Future Finance - Issue #117: Fireblocks Secures The Bag, Shopify Is Getting Into NFTs And Buckle Up For Defi Summer 2.0

Welcome to another issue of Future Finance, your weekly off-chain newsletter about the world of on-ch

Future Finance - Issue #117: Fireblocks Secures The Bag, Shopify Is Getting Into NFTs And Buckle Up For Defi Summer 2.0 By Alan Tsen • Issue #117 • View online Welcome to another issue of Future Finance, your weekly off-chain newsletter about the world of on-chain finance. And always, there's no shortage of news from the industry. So grab a coffee (or beer), and let's get into this week's news from the world of open and decentralised finance. 👉 Got some interesting news I should include in my newsletter? Feel free to respond to this email or hit me up on Twitter - my DMs are always open. — Alan Tsen 👊💯 Ps. If you like what I'm doing here, please feel free to share it on your favourite social media network. Also, it'd be great if you forwarded this newsletter to a friend you think might enjoy it.

📰 News This Week

Harley Finkelstein @harleyf If you've spent 1 minute on the internet this year, you've seen a lot about NFTs. @Shopify we are making it easier for our merchants to sell NFTs directly through their stores, with one of the first being the @ChicagoBulls NFT store. https://t.co/Qv2wKO7RCS 3:09 AM - 27 Jul 2021

👀 Shopify continues to 'arm the rebels'. This week they jumped into the world of NFTs 👇👇👇

Shopify Allows Merchants To Sell NFTs Directly Through Their Storefronts The NBA's Chicago Bulls launched its first-ever NFTs –– including digital artwork of NBA championship rings –– by launching an online store on Shopify. techcrunch.com  •  Share

Fireblocks Raises $310M Series D: Removing the Complexity Of Working With Digital Assets Today, we're excited to announce that Fireblocks has raised $310 million in Series D funding,  co-led by Sequoia Capital, Stripes, Spark Capital, Coatue, DRW VC  and SCB 10X, the venture arm of Thailand's oldest bank, Siam Commercial Bank. This extension of capital brings our valuation to a new milestone of over $2 billion. www.fireblocks.com  •  Share

Binance Exits Stock Token Trading Digital assets are inclusive of securities, commodities, utilities, and all of the above. For crypto exchanges, the ability to trade security tokens makes sense – if you are fully compliant. www.crowdfundinsider.com  •  Share

Figure Completes $200 Million Series D Figure officially closed its Series D fundraise of $200 million at a $3.2 billion valuation, welcoming new investors including entities and funds managed and/or advised by affiliates of Apollo Global Management, Inc., Blockchain.com, Rockaway Blockchain, HOF Capital, Endeavour Capital, National Bank Holdings, Goldentree Asset Management and L1 Digital. www.businesswire.com  •  Share

PayPal Hints it May Use "Interesting DeFi Apps" in Future In its Q2 earnings call, PayPal updated investors on its new consumer wallet while also hinting at future engagement with DeFi applications. cryptobriefing.com  •  Share

1inch to Airdrop 10M Tokens to DeFi Users to 'Refund' Gas Costs 1inch said any users staking through the 1inch dapp will be refunded the gas amount spent in 1INCH tokens on the first day of each month. www.coindesk.com  •  Share

Twitter And Amazon, Learning From Facebook, Make Strides In Crypto While Facebook's digital currency remains MIA, Twitter and Amazon are making their own headway in cryptos—all in a bid to simplify payments on their global platforms. www.emarketer.com  •  Share

Solana-Based Stablecoin Exchange Saber Raises $7.7 Million From Chamath Palihapitiya's Social Capital And Others Solana-based stablecoin exchange Saber has raised $7.7 million from Chamath Palihapitiya's Social Capital, Jump Capital, and others. www.theblockcrypto.com  •  Share

Binance Now Supports Direct Polygon Withdrawals And Deposits Crypto's largest centralized exchange, Binance, now allows users to withdraw and deposit Polygon's MATIC token directly from and onto the protocol's proof-of-stake mainnet. thedefiant.io  •  Share

Traders Anticipate 'DeFi Summer 2.0' After TVL And Token Prices Rise A rally in blue-chip DeFi tokens and the sector's rising total value locked has traders hopeful that a prolonged rally will take place. cointelegraph.com  •  Share

Source: DefiLlama as at 30/7

Prime Trust Raises $64M To Scale Fintech Infrastructure Biz Prime Trust is using its Series A on an "aggressive" hiring campaign to extend its reach into the world of fintech. www.coindesk.com  •  Share

Uniswap Delists 100 Tokens From Interface, Including Options And Indexes Uniswap Labs has delisted 100 tokens from its web interface as it continues to monitor the regulatory landscape. cointelegraph.com  •  Share

Cryptocurrency-Based Decentralized Finance (DeFi) Takes On Wall Street The tech rebels behind 'decentralized finance' want to change the way the world borrows, lends, and saves. Can they pull it off? fortune.com  •  Share

