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Valuart Launches Auction of NFT Derived From Banksy’s ‘Spike’
Lugano, Switzerland, 22nd July, 2021,

Valuart, a startup that mints licensed NFTs derived from original artworks, has launched its first drop. The auction for ‘Spike,’ a digital artwork based on the iconic Banksy installation that first surfaced in Palestine, commenced on July 22. 50% of the proceeds raised from the sale will go to charity.

Created by infamous street artist Banksy, ‘Spike’ is now in the possession of Vittorio Grigòlo. The world famous tenor and Valuart co-founder is auctioning a digital interpretation of the Bansky work, reimagined as a CGI artwork. In the NFT version, Spike is seen floating across the universe until it is eventually returned to its rightful place on earth, to emerge as a newly minted non-fungible token.

Vittorio Grigòlo said: “After months of hard work, we can finally share our creation with the world. I’m convinced that Valuart’s model represents the future of how we perceive, admire and give value to art and artists. This first drop is a stepping stone that will pave the way towards a very exciting future for artists and their art, as well as art collectors and art lovers.”

Following the Spike drop, Valuart plans to launch digital originals (1:1 digital clones) of some of the world’s most iconic licensed artworks. This will include ‘Mantum and the Stole’ scheduled for October 22. This unique artwork by Stefano Zanella was first worn on December 24, 1999 by Pope John Paul II to mark the opening of the Holy Door of the Vatican Basilica.

Valuart is intent on digitizing some of the most famous artworks ever created, breathing new life into a classic medium and giving NFT collectors a chance to acquire a piece of creative history. The company has on-boarded leading artists, institutions and celebrities for this purpose.

After certifying the authenticity of a given artwork on the blockchain in collaboration with the owner of the physical asset, Valuart creates a Digital Original (a perfect digital “clone”) and contextualizes it into unique stories through market-leading content creation. In doing so, it aims to foster a new standard for the NFT art market.

“I’m thrilled to participate in this project and use my voice to create a magical atmosphere for the rebirth of this extraordinary piece of art I discovered more than a decade ago,” said Vittorio Grigòlo. “I cannot wait to share this amazing creation with the public.”

50% of the revenues deriving from the auction of the ‘Spike’ NFT drop will be dedicated to supporting those suffering from conflicts throughout the world.

About Valuart

Valuart was founded by crypto enthusiasts Etan Genini, Vittorio Grigòlo, and Michele Fiscalini with the goal of helping artists realize the true value of their work. Valuart connects art collectors with creators, unlocking new opportunities for monetization through the medium of NFTs. By tokenizing classic artworks, Valuart is bringing the art world into the 21st century.

Learn more: www.valuart.com

Contacts
- Etan Genini
- etangenini@valuart.com
July 22, 2021
Why are Slot Streamers so Hyped on Twitch?
Source: https://unsplash.com/photos/_68ATDXuBLo

The Twitch platform has seen an influx of niche streamers outside of the gamers that the platform was initially intended for in recent years. As more and more people tune into streams of all kinds, new opportunities become available for streamers to take advantage of.

Currently, one of the quickest growing Twitch streaming trends is slot machines and other casino games.

The most popular slot streamers are earning full-time incomes, and a small handful are even clearing 6-figures in a single month.

The casino industry has been booming recently and has been at the forefront of adopting new technology and platforms to bring a younger, tech-savvy demographic into the space. You only need to look at these crypto casinos reviewed by Vienne Garcia to see this in action.

Twitch has become a valuable part of that movement, and casino providers regularly sponsor streamers and offer affiliate programs, which further accelerates growth in this niche.

3 Reasons Why People Love Watching Slot Streamers

But what is it that makes these slot streamers so popular to viewers? Read this article to find out exactly why tens of thousands of people are using Twitch to watch slot streamers every day.

Belonging to a Social Group

One of the best things about watching Twitch streamers is the feeling of belonging to a community of individuals who share at least one similar interest. The common interest, in this case, is online slot games, but it can be whatever niche the streamer is a part of.

By regularly watching the same streamers on Twitch, viewers can discuss and build connections with other people who also enjoy online slots. In most cases, people will find they also share other similar interests, and relationships can grow further around these.

Finding a group of like-minded people to hang out with is great fun at the best of times but has been even more critical since socializing has become much more difficult for many of us due to the global pandemic. Social media and online communities are more important than ever.

