PRICE CHANGE: WTD/YTD

- BTC ($39,003): +4% / -17%
- ETH ($2,629): +1% / -29%
- XRP ($0.74): +3% / -12%
- UNI ($8.73): -10% / -49% 
- Crypto Market Cap ($1.7T): +3% / -21%
- BTC Dominance: 42%
- ETH Dominance: 18% 

STABLECOIN MARKET CAP CHANGE: WTD/YTD

- Tether ($80B): 0% / +2%
- USDC ($53B): -1% / +25% 

NFT 3M TRADING VOLUMES

THIS WEEK IN CRYPTO

- DeFi developer Andre Cronje and his frequent collaborator Anton Nell announced they were quitting DeFi and were discontinuing the front-ends for many of their projects including Yearn, Keeper, Multichain, and Chainlist. Yearn (YFI) fell 13% and Fantom (FTM) was down 15% in 24 hours. Solidly (SOLID), their new DeFi protocol which launched last week, fell almost 65% on the news. Tweet. Link. 

- The total market cap of crypto fell this week along with broader markets as Russia continued its ongoing invasion of Ukraine. Link. 

- Mastercard, Visa, PayPal, and Revolut ceased operations in Russia. Link. 

- Volumes and prices for NFTs fell this month, but unique traders and number of sales increased. OpenSea's trading volume is down 30% over the last 7 days. Average selling price of an NFT fell below $2,000, compared to an all-time high of almost $6,900 on Jan 2. Link. 

- NFT marketplace OpenSea removed collections and blocked users based in Iran due to US sanctions. Link. Link.

- Also this week, Infura, which hosts Ethereum nodes and operates blockchain infra, accidentally blocked users in Venezuela from accessing their MetaMask wallets after updating settings to comply with new sanctions. Infura is currently blocking access to Iran, North Korea, Cuba, Syria and the Crimea, Donetsk, and Luhansk regions of Ukraine. Venezuela's access was eventually restored. Link. 

- Nadya Tolokonnikova, activist and Pussy Riot co-founder, launched UnicornDAO, an art collectors fund that will invest in NFT projects from female and non-binary artists. As few as 5% of NFT sales go towards projects from female artists. UnicornDAO is backed by MoonPay, Guy Oseary, Yuga Labs, Beeple, Pak, and Gary Vee's VaynerFund. Link. 

- Shake Shack is offering customers 15% bitcoin back for purchasing items through Cash App, a digital wallet from Block (fka Square). Link. 

- Crypto metaverse project Sandbox hit 2 million registered users. Link.  

- Ukraine cancelled a crypto airdrop to donors. Instead it will have NFTs to support the country's armed forces. The Ukrainian government and NGOs have received over $55 million in crypto across 102k+ donations since the crisis began. Link.  

- Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the US will monitor crypto exchanges to ensure they are complying with sanctions. Many major exchanges are complying with applicable sanctions against Russia, but refused requests from the Ukrainian government to block addresses of Russian users and halt support of the Russian ruble. Link. Link. 

- NFT gaming project Pixelmon revealed its artwork and the poor quality caused many to accuse the project of being a scam. The creator said the in-game assets would look better than what was seen on OpenSea. Pixelmon made $70 million in its Feb mint. Link.  

- Crypto game Axie Infinity is increasing its marketplace fees from 4.25% to 5.25%. The additional 1% will go to creators who drive new players to the game - if no code is input the full 5.25% is sent to Axie's treasury. Axie had decreased token rewards earlier this month, and has seen a significant decline in volumes and retention. Link. 
 
- Hackers claim to have a customized driver that allows Nvidia's GPU graphics cards to be used for mining crypto. Nvidia had introduced the limiter on its graphic cards in order to limit usage to PC gamers following supply shortages driven by crypto miners. Link. 

- Ukraine DAO sold an NFT of the Ukrainian flag for 2,258 (~$6.75 million) via PartyBid. The money is going to support Ukraine. Link. 

- Over $30 billion of Terra's LUNA token is staked, representing a majority of the token's $34 billion market cap. It's the second most staked token behind Solana. Participants are earning almost 7% yields. Link. 

- Ethereum miners made almost $1.2 billion in revenue in February - $1.1 billion from block subsidies and $110 million from transaction fees. This was a 15% decrease from January. Link. 

- Treasure, the largest NFT marketplace on Arbitrum, saw roughly $1.4 million worth of NFTs stolen from an exploit on its contract. The marketplace was paused and users were asked to de-list their NFTs. Link. Detail on exploit. 

- FTX is investing at least $100 million and up to $1 billion in projects that help humanity. Link. 

- Schwab filed to create a "Crypto Economy ETF" which would index to companies benefiting from or utilizing crypto or blockchain tech. Link. Filing. 

- Social media platform Parler is launching a Solana NFT marketplace, DeepRedSky, and its first 10k NFT collection called "Official CryptoTrump Club" includes pictures of Donald Trump in various settings. Link. 

- The SEC has sent subpoenas to a number of NFT projects for information about their token offerings. Indications are the agency is looking into fractionalization and NFTs as a fundraising mechanism. Link. 

- A smart contract bug caused a premature unlock of millions of Convex Finance tokens, causing the price of CVX to fall 20% in just a few hours. Link. 

- Stablecoin issuer Circle delayed its DeFi API over regulatory concerns. The DeFi API product would have helped businesses access Compound on Ethereum. Link. 

- Citadel founder Ken Griffin said the firm plans to be a market maker in crypto in the coming months. Link. Interview. 

- HEIR, a Solana-based fan engagement platform from Michael Jordan, launched its first NFT collection 6 Rings. It originally wanted to sell 10k NFTs but reduced the collection to 5k at 2.3 SOL each (~$221). 6 Rings holders are "founding fans" and have access to an upcoming platform that connects athletes with their fans. Link. 

- Tenderly, a blockchain infra company that makes it easier for developers to build blockchain products, raised $40 million in Series B funding. Developers use Tenderly to monitor the health of their dApps and smart contracts. Link. 

- Electric Capital closed on $1 billion of assets - $400 million to invest in equity of crypto startups and $600 million to invest directly in crypto tokens. Link. Link. 

- Dolly Patterson launched "Dollyverse" with Blockchain Creative Labs and Eluvio. Dollyverse will include the release of a co-branded book with James Patterson, an album, NFTs, and a livestreamed performance at SXSW. Link. 

- Dolphin Entertainment is partnering with NFT collection The Flower Girls to make scripted and unscripted TV series, books, games, music, events, and merch inspired by the NFT collection. Dolphin produces children's programming like Nickelodeon shows "Zoey 101" and "Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide". Link.