Top Web3 Headlines This Week
Here are the top web3 stories from the past week.
Capital Raised
Money Still Flows to Web3 Investment Firms
💰 The turmoil in the Crypto markets hasn’t stopped venture money from flowing into web3…yet. Dapper Labs announced a $725MM fund to invest in Flow blockchain related projects. Crypto venture firm Dragonfly closed its third fund with a whopping $650MM size. 6th Man Ventures added a second fund with $145MM in dry powder. To be fair, these were likely done well ahead of the recent Crypto market selloff. It will be interesting to see if we continue to see capital flowing into the sector in a month or two.
FTX Founder Buys 7.6% of Robinhood Stock
💸 Sam Bankman-Fried (known as SBF in the industry) is the most interesting man in Crypto. He started a Crypto trading firm in his mid-20s. Then he launched institutional trading powerhouse FTX shortly after. When FTX raised a $400MM funding round at a $32Bn valuation, SBF’s wealth was estimated in the $20Bn range, just shortly after his 30th birthday. The market selloff has hit his pocketbook hard, but SBF still had the funds to take a 7.6% equity stake in stockbroker Robinhood this week for a cost of $648MM.
Products and People
Terra Stablecoin Collapses
📉 The Terra UST stablecoin broke its $1 peg and collapsed. They took $20 Billion in value from investors with the implosion. CoinDesk has more on how this happened and where the impacts were felt. The Milk Road reported on the winners and losers from this mess.
Coinbase Asset Custody Questions
₿ Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong gave another jolt to the already battered Crypto markets last week when the company stated that custody assets could be considered part of the company estate in the unlikely event of a bankruptcy. This was a surprise to market participants as stockbrokers segregate customer assets from their balance sheet. Since Coinbase holds all assets on a shared wallet, this is not the case. Coinbase’s share price is down 50%+ this month, and off from its IPO price by 75%.
NFT Fantasy Sports Coming Fast to U.S.
⚾ European fantasy sports leader Sorare is bringing their NFT game to the United States. In March they announced a deal with Major League Soccer, and they followed up last week with a new partnership with Major League Baseball. Sorare did over $300MM in sales of NFT assets for European soccer, and the market opportunity in the U.S. is even bigger. DraftKings also started to unveil the details on their NFT game for the upcoming NFL season called Reign Makers.
