Kings of Leon, Grayscale and the PS5 what do they have in common? They’re all in the news this week! Rock band Kings of Leon have released their new album as an NFT; Grayscale acquired nearly 35 million XLM and Ethereum mined on the new PS5!
Mainstream Adoption
Google Finance has implemented a crypto tab so you can now look at the latest price fluctuations and view a graph of their latest performance. It includes: Bitcoin, Ether, Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash sitting side-by-side with common stocks and fiat currencies taking crypto ever closer to the mainstream.
Finance enthusiast and SEC Chair Nominee, Gary Gensler dude, reports cryptocurrencies as a “catalyst for change” during a recent hearing. He sees Bitcoin and other crypto as an innovation that have “brought new thinking to payments”. Gensler is invested heavily into crypto with a deep knowledge of blockchain technology and is excited about the future of finance.
Gensler isn’t the only one who sees crypto as the future of finance, Citigroup believes cryptocurrencies are at an integral point and could easily become a preferred currency or be an integral asset in international trading. Citigroup released a report that detailed the “tipping point” crypto currently finds itself in, with a heavy emphasis on the possibility of the future of Bitcoin. With increased institutional investment and support, future updates could be the deciding factor in Bitcoin’s explosion in mainstream usage.
With more support for crypto daily, it’s not a surprise that more institutions look to invest and make cryptocurrency a form of payment. Especially in the car industry, with Tesla’s recent investment, a major Canadian car dealership, HGreg, has followed in its footsteps as they look to accept Bitcoin. The Quebec based dealership has started tests in accepting Bitcoin as payment for their vehicles and are likely to soon accept crypto from the public.
In other news, a group of Chinese crypto enthusiasts have successfully mined ETH on the new PlayStation 5! The Next-Gen model was modified so it could complete such a task achieving a hashrate of 98.76MH/s with an electricity consumption of 211W. With this method, with an earning of around $50, you can make your money back on your PS5 purchase in around 10 weeks!
Paid to play video games?! Game developer, Ubisoft, have started plans on making a free-to-play NFT video game. Ubisoft has partnered with the Belgian Pro League and Sorare as they look to make a fantasy football game, in which you can earn digital cards that can then be sold on the blockchain. Digital cards have previously sold for more than 100 ETH! Will you be playing?
Whales
MicroStategy holds $4.4 billion in Bitcoin! As they continue to buy more everyday, they have now accumulated a whopping 90,000 BTC, making them one of the largest investors in the market.
From one whale to another, MicroStrategy purchases nearly 35 million XLM as interest in Stellar increases. Especially with Stellar’s most recent update to XLM, Horizon 2.0, which aims to make transactions more flexible, could see more institutional investment into the coin in the coming months?
Meanwhile, there has been speculation for weeks on who will be the next big player to buy BTC. Google, Twitter and Amazon were the likely candidates. But how about Netflix? Billionaire, Tim Draper, recently said on a podcast how the CEO of Netflix, Reed Hastings, is “an innovative guy and has a lot of creative thinking”. With an increase of institutional investors, who are you betting on?
NFT’s
Fan of Kings of Leon? Fan of crypto? Well you’re in luck! The prestigious rock band have released their new album as an NFT, with tokenized tickets for superfans. Although it is available elsewhere, the unique nature of an NFT makes the album extremely personal.
Important Information
Cryptocurrencies are generally not regulated and investors do not have access to recourse or compensation schemes such as, for example, in the UK, the Financial Ombudsman Service or the Financial Services Compensation Scheme. Investing in cryptocurrencies can be high risk and investors should carefully evaluate their appetite for risk and their understanding of trading cryptocurrencies prior to entering into a transaction.
