Author Archives: TheBlock.co

A tough year for NFTs is finally over, but the pain for NFT investors is likely to continue in the new year. Marketplace volumes have yet to pick up, and the debate over royalty enforcement continues after many major marketplaces made the fees optional. Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs ended 2022 with a floor price of 69[Read more…]

Consensus predictions Larry Cermak General-purpose zk-rollups will finally launch in 2023 and actually become as usable as Ethereum. Arbitrum, Starknet, zkSync and Scroll all release native tokens in 2023, and there will be a recurring discussion about the value accrual of L2 tokens against ETH itself as rollups manage to suck up most of the[Read more…]

Even in the no man’s land between Christmas and New Year, there’s news to be had in crypto.  Here are three stories you might have missed while tucking into festive leftovers or trying to keep track of the many threads of the FTX saga.  Nexo and Vauld’s season finale Nexo and Vauld looked set to end their courtship this[Read more…]

Crypto exchange Binance clarified that an initial $1 billion deposit to its crypto industry recovery fund came from its own assets after details of the transferring wallet raised questions among some commentators on Twitter.  On-chain transactions show the funds came from one of Binance’s cold wallets for BUSD, the exchange’s dollar-pegged stablecoin. This wallet was recently listed in Binance’s proof of[Read more…]

Binance’s industry recovery fund, to which it’s already contributed $1 billion, has attracted some big names early on including Jump Crypto, Polygon Ventures and market maker GSR.  Aptos Labs, Animoca Brands and Kronos are also among some of the other early contributors, CEO Changpeng Zhao said. These firms joined the recovery fund with an initial aggregate commitment[Read more…]

Magic Eden has added support for trading of non-fungible tokens on the Polygon network, a move that will boost its ability to work with gaming projects on the network. Rather than acting merely as a venue for NFT trading, the firm wants to expand and capitalize on the emerging blockchain gaming niche on Polygon. Magic[Read more…]

Powerhouse Hollywood talent agency WME is once again showing its faith in web3’s future potential by adding contemporary artist Ilse Valfré to its roster, The Block learned exclusively. Valfré, who has 897,000 Instagram followers, was recently selected to participate in the social media company’s trial program which allows creators to showcase, mint and sell non-fungible tokens[Read more…]

Heroic Story, a web3 gaming and entertainment studio, has raised $6 million in a seed round led by Upfront Ventures.  Investors in the round, which brings the startup’s total financing to date to $7.4 million, also include Multicoin Capital and Polygon Technology, according to a company release. Angel investors such as Andreessen Horowitz’s Jonathan Lai and Miramax’s[Read more…]

Bogota, Colombia-based crypto wallet app Zulu has raised $5 million in a seed round as it seeks to expand its user base in Latin America.  Early-stage venture capital firm Cadenza Ventures led the round. Firms including web3-focused fund Nexo Ventures also participated, as well as several individual investors. Zulu focuses on using stablecoins to help Latin America-based[Read more…]

Nu Holdings reported a surprise net profit of $7.8 million, besting analyst expectations for a net loss of $9 million. The Sao Paulo-based neobank’s third-quarter revenue totaled $1.3 billion, topping the average analyst estimate of $1.24 billion as compiled by FactSet. Shares rose 11% in post-market trading. NuCripto reached 1.3 million customers following its full[Read more…]