Category: NFTs

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Crypto News NFTs

Ethereum-Based Azuki NFT Sells for Record $1.4 Million

Azukies, an Ethereum-based collection of hand-drawn, anime-style profile picture non-fungible tokens, are the hottest trend in the NFT ecosystem. The project reached a milestone this week with the sale of a single Azuki for a record US$1.4 million.

Azukies comprise 10,000 avatars released by a Los Angeles-based group called Chiru Labs. Each Azuki comes with unique traits and stats, some of them being ronin samurais or skateboarders holding a boombox.

Azukies Outsell BAYC and CryptoPunks

These NFTs have garnered huge sales since their release in January, surpassing some of the biggest collections in the market, such as the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) and CryptoPunks in terms of sales – over US$300 million across secondary markets in February.

Azuki #9605 sold for 420.7 ETH (US$1.4 million) on the OpenSea marketplace, as revealed by Twitter user trebooomin, who said he and his friends of Red Bean DAO sold it to a buyer with the moniker Bitcoin4Freedom on Twitter:

Azuki #9605. Source: OpenSea

Floor Price Skyrockets

The floor price of Azukies doubled shortly after the sale – 20 ETH (US$64,155) on OpenSea and LooksRare, as per data from CoinGecko:

While Azukies are enjoying tremendous hype in the market, their audience is not immune to malicious actors. Unfortunately, Arthur Cheong – founder of DeFi venture capitalist firm Defiance Capital – last month witnessed his Ethereum wallet being drained of his NFTs, which numbered at least 17 Azukies among other valuable collectibles worth a total of US$1.7 million.

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Chiliz FTX NFTs Sports

Chiliz (CHZ) Surges Amid Launch of Testnet Enabling Sports Brands to Mint NFTs

Chiliz, creator of the fan token Socios, is inviting brands to build alongside it on Chiliz Chain 2.0 blockchain network, which launched its first testnet on March 31.

The digital asset sporting project has announced the launch of the Scoville testnet for its newly established layer-1 blockchain network, Chiliz Chain 2.0, also known as CC2.

CC2 is aiming to advance the Web3 capabilities of high-profile sporting and entertainment firms to create NFTs and fan tokens, and construct DeFi applications and play-to-earn games along with implementing a range of programs and services for their community:

Chiliz Scores High on the Scoville Scale

Chiliz has defined the fan token market with its Socios platform, signing football heavyweights such as FC Barcelona, Paris Saint-Germain and Juventus, along with the UFC, F1 teams and esports clubs, with more than 130 partners in total. Argentinian football superstar Lionel Messi has signed on as the new face of the platform.

Chiliz grabbed the attention of the crypto world when its native token CHZ grew 7,000 percent in three months amid major sports partnerships. The token also pumped after a partnership with FTX was announced in September 2021.

CC2 to Run on Brand-New Blockchain BNB

The firm has bigger ambitions beyond fan tokens, which is the reason it is developing a second-generation blockchain to allow other sports and entertainment brands to build all sorts of Web3 applications alongside Socios. A rollout for a planned mainnet is scheduled for later in 2022. With CC2, the firm will shift away from its current blockchain that is forked from Ethereum to a brand-new one built on the BNB Chain.

According to chief strategy officer Max Rabinovitch, it has always been Chiliz’s plan to expand from its initial fan token focus into the wider crypto ecosystem – to let IP holders and other builders tap into a broader platform powered by the CHZ token. The broader fan token ecosystem generates billions in monthly trading volume, with the largest listed fan token, Socios’s Manchester City FC (CITY) token having a market cap of over US$58 million.

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Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs Scams

35 NFTs Stolen in Twitter Phishing Attacks Last Week

A Mutant Ape and a Bored Ape were among 35 NFTs stolen last week via a handful of hacked verified Twitter accounts. The combined value of the phishing attack is assumed to exceed US$900,000.

The phishing incident disguised itself off the back of a Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) airdrop that happened earlier this month. BAYC had airdropped ApeCoins to Mutant Ape and Bored Ape holders, which allowed for a copycat attack by scammers who hacked verified Twitter accounts and spread fake URLs impersonating a BAYC link:

Victims of the link who were prepared to pay 0.33 ETH to take part instead encountered code that allowed the hackers access to their wallets. Some victims claimed that, although the links appeared strange, they would nonetheless be safe as they were shared by trusted public figures.

Twitter is yet to comment on the incident, despite many users feeling the social media giant is partly to blame.

Other Recent Phishing Attacks

This isn’t the first large-scale phishing attack this year. Earlier in March, US$790,000 worth of Rare Bears were stolen. The phishing scam behind the NFT theft utilised the weakened security of Discord groups to share around a ‘corrupt’ link.