The most successful streamers will make sure they cultivate this social element by encouraging discussion and also interacting with their viewers during their streams. After all, the more engagement they get in their videos, the more viewers and followers they will build over time.

Tips and Strategies for Games

Some online casinos might offer free spins or a “free play” mode on the games, but the majority of the slot games out there can only be played with real money. Playing with real cash before you really know how a game works or even if you’ll like it can be a bit of a risk.

What better way to remove the risk than watching somebody else play the game for a while as they risk their money. Watching streamers play specific games is an excellent way to judge whether you want to go on and give that game a try for yourself.

You can take a look and see precisely how the game works and assess the potential win percentage. In addition, you might also be able to pick up a few handy tips or strategies from the streamers for some of the games.

Although slot games rely heavily on luck, arming yourself with as much knowledge of the game as possible will always put you in a better position to win when it comes time to play for yourself.

Popular slots streamers usually have discount codes and affiliate links, which is how they make such large incomes. Often, these kinds of links will offer viewers promotions like free spins, which is also a nice bonus and another benefit of watching streamers play.

Purely Entertainment

Believe it or not, some viewers of slot streamers have little intention of playing the games for themselves. Many viewers watch purely for entertainment.

Even though these viewers are there for “entertainment”, the reasons why they find such streams entertaining can be very different from each other.

For example, some viewers watch a stream purely because they enjoy the streamer. Successful streamers tend to be funny in some way or charismatic and are able to draw an audience no matter what content they happen to be streaming.

In other cases, people are entertained by watching the streamer risk large sums of cash. Some people absolutely love the sense of jeopardy when a streamer has staked big bucks and there will be people who draw enjoyment from huge wins and losses alike.

To give you an idea of the kinds of sums people tune in to see at stake, the YouTube video below shows one of Twitch’s most-watched slots streamers winning almost $1.5m on the Gates of Olympus online slot.

10 Most Popular Twitch Slots Streamers

The following is a list of the current top 10 streamers who stream slot games on Twitch by average viewership per stream. The figures have been taken from Twitchmetrics.net and have been rounded to the nearest 100.
- TrainwrecksTV – 30,500 average viewers
- FaZeBanks – 29,800 average viewers
- ROSHTEIN – 21,800 average viewers
- Bidule – 6,800 average viewers
- Xposed – 6,000 average viewers
- Yassuo – 6,000 average viewers
- VonDice – 5,700 average viewers
- DeuceAce – 5,600 average viewers
- Loopooyt – 4,200 average viewers
- AyeZee – 4,200 average viewers
As you can see, the viewerships for the top streamers are very large. You should note that some on this list, particularly the top 2, also stream other content. In most cases, their viewers will watch them no matter what they stream, and some of them had built their follower base before they even began streaming slots.

However, the list above still shows the most-viewed streamers that stream slots content, and you can see just how many people are tuning in to watch them.
July 22, 2021
SLT Wallet Relaunched!
London UK, July 20th, 2021: The Smartlands technical team is pleased to unveil the much-anticipated SLT Wallet.

The upgraded wallet was rebuilt to comply with the Smartlands platform architecture, and now our smart contracts fully reflect all the latest changes in Stellar protocol. At the same time, we aimed to preserve the layout visually familiar to our users.

The new SLT wallet supports all the accounts generated in the previous version of the wallet, and should there be forgotten funds in the SLT wallet, one can easily access them with the account details.

“We are happy to fulfill this initial release and present to our audience the key to the upcoming tokenization benefits.” – said Ilia Obraztcov, CEO of Smartlands Platform Ltd.

“The wallet itself is a gigantic development that never stops. We had launched and updated it previously, but new reality and even more ambitious plans made us restart and develop the solution that answers all the needs of nowadays investors.” – said Victor Yermak, Strategic Technology Adviser of Smartlands Platform Ltd.

Our plans for the wallet upgrade are forceful enough; over the upcoming course of updates, we intend to add the following features:
- Staking functionality;
- Voting module;
- Ledger compatibility;
- Deep integration with our smartlands.app marketplace;
- USDC support, including the direct ETH/USDC deposit feature.
The new address of the SLT wallet is https://wallet.smartlands.app/. We welcome all newcomers and those who already own an account to use the SLT wallet and share the benefits of the Smartlands Platform. Happy trading and soon to be happy investing!

