The XBO Weekly #18 – Crypto News
Crypto gains despite market woes
The cryptocurrency market continued its advance and managed to regain the psychological market cap threshold of $1 trillion, despite the bankruptcy filing of yet another institutional lender facing serious liquidity concerns, Genesis Global, claiming $5.1 billion in liabilities. The fact that the market gained despite the events suggests that the problems were previously factored in, and that the potential for contagion to parent company DCG, which also controls digital asset manager Grayscale, is viewed as limited. DCG is reducing its holdings, including the news site Coindesk, which it purchased for $500,000 in January 2016, and is reportedly attracting interest from the founder of Cardano (ADA) for $200 million. Bitcoin (BTC) increased by 8% to $22,700, reaching heights not seen in 5 months (i.e., prior to the FTX collapse), while Ether (ETH) rose by 12% to $1,625.
Stablecoins outperformed payment processors in 2022
Tether handled $18.2 trillion in transactions in 2022, according to data supplied by the top stablecoin through Twitter, surpassing large payment processors Mastercard and Visa, which processed $14.1 trillion and $7.7 trillion, respectively. Stablecoins enable users who do not have access to the US dollar to send and receive money with lower price risk and have greatly contributed to the rise in crypto remittance payments in recent years. With a market valuation of about $67 billion, USDT is the third biggest cryptocurrency. The gap with its nearest competitor, USDC, has been shrinking as a number of prominent centralized exchanges have urged their customers to switch their USDT holdings into USDC.
Solana rises despite FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt)
Following a week of extraordinary volatility, Solana (SOL) staged a strong recovery, finishing with a 5.7% gain, aided in part by the resurgence of bitcoin as well as the possibility the FTX exchange might continue to operate. The currency of the Solana development platform came under intense pressure after bankrupt crypto exchange FTX discovered that it controls 11% of the market capitalization of SOL among its crypto assets, a share which is worth close to $1 billion today. The fact that the exchange might need to liquidate some of its assets has a depressing effect on their price. In the meantime, the project has shown signs of resiliency, with unwavering support from users and developers, resulting in speed and reliability gains in recent upgrades.
XBO featured Coin of the Week – The Sandbox (SAND)
The Sandbox is a virtual environment where users develop and monetize assets and experiences using SAND, the platform's utility token, as well as non-fungible tokens (NFTs). While the Sandbox looks and feels similar to Roblox, the main distinction between the two platforms is that Sandbox users own their virtual world assets. Landowners in The Sandbox can organize events and competitions and use SAND to buy assets, participate in governance, play games, and more.
Out of a total quantity of 3 billion tokens, 1.5 billion are now in circulation. The coin is currently trading at $0.81, up 115% from its January 1 cycle low, yet is still valued at one-tenth of its November 2021 all-time high.
Buy, Sell, or Swap SAND - Simply and securely, with XBO.
Disclaimer: The above does not constitute financial advice. It is only intended for informational and educational purposes.