More recently, a crypto venture capitalist lost US$1.7 million worth of NFTs. Arthur Cheong, the founder of Web3 and DeFi venture capital firm Defiance Capital, had his hot wallet account hacked and 59 NFTs taken.

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Crypto News Fantasy Sports NFTs Sorare Sports

Blockchain Fantasy Football Game ‘Sorare’ Signs Deal with USA Major League Soccer

Sorare has signed yet another football league to its non-fungible token (NFT) fantasy football game. US Major League Soccer (MLS) is the first American league to join the platform for digital football collectibles.

Football leagues across the globe are jumping on the NFT train by enabling a new level of participation and interaction with fans, with the novel technology gaining a lot of traction among sports fans and clubs.

As outlined in an MLS post, Sorare will become the league’s official fantasy football NFT game, adding new players to the fantasy league roster:

MLS Has Youth on its Side

According to Chris Schlosser, MLS senior vice-president of enterprise ventures, “I think [digital] collectibles on their own are a really exciting opportunity, but generally, we’re starting to see more and more in this NFT-as-utility space where people want to use their NFTs to do things, and that’s what Sorare figured out early on.”

MLS is one of the fastest-growing football leagues in the US and has one of the youngest fan bases (average 39.6 years) of any major sports league in the US. According to an article by Forbes, millennials and gen-Zers account for 58 percent of MLS supporters, making NFTs a smart move to get in with the tech-savvy crowd.

US League Joins European Heavyweights

MLS will be joining more than 230 global football leagues, including European heavyweights Bundesliga, Laliga, and Bayern Munich. The platforms’ 350k monthly users across 184 countries will now be able to also collect and use NFTs from the MLS league.

Sorare is a fantasy football game built on the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain. The platform opens doors for users to buy, sell and trade NFTs of their favourite players to build their fantasy team. Scores are tracked based on real-life performances, and players win prizes based on their rank in the league.

The platform’s last funding round in late September 2021 saw it raise US$680 million, boosting its total valuation to US$4.3 billion.

We’re excited to continue our progressive approach to bring NFTs to MLS with industry-leader Sorare. Utilizing the latest technology to provide fans the opportunity to add MLS players and future stars to their personal collections and give them an interactive free-to-play fantasy soccer game made Sorare the obvious choice.

Chris Schlosser, SVP of emerging ventures, Major League Soccer
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Crypto Art Crypto News NFTs

NFT Artist XCOPY Raises $24 Million in Minutes From Latest Drop

NFT artist XCOPY released an open edition art piece last week, raising US$24 million in a matter of minutes. As part of the drop, several other auctions of more limited XCOPY artwork ran alongside.

Most of the funds came from mints of his Max Pain piece, sold as an open edition, but a series of ranked auctions also brought in a generous amount of money.

Max Pain Sells For a Painful Price

XCOPY has again proven that high-value NFT artwork is not going anywhere fast. The London-based NFT artist launched his ‘Max Pain and Frens’ NFT drop via Nifty Gateway. The total amount raised from the drop sits at a comfortable US$24.4 million, with over US$23 million of that coming from the headline act.

Max Pain NFT. Source: Nifty Gateway

The sale for Max Pain opened at 22:30 UTC, with patrons having a window of just 10 minutes to mint an NFT, with no maximum limit on the amount that could be minted. In total, 7,394 NFTs were minted at a hefty US$3,108 each.

Along with Max Pain, two auctions for more limited XCOPY pieces went ahead. The first, entitled Waster, was launched in an edition of six and used a ranked auction system. The top six bids, ranging from US$101,000 down to $91,000, received NFTs.

Waster NFT. Source: Nifty Gateway

Along with Max Pain and Waster, another limited edition piece named Damager Luxe used the same auction system, with a winning bid of US$79,999.

Damager Luxe. Source: Nifty Gateway

Fans who held five NFTs supported on Nifty Gateway’s marketplace could also enter a raffle to purchase one of 24 Gourmet Spicy pieces for US$1.

Gourmet Spicy NFT. Source: Nifty Gateway

Also, in a follow-up to XCOPY’s last open edition drop, Afterburn holders could burn either one or two of their NFTs to receive a selection of other previously unreleased works. Afterburn was released in March 2021 for US$999 in a five-minute open edition with two other NFTs.  

NFTs Fetch Exorbitant Prices

Last year, two transactions caught the attention of the NFT community for the masses of money involved. An Axie Infinity land plot sold for US$2.5 million, a record for the game. Beeple, another NFT artist known for the inflated amounts his artworks sell for, sold programmable artwork for a whopping US$29 million. Those two cases only add to the amazing feats XCOPY has achieved.

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Australia Blockchain Crypto News DAO DeFi Immutable X Maple NFTs Synthetix

Australian Web3 Ecosystem Is Growing Fast, Driven By Crypto and Blockchain Technology

The Australian Web3 ecosystem has grown immensely over the past couple of years and is driven by cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology.

