FTX Debtors’ List of Assets Omits Mention of Large Stash of NFTs and ENS Names Owned by Alameda

January 20, 2023 Bitcoin.com

SuperRare cuts 30% of staff as growth slows during crypto winter

January 7, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Despite only being a week into the new year, SuperRare adds to a number of firms announcing staff cuts such as Huobi and Genesis.

Non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace SuperRare has announced a 30% staff-member cut as CEO John Crain explained that the firm mistakenly over-hired during the last bull market.

In a Jan. 7 tweet, Crain shared a screenshot of his message to SuperRare’s Slack channel announcing the 30% cut, stating that he had “some tough news to share.”

“Startups are a balancing act of managing rapid growth while doing everything possible to conserve limited resources. During the recent bull run, we grew in tandem with the market” he noted, adding that:

“In recent months it’s become clear that this aggressive growth was unsustainable: we over-hired, and I take full ownership of this mistake.”

I have some tough news to share: pic.twitter.com/iLDKqgyhQa
— SuperRare John (@SuperRareJohn) January 6, 2023

Crain didn’t outline specifically what sort of redundancy packages the terminated employees will receive, but noted that the firm will “do everything we can to help them transition to new opportunities and support them in future endeavours.”

SuperRare is one of the biggest names in the space, but notably sees significantly less trading volume than competing NFT marketplaces such as OpenSea and Magic Eden.

According to data from DappRadar, SuperRare oversaw $663,000 worth of trading volume over the past 30 days, compared to OpenSea’s 30-day trading volume of $307 million and Magic Eden’s $80.1 million.

This is due in part to SuperRare’s model which is more focused on art, the artist community and single-edition NFT artworks as opposed to the computer-generated avatar model bearing thousands of tokens in a single collection, which is popular on OpenSea and Magic Eden.

Moving forward, Crain outlined that despite a slowing of growth during the crypto bear market, SuperRare is still focused on pushing on with its initial vision of opening up greater access and exposure to digital artists.

“We are facing headwinds, yes — but there remains an incredible uncaptured opportunity as we continue building something totally new: a global digital art renaissance that is transparent, fair and that anyone can access from anywhere in the world,” he concluded.

The hefty staff cut from SuperRare adds to a wave of blockchain and crypto firms that have shed staff during crypto winter, with Cointelegraph reporting on at least six companies doing so since early December 2022 alone.

In terms of the most recent companies to decrease head counts, it was reported on Jan. 5 that crypto lender Genesis laid off 30% of its staff, while the reportedly troubled crypto exchange Huobi also announced a 20% cut on Jan. 6.

A report from The Wall Street Journal this week also indicated that U.S. bank Silvergate cut 40% of its staff as a result of an $8.1 billion bank run that was triggered in response to the FTX collapse in November.

Russian Social Media Giant Vkontakte Launches NFT Service

December 15, 2022 Bitcoin.com

Apple to allow third-party app stores in windfall for NFTs and crypto

December 14, 2022 Coin Telegraph

App Store

In a win for crypto app developers, incoming EU laws will force Apple to permit alternative app stores and apps without the need to go through its App Store.

Tech giant Apple is gearing up to permit third-party app stores on its devices to comply with new anti-monopolistic requirements from the European Union (EU), which could be seen as a huge win for crypto and NFT app developers, at least in Europe.

Under the new rules, European customers would be able to download alternative app marketplaces outside of Apple’s proprietary App Store, thus allowing them to download apps that skirt Apple’s 30% commissions and app restrictions according to a Dec. 13 Bloomberg report citing those familiar with the matter.

Currently, Apple has stringent rules for NFT apps that practically force users to go through in-app purchases subject to Apple’s 30% commission, while apps are not permitted to support cryptocurrency payments.

Apple’s enforcement of its rule led to a block of Coinbase’s self-custody wallet app update on Dec. 1 as Apple wanted to “collect 30% of the gas fee” through in-app purchases, something that is “clearly not possible” according to Coinbase.

