GM, frens! Ambire here with our weekly newsletter. Today we’ll talk about ETH NFTs volume reaching heights not seen this year, CZ’s top Binance executives resigning, BlackRock’s CEO bullish remarks on crypto, Polygon securing its second partnership with the India government, and uranium-backed tokenized crypto assets (+ some other worthy reads). Let’s get to it:

Ethereum NFT trading reaches highest levels since February after 63% jump in volume

All the NFT bros out there are getting excited, and for good reason. Ethereum NFT trading volumes have been steadily increasing in the past few weeks. Last week's sudden surge in volume is especially impressive, as it was up 63% from the previous week to $88 million worth of transactions.

This is the biggest volume seen since February when the total volume jumped 109%. This jump was largely due to the Azuki Elementals mint sale, which saw 10,000 NFTs traded for a whopping $37.5 million.

Clearly, Ethereum NFTs are still thriving, despite recent dips. The current trend in Ethereum NFTs has created a new wave of enthusiasm and investment in this field. As such, prices for some rare tokens have skyrocketed.

CZ's top executives resign

Senior executives, including general counsel Gan Ng, chief strategy officer Patrick Hillmann, and vice president of compliance Steven Christie, have resigned from their positions at Binance.

The resignations come after a series of investigations were conducted at Binance, and are allegedly, due to CZ's handling of said investigations. They are leaving following the recent departure of Matthew Price, a former IRS agent that Binance hired to oversee global investigations and intelligence in 2021.

The executives’ decision to leave Binance marks a managerial and strategic crisis, which will only continue to increase the pressure on Changpeng "CZ" Zhao. The changes in leadership are said to be particularly significant due to the legal and compliance departments being in direct contact with regulators.

It is expected that Binance will have to restructure and reorganize its executive team in order to maintain operations.

BlackRock's CEO sees crypto as "Digital Gold"

BlackRock CEO Larry Fink made some interesting remarks about crypto and BTC in particular, calling crypto "digital gold" and expressing his view that it could play a crucial role in international investments. Fink made these comments during an interview on FOX Business, discussing the potential for crypto assets to act as a hedge against traditional issues such as inflation and currency devaluation.

Fink pointed to gold's historical role as a reliable source of security for investors, noting that he sees crypto playing the same part in modern times. He believes that crypto can offer strong protection against the fluctuations of individual countries and their currencies.

In line with his views, BlackRock itself recently filed for a BTC ETF. The move could prove to be a major catalyst for the adoption and use of crypto, making it more accessible and attractive to mainstream investors.

Fink’s comments also reflect the growing acceptance and recognition of cryptocurrencies within big finance, finally, after years of resistance. The importance of this development is hard to overstate, as it could pave the way for a whole new generation of crypto assets and projects.

Polygon secures a second partnership with the India government

Polygon has just announced its second partnership with the Indian government, this time in the state of West Bengal. This new deal will see the City Development Authority team up with Airchains and Polygon Supernets to create a blockchain-based land ownership and mutation system.

The founder of Polygon, Sandeep Nailwal, recently took to Twitter to share the news and highlight its importance in driving mainstream adoption. According to him, this is because it demonstrates the power of real-world Web3 use cases, showing how blockchain technology can be used to improve existing systems and processes.

He mentioned that land document mutation through unlawful means is a pervasive issue in India, leading to countless landowners falling victim to fraudulent activities.

He emphasised that leveraging blockchain technology can address this problem effectively. He also added that by implementing a transparent and secure digital system on Polygon Supernets, the West Bengal City Development Authority aims to prevent scams and create a trustworthy platform for land ownership transactions.

In any case, this partnership is a major milestone for Polygon and the blockchain industry as a whole, showing how real-world applications are already taking shape.

Uranium-backed crypto a reality?

Reports suggest that Madison Metals, a junior mining company headquartered in Toronto, Canada, is considering creating a cryptocurrency backed by uranium, following an unsuccessful attempt to launch an NFT collection.

Madison Metals first tried to launch a uranium-backed NFT collection in April 2023, but it was postponed, but apparently, the company isn't willing to give up on crypto yet. The company's CEO Duane Parnham recently suggested that the revised offering is likely to be available soon.

Parnham explained that the new cryptocurrency would be based on the same concept as their original NFT idea: to facilitate trading of commodities among retail investors, so essentially it's going to be a fungible tokenized uranium-backed asset that the regular traders would be able to own and trade.

Tokenization sounds like a great way to make commodities investing more accessible to everyone, if you know a thing about crypto you can probably already guess how such future commodity trading hubs are going to function.

Other worthy reads:

Thread on mass adoption from Yugi:

A thread on macro from Conks:

The fun page: our weekly meme collection

That's all for now, frens.

We'll see you next week. And remember, the market conditions are temporary, but our commitment to building a better DeFi is here to stay. Thanks for joining us and we look forward to seeing you back next week. Cheers!

Yours, The 🔥 Team

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