Rays of Sunshine

Blubber Notes #54

Dear Future Whales,

This past week brought a wave of positive news in the crypto space, with exciting developments aimed at bridging the gap between cryptocurrencies and real-world applications. Additionally, there was encouraging funding news for what could be considered the leading metaverse project currently in the market, and Opensea, a prominent platform in the NFT space, introduced a new trading tool.

With so many promising updates and advancements, the crypto community is eager to explore these new opportunities. Let's dive in!

Summary:

• Gnosis Safe launches VISA Card

• Futureverse raises 54M

• OpenSea Peer-to-Peer Swap

🤑 Crypto spent like Fiat

• Gnosis, known for their crypto security “SAFE”, has launched a self-custody crypto debit card with Visa. Gnosis card is a visa card that allows users to spend their crypto like fiat from a self-custodial wallet.

• The crypto critics have always made the point that you can’t spend your cryptocurrency in the real world. Well, you can now spend USDC or USDT in your SAFE. The (KYC) is facilitated by Fractal so they can comply with (AML) & (CFT) laws through their compliance partners. With web3 and self-custody markets growing in the wake of major centralized exchange collapses, there is likely to be an uptick in users moving to self-custodial options.

  

  Source: Twitter Bankless/Gnosis

• Is this a new concept?

  • No, Coinbase card has been active and even offers cash back options in cryptocurrency. Coinbase card offers you the ability to spend USDC or USD with no hidden fees to earn various percentages of BTC or ETH back.

  • Cryptocurrency debit cards offer a new element to personal finance that could grow over time. I’d also recommend looking into Bof.Xyz as another platform to manage your spending supported by self-custody.

🐇 A Future with Futureverse

• Futureverse has been a focus of mine for over a year now, and they have everything needed to create an open metaverse - a great team, strong partnerships, and a supportive community.

• Despite a 76% decline in Web3 funding and an 18% drop across all sectors in Q2 2023, Futureverse secured an impressive $54 million in Series A funding led by 10T Holdings and Ripple Labs.

• The rabbit hole that is the Futureverse ecosystem runs deep! Even with FLUF World floor prices at near 1+ ETH, there are even more affordable options available to engage with their ecosystem

• Fellow Futurverse enthusiast, KonaRoad, did a nice break down below!

Source: Twitter

🔨 OpenSea innovates a year too late?

• Last week, OpenSea hinted at significant news regarding their platform, leading many users and web3 enthusiasts to speculate that a token drop was on the horizon. Market sentiment suggested that OpenSea might give back to its users and revitalize the space.

• However, instead of a token drop, OpenSea introduced a peer-to-peer trading feature, allowing users to engage in NFT trades directly with each other and offer additional value with WETH. Unfortunately, the response on Twitter was mostly negative or indifferent to this new trading integration.

  

  Source: Twitter

• Some users feel that the introduction of the peer-to-peer trading model came too late, possibly missing the opportunity to capitalize on the excitement and expectations that had been building up. The disappointment and lackluster reactions on Twitter suggest that the community was expecting something different, such as a token drop, to inject more life into the platform.

💡 Suggested Educational Podcast:

• I suggest listening to the latest Web3 Breakdowns pod on Designing a Sustainable Token Economy.

  • (3:27) A view on NBA TopShots as an inflation failure versus a crypto failure.

  • (19:33) Using tokens for platform purchases instead of a centralized currency.

  • (32:58) Pros and cons of not having control over market volatility.

Authored by Matt Bartlett, CAIA. Follow Matt on Twitter @MattBartlettVE

NOT INVESTMENT ADVICE

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