🗞 Market commentary.
It’s been ages since I heard someone utter the word Polkadot. People used to talk about its parachains, the underlying auctions within the ecosystem, its sister network Kusama etc., etc., etc., a couple of cycles back. However, in no time after it attained its $55 peak in H2 2021, it faded away.
CT folks woke up on Tuesday to its spending numbers doing the rounds on social media. The team recently released its H1 report where it revealed that its treasury has spent $87 million [11 million DOT] in the first half of 2024. The catch? $37 million was shelled out on marketing and advertising that the team branded as “outreach.” The irony - it was ineffective… until now.
Social volume and mindshare figures have all flipped in Polkadot’s favor and DOT managed to bless everyone’s timeline today.
The funds dedicated towards other heads - including development, operations, and research - have seen substantial rises from last quarter, but remain deflated when compared to outreach’s number.
The team might soon start to regret its choices because community members ain’t pleased at all. Bearish.
At the current rate of spending, the treasury could last for another couple of years. The pink-circles-themed project’s team and DAO members are kinda freaking out, and discussions w.r.t. stricter budgeting and a change in inflation parameters have already begun.
On the price front, we managed to survive yet another day above $60k. BODEN was one happy man on the top gainer list, thanks to its 25% daily surge. Other large-cap assets more or less continue to remain range-bound and trade flat.
📊 Luke’s Chart of the Day
TON/USDT Binance 1D Log Chart
$TON TVL (see Defillama) continues to ramp steadily. Since 19 June, TVL growth has diverged from the previous price correlation, where the price is usually above TVL. These correlations are often sticky. Price slows due to a market correction or other bottleneck that eventually clears, and the price snaps back up again.
The bullish chart above lends weight to this thesis. We’ve had three small consolidations (white trendlines) before the current large one. It looks like we’re headed up to knock on the door again. Maybe we get one more pullback before the breakout that sends us much higher. I’d look for $13 near term, with a longer-term bull target of around $30 (4.618 extension). 1D RSI is at 65, which is the same level we broke out from on the previous run-up.
Come by the Lucky Luke Discord channel for comments, to roast my picks or to pump your own bags. All banter is welcome any time!
🔥 Degen corner.
Get Based
Base is becoming an unstoppable force. Despite the chop-solidation phase we’re in right now, it has been delivering and swiftly onboarding masses on-chain. The result? Its earnings keep increasing. In Q2, it generated ~$19.48 million, higher than all previous quarters.
Another interesting thing to note is that the number of USDC active users on Base has registered a steep incline over the past few months. There are close to 600k monthly senders at the moment. Evidently, Base has been able to leave behind other chains like OP Mainnet, Polygon, Ethereum, Arbitrum, and Avalanche.
Based.
📰 DeFi news.
Mantle’s incentives campaign Metamorphosis Season 1 goes live - read
Hashkey is looking to distribute its native token via a Telegram game - read
New Maker proposal to increase weETH capacity is up for voting - check
Marginfi is looking to launch “mrgnswap,” to allow traders to instantly long/short newly created meme coins with leverage - check
Vitalik Buterin wants to see “many more things” like prediction markets being built going forward - read
An app flips a chain on the revenue front: Pump.fun flips Ethereum [$1.99 million vs. 1.91 million] - check
Proposal introduced to deploy Aave V3 on Aptos Mainnet - check
Bahamas wants to force banks to support its ‘Sand Dollar’ CBDC - read
Don’t forget to hop onto our blocmates News feed to get even more daily news.
🫠 ICYMI.
Life gets busy so here’s what you’ve missed.
An Investigation Into the Layer 3 (L3) Landscape
Research
Reet, we're talking L3s!
How did we get here? What's the benefit? Much to care about, or pass? Ollie has penned a piece on the above, and some names on our radar...
🐥 Tweet of the day.
To save you doom scrolling.
It’s a bad summer for Bitcoin on-chain activity. There are a few hiccups. Metrics are flashing signs they shouldn’t. Risk management remains to be the key at this juncture.
Check it out here
🦍 And finally…
This very second, Solana has re-claimed $150. I remember stepping into the market when it was hovering around $38 back in 2021. Been one hell of a ride since then. Given the ecosystem's of late advancements, you'd need to be utterly oblivious not to have conviction. Let your bags breathe because SOL is only destined to go higher! You can’t fade it.
till next time,
Lavina 🫡
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