It then claimed Apple wanted the wallet to disable NFT transactions if they couldn’t be done through its in-app purchase system.

Alex Salnikov, co-founder of NFT marketplace Rarible tweeted on Dec. 13 in response to the news that a “crypto app store” could be built and would be a “great candidate” for a venture capital-backed startup.

Apple’s move to open its ecosystem is in response to the EU’s Digital Markets Act aiming to regulate so-called “gatekeepers” and ensure platforms behave fairly with part of the measures allowing “third parties to inter-operate with the gatekeeper’s own services.”

It will be applicable starting May 2023 with businesses needing to fully comply by 2024.

Apple hasn’t decided if it will comply with a part of the Act allowing developers to install alternative payment systems within apps that don’t involve Apple. if it does comply, it could open up payment systems that allow cryptocurrencies.

Under consideration by the tech giant is mandating security requirements for software outside of its store, such as verification from Apple, in a bid to protect users against unsafe apps.

The changes to Apple’s closed ecosystem would apply only within the EU, other regions would need to pass similar laws such as the proposed Open App Markets Act in the United States Congress from Senators Marsha Blackburn and Richard Blumenthal.

The World’s Largest NFT Marketplace Opensea Adds BNB Blockchain Support

November 29, 2022 Bitcoin.com

Nifty News: NFT marketplace says no to opt-in royalties, Visa jumps on World Cup NFTs and more

November 2, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

A new NFT marketplace is giving a hard pass to optional royalties, bucking the trend, and NFTs are getting a new home on Ripple’s XRPL.

NFT marketplace says no to optional royalties

While nonfungible token (NFT) marketplaces such as Ethereum (ETH)-based X2Y2, LooksRare, and Solana (SOL)-based Magic Eden have made the switch over to “optional” creator royalties, a newly launched marketplace is taking a hard stand against it.

Find Satoshi Lab, the company behind the popular move-to-earn app StepN has launched its new NFT marketplace named MOOAR on Nov. 1, notably featuring “no optional royalties.”

Instead, its NFT royalty policy will be set to a default of 2% but allows creators to set royalties between 0.5% to 10%. There is no option for 0% royalties, nor can it be set by the user.

“With the raging debate going on surrounding the paying of royalties, we are aware that many users have been vocal in opposing the enforcement of such royalties,” said the MOOAR team in a Medium post.

“Fully empathizing with the sentiment, we strongly believe this ‘cancel culture’ has forced marketplaces into a corner to the point that prominent marketplaces have adopted optional royalties,” it added.

Launch Day! Get #MOOAR!

Find Satoshi Lab (@FSLWeb3), the company behind STEPN, is thrilled to announce the launch of MOOAR NFT marketplace & launchpad.

This milestone is one of many on our roadmap to become a one-stop platform for the Web3 Community. ⬇ [1/10] pic.twitter.com/IfSSo2RWaS
— MOOAR | Season #1 (@mooarofficial) November 1, 2022

On Aug. 27, Ethereum-based NFT marketplace X2Y2 announced it would be introducing an option that allows buyers to set the royalty fee when buying an NFT.

With the new update, buyers on the platform will be given the liberty of setting the amount of royalties they want to contribute to an NFT project. This means that some creators may not receive royalties when their artworks are sold.

The controversial move was followed by the Solana-based NFT marketplace Magic Eden on Oct. 15, which announced it would also be moving to an optional royalty model after “difficult reflection and discussion with many creators.”

Less than two weeks later on Oct. 27, NFT marketplace LooksRare became the latest to succumb to pressure from buyers, announcing it was doing away with enforcing creator royalties, allowing buyers to choose to pay royalties on an opt-in basis.

Visa gets in on World Cup NFT action

Credit card giant Visa has become the latest major company set to cash in on FIFA World Cup-related nonfungible tokens (NFTs) — unveiling a charity auction for five NFTs ahead of the upcoming tournament in Qatar.

