Author: Jana Serfontein

Jana has keen interest in what cryptocurrencies have to offer in regards to NGO’s, governments and the financial system. And is also intrigued with the psychological effect that cryptocurrencies have on society.

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Bitcoin Dogecoin Ethereum Fashion Litecoin Metaverse NFTs Payments Shiba Inu

Gucci to Begin Accepting Bitcoin in Some Stores

Luxury high-end international fashion brand Gucci is set to accept various cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin, Ether, and even Dogecoin in some of its stores in North America.

Gucci will start accepting cryptos in five of its stores across the US later this month. The locations are New York City (Wooster Street), Los Angeles (Rodeo Drive), Miami (Design District), Atlanta (Phipps Plaza), and Las Vegas (The Shops at Crystals).

The stores will accept include Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum, Wrapped Bitcoin, Litecoin, Dogecoin, Shiba Inu, and five stablecoins that are pegged to the US dollar.

Crypto Provides an ‘Enhanced Customer Experience’

According to Marco Bizzarri, president and CEO of Gucci, the brand is “always looking to embrace new technologies when they can provide an enhanced experience for our customers”. He added:

Now that we are able to integrate cryptocurrencies within our payment system, it is a natural evolution for those customers who would like to have this option available to them.

Marco Bizzarri, president and CEO, Gucci

Gucci has been active in the Web3 and NFT space and recently established a Web3-focused team and released a couple of NFTs. The brand is also extending its crypto efforts to the metaverse where it is developing digital real estate in the decentralised blockchain game The Sandbox. Further, Gucci is building a virtual “Gucci Vault” for Gucci-themed NFTs.

More and More Companies Accept Crypto Payments

Gucci joins a raft of companies that accept crypto as payment. Last year, Crypto News Australia reported that a real estate company in Los Angeles would allow its tenants to rent properties with Bitcoin, starting with the Grove shopping centre and other LA properties.

Many companies in Australia are also accepting cryptocurrencies as payments. You can now order a custom-built PC, buy dog food, design a custom home, get solar power and pay for almost everything in Bitcoin.

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Australia Crypto News NFTs

Australia Zoo Launches NFT Project ‘Wildlife Warriors’ to Help Protect Wildlife

The world-famous Australia Zoo is collaborating with Meadow Labs to create a unique Australian-themed NFT collection built atop the carbon-neutral Algorand blockchain.

The collection is in celebration of the 20th anniversary of the Queensland-based zoo’s Wildlife Warriors, and all primary proceeds generated from the project will be donated to Australia Zoo and its associated conservation organisation:

Established in 2002 by Australia Zoo co-founders Steve and Terri Irwin, Wildlife Warriors is all about the protection of injured, threatened, and endangered wildlife. The initiative boasts 11 conservation projects worldwide and three conservation properties. Wildlife Warriors’ flagship project, the Australia Zoo Wildlife Hospital, has treated over 110,000 animals since opening its doors.

Sustainable Blockchain Placates the Naysayers

Created on Algorand, the world’s first carbon-negative blockchain with 0.01 gas and transaction fees, the series of NFTs celebrates the 20th anniversary of Australia Zoo’s Wildlife Warriors. By building the series on Algorand, hardline environmentalist naysayers on Twitter can be effectively shut down:


The limited set of NFTs is centred on raising awareness and funds to protect Australia’s wildlife and wild places. In partnership with Meadow Labs, an Australian-based technology start-up, this rare NFT collection will consist of a series of drops, each focusing on a different Australia Zoo Wildlife animal. Each NFT will be randomly generated, non-deterministic, utility-driven, and unique to each buyer.

Meadow Labs co-founder and CEO Martin Kelly said: “We’re really excited to partner with Australia Zoo in their first foray into Web3 and their mission of fighting for the planet’s wildlife and wild places, one NFT at a time. This is a sensational example of what innovative brands can achieve when they open themselves up to the endless possibilities Web3 has to offer. This is just the beginning of a long term-partnership to create an ‘NFT for good’ movement that builds on ensuring we all have a sustainable future.”

Robert Irwin, son of Steve and Terri, added:

At Australia Zoo we’re always open to new ways [to] help continue our Wildlife Warriors mission. Any innovation that can help our conservation efforts, particularly one that shares our vision of protecting the planet, is something we’re thrilled to support. This green chain and new technology allows us a new avenue to continue to fight for the protection of our wildlife and wild places.

Robert Irwin, Australia Zoo

Although an Australian project, the NFTs will be available globally and can be purchased with fiat (tangible currency) on-ramping via MoonPay, which will allow customers to buy cryptos directly from the bespoke webstore, thus simplifying the process and making the collection accessible to all.

Could NFTs Help With Wildlife Conservation?

A variety of different industries are incorporating the sale of NFTs to boost fundraising efforts, and why should wildlife be any different? Crypto News Australia has previously reported on the endangered Seychelles magpie robin NFT project. The magpie robin has been made available to purchase in digital form in a series of collectible NFTs, sales of which will help fund conservation efforts.

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Crypto News Crypto.com Tokens

Crypto.com Restarts Staking Rewards Following Brutal Community Backlash

Crypto.com has had to restart its staking rewards program after the community reacted harshly to the company announcing it would discontinue it.

Native Token Crashes 11% Amid Backlash

Revisions to Crypto.com’s staking rewards sent its native token CRO tumbling 11 percent as the community expressed its dismay. The exchange announced it would be reducing rewards on the usage of its Visa-enabled cards based on the tiers offered.

In a blog post, Crypto.com said lower tiers such as Midnight Blue and Ruby Steel would get 0 percent, while Royal Indigo and Jade Green would receive 0.5 percent and Icy White and Frosted Rose Gold 1 percent, while Obsidian, the highest tier, would get a mere 2 percent.

Revised CRO card rewards. Source: Crypto.com

Crypto.com CEO Kris Marszalek said the firm would continue to offer staking rewards to its card users just a day after eliminating the program. The decision has since been rescinded, with Marszalek subsequently tweeting:

Rewards are still less than those offered at the moment, to which the community reacted badly. Marszalek, however, said the changes were necessary to ensure “long-term sustainability” of yields offered on its card program:

Crypto.com had already slashed rates of returns offered on its token deposits this year. Cuts announced on March 26 reduced flexible returns offered by the firm on popular tokens such as Bitcoin and Ethereum to 0.5 percent from between 1.5 and 2 percent.

Crypto.com Gets Active in Sports Arena

Crypto.com is gaining increasing traction in the sports arena. Last year, the firm signed a US$35 million multi-year deal with renowned European football club Paris Saint-Germain. In January, it also clinched a five-year partnership worth A$25 million with the Australian Football League.

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Australia Brisbane Jobs Melbourne Perth Sydney

Australia Ranks 4th in Crypto Job Opportunities Report

As the crypto market continues to expand it has created many niche roles, with skills in technology ranking highest as the prime prerequisite to land a job in crypto.

Many job listings call for specific skills in Java, Machine Learning, Python, and Artificial Intelligence (AI). According to a report called “Crypto & AI Jobs: The Top Cities & Industries For Opportunities”, Australia ranks fourth, with 385 jobs available in the crypto industry.

Top five countries for crypto jobs. Source: smallbusinessprices.co.uk

The top three cities in Australia for jobs in crypto are Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. The data also reveals that the leading industries for crypto jobs are Internet and Technology, Banking and Financial Services, Computer Hardware and Software, Accounting and Finance, and finally Consulting.

The US ranks highest on the global list with a total of 3,893 advertised jobs in the cryptocurrency field. Last year, Crypto News Australia reported that jobs in the crypto and blockchain field grew by 118 percent in 10 months.

AI Job market. Source: smallbusinessprices.co.uk

With the rise of available jobs in niche categories such as AI, Australia also ranks fourth, with a total of 603 jobs available in the field. The top three cities for AI jobs in Australia are Sydney, Melbourne and Perth, and the leading industries for jobs linked to AI are Information Technology, Computer Software and Hardware, Consulting, Accounting, Legal, and Internet and Technology.

Australia Gearing Towards Crypto Jobs

The rapid growth of the worldwide crypto market parallels the need for individuals with industry-specific skills. As the report shows, Australia’s high global ranking in crypto employment opportunities is down to implementing better regulation in order to provide incentives for new investors and thus create more jobs in the field for Australians.

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Bored Ape Yacht Club Crypto News Ethereum Metaverse NFTs

Bored Apes Metaverse Project ‘Otherside’ Tops $561 Million in 24 Hours

Yuga Labs, creators of the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) series, has witnessed US$561 million in Otherside NFT sales within a matter of 24 hours. The craze led to the crash of Etherscan, and Ethereum gas fees blew out to thousands of dollars per transaction.

The highly anticipated Otherside metaverse mint on April 30 clogged the Ethereum mainnet, catapulting gas fees to shocking new heights. In less than a day, Yuga Labs generated most of its sales from just the Otherside’s “Otherdeed” NFT, intended as “the key to claiming land in Otherside”, Yuga’s upcoming metaverse game.

A total of 55,000 NFTs were minted at 305 APE each, which translates to about US$5,800 per Otherdeed, given Apecoin’s price at the time of the mint. From this mint alone, Yuga Labs raked in over US$318.7 million.

According to data from CryptoSlam, Otherdeed has already seen over US$242 million in secondary volume traded, and US$190 million of that was on OpenSea. APE pumped 55 percent last month following rumours of a land drop going viral.

High Demand Causes Etherscan Crash

Given the high number of NFTs and higher demand, the Otherdeed mint immediately caused a massive surge in Ethereum gas fees. Traffic on block explorer Etherscan also led to the site crashing. Gas wars, such as experienced in this mint, can occur on proof-of-work chains such as Ethereum when a sudden increase in demand for fast transactions clogs a network, sending fees soaring:

Gas fees on Ethereum saw extreme spikes up to thousands of dollars per transaction. While some were able to get their transactions processed within a few hours for a couple of hundred dollars in gas fees, others reported paying upwards of US$4,000 for a single transaction.

Given the context, the average price of Ethereum gas over the course of the night was more than US$6,000, about 100 to 200 times the normal fee. Data from Etherscan shows that users have paid around 64,000 ETH in gas fees, equalling in excess of US$175 million in 24 hours in relation to Otherside.

Gas Fees Could Have Been Averted

Will Papper, the co-founder of Syndicate DAO, has said that the contract had “nearly zero optimisations” and provided a few “tricks” that could have “saved many millions”:

Yuga Labs has addressed the gas fees issue, noting that the mint was “so large that Etherscan crashed”, and apologised for “turning off the lights on Ethereum for a while”:

There has been a lot of concern regarding Ethereum’s high gas fees, and many Ethereum layer 2 NFT marketplaces are aiming to effect reductions.

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Australia Bitcoin ETFs Ethereum

Canadian Challenger Joins Australian ETF Race

A Canadian challenger could blow open the Australian crypto exchange-traded fund (ETF) race as it moves to seize an opportunity to make history by listing Australia’s first ETF.

According to a report in the Australian Financial Review, Toronto-based 3iQ Digital Asset Management has applied to launch two ETFs after a technical delay held up rival investment houses. The crypto specialist firm lodged disclosure documents with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) late last week. These documents revealed its plans to list the 3iQ CoinShares Bitcoin Feeder ETF and 3iQ CoinShares Ether Feeder ETF on the Cboe Australia exchange.

