Shaking Up The Stablecoin Scene

With the initial phases of the Merge underway, Ethereum ETH/USD has outperformed Bitcoin BTC/USD and the broader markets over the past week.

That includes the S&P 500 and Nasdaq.

Meanwhile, plans for life after proof-of-stake vary wildly for two of the space’s largest miners.

Hive Blockchain is exploring alternative blockchains to continue mining operations while Hut 8 Mining will likely have to change its name after deciding to pivot away from mining altogether.

And finally, capsized lender Voyager Digital will be auctioning off its remaining assets next week as part of its bankruptcy proceedings.

Perhaps they should have taken that “low-ball” bid from FTX?

Having said that…let’s get to it!

1. Shaking up the stablecoin scene

2. Institutional bullishness continues

3. Bernstein’s catalysts for crypto

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1. Shaking up the stablecoin scene

Binance is the issuer of the third largest stablecoin, Binance USD BUSB/USD, at $19 billion.

USDC USDC/USD is the second largest stablecoin at $52 billion.

This week, the former announced it would effectively remove the latter as a tradeable asset on its platform and automatically convert customers’ USDC holdings to its own BUSD on September 29.

Other stablecoins that Binance will be waving off include pax dollar (USDP) and trueUSD (TUSD).

The move will converge the firm’s services offerings around its in-house BUSD which the company expects will enhance liquidity and capital efficiency for its users.

The biggest winner here? Tether—the largest stablecoin at $68 billion—which went unmentioned in Binance’s announcement.

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2. Institutional bullishness continues

A $42.7 billion alternative investment giant just deputized ING’s former head of digital assets to build out and lead its new blockchain-focused fund.

Herve Francois joins Investcorp—after serving as ING’s crypto lead for nearly 8 years—to seek out opportunities throughout the space including DeFi, NFTs, P2E, interoperability, scaling solutions, the metaverse, and the transition to web3.

Meanwhile, a pair of ex-Revolut employees have raised $78 million to take on renewable energy on the blockchain.

Tesseract’s goal is to tokenize Purchase Power Agreements (PPA) used to secure energy at fixed prices into tradeable assets.

The startup raised $30 million traditionally and the rest via a sale of its native token.

I repeat: builders build.

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3. Bernstein’s catalysts for crypto

Wall Street investment firm Bernstein recently listed some potential catalysts for the crypto markets—let’s take quick a look.

Ethereum Merge: Bernstein believes the switch from proof-of-work (PoW) to proof-of-stake (PoS) will be executed successfully

Rollup-driven demand: Rollups—which help increase speed and lower costs for transactions—now make up 15-25% of all transactions on Ethereum

Flippening: Bernstein sees “innovation-crypto” (read: Ethereum) driving the next phase of growth which means ETH overtaking BTC

DeFi Summer 2.0: Layer 2 scalability is making DeFi affordable again

NFTs shift to P2E: Bernstein notes a migration of talent from traditional gaming studios to web3 game development

Value accumulation: Retail investor focus will shift from meme coins and the latest/fastest blockchains to those offering sustainable applications

Fat application thesis: Value in blockchains will accumulate at the application layer as lower costs, enhanced scalability, rollup user growth, and improved token value attract retail interest