The emergence of NFTs, DeFi, and decentralised autonomous organisations (DAOs) has expanded the space. The days of ICO token raises have been superseded by building meaningful communities. Notable communities/projects in the space include Immutable, Synthetix, Sigma Prime, Maple Finance, and DAOunder, all of which have helped garner increasing interest in the ecosystem.

Australia web3 economy. Source: crypblizz

The branding surrounding Web3 has made the space more inviting than the nuanced word ‘crypto’ would have suggested a few years ago.

Aussie Blockchain History in Brief

  • pre-bitcoin 1970 -2000s: cypherpunk movement;
  • 2009 – 2013: the birth of Bitcoin and underground knowledge of the space;
  • 2014 – 2016: Ethereum launches and early adopters spring up;
  • 2017 – 2018: ICO boom and an influx of capital and interest;
  • 2018 – 2020: ‘DeFi Summer’, where projects started to build the foundations for decentralised finance;
  • 2021: NFTs, DeFi and DAO boom interest; and
  • 2022: who knows?

The following categories summarise the activities within the Australian Web3 ecosystem:

Communities/DAOs

These form the backbone that brings people together, and with recent events, many communities have moved online to Discord. In-person events such as Blockchain Week show that people are willing to meet in real life again. By bringing it all together, people feel a sense of community and the ecosystem grows accordingly.

Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs)/Gaming

NFTs took 2021 by storm and a lot of people are forking out vast amounts of money for expensive JPEGs. However, a lot of great Aussie projects such as Immutable, which was recently valued at US$3.5 billion, and Illuvium have also been making waves in the Web3 ecosystem.

Decentralised Finance (DeFi)

DeFi is such a vast category that it can be been broken down into the following:

  • Layer 1 blockchains: Fantom, Algorand, ThorChain;
  • Finance layer: Synthetix, Ren Protocol, Maple Finance, Zeta Markets and Drift;
  • Infrastructure: Rocket Pool, Chainflip, Sigma Prime; and
  • Identity: ArcX and BronID.

Venture Capital

Over the past two years, traditional Web2 funds have been spinning off an extra allocation into the space. Airtree, for example, launched a US$50 million Web3 fund, which is a very healthy sign for the growth of this sector.

Media

The right kind of media is essential in this growing space, with click-bait schemes popping up left, right and centre. Influencers who are voicing their opinions in this space can be invaluable.

Legal/Regulatory/Government

Bodies like Blockchain Australia are helping form relationships and policies within the ecosystem. Collaboration between these associations and regulatory bodies will accelerate the adoption process.

Exchanges and Retail Investors

Retail investors use these exchange platforms to enter the Web3 markets. BTC Markets, Independent Reserves, Coinjar and Coinstop are some of the first Australian native exchanges.

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Crypto Art Crypto News NFTs Payments

Visa Launches Program to Invest in NFT Creators

Payments giant Visa has launched the Visa Creator Program, a one-year product strategy and mentorship course for entrepreneurs from the art, music, fashion and film worlds who seek to augment their work with non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

The program had its beginnings in October 2021 when Visa announced former major league baseballer Micah Johnson as its first official creator. Johnson’s art has since sold for a total value of almost US$21 million. His best-known piece is Aku, a young black astronaut who digitally “travels” to the International Space Station.

Roughly 50 million artists, musicians, fashion designers and filmmakers already publish content as a source of income, with the global creator economy worth an estimated US$100 billion. Visa’s inaugural class of content creators are already engaging with NFTs, and prospective candidates who intend to join them must apply and be selected.

Program Also Offers Web3 Engagement

The Visa Creator Program offers participants opportunities to engage with Visa’s network of clients and partners, as well as providing access to “thought leaders” in the Web3 space.

Visa’s immersion in the NFT space began last August when it bought a CryptoPunk for almost US$150,000. At the time, the company’s head of crypto Cuy Sheffield said that Visa wanted to “signal [its] support” for people involved in the NFT market.

Six months later, you could say it’s a case of mission accomplished.

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Axie Infinity Crypto News Hackers NFTs

Axie Infinity Loses $625 Million in Biggest DeFi Hack on Record

Ronin, the Ethereum sidechain specifically designed for popular NFT game Axie Infinity, has been the victim of a major hack, draining approximately US$625 million worth of WETH and USDC from its bridge.

Attack Started One Week Ago

Sky Mavis – the studio behind Axie Infinity – said the attack started on March 23, almost a week before being noticed yesterday, when a user was unable to withdraw 5k ETH from the bridge. The company is now reportedly in talks with several government agencies to identify the exploiter.

