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Our weekly updates are put together by folks deep in the crypto scene, giving you a clear picture of what's happening without overwhelming you.
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To Watch This Week
AIRDROPS + ALPHASep 12, 2024
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Coins
Coinbase Wrapped Bitcoin Sparks Pushback from Justin Sun
Coinbase's launch of its wrapped Bitcoin product, cbBTC, has ignited a fierce debate within the industry, with Tron (TRON) founder Justin Sun lambasting the new offering, calling it a "dark day for BTC" and warning of significant risks to decentralized finance. Speaking with Decrypt, however, a Coinbase spokesperson stood firm on the product's security and reliability. The cbBTC token is available on Ethereum and Coinbase's Base network and can be used in various DeFi platforms. "cbBTC lacks P...
Sep 15, 2023
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The Coins
What Are Wrapped Tokens? How They Work and What They’re Used For
One way to understand blockchains such as Bitcoin and Ethereum is as separate distributed databases. As blockchains are separate, they can’t communicate easily with each other. You can’t use your Bitcoin directly on the Ethereum blockchain, because only the Bitcoin blockchain “knows” that you hold Bitcoin. Wrapped tokens were created as a solution to this problem. With wrapped tokens, you can effectively move assets between blockchains and use them across the crypto ecosystem. What are wrapp...
May 17, 2022
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The Coins
What is Wrapped Bitcoin?
Bitcoin is the world’s first, largest, and most-recognized crypto asset. Since Bitcoin’s creation over a decade ago, the technology behind the revolutionary “peer-to-peer electronic cash system” has largely remained the same. But Bitcoin isn't the be-all and end-all of cryptocurrency. On smart contract blockchains such as Ethereum, developers have created a thriving decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem. In order to use Bitcoin within Ethereum's DeFi ecosystem, it's necessary to create an ERC-...
Feb 23, 2022
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Coins
Wrapped Bitcoin Inflows Stall as Ethereum DeFi Use Down: Report
Despite Wrapped Bitcoin's surging popularity in 2021, its supply growth has stagnated since December of last year, according to a report from crypto financial intelligence provider CoinMetrics this week. Wrapped Bitcoin is an ERC-20 Ethereum token backed 1:1 by Bitcoin (BTC). All wBTC is redeemable for actual BTC held custodially in a multi-signature wallet controlled by BitGo. The asset is similar to dollar-pegged stablecoins, which allow holders to effectively transfer and utilize their fiat m...
Feb 8, 2021
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DeFi
Wrapped Bitcoin Hits Record Volume of $143 Million on Uniswap
22Bitcoin’s price is near its all-time high, but that’s not the only metric rising to record levels, as Wrapped Bitcoin trading on the Uniswap exchange continues to grow. Uniswap trading volume for WBTC rose to a new single-day all-time high of nearly $143 million on February 6, according to blockchain data provider Glassnode, part of a stunning rise that has seen Bitcoin worth hundreds of millions of dollars make its way onto the Ethereum blockchain. Wrapped BTC volume on Uniswap over time. Ima...
Oct 15, 2020
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Coins
Coinbase Pro to List Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC)
Crypto exchange Coinbase today announced that starting Monday, October 19, its “Pro” exchange will support Wrapped Bitcoin, or WBTC. The San Francisco-based company, which operates one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, said that it would accept deposits of WBTC on Monday from US customers outside of New York state. Trading will commence on “or after 9AM Pacific Time (PT) Tuesday, October 20, if liquidity conditions are met.” It’ll go live with two pairings: WBTC-USD and WBTC-USD....