Weekly Market Highlights - Ethereum’s Dencun upgrade is activated
15 March 2024
Macro/TradFi
Bitcoin's market cap soared past US$1.4T earlier this week, exceeding silver's value and making it the world's eighth most valuable asset.
VanEck has slashed fees for its Bitcoin spot ETF to zero, applying to the first US$1.5B of funds in its Bitcoin Trust ETF until March 31, 2025.
MicroStrategy has acquired an additional 12,000 Bitcoin, bringing its total holdings to 205,000 Bitcoin. The recent purchase was made at approximately US$68,477 per BTC.
Crypto
L1/L2:
Ethereum has rolled out the Dencun upgrade on its mainnet, which introduces "blobs" aimed at reducing the cost of Layer-2 transactions, along with 8 other code updates.
BNB Chain has introduced a rollup-as-a-service (“RaaS”) solution to support the development of Layer-2s in its ecosystem, offering cost-effective and no-code infrastructure for dApps to deploy custom rollups.
Swell, a liquid restaking (“LRT”) protocol, collaborates with AltLayer and EigenDA to launch its own layer-2 restaked rollup built on Polygon CDK.
Metis has launched an alpha version of its decentralized sequencer, marking a key step in its roadmap to decentralize its Layer-2 network infrastructure.
Zerion is developing the ZERO Network, a Layer-2 network aiming for zero fees, with a planned launch in late Q2 or early Q3 this year.
DeFi:
PancakeSwap has announced V4, scheduled for release later this year, with four new features: hooks, custom pool types, singleton, and flash accounting, aiming to make on-chain trading cheaper and more efficient.
EigenLayer has released its final roadmap for the mainnet launch, emphasizing a smooth and secure rollout with a multi-phased approach.
MakerDAO will launch the first phase of its Endgame plan in summer 2024, introducing two new tokens, NewStable and NewGovToken.
Stablecoin:
Tether's USDT is set to launch on Celo, with the integration aimed at enhancing cross-border payments and peer-to-peer transactions, particularly in emerging markets.
Other:
Eclipse, Ethereum's first SVM Layer-2, has secured US$50M in funding ahead of its mainnet launch.
Polyhedra Network, known for the zkBridge protocol, has achieved a US$1B valuation after securing US$20M in a strategic funding round.
Modular network Elixir has secured US$8M in a Series B funding round co-led by Mysten Labs and Maelstrom, bringing its valuation to US$800M ahead of its mainnet launch in August 2024.
NFTfi, a lending protocol for non-fungible tokens, secured US$6M in its Series A1 funding round, led by Placeholder VC.
Latest Binance Research Publications
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Orbiting the Cosmos Ecosystem
Monthly Market Insights - March 2024
Scaling Blockchains: Embracing Modularity
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