It's go big or go home this week, with two record breaking human achievements to start your Sunday. The "world's largest offshore wind farm" generated its first electricity for the U.K. national grid... although currently only one of the planned 277 turbines is up and operational, so technically not the "world's largest" yet.
However on the other side of the pond, a Minnesota man grew the "world's largest pumpkin", which was verified by Guinness World Records at a mammoth 1,246.9 kg. One imagines there isn't much to do in Minnesota?
But who is The Pumpkin King and who is making claims that don't quite add up in the world of crypto this week? Read on to find out...
Everybody loves a good meme these days. Especially if by 'everybody' we mainly mean internet edge-lords and degen crypto traders. Memes may have embedded themselves deeply into the fabric of society, but few imagined that they would fundamentally change the U.S. stock market. However, the meme-stocks craze of 2021 has done just that; prompting the 'move to T+1', which will reduce settlement times (and their associated bottlenecks) from 48 to 24 hours.
And just so our degen crypto trader friends don't feel left out, we also investigated the rise (and risks) of meme-coin sniper bots, and looked at staked ether arbitrage opportunities in the 'still sometimes inefficient' crypto market.
To crypto, or not to crypto, that is the question: Frax Finance launched v3 of its 'Final Stablecoin', incorporating the Federal Reserve's IORB rate in an attempt to make all other stablecoins obsolete. However, a recent report revealed that cash is still king, even in the virtual arena, with over twice as many online retailers accepting bank notes as cryptocurrencies.
JPMorgan meanwhile, is still all-in on blockchain and somewhere between 'meh' and 'ugh' on crypto. This week it opened up its Tokenized Collateral Network, allowing shares in money market funds to be tokenized and, um, used as collateral in ongoing trades... which we're sure is great if you happen to be a major investment fund manager.
Kraken and several other exchanges have shifted focus to Europe, claiming that the new MiCA framework, while not perfect, finally gives them the regulatory clarity they have been clamoring for. Although, with the SEC not pursuing an appeal on the Grayscale ETF ruling, perhaps the U.S. regulator is finally tiring of its anti-crypto crusade.
It appears that reports of the death of NFTs have been greatly exaggerated, as Bored Ape creators, Yuga Labs, lead the charge from overpriced monkey avatars to non-fungible tokens with 'tangible utility' within Web3 gaming and beyond. Worldcoin, however, may be on its last legs, having been banned in Kenya, soon to be replaced in Argentina, and abused for a quick buck (or peso) in Chile.
Finally, we rounded up the week's developments in the ongoing Sam Bankman-Fried trial. Here are some things that we learned:
1. Don't hire your girlfriend as CEO, encourage her to commit fraud, and then dump her.
2. Bringing regulator heat onto your competitors will not protect you from bad business decisions.
3. The quality of courtroom sketch artists in the U.S. is really going downhill.
Right, we're off to grow the world's biggest crypto exchange. Enjoy the rest of the weekend.
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