WhiteboardCrypto Newsletter - Oct 12

Welcome back to this week's edition of our WhiteboardCrypto Newsletter!

Side note: The HBO documentary that claims to have identified Satoshi, the creator of Bitcoin, is problematic, in our opinion. There are many reasons Satoshi chose to stay anonymous, and any attempt to figure out who they are directly goes against those wishes. Let’s respect each other, and remember to act in kindness.

The Sun is blinding

Justin Sun, the founder of Tron, was recently elected as the acting Prime Minister of Liberland, a crypto-focused micro-nation. Liberland, a self-proclaimed libertarian state, has embraced blockchain technology to establish its governance, aiming to become a hub for decentralized innovation. Sun’s election shows his expanding influence in both politics and cryptocurrency, despite the controversy around his character and actions.

Learn more here.

EIGEN uh oh

EigenLayer recently faced an unauthorized sale of 1.6 million EIGEN tokens (worth $5.5 million) due to a compromised email. The attacker converted the tokens into stablecoins via centralized exchanges. While the issue is being investigated, the breach involved tokens that were supposed to be locked up. However, the loss accounts for less than 0.05% of EigenLayer’s $12.9 billion TVL, so the impact on overall network security seems limited.

Learn more here.

FTX payments approved

FTX’s bankruptcy plan has been approved, with 98% of customers expected to receive repayments based on their balances as of November 2022. Creditors could get up to 119% due to asset appreciation. Critics argue this favors institutional investors, whose larger claims benefit more from asset increases; there are also frustrations about how much the value of crypto has increased since 2022, so people will miss out on those gains. Payouts are set to begin soon, although the exact timeline remains uncertain, and they will prioritize users who held less than $50,000.

Learn more here.

Ronin deems Chainlink most secure

The Ronin Network, known for Axie Infinity, integrated Chainlink’s Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP) to enhance security after its multiple bridge hacks leading to almost $700m in losses. CCIP will be implemented over the next few months to secure asset transfers from Ethereum to Ronin. Users won’t need to do anything as this is all happening in the backend, but it’s good to know that the popular bridge is making moves for better security.

Learn more here.

FBI created its own crypto to catch criminals

Ever bought NexFundAI? Well, it was created by the FBI to try to catch three market makers and their employees that manipulated the market through pump-and-dump schemes by artificially inflating the price of a token. The companies were ‘hired’ by the FBI’s project to make it look like there was more volume of trades than there actually were. This method of catching criminals is the first of its kind in the crypto world, as far as we know.

Learn more here.

WBTC restructuring

Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) just moved its reserves ahead of a planned restructuring that’s stirring up some controversy. The main issue? Critics think the restructuring could make WBTC more centralized by giving too much control to a few players. On the flip side, supporters say it's just about improving efficiency and keeping liquidity strong. It's a classic decentralization vs. practicality debate playing out in the crypto space.

Learn more here.

Thanks for reading and I hope you learned something!

- Theodore