NFT sales limp into August with a 25% drop from June to July amid crypto slump

NFT sales limp into August with a 25% drop from June to July amid crypto slump

Market analysts are mixed on outlook for non-fungible tokens, as some see mostly gloom, others point to glimmers of optimism.

Non-fungible token (NFT) sales in July on secondary markets fell 25% from June to US$650 million, the second month in a row under US$1 billion, according to data from NFT aggregation site CryptoSlam, and reflecting a broader crypto slump.

Sales had peaked in January at US$4.7 billion, with more than 1 million unique buyers in the market.

“The current [crypto] market right now is in a bear market,” Anndy Lian, blockchain author and entrepreneur and founding member of NFT creator studio Influxo, told Forkast in an interview. “So [NFT] sales actually reflect very much on how the market is reacting.”

Yehudah Petscher, NFT relations strategist for CryptoSlam, said he thinks the market has yet to find the bottom.

However, he did find some optimism in the number of unique buyers in the market, pointing out buyers fell just 7% month-on-month in July to 532,000, which remains higher than in the same month last year.

This shows, Petscher says, that while total sales in U.S. dollars are down, the number of transactions make for a slightly more optimistic outlook.

“NFTs are in rough place right now, but I still think in a very healthy place as far as growth [or] as far as transactions [are concerned],” Petscher said.

The so-called “Merge” for Ethereum could also give the NFT market a shot in the arm, as the leading blockchain for NFTs is slated to move to a proof-of-stake (PoS) network in coming months.

The move to PoS will reportedly reduce the energy used in the Ethereum network by up to 99%, blunting environmental criticism of how the network operates.

“I think [the Merge] will create another spur of hype among the Ethereum fan base,” Lian said, but warning that transaction fees — another common criticism of the Ethereum network — will likely remain high.

NFT and crypto markets now seem to be largely correlated, despite expectations during the NFT boom of late 2021 and early 2022 that they would be inversely correlated. The view then was investors would be less willing to buy NFTs when the crypto they were denominated in was gaining in U.S. dollar terms.

Rather than falling crypto values driving the price of NFTs up to compensate, the overall negativity in the market is driving prices lower to attract what buyers are there, Petscher said.

“There’s not a lot of liquidity and people are worried that there’s not going to be buyers when they’re looking to sell, so it is a race to the bottom,” Petscher said. “We can see that with prices across the board.”

Apes (still) rule

Projects from Yuga Labs continued to dominate the top of the bestseller list in July, with Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC), Mutant Ape Yacht Club (MAYC) and CryptoPunks all in the top five.

This made the project the seventh to reach the US$1 billion in total sales mark, despite it only launching in May.

With over US$30 million in secondary sales in July, soccer-based collection Sorare came in third on CryptoSlam’s list. Sorare allows people to buy and sell players as part of a global fantasy football competition as another way to interact with the world’s game.

Petscher told Forkast that he expects sports to be a real growth area, as these tokens typically bring with them increased utility.

Another growth area is art, Petscher says, who sees attention beginning to move away from NFTs as simply profile pictures to more fully fledged pieces of art as more creators move into the space.

“It’s just the tip of the iceberg,” Petscher said. “Art [NFTs] are just starting, it’s here in a big way and it will just keep growing.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

Original Source: https://forkast.news/nft-sales-limp-july-25drop-june-crypto-slump/

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Who owns the most ethereum? Biggest ETH holders

Who owns the most ethereum? Biggest ETH holders

Ethereum’s long-awaited upgrade to a proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus mechanism is set to begin in the third or fourth quarter of 2022. The event is expected to increase scalability and adoption rate for the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalisation, ether (ETH).

What are the major ether use cases? Will ETH supply change after migrating to PoS? Who owns the most ethereum (ETH) coins? In this article, we discuss the project in detail and find out more about ethereum holders.

What is ethereum?

Ethereum is the world’s leading smart contracts blockchain. Its native cryptocurrency, ether (ETH), is the second largest after bitcoin (BTC), with a market capitalisation of more than $200.71bn at the time of writing (28 July).

Founded by Russia-born, Canadian programmer Vitalik Buterin and a host of co-founders, including Gavin Wood, Charles Hoskin, Joseph Lubin and Anthonio di Lorio, Ethereum debuted in 2015, preceded by a whitepaper published by Buterin in 2014.

In its whitepaper, Ethereum described a cryptographic ledger that allowed users to encode smart contracts and build decentralised applications (Dapps) within its blockchain.

Built on Bitcoin’s innovation, Ethereum has several differences with Bitcoin which was launched in 2009.

The role of Ethereum in the blockchain industry differs from that of bitcoin. The former is a platform for developing and deploying decentralised applications (Dapps) on its network, whereas the latter focuses on facilitating peer-to-peer decentralised payments.

In short, Ethereum could be compared to a market place of blockchain-based financial services, games, social networks, and other Dapps. According to State of the Dapps, as of 28 July 2022, out of 4,073 decentralised applications, 2,970 were built on the Ethereum blockchain.

Tokenomics is another distinction between the two leading blockchains. Unlike bitcoin, ether has no hard cap.

