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Bitcoin.com Celebrates Ethereum’s Birthday With $6000 Giveaway

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Bitcoin.com Celebrates Ethereum’s Birthday With $6000 Giveaway

July 30th marks the day, six years ago, Ethereum was launched. The Bitcoin.com Wallet, having just integrated Ethereum, is excited to celebrate the achievements of the world’s premier smart contract platform – and to do so, we’re giving away $6000 in Ether (ETH), the native currency and the ‘fuel’ of the Ethereum network.

What Is Ethereum?

With the ambitious vision of creating a fully decentralized general purpose computing network, Ethereum and the massive community of developers that has sprung up around it, have pioneered smart contracts, NFTs, decentralized finance, and more.

From humble beginnings, now billions of dollars are transacted daily through Decentralized Applications (DApps) deployed on Ethereum – and, just like with Bitcoin, it’s all done permissionlessly and pseudonymously.

The Ethereum community has striven to maintain ‘credible neutrality’ in the evolution of the platform – so far very successfully in our opinion. The result is that the platform supports the fundamental human right to economic freedom – and that’s something we at Bitcoin.com can get behind!

The Giveaway

To be eligible to win, all you have to do is buy any amount of ETH through the Bitcoin.com Wallet or via our website between July 30th and August 6th – and that’s it! You’ll automatically be entered to win one of the following prizes:

Grand Prize $1000 (1 person)

Second Prize $500 (4 people)

Third Prize $100 (30 people)

Good luck!

Full terms and conditions here.

Mila Kunis’ ‘Stoner Cats’ NFT Sale Pulls in $8M — Animated Series Can Only Be Watched by NFT Holders

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Mila Kunis' 'Stoner Cats' NFT Sale Pulls in $8M — Animated Series Can Only Be Watched by NFT Holders

A new non-fungible token (NFT) project crafted by the American actress and producer, Mila Kunis, has made millions selling NFTs tied to an animated series called “Stoner Cats.” The project is a show that will only allow token holders the ability to watch the upcoming series produced by Orchard Farm Productions, a studio owned by Kunis.

Animated Series Created by Mila Kunis and Ashton Kutcher Sparks New NFT Hype

The cryptocurrency community and mainstream news publications have been discussing a new NFT project bolstered by Mila Kunis and her husband Ashton Kutcher called “Stoner Cats.” The duo has teamed up with popular celebrities such as Chris Rock, Jane Fonda, and the “Family Guy’s” Seth MacFarlane. Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin will be joining the animated series as well playing the character called “Lord Catsington.”

Essentially the show is about an older woman called “Ms. Stoner” who lives with a number of mischievous cats. Ms. Stoner has Alzheimer’s Disease and decides to partake in using medical marijuana for her ailments. However, as soon as the elderly woman fish bowls the house, her cats get high and they start talking to each other.

Mila Kunis' 'Stoner Cats' NFT Sale Pulls in $8M — Animated Series Can Only Be Watched by NFT Holders
The “Stoner Cats” animated series cast.

The “Stoner Cats” website shows a small clip of Ms. Stoner and her cats, which gives viewers some perspective of the upcoming show. But not just anyone can watch the new show, as the series will only be available to NFT holders, which sold out on Tuesday. The sale of over 10,000 NFTs sold out in less than 35 minutes as each card sold at 0.35 ETH a pop (over $800). The sale raised a total of $8.4 million and NFTs can also be sold on secondary markets. The animated series web portal explains in great detail what the show will entail.

“Stoner Cats is an adult animated short series centered on five house cats who mysteriously become sentient,” the site details. “With their *higher* consciousness, they realize that their beloved owner, Ms. Stoner, needs rescue from a myriad of dangerous situations. With great *flower* comes great responsibility.”

Ms. Stoner NFT Owner Wants $81 Million for the Blockchain-Based Card

With token cards on secondary markets like Opensea, the NFTs command a significant premium compared to the initial $800 investment. The “Ms. Stoner” NFT recently sold for 30 ETH ($69.7K) and the current owner wants 35,000 ETH or $81 million for the single NFT.

Mila Kunis' 'Stoner Cats' NFT Sale Pulls in $8M — Animated Series Can Only Be Watched by NFT Holders
The Ms. Stoner card that sold for $69,700 worth of ethereum (ETH).

From the looks of secondary price tags, crypto fans believe the Mila Kunis’ NFT collectibles will be more valuable in the future. Moreover, Stoner Cat NFT creators will get 2.5% on every sale that follows the original.

“Stoner Cats NFTs will act as lifetime passes that unlock all future content released,” the web page emphasizes.

While the Stoner Cats project saw a lot of action during the sales, research provided by Dune Analytics indicates that close to $800K in ethereum (ETH) was spent on the 35 minutes worth of Stoner Cat NFT purchasing madness.

What do you think about the show Stoner Cats and the NFT sales? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.