SLT Wallet is not only a Smartlands Platform-specific device but a multifunctional toolbox for any trader on the Stellar blockchain. It’s designed to accommodate the most demanding trader experience conveniently and intuitively, with the most relevant information always at hand. Moreover, Smartlands wallet will assist users in selecting between all investment opportunities provided by Smartlands Platform.

Smartlands is a digital investments platform with a proven use case for tokenizing shares in real assets. Having its mission of tokenizing the real economy and bringing all its benefits to a broad audience, Smartlands launched an alternative investments project in Ukraine. The SLT is a cryptocurrency of the Smartlands ecosystem. It is limited to a maximum of 7.1mn tokens and runs on the Stellar open-source network.
July 22, 2021
Binance NFT Marketplace Launches Golden Ticket NFT by Virtue Poker for Tournament with Phil Ivey, Vince Vaughn and Others
Ta’ Xbiex, Malta, 22nd July, 2021,

Virtue Poker, the world’s first fully licensed blockchain based peer-to-peer poker platform has partnered with the newly launched Binance NFT marketplace to offer a one-of-kind NFT for Hall of Fame and Virtue Poker Team pro, Phil Ivey.

Dubbed “The Phil Ivey Golden Ticket NFT” – this collaboration will feature the first and only Phil Ivey Binance Smart Chain based NFT and will include an entry into a Celebrity Poker Tournament that includes Ethereum Co-Founder Joe Lubin, NBA Hall of Fame player Paul Pierce, YoutTube phenomenon Mr. Beast, and Hollywood actor Vince Vaughn.

While the popularity of NFT’s has exploded in 2021 – the industry’s focus has largely been on the rarity of an item and reputation of the artist or company that produced the NFT. With this partnership, Virtue Poker and Binance NFT Marketplace aim to foster another angle to the booming NFT industry: a real-world once-in-a-lifetime experience.

“I’ve been working with the Virtue Poker Team for over 3 years,” says Phil Ivey. “I’m excited to take this next step forward with both them and the Binance NFT Marketplace, and also really curious to meet the future holder of my NFT and get to know them.”

The NFT auction will be hosted on the Binance NFT Marketplace on July 27th 2021 – and is an exciting step forward for Binance as it continues to work to penetrate the fast-growing NFT industry. The event will be hosted on Virtue Poker in August – with the victor winning a seat to the 2021 World Series of Poker Main Event in October in Las Vegas, and being able to choose the charity of their choice to donate $50,000.

Virtue Poker was developed within ConsenSys in 2016 and saw multiple successful rounds of investment that included Pantera Capital, Fenbushi Capital, ConsenSys, and other major backers. Its most recent Private Sale held in April 2021 raised $5 million from backers such as DFG Group, Digital Strategies, Flurry Capital and JRR.

About Virtue Poker

Virtue Poker is a decentralized poker platform that uses the Ethereum blockchain and peer-to-peer networking to provide an online poker site that’s safe, honest and fun. It was founded in 2016 within Consensys, the leading full stack Ethereum software engineering company and incubator founded by Ethereum co-founder Joe Lubin in 2014. Backed by Consensys and stakeholder Phil Ivey, Virtue Poker is on a mission to make blockchain-based betting mainstream.

Contacts
- Press
- info@marketacross.com
July 22, 2021
Elon Musk and Jack Dorsey Express Their Support for Crypto at the B Word Conference, Prices Soar
Key takeaways:
- Elon Musk and Jack Dorsey appeared as guests at the event hosted by the Crypto Council of Innovation.
- The guests talked about their first interactions with Bitcoin and their general outlook on the cryptocurrency sector.
- Both Musk and Dorsey are big supporters of digital currencies and believe that the current banking system is predatory and detrimental to the world’s economic development.
At Wednesday’s live-streamed session hosted at The B Word Conference, Tesla’s self-declared ‘Technoking’ Elon Musk, Twitter’s co-founder Jack Dorsey and ARK Invest’s CEO Cathie Wood appeared as guests. The trio of CEOs was asked poignant questions regarding the cryptocurrency industry.

Dorsey and Musk agree that Bitcoin is a revolutionary system, capable of rivaling the established banking order

A still from the live session showing the three guests and host Steve Lee.
Image source: The B Word

When asked about what shaped his views on Bitcoin, Elon Musk explained that it was a natural process as a side effect of his involvement in Paypal and the payment service industry. He pointed out how slow traditional financing institutions are when it comes to processing transactions and added that he was intrigued by the possibilities of blockchain solutions in the financial space since the beginning.

