Edition #8 - 11 MAR 2022
Average cost of a transaction on the network falls to below $10 for the first time since August.
gaming developments
Yield Guild Games, one of the pioneer P2E guilds, reaches 20,000 scholar milestone – doubles its scholar total since December;
Axie Infinity racked up NFT trading volume of $3.5 billion throughout 2021, making the collection, by far, the most traded amongst blockchain games - representing two thirds of the total gaming NFT market;
The Sandbox hits 2 million player mark for the first time, on the back of its “Alpha Season 2” event.
metaverses & Adoption
US President Joe Biden has released a crypto executive order on Wednesday, with highlights including consumer protection, illegal crypto activity and plans for a digital dollar;
Total NFT sales volumes exceeded $17 billion in 2021, a jump of 200x from 2020, according to a NonFungible report;
Adobe’s creative Behance platform adds support for NFTs on Solana and Polygon;
Turkey’s Ankara University is launching its official NFT course.
zen portfolio highlight
This week we highlight our portfolio company Moon – an upcoming interactive, political, and social Metaverse created to virtually explore and colonize the moon. Built on BNB Chain, Moon will offer a sophisticated gameplay with multiple avenues to engage in business, build communities, and create a thriving civilization – all in a lunar setting.
Moon is inspired by the most famous and successful open-ended and real-time strategy games of all time, including Sim City, Rise of Nations, and Age of Empires.
Make sure to secure your own piece of the Moon, ahead of the official launch in Q3 2022. Find out more on Twitter, Discord and Telegram.
defi
Goldman Sachs is starting to offer cryptocurrency exposure to its clients by partnering with Galaxy Digital and its Ethereum Fund
Fantasm Finance, a synthetic asset protocol, loses $2.6 million in yet another DeFi hack;
Cathie Wood, founder of the famed ARK Invest, sees DeFi as threat to all traditional finance arms;
Stripe, the US payment processing giant, adds crypto and NFT support to its traditional transactions platform.
funding rounds
Immutable, an NFT-focused protocol, completed its $200 million Series C round this week with a $2.5 billion valuation led by Temasek, including Animoca Brands and Tencent;
Rarify, an NFT infrastructure provider, closed its $10 million Series A round late last week, led by Pantera Capital at $100 million valuation;
Espresso Systems, a Web3 privacy solutions developer, raised a $32 million Seed round, led by Greylock Partners and Slow Ventures at undisclosed valuation.