The Ethereum network is gradually expanding, as the total number of addresses continues trending up. According to Glassnode, it increased from around 10,000 addresses in 2015 to more than 155 million addresses in June 2022.

Ethereum blockchain: Number of addresses

Ethereum use cases

Ethereum smart-contracts helped the platform to become widely used in various sectors, from decentralised finance (DeFI), to gaming and non-fungible tokens (NFT) space.

Top 20 Ethereum-based tokens, as of 28 July, included: stablecoins, like Tether (USDT) and USD Coin (USDC); DeFi cryptocurrencies, like Uniswap (UNI) and Chainlink (LINK); and gaming cryptocurrencies, like ApeCoin (APE), Decentraland (MANA), The Sandbox (SAND) and Axie Infinity (AXS).

According to Ark Invest’s Big Ideas 2022 report: “After a turbulent 2018-2019, Ethereum emerged in 2021 as the predominant smart contracting platform for decentralized finance and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
“Ether (ETH) is both the preferred collateral in DeFi and the unit of account in NFT marketplaces, suggesting that it is likely to capture a portion of the $123 trillion global money supply.”

However, the dominance of DeFi applications on Ethereum blockchain has decreased lately, while NFT transactions have been growing. According to Glassnode’s data as of 25 July 2022, consumption of gas by NFT projects surged 6.2%, since November 2021, while DeFi application’s gas usage plunged from 27.5% to 15.1%.

Ethereum supply: How many ether (ETH) coins are there?

The Ethereum network began with 72 million Ether coins in circulation. A crowd sale conducted in July and August 2014 to fund the project’s development sold about 83% of its initial supply or 60 million.

In exchange for an ETH wallet address, the crowd sale participants sent a total of 31,000 bitcoin to a designated Bitcoin address. The participants were promised to receive the ETH that they bought when the network was launched.

The initial ETH price for the crowd sale was set at 2,000 ETH per BTC, and it was intended to progressively decrease to a final price of 1,337 ETH per BTC in the 42-day public sale that ended on 2 September 2014.

The crowd sale raised 31,529 BTC (approximately $18m at the time) in exchange for 60 million ETH, according to blockchain research firm Messari.

The total number of ethereum coins in circulation today differs from the early days. Following the launch of the Ethereum Mainnet in 2015, each block minted a new ETH. Block rewards, which were initially set at 5 ETH per block, have now been reduced to 2 ETH per block.

Ethereum does not have a fixed supply. As of 28 July 2022, circulating ETH supply totals 121.73m, according to CoinMarketCap.

Ethereum (ETH) historical price chart

ETH supply after PoS migrating

Ethereum is in the process of migrating to proof-of stake (PoS) consensus which will see ETH ditching its proof-of-work (PoW) miners. It will instead reward newly-issued ETH tokens to validators who have staked ETH tokens on the network.

The upgrade to PoS or known as ‘The Merge’ and ‘Ethereum 2.0’ is touted as the biggest event on the cryptocurrency markets. Validators depositing ETH through staking will reduce the circulating supply of ETH in the future.

What is your sentiment on ETH/USD?

The network said only 1,600 ETH a day will remain after the Merge, dropping the total issuance by 90%.

As of 28 July 2022, over 13.8 million ETH had been staked in anticipation of The Merge, removing approximately 11.5% of the coin’s current supply from circulation.

According to Glassnode’s data as of 9 July, Lido, a project offering a staking solution for Ethereum, accounted for 4.137 million ETH staked (31.8%), while the combined stake of three crypto exchanges Coinbase, Kraken and Binance accounted for 3.505 million ETH (27% of the total amount staked).

The Merge is expected to happen later in 2022, which Ethereum said will reduce the energy required to secure Ethereum by about 99.95%.

Who has the most ethereum?

There were 201.76 million ethereum holders as of 28 July, up from 199.58 million a month earlier on 29 June, according to CoinCarp.

Who are the biggest ethereum holders? The largest ETH-holding address was an ETH2 deposit smart contract which held over 13.1 million coins or close to 11% of ETH’s circulating as of 28 July, according to Ethereum data on-chain Etherscan and Coincarp.

The second largest ETH-holding  address was a Wrapped Ether smart contract with 4.28 million ETH (3.58% of circulating supply), as of 28 July.

The third and fourth highest amounts of ETH were deposited in wallet addresses identified as belonging to crypto exchanges Kraken and Binance.

Based on data from Etherscan, two unidentified wallet addresses in fifth and sixth places are top holders of ethereum outside those deposited in the smart contracts and crypto exchanges.

The two unidentified wallets had about 1.95 million and 1.49 million ETH tokens in them, respectively, representing 1.6% and 1.2% of the total ETH supply, as of 28 July 2022.

The two wallets mentioned above were the only two unidentified addresses among the top 10 ether holders. The remaining protocols were identified as smart contracts, cryptocurrency exchanges, and decentralised finance (DeFi) protocols.

It is unknown how much ETH holdings do early contributors and ethereum insiders currently have. In October 2018, Buterin disclosed his wallet address on Twitter. He added that he “never personally held more than ~0.9% of all ETH, and my net worth never came close to $1b.”

