The global crypto market cap is $2.06T 3.62%▼ with a 24-hour market volume of $119.83B 4.16%▲. Bitcoin's dominance is currently 43.85% 0.44%▲. CURRENT PRICES BY MARKET CAP | # | Name | Price | 24h % | | 1 | Bitcoin BTC | $48,288.35 | 2.04% ▼ | | 2 | Ethereum ETH | $3,199.48 | 3.52% ▼ | | 3 | Cardano ADA | $2.79 | 3.71%▼ | | 4 | Binance Coin BNB | $476.14 | 4.84%▼ | | 5 | XRP XRP | $1.16 | 5.94% ▼ | *Prices as of 4:00 p.m. ET.
| |
 Publicly traded Riot Blockchain reported a 1,540% YoY increase in Q2 revenue. The total revenue exceeded $31.5M, up from $1.9M in the same quarter of 2020. More: - The mining company additionally reported a Q2 net income of $19.3M, up from last year's loss of $10.6M.
- Total revenue from mining operations throughout Q2 increased 70%, with Riot mining 675 BTC.
- Shares of the publicly traded company have risen 38% over the last quarter.
| |
 Paxos announced a rebrand of its Paxos Standard (PAX) stablecoin to "Pax Dollar" (USDP) to better identify Pax Dollar as a dollar-pegged stablecoin. The decision was made to make it more easily identifiable for consumers to recognize Paxos Standard as a dollar-backed stablecoin. More: - Paxos is doubling its efforts to take market share from stablecoin powerhouses Tether (USDT) and Circle (USDC).
- In early August, a lawyer at Paxos claimed Circle's USDC was not a dollar-backed stablecoin and that it operates similarly to USDT.
- Following the lawyer's comment, Circle changed its policies for USDC reserves and announced that the reserves would only consist of dollars and short-term Treasuries.
| |
 A message from OPTIMIZELY Opticon is once again taking place on a virtual stage. Have you registered yet? Opticon, brought to you by Optimizely, is happening once again! It will be taking place virtually from September 21-23 in North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific, respectively. This year's theme is the Path to Potential. Learn all about how you can take your organization from reactive to adaptive in this unpredictable climate. Right now, digital experiences mean everything as you begin to cultivate loyal customers. As a business, you only have one chance to make the perfect first impression. For those who have known a brand in-store, going online can alter an impression that took years to create. At pivotal moments like this, when customer habits are rebooting post-pandemic, the effects can last for years. At Opticon21, you’ll learn not only how to survive but thrive in this environment by adapting to change rather than reacting to it. Register here to save your seat
| |
 🍋Fresh Funding🍋 Aletha AI, NFT/AI: $16M ⮕ The token sale funding round was participated in by Metapurse, Crypto.com Capital, Mark Cuban, Dapper Labs, BITKRAFT, Galaxy Interactive, LD Capital, and others. More: - Alethea builds intelligent NFTs (iNFTs), which strive to combine machine-learning with NFTs to create an AI-powered metaverse.
- Alice, the first iNFT developed by Alethea, was auctioned at Sotheby’s for $478,800 back in June.
- Alethea’s iNFTs are designed to be metaverse agnostic, fractionable and permissionless.
Blockstream, Infrastructure: $210M ⮕ Baillie Gifford and iFinex led the Series B funding round for the Bitcoin infrastructure development firm. More: - Blockstream plans to use the fresh funding to expand its crypto mining operations and further develop new products.
- iFinex is the parent company of crypto exchange Bitfinex and stablecoin issuer Tether (USDT).
- Blockstream reached a post-funding valuation of $3.2 billion.
Euler, DeFi/Lending: $8M ⮕ The Series A funding round was led by Paradigm and participated in by Lemniscap, Anthony Sassano (Ethhub), Ryan Sean Adams (Mythos Capital), David Hoffman (Bankless), and others. More: - Euler was founded in Sept. 2020 as a permissionless lending and borrowing protocol similar to Aave (AAVE) and Compound (COMP).
- The startup plans to use the fresh funding to double the size of its development team.