The auction is in partnership with crypto exchange Crypto.com, with all auction proceeds going to Street Child United, a charitable organization promoting the rights of impoverished children.

Each NFT features digital art inspired by icon goals from five famed soccer players including Jared Borgetti, Tim Cahill, Carli Lloyd, Michael Owen, and Maxi Rodriguez, and is part of the “Visa Masters of Movement.”

*NFT titled "Jared Borgetti 2002 FIFA World Cup Korea Japan™"*

The credit card company has been a long supporter of NFTs and its ability to provide a “promising medium for fan engagement.”

In a report released on Aug. 23, 2021, Visa said that “NFTs appeal to collectors, fans, teams, leagues, and talent.”

In particular, NFTs can become primary sources of fan engagement, customer relationship management, and newer revenue streams, it said.

Visa’s announcement also comes on the same day that Crypto.com announced it will now be able to self-issue its own Crypto.com Visa card in Singapore, after becoming a Visa Associate Program Member in the city-state.

The Crypto.com Visa card will allow the exchange’s users in Singapore to use it for everyday purchases and earn rewards in CRO coins.

Visa is the Official Payment Technology Partner of FIFA. Other notable sponsors include Crypto.com which became an official sponsor in March, and blockchain network Algorand, which inked a partnership in May as FIFA’s official blockchain platform.

Ripple's new stomping ground for NFTs

As of Oct. 31, Ripple’s XRPL blockchain has officially become a new home for NFTs.

RippleX developers have been working on the project since the XLS-20 proposal was filed on May 25, 2021, which proposed the goal to bring NFTs to the XRP Ledger.

At the time, the team described the proposal as one that would introduce extensions to the XRP Ledger that would support a “native non-fungible token type, along with operations to enumerate, purchase, sell and hold such tokens.”

Ripple CTO David Schwartz told his 395,600 Twitter followers on Oct. 31 that the XLS-20 standard has now been enabled on the XRP Ledger Mainnet after a vote approved the roll-out of the technology.

Schwartz noted that “this presents a key milestone for developers and creators to tokenize any asset and build innovative Web3 projects with utility.”

Thanks to the collective effort of the #XRPL community and @RippleXDev engineers, XLS-20 is now enabled on the XRP Ledger Mainnet and a few NFTs have already been minted. (1/4)
— David "JoelKatz" Schwartz (@JoelKatz) October 31, 2022

In an accompanying Nov. 1 blog post, Schwartz said the benefits of launching NFTs on the XRP Ledger include much lower costs for minting, trading and otherwise transferring NFTs compared to “leading layer-1 blockchain solutions.”

He also said their “no-smart contracts” approach will make NFTs on the XRPL less vulnerable to hacks, while NFTs will include “automatic royalties” which essentially allow creators to be given a share of revenue whenever an NFT is bought or sold.

Scammers impersonate indie game, adding NFT twist

The indie developer behind farming sim game Coral Island has taken to Twitter to warn its followers of a scammer impersonating them on the internet and purporting to be involved in “GameFi” and NFTs.

The developer Stairway Games pointed to the doppelganger account on Twitter on Oct. 31, clarifying that Coral Island “is not an NFT game” and the page has no affiliation with Coral Island.

The fake Coral Island Twitter page in question describes itself as “Re-imagined farm sim game goes GameFi. Enter the farmverse!” and links to a similar Instagram page, as well as a fully-decked-out website using assets, lifted directly from the developers.

The website includes sections such as “Roadmap” and “Tokenomics,” with claims that it would launch staking, airdrops, character NFTs, and a “token earning system” in the future.

Hey folks, this is not us. @coralislandgame is the only Coral Island game twitter page. We are not an NFT game and the page below has no affiliation to Coral Island. Thank you! pic.twitter.com/Aei1650McT
— Stairway Games (@stairwaygames) October 31, 2022

Coral Island is a farming simulator game currently in early access, it’s said to be a mix of “Harvest Moon, Story of Seasons, Stardew Valley and a tiny bit of Animal Crossing,” according to one user review on gaming platform Steam.