“First rules-based global monetary system ever. This is a very big idea.”
– Cathie Wood, CEO of ARK Invest on Bitcoin

Jack Dorsey’s views on Bitcoin were most directly shaped by the Bitcoin’s network and the community surrounding it. He has been keeping a close eye on it ever since he first started hearing about it in 2009.

His first direct involvement with Bitcoin came very early due to the launch of Square digital payments company in the late 2000s. His views on Bitcoin are very similar to Musk’s as both started a digital payment company as they saw clear negatives in the way the traditional banking sector operates. He pointed out the remittance problem, which is coincidentally one of the main reasons why El Salvador passed the so-called “Bitcoin Law”, in hopes to avoid paying exuberant transaction processing fees.

“It’s deeply principled, it’s weird as hell, it’s always evolving and it just reminded me of the internet when I was a kid.”
– Jack Dorsey, CEO of Twitter on Bitcoin

Musk has previously criticized Bitcoin for its excessive power consumption and has eventually decided to stop accepting BTC payments for Tesla vehicles. “One thing you do need to watch out for with crypto, especially bitcoin, using proof of work, using energy that’s a bit too much and not necessarily good for the environment,” Musk said.

Nevertheless, he disclosed that both his companies, Tesla and SpaceX, in fact own Bitcoin but no other digital currency at the moment. He also reiterated his position that Tesla will start accepting Bitcoin payments once more, as soon as the carbon footprint of Bitcoin reaches a low enough threshold.

Buy/Sell BTC

Individually Musk doesn’t own just Bitcoin and Dogecoin but also Ethereum. Following his statements, the price of Ethereum soared and rebounded in a dramatic fashion after a big drop earlier in the week. It is worth pointing out that Ethereum was already closing out a strong single-day performance before Musk’s statements, so it is hard to estimate how big of an impact his statement had.

Generally speaking crypto prices have been on a considerable uptick over the last 48 hours. After prolonged sideways trading during July and a relatively big drop earlier in the week, the total crypto market cap has since increased by 4.3%.
July 22, 2021
Nodle Announces Partnership with ESTV
San Francisco, United States, 22nd July, 2021,

Nodle, a citizen-powered decentralized wireless network that provides low-cost, secure connectivity for the Internet of Things (IoT), announces a strategic partnership with ESTV, the global leader in eSports content streaming. With ESTV boasting over 29.6M unique viewers and 124.8M viewership minutes worldwide, the partnership looks to dramatically increase the reach of the Nodle Network, introduce new revenue streams for ESTV through mining Nodle Cash, and further enhance their user experience.

For ESTV, the Nodle networking library will be built into the upcoming release of ESTV’s mobile app, while the Nodle Cash app will be prominently seen and promoted throughout ESTV’s 24/7 global broadcasts. ESTV will gain an additional source of revenue and each user can easily opt-in to passively earn Nodle Cash, all while watching in their favorite teams and streams. In turn, users will be able to convert earnings to ESTV gear and other ESTV offerings.

Nodle Cash can not only be earned by any mobile gamer through the Nodle Cash app, but also inside the ESTV mobile app. ESTV network, tournaments, anchors, athletes, celebrities and ESTV current and future partners will also promote Nodle Cash App downloads to gamers around the world.

Nodle Cash is remotely mined through the use of Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) and an algorithm called “Proof of Connectivity.” This allows anyone with a smartphone to automatically scan for nearby BLE-enabled IoT devices and sensors, and move tiny bits of data, such as location, temperature, air quality, foot traffic, and more through their phone and up to the cloud. In addition, all transactions are encrypted to protect privacy. Nodle customer types like enterprises, manufacturers, and smart cities pay for receiving data insights coming from IoT devices and sensors to improve decision-making, and in return, users who lend their Bluetooth and Internet access get rewarded in Nodle Cash.

“This will be one of our first major collaborations in bridging the Nodle Network to the booming world of gaming and esports,” says Micha Benoliel, CEO and Co-Founder of Nodle.

“We are thrilled to have our Nodle brand associated with ESTV and can’t wait to see it being used in tournaments where everyone wins with Nodle Cash,” added Garrett Kinsman, VP of Sales and Growth and Co-Founder of Nodle.

