TLDR Crypto 2022-11-03

Binance may buy bank 🏦, Instagram NFT mints 🖼️, is centralization inevitable? 💡

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Markets & Business

Divisions in Sam Bankman-Fried’s Crypto Empire Blur on His Trading Titan Alameda’s Balance Sheet (2 minute read)

Alameda Research's balance sheet is largely made up of FTX's FTT token. The company's assets amounted to $14.6 billion at the end of June. Its single biggest asset is $3.66 billion worth of unlocked FTT. There are about 197 million FTT worth $5.1 billion in circulation. While FTX and Alameda are officially separate companies, Alameda's balance sheet shows that the companies are unusually close.

Binance, With Over $1 Billion to Spend, Weighs Buying a Bank (1 minute read)

Binance is considering buying a bank. It is open to minority investments or a full acquisition. Every time Binance works with a bank, the bank's valuation goes up exponentially. Binance aims to capitalize on the expected increase in share price after the acquisition.
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Innovation & Launches

Instagram will soon allow select creators to make and sell NFTs directly in its app (3 minute read)

Instagram creators will soon be able to make and sell NFTs directly to fans both on and off Instagram. Meta has developed a toolkit for creators to create, showcase, and sell NFTs. Buyers will be able to purchase NFTs directly within the Instagram app through in-app purchases. Instagram will not take a cut of creator revenue for now. The feature is currently being tested with a small group in the US.

JPMorgan Dives into DeFi After CEO Trashed Crypto as ‘Ponzi’ (2 minute read)

JPMorgan's Onyx unit recently executed live foreign exchange swaps of tokenized Japanese Yen and Singapore Dollars. The swaps were made as part of Project Guardian, an initiative backed by the Monetary Authority of Singapore that aims to explore DeFi applications in wholesale funding markets. Project Guardian is currently deployed on Polygon, but it will eventually be rolled out to other blockchain networks. It uses a modified version of Aave Arc.
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Guides & Resources

Lens Protocol & The Web3 Social Thesis (3 minute read)

Lens Protocol is a novel social graph protocol for web3 social applications. It allows users to own their profile and interpersonal relations. This means users' online identities can no longer be destroyed by a centralized entity. This Twitter thread explains Lens' architecture and how it solves the problems with web2 social networks.

Web3 Credentials → A Primer (26 minute read)

This article teaches readers how to build an on- and off-chain resumé with web3 credentials. It covers what web3 credentials are and why they are important, the problems with web2 credential issuance, the current web3 credential landscape, and how to use web3 credentials. web3 credentials can be used to certify knowledge and prove experience through token ownership.
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Miscellaneous

Centralization is inevitable (7 minute read)

This article discusses why a centralized web is inevitable and how processes generally move from being decentralized to centralized. A decentralized web is unlikely as consolidation tends to sneak into systems. Many industries are currently highly consolidated. Networks are not distributed evenly around the world and people will move to whatever system is most efficient and easy to use.

What to Expect From Ethereum’s Next Big Upgrade (2 minute read)

Ethereum's Shanghai update will make it possible to withdraw staked ETH. It will also introduce a handful of minor developer-oriented tweaks. There is no release date or full feature set available yet for the update. Proto-Danksharding, a highly anticipated method of increasing network capacity and lowering fees, may not be included in the update. The developers plan to finalize the feature set in the next month or so.
Quick Links

Design and Evaluation of IPFS: A Storage Layer for the Decentralized Web (8 minute read)

The InterPlanetary File System project is an implementation of a distributed file store that aims to support the decentralized web.

Crypto Exchange Coinbase's Chief Product Officer Steps Down Amid Restructuring (1 minute read)

Surojit Chatterjee, Coinbase's former chief product officer, will continue to serve in an advisory role until at least February 3.

Binance CEO sees no threat to crypto from central banks' digital currencies (1 minute read)

Central Bank Digital Currencies are not a threat to cryptocurrencies as they validate blockchain technology and build trust among skeptics.

Bitcoin mining in the crypto crash — the mining companies’ creative accounting (11 minute read)

The business model Bitcoin miners use where they borrow against freshly minted Bitcoins and their rigs only works if Bitcoin's price goes up forever, which it doesn't.

Robinhood reports 12% quarterly decline in crypto revenue as monthly active users fall 1.8 million (1 minute read)

Robinhood plans to continue to invest in the crypto space to make sure it is well positioned for when the market turns around.
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