Presented by CryptoLink.Tech

Volume 1 | Edition 15 | September 28, 2023

Opening Thoughts

What a week for CryptoLink.

Welcome back to Chain Reaction, your favorite coffee read and where you can find the s*** you need to hear about, once a week!

Wow! If you're lucky enough to be part of the incredible CryptoLink community, then you must have experienced the phenomenal week we just had, launching on Pulse!

But hey, if you haven't had the chance to join us yet, don't fret! You absolutely need to check out what's happening in CryptoLink Connect this week. Trust me, it's going to be off-the-charts amazing! 👀

Some weird things are going on in Macro right now, folks.

It’s more than likely to get worse before it gets better but who am I to say?

Check out the last segment today for a little piece on why the halving cycle may not be the indicator we all think it is…

I don’t have much more for you right away, let’s get into some updates and news for the week!

Cryptolink Connect

Here, we delve into the latest and greatest in the CryptoLink ecosystem!

A Pulse in DeFi: CryptoLink Has Successful New Chain Launch

Surprise!

I know we kept this a bit under wraps for a while but most of you caught on in the last week before launch!

We have officially launched on PulseChain with all 3 Validators up and running.

Along with the staking of the validators we saw an immense amount of excitement out of the PulseChain community. On Sunday I went on stage with some Pulse influencers (best word for the occasion) and talked about what we were bringing to the chain.

We saw incredible engagement and attendance, with over 770 listens both live and on the recording.

The hype is definitely real with the Pulse community, they’ve needed a bridge since launch and we finally made our way there.

Special shoutout to CpunksW00t! from the CryptoLink community for getting the ball rolling with the Pulse Validators!

Also shout out to the Pulse community, thank you for showing the love! I’m genuinely excited to begin to cover PulseChain more.

We also saw the PAPER price make a nice little bounce back after the Pulse Validator buys and the arbitrage that followed the craziness off the Pulse launch!

It’s been fun so far, and we are just getting started!

Today (September 28) at 6:30 PM EST I will be going on a YouTube livestream with a DeFi YouTuber. Down below you can find the link to the channel!

On Friday I will be doing another X Space as well at 5PM EST with the account below! 👇👇

The fun never ends, folks.

Stop by both the livestream and the X Space to help hype up the Pulse community about what we just launched there!

Small Delay, Big Development: ETH Validator Reservations Pushed to Next Week

This one probably is not a surprise at this point but we decided not to launch ETH this week.

Why?

Because our development team is small (Atlas and Druuu) and they are now working on a more important task at the moment.

At the moment the dev team is focusing on getting AnyToAny widgets working on MetaMask Mobile.

This has been a problem with some of our possible integrators and the last thing we want is for something like that to deter a possible integration!

Have no fear, ETH is coming very soon. The dev team will be on it shortly, first they must move the entire world of tech yet again by fixing MetaMask Mobile’s problems.

World Of Web3

This section covers major recent developments and trends in the crypto and AI worlds.

SEC Alpha: Ethereum Futures ETFs May Start Trading as Early as Next Week

Ah, the dance between the regulatory bodies and the crypto market continues to twirl on the stage, with spot and futures ETFs taking the limelight this time around.

On one side of the ring, we've got Ethereum futures ETFs prepping to make a grand entrance into the trading scene, possibly as early as next week, riding on the coattails of a looming government shutdown.

It seems like the SEC wants to get these babies out the door before Uncle Sam potentially closes shop on October 1. 👀

The anticipation is palpable, with a Bloomberg analyst giving a hearty 90% chance of these ETFs seeing the light of day in October.

Now, cut to the other side of the ring, where the spot Ether ETF applications from ARK 21Shares and VanEck find themselves in a bit of a regulatory limbo.

The SEC, perhaps playing hard to get, has decided to push the deadlines for these Spot ETFs to late December.