Unique Addresses Tethered to Ethereum Defi Apps Climb Past 3 Million

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Unique Addresses Tethered to Ethereum Defi Apps Climb Past 3 Million

The number of users or unique addresses leveraging decentralized finance (defi) protocols via Ethereum has risen past 3 million according to recent statistics. A vast majority of these unique addresses use the defi protocol Uniswap, as 2.4 million users have been recorded since December 2018.

Ethereum Defi Applications See Unique Addresses Surpass 3 Million

According to statistics from Dune Analytics, the number of users or unique ethereum addresses utilizing defi has jumped past the 3 million threshold this week. At the time of writing, data shows there are 3,092,000 unique addresses recorded on July 27. The lion’s share of these addresses stems from the decentralized exchange (dex) platform Uniswap.

Unique Addresses Tethered to Ethereum Defi Apps Climb Past 3 Million

Uniswap’s dex currently has approximately 2,438,374 unique addresses that leverage the Uniswap trading protocol. It’s worth noting, however, that since a user can have more than one unique address, records could be considered overestimates. Further, the data from Dune Analytics’ “Defi Users Over Time” chart only captures a snapshot of Ethereum-based defi apps.

Unique Addresses Tethered to Ethereum Defi Apps Climb Past 3 Million

The defi lending application Compound holds around 326,723 addresses on Tuesday and the liquidity protocol 1inch has around 276,924 unique addresses. Behind Uniswap, Compound, and 1inch, are defi apps like Sushiswap, Balancer, and Kyber, respectively.

Total Value Locked Jumps $10B, Dex Volume Grows, Defi Tokens Gather Double-Digit Gains

While cryptocurrency markets saw some price recovery this week, defi crypto assets saw significant increases. Seven days ago, the total value locked (TVL) across a myriad of defi applications recorded by defipulse.com shows the TVL was around $55 billion. The TVL metric has since increased to the current $65 billion recorded on July 27.

Unique Addresses Tethered to Ethereum Defi Apps Climb Past 3 Million

Decentralized exchange (dex) statistics show that there was $2.33 billion in trade volume recorded on popular dex platforms over the last 24 hours. Seven-day data indicates $15 billion in global swaps were recorded, and Uniswap captured 64% of that volume.

These stats represent ETH-based dex platforms only. Uniswap’s volume trade volume is followed by Sushiswap (9.6%), Curve (7.8%), and 0x Native (5.5%). Defi tokens stemming from applications like Uniswap, Sushiswap, and Aave saw double-digit gains after BTC’s short squeeze on Sunday evening.

What do you think about the recent defi action over the last week? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.

Stacks AMM Revealed, Native Bitcoin Swaps Executed With Proof-of-Transfer Protocol

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Stacks AMM Revealed, Native Bitcoin Swaps Executed With Proof-of-Transfer Protocol

According to a recent report, the first trust-less swap between the Bitcoin blockchain and Stacks protocol has been executed. The co-founder of the Stacks protocol, Muneeb Ali tweeted about the native bitcoin swap and said the progress is a big deal.

Trust-less Native Bitcoin Swap Executed With an NFT Called ‘Boombox’

On July 23, a trust-less swap using the Stacks protocol and the Bitcoin (BTC) blockchain was settled onchain. The swap dubbed the “Catamaran Swap between BTC and STX” was discussed on the Reddit forum r/stacks.

“The first trustless swap between [the] Bitcoin [blockchain] and Stacks chain is happening,” a user wrote on the forum. “It is similar to a submarine swap. However, I would call it catamaran swap because we have two chains on top of the water,” the individual added. Further into the Reddit thread, the individual notes that the swap was “successfully completed.”

People can see the swap conditions as defined on the Stacks chain and then the bitcoin transfer and the verification. According to the description, the asset swapped was a non-fungible token (NFT) asset called “Boombox (b-12).” The creator of the Reddit post wrote that the “swap demonstrates that you can trigger trustless actions like asset transfers by sending bitcoins from one address to another.”

The individual added that the feature gives Bitcoin a “new dimension” because “transfers can be inspected and validated by smart contracts on the Stacks blockchain.”

The Stacks project is considered a Layer-1 blockchain that leverages the Bitcoin (BTC) blockchain as the base layer. Validation is provided by proof-of-transfer between both networks and similar to Ethereum’s Solidity programming language, Stacks has a programming language called Clarity. The co-founder of Stacks, Muneeb Ali, tweeted about the milestone on Monday, as he wholeheartedly believes it’s a watershed moment.

“Users can do trustless BTC swaps to stablecoins, derivatives, perpetuals, and other crypto assets,” Ali stressed in his Tweet. “All by pure bitcoin transactions on the main BTC chain. Users can purchase any digital assets (like NFTs and decentralized domains).” Ali further remarked that it was a big deal and stated: “Bitcoin has established itself as digital gold, but you can’t use BTC to trade without going through: (a) centralized exchanges or (b) alt blockchains w/ wrapped [bitcoin]. Not anymore.”

