What’s Next for USDC

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Good Morning,

I’m at Coinfest Asia in Bali. It’s a good reminder that crypto is truly a global asset. The spirit in Asia is much stronger. No one really thinks about US regulations. Builders keep on building and investors keep on investing 💪

In Today's Email:

• What Matters: Coinbase buys stake in Circle 💵

• Case Study: Rollbit dump or arb 🎰

• Governance & Features: Aevo’s Friend Tech perp 📈

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WHAT MATTERS

Coinbase Acquires Minority Stake in Circle

State of play: Jeremy Allaire, the CEO of Circle, announced that Coinbase is acquiring a minority stake in Circle.

• Both companies are dissolving the Centre Consortium, a jointly managed self-governance group for USDC.

• Circle will take complete control over the issuance and governance of USDC.

• Six new blockchains will integrate with USDC.

Why it matters: This is a necessary move to promote USDC amidst the decreasing supply and shows the importance of USDC's interest to Coinbase’s bottom line.

For builders: Decentralized stablecoin is an area that hasn’t been truly solved with players like FRAX and DAI leading the way.

• There’s a lot of money to be made here for founders who can think of a novel way that balance the dynamics between collateralization design, regulation, and use cases (yield).

For investors: Things are looking better for stablecoins as regulators work on new frameworks.

• Clarity for Payment Stablecoins Act of 2023 has won bipartisan support in the US House of Representatives.

• Circle recently earned a Major Payment Institution License in Singapore.

CASE STUDY

Are Whales Dumping RLB?

Credits to @thiccythot_ for the original thread.

State of play: @thiccythot_ accused four wallets of dumping RLB, causing a negative impact on the price of RLB. The accused “jeeters” are actually arbitraging the pool.

• The first wallet being accused is 0x13b19, which sold over $35M RLB since July, or 800K of RLB per day.

• 0x13b sends tokens in from the Rollbit hot wallet and swaps to tether via the Uniswap UI (not automated) then sends stables back into the Rollbit hot wallet.

• Commentators were pointing out that those wallets are actually arbitrage wallets. The next day, @thiccythot_ clarified that 0x13b19 is actually arbitraging the pool.

Our take: @thiccythot_ skepticism is warranted as when a project conducts some form of new token mechanisms (buyback-and-burn), there are usually incentives for insiders to capitalize on the mechanics to profit (or cash out).

• He might be missing the mark this time around, but it’s always good to look closely onchain.

Take a peek at our referral reward at the bottom of this issue. Share this newsletter and receive our list of 100 smart crypto investors' wallet addresses 👇

INSIGHTS

Sniping Bot Generated 260 ETH

The leading profit earner on Friend Tech is a sniping bot, having amassed a total profit of 260 ETH by exploiting a tx pool leakage.

The address 0xCC2 managed to capitalize on a peculiarity in Base's sequencer, enabling it to achieve simultaneous block inclusion for recently listed shares.

• It took 24h for a mempool leakage to be discovered.

• The RPC provider for Friend Tech was accidentally sharing their tx pool.

• Same block inclusion means that you could backrun new account’s shares in the same block they were created before everyone else.

The loophole has been fixed, but there is concern that there are other loopholes that are not yet publicly known. Some speculate the following:

FEATURES & GOVERNANCE UPDATE

Aevo Lists Friend Tech Index Perp Contract

Aevo introduced an index perpetual contract on the market cap of accounts on Friend.tech.

• The FRIEND-PERP market is live and currently trading at $5.6, with a daily trading volume of $99K.

• FRIEND-PERP has experienced a ~36% decline in 2 days from its all-time high (ATH) at ~$8.80.

Why it matters: DeFi protocols need to find novel ways to generate revenues.

• Aevo acted swiftly and figured out a way to monetize the Friend Tech hype while providing value for market participants.

Other notable feature updates:

• Thorchain Lending goes live.

• Sei Mainnet goes live.

• Immutable zkEVM Testnet goes live.

• Nautilus goes live.

• Silo Llama goes live.

• tBTC goes live on Solana.

• LUSD goes live on Aave.

• Compound goes live on Base.

• Linea ERC20 Token Bridge goes live.

• Archblock launches the Short-Term U.S. Treasury Bill Fund.

• Diva launches alpha testnet.

• Scroll launches its Sepolia testnet.

QUICK BITES

• Binance US looks to MoonPay as US banks cut ties.

• BNB price approaches a one-year low.

• BIS warns emerging economies of crypto risk.

• SBF pleads not guilty.

• EDX Markets taps Anchorage as a custody provider.

• Coinbase takes a stake in Circle.

• Friend.tech gains 100K users in days.

• Coin Center urges Congress for clearer crypto tax regulation

• Vitalik Buterin sends $1M ETH to Coinbase.

• BNB Chain Exploiter liquidated for $30M on Venus Protocol.

• Balancer reveals 'critical vulnerability' in some V2 pools.

MEME & NOTEWORTHY READS

• Decentralised‘s read on volatility as a service.

• Ann’s read on using friend tech.

• Coinshares’ read on why bitcoin just plummeted.

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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.