"Snap the Whip" ------ Winslow Homer

Introduction:

The London Stock Exchange announced that it will accept ETN applications for BTC and ETH in the second quarter of 2024; after continuously creating new ATHs, BTC's market capitalization has surpassed silver, becoming the eighth largest asset in the world by market cap. These developments mark the ongoing rise of cryptocurrency as a mainstream investment option. Although the BTC price has reached new highs and the market is showing a correction trend, MeMe coins have dominated the FOMO sentiment in the entire market.

1. Investment and Financing Observation

Last week, there were a total of 35 investment and financing events in the crypto market, a year-on-year increase of 34%, with a total funding scale exceeding $260 million :
In the DeFi sector, 9 investment and financing events were announced, with the DeFi protocol Elixir completing an $8 million Series B financing led by Mysten Labs;
In the NFT and metaverse fields, 2 investment and financing events were announced, with the NFT lending protocol NFTfi completing a $6 million Series A1 financing led by Placeholder VC;
In the blockchain gaming sector, 8 investment and financing events were announced, including the mobile NFT shooting game studio Carbonated, which completed $11 million in financing for "MadWorld," led by Com2uS;
In the infrastructure and tools sector, 8 investment and financing events were announced, with Polyhedra Network completing a $20 million financing led by Polychain Capital, achieving a company valuation of $1 billion;
In other Web3/crypto-related projects, 6 investment and financing events were announced, with UXLINK raising a total of $9 million, with participation from OKX Ventures and Web3Port Foundation;
In the centralized finance sector, 2 investment and financing events were announced, with the Dutch cryptocurrency derivatives exchange D2X announcing the completion of a $10 million Series A financing, co-led by Point72 Ventures and GSR Markets.
From a month-on-month perspective, the number of investment and financing events in the cryptocurrency market increased significantly last week, with funding still concentrated in the infrastructure direction, where Kucoin Labs and Polychain Capital were particularly active, mainly focusing on technical infrastructure and the Web3 field.

About Berachain
Berachain is a DeFi-based EVM-compatible L1 built on the Cosmos SDK, supported by liquidity consensus proof. Berachain allows transactions and lending without traditional intermediaries like banks. It has three main tokens: BERA, BGT, and the Honey stablecoin. The test version of this blockchain was released to the public in January, but the project has not yet fully launched. Previous investors in Berachain include Polychain Capital, Hack VC, and Robot Ventures.
About Eclipse
Eclipse is a customizable rollup provider compatible with multiple Layer 1 blockchains. The platform enables developers to deploy their own rollups powered by the Solana operating system, using any chain for security or data storage. The project will utilize the newly raised funds to develop Ethereum Layer 2 solutions using the Solana Virtual Machine (SVM). By combining the high performance of SVM with the liquidity of Ethereum, Eclipse aims to provide differentiated Layer 2 solutions. The team's goal is to launch the final mainnet version in the second quarter of this year. It has already launched the development and testnet versions of its protocol and plans to deploy well-known dapps at the mainnet launch, including collaborations with Rarible, Pyth Network, and Solend.
About UXLINK
UXLINK is an innovative web3 social system designed for mass adoption, allowing users to build social assets and trade cryptocurrencies. It includes a range of highly modular Dapps, from onboarding to graphical formation, group tools to social trading, all seamlessly integrated within Telegram. Unlike other social infrastructure projects that primarily focus on one-way follow relationships, UXLINK is the first to innovate with a focus on two-way, acquaintance-based social relationships, similar to the distinctions between Twitter vs Facebook; Weibo vs WeChat. UXLINK is committed to building an integrated social ecosystem that combines Web3 traffic entry, social trading platforms, and infrastructure.

2. Industry Data

$BOME Surges to Create Wealth , Boosting SMOWL Prices

On March 14, PEPE MeMe artist Darkfarm launched BOOK OF MEME ($BOME), which surged 20 times within 3 hours of its launch, and the price continued to soar, with early participants showcasing hundredfold returns on social platforms;
On March 16, after Binance listed $BOME for spot trading, the price reached a high of $0.002688, with a market cap exceeding $1.2 billion, ranking 7th among meme projects by market cap, and the 24-hour trading volume ranked first in the meme project sector. Its powerful wealth creation effect triggered FOMO sentiment across the market, making BOME a hot topic in the industry.