More Nifty News

The nonfungible token (NFT) marketplace for American video game retailer GameStop has officially gone live on Ethereum layer-2 blockchain ImmutableX, all part of the latest Web3 push from the gaming retailer.

There’s been pushback from Silicon Valley CEOs about the current iterations of the Metaverse. Microsoft gaming chief Phil Spencer called it a “poorly built video game,” while Snap CEO Evan Spiegel hinted that the current iterations of the concept are very basic, and he won’t feel like spending time inside it after a long day of work.

Gamestop NFT Marketplace Is Now Live on Immutable X, Market Features Web3 Games

November 1, 2022 Bitcoin.com

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Nifty News: GameStop NFT market goes live, Hong Kong’s NFT concept and more

November 1, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Adoption

The latest Web3 offering from GameStop sees the official launch of its NFT market, and the Hong Kong government is testing a proof-of-concept NFT at a convention.

The nonfungible token (NFT) marketplace for American video game retailer GameStop has officially gone live on Ethereum (ETH) layer 2 blockchain ImmutableX, all part of the latest Web3 push from the gaming retailer.

The pair first partnered in February to build the marketplace offering a $100 million grant for NFT content creators and tech developers before a public beta of the NFT marketplace debuted in July.

With the Oct. 31 announcement of the full launch, GameStop’s market will allow for popular Web3 games on ImmutableX such as the role-playing game Illuvium and Gods Unchained to be accessed by users.

Gamestop has worked to launch a series of Web3-powered products over the past year with a beta self-custody crypto wallet released in May that integrates with its NFT marketplace.

In March the retailer also launched its first beta NFT marketplace on Loopring, an Ethereum-based layer-2 protocol.

Most recently in September, GameStop announced a partnership with FTX US aimed at bringing more customers to crypto and working together on e-commerce and online marketing initiatives.

Hong Kong’s proof of concept NFTs

The Hong Kong government on Oct. 31 released a policy statement that set out its stance on virtual assets and detailed its related pilot projects, one of which involved NFTs.

Its NFT-based project is a proof of concept to promote the usage of NFTs with the government Financial Services and the Treasury Bureau (FSTB) and foreign investment department InvestHK issuing NFTs at their flagship Hong Kong Fintech Week event.

The NFT serves as proof of attendance for the conference-goers with the statement saying it's a “digital badge and memento using blockchain technology in celebration of their participation”.

The NFT can also be used to create an Augmented Reality (AR) avatar “to experience the Metaverse” while at the event and holders will receive a discount on tickets for the event in 2023.

Although it's not mentioned what blockchain the NFTs are minted on they can be stored in a crypto wallet, or for those who are without a wallet, can be stored as what the statement calls an “NFT-to-be” with a user storing it on an email address until they create a digital wallet.

Hong Kong Fintech Week kicked off on Oct. 31 and sees speakers from a range of Web3 firms including Yat Siu, co-founder of Animoca Brands, Sam Bankman-Fried, co-founder of FTX, and Sebastien Borget, co-founder of The Sandbox metaverse and others.

Art Gobblers makes over $20M hours after launch

NFT project “Art Gobblers” created by Justin Roiland, the co-creator of the popular animated show Rick and Morty, has seen nearly $20.5 million in ETH volumes just seven hours after launch.

The project is a collaboration between Roiland and venture capital firm Paradigm, and describes itself as an “experimental decentralized art factory.”

According to Blur data, the project is seeing strong launch success with 12,906 ETH in volume at the time of writing.

According to a Paradigm overview, the Art Gobblers ecosystem is intended to work by financially incentivizing artists and collectors in a feedback loop for both to contribute to the project, either with better art, or more money.