Muneeb Ali Says Trust-less Swaps Are a ‘Big Deal,’ Automated Market Maker ALEX Revealed

The computer scientist and Stacks co-founder said that wrapped bitcoin is “not bitcoin” and said that many bitcoiners don’t trust the network models that house these crypto assets. As far as centralized exchange (cex) platforms, Ali mentions that there’s counterparty risk involved and users need to pass KYC requirements. “All that changes now,” Ali said.

“Stacks is a unique L1 blockchain that enables cross-chain transactions with Bitcoin: smart contracts that work with pure bitcoin transactions. Using Stacks, developers have built trustless swaps with native BTC,” the Stacks executive detailed.

Ali also said that usd coin (USDC) will soon be supported and that “trust-less BTC/USDC swaps can be possible.” He added that Ethereum features are possible directly on Bitcoin, and users can create “Uniswap-like AMMs (Automated Market Makers) built around native BTC swaps, [and] do pure BTC transactions to interact.” Moreover, Ali highlighted that these features will come with the robust security of the BTC blockchain. The Stacks executive’s tweetstorm continued:

Bitcoin is sovereign money. An entire open financial world will be created around Bitcoin. Native BTC swaps to new assets are a foundational building block of Bitcoin defi. Bitcoin eating the banks.

Of course, a few people mentioned to Ali that the project Thorchain has been doing trust-less swaps for quite some time now. In fact, the popular peer-to-peer trading platform Shapeshift leverages Thorchain’s tech to complete native swaps. Although, someone was quick to point out that Thorchain has been having some issues with hacks in recent times.

The next day, the Stacks executive mentioned the Automated Market Maker (AMM) project being built on the protocol called ALEX. The ALEX project describes how the protocol works in a blog post published on Tuesday.

According to the website and the recent blog post, the AMM allows users to lend, earn and borrow bitcoin with minimized risk and maximized returns. In a tweet, the ALEX Twitter account says that the AMM “helps crypto users preserve their capital and maximize the value of their assets – we do this by offering fixed-rate lending/borrowing and superior LTV with higher security and lower fees.”

Stacks Has Stiff Competition

The Stacks team still has some stiff competition with projects like Thorchain, Badger DAO, and RSK. Many of which already have fully operational defi applications that allow people to chase liquidity pools and other types of defi protocols. Alongside this, despite Ali’s claim that people don’t trust the network models with concepts like wrapped bitcoins, the Ethereum (ETH) and Binance Smart Chain (BSC) has an enormous lead over projects like Stacks, Badger, RSK, Liquid, and Thorchain combined.

During the last two years, ETH and BSC have seen a plethora of projects that allow cross-chain swaps, synthetic and wrapped bitcoins, stablecoins, AMMs, lending pools, and decentralized exchange (dex) platforms. Just on the Ethereum chain alone, there’s WBTC, HBTC, RENBTC, SBTC, PBTC, TBTC, and IMBTC which adds up to a whopping 250,729 bitcoin housed on the ETH network.

What do you think about the swap between Stacks and the Bitcoin blockchain and the AMM ALEX? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.

Goldman Sachs Files Defi ETF Application

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Goldman Sachs

Goldman Sachs, one of the biggest banking institutions in the world, has filed an application to offer an Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) linked to the performance of decentralized finance (defi) companies. The instrument, if approved, would help institutions and retail investors gain exposure to defi assets with the help of a regulated bank like Goldman Sachs.

Goldman Sachs Proposes Defi ETF

Goldman Sachs, one of leading commercial banks in the world, has introduced an application to the SEC to offer a defi-linked ETF. The defined ETF is called “Goldman Sachs Innovate Defi and Blockchain Equity ETF,” and it would seek to provide exposure to these technologies for regulated institutions. The performance of the fund would be linked to the Solactive Blockchain Technology Performance-Index.

This index follows a portfolio of tech industries that are invested in blockchain technologies. The index includes companies like Nokia, Alphabet, IBM, Microsoft, and Overstock. This would be the first ETF that aims to capitalize on the popularity that the defi sector has experienced this year. As Bitcoin.com News reported in June, Goldman Sachs has been courting the cryptocurrency sector recently, having partnered with Galaxy Digital to provide bitcoin futures products.

Big Banks Go for Crypto Domination

This filing is just another piece of evidence that indicates big banks are now interested in bringing their services and structures to the cryptocurrency market. While many of these disregarded cryptocurrency in the beginning, they are now focused on integrating investment products that are designed to bring traditional investors to the crypto sphere.

Goldman Sachs released a note on the state of the cryptocurrency market earlier this month when it stated that Ether could surpass Bitcoin as the most important crypto because the former has the “highest real use potential.” This view of the crypto ecosystem could have fueled the ETF application made by the investment bank, focused on following defi and blockchain-based companies.

A recent survey made by the bank also concluded that high net worth families are turning to crypto as an investment vehicle, due to several factors. These include “higher inflation, prolonged low rates, and other macroeconomic developments following a year of unprecedented global monetary and fiscal stimulus.” The survey points out there is a real audience expecting cryptocurrency investment products coming from regulated sources.

What do you think about the Goldman Sachs defi ETF application? Tell us in the comments section below.