Crypto Research

SHAPELLA ARRIVES We are now less than a week away from staking withdrawals being enabled on the Ethereum network. We have been discussing this topic frequently throughout our research, but to reiterate, we maintain that the market is overly pessimistic about the supply-side effects of this event. To reiterate the key points behind our rationale:LIQUIDITY ACCESS FOR MOST STAKERS: Approximately 60% of the staked ETH is through liquid staking providers...

Funding declined slightly this week, from $316M to $254M, with infrastructure making up the majority of funding for the second week in a row at $200M, nearly 80% of total funding. Infrastructure also had one of the biggest deals of the year – LayerZero Labs, an interoperability protocol that raised $120M in a Series B round. We discuss this deal in more depth later in this report. Other segments lagged...

Walter Teng outlines the tailwinds & risks for DeFi's largest lending market in the latest DeFi Digest report. Click the link below to read the full DeFi Digest report on Aave. CRYPTO DEFI DIGEST: LONG THESIS - AAVE *Recorded March 29, 2023

BOND VOLATILITY MOVING LOWER IS GOOD FOR LIQUIDITY Over the past few weeks, we have discussed how the ongoing banking crisis, the Fed's language shift and easing monetary policies from major central banks have led to increased net liquidity in the U.S. and higher global USD liquidity.  _Source: Bloomberg, Fundstrat_ One risk that these absolute liquidity levels face is a negation by the Fed’s reverse repo facility. The Reverse Repo...

Total funding this week was little changed on a week-over-week basis, with $286 million raised compared to $278 million last week. Infrastructure continued to lead funding, with an extension round from hardware wallet manufacturer Ledger ($109m) accounting for over one-third of total funding for the week. Ledger has benefited from implosions on centralized exchanges which led to an increasing demand for cold storage. They raised at the same valuation as...

INTRODUCTION Video games have captivated users since the dawn of digital technology. In 1972, Atari Inc. released Pong, a simple arcade ping-pong game that helped launch the evolution of gaming. Popular games such as Pacman, Asteroids, and Space Invaders paved the way for future gaming consoles like Nintendo, Gameboy, PlayStation, and Xbox. Gaming has transformed even more in recent years as users can access rich gaming experiences via portable devices,...

Sean Farrell outlines the recent updates to the FS Insight Crypto Members Area, including: Simple search by token or topicReal-time data dashboard of analyticsPortfolio & allocation toolsEducational library of basic conceptsWebinars & weekly videos

DOVISH FED STATEMENT On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve raised the target Fed Funds rate range by 25 basis points (BPS), marking the ninth increase in just over a year. The FOMC statement hinted at a nearing end to rate hikes by removing the reference to "ongoing increases." According to the FOMC's updated forecast, there will be one more rate increase this year, and officials expect slower economic growth in 2023...

Total funding rose from $124 million last week to $247 million this week, with nearly two-thirds represented relatively evenly between Web3 & NFTs and Metaverse & Gaming. 53% of the deals this week were seed rounds, comprising 32% of the total funding. One of the larger deals this week comes from OP3N, a Web3 AI-powered platform described by its CEO as, “a Web3 version of WhatsApp meets Amazon.” OP3N allows...

Sean Farrell joined Tom Lee for a market update webinar, discussing the recent collapse of SVB (Silicon Valley Bank), subsequent macro events, and what this means for crypto. Recorded March 16, 2023 WATCH THE MARKET UPDATE WITH TOM LEE: "YIELD CURVE UN-INVERSION MEANS SOMETHING BROKE. EITHER INFLATION OR ECONOMY."