StarkNet now open for DApp deployment on Ethereum mainnet

February 23, 2022 Coin Telegraph

StarkNet hopes to inspire creativity among the developer community and lead the layer 2 building boom.

StarkNet, the layer-2 (L2) scaling solution established by Ethereum protocol StarkWare, announced that the first few decentralized apps, or DApps, built on the platform have been deployed since it launched on the Ethereum Mainnet in November.

Now that the StarkWare team has developed all of the infrastructure needed for DApps to deploy, the company shared the nine projects listed by zkRollups, a digital directory for the zero-knowledge ecosystem, in a Twitter thread. The list ranges from decentralized finance (DeFi) to nonfungible tokens (NFTs) and gaming applications.

Here are the latest projects we have listed - all building on StarkNet ✨ from @StarkWareLtd https://t.co/y55wb8p8nb ️

1/
— zkRollups.xyz (@zkRollupsXYZ) February 22, 2022

StarkNet is a permissionless validity rollup, or zero-knowledge Rollup, that uses basic compression technology to boost the production and security benefits of Ethereum layer 1. The company prides itself in its products' ability to provide "rock-bottom" gas fees, transactions costs and "limitless" scaling potential.

Cointelegraph spoke to StarkWare co-founders Uri Kolodny and Eli Ben-Sasson. Ben-Sasson talks about the crucial missing step to taking crypto mainstream:

"If you compare WeChat and WhatsApp and Facebook, they're used by hundreds of millions of billions of people. There is nothing in crypto today that serves billions of people. And part of the reason is the limited scale."

Kolodny then drew a comparison between the skyscrapers in Manhattan that allowed for greater population growth to StarkNet's potential to do the same for Ethereum's user base. He added that L2 technologies, like StarkNet, will be "crucial" in serving a "massive anticipated rise" in blockchain use.

Ben-Sasson added that the StarkNet platform is like "the missing link in tech evolution which makes blockchain usable for everything" and will ultimately "propel us to a Web3 reality."

The founders noted that they expect StarkNet to be fully decentralized within the next year. Recently, StarkWare raised $50 million in a Series C funding round that brought the firm’s valuation to $2 billion.

On Wednesday, Opera web browser announced its integration with Ethereum L exchange DeversiFi, which is powered by Starkware and aims to provide cost and time-efficient transactions within the mobile browser wallet.

2 key Bitcoin price metrics suggest BTC is primed to reclaim $40,000

January 31, 2022 Coin Telegraph

2 key Bitcoin price metrics suggest BTC is primed to reclaim ,000

Apple

Data suggests $34,000 was the bottom and BTC’s recent performance could be a sign that traders are beginning to open fresh longs.

Cryptocurrencies had a volatile week after Bitcoin's (BTC) sudden crash to $33,000 on Jan. 24. However, the sharp 9% drop fully recovered within 8 hours after BTC price regained the $36,000 support.

On Jan. 26, Bitcoin rallied to $38,960 but it could not sustain the level and corrected by 8.8% in the following 8 hours. When factoring in the recent ups and downs, Bitcoin managed to only gain a meager 1.6% over the past seven days.

Even with the considerable price swings, the aggregate futures contracts liquidations were relatively low. Longs (buyers) had $570 million futures terminated, while shorts (sellers) faced $690 million. Data shows that Bitcoin futures represented 41% of the total $1.25 billion liquidations.

Regulatory winds could be limiting BTC’s price recovery

The total crypto market capitalization presented a modest 1.6% weekly increase, in line with Bitcoin's performance.

*Total crypto market capitalization, USD billion. Source: TradingView*

Notice how the Jan. 24 price is forming higher lows and currently shows support at $1.75 trillion. Even with the price being 22% down in 2022, the total crypto market capitalization showed a healthy 12.5% bounce since the Jan. 24 low.

Investors seem to be digesting this week's regulatory news where United States Congressman Ted Budd submitted an amendment to scrub a bill provision allowing the U.S. Treasury to unilaterally prohibit certain financial transactions without public input.

If passed in its current form, the America COMPETES Act of 2022 would result in a significant blow to the cryptocurrency industry, as Coin Center's executive director Jerry Brito stated.

Investors were negatively impacted by news that the U.S. White House is reportedly preparing an executive order on crypto to make government agencies conduct risk analysis on cryptocurrency as a national security threat.

