Highlights 🧵:
1/ May's U.S. inflation data came in below expectations, with the CPI up 3.3% year-on-year compared to expectations of 3.4%. This triggered a rally in risk assets like stocks and crypto, although the effect on crypto appeared to be short-lived.

2/ The Fed dot plot revealed the latest interest rate forecasts, indicating a median estimate of just one rate cut this year, down from three projected in March. Nonetheless, traders remain optimistic, pricing in two rate cuts this year, with the first expected in September.

3/ BNB Chain and Binance Labs have jointly announced the launch of “BNB Incubation Alliance”, which aims to support early-stage blockchain projects. Winning projects will be fast tracked into BNB Chain's "Most Valuable Builder" program, receive BNB chain grants, and gain the chance to receive investment opportunities from Binance Labs.

4/ Tether’s investment arm expects to invest more than US$1B in deals over the next year, with a focus on financial infrastructure, AI, and biotech.

1/ The U.S. SEC has ended its investigation into Ethereum and will not take enforcement action against Consensys. This decision follows a lawsuit by Consensys, which argued that the SEC's actions were unwarranted since Ether is a commodity, not a security.

2/ Microstrategy, the largest corporate holder of Bitcoin, disclosed that it has purchased an additional 11,931 Bitcoin between 27 April and 19 June for a total amount of nearly US$786M. This purchase follows the company's US$800M convertible notes offering to institutional investors, now bringing its Bitcoin holdings to a total of 226,331BTC worth ~US$15B.

3/ 3iQ, a digital asset manager, has applied for a listing of a Solana exchange-traded product (“ETP”) on Canada's Toronto Stock Exchange, potentially making it the first Solana ETP in North America if approved. Named The Solana Fund (QSOL), this ETP aims to provide exposure to SOL and its daily price movements, with potential interest from SOL staking yields estimated at 6-8%.

In our latest report, we provide an overview of the crypto industry by highlighting projects across multiple sectors.

We spotlight themes from Real-World Assets, Memecoin Trading, the Bitcoin Ecosystem, and others in this report.

Check it out 🔽
https://www.binance.com/en/research/analysis/industry-map-jun24

1/ VanEck filed for the first Solana ETF in the United States, stating that SOL is a commodity. This comes after 3iQ's filing for a Solana ETF in Canada on 21 June. Matthew Sigel, Head of Digital Assets Research at VanEck, stated that "SOL’s decentralized nature, high utility, and economic feasibility align with the characteristics of other established digital commodities…”

2/ According to Arkham Intelligence, the U.S. Government transferred 3,940 BTC to Coinbase. The U.S. Government remains the largest national holder of Bitcoin, with over 213,000 BTC seized from sources such as Silk Road. Additionally, the German Government has been observed moving approximately 4,600 BTC over the past week to CEXes.

3/ Mt. Gox has announced that it will begin repayment distributions to victims of the 2014 hack.. In May, the exchange moved over 140,000 BTC from cold wallets to an unknown address for the first time in five years. This news has likely contributed to the market sell-off in June.

A summary of the latest U.S. PCE inflation release ⬆️

How do we get to one billion on-chain users?

Our latest #Binance report covers the latest developments which are making blockchains more accessible to new users than ever before.

Check it out 🔽
https://www.binance.com/en/research/analysis/road-to-one-billion-on-chain-users

A summary of the latest U.S. FOMC Minutes release 🔼

Time to look at July's market insights!

Our team analyzed the state of the crypto market and provided key insights on Bitcoin sell pressure from miners, TON's growth, competition in the restaking landscape, and more.

Check it out ⬇️
https://www.binance.com/en/research/analysis/monthly-market-insights-2024-07

Happy Friday! Binance Bytes is an initiative by the Research team to provide a quick round-up of the week.

Highlights 🧵:

1/ Mt. Gox has started repayment distributions to creditors in BTC and BCH, transferring 47,228 BTC from its cold wallet to Bitbank and other wallets. The defunct exchange will be repaying over 140,000 BTC to victims of the 2014 hack after nearly a decade, causing marketwide concerns about potential selling pressure in the coming months.

2/ Pump fun surpassed Ethereum network's daily revenue on Jul 2 with approximately US$2M in fees generated on a single day. Pump fun’s cumulative revenue has soared over US$51.3M since its inception in March, with massive retail interest in memecoin trading on the Solana blockchain.

3/ The European Union’s Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA) regulation for stablecoins entered into force on 29 Jun, with Circle being the first licensed stablecoin issuer under it. The MiCA regulation institutes uniform EU market rules for crypto-assets.

A summary of the latest U.S. CPI inflation release 🔼

1/ U.S. CPI inflation came in at 3.0%, below the expected 3.1%, marking the third consecutive month of declining inflation and the lowest reading since early 2021. This brings CPI just 1% away from the Federal Reserve’s 2% target and raised the likelihood of a September interest rate cut to over 80%. The Producer Price Index (PPI) will be released on July 12, with PCE inflation data following on July 26.

2/ U.S. Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) Chairman Rostin Behnam reiterated that Bitcoin and Ethereum are commodities under the Commodity Exchange Act, stating that 70-80% of cryptocurrencies in the market are not securities.

3/ TON announced an EVM-compatible Layer-2 Network on Tuesday at EthCC in Belgium. The TON Applications Chain (TAC) will build on Polygon’s CDK and Agglayer, aiming to allow Ethereum developers to build decentralized applications for Telegram users while tapping on the seamless availability of liquidity from EVM chains.

#Binance Research presents our comprehensive industry report for the first half of 2024.

Discover the top crypto dynamics of early 2024 and key trends for the rest of the year.

Check it out 🔽
https://www.binance.com/en/research/analysis/half-year-report-2024

Despite a recent upswing, the crypto market has largely been rangebound and is still down from its peak in March.

Curious about what's happening? We introduce our CPT framework and examine a few short- and long-term drivers in this report.

Read on 🔽
https://www.binance.com/en/research/analysis/whats-driving-the-crypto-market-introducing-our-cpt-framework

1/ Grayscale launched a decentralized AI fund, seeking to enhance investment opportunities in the AI landscape. The fund holds a basket of AI crypto tokens including NEAR, FIL, RNDR, LPT, and TAO, aiming to finance AI services, centralized AI solutions, and AI-related infrastructure.

2/ Li.Fi experienced a US$11M exploit due to a smart contract vulnerability in the Li.Fi bridge. The team released an incident report, stating that the vulnerability allowed the attacker to gain unauthorized access to self-custodial wallets that had set infinite token approval for the Li.Fi contract. The project will work on a voluntary compensation to reimburse 100% of the funds.

3/ Stripe has expanded into the European market, allowing users to purchase cryptocurrencies using a credit or debit card. “Now, merchants who rely on Stripe’s onramp for things like conversion optimization, identity verification, and fraud prevention can reach a more global audience." stated John Egan, Head of Crypto at Stripe.