitiveness of the project itself, but also shows the flow and confidence of market funds. It also indicates the direction and trend of innovation. PANews regularly launches the (Financing Weekly Report) column every Monday morning, continuing to record weekly financing market information. At the end of the year, based on the financing information throughout the year, we review the overall primary market performance this year to provide investors with a reference.

Overview of the investment and financing market in 2024

According to incomplete statistics from PANews, a total of 1,259 investment and financing events were revealed in the primary market of the cryptocurrency and blockchain industry in 2024, with the total capital scale exceeding US$9.3 billion. Judging from the total number and scale of financing, the investment and financing market situation this year is basically the same as that in 2023, when 1,174 transactions completed a total of US$9.615 billion in financing. Compared with 1,660 investment and financing events in 2022, with total funds exceeding US$34.8 billion, a more stable trend has been formed in the past two years, and investment transactions tend to be more cautious and rational.

The fear of 'this is the last cycle' + uncertainty about how long good times can last + social pressure from others performing better. These three constitute a lethal combination that undermines the decision-making ability of many.

Possible Consequences:

Distraction: Blindly chasing every hot trend while ignoring the necessity of focusing on key trades.

Pessimism and Hesitation: Losing confidence due to uncertainty, leading to an inability to hold any assets for the long term, or even completely avoiding the market.

Lack of Belief: Insufficient in-depth research on projects, making it hard to build enough confidence to cope with market fluctuations.