Metaverse tokens decoupled after last week’s Apple news

Steady bearish newsflow might have been the cause for cryptocurrencies’ recent price action but there were some stellar performances from Metaverse tokens.

*Top weekly winners and losers on Jan. 31. Source: Nomics*

Apple (AAPL) CEO, Tim Cook, said in an investors' call on Jan. 27 that metaverse applications have a lot of potential and that his company is investing in augmented reality developments on its devices.

The news was enough to catapult metaverse-related tokens by up to 36%, including Flow, The Sandbox (SAND), Decentraland (MANA), Enjin Coin (ENJ), and Arweare (AR).

On the other hand, Terra (LUNA) was impacted after the Avalanche-based reserve currency Wonderland Money (TIME) announced that a pending proposal would determine whether the project closes up shop or not. As a result, the MIM stablecoin dipped below 1.00 and some speculate that this may have had a knock-on effect on Terra's LUNA and UST token.

Scalability and interoperability blockchain solutions Cosmos (ATOM), Fantom (FTM), and Harmony (ONE) presented negative performances after the Ethereum hash rate surpassed 1.11 PH/s, its highest level ever registered. A higher hash rate indicates that more miners are joining the network, which helps to cement blockchain security.

Tether premium and CME futures showed improvement

The OKEx Tether (USDT) premium measures the difference between China-based peer-to-peer (P2P) trades and the official U.S. dollar. Figures above 100% indicate excessive demand for cryptocurrency investing. On the other hand, a 5% discount usually indicates heavy selling activity.

*OKEx USDT peer-to-peer premium vs. USD. Source: OKX*

The Tether indicator continued to display strength as it stood above 99% over the past seven days. That is in stark contrast to three weeks ago when panic selling from China-based traders drove the indicator to a 4% discount.

To confirm that the crypto market structure has improved, traders should analyze the CME's Bitcoin futures contracts premium. This metric analyzes the difference between longer-term futures contracts to the current spot price in regular markets.

Whenever this indicator fades or turns negative (backwardation), it suggests that there is bearish sentiment.

*BTC CME 2-month forward contract premium vs. Bitcoin/USD. Source: TradingView*

These fixed-month contracts usually trade at a slight premium, indicating that sellers request more money to withhold settlements for longer. As a result, futures should trade at a 0.5% to 2% premium in healthy markets, a situation known as contango.

Notice how the indicator flirted with the backwardation from Jan. 18 to 24 as Bitcoin dipped below $42,000. However, as BTC showed signals that $33,000 could have been a local bottom, the futures markets recovered a healthy 0.5% premium.

Considering that the aggregate cryptocurrency market capitalization is down 22% in 2022, the market structure looks primed for a recovery.

Barring a significant change in these fundamentals, Bitcoin bulls are probably beginning to feel comfortable adding positions below $40,000.

The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cointelegraph. Every investment and trading move involves risk. You should conduct your own research when making a decision.

Litecoin is finally launching its major Mimblewimble upgrade

January 31, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

Privacy opt-ins are coming to Litecoin even as regulators continue to scrutinize anonymity-boosting protocols.

After two years of development, Litecoin (LTC) has finally launched its highly anticipated Mimblewimble upgrade, opening the door to more privacy-oriented transactions on the network.

Mimblewimble’s integration into Litecoin came by way of the Mimblewimble Extension Block, also known as MWEB, which allows the network’s users to opt-in to confidential transactions. MWEB lead developer David Burkett, who has been sponsored by the Litecoin Foundation, said the upgrade improves Litecoin’s viability as a fungible currency that can be used for everyday transactions, pay employee salaries and even purchase real estate.

Mimblewimble is a privacy-focused decentralized protocol that derives its name from a tongue-tying spell that was first made famous in the Harry Potter book series. The protocol has a confidentiality feature that allows users to conceal transaction information. It also provides a framework for other blockchains to enhance the usability of their cryptocurrency.

"You're a wizard, Harry."

Mimblewimble is not just a tongue-tying spell used in the magical series, but it's also a privacy-oriented decentralized protocol that structures and stores transactions on the blockchain. https://t.co/XCpNlb5AiD
— Cointelegraph (@Cointelegraph) November 22, 2021

Litecoin first embarked on Mimblewimble integration in a pair of Litecoin Improvement Proposals dating back to October 2019. The network launched its first Mimblewimble testnet in October 2020 following initial delays due to low community participation. The testnet was also launched around the time that regulators in Europe — chiefly, Europol — were sounding the alarm over privacy coins.

