Tether $4.52 Billion Q1 2024 Profit

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Good Morning.

FriendTech token debut was a flop, Tether reports record profits, and Hong Kong Bitcoin ETFs registered… wait for it… $11M in first-day volume. At least Larri Fink is shilling Bitcoin ETFs to sovereign wealth funds and pension funds.

In Today's Email:

• What Matters: Tether $4.52B profit 💰️ 

• Founders Highlight: Movement Labs’s co-founders 🏃‍♂️ 

• Deal Flows: a16z’s $90M OP deal 🤝

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WHAT MATTERS

Tether Sets New Quarterly Profit Record

State of play: Tether achieved a record quarterly net profit of $4.52B in the first quarter, surpassing its previous high of $2.85B from the last quarter of 2023, according to its attestation report by auditing firm BDO.

• Tether's Q1’24 net operating profits reached $1B, primarily driven by its US Treasury holdings, with additional gains from bitcoin and gold.

• As of March 31, Tether's reserves surpassed its liabilities by nearly $6.3B.

• Tether’s USDT market cap was around $110B, more than three times USDC’s $33B market cap.

Why it Matters: Tether's USDT is recognized as the world's largest stablecoin.

For builders and investors: Tether is expanding its business beyond stablecoins, recently launching a data initiative for technology development and investment.

• It has also introduced divisions focused on blockchain-based financial infrastructure and mining and energy sectors.

BUILDER-INVESTOR HIGHLIGHT

Rushi & Scanlon of Movement Labs

Intro: Rushi Manche and Scanlon Cooper are the co-founders of Movement Labs, a project that aims to build an ecosystem of modular Move-based blockchains through “M2” — a Move Virtual Machine Layer 2 for Ethereum.

Previous background: In college, Manche explored crypto within the Cosmos blockchain ecosystem, while Cooper was the first to use Move, developing a yield aggregator for Aptos.

• Both Manche and Cooper are Vanderbilt college dropouts.

• Manche is currently 21 years old, and Cooper is 24 years old.

• Manche became interested in Move after reading an article about Facebook's blockchain efforts during his college years.

The big idea: Manche and Cooper are on a mission to create a global community of Move builders, working together to increase the security, performance, and user experience of building in decentralized networks.

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INSIGHTS

VanEck Exec: Biden Hurries to Make DeFi Illegal

Matthew Sigel, the head of digital assets research at VanEck claims that DeFi and self-custody are under threat by the action of Joe Biden’s administration.

• Sigel points out that the latest focus of US regulators’ actions is aimed towards DeFi projects and custody solutions.

• The SEC issued a warning to the Uniswap Foundation on April 11, alleging it has been operating an unregistered exchange.

• The SEC has also issued a warning letter to ConsenSys, alleging that MetaMask is violating securities law

• The IRS also proposed reporting requirements for non-custodial wallets, which includes an overly broad definition of brokers

DEAL FLOWS

A16z Buys $90M OP Token in Private Deal

Deal flows soared this week, we saw $200M+ in deals 💼 

a16z has purchased approximately $90M of Optimism’s OP token with a 2-year vesting period, following increased activity and growth in the Optimism ecosystem

• a16z now owns stakes in Optimism and Coinbase which owns Base, both serve similar markets as they secured major crypto projects as users of their technology stacks.

• On March 7, the Optimism Foundation announced the sale of about 19.5M OP tokens, valued at nearly $90M, to an unnamed buyer.

• The foundation stated that the tokens were part of a 30% reserve of OP’s initial treasury allocated for its working budget.

Deal flows in the past week:

• Blade Games, $2.4M Seed Round

• Paragraph, $5M Seed Round

• X10, $6.5M Seed Round

• Agora, $5M Seed Round

• Baxus, $5M Seed Round

• MilkyWay, $5M Seed Round

• Mitosis, $7M Seed Round

• Eywa, $7M Seed Round

• Bedrock, Undisclosed $ Seed Round

• Backed, $9.5M Series A

• LazyBear, $4M Strategic Round

• Holograph, $11M Strategic Round

• Securitize, $47M Strategic Round

• Optimism, $90M Private Token Sale

• TON, Undisclosed Secondary Market Round

• Mirror, Undisclosed $ Acquisition by Paragraph

QUICK BITES

• MoonPay integrates PayPal.

• Coinbase's Q1 earnings jump to $1.6B.

• FriendTech launches token, airdrops, and V2 rollout.

• Spot Bitcoin ETFs record the largest daily net outflows ever.

• Nigerian court postpones another Binance case to May 17th.

• Jito becomes the largest protocol on Solana with $1.4B in TVL.

• Block plans to invest 10% of Bitcoin profits into BTC each month.

• BlackRock sees SWFs and pension funds coming to Bitcoin ETFs.

• EigenLayer to distribute extra $1,000 in EIGEN following backlash.

• Tether enters transaction surveillance partnership with Chainalysis.

• MicroStrategy unveils a plan for Bitcoin-based decentralized identity using Ordinals.

NOTEWORTHY READS

• Arthur Hayes’ read on mayday.

• Fred Wilson’s read on moving onchain.

• Forbes’ read on (no) plans to kill crypto.

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Disclaimer: All the information presented in this publication and its affiliates is strictly for educational purposes only. It should not be construed or taken as financial, legal, investment, or any other form of advice.