*A diagram explaining the intention of the Art Gobblers ecosystem. Image:* *Paradigm*

Artists create a drawing using the websites tool which can then be turned into an NFT provided they have enough native tokens called GOO, these NFTs can then be “eaten” by an Art Gobbler which will store the artwork in its “belly gallery” with the NFT artwork associated to that Gobbler on-chain.

The project also enacts other deflationary measures such as restricting the amount of NFTs that can be minted and mechanisms that automatically adjust prices in coordination with an issuance schedule.

The initial mint saw 2,000 “Gobblers” minted with the community expected to spend GOO tokens to mint a further 8,000 over the next 10 years.

Cardano NFTs hit third place for trading volume

Cardano (ADA) NFTs surged in trading volume over the past month placing the blockchain in third place according to an Oct. 27 report by analytics platform DappRadar.

The report said in the last 30 days Cardano’s NFT volume reached $191 million bringing it to the third-largest NFT protocol behind Ethereum and Solana (SOL).

The blockchain’s popular NFT marketplace JPG Store saw a 40% increase in trading volume in the last 30 days also which reached a value of $11.2 million.

DappRadar attributes the surge to the blockchain’s Vasil hard fork upgrade that went live on Sep. 22 which brought with it increased efficiency for its smart contracts allowing decentralized applications to deploy and run at lower costs.

More Nifty News:

American National Basketball League (NBA) athlete Steph Curry filed a trademark application for a so-called “Curryverse” that could see the basketball champion granted exclusive rights for, among other things, “metaversal appearances.”

A Japanese city has adopted a metaverse-based school to try to get students to attend classes with students able to explore a virtual campus and classrooms, although the students must gain permission from their real school principals before attending.

Nifty News: LooksRare the latest NFT market to sack royalties, Twitter’s tweeting tiles and more

October 28, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Blockchain

LooksRare joins the lineup of NFT marketplaces that have abandoned default creator royalties but says its replacement solution is “competitive.”

Nonfungible token (NFT) marketplace LooksRare is the latest in a string of NFT markets to do away with enforcing creator royalties by default, following the likes of Magic Eden and X2Y2.

The platform tweeted on Oct. 27 that it would not be supporting creator royalties by default, instead choosing to share 25% of its protocol fees with NFT creators and collection owners. Buyers can still choose to pay royalties when purchasing an NFT but it will be on an opt-in basis.

Explaining the changes, it said 0.5% of its 2% protocol fee would go to collections, as long as that collection has a receiving address for the funds.

LooksRare said the willingness of buyers to pay royalties has “eroded” as a result of many NFT markets now moving to a zero-royalty model adding that these disadvantage creators by removing a source of passive income

For this reason, it says it wants to create a “competitive solution” through its fee-sharing model with creators.

That’s why we’re choosing to lead the charge in this new landscape, by creating a competitive solution that still benefits creators: diverting protocol fees directly to creators.
— LooksRare (@LooksRare) October 27, 2022

The reaction from the community was mixed, with some praising LooksRare for the revenue sharing model, but well-known Twitter NFT statistician, the aptly named NFTstatistics.eth, said he doesn’t see the benefit.

“The average royalty paid is around 6%” they tweeted, “I wouldn’t say that giving artists 0.5% [...] is a competitive solution that benefits creators.”

“I do get that everyone is trying to survive in this race to the bottom,” he added.

Twitter’s testing token tweeting tiles

Twitter’s development team announced on Oct. 27 that it’s testing “NFT Tweet Tiles” with some links to NFTs showing on the platform with a larger picture along with details of the NFT and the name of its creator.

Now testing: NFT Tweet Tiles

Some links to NFTs on @rarible, @MagicEden, @dapperlabs and @Jumptradenft will now show you a larger picture of the NFT alongside details like the title and creator. One more step in our journey to let developers impact the Tweet experience. pic.twitter.com/AkBisciB1i
— Twitter Dev (@TwitterDev) October 27, 2022

Supported NFT marketplaces, for now, include Rarible, Magic Eden, Dapper Labs and Jump.trade. It comes after the platform rolled out NFT profile pictures in January, but only for its paid subscribers on Apple iOS.