🎧 Podcasts Of The Week

The Origins and Future of Aave, The Decentralized Finance Protocol to Lend and Borrow Crypto This week, Kevin Rose chats with Stani Kulechov, founder of the open-source and non-custodial liquidity protocol Aave. They cover the origins of the project, known initially as ETHLend before rebranding in 2018, and the platform's future, including the possibility of a decentralized Twitter competitor. pca.st  •  Share

The ETHCC Experience | Interviews with Ethereum Community Leaders Did you miss out on ETHCC? Here's the antidote to your FOMO. David interviews 9 thought leaders and builders about the conference, Paris, and the broader Ethereum Community. pca.st  •  Share

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By Alan Tsen Future Finance is a curated newsletter sent to your inbox every week. We cover all the most important news in the world of decentralised finance. It takes 10 minutes to read and provides you with all the essential news. Tweet     Share

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B of A, Coinbase, FTX joined Paxos Series D /Robinhood ($HOOD) made public debut / U.S. considering stricter crypto taxes / PayPal announced new crypto features

Plus: FTX released business and operations report for first half of 2021

Inside.com Part of   Network July 29, 2021

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The global crypto market cap is $1.54T 0.28%▼ with a 24-hour market volume of $75.10B 20.42%▼. Bitcoin's dominance is currently 47.99% 0.37%▼. CURRENT PRICES BY MARKET CAP # Name Price 24h % 1 Bitcoin BTC $39,509.80 1.87% ▼ 2 Ethereum ETH $2,316.24 0.09% ▲ 3 Binance Coin BNB $313.39 0.51% ▼ 4 Cardano ADA $1.27 1.43% ▼ 5 XRP XRP $0.7037 1.37% ▼ *Prices as of 3:00 p.m. ET.

Paxos announced additional investors to its $300M Series D funding round. Bank of America, Coinbase Ventures, FTX, and Founders Fund became Paxos’ latest strategic investors. More: Paxos offers primarily back-end infrastructure services to reduce transaction delays and increase liquidity on exchanges. The Series D round, along with the capital raised by the new strategic investors, brought Paxos to a value of $2.4B. Founders Fund is Peter Thiel’s investment fund that most recently backed crypto exchange startup Bullish.

Robinhood ($HOOD) made its public debut today at $38 per share. The stock price briefly fell 9% in the first 15 minutes before recovering to around $36. More: Robinhood has played a key role in crypto support over the past year, with its early support for cryptocurrencies like dogecoin (DOGE). Robinhood is reportedly testing new features to protect crypto investors from unexpected volatility. FINRA fined Robinhood $70M last month due to outages and other issues related to its crypto and stock brokerage services. Note: Inside.com's founder and CEO, Jason Calacanis, is an investor in Robinhood.

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▲ TOP GAINERS # Name Price 24h % 1 Quant QNT $131.87 36.23% ▲ 2 THORChain RUNE $5.39 23.64% ▲ 3 Nano NANO $4.36 7.23% ▲ 4 Solana SOL $30.18 7.21% ▲ 5 0x ZRX $0.7514 6.22% ▲ ▼  TOP LOSERS  # Name Price 24h % 1 Axie Infinity AXS $42.68 7.37%▼ 2 Mdex MDX $1.10 6.58%▼ 3 UNUS SED LEO LEO $2.81 5.89%▼ 4 Telcoin TEL $0.01885 4.22%▼ 5 Horizen ZEN $54.87 3.91%▼ *Limited to cryptocurrencies in the Top 100. Prices as of 3:00 p.m. ET.

The latest $550B U.S. infrastructure bill includes taxes on crypto that could raise $28B in funding. The proposed bill would include stricter crypto reporting to the IRS for crypto brokers.  More: Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH) said that Congress' concerns over crypto transparency were the reason for adding these new measures. Some of the proposed measures detailed in the bill require brokers and crypto platforms to use tools that currently don’t exist. The infrastructure bill also includes provisions for increased high-speed internet, clean energy transmission, and EV infrastructure.

PayPal announced new consumer wallet features for further crypto functionality in its Q2 earnings call. The new wallet will offer high-yield savings, bill pay functionality, and other crypto functions. More: PayPal further hinted at expanding into DeFi products during the call. Uniswap Labs stated at the Ethereum Community Conference that PayPal had expressed interest in talks with the DeFi protocol. The payment company is currently looking for the “very best” in crypto ecosystems to work on the project.

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QUICK HITS This fintech startup explains how startup employees left behind $4.9 billion last year year by not exercising their stock options. * FTX released its business and operations updates for the first half of 2021, showing a massive jump in average daily volume. A draft bill in Israel would require investors to report bitcoin (BTC) holdings of over $61,000 to tax authorities. Compass Mining will offer U.S. clients bitcoin mining functionality within its Choice Individual Retirement Account offering. New legislation in Virginia is expected to reduce ambiguities and improve clarity for their state crypto regulation (if approved). THORChain rallied 39% after a recent attack on its system. Consumers have fallen in love with Affirm's flexible pament options — find out how businesses are leveraging that for an +85% bump in AOV. * * This is sponsored content.

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.

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