Eric Yoon, Founder & CEO of ESTV commented: “We are excited to partner with Nodle to deliver their technology to our upcoming ESTV mobile app. Global ESTV users will be able to earn Nodle Cash while watching live tournament events, as well as while enjoying our vast ESTV content library. The more our viewers view content on the ESTV mobile app, the more Nodle Cash they’ll earn. This partnership is truly a win-win-win for ESTV viewers and users, Nodle, and ESTV!”

ESTV is currently distributed in 45 countries via Over The Top platforms including Roku Live Channel, Sling TV, Amazon Fire TV, Rakuten TV, PLEX, etc. and on most Connected TV platforms including Samsung TV Plus, VIZIO, TCL, Hisense, etc.

###

Nodle’s CEO and Co-Founder Micha Benoliel is available for interviews.

About Nodle | The Citizen Network™:

Nodle is building the largest decentralized wireless network on Earth to connect and secure the next trillion Things. The Nodle Network is powered by millions of Bluetooth-enabled smartphones that earn Nodle Cash for providing connectivity to nearby Bluetooth-enabled IoT devices and sensors. App developers and publishers have the opportunity to monetize their applications via the Nodle networking library which enables them to mine Nodle Cash for helping the network grow. Nodle’s powerful privacy-first IoT stack allows for various use cases including connecting and securing physical assets, tracking lost or valuable items, capturing sensor data, security certificates, providing decision-making insights for consumer electronics manufacturers, enterprises, smart cities, and the finance industry, and much more. The Nodle Cash app is available for iOS or Android.

Twitter | Telegram | Discord | YouTube | Medium | GitHub | Website

About ESTV

ESTV is the first 24-7 live linear video channel dedicated to esports in the U.S. Launched in May 2019, ESTV provides round-the-clock coverage of esports athletes and gaming franchises from an insider perspective. ESTV is available on the Roku® Channel (U.S. & Canada), Amazon Fire TV, Samsung TV Plus, Dish® Sling TV, VIZIO, Rakuten TV (Europe), TCL TV (worldwide), ZEASN (worldwide), Hisense Sharp (worldwide), RAD TV (Playstation, Google TV & Android TV), EASY TV (Brazil), Select TV, TikiLIVE, XOD Global (worldwide), Simul-TV in the U.S. and international territories as well as over the air network for local media market. We are also available on Twitch, YouTube and Facebook platforms and streams live linear feed and AVOD services. ESTV partners with the world’s top gaming networks and production partners for the most robust esports content lineup on linear, online and mobile. ESTV is also an exclusive media broadcast partner of the Department of Defense Joint Base Lewis McChord and NFL Alumni esports events. For more information, please visit www.estv.co.

Contacts

Director of Communications
- Daren McKelvey
- Nodle
- Daren@nodle.co
July 22, 2021
How China is Using Bitcoin as a Mean to Extract Money Out of the U.S.
Key takeaways:
- China and some developing countries, such as Iran, are using domestically mined Bitcoin to circumvent tariffs and U.S. sanctions.
- Most of the cryptocurrency transactions are converted to USD, meaning that the U.S. experiences considerable USD outflows and has no practical way of preventing this trend.
- Chinese Bitcoin mining crackdowns have shaken up the world’s hashrate distribution, but China still controls by far the biggest piece of the pie.
“Trade wars are good, and easy to win,” famously tweeted former U.S. President Donald Trump early in 2018. Fourth year into the trade dispute and many billions lost across each state’s economy as well as up to 245,000 jobs lost on behalf of the U.S. in the meantime, the trade war with China doesn’t seem like such a good idea anymore.

China has played the whole situation out to perfection each step of the way and greatly benefited from the whole mess. The country circumvented the sanctions and high tariffs by exporting products through its neighboring Asian countries and other allied intermediary countries around the world. Not only that, the Beijing government has found a way to siphon money from the U.S. via the cryptocurrency industry as well.

Buy/Sell BTC

Bitcoin mining is a very lucrative business

It is common knowledge that most of the Bitcoin mining operations are located within the borders of China. The Asian superpower hosts 65% of all bitcoin farms. Each day 900 Bitcoin are mined, which amounts to a daily revenue of $31 million. Paper napkin math shows that in a year, BTC miners have earned approximately $10 billion over the last year.

China leads the world in the share of hashrate, despite losing more than a third of its hashrate output since April 2020. Image source: cbeci.org

Accounting for China’s share of hashrate distribution over the last 12 months, this means that Chinese-based miners have turned a profit of up to $7 billion since the end of last June.