The attack occurred after four Ronin validators and one Axie DAO third-party validator were compromised:

Sky Mavis’s Ronin chain currently consists of nine validator nodes. In order to recognise a Deposit event or a Withdrawal event, five out of the nine validator signatures are needed. The attacker managed to get control over Sky Mavis’s four Ronin validators and a third-party validator run by Axie DAO. 

Ronin Network statement

The attacker drained US$25 million USDC and 173.600 ETH (nearly US$600 million) from the bridge that connects Ronin with the Ethereum mainnet by using “hacked private keys” to execute the exploit. In doing so, they were able to forge two fake withdrawals (transactions 1 and 2) and steal the funds.

Biggest Hack in Crypto History by Now

This is now the largest hack in crypto history, narrowly exceeding last year’s US$600 million Poly Network hack, but still significantly larger than the US$326 million Solana wormhole hack earlier this year.

Sky Mavis is said to be working with Chainalysis to monitor the stolen funds, most of which are still in the hacker’s wallet. Additionally, the company stated that it would migrate its entire node infrastructure, so it might take a while for things to get up and start running again. Also, as a result of the attack, both Ronin and Katana DEX are temporarily halted to avoid further attack vectors.

Jeff Zirlin, co-founder of Sky Mavis, described the hack as “one of the biggest in history” at the recent NFT LA conference:

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Crypto News DeFi Hackers NFTs Scams

Suspicions Raised as $350,000 Bored Ape NFT Sells for Just $115

The owner of a Bored Ape NFT worth US$350,000 sold it for only 115 DAI (US$115) in what appears to be either a costly mistake or some kind of hack of the owner’s OpenSea account.

We’re accustomed to seeing NFTs – especially those from the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) – being sold for hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars. Mistakes abound in this space, however. Three months ago, the owner of a Bored Ape mistakenly sold his NFT for US$3,000 instead of its market value price of $300,000.

In this latest case, however, bells started ringing in the NFT community as it’s unusual to see an owner of a valuable Bored Ape accepting such a low offer.

Second Undervalued Transaction, Same Buyer, Same Day

The owner of Bored Ape #835, who goes by the moniker “cchan“, accepted a bid of only 115 DAI – an Ethereum-based stablecoin – for his NFT. But what’s striking is that cchan also sold his Mutant Ape (from the Mutant Ape Yacht Club) #11670 for 25 DAI to the same buyer on the same day.

Bored Ape #835 is now owned by a user with the handle “6315EF”.

Currency Confusion or Tax Dodge?

People on crypto Twitter started conjecturing possible explanations for this event, such as cchan confusing ETH with DAI. Another possibility is tax-loss harvesting, which is selling certain assets at a loss to offset capital gains made via the sale of other assets or stocks, thus minimising the amount of taxes owing.

However, one user on Twitter said cchan was not aware of the situation, which suggests he had his account hacked:

This is quite a significant loss for cchan, having acquired his Bored Ape #835 in August last year for 15 ETH (US$51,000 today).

The NFT space is chock-full of horror stories like this. As Crypto News Australia reported a week ago, a trader with the online handle Dino Dealer sold his US$1.2 million clipart rock for less than a cent after erroneously listing the NFT for 444 wei, the smallest denomination of ETH, instead of 444 ETH.

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Ethereum Gaming Loopring NFTs

Loopring (LRC) Surges 55% Amid Release of GameStop NFT Marketplace

The Ethereum Layer-2 protocol Loopring (LRC) surged 55 percent following the launch of the beta version of GameStop’s Loopring-powered NFT marketplace on March 23.

According to CoinGecko, the price of LRC leapt from US$0.80 to just over US$1.20 in under 12 hours. At the time of writing the price is sitting at US$1.08, up around 35 percent from its pre-launch price but still down more than 70 percent from its all-time high.

Loopring Aims For Cheap, Secure, Fast NFTs

The launch was announced by Loopring’s head of growth Adam Browman, who said the new marketplace would make NFTs accessible to all in the gaming community by reducing costs and ensuring security:

The new marketplace built atop Loopring L2 ensures that users receive the strongest digital property rights anchored by a secure, decentralised, and credibly neutral environment like Ethereum. Loopring zkRollup inherits Ethereum’s self-custodial security while abstracting away costly gas fees, leaving no one priced out.

Adam Browman, Loopring head of growth

Browman also noted that Loopring provides the performance and scalability required to run this kind of marketplace, which he says was, until recently, “unimaginable”.

Launch Sparks New Interest

Interest in Loopring exploded in November last year when rumours first emerged of its involvement in a GameStop NFT marketplace, causing the price to surge to well over US$3 and the number of Loopring Smart wallet app users to boom:

After the initial wave of interest, though, investors started to question the degree of Loopring’s involvement as other layer 2s, such as ImmutableX, were linked with the project. The announcement of this beta marketplace confirms the rumours and may signal further growth for Loopring in coming months.