It's a stark contrast to the rush we're seeing with the Futures ETFs. While one is getting the red carpet rolled out, the other is being told to wait in the wings.

The difference in treatment between Spot and Futures ETFs is not just a regulatory s*** show but a storyline that reflects the broader narrative of the crypto space navigating through the regulatory maze.

What’s the difference between a Futures ETF and a Spot ETF?

Check out this week’s Decoded segment for the quick rundown!

Unlocking Limitless: OpenAI Brings Back Browsing with ChatGPT and More

OpenAI finally did it.

They brought back browsing for ChatGPT Plus and Enterprise users with promises of rolling it out to all users at some point.

Not only can it search the web, but it is no longer limited to data and knowledge before 2021. This makes this update a fairly important one for those of use that use it within the web3 space!

So much has happened since 2021 and using GPT up to this point was tough for crypto-related things.

It would regularly want to talk about outdated topics and a bull run that is long past and nearly forgotten.

It’s now juiced and ready to give us the latest and greatest.

Not only are they re-rolling out browsing, but they are also rolling out a new feature over the next two weeks including a mobile-only feature.

The ability to input images and have them analyzed really opens the floodgates of opportunity to take this technology and run with it.

A perfect example by BrexHQ’s AI Lead, Pietro Schirano:

Let the fun begin!

I don’t have access to GPT with vision yet, but simply having browsing back has been a joy.

I’m excited to get more updates in the near future!

Web3 Wickets: ICC Uses Near Blockchain for World Cup Web3 Fan App

The fusion of cricket and blockchain is not a phrase I thought I’d be penning down so soon, but here we are, standing at the crossroads where tradition meets innovation.

The ICC stands for International Cricket Council and it is to the world of Cricket as FIFA is to Soccer or the World Rugby Organization is to Rugby.

Cointelegraph got an exclusive interview with the ICC Head of Digital to get a peek into their experience working with NEAR blockchain. Check that out here!

I’ll let them get into the specifics, but you know I love a good large-scale adoption story!

It’s also very cool to see the worlds of old and new—traditional and modern—collide with such grace and excitement.

Cricket is one of the biggest sports in the world with a history second to none. We love to see the governing body of Cricket embracing the technology that blockchain has to offer!

Interchain Intel

Updates and insights from across different blockchain networks.

Supply and Demand: Optimism Native Token Sees Huge Price Hit Amid Looming Token Unlock

No one likes an inflated supply.

Optimism has a big token unlocking event tomorrow on Saturday, September 30thth.

~24 million OP tokens will be unlocked for core contributors and investors on Saturday, equating to roughly $30 million in USD value.

Not only is that a ton of tokens hitting the market Saturday, but it’s actually about 3% of Optimism’s circulating supply.

Along with the news of a massive flood of new tokens came a 10% drop in price in the last week according to Cointelegraph.

I’m not on Optimism, but if you are let me know what you think of this on X!

Business is Boomin: Base Hits New TVL High, Surpassing Solana

I know we talked about Base’s new volume high last week.

But this is newsworthy as well!

Base surpassed Solana in TVL this week, hitting $400 million. This puts Base in the top ten blockchains in terms of TVL and shows a considerable amount of adoption in its short life thus far.

While I was doing the research for this, I found a Cointelegraph article about it from only about a day ago. Interestingly enough their screenshot of DeFi Llama had Mixin in the top 10 blockchains.

Now in the last 2 days it has lost 60% of its TVL.

I have no clue what sort of nuclear event happened over there but it may be worth looking into.

Sheeeeeeesh.

Tech Bitcoin Trends

Here, we explore the latest technological advancements and innovations in the blockchain space.

Bitcoin Halving: Good Omen or Lucky Timing?

In one week, I came across two articles pointing this out so I figured it was worthy of dethroning Tech Trends this week.

There is an interesting relationship between the Bitcoin halving events and the beginning of bull-runs…

Or maybe it was always macro, and there’s a bit of coincidence here.