Chinese crackdowns have disrupted the markets but the government has no intention of outright banning Bitcoin

The approach Chinese authorities have undertaken in regards to crypto is hard to understand. On one hand, the cheap electricity costs have attracted miners across the world to build their mining infrastructure within the country. Additionally, as a part of its 5-year policy plan, the country has explicitly embraced blockchain as pivotal technology for guaranteeing continued economic growth.

On the other hand, Beijing has repeatedly imposed various restrictions on the crypto industry, by restricting banks and other payment service providers from offering the ability to make crypto transactions and, most recently, a crackdown on Bitcoin mining businesses. The crackdowns have had a devastating effect on the Chinese miners, which is evident by looking at the data from Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index (CBECI). The world’s hashrate share of Chinese miners has dropped from 65% to 46%, from April ‘20 to April ‘21. The total hashrate also dropped drastically following the news of Chinese crackdowns.

Total hashrate experienced a more than 50% drop from its April high. Image source: Blockchain.com

Looking more closely at the provinces that have been impacted by the crackdowns, a pattern quickly emerges. It seems that the authorities are trying to relocate mining operations to provinces that have an abundance of hydropower resources, thus making the mining cheaper and, more importantly, more environmentally friendly.

China is well aware that the USD reigns supreme when it comes to cryptocurrency investments. It has no intention of outright banning BTC, since doing so would relinquish its power over the crypto markets and consequently losing a part of its grip over the U.S. dollar.

Who will benefit from the exodus of Bitcoin miners?

The United States is quickly turning into the most likely candidate for fleeing Bitcoin miners and is already controlling a 17% share of the global hashrate. Several developing countries are looking to Bitcoin to circumvent the U.S. imposed sanctions, such as Iran, or simply to try and capitalize on the growing trend, like in the case of El Salvador, which has recently passed the so-called “Bitcoin Law”, essentially making BTC a form of legal tender.

U.S. officials are well aware of the problem cryptocurrencies pose to the USD hegemony. It allows its hostile nations, such as Iran or China, to weaken the U.S. dollar on the global stage by allowing payment for imported goods with domestically mined digital currencies, while at the same time banning the coins generated abroad.

The U.S. is in a precarious position, as the public uproar caused by banning cryptocurrencies would be huge. For the time being, it can only try to make crypto-assets less appealing to limit the USD outflows accrued by crypto transactions.

Buy/Sell BTC
July 22, 2021
Wault’s Decentralized Solutions Will Revolutionize DeFi

Amidst the surge of the Covid-19 pandemic in many parts of the world last year, there was an unprecedented increase in the demand for digitized solutions worldwide. E-commerce, e-meetings, online workplaces, and many digital solutions sprouted from every corner of the world. Most notably, the financial industry has been undergoing a massive shift with the rise of decentralizedd finance (DeFi), moving hand-in-hand with developments in cryptocurrency.

In fact, cryptocurrencies have played a huge role in digitization and decentralization since Satoshi wrote the first blockchain whitepaper. However, it wasn’t until the pandemic progressed and demand for digitization and insurance against failing economies and traditional assets increased, that individuals and institutions turned to cryptocurrencies on a never-before-seen scale.

That’s how over the past few months, bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have managed to reach new all-time highs, and besides the pandemi, new use cases with legitimate utility have been a major reason behind the bull run.

Decentralized finance, which first entered the scene in 2017, quickly rose to popularity amidst the pandemic, and in hindsight–it’s no surprise. After all, DeFi has brought the whole package of financial services like lending, borrowing, saving and investing onto blockchain networks, and has eliminated inefficient financial intermediation in the process. With DeFi, anyone with internet services can control their financial assets (cryptocurrency) and even earn much higher yields on them than in traditional finance. This way, both the unbanked and underbanked populace can participate in a fair economic system.

DeFi tools and their evolution

While decentralized finance may be one of the biggest driving forces in the crypto bull run and the public acceptance of cryptocurrencies, it is still a segment in development. Over recent years, several DeFi product niches like smart contracts, liquidity pools, yield farms and even stablecoins have been tweaked for better optimization by different developers. The emergence of the Binance smart chain (BSC) and layer-2 solutions to compete with and improve on Ethereum’s inefficiencies is one significant example.

The segment of Stablecoins is another area with immense promise. The stablecoin, Tether (USDT), is the most popular and the largest stablecoin by market capitalization and has been one of the largest contributors to DeFi liquidity pools. The primary reason is found in its name–stable; The volatility of crