Category: Blockchain

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Blockchain Crypto News Ethereum Google Industries NFTs

FLOW Surges 20% on News of Google Signing Deal with NFT Giant

Dapper Labs, a leading platform for digital collectibles and games on the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain, has partnered with Google Cloud services to help the Canadian start-up scale. As a direct result, the FLOW token has seen an increase of nearly 20 percent.

Dapper Labs has its own blockchain, Flow, which helps users scale apps and games. Google will improve on the product by acting as a network operator, providing developers on the Flow network with digital infrastructure that can process high transaction volumes at greater speed.

With Google’s help, Dapper Labs hopes to scale NBA Top Shot and other NFT lines running on Flow to billions of users.

NFT Platforms Still Performing Well

Dapper Labs products are some of the most used platforms on the Ethereum blockchain, with between 500,000 and one million transactions per week. NBA Top Shot, its flagship invention, has recorded over US$700 million in total sales and has been the leading collectible Dapp by users and volume (US$3.05 million) for the past 30 days, according to industry data site DappRadar.

Flow USD price chart. Source: Coinmarketcap

Following news of the partnership, FLOW‘s price spiked 15.5 percent in 24 hours to highs of US$24.13, while daily transaction volume stands at US$150 million, bouncing back after this month’s major dip.

Also earlier this month, another Dapper Labs product, CryptoKitties, sold more than US$7 million worth of NFTs in 24 hours as growing interest in non-fungible artworks boosted sales.

Warner Music partnered with the company via a strategic investment deal announced the same day, while Dapper Labs further revealed that Ubisoft, known for developing games such as Far Cry and Assassin’s Creed, would function as an adviser on Flow.

Blockchain technology is becoming more and more mainstream. So companies like Dapper need scalable, secure infrastructure to grow their business and, even more importantly, support their networks.

Janet Kennedy, vice-president, Google Cloud North America

Google Dabbling in Blockchain

After it recently lifted an advertising ban on cryptocurrencies, Google’s latest partnership suggests it could venture into infrastructure building for Web 3.0.

Google’s cloud services do not currently offer mining cryptocurrency, but Janet Kennedy, vice-president of Google Cloud North America, has said developers will be able to choose regions that power their platforms based on their energy consumption.

Dapper Labs CEO and co-founder Roham Gharegozlou tweeted that he was “amped to welcome Google to Flow Blockchain”.

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Blockchain Crypto News Gaming Sports

Algorand Sponsors Drone Racing League in $100 Million NFT Metaverse Gaming Expansion

The New York-based Drone Racing League (DRL) has landed its biggest partnership to date with Algorand (ALGO), an open source blockchain project. The US$100 million partnership will span five years, with DRL spreading its reach in the crypto industry by making use of innovative blockchain technologies to spice up the sport.

According to an announcement by Algorand, “DRL, recognised globally for cutting-edge technology, immersive sports entertainment, and thrilling, high-speed drone racing, will bring to life next-generation fan experiences on the Algorand blockchain”.

Drone racing is seen by some as the sport of the future, and studies conducted by ALGO and DRL show that their target market is 40 times more likely to follow and engage with crypto social media than the general population, being part of the tech-savvy and early adopter market segment. According to DRL president Rachel Jacobson, “DRL is a defining 21st-century sports property, and we’re only going to do 21st-century business deals”.

DRL president Rachel Jacobson: “We’re only going to do 21st-century business deals.” Source: thedronegirl.com

Algorand has been growing its ecosystem at an exponential rate, with more than 500 global organisations already leveraging its technology. Australian blockchain solutions have also partnered with the project.

As crypto gaming becomes more prevalent, it has also begun to expand into mainstream sport and GameFi.

DRL’s global, tech-obsessed fans love that our sport constantly evolves, and blockchain was the next groundbreaking technology in our sights. Algorand shares our values of speed, innovation and inclusivity. We have ambitious plans to deliver a unique sports experience in the metaverse and are incredibly excited about how this partnership will change the game for sports and tech fans and the global blockchain community.

Rachel Jacobson, DRL president

A Growing Community of Innovation

The five-year partnership will allow for blockchain-enabled ticketing, collectibles, fan transactions and NFTs on Algorand, and crypto developers, programmers and coders will be welcomed to Algorand hackathon events at DRL races around the world. From title sponsorship to metaverse gaming, this deal is nearly all-encompassing.