Privacy coins that promote anonymity and attempt to obfuscate digital ledger transactions have come under scrutiny around the world. As Cointelegraph reported, several exchanges ditched their support of leading privacy coins Monero (XMR), Zcash (ZEC) and Dash (DASH) in early 2021 amid regulatory heat.

In addition to anonymity and private transactions, Mimblewimble’s technology places heavy emphasis on fungibility and scalability — key features that are currently lacking across many blockchains. The Litecoin Foundation believes the Mimblewimble integration will contribute to LTC’s status as “sound money,” which is a broad concept that refers to stable monies that are less susceptible to depreciation and influence from monetary policy.

Despite being one of the earliest cryptocurrencies to hit the market, Litecoin has struggled to stay relevant over the years. LTC is currently ranked 21st in the market cap rankings with a total value of $7.5 billion.

Ethereum failing to target core Web3 issues, says NEAR co-founder

January 27, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

Co-founder of NEAR Protocol, Illia Polosukhin, lays out his vision for Web3 and explains why Ethereum may not play a prominent role in its foundation.

Illia Polosukhin, the co-founder of NEAR protocol, thinks Ethereum development has a focus problem. He says engineers should be fixing crucial issues that will enable Web3 to scale to billions of users.

“We need simplicity of usage. We need easy programmability. We need composability that is natural to the applications. I don't see the current Ethereum evolutions targeting any of those goals,” Polosukhin said in an exclusive interview with Cointelegraph.

Polosukhin envisions a new version of the internet, or Web3, in which the user will retain full ownership of their own data and assets. He believes this new iteration of the internet won’t be based on a single “killer app” but instead a combination of different apps.

“Our goal is that users [are] in control of their data. They're in control of their money and assets. They are able to govern these platforms, which means there is no need to build an everything-fulfilling platform,” he said.

Thus, improving both blockchain technology’s scalability and interoperability is key to building the foundations of Web3. According to Polosukhin, while Ethereum remains the dominant smart-contract platform, it lacks NEAR’s focus on achieving those goals.

Specifically, he thinks Ethereum's reliance on layer 2 solutions or rollups to solve its scalability problem could lead to tradeoffs in terms of composability.

“Rollups naturally will kind of create less compatibility and create more sub-spaces in which things are happening,” he said.

As a layer-1 solution alternative to Ethereum, NEAR aims to solve the scalability issue by leveraging sharding technology, a process that splits the protocol’s infrastructure into several segments, without sacrificing composability.

“By actually scaling up the composable structure, we allow to have a lot more applications running closely with each other with the same financial models,” explains Polosukhin.

A core component of NEAR’s composibility feature is the Rainbow Bridge, a protocol that allows a free transfer of assets from the Ethereum blockchain and vice-versa.

“That allows not just to send tokens around, but it actually allows to read the state of each chain from the other chain so you can actually pass any generic messages between them and execute contracts.” he explained.

NEAR was one of the fastest-growing development communities in 2021. According to Polosukhin, one of the protocol’s main attractivity consists in offering popular and easy-to-use programming languages such as Java and Rust. Another factor was the $800 million fund announced last year for developers to build on the NEAR protocol.

“Buiding development of core components and then other people can build on their own companies and projects have been very powerful”, he said.

Watch the full interview on our YouTube channel and don’t forget to subscribe!

Polygon (MATIC) sees a strong oversold bounce after $250B crypto market rebound

January 26, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Polygon (MATIC) sees a strong oversold bounce after 0B crypto market rebound

Bitcoin

MATIC price secured a near 40% gain as crypto market sentiment improves in the wake of a notable $250 billion relief rally.

Polygon (MATIC) emerged as one of the best performers among high-ranking cryptocurrencies on Jan. 26 as the price rose nearly 17% to reach an intraday high at $1.825.

The gains surfaced amid a synchronous rebound across the crypto market that started on Jan. 24. In detail, investors and traders poured in over $250 billion across digital assets, benefiting Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH) and many others in the process.

*Performance of the top-fifteen cryptocurrencies in the last 15 days. Source: TradingView*

Polygon, a secondary scaling solution for the Ethereum blockchain, also cashed in on the crypto market rebound. The valuation of its native token, MATIC, rose from as low as $9.77 billion on Jan.24 to as high as $13.58 billion two days later.

