Star Project Weekly | The Graph Detonated the Secondary Market; PayPal Participated in Paxos’ $142 Million C Round of Financing (12.14-12.20)
In the week from December 14th to December 20th, the events worthy of attention in the progress of star projects include: the blockchain index protocol The Graph launched the main network, GRT detonated the secondary market; the Polkadot parachain test network Rococo v1 version was released; Compound will release the Compound chain in early 2021 and issue the native token CASH; Marlin Protocol's new token distribution mechanism FlowMint is officially launched.
Star Project Progress
The following are specific project progress and financing events:
Star Project Progress
In the early hours of December 18th, the blockchain data index project The Graph (GRT) officially launched its mainnet. Immediately afterwards, leading exchanges such as Coinbase and Binance announced the launch of their native token GRT. After being launched on the secondary market, GRT has risen sharply for several consecutive days. As of 8:00 on December 21, GRT was quoted at 0.726 USDT, and the highest point was as high as 0.783 USDT, which has risen from its price (0.03 USDT) in the public offering last month More than 20 times.
Polkadot parachain test network Rococo v1 release
The Rococo v1 testnet has been released, allowing community parachains to connect to the relay chain via cumulus. On December 17, the Rococo V1 conference disclosed the relevant arrangements and progress of the parachain. The specific content is summarized as follows:
1. Rococo V1 is expected to support about 10 parachain projects;
2. Each parachain in the test network needs to run at least one validator node and Curator manager node;
3. Parity will act as Rococo's evaluator, and at the same time run some validator nodes to participate in the supervision of parallel chain testing;
4. The test network will not go online to test parallel threads;
5. Participating in the parallel chain test will follow the two principles of first-come-first-served and from simple to complex.
Compound will release the Compound chain in early 2021 and issue the native token CASH
The Compound development team released a new white paper, detailing the new tool Compound Chain (Compound Chain). According to the white paper, this is a distributed ledger capable of transferring value and liquidity between peer-to-peer ledgers, and users can borrow and lend cross-chain assets from different blockchains such as Polkadot and Tezos based on the Compound chain. The Compound chain will issue the native token CASH to pay transaction fees, and COMP will still serve as the governance token. The development team is currently building a testnet implementation with limited functionality, which is expected to be released in early 2021.
Uniswap Announces the Launch of Sybil, a Governance Tool
According to the official blog, Uniswap announced the launch of Sybil, a governance tool for delegate discovery. Sybil maps on-chain addresses to digital identities to maintain a delegated list while avoiding cumbersome user registrations, on-chain transactions, and manual record-keeping procedures. The purpose of Sybil is to provide an easy way for governance token holders to identify representatives of their community and in doing so increase participation in the protocol development process.
DFINITY is about to reach the Mercury stage
At the online summit co-organized by DFINITY, DfinityFUN Chinese community and SNZ on December 17, Dominic Williams, chairman and chief scientist of DFINITY, said that the "Mercury" milestone is about to start, and the final stage will be ushered in in February or March next year. The "Genesis" conference officially completed decentralization. Dominic also said that DFINITY will bring great opportunities for decentralized applications. Future developers only need to write abstract logic into network space and use DFINITY’s revolutionary new capabilities to build without relying on traditional IT technology stacks. Run a hyperscale Internet service.
Marlin Protocol's new token distribution mechanism FlowMint officially launched
On December 15th, FlowMint, the new token distribution mechanism of Layer 0 expansion project Marlin Protocol, was officially launched. In the next 24 months, 20% of the genesis supply of Marlin token MPOND will be distributed to different blockchain communities through FlowMint. Users can participate in the Marlin network through ATOM, DOT, IRIS, MATIC, NEAR, BNB and other tokens to obtain Marlin tokens.
Plasm official: Plasm will reach ETH2.0 on Polkadot
Plasm officially stated that if everyone defines ETH2.0 as "ETH1.0 + fragmentation (+Rollups)", then Plasm will achieve ETH2.0 on Polkadot. ZK Rollups and Optimistic Rollups solve the "data availability" problem of Layer2. Plasm officially stated that once Polkadot is connected to the parachain, it will have a sharding architecture, which will make Polkadot scalable.
