As a seasoned crypto investor with battle-scarred fingers from riding the wild crypto rollercoaster for years, I must admit that the recent surge of optimism is as intoxicating as the sweet scent of freshly minted USDT. The $120 billion market cap milestone reached by Tether’s stablecoin feels like a “Uptober” signal that could very well set the stage for another historic crypto rally.
There’s growing optimism among cryptocurrency investors now that Tether has reached over $120 billion in value for the first time. This milestone could mark the beginning of a significant surge known as “Uptober” rally, as more and more investors are accumulating stablecoins.
Enhancing the positive mood among investors, Ethereum’s co-creator Vitalik Buterin revealed that an upcoming update, named “The Verge,” would allow Ethereum nodes to be operated on mobile devices and smartwatches. This upgrade aims to make the mainnet more user-friendly and secure.
Tether’s USDT hits record $120 billion market cap, flashing “Uptober” signal
For the very first time, the U.S. dollar-backed stablecoin from Tether has exceeded a market capitalization of $120 billion, indicating a possible surge in the cryptocurrency market.
On October 20th, as reported by their own site that provides real-time updates, Tether’s USDt (USDT), the world’s leading stablecoin, crossed a new threshold.
Stablecoins are the main on-ramp between the world of fiat currencies and digital assets. A growing stablecoin supply is often used as a signal to predict an upcoming bull rally, as it suggests that investors are loading up on stablecoins before investing in cryptocurrencies.
As an analyst, I’ve noticed a significant increase in the circulation of Tether (USDT) following a recent dip in Bitcoin’s price. Specifically, in August, Tether minted approximately $1.3 billion worth of USDT within five days after Bitcoin’s price hit a five-month low of around $49,500 on Aug. 5. This rapid expansion of USDT could potentially serve as a catalyst for the upcoming Bitcoin rally.
Ethereum “Verge” upgrade to enable nodes on phones and smartwatches
Vitalik Buterin, one of Ethereum’s co-creators, announced that their upcoming update, dubbed “The Verge,” aims to enhance Ethereum’s security and accessibility. This means that nodes on the network could potentially run on devices as compact as a “smartphone or smartwatch.
The Verge intends to lower the need for hardware through “stateless verification,” enabling nodes to authenticate blockchain blocks without having to store extensive amounts of data.
Stateless verification
One issue that Ethereum faces is the growing amount of data needed to run a node, which currently demands “tens of hundreds of gigabytes of state data,” as per findings by Paradigm. In simpler terms, this means that the data storage requirements for operating an Ethereum node are getting larger and larger, reaching up to hundreds of gigabytes at present.
The Verge presents stateless verification, a feature that Ethereum’s Vitalik Buterin believes will make verifying the entire blockchain computationally feasible for everyday devices such as mobile wallets, web wallets, and even smartwatches, making verification an automatic process.
Kraken to launch Ink blockchain for DeFi in early 2025
Kraken, a popular cryptocurrency trading platform, is set to debut its self-developed blockchain named “Ink” in the first quarter of 2025. The main focus of this new blockchain will be on developing decentralized financial services, often referred to as DeFi applications.
As an analyst, I’ve recently come across a fascinating development: Ink is striving to empower its users with the ability to directly engage in token trading, borrowing, and lending activities, thereby bypassing traditional intermediaries. This innovative move signals a significant shift in the crypto and Web3 landscape, distancing itself from the current role of Centralized Exchanges (CEXs).
The upcoming release of Kraken’s blockchain is designed to streamline Decentralized Finance (DeFi) procedures, making them more approachable and affordable for a wider range of users.
Cosmos ecosystem rocked by North Korean developer allegations
In my analysis as a researcher, recent investigations conducted on-chain have raised suspicions that certain components within the Cosmos ecosystem might have been developed by entities linked to North Korea. This potential development reportedly caught the attention of the FBI in the year 2023.
A portion of Cosmos’ Liquid Staking Module (LSM) could potentially be the work of developers from North Korea, as suggested by Jacob Gadikian, a member of the Cosmos ecosystem. He recently disclosed this finding in a blog post dated October 16th.
Regarding the creators of the LSM, it’s not about where they come from or their racial background. Instead, they are renowned as highly talented and extremely productive cybercriminals in the realm of cryptocurrencies.
As a researcher, I found myself grappling with investor apprehensions upon discovering potential links between certain developers and the notorious Lazarus Group, a cybercrime entity rumored to be associated with the North Korean government. This group has been implicated in several high-profile crypto heists, such as the $600 million breach of the Ronin Bridge.
Radiant Capital hacker moves $52 million in stolen funds
The hacker behind the recent theft from decentralized finance protocol Radiant Capital has moved almost all of the stolen funds from layer-2 protocols to Ethereum in a possible move toward obscuring their location.
As an analyst, on October 24th, I noted a significant finding from PeckShield’s report. They revealed that addresses associated with the Radiant Capital exploiter have transferred almost all of the unlawfully acquired cryptocurrency from the exploit, which originally took place on the layer-2 network Arbitrum and Binance BNB Chain, to the Ethereum network.
The total amount moved was about 20,500 Ether (ETH) worth around $52 million, PeckShield noted.
DeFi market overview
Based on information from CryptoMoon Markets Pro and TradingView, it appears that most of the top 100 cryptocurrencies, ranked by market cap, closed out the week with gains.
This past week, I experienced a significant surge in my crypto portfolio as the newly-introduced Goatseus Maximus (GOAT) memecoin took the lead, skyrocketing more than 125%! Coming in second was ApeCoin (APE), which also saw impressive gains, climbing over 64%.
Thanks for reading our summary of this week’s most impactful DeFi developments. Join us next Friday for more stories, insights and education regarding this dynamically advancing space.
Read More
- GOAT PREDICTION. GOAT cryptocurrency
- LDO PREDICTION. LDO cryptocurrency
- JASMY PREDICTION. JASMY cryptocurrency
- CYBER PREDICTION. CYBER cryptocurrency
- DOP PREDICTION. DOP cryptocurrency
- DEXE PREDICTION. DEXE cryptocurrency
- NOT PREDICTION. NOT cryptocurrency
- SCR PREDICTION. SCR cryptocurrency
- OKB PREDICTION. OKB cryptocurrency
- BRN PREDICTION. BRN cryptocurrency
2024-10-25 22:09