Meanwhile, its price jumped from $1.312 to $1.825 in the same period — that's nearly a 40% gain in just three days.

Fed meeting and high-profile hiring

The latest bout of buying in the Polygon market appeared ahead of a Federal Reserve announcement about its interest rate increase scheduled to come on the afternoon of Jan. 26.

In detail, cryptocurrencies have also been through several whipsaws in recent months over expectations that the U.S. central bank would embark on a series of interest rate hikes to fight inflation. Similarly, stock markets have suffered because of the prospect of the Fed's shrinking balance sheet and higher rates.

According to Luca Paolini, the chief strategist at Pictet Asset Management, people may have expectations that the recent turmoil in the stock market and a rising rift between Ukraine and Russia that has drawn in NATO allies' focus may have the Fed tone down its rate hike rhetorics.

Waiting for the FED to speak today.
— David Gokhshtein (@davidgokhshtein) January 26, 2022

Nonetheless, Polygon managed to outperform top rivals like Bitcoin and Ethereum in terms of intraday gains, and it appears a high-profile hiring was the core reason behind it.

As Cointelegraph reported on Jan. 25, YouTube's head of gaming, Ryan Watts, left the streaming giant to join Polygon Studios , a gaming and nonfungible token (NFT), backed by the namesake layer-2 protocol's $100 million fund.

The news seemingly boosted investors' appetite for MATIC, prompting it to do better than other large-cap cryptocurrencies.

Huge news for $matic https://t.co/uNFO6MtddN
— Lark Davis (@TheCryptoLark) January 25, 2022

Key support levels held

MATIC's sharp rebound placed the price back above its 200-day exponential moving average (200-day EMA; the blue wave in the chart below), a level significant for its role in limiting the market's downside bias.

*MATIC/USD daily price chart. Source: TradingView*

On Jan. 25, MATIC bulls attempted to reclaim the 200-day EMA as support almost a week after losing it. The drop-and-bounce around the blue wave looked very similar to the price action in the July–August period last year, wherein closing above it had led to a 200%-plus price rally.

The fractal shows strong buying sentiment among MATIC traders near the 200-day EMA.

Therefore, should the price stay above the support, its likelihood of continuing its uptrend appears higher. Nonetheless, the bullish momentum risks exhaustion near MATIC's descending trendline resistance, as shown in the chart above.

The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cointelegraph.com. Every investment and trading move involves risk, you should conduct your own research when making a decision.

Ascending channel pattern sets Polygon (MATIC) up for a potential 30% rally

January 13, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Altcoin

A bullish technical analysis pattern and the potential approval of the EIP-1559 proposal could back MATIC’s attempt to rally to a new all-time high.

Polygon prices look poised to rise by at least 30% in the wake of a key Jan. 18 upgrade that would push a considerable portion of its native MATIC token out of circulation.

Dubbed EIP-1559, the improvement proposal originally came to light as part of Ethereum's so-called London Hard Fork upgrade on Aug. 5. The proposal effectively started destroying, or "burning," a part of the fees paid to miners via Ether (ETH).

Traders and investors raised their bids for Ether before and after the EIP-1559 upgrade, noting that it made Ether a deflationary asset for the first time in history. For example, a model created by Ethereum co-founder Justin Drake claimed that EIP-1559 would reduce Ether's annual supply by 1.6 million ETH.

MATIC looks for new record highs

Polygon, which acts as a layer-2 protocol built to scale Ethereum's prevailing scalability issues, rolled out a testing implementation of EIP-1559 on Dec. 14, 2021. After the test net launch, MATIC price rallied by almost 30% to $2.35, which includes a brief run-up to its record high near $3.

In theory, a lower supply against a rising demand would make the asset more valuable in the eyes of its bidder.

This classic economic reference has assisted in boosting demand for cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC) before. Issuance would be halved every four years against a limited supply cap of 21 million units. This begs the question, could the MATIC price rally in the same way? Mineplex co-founder Alexander Mamasidikov thinks yes.

Mamasidikov told Cointelegraph that EIP-1559 would impact MATIC price positively, adding that it could easily rally toward its current record high following the technical upgrade.

"In periods of price recovery, investors are often on the lookout for both technical and fundamental features to hang onto in order to back a coin, and Polygon brandishes both," he said, adding:

"While Polygon remains a better version of Ethereum in terms of lower transaction costs, it is also the delight of retail investors with respect to its low price at this time when compared with Ethereum or other smart contract networks."

