Chart of the Week 

Bitcoin Ordinals inscriptions continue to surge, making new record highs of over 4 million. Bitcoin Ordinals NFTs are minted on Bitcoin’s base layer using the Ordinal theory through the Ordinals protocol. The aim of Ordinal theory is to give each Satoshi an individual identity, allowing them to be tracked, transferred, and imbued with individual meanings through inscriptions. This allows one Satoshi to be different from another, hence non-fungible.  Want to read more? Check out our new report Bitcoin’s Expanding Ecosystem: Layer-2, DeFi, NFT.

Weekly Market Index

Last week’s crypto market prices were down -2.38%. Volume and volatility also dropped by -14.91% and -21.18%, respectively.

Weekly Performance

Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) were down -3.8% and -1.6%, respectively, in the past seven days. Other selected top-cap tokens also dropped.

Selected key categories were also all down in the past seven days.

News Highlights

• The US Federal Reserve increased interest rates by 25 bps last week - its 10th hike in 14 months. That pushed its benchmark target rate to between 5% and 5.25%, up from near zero in March 2022.

• Crypto.com introduces its first-ever Artificial Intelligence (AI) powered-initiative, Amy. Amy is an AI companion that can help users learn about the crypto industry with near real-time information about specific tokens and projects, as well as details on price listings and historical events.

• The Kingdom of Bhutan has reportedly been running a Bitcoin mining operation for the past few years. This would make Bhutan one of the only countries to run a state-owned mine, alongside El Salvador.

Recent Research Reports

• Bitcoin’s Expanding Ecosystem: Layer-2, DeFi, NFT: The landscape of the latest projects building on top of Bitcoin is expanding beyond payments and includes Layer-2 scaling solutions and key application categories like DeFi and NFT.

• Liquid Staking Derivatives: Money Legos in DeFi: Liquid staking is now the second largest sector in crypto after DEXes, replacing DeFi lending. Today the liquid staking narrative remains strong in anticipation of Ethereum’s Shanghai upgrade, and this report explores its current landscape.

• Alpha Navigator: Quest for Alpha [April 2023]: Asset classes were generally flat in April, with crypto outperforming. US Federal Reserve could be on the cusp of ending rate hike cycle.

• Crypto.com Visa Card Consumer Spending Insights 2022: A full break-down of what our community across the globe likes to spend on in 2022.

• Overview of Decentralised Derivatives: Crypto derivatives dominate the market today, representing about 70% of the entire crypto market. In this report, we shed light on derivatives in DeFi, their market overview, and some innovations in the space.

Catalyst Calendar

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