According to Blur data: The floor price of the NFT series SMOWL, previously launched by Darkfarms, the founder of the meme coin BOME on the Solana chain, has surpassed 0.6 ETH, currently reported at 0.644 ETH, with a daily increase of 95.21% and a 7-day increase of 1185.35%.
Recently, the popularity of MeMeCoin has been increasing day by day, and in addition to the unique wealth effect, attention feedback phenomena can also be observed. For example, the BOME community is driving the value of the SMOWL community, and this correlation may serve as a reference dimension for investors.

Ecological MeMe Coins Surge, SOL Market Cap Surpasses BNB

On the day of $BOME's launch, the number of active addresses on the Solana network reached a nearly one-month peak (1.19 million), with the highest increase in active addresses at 115.66%. Influenced by the $BOME craze, the number of newly issued meme coins on the Solana network surged in the past two days, with 8,849 new SPL tokens added on March 14, expected to surpass the nearly one-month peak (9,690) this week.
DeFiLlama data: The TVL on the Solana network exceeds $4 billion, and in the past 24 hours, the trading volume on Solana's DEX exceeded $3.6 billion, second only to Ethereum. After SOL reached $200, its market cap has reached $87 billion, surpassing BNB's $82.9 billion, climbing to fourth place in market cap.

Smart Money Flows into SX Network, Potentially Leading the GambleFi Trend

Last week, a noticeable increase in data flowing into SX Network was observed, suggesting that SX may become a focus and reference option for investors.
It is reported that SX Network aims to disrupt the $20 billion sports betting industry. As of the time of writing, the total transaction volume on the SX Bet platform has reached $361 million, with protocol revenue of $4.5 million.

The total supply of the SX Network protocol token SX is 1 billion, with a circulating supply of 489.6 million. Referring to DeFi protocol token mechanisms, SX also has a mechanism for burning based on the protocol's development status, with 759,119 SX already burned.
CoinGecko data: SX is currently priced at $0.13, and its price performance has been relatively sluggish this year. Considering the current business status and token mechanism, it may be considered as a portfolio allocation target in the new cycle.

About SX Network
SX Network is the first Layer 2 sports entertainment application chain on Polygon. In April last year, SX Network raised $9.5 million, with this round of financing led by Polygon and Hack VC, with participation from CMCC Global, Nascent, FJ Labs, and angel investors including Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal.
SX Network will use these funds to further develop its prediction market platform SX Bet (formerly SportX) and for decentralized prediction market governance. The SX Bet platform currently offers a range of prediction activities for sports events such as football, basketball, tennis, and esports.

USDe Market Cap Exceeds $1 Billion, Future of Decentralized Stablecoins Looks Promising

Last week, USDe developer Ethena Labs tweeted that the total supply of the stablecoin USDe has exceeded 1 billion; while Dune data shows that the staked USDe has also surpassed 300 million.
Although USDe has not been around for long, considering the current yields generated from staking and financing rewards, as the supply and market cap of USDe grow, as long as the CEX used for hedging by Ethena does not collapse, USDe has the potential to grow into one of the largest on-chain stablecoins in cryptocurrency.

About Ethena Labs
Ethena Labs is a CDP project based on Ethereum, aimed at creating a censorship-resistant, scalable, and stable cryptocurrency USDe. The project is inspired by Arthur Hayes and plans to achieve this by utilizing staked Ethereum for Delta hedging.
Ethena Labs employs various strategies to mitigate risks and has developed a comprehensive risk management approach. The launch of USDe will bring a more stable asset collateral base, attracting a large number of investors. The team has demonstrated exceptional planning and coordination capabilities to ensure the protocol is ready for mainnet launch. Ethena is building a derivatives infrastructure to enable Ethereum to transform into a global internet bond through Delta neutral positions on stETH, thereby creating the world's first crypto-native, yield-bearing stablecoin.

3. VC Holdings

Note: The above data is sourced from https://platform.arkhamintelligence.com/, statistics time: March 18, 2024, 12:00 (UTC+8).