The fund will give exposure to both Bitcoin and Ether by buying units in two of 3iQ’s existing ETFs, which are listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange and co-managed by London-based CoinShares. The funds will trade on Cboe under the tickers BT3Q and ET3Q.

Technical Challenges Delay ETF Race

Local issuers ETF Securities and Cosmos Asset Management had expected their pending ETFs to begin trading on April 27, but were unable to launch after Cboe told the market “standard checks” were still ongoing. Both ETFs are still yet to begin trading.

The hold-up was caused by a powerful but undisclosed “prime broker” who required more time to support the new asset class, forcing a delay in trading. This presented 3iQ with the opportunity to get ahead of its competitors and list Australia’s first ETF to be invested directly in digital assets.

Australian ETF Race Heats Up

Australia appears to be leading the ETF charge ETFs. In December 2021 the country saw its first spot crypto ETF, which launched through ETF Securities and 21Shares. Early last month, it was announced that Australia would soon receive its first Bitcoin ETF. Since then a slew of competitors – Cosmos Asset Management Bitcoin ETF, 21Shares Bitcoin ETF, and 21Shares Ethereum ETF – were set to follow suit by launching their own crypto ETFs.

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Bitcoin ETFs Gold

World’s First Hybrid BTC and Gold ETF Launched

The world’s first combined Bitcoin and Gold exchange traded fund (ETF) has been launched this week in Switzerland. The product has been developed by ETP issuer 21Shares and cryptocurrency data provider ByteTree Asset Management.

The first ETF product to combine gold and and what has now become known as digital gold – bitcoin – in a single fund was launched on the SIX Swiss Exchange. As Charlie Morris, chief investment officer at ByteTree Asset Management, has said, “We are making bitcoin an acceptable asset to hold and bringing gold into the 21st century.”

ByteTree and 21Shares Make BOLD Move

ByteTree Asset Management BOLD ETP will track a customised benchmark index comprising bitcoin and gold, which rebalances monthly according to the comparative volatility of the two assets. Whichever of the two has been less volatile over the previous 360 days will be given the higher weighting. At launch, the weighting will be 18.5 percent bitcoin and 81.5 percent gold.

While gold ETPs and spot bitcoin ETPs are both widely available independently, at least in continental Europe, Morris claimed that ByteTree’s active rebalancing strategy had improved returns by seven to eight percentage points a year in backtesting. Morris added: “It struck me that bitcoin and gold were always counter-cyclical. It’s obvious to me that bitcoin has always been correlated to the stock market, or to risk assets in general.”

According to Charlie Erith, CEO of ByteTree Asset Management, the investment strategy is “a unique approach to blending a high return digital asset with a traditional store of value, with a low correlation to equities and bonds”. He added:

Gold has historically delivered portfolio protection in inflationary environments, while bitcoin is the digital equivalent of gold with growing adoption by investors as a distinct asset class and a core store of wealth … In a time of rising structural inflation and heightened geopolitical risk, we believe this can act as an important risk and return diversifier in a balanced portfolio.

Charlie Erith, CEO, ByteTree Asset Management

21Shares Has Form in ETF Space

21Shares has been very active in launching ETFs, after releasing a product in December 2021 that provided Australian investors with access to the country’s first direct Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs.

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Algorand Avalanche Crypto News Ethereum Solana Terra

Institutions Leaving ETH for Competing Altcoins, CoinShares Report Reveals

According to analysis from CoinShares, investors have favoured smaller layer-one altcoins of late with institutional capital outflows from Ethereum hitting US$17 million:

Smart Money Favours Layer-One Projects

Institutional investors have been shifting their attention away from Ethereum to competing layer-one blockchain projects, with capital inflows for altcoins increasing while ETH products posted outflows for the third consecutive week. Data from CoinShares’ Digital Asset Fund report shows that investors bought up US$3.5 million worth of Avalanche, Solana, Terra, and Algorand.

The data shows total outflows of ETH now amount to US$59.3 million, around 35 percent of the year-to-date outflows of US$169 million.

Weekly Flows from ETH. Source: CoinShares

Decentralised application usage on Solana in the past week has increased, according to data from DappRadar. While the metrics from Avalanche’s DApp usage have not increased over the week, the project’s investment in incentive programs and millions spent bringing developers to the platform signal a bullish future.

Significant Shift in Past Three Weeks

Inflows into Avalanche, Solana, Terra and Algorand were US$1.8 million, US$800,000, US$700,000, and US$200,000 respectively, with Bitcoin recording inflows worth US$2.6 million for the first time in two weeks. Over the past three weeks, total outflows were US$219 million, a significant shift from the US$134 million that left the market in the first week of April.

In March, another report released by CoinShares showed that institutional crypto funds had seen their biggest capital inflows since December 2021, with over US$193 million coming in during the week ending March 25.

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DAO Stablecoins TerraUSD

NEAR Protocol Launches Decentralised Stablecoin ‘USN’ to Compete with UST

The highly anticipated decentralised stablecoin USN has launched on the Near protocol with Decentral Bank, an independent team, taking the lead in the stablecoin initiative:

USN Stablecoin Goes Live

USN is a stablecoin designed in similar fashion to TerraUSD (UST) and can be minted by depositing NEAR tokens, the Near blockchain’s native crypto asset, as collateral. USN is led by Decentral Bank, a decentralised autonomous organisation (DAO), in collaboration with Proximity Lab, a DeFi-focused team in the Near ecosystem. USN does not pay as high a yield as previously thought, but still offers a 10 percent annual yield from Decentral Bank.

Additional Stability for USN

The Decentral Bank DAO will have a few stability mechanisms to support USN’s dollar peg, with the first being an arbitrage system that will try to ensure that the USN stablecoin trades around one dollar’s worth of NEAR tokens. The second stability measure is a “reserve fund” made up of NEAR and USDT tokens held by the DAO treasury. It is still unclear how much will be spent on this fund:

Stablecoins Should Be on the Lookout for TerraUST

In March, Terra co-founder Do Kwon outlined plans to buy US$10 billion in Bitcoin, which had a very bullish impact on the price of BTC. TerraUST also recently became the third-largest stablecoin, outranking Binance USD.

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Crypto News Facebook Metaverse Social media Virtual Reality

Meta Launches a Metaverse-Themed Store in San Francisco

Meta, the parent company of Facebook, will open a physical metaverse-themed store in the San Francisco Bay area. A feature of the store will be wall-to-wall curved LED screens that display what users see using virtual reality (VR) headsets.

In an April 25 announcement, Meta said it would be opening its doors in the Burlingame, California location on May 9. The store, situated on the Meta campus, is aimed at providing interactive demos for the company’s hardware products, including VR headsets, video communications displays, and smart glasses.

Virtual reality now in the hands of Meta Store customers. Source: wsj.com

According to store head Martin Gilliard, “The Meta Store is going to help people make that connection to how our products can be the gateway to the metaverse in the future.” He added:

We’re not selling the metaverse in our store, but hopefully people will come in and walk out knowing a little bit more about how our products will help connect them to it.

Martin Gilliard, store head, Meta Store

Backlash Greets Meta’s Metaverse Vision

Facebook rebranded as Meta in October 2021 saying it was time it focused its efforts on expanding beyond social media, later announcing its metaverse vision for connecting online social experiences and the physical world.

Although its plans may be well-intentioned, Meta has since received a lot of backlash in the Twittersphere:

Meta Makes More Moves in the Metaverse

Only a week ago, Meta announced the launch of a digital economy that will allow users to sell virtual goods for its VR game as it continues to expand in the metaverse. Meta is also looking into introducing non-blockchain-based virtual tokens and loans as it seeks new revenue streams against a backdrop of fierce competition in the social media landscape.