Date: 11/15/2021
“VCs, bankers, bureaucrats in charge of budgets are monetary aristocrats.” — Jimmy Song
Weekly News Report:
1. At 5:15 UTC (00:15 EST) on Sunday, Nov. 14, Taproot, the long-anticipated Bitcoin upgrade, activated at block 709,632, opening the door for developers to integrate new features that will improve privacy, scalability and security on the network. Bitcoin was trading flat after Taproot, the blockchain’s biggest network upgrade in four years, went live.
2. The investment firm VanEck’s bitcoin futures exchange-traded fund (ETF) is set to debut on the Chicago-based CBOE exchange next Tuesday under the ticker symbol “XBTF,” going live after delays since winning U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission approval in late October.
3. In what could be seen as a historic step toward the legitimization of the metaverse, the Caribbean nation Barbados is preparing to legally declare digital real estate sovereign land with the establishment of a metaverse embassy.
4. Crypto asset manager Valkyrie Investments will launch a decentralized finance (DeFi) fund next week with $100 million behind it, designed to give investors safe and easy exposure to the fast-growing industry.
5. Bloomberg LP and Galaxy Digital on Monday released a Solana index, making SOL only the third crypto asset — after BTC and ETH — with a standalone price tracker developed by the pair. The launch signals Wall Street investors’ interest in a token that has surged over 11,700% in the past 12 months.
6. Bitfarms (BITF), the Canadian bitcoin miner, has doubled its mining power over the last eight months and received and installed 1,500 S19j Pro miners so far in November.
7. The Invesco CoinShares Global Blockchain ETF Fund of Fund will be open to Indian investors next week between Nov. 24 and Dec. 8 after getting the go-ahead from SEBI.
8. Paradigm, the venture firm launched by Coinbase co-founder Fred Ehrsam and former Sequoia partner Matt Huang, now has $2.5 billion for placing bets on the next generation of leading crypto projects. It tops the $2.2 billion fund announced by Andreessen Horowitz in June.
9. NFT continues to disrupt the mainstream entertainment industries, with NFT gaming firm Animoca Brands partnering with South Korean record label, talent agency and music production company Cube Entertainment to build a “K-pop music metaverse.”
10. Zanzibar, a semi-autonomous territory in Tanzania, is reportedly exploring ways to regulate and adopt cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin. More African countries are considering adopting Bitcoin as the local crypto market surges over 1,200% in one year.
11. Circle, the United States-based issuer of USDC, has set its sights on thriving Asian crypto markets. Circle’s Asia plans include a regional headquarters in Singapore, a new venture arm, and investment in a Japanese yen stablecoin.
12. “By playing-to-earn and learn, our scholars are gaining critical new skills that will shortly be in huge demand by employers setting up shop in the metaverse,” says CGU co-founder Sergei Sergienko. CGU claims to also attract many Axie players from Cuba, Venezuela, Turkmenistan, Myanmar and African nations.
13. A survey released by the Pew Research Center found that roughly 16% of Americans have invested, traded or used some form of cryptocurrency. The number jumps to 31% for people aged 18–29, and even higher to 43% for males in the same age bracket.
14. The virtual reality “metaverse” is the future of Disney, the Walt Disney Company’s CEO Bob Chapek said during a Boston event with New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft on Monday. Chapek described the virtual reality world as “blending this physical world with the digital world without constraints.”