- Security audit permitting, Euler anticipates a launch before 2022.
| |
▲ TOP GAINERS | # | Name | Price | 24h % | | 1 | Avalanche AVAX | $52.46 | 13.25% ▲ | | 2 | Quant QNT | $199.15 | 9.58% ▲ | | 3 | Terra LUNA | $31.31 | 9.30% ▲ | | 4 | Mdex MDX | $0.2562 | 1.50% ▲ | | 5 | Hedera Hashgraph HBAR | $0.2562 | 1.50% ▲ | ▼ TOP LOSERS | # | Name | Price | 24h % | | 1 | Helium HNT | $23.11 | 10.94%▼ | | 2 | SushiSwap SUSHI | $12.39 | 9.87%▼ | | 3 | Fantom FTM | $25.15 | 8.84%▼ | | 4 | Celsius CEL | $5.38 | 9.24%▼ | | 5 | Audius AUDIO | $2.77 | 8.70%▼ | *Limited to cryptocurrencies in the Top 100. Prices as of 4:00 p.m. ET.
| |
Tezos (XTZ) hit a 12-week high of $4.38 following partnerships with Crypto Finance Group, InCore Bank, and Inacta. The partnership introduced a collaboratively developed Tezos standard asset tokenization standard for compliant digital financial products. More: - The “DAR-1” token standard builds off Tezos’ FA2 standard but enables smart contract functionality.
- The new token standard will assist in additional token functionality for AML compliance, governance, and other data-driven features.
- InCore Bank additionally announced that it was the first B2B bank in Switzerland to offer institutional staking, trading, and storage for the Tezos blockchain.
| |
 A message from HELLOFRESH Dreaming of a hassle-free, delicious dinner? Make it a reality with HelloFresh Join HelloFresh today and get 14 free meals across 5 weeks, including free shipping! No need to pinch yourself—this is real life. At HelloFresh, our chef-prepared recipes bring seasonal ingredients and pre-portioned produce straight from the farm to your door in less than a week, all while saving you time and money. And with more than 50 menu and market items to choose from every week, you’ll never run out of ideas for eat dreams. So go ahead and fulfill those food fantasies. Join HelloFresh today and get 14 free meals across 5 weeks, including free shipping on your first box with code "INSIDE14"!
| |
 Japan’s Financial Services Agency (FSA) is reportedly set to announce plans to further its crypto regulations. The FSA stated that the upcoming regulations would be proposed to improve consumer and investor protections. More: - Japan’s FSA plans to proceed slowly with the regulatory rollout to assure the new laws don’t inhibit the development of crypto projects.
- Regulations, particularly around “riskier” digital assets, are expected as early as next summer.
- Japan has made major changes to its crypto regulations since a 2019 hack of Japanese crypto exchange Coincheck resulted in the loss of $500M in crypto tokens.
| |
 Africa surpassed North America in P2P trading volume of BTC over the past seven days. With over $18M in BTC transactions, Africa is now the leading continent in BTC P2P trading. More: - Weighing BTC trading activity against individual and continental wealth, the surge in P2P trading signals a widespread adoption of BTC in Africa.
- Kenya, Nigeria, and Togo were reportedly the top countries in Africa by transaction volume.
- Paxful and LocalBitcoins were the most frequented marketplaces for P2P BTC transactions.
| |
QUICK HITS * Sponsored Content
| |
Upcoming Events Want to see all of our upcoming events? Visit us at https://inside.com/events - August 26 – DAOs: Disrupting with Code (Register Here)
- August 31 – [Webinar] How to Grow SMS Subscribers Before Black Friday & Cyber Monday (Register Here)*
- September 2 – A SPACES Conversation with Anand Iyer (Set A Reminder)
- September 15 – Psychedelic Medicine: Fad or Phenom? (Register Here)
- September 21 – AMA with Katie Stanton of Moxxie Ventures (Register Here)
- September 29 – Livestream Shopping: The rise of the next billion-dollar industry (Register Here)
- October 6 – Design for Startups (Register Here)
- October 26-27 – Meet our Fund Fall ’21 Cohort (Register Here)
DID YOU KNOW WE'RE HIRING? *This is a sponsored post
| |
 |  | Griffin McShane is a J.D. candidate currently living in Portland, Maine. He is a graduate of Providence College, where he studied both computer science and business. Griffin aspires one day to go to the moon and bring some of his altcoins along for the ride. |   | | Editor | Aaron Crutchfield is based in the high desert of California. Over the last two decades, he has spent time writing and editing at various local newspapers and defense contractors in California. When he's not working, he can often be found looking at the latest memes with his kids or working on his 1962 Ford. | |
Opticon21 promises a day of high-profile speakers and industry-shaping digital leaders. | |
| |