That’s what TXMC on X is saying and it’s the subject of the two articles in question.

I’m not a macro guru, as I have stated many times in the past. I’d consider myself to have a slight advantage when looking at these things because of my education in political science but it really doesn’t take that to see what’s happening in that chat does it?

If you can’t see the chart in the post on X, I’ll help you out.

It maps the Bitcoin price up against the 10-year Treasury Yields with indicators marking the previous Bitcoin halving events.

The result?

An interesting pattern emerges. The Bitcoin halvings seem to line up pretty well with bottoms in the 10-year Treasury Yields.

For those who may not know, the Treasury Yield is generally an indicator on the health of risk-on assets, like Bitcoin.

When the yield is high, risk-on assets suffer. When the yield is low, assets like Bitcoin do well and growth speculation rises.

Now it’s interesting because the Cointelegraph writer I read doesn’t tend to agree and provided some decent evidence as to why it may not be.

If you want to read that article, check it out here.

I, however, tend to think that the Bitcoin rallies are mostly macro. Why wouldn’t they be?

The economy is what it is and blockchain doesn’t get to live in fairytale land.

I believe it’s more than likely a bit of both. Both a coincidence that the halving events have coincided with local lows in the Treasury Yields and that the halving events have played a part in the runs themselves.

Either way, I’m not going to try and be a chart guru for you guys.

I thought it was thought provoking nonetheless!

(It’s probably always macro, js)

Decoded

In this section, we decode complex blockchain and cryptocurrency concepts into understandable language.

Futures ETFs vs. Spot ETFs

Imagine a market.

Call this market Wally’s Apple Speculation Market. where fresh apples are bought & sold.

You spot a vendor, and the price today is $1 per apple. If you buy an apple today, you're engaging in a "spot" transaction. This is like a Spot ETF, where you buy assets at today's market price.

Maybe demand soars tomorrow, you can then re-sell that apple for a profit.

Maybe the market becomes inflated with apples because Cletus starts an apple orchard that uses mechanized farms tomorrow. Then your apple’s value could plummet.

With a Spot ETF, you are riding the market daily as you are holding the asset (or a share of it) at its current price.

Now, let's say you believe that in a month, the demand for apples will soar, pushing the price to $2 per apple. You strike a deal with the vendor to buy an apple for $1.50 next month.

Next month the apple’s price hits $2, you were right!

You now have the opportunity to flip that apple you bought at $1.50 for $0.50 profit.

This agreement is similar to a Futures ETF, where you're betting on the future price of assets.

The core of the matter is, Spot ETFs are about the here and now, while Futures ETFs are a gamble on the future. And just like in our apple market, the dynamics of supply, demand, and external factors play crucial roles in determining whether your bet pays off or goes sour.

Final Byte: Wally’s Wisdom

This week has been fantastic so far.

I hope this edition of Chain Reaction helped brighten your Thursday even more!

Be sure to pop into one or both of the live streams I’ll be doing today and tomorrow. The links are posted above in the CryptoLink Connect section in the PulseChain talk.

We appreciate your continuous support. We really couldn’t do this without you guys.

It’s because of the people that read Chain Reaction that I see a vision for us in media and content.

Chain Reaction has now seen 4 different calendar months of web3 packed action.

If you enjoy reading this, please do me a favor and share it with one person. If everyone reading this got one more person to subscribe and they do the same and so on… we could bring so many people into the fold at CryptoLink through this newsletter!

Not only can we inform people about CryptoLink but we can start to work towards having a framework of content and news that is fit to onboard new people into the space.

I love you all!

Have a wonderful weekend.

If you want me to cover something specific or you’d like to write a guest section then reach out to me on X or Discord!

Best,

Wally
Marketing, Branding, Media
CryptoLink.Tech

ZEALY CODE: When will ferret join pug in Thailand? Is BTK going to survive the apocalypse? Is Druuu real? Find out next episode!