4. This Week's Focus

March 18

• CME launches euro-denominated micro Bitcoin and Ethereum futures;
• Arbitrum One introduces additional fee reduction measures;
• NVIDIA AI conference GTC opens, continuing until March 21;
• BNB Chain Q1 hackathon top 12 holds online Demo Day;
• Binance Earn to airdrop PIXEL to eligible RONIN locked product users, expected to complete on this day;
• Layer 2 ZK programmable privacy and scaling project Ola will open invitation code applications on March 18;
• Manta Network (MANTA) will unlock 6.67 million tokens at 17:30, valued at approximately $20.33 million;
• The non-custodial liquid staking protocol ether.fi has launched an airdrop query page, with the airdrop claim window opening at 19:00;
• The Ethereum Foundation collaborates with Polygon, Aztec, Scroll, Taiko, and zkSync to launch ZK project grant funding;

March 19

• OP Labs will upgrade OP Sepolia, supporting fully functional OP Stack fault proof;
• dydx (DYDX) will unlock approximately 570,000 tokens at 23:00, valued at about $2.1 million;
• The AVAX ecosystem social reasoning chain game Castle of Blackwater launches IDO, registration opens today;
• Pixels (PIXEL) will unlock approximately 54.38 million tokens at 18:00, valued at nearly $40 million;
• South Korean cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb stops supporting Orbit Chain trading;
• Binance will list BOME on its investment platform at 11:00;
• Nym (NYM) will unlock approximately 3.14 million tokens at 8:00, valued at about $790,000;
• Pixels (PIXEL) will unlock 54.38 million tokens at 18:00, valued at approximately $39.25 million;

March 20

• Cosmos Hub has passed the governance proposal vote for the Gaia v15 upgrade, planned to go live on the mainnet today;
• Bybit's website shows that the Wormhole token W will officially launch on March 20;
• GPU cloud infrastructure Aethir launches public sale of nodes, with 100,000 checker nodes available for public sale at 18:00 on Aethir's official website;

March 21

• Federal Reserve interest rate decision, followed by Powell's monetary policy press conference;
• StratisEVM mainnet is planned to launch today;
• Opentensor Foundation releases the Bittensor roadmap;
• Coinbase's international trading platform lists Stacks and StarkNet perpetual futures contracts;
• Stratis transitions to StratisEVM, which is planned to launch on March 21, 2024;
• ETHTaipie 2024 will be held in Taiwan from March 21 to March 24;

March 22

• Lido community completes voting on a new reward sharing plan, proposing to eliminate tiers and establish minimum thresholds for applicants;
• Immutable (IMX) will unlock 34.19 million tokens at 8:00, valued at approximately $96.76 million;
• SPACE ID (ID) will unlock 78.49 million tokens at 8:00, valued at approximately $127 million;
• Newman Group will host the Official Web3 Kick-off Party at ComplexCon HK themed event at the AsiaWorld-Expo in Hong Kong;

March 23

• Nervos CKB and developer community Rebase will hold the Bitcoin Spring themed Hacker House in Wuhan, Donghu from March 23 to April 5;
• Arbitrum token ARB will unlock 1.11 billion tokens at 21:00, valued at approximately $2.32 billion;

March 24

• APE will unlock 15.6 million tokens at 8:00 on March 17, valued at approximately $35.57 million;
• Project progress Smart Layer airdrop token SLN claim will be open until March 24 at 15:30;

5. Conclusion

Last week, BTC price reached an all-time high, ETH completed the Dencun upgrade, and $BOME ignited a frenzy in the MeMe coin market, with SOL's market cap surpassing BNB to climb to fourth place. Although the market showed a correction after BTC's new high, the FOMO sentiment brought by MeMe coins did not allow the market to enter a cooling period, instead highlighting the vibrant out-of-the-box capabilities of cryptocurrencies. In the investment and financing data, investors continue to show strong confidence in the future of the crypto market, especially in the infrastructure sector, underscoring the market's emphasis on building a more robust, efficient, and scalable blockchain ecosystem.
This week, there are several noteworthy events and major project token unlock plans to pay attention to, particularly the large-scale unlocks of tokens like Arbitrum, APE, and SPACE ID, which may lead to corresponding sell-off behaviors that could significantly impact market conditions. Although the market has begun to show slight corrections, the cyclical market will continue in the long run. With the successful upgrade of ETH, various L1 and L2 projects are gradually enabling Blob, especially the L2 ecosystem, which may be in the final buildup before an explosion in the upcoming cycle. It is recommended that investors and project parties closely monitor industry dynamics, seize investment opportunities during the correction period, and prepare for the arrival of a new round of rebound market.
Note: All opinions above are for reference only and do not constitute investment advice. If there are any objections, please feel free to contact us for corrections.