What do analysts view of Ethereum?

According to Ark Invest, Ethereum could displace many traditional financial services and ether (ETH) could compete as global money.

“As financial services move on-chain, decentralized networks are likely to take share from existing financial intermediaries. The beneficiaries of this shift include Ethereum, the base protocol, and DeFi, the decentralized applications built on top of Ethereum,” the company said.

Anndy Lian, intergovernmental blockchain advisor, said Ethereum’s upgrade from PoW to PoS is a big move for the cryptocurrency market.

“This is like the launch of Windows 95 where all good things will follow,” said Lian who is also the author of Blockchain Revolution 2030.
“Ethereum’s transition to PoS will bring many benefits, including improved efficiency, scalability, security and reduced centralization. I am looking forward to more surprises,” he said, adding that there will be more upgrades after The Merge.

Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile, including for ethereum (ETH) and bitcoin (BTC). It is important to do your own research on a coin or token to determine if it is a good fit for your portfolio. Whether ethereum (ETH) is a suitable asset for you will depend on your risk tolerance and how much you intend to trade.

When looking for ethereum projections, bear in mind that analysts’ and algorithm-based ETH crypto price predictions can be wrong. Their expectations are based on fundamental and technical studies of the cryptocurrency’s past performance, which offers no guarantee of future results. And never trade money that you cannot afford to lose.

 

Original Source: https://capital.com/who-owns-the-most-ethereum

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Anndy Lian’s speech at Block Review Thailand Roundtable- Ethereum Merge: Everything you need to know

Anndy Lian’s speech at Block Review Thailand Roundtable- Ethereum Merge: Everything you need to know

Block Review organized a roundtable lunch in Bangkok Thailand, on 26 July 2022. 20 carefully selected guests were present at the event. The guest comprises former minister, senior bankers, and c-suite technology founders.

The roundtable aims to let stakeholders understand more about blockchain technology and how this can help with their businesses.

The event is closed door, held under the Chatham House Rule, participants are free to use the information received, but neither the identity nor the affiliation of the speaker(s), nor that of any other participant, may be revealed. Mr Anndy Lian, who is based in Singapore is not able to attend the event in person, had his session recorded with the agreement of all the participants. Anndy Lian is an all-rounded business strategist in Asia. He has provided advisory across a variety of industries for local, international, public listed companies and governments. He is an early blockchain adopter and experienced serial entrepreneur, book author, investor, board member and keynote speaker.

Currently, he is appointed as the Chief Digital Advisor at Mongolia Productivity Organization, championing national digitization.

Prior to his current appointments, he was the Chairman of BigONE Exchange, a global top 30 ranked crypto spot exchange and was also the Advisory Board Member for Hyundai DAC. He also played a pivotal role as the Blockchain Advisor for Asian Productivity Organisation (APO), an intergovernmental organization committed to improving productivity in the Asia-Pacific region.

The topic of the roundtable is Ethereum Merge: Everything you need to know.

The Merge represents the joining of the existing execution layer of Ethereum (the Mainnet we use today) with its new proof-of-stake consensus layer, the Beacon Chain. It eliminates the need for energy-intensive mining and instead secures the network using staked ETH. A truly exciting step in realizing the Ethereum vision – more scalability, security, and sustainability.

At the Ethereum Community Conference in France, Vitalik Buterin said that Ethereum is just 40% complete—and there’s plenty more coming after the “merge.” The Ethereum mainnet with the proof-of-stake beacon chain—is just the first in a series of planned upgrades.

Ethereum will then undergo further upgrades, which he calls the “surge,” “verge,” “purge,” and “splurge,” he told the conference. These terms are no strangers to Ethereum followers.

Highlights of Ethereum 2.0 aka The Merge:

– Ethereum will move to a POS consensus when it merges with the Beacon Chain

– ETH2 is not a new asset. ETH in your wallet or exchange account will not be impacted.

– Ethereum’s transition to POS will bring numerous benefits, including improved efficiency, scalability, and security, as well as reduced centralization

Anndy answered some of the questions that were being asked:

  • What is Ethereum 2.0’s release date?
    The Ethereum development community is making good progress and we expect ETH 2 to go live in 2022. As of July 2022, the Ethereum core developers updated the Ethereum merge timeline with a tentative launch date sometime during the week of September 19th, 2022.

 

  • Why is Ethereum moving to proof of stake?
    Ethereum’s transition to proof of stake will bring numerous benefits, including improved efficiency, scalability, and security, as well as reduced centralization.

 

  • Will ETH gas fees be cheaper?
    No, it will not be cheaper. Gas fees are governed by simple supply and demand. If there is more demand than supply, then gas prices are high. If there is more supply than demand, then gas prices will be low.

 

  • Is ETH 2.0 a new coin?
    No. There is only one $ETH. There is no $ETH2.

 

  • Is Ethereum going to be on POS?
    Yes. Ethereum’s current POW consensus will be shelved. However, the network will still operate the same to its end users.

 

  • Is ETH 2.0 going to help the current ecosystem?
    Yes. The projects that are built on Ethereum will benefit greatly from the upgrade.

 

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