What do Polygon's technicals say?

MATIC has been trending higher inside an ascending channel pattern since July 2021, confirmed by at least two reactive highs and two reactive lows.

The token recently retested the channel's lower trendline around $1.89 as support, a move that was followed up with a bullish retracement toward $2.50. It now acting as resistance and the $2.50 level also turned out to be near the 1.00 Fib line near $2.44.

*MATIC/USD daily price chart featuring ascending channel pattern. Source: TradingView*

That being said, MATIC may attempt a break above the $2.44-resistance around the EIP-1559 upgrade on Jan. 18. The move would set itself on a course to test its interim upside target near $3, which is approximately a 30% jump.

Meanwhile, if the EIP-1559 factor plays out any longer than anticipated, MATIC price may even attempt an extended run-up toward the 1.618 Fib line around $3.52. Conversely, a rejection at $2.44 could have Polygon retest the ascending channel support for a negative breakout.

Such a move would risk invalidating the bullish setup, as discussed above. All of this is in conjunction with exposing MATIC to a correction toward $1.77 or lower.

StarkWare Says It Will Launch Layer 3 on Ethereum

December 21, 2021 The Crypto Briefing

ZK-rollups step into the limelight after the quest to scale Ethereum evolves

December 12, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

ZK-rollups become the latest trending solution for scalability on the Ethereum network as developers strive to increase throughput capabilities while decreases transaction costs.

Scalability on the Ethereum (ETH) network has been a point of contention within the cryptocurrency ecosystem for years, primarily due to high fees and network congestion during periods of peak demand.

The latest solution to emerge as the final fix to Ethereum’s scalability woes are Zero-knowledge rollups (ZK rollups), a form of scaling that runs computations off-chain and submits them on-chain via a validity proof.

Zk rollup season
— cryptowarlord.eth ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) (@CryptoWarlordd) December 7, 2021

Earlier in the year, protocols that opted to use optimistic rollups such as Optimism and Arbitrum dominated the headlines and were touted as the best solution to scaling on Ethereum, but aside from Arbitrum, the hype for those protocols has quieted down and traders have pointed out that even optimistic rollups have higher than desirable fees when the network is under peak demand.

Early successes in 2021

At the same time that optimistic rollup solutions were in the spotlight, protocols that adopted the ZK rollups model quietly demonstrated their capabilities.

dYdX, a decentralized perpetual and futures exchange, was one of the earliest adopters of ZK-rollup technology through its partnership with StarkWare, whose StarkNet network is a permissionless decentralized ZK-Rollup.

To date, the platform has seen a decent amount of success and at times managed to process a higher 24-hour trading volume than Coinbase.

Loopring (LRC) is another protocol that has utilized ZK-rollups to decrease transaction costs and speed up its throughput capabilities, which has helped drive the price of LRC to a new all-time high of $3.83 in early November.

*LRC/USDT 1-day chart. Source: TradingView*

ZK-rollups could be the next "rotation" for traders

Following last week's sharp market-wide sell-off, ZK-rollups have reemerged as a buzzword in crypto sector.

Polygon, a layer-two platform for the Ethereum network, made headlines with the announced acquisition of Mir, a project developing two subcategories of zero-knowledge proofs known as PLONK and Halo.

The 250 million MATIC token investment by Polygon, which already offers some of the lowest fees of any protocol on the Ethereum network, was done in an effort “to explore and encourage all meaningful scaling approaches and technologies at this stage,” according to Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal.

Another much-anticipated protocol that has been gaining traction recently is zkSync, a scaling solution created by Matter Labs that secured $50 million in a Series B round led by Andreessen Horowitz in early November.

*zkSync total deposits vs. total unique users*

According to Digital Delphi, the two main projects that are live on zkSync is ZigZag, a decentralized exchange, and a funding platform called Gitcoin.

Analysts at Delphi Digital said,

“According to L2 fees, token swaps through ZigZag on zkSync have the lowest fees.”

Terra becomes top-10 crypto: Classic ‘bull pennant’ setup paint $100 LUNA price target

December 9, 2021 Coin Telegraph

<div>Terra becomes top-10 crypto: Classic 'bull pennant' setup paint 0 LUNA price target</div>

Bitcoin

Chiron's $50-million fundraiser to back Terra-backed projects has boosted traders' appetite for LUNA.