DeFi Insurance Project Cover Protocol Launches Governance Portal
The DeFi insurance project Cover Protocol (COVER) announced the launch of a governance portal, where users can govern by proposing improvement proposals (CIP) and performing Gauge voting.
Specifically, community members can create topics on the Cover Protocol forum to propose proposals, discuss and vote on them before uploading to Snapshot, and then the proposal creators can contact team members to add them to snapshot.page as core proposals, Or when community members hold more than 10 COVER tokens, they can add them by themselves.
BarnBridge will launch BarnBridge DAO in Q1 of 2021
BarnBridge, a cross-platform hierarchical derivatives protocol, officially announced that it will launch BarnBridge DAO in the first quarter of 2021. Previously, on December 11, BarnBridge stated that from a code point of view, DAO was 95% complete.
Equilibrium’s USD stablecoin to be integrated into Moonbeam
The cross-chain DeFi lending agreement Equilibrium announced that it will integrate its dollar-pegged stablecoin into the Polkadot project Moonbeam. (Cointelegraph)
Crypto artist beeple's artwork sold at auction on Nifty Gateway for $777,777
Security Incident and Follow-up
Security Incident and Follow-up
Filecoin official: Filecoin network experienced short-term chain interruption
On December 20, Filecoin officials stated that earlier today, the Filecoin network experienced an on-chain interruption due to potential uncertainty among normative participants. This issue is gradually being resolved and the network is being restored.
DeFi protocol Warp Finance was attacked by flash loans, and about $8 million was stolen
The DeFi portal DefiPrime tweeted that at 06:34 on December 18, Beijing time, the DeFi protocol Warp Finance suffered a flash loan attack, and about $8 million was stolen. In addition, Warp Finance also tweeted that it is investigating the illegal stablecoin loans that have been lent in the last hour, and recommends not to deposit stablecoins until the official finds out the violation.
On December 20, Warp Finance officially announced that it has successfully recovered approximately US$5.85 million in the form of ETH/DAI-LP tokens, accounting for 75% of the funds lost in the flash loan attack ($7.76 million).
Nexus Mutual Founder's Personal Wallet Stolen, Over $8M Lost
The personal address of Hugh Karp, founder of DeFi insurance protocol Nexus Mutual, was attacked with 370,000 XNM tokens in the address, resulting in a loss of more than $8 million. This was a targeted attack and only Karp's address was affected, with no subsequent risk to Nexus Mutual or other members. Karp was using a hardware wallet at the time, and the attackers tricked him into signing a transaction that somehow gained remote access to his computer and altered its MetaMask plugin to transfer funds to the attacker's own address. (The Block)
NiceHash has fully compensated users affected by the 2017 hack
Investment and financing overview
Investment and financing overview
Paxos Receives $142 Million in Series C Financing, PayPal Ventures and Others Participate
Paxos, a stablecoin PAX issuer, received $142 million in Series C financing, led by Declaration Partners, with participation from PayPal Ventures, RIT Capital Partners and investment banking legend Ken Moelis. The company will use the fresh funds to expand its stablecoin, cryptocurrency trading and blockchain settlements, among other businesses. (The Block)
Binance Leads Math Wallet’s Series B Funding of US$12 Million
On December 17, Binance Labs announced that it led MathWallet's B round of financing, with a total financing of $12 million in this round.
American Express invests in cryptocurrency trading platform FalconX
The venture capital arm of American Express has invested in cryptocurrency trading platform FalconX for an undisclosed amount. Amex’s global head of venture capital, Harshul Sanghi, said Amex’s investments in startups are a way of gaining a better understanding of emerging areas of the payments ecosystem. (Bloomberg)
Industrial Internet company Shugen Internet Technology Co., Ltd. announced that it has completed the C round of financing of 800 million yuan. This round of financing was led by IDG Capital, Tencent Strategic Investment, Haitong Investment, Keyuan Industrial Fund, Tianya Capital, CCB Jinyuan and existing shareholders Zhongwei Capital followed up. Light Source Capital acted as the exclusive financial advisor for this round of financing. (36 krypton)
Decentralized exchange Bonfida raises $4.5 million led by CMS Holdings
Bonfida, a decentralized exchange built on the Solana public chain, received $4.5 million in seed round financing. This round of financing was led by CMS Holdings, with participation from Sino Global, Three Arrows Capital, Spartan Group, and Genesis Block Ventures. (The Block)
On December 18, Sorare, a digital football NFT collection platform, announced that FC Barcelona star Gerard Piqué invested $4.3 million in the platform, bringing Sorare’s total seed round financing to $9 million. Piqué will also Join Sorare as a strategic consultant. (CoinDesk)
Neufund received 4 million euros in financing, led by Atlantic Labs and others
Neufund, a German blockchain startup, received €4 million in financing, led by Udo Schloemer, CEO of Christophe Maire's company Atlantic Labs and Factory Berlin, with participation from Freigeist Capital and Dario Suter (founder and managing director of DCM). The funding round is effectively an extension of the company’s previous €3.4 million Series A round and will be used for routine matters such as obtaining financial licenses, hiring and further product development. (Tech.eu)
Lending Platform Union.Finance Receives $3 Million Investment
Union Finance, an Ethereum-based lending platform, has raised $3 million. Investors include Placeholder, 1kx, CoinFund, Distributed Global, Spartan Group, Variant, KR1, Scalar, Defiance, and Infinite Capital. It is reported that Union will start the public test of the test network this month.
Settle Network Receives $3 Million from Stellar
Settle Network, a Latin American digital asset settlement network, has received $3 million in investment from the Stellar Development Fund. The investment will be paid out in XLM and will help strengthen Settle’s current suite of payment tools. The investment is the fourth from the Stellar Development Fund this year. (Cointelegraph)
Ethereum 2.0 mortgage service provider Lido Finance completes $2 million financing
Ethereum 2.0 mortgage service provider Lido Finance has completed $2 million in financing. This round of investment includes institutions such as Semantic Ventures, ParaFi Capital, Terra, Stakefish, and Staking Facilities, as well as MakerDAO's Rune Christensen, Aave's Stani Kulechov, and Synthetix's Kain Warwick. Angel investors participated. The fresh funding will put Lido on track to launch its mainnet this month. (The Block)
Safello raises $1.3 million, plans IPO in first half of 2021
European bitcoin exchange Safello said it has raised 11 million Swedish kronor (about $1.3 million) to cover its planned listing on Nasdaq First North Growth Market in the first half of 2021. The round was led by CoinDesk parent company Digital Currency Group, with participation from venture capital firms Northzone, White Star Capital and Techstars. (CoinDesk)
Australian DeFi startup Maple Finance completes $1.3 million seed round
Australian DeFi startup Maple Finance has completed a $1.3 million seed round of financing with its MPL governance token. Participating investors include Framework Ventures, FTX, Aave founder Stani Kulechov, Synthetix founder Kain Warwick, FBG, The LAO, etc. The total supply of MPL tokens will be fixed at 10 million, of which about 30% will be used for liquidity mining. (CoinDesk)
Blockchain company DMG completes $1 million private placement
Cryptocurrency and blockchain company DMG Blockchain Solutions Inc. announced that it has raised $1,000,405 through a non-broker private placement. The company intends to use the net proceeds from the private placement for general working capital purposes.
Euler XYZ, the research and development company of the permissionless lending protocol Euler founded by Oxford University researcher Michael Bentley, raised $800,000 in seed round financing, led by Lemniscap, LAUNCHub Ventures, CMT Digital, Divegence Ventures, Block0 and Cluster, as well as Coinbase’s Luke Youngblood, Richard Burton, a person in the DeFi field, and Josh Buckley, CEO of Product Hunt, a new product information website, participated in the investment. (PR Web)
Jaguar Land Rover Invests in Blockchain Technology Firm Circulor
InMotion Ventures, Jaguar Land Rover’s venture capital and mobility services arm, has invested in blockchain technology company Circulor to enable Jaguar Land Rover to source premium materials with greater transparency across its network, including origin, benefits and supplier compliance. (Insider Media)
Interest rate trading platform Horizon Finance receives investment from Robot Ventures
Horizon Finance, an interest rate trading platform, announced that it has received investment from Robot Ventures, the investment fund of Compound founder Robert Leshner. The investment amount is currently undisclosed.
Tarun Chitra, CEO of DeFi simulation platform Gauntlet Networks, is a partner in Robot Ventures’ second fund, which had raised $4 million as of the end of September, half of which came from Galaxy Digital CEO Mike Novogratz.