The new feature could be a move to appease its most active users, as leaked internal Twitter documents show it found the topics of interest among English-speaking heavy users of the platform have shifted over the last two years, with one of the highest-growing topics now being cryptocurrencies.

There are also circulating rumors that Twitter is developing a crypto wallet, but so far, the claim hasn’t been backed by evidence nor confirmed by Twitter. Regardless, speculation abounds that it could be in the works with the takeover by crypto-friendly Elon Musk.

EPL lines up $35M NFT deal with Sorare

The top English men’s professional soccer league — the English Premier League (EPL) — is working on signing a nearly $35 million, or 30 million British pounds, NFT deal with Ethereum blockchain-based fantasy soccer game Sorare, according to Sky News.

Sorare is a fantasy soccer league trading card game where players buy, sell and trade NFTs player cards to manage a team. The team can then enter contests and earn in-game points based on the actual on-pitch performances of the corresponding players.

The EPL will hold discussions with its 20 clubs regarding the reported multi-year contract on Oct. 28. The deal will allegedly focus on static images of EPL players assigned to NFTs, which of course, will allow fans to buy, own and likely trade them.

In March, it was reported that the EPL tapped blockchain firm ConsenSys for an NFT deal allegedly valued upward of $300 million. Still, Sky News reports that a slide in NFT prices had ConsenSys renegotiating to lower the price of the agreement, which made Sorare’s offer more attractive to the league.

A separate deal between the EPL and blockchain developer Dapper Labs is reportedly also under discussion.

New NFT market gains on leader OpenSea in 24-hour trading volume

The new NFT marketplace and aggregator Blur hit a record high of 1,610 Ether (ETH), around $2.5 million, in 24-hour trading volume on Oct. 26, according to Dune analytics, placing it only behind the largest marketplace, OpenSea.

It topped its rivals LooksRare and X2Y2 in terms of market share on the day, taking to Twitter to celebrate the milestone.

In the last 24 hours Blur became the #2 NFT marketplace by volume (excluding wash trades)! Blur is also the #1 aggregator.

This is a huge win for the entire Blur community who will eventually be majority owners of Blur. It's only day 7 and we're just getting started! pic.twitter.com/YpvywTdU5H
— Blur (@blur_io) October 26, 2022

The Ethereum-based platform launched a beta version on Oct. 19 with an airdrop of its native token BLUR to anyone who had traded NFTs in the last six months. It says it targets “pro traders” and offers no trading fees and optional royalties.

On the same day, NFT marketplace X2Y2 tweeted that it would like Blur “to stop using our listings on your website” and subsequently blocked Blur from its platform, claiming it violated X2Y2’s terms by using multiple application programming interface (API) keys.

More Nifty News

NFT marketplace myNFT will showcase its first-ever physical NFT vending machine at the NFT.London event slated for Nov. 2–4. It will allow eventgoers to buy an NFT by purchasing a displayed envelope, scanning a code to create a myNFT account and receiving the NFT in their newly created wallet.

Monkey Drainer, the pseudonym of an alleged phishing scammer, has reportedly stolen $1 million worth of ETH so far this week through creating copycat NFT minting websites, and its possible the scams may have stolen over $3.5 million in total so far.

NFT marketplace

NFT marketplace says no to optional royalties

Visa gets in on World Cup NFT action

Ripple's new stomping ground for NFTs

Scammers impersonate indie game, adding NFT twist

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Hong Kong’s proof of concept NFTs

Art Gobblers makes over $20M hours after launch

Cardano NFTs hit third place for trading volume

More Nifty News:

Twitter’s testing token tweeting tiles

EPL lines up $35M NFT deal with Sorare

New NFT market gains on leader OpenSea in 24-hour trading volume

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