Terra (LUNA) faces the prospects of hitting $100 in the coming weeks as it paints a classic bull pennant structure.

In detail, bull pennants appear as the price trends inside a triangle pattern after a strong move upside. Many analysts see it as a sign of bullish continuation, i.e., they think the instrument would eventually break above the triangle's upper trendline to resume its price rally higher.

Additionally, the profit target of a bull pennant structure typically comes to be the length equal to the size of the previous price rally, called flagpole, when measured from the breakout point. As it appears, LUNA has been forming a similar pattern on its lower-timeframe chart.

*LUNA/USDT four-hour chart featuring Bull Pennant setup. Source: TradingView*

Considering the breakout happens at the point where the bull pennant trendlines converge — the apex — the ideal profit target comes out to be over $22, the flagpole height. That puts LUNA on the road to almost $100.

Supportive bullish catalysts

The bullish technical setup in the Terra market appeared as LUNA rallied nearly 65% in less than three weeks to become the tenth-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization.

The digital asset jumped past Dogecoin (DOGE) and Avalanche (AVAX) to value over $28.60 billion, almost 1.18% of the current total cryptocurrency market valuation of $2.30 trillion. Meanwhile, LUNA's token price climbed from $43.50 to over $77 on Dec. 5, a new all-time high.

*LUNA circulating market capitalization. Source: Messari*

Traders took cues from Chiron Partners, a Hong Kong-based venture capitalist firm, that announced Dec. 8 that it had raised $50 million for a dedicated fund, dubbed Chiron Terra Fund I, to build decentralized finance (DeFi) and metaverse-linked nonfungible token (NFT) projects atop the Terra blockchain.

Jake Cormack, chief operating officer at Chiron Partners, credited Terra's growth potential behind their decision to choose them as their official public ledger, particularly after the blockchain's recent Columbus-5 upgrade , which promises to enable higher scalability and greater cross-chain interoperability.

Deflation FOMO

In detail, the Terra ecosystem consists of a family of stablecoins pegged to a growing list of fiat currencies and a mining token, LUNA. LUNA serves as a governance token, volatility absorption tool, and rewards catcher through "seigniorage" and transaction volumes.

The volatility absorption feature, in particular, proves to be the most bullish case for LUNA. Notably, the Terra ecosystem maintains its stablecoins fiat-peg by burning LUNA tokens. In other words, if the price of Terra's native stablecoin TerraUSD (UST) goes above $1, the protocol burns LUNA to mint more UST, thus bringing its value back to $1.

Conversely, if the UST value goes below $1, the protocol swaps the stablecoin for LUNA to prop up its prices. With the Columbus-5 upgrade and Chiron's $50-million fund promising to bring more projects to the Terra ecosystem, anticipations of more deflationary pressure on LUNA have been rising.

$LUNA price hit a new high shortly after Terra’s Columbus-5 upgrade increased deflationary pressure on the token and integrated Terra with the Cosmos $ATOM ecosystem. https://t.co/vYimuTqo5r pic.twitter.com/59xJdZ2FiB
— Cointelegraph Markets (@CointelegraphMT) October 6, 2021

As Cointelegraph reported, UST stablecoin adoption is growing with its net supply hitting a new record high of $8.221 billion on Dec. 8. On the other hand, according to TerraAnalytics, the Terra protocol has burned more than 104 million LUNA tokens ever since the Columbus-5 upgrade went live at the end of September.

Talis's $2.3M NFT marketplace

Bullish cues for LUNA before the Chiron announcement also came in the form of Talis. The startup raised $2.3 million in funding led by ParaFi Capital and Arrington Capital to build an NFT marketplace on the Terra blockchain.

*LUNA/USDT versus BTC/USD daily price chart. Source: TradingView*

Two days after the announcement, LUNA rose nearly 13% to reach its new all-time high despite a major correction in Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), and most other cryptocurrencies.

Polygon’s expanding ecosystem backs MATIC’s rise toward a new all-time high

December 1, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Altcoin Watch

Strong fundamentals and the steady growth of the Polygon network are just a few of the factors behind MATIC’s recent rally above $2.00.

Layer-two (L2) solutions for the Ethereum network have become a popular topic of discussion and speculation on their associated tokens backed the massive rally seen in many of the protocols this year. The parabolic growth of the decentralized finance (DeFi) and nonfungible token (NFT) sectors also led to a surge in the cost of carrying out simple transfers and this prompted developers and investors to migrate to L2-supportive platforms.

