US Government Moves Silk Road BTC and Starknet Implements Upgrade
Market Update
- Crypto markets had a volatile morning, initially rallying off a cooler-than-expected CPI print of 0.2% (est. 0.295%) and Core CPI of 0.2% (est: 0.3%). According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, this is the slowest rate in more than two years. Shortly after the CPI release, an on-chain wallet of the US Government containing bitcoin from the Silk Road Hack was seen transferring 9,000 Bitcoin, potentially to sell it. This shook the crypto market and caused crypto prices to drop sharply. At the time of writing, $BTC is down 0.55%, and $ETH is up 0.48%. Altcoins are also up across the board, with Chinese-based Layer 1 protocol $CFX being a particular standout, up 9.28% after an announcement that China is testing SIM card NFC payments for the digital yuan. Traditional markets have rallied post-CPI as well –SPX and NDQ are up 0.86% and 1.29%, respectively.
- The Starknet team successfully implemented the Quantum Leap - Starknet V12.0 upgrade on mainnet, increasing the network's capacity. This enhancement was introduced on the Ethereum mainnet on Wednesday, following a week-long trial on the Goerli testnet. During this trial period, the network approached the milestone of triple-digit transactions per second (TPS). The team's objective, however, is to achieve several hundred transactions per second by the end of the third quarter. Throughout the testing phase, the Quantum Leap upgrade consistently delivered 37 TPS, with occasional spikes reaching up to 90 TPS. This represents a substantial improvement compared to the network's previous speed of 10 TPS. Starknet is an Ethereum Layer 2 network that incorporates validity-based Layer 2 solutions. These validity-based solutions use a zk-rollup technology that condenses multiple off-chain transactions and collectively puts them on Ethereum Layer 1.
- Bankrupt crypto lender, Celsius, has begun legal action against Stakehound for failing to pay back $150 million in digital assets, including staked Ethereum, Polkadot, and Matic. Celsius claimed that StakeHound declined to return the funds entrusted to it during its bankruptcy last year. Celsius also stated that StakeHound initiated an arbitration agreement against them in Switzerland, asserting they were not obligated to return the funds. According to the court filing, Stakehound claimed it lost the keys to Celsius 35,000 ETH in 2021, which means it has no obligation to repay. At the time, StakeHound blamed Fireblocks for losing the keys and sued the custodian. Celsius argues that the arbitration violates U.S. Bankruptcy Code, where section 362 prevents a creditor from taking any legal action or collecting debt against anyone that filed for bankruptcy. Celsius wants the court to compel StakeHound to return the funds and pay damages for breach of contract. Stakehound has yet to make a defense against the allegations.
Daily Technical Strategy
Mark L. Newton, CMT
Head of Technical Strategy
Conflux looks to be bottoming out, following a steep drop over the last few weeks to retest a key area of support near former lows. The area near $0.17 was important back in mid-June, and looks to have proven successful again in causing support to recent weakness. Fast forward to today, and Wednesday's gains (7/12) look important and bullish for $CFX in the short run, as prices have jumped to multi-day highs which is resulting in a large uptick in momentum. Gains look likely into late-July with targets near $0.25 which intersects the four-month downtrend. This should be a significant area of resistance, but exceeding $0.25 would allow for the start of a more meaningful uptrend, which eventually could lead back to all-time highs. Upside targets above $0.25 lie at $0.325, then $0.367, both of which could serve as resistance. While not expected, we believe any pullback lower than $0.17 on a weekly close would postpone the rally and result in near-term weakness to $0.135.
Daily Important Metrics
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All metrics as of July 12, 2023 2:19 PM
All Funding rates are in bps
Crypto Prices
| Symbol | Market Cap | Last Price | Daily Change | Year to Date | Relative to BTC YTD |
 BTC | $592B | $30,474 | ↓ -0.20% | ↑ 84% | |
 ETH | $227B | $1,890 | ↑ 0.91% | ↑ 58% | ↓ -26% |
 ADA | $10B | $0.2897 | ↓ -0.42% | ↑ 17% | ↓ -67% |
 DOGE | $9.1B | $0.0649 | ↑ 0.24% | ↓ -7.43% | ↓ -91% |
 SOL | $8.9B | $22.22 | ↑ 0.72% | ↑ 124% | ↑ 41% |
 MATIC | $6.8B | $0.7268 | ↓ -1.83% | ↓ -4.63% | ↓ -89% |
 DOT | $6.3B | $5.19 | ↑ 0.52% | ↑ 19% | ↓ -65% |
 LINK | $3.4B | $6.29 | ↑ 1.66% | ↑ 13% | ↓ -71% |
 NEAR | $1.2B | $1.34 | ↑ 1.52% | ↑ 5.16% | ↓ -79% |
Exchange Traded Products (ETPs)
| Symbol | Premium to Nav | Last Price | Daily Change | Year to Date | Relative to BTC YTD |
| GBTC | ↓ -28% | $20.02 | ↑ 0.45% | ↑ 141% | ↑ 58% |
| BITW | ↓ -55% | $11.71 | ↓ -0.06% | ↑ 118% | ↑ 34% |
| ETHE | ↓ -44% | $10.13 | ↑ 1.24% | ↑ 113% | ↑ 29% |
| BTCC | ↑ 0.14% | $5.59 | ↓ -0.53% | ↑ 84% | ↑ 0.53% |
News
QUICK BITS
CoinDesk Aptos' APT Token Steady After $32M Token Unlock The dollar value of the unlock amounted to 38% of the cryptocurrency's average 30-day trading volume and had potential to push prices lower, per one analyst. |
Decrypt.co Social Analytics Platform LunarCrush Raises $5M in Series A Funding LunarCrush aims to broaden its focus beyond crypto and NFTs to stocks using artificial intelligence. |
Bitcoinist CBDC: Reserve Bank Of India Urges More Lenders To Embrace Digital Rupee, Sources Say In an effort to enhance the adoption of the Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) and explore the potential of digital currencies, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI... |
CoinDesk Cathie Wood's ARK Sells $12M Coinbase Shares as COIN Nears Yearly High ARK currently owns 11.03 million shares of Coinbase. |
Coin Telegraph Celsius files lawsuit to recover $150M from staking platform StakeHound Celsius aims to claw back 40 million MATIC, 66,000 DOT, 25,000 staked native ETH and 35,000 ETH from liquid staking pl... |
THOUGHTS AND OPINIONS
Coin Telegraph Grayscale CEO: BlackRock ETF filing a ‘moment of validation’ for Bitcoin BlackRock’s commitment to advancing its crypto efforts only lends to the validity of Bitcoin as an asset class, said M... |
FUNDRAISING AND M&A
CoinDesk Tim Draper-Backed Fund Joins $5M Series A for LunarCrush The social media analytics platform is expanding from a digital asset trading focus to allow users to search for any topic. |
PRODUCT UPDATES AND PARTNERSHIPS
The Block Starknet deploys ‘Quantum Leap’ upgrade boosting network’s speed The Starknet team deployed the Quantum Leap - Starknet V12.0 upgrade on the mainnet, resulting in increasing the network’s throughput. ... |
HACKS, EXPLOITS, AND SCAMS
Coin Telegraph New York prosecutor charges hacker over $9M exploit of Solana-based exchange A skilled computer security engineer has been charged with wire fraud and money laundering related to an attack on a d... |
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