You need to build in the right programming so that it’s not just a logo slap […] The crypto community are too smart – they see through just a jersey patch or signage. They want to know, ‘How do I get involved? And how is this going to change my sports experience?’

Rachel Jacobson, DRL president

DRL starts its sixth season on September 29, and the league has media rights deals with NBCUniversal and a streaming deal with Twitter. Other sponsorships include DraftKings, T-Mobile, Bodyarmor and the US Air Force. DRL helps the Air Force with recruitment and training of future drone drivers.

The global drone market – specified as the “Unmanned Aerial Vehicle” sector – is projected to be worth US$58 billion by 2026, according to MarketsandMarkets Research. With DRL also functioning as a drone maker, Jacobson says it wants to leverage products to lure more revenue.

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Australia Blockchain Crypto News Ethereum Gaming

Sydney-Based ‘Immutable’ Raises $60 Million for Eco-Friendly NFT Games Platform

Australian gaming and digital asset technology business Immutable has announced an A$82 million (US$60m) Series B funding round, bringing its total funding to A$105 million.

Sydney-based Immutable, creators of Immutable X – a solution for scaling and trading non-fungible tokens (NFTs) – will use the funds to expand its engineering and sales teams and strengthen its partnerships with gaming companies.

The funds will also be used to scale the growth of Immutable’s in-house published NFT games, Gods Unchained and Guild of Guardians.

Ten International VC Firms Participate in Funding Round

The Series B round was co-led by San Francisco-based BITKRAFT Ventures and King River Capital, with participation from eight other VC firms. Immutable X will act as the underlying infrastructure to power NFT trading, enabling transactions at a much faster rate than is usual on Ethereum. It also requires reduced computing power and thus incurs much lower gas fees for users.

Immutable co-founders James (left) and Robbie Ferguson. Source: smartcompany.com.au

Immutable’s sibling co-founders James and Robbie Ferguson maintain their product is built to preserve the security and decentralisation of Ethereum, the blockchain of choice for NFTs, although Solana is starting to challenge its supremacy and is hosting three new NFT games on its blockchain where players can compete and trade with NFTs.

First Carbon-Neutral Scaling Solution for NFTs on Ethereum

Ultimately, the Immutable platform is the first carbon-neutral scaling solution for NFTs on Ethereum. “NFT trading is a terrible mainstream user experience right now,” says Robbie Ferguson. “It’s expensive, illiquid, and the only existing scaling solutions compromise on the most important thing – the security and user-base of Ethereum.”

We want businesses to create their game, marketplace, or NFT application within hours via APIs, with a mainstream user experience. No blockchain programming required.

Robbie Ferguson, co-founder, Immutable

Ferguson says the company has 120 employees and hopes to grow to 200 within six months. He acknowledges other major blockchains besides Solana have an eye on NFTs, including Flow (owned by Dapper Labs) and Polygon, but sees competition as a good thing because “our most important mission is we want to make digital worlds real. And that means giving people ownership of their stuff in a secure, decentralised blockchain.”

Jens Hilgers, founding partner of leading investor BITKRAFT Ventures, sees Immutable as the future face of asset trading.

In-game items and digital assets will broadly move onto the blockchain. To support and accelerate this shift the industry is in need of a scalable, fast, efficient and trusted blockchain layer. We have found [with Immutable] the best team and product in the market to make this industry shift a reality. 

Jens Hilgers, founding partner, BITKRAFT Ventures
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Blockchain Crypto News Solana

SOL Drops 15% After Solana Network Crashes From Cyber Attack

The high-performance blockchain Solana recently suffered a DoS (Denial of Service) as result of resource exhaustion in the network, which also caused the SOL token to tumble 15 percent. 

On September 14 at 12:38 UTC, Solana experienced “intermittent instability” and stopped processing transactions. The Ethereum Layer-2 solution Arbitrum also suffered an outage. This is the second time this month the protocol has gone down – on September 2, Solana suffered a period of intermittent performance degradation that lasted about an hour. 

Engineers at Solana found a “large increase” in transaction load that peaked at 400,000 TPS, flooding the transaction processing queue. Some users reported their funds were stuck as result of the DoS. To solve the issue, 80 percent of validators had to restart and upgrade the network to version 1.6.25, turning the Solana mainnet up again. 

While the SOL token experienced a slight drop, it has recovered since then, trading at US$157.55 at press time. The SOL token has been one of the top performance coins in the market, delivering its holders more than 13,700 percent growth since the beginning of the year.

Solana Gaining Ground Despite Network Problems

Despite this month’s hurdles, Solana has managed to gain ground, especially in the NFT space. Crypto News Australia reported Solana’s first million-dollar NFT deal this week when it traded a Degenerate Ape Academy token for 5980 SOL, worth US$1.11 million at the time.

There are several projects coming to Solana, including Play-to-Earn NFT games which have become a popular trend on social media, especially for users from third world countries who can make a steady income playing crypto games. Solana will soon launch three exciting NFT games to help it gain ground in the blockchain gaming space: Star Atlas, Aurory, and Genopets.

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Blockchain Crypto News Ethereum NFTs Solana

Solana Continues to Gain Ground, Netting First Million Dollar NFT Sale

The Solana blockchain is stealing a march on its Ethereum rival with its first million-dollar non-fungible token sale.

A Degenerate Ape Academy NFT (below) changed hands on September 11 for 5980 SOL, or about US$1.11 million, in a record sale for Solana.

And that wasn’t all. After shelling out seven figures for Degen Ape #7225, a hideously scarred zombie primate with a halo munching on a brain, Moonrock Capital, a European blockchain advisory and investment firm, announced a few hours later it had purchased a CryptoPunk knock-off NFT, also on the Solana blockchain, for 1388 SOL (US$257,446.24).

Last week, a single Bored Ape NFT sold for a new record US$2.9 million to the creators of The Sandbox, an upcoming Ethereum-based open-world metaverse game.

Ethereum Challenged By Cardano, Tezos and Solana

However, with its lower fees and reduced traffic, Solana is presenting a serious challenge to the Ethereum blockchain, which initially cornered the market on NFTs. But its popularity caused traffic and fees on Ethereum to skyrocket and rivals like Cardano, Tezos and Solana are capitalising, at least for now.

As the NFT space continues to explode, more artists and content creators are moving their works from Ethereum to Solana while it remains the cheaper option.

The price of Solana’s native token has already taken off in response, with its market capitalisation vaulting over XRP and Dogecoin to become the world’s sixth-largest cryptocurrency. Its total value is now US$54 billion compared with XRP’s $43.5bn and DOGE’s $32bn.

A month ago, a single SOL was worth just $40. After it recently hit an all-time high of more than $200, the token is now changing hands at around $185.

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Blockchain Crypto News Institutions Payments

Mastercard Acquires Blockchain Forensics Company to ‘Help Keep Users Safe’ 

American multinational Mastercard has acquired blockchain forensic firm CipherTrace in an attempt to enhance its operations in the cryptocurrency industry. 

According to a September 9 press release, the deal would enable both companies to combine their technologies, from AI to cyber capabilities, to differentiate card and real-time payments architecture. Mastercard hopes to close the acquisition by the end of the year, giving the company insight into more than 900 cryptocurrencies.

[The acquisition] follows a number of investments the company has made, including partnerships with Uphold, Gemini and BitPay to create crypto cards, the creation of new platforms to test and support Central Bank Digital Currencies, programs to support the broader use of blockchain technology and NFTs, and the potential to support select stablecoins directly on its network.

Mastercard press release

Mastercard’s Multiple Plans for the Crypto Industry

Six months ago, Mastercard announced support for cryptocurrencies, prioritising stablecoins and popular tokens like Ethereum and Bitcoin. With this acquisition, Mastercard dives deeper into the digital assets space and brings a solution to protect its customers and merchants, also allowing global businesses and stakeholders to build upon and comply with regulations for their digital assets services.

We help companies – whether they are banks or cryptocurrency exchanges, government regulators or law enforcement – to keep the crypto economy safe. Our two companies share this vision to provide security and trust throughout the ecosystem. We are thrilled to join the Mastercard family to scale CipherTrace’s reach across the globe.

Dave Jevans, CEO, CipherTrace

Mastercard added it’s joining forces with a broad set of partners, including fintech companies, crypto-wallet providers, and governments, to further drive innovation in the digital assets space. A year ago, the credit card giant teamed up with Blockchain Australia and VeChain to track Aussie food and wine exports with blockchain technology.

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Australia Blockchain Crypto News

Australian Dairy Farmers to Add Milk to the Blockchain

The Australian dairy industry has become the latest to start using blockchain technology to enable traceability and provide access regarding provenance.

The Australian Dairy Traceability Guideline, released on September 8, sets out common terms and codes for products in various parts of the supply chain. It will enable participants in the industry to track milk and dairy products and allow for real-time payment, having introduced a standard form contract to which both farmer and processor can be parties.

The technology will enable all involved in the sector to utilise the same approach to track products.

About the Industry

In order to remain successful, the dairy industry needed to address structural issues and the market power imbalance between farmers and processors. Australia’s share of the global trade in dairy has declined from 16 percent in the 1990s to only 6 percent today, and the number of dairy farms across the country has decreased from 15,000 to just over 5,000 over the same period.

This shrinkage of the industry has meant that profitability and productivity have become more reliant on how technology, information and data are shared, captured and used for mutual benefit.

Meting increased demand of customers in Australia and abroad will require new ways of operating, which is why the industry is looking to blockchain and smart contracts.

Blockchain and Smart Contract Assistance

In an increasingly globalised society, more information is sought about milk production, quality and consumption, and provenance. This is becoming a powerful tool for the industry and is helping to shape how it operates.

As the dairy industry modernises, more technology is becoming available to capture and share data about important production, product management and processing activity.  Sensors are increasingly being used to monitor production, reduce manual tasks, provide quality assurance, and automate business processes – including events that may trigger smart contract conditions.

The Australian Dairy Traceability Guideline

Blockchain and distributed ledger technology will combine to capture and share information about supply chain events. Blockchain will harness data on milk production, quality, and transport information, and when farmers and processors enter into standard agreements, ledger technology will automate payments using smart contracts.

Dairy Joins Other Australian Industries

Dairy is the latest Australian industry to get into blockchain. Last month, Crypto News Australia reported on how the merino wool industry has enlisted blockchain to ensure transparency of the entire supply chain. Also in August, Australia’s prized Kakadu plum industry embraced blockchain in the same manner.

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Blockchain Crypto Art Crypto News NFTs Sports

NFL Prohibits Teams From Launching NFTs and Crypto Sponsorship

In a move that counters the trend in most other major sports, from football to boxing to cricket, the US National Football League (NFL) has banned its teams from selling non-fungible tokens (NFTs) or sponsorships to cryptocurrency trading firms.

As reported on sports website The Athletic on September 3, clubs are restricted from selling “advertisements for specific cryptocurrencies, initial coin offerings, other cryptocurrency sales or any other media category as it relates to blockchain [or] digital assets”, according to the NFL guidelines.

However, the policy does allow for sponsorships with companies that mainly provide investment advisory or fund management services related to cryptocurrency, along the lines of Grayscale Investments’ agreement with the New York Giants.

Rule Does Not Appear to Apply to Specific Players

Tom Brady with wife Gisele Bündchen. Source: Us magazine

Individual ventures seem to be exempt from the rule. For example, star quarterback Tom Brady has a joint stake in crypto derivatives exchange FTX with his Brazilian supermodel wife Gisele Bündchen, and he also owns an NFT platform in partnership with sports betting operator DraftKings. Brady’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers teammate Rob “Gronk” Gronkowski recently sold an NFT collection, while Kansas City quarterback Patrick Mahomes released his own collection of NFTs on MakersPlace in March.

Russell Okung, first NFL player to be part-paid in bitcoin. Source: oldnorthbanter.com

Carolina Panthers lineman Russell Okung announced last December he would be getting half of his US$13 million salary paid in bitcoin. Okung timed his decision well, as the NFL had just capped the league’s salaries at US$180 million. Some suggest Okung is now the highest paid NFL player thanks to his crypto manoeuvre.

The NFL policy places it at odds with other major sports in the NFT space. The NBA has pursued a lucrative partnership with Dapper Labs’ NBA Top Shot dating back to May last year, and in July Major League Baseball launched its own NFT marketplace with Fanatics-owned Candy Digital.

The Athletic’s report does not disclose any negative feedback from players who have already participated with crypto firms, or whether they have been granted any form of immunity from the new ban.

Possible Reasons for the Ban

It has been suggested that teams are not permitted to sell NFTs because the league is developing its own strategy for sports digital trading cards and art. While other leagues have opened the floodgates for digital assets, the NFL is notoriously cautious with new commercial categories. For example, it trod very cautiously with gambling and alcohol promotions before eventually relaxing its restrictions.

In the case of cryptocurrency, the league currently only allows teams to align with companies that are a step removed from trading.

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Blockchain Crypto News Gas NFTs Solana

Solana Booms as NFT Projects Consider Switching From Ethereum

As the NFT space grows, more artists and content creators could move their works from Ethereum to Solana, the high-performance blockchain, due to the excessively high fees of the ETH network.

Ethereum is the largest NFT minting hub for now, though network congestion, slow transactions, high fees and other hurdles are prompting content creators to migrate to other NFT-supporting blockchains, and Solana seems to be the DeFi protocol picking up the most momentum for NFTs.

Take the example of a group called “Burnt Banksy”, which is building a blockchain platform on Solana called Burnt Finance. It all started when the group bought an original artwork from the otherwise anonymous English street artist known as Banksy for US$95,000 and resold it for US$400,000 on OpenSea, the leading decentralised NFT marketplace.

Innovative Features Make a Bull Case

While there are other platforms such as Polkadot, Binance Smart Chain and Cardano that offer scaling solutions with low gas fees, NFTs are growing faster on Solana than in other protocols.

One of the reasons is that Solana uses innovative features such as the cryptographic clock system called PoH (Proof of History), which manages to support 65,000 TPS (transactions per second) with a $0.0015 average fee per transaction.

Another reason that Solana is gaining momentum on the NFT market is that the level of competition is soaring on ETH-based platforms. It’s difficult to sustain businesses models on these platforms while also keeping pace with gas fees. Content creators with cheaper collections – around US$100 to US$500 raribles or collectibles – may expect Solana to stand out from ETH competition by offering cheaper NFTs thanks to Solana’s lower gas fees.

Other types of NFTs could thrive in Solana. Fractionalisation is a recent trend that’s blowing up now in the DeFi community. The idea is that you can buy a fraction of an NFT and receive exposure to it instead of paying for the complete piece, something that could work with Solana but wouldn’t with ETH’s current gas fees. For instance, if you want to buy a piece of a CryptoPunk for US$20, you would probably pay a similar amount for it in gas fees.

Solana’s NFT Marketplace Also Booming

Solanart is the protocol’s NFT marketplace, which recently registered an expanding transaction volume with over US$5 million in transactions in a single day.

As the NFT industry grows, the crypto community is shifting its eyes to other potential protocols to build on, and Solana seems one of the preferred candidates. The ETH community, on the other hand, is looking to the rollout of ETH 2.0, which is expected to fix the network’s scaling challenges and gas fees.

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Australia Blockchain Crypto News Education Jobs

Report: Crypto and Blockchain Jobs Up 118% in 10 Months

Cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology have boomed in recent years and organisations need to expand their abilities. Given the relative newness of the industry, jobs and qualifications have not really been geared toward developing blockchain, but this is now changing. Organisations need to appoint individuals with the necessary know-how if they are to keep pace with changes in the market.

In a report released by The Korea IT Times, crypto and blockchain companies have been doing just that, and the number of jobs in those fields is rapidly rising. Organisations have an increasing need for employees with specific crypto and blockchain knowledge. Because of sheer demand, crypto recruitment shortages have been experienced as exchanges have had to compete with banks for the best in the business.

According to data from crypto trading simulator Crypto Parrot, as of mid-July this year crypto and blockchain job postings had grown an impressive 118 percent over the previous 10 months.

Jobs Wanted, Though Not So Much in Software Development

The growth has come with a shift in the most sought-after roles. For example, the share of management posts in crypto and blockchain increased 29.87 percent year-on-year as of July 16, while human resources posts rose a massive 200 percent over the same period.

By contrast, software development jobs have slipped to 29.7 percent of all crypto and blockchain job posts, compared to 34.8 percent in 2020.

Twitter accounts such as Cryptocurrency Jobs post available jobs daily:

In its report, The Korea IT Times observed that blockchain-related roles appear to attract a higher salary range than other technology posts, due to the required strong knowledge of cryptography and expertise in ledger economics and object-orientated programming.

The industry is also finding favour in remote workers due to the pandemic, citing that it proves a good fit for an industry built on decentralisation. Remote working also encourages core developers and researchers to engage with many organisations and employers on different projects.

As crypto, blockchain and DeFi have gained traction in educational institutions, the report indicates that many developers in these sectors remain self-taught. Data suggests that universities and institutions still lag in this area.

Australia Embraces Crypto and Blockchain 

Australia is fast becoming a major player in the world of crypto and blockchain. TAFE Queensland, in partnership with Blockchain Collective, for example, has become the first Australian tertiary institution to offer a registered Diploma of Applied Blockchain.

Australia is also at the forefront of becoming a crypto-friendly country as politicians advocate for better regulations to attract new investors and create more job opportunities for Australians.