Welcome to Around the Blockchain, Huobi Learn’s daily rundown of the crypto markets.
Over $10 million in BTC and ETH has been raised in response to the Ukraine government’s call for donations amid the Russian invasion. On-chain data shows donations of $5.2 million in ETH — including $1.1 million in Tether and $109,000 in USDC — with $250,000 in Tether from FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried and approximately $277,000 in ETH from Chain.com CEO Deepak Thapliyal. The crypto, held in the ERC20 wallet, has yet to be withdrawn. BTC donations total $4.2 million, of which $2.9 million has been withdrawn. Over the weekend, Russian art collective Pussy Riot helped establish a DAO that raised $3 million in ETH for the war effort and humanitarian relief.
Russian soldiers surrendering to Ukraine will each receive 5 million rubles ($43,455) in crypto or cash, as well as an amnesty after trial, said Ukrainian TV host Masha Efrosinina, who is also honorary ambassador of the United Nations Population Fund in Ukraine. In an Instagram post, she said this offer came from Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense and the global IT community. According to the Ukrainian ambassador to the US, a Russian platoon that surrendered on 24 Feb was unaware that they were being sent to kill Ukrainians.
South Korea’s Ministry of ICT, Science and Future Planning has pledged $186.7 million to create a broad Metaverse ecosystem called the Expanded Virtual World, in order to drive the country’s digital content development and corporate growth. The ecosystem is part of a broader ‘Digital New Deal’, a set of policies created to foster digital technology growth in South Korea. Content creators will receive support to attract suitable talent to build the platform, and the ministry intends to offer financial support and tech development to support corporate growth. Additionally, the ministry said it will hold community-oriented creative activities, a Metaverse developer contest, and a hackathon.
According to on-chain analytics firm Glassnode, there may be positive sentiment for Bitcoin, as the number of addresses with a non-zero BTC balance has reached an all-time high of 40,276,163. Among these addresses, 817,445 have at least one whole BTC, marking a 10-month high on 28 Feb. At the same time, HODLing has become increasingly common among owners of wallets with a positive BTC balance. Glassnode also said the amount of BTC circulating supply last moved three to five years ago had reached a four-year high of slightly over 2.8 million coins.
Ethereum gas fees are at their lowest in six months, having dropped by 80.26% since 10 Jan from $52 to $10.26 per transaction on average. Layer two (L2) transactions have followed suit in the past week — the lowest L2 fee for ETH transfers $0.13 per transaction via Loopring; gas fees to swap tokens using Loopring cost $0.66 per swap. Loopring is followed by Zksync ($0.16), Polygon Hermez ($0.25), Arbitrum ($0.56), Boba Network ($0.99), Optimism ($1.24) and Aztec ($4.23). Median-sized gas fees have also fallen by over 80% since 10 Jan, from $29 to $4.55 per transaction.
The total value locked (TVL) in DeFi has surpassed $200 billion as crypto markets have rebounded from last week’s market downturn. Several native assets from the $611 billion worth of smart contract protocols have seen double-digit growth, with cypherium (CPH), counterparty (XCP) and terra (LUNA) comprising the top three at a respective rise of 330%, 54% and 52%. In terms of overall TVL in DeFi, Ethereum dominates with $112.36 billion (55.94%), followed by Terra with $20.17 billion (10.4%) and Binance Smart Chain (BSC) with $12.13 billion (6.03%).
Show me the money
According to data from the Huobi Global, BTC reached a low of 37,000 on Sunday night before seeing a slight increase to around 38,000. Similarly, ETH fell to a low of 2,550 last night before rebounding to around 2,650. In terms of contracts, Huobi Futures data show stable open interest (OI) in both BTC and ETH futures, though the former saw a slight decrease in volume while the latter’s volume remain unchanged.
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