BTC is currently trading around $28,300 and ETH around $1,850. Notable gainers in the last 24 hours are KAS, BGB, and AGIX. The global crypto market cap is ~$1.23T, up ~0.8% over the last day. DeFi Total Value Locked is ~$51b and BTC dominance is around 48%.
It’s another short week with many non-U.S. developed markets closed for Easter. U.S. equities are down this morning, while crypto is slightly positive. Friday’s nonfarm payrolls release came in roughly in line, missing expectations by ~3k jobs, but the unemployment rate came in lower than expected at 3.5%. Overall, the release does not provide a compelling narrative for a Fed pivot, and expectations for a 25 bp hike have resultantly increased since last week, with such a key data point now behind us. It’s a slow start to the week before a slew of inflation and monetary policy releases come on Wednesday and Thursday that include U.S. CPI and PPI, a BoC interest rate decision, and the FOMC’s meeting minutes. Lastly, it’s a big week in crypto, with the upgrade to enable staked ETH withdrawals scheduled for Wednesday evening.
Notable news includes: Ethereum voluntary exits saw their first real surge heading into Shapella, but the number of validators seeking to exit so far remains minuscule relative to most expectations; Lido’s stETH withdrawals will be delayed until early May at a minimum; re-staking protocol EigenLayer launched its first testnet; a new Arbitrum proposal requested that the Foundation return 700m ARB tokens to the DAO, calling the unauthorized use of funds “a clear overreach of the DAO’s power of treasury resources”; zkSync was able to help recover the 921 ETH from Gemholic’s botched token sale that didn’t previously use a testnet and misunderstood implications of the network’s lack of EVM-equivalency; USDT supply breached $80b; Sifu lost 1,800 ETH in the SushiSwap exploit; the SushiSwap exploit additionally raised interesting MEV implications, as a Lido node operator received a lottery block proposal during the exploit with a 689 ETH MEV payment that Sushi is hoping to claim to help refund its victims; Bitget unveiled a $100m venture fund focusing on Asia; and, a new report showed that Sam Bankman-Fried referred to Alameda as ‘unauditable.’
Authors:
Matt Kunke, Research Analyst | Twitter, Telegram, LinkedIn
Brian Rudick, Senior Strategist | Twitter, Telegram, LinkedIn
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