One L2 solution that saw its token price rise to new highs earlier in the year and now looks poised to make another breakout higher is Polygon (MATIC), a proof-of-stake blockchain protocol that aggregates scalable solutions on Ethereum to support a multi-chain ecosystem.

Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView shows that MATIC hit a low at $1.01 on Sept. 21, and over the past few months, the price has been in a steady uptrend, bringing the altcoin above the $2 mark on Dec. 1.

*MATIC/USDT 1-day chart. Source: TradingView*

Polygon's ecosystem is expanding and proof of this can be seen in the increase in protocol launches, cross-chain migrations, the launch of a Polygon-focused exchange-traded product (ETP) and a steady uptick in user activity.

Ecosystem expansion

One of the biggest drivers of MATIC price and on-chain activity has been the addition of new protocols to the Polygon network throproject launches and cross-chain migrations.

Most recently, IDEX decentralized exchange announced that it would launching v3 of its exchange on the Polygon network, making it the first hybrid liquidity DEX on Polygon.

Tomorrow. Approximately 12 PM PST.

IDEX v3, the first Hybrid Liquidity DEX will be launching on @0xPolygon.

✅ Combined AMM + Order Book Liquidity
✅ Trading Rewards + Liquidity Mining
✅ No failed transactions
✅ Real limit & stop-loss orders
✅ Cheap transaction fees pic.twitter.com/1nmOEzEGLW
— IDEX (@idexio) November 30, 2021

The Polygon network has seen project launches from NFT projects like the OpenBiSea NFT marketplace and gaming/DeFi platforms like Rainmaker Games, Harvest Finance and Jarvis Network.

Currently, the Uniswap community is in the process of voting on whether to add Polygon support for Uniswap v3 and after a majority yes Phase 1 vote on Nov. 25, the process has shifted into Phase 2.

Rising institutional support

Another reason for the bullish price action for Polygon has been increased interest from institutional investors. Several exchange-traded products (ETPs) for Polygon have been listed in recent months, including the Osprey Polygon Trust in September and the 21Shares Polygon ETP in November.

Polygon is also included on the list of assets being explored by the Grayscale Investments as a potential Trust candidate.

The network has also benefited from a $20 million investment fund launched by Wintermute, a digital asset market maker focused on helping to bootstrap the development of decentralized applications on Polygon.

Currently, the Polygon network is receiving increased attention as it prepares to host a ZK Summit on Dec. 9 where developers will discuss the “current state and future of zk-STARKs and applications of zero-knowledge proofs.”

Increase in active users and wallets

A third reason for the bullish price action seen in MATIC has been the steady increase of users on the network as evidenced by the increase in wallet addresses holding a balance.

*Polygon addresses with a balance vs. MATIC price. Source: Intotheblock*

As shown in the graph above, the number of Polygon wallets holding a balance has steadily increased throughout 2021 and is currently at an all-time high of 282,760.

Evidence of the increased activity can also be found in the data for total revenue generated from fees on the network, which has been steadily increasing over the second half of 2021.

*Polygon price vs. total revenue. Source: Token Terminal*

As new protocols continue to list on the Polygon network, these stats are likely to rise if new users continue to use the platform to escape the high fees seen on the Ethereum network.

VORTECS™ data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro began to detect a bullish outlook for MATIC on Oct. 15, prior to the recent price rise.

The VORTECS™ Score, exclusive to Cointelegraph, is an algorithmic comparison of historical and current market conditions derived from a combination of data points including market sentiment, trading volume, recent price movements and Twitter activity.

*VORTECS™ Score (green) vs. MATIC price. Source:* *Cointelegraph Markets Pro*

As seen in the chart above, the VORTECS™ Score for MATIC spiked into the green zone on Oct. 15 and reached a high of 94 around 48 hours before the price began to increase by 57% over the next six weeks.

Scalability

Regulatory winds could be limiting BTC’s price recovery

Metaverse tokens decoupled after last week’s Apple news

Tether premium and CME futures showed improvement

Fed meeting and high-profile hiring

Key support levels held

MATIC looks for new record highs

What do Polygon's technicals say?

Early successes in 2021

ZK-rollups could be the next "rotation" for traders

Supportive bullish catalysts

Deflation FOMO

Talis's $2.3M NFT marketplace

Ecosystem expansion

Rising institutional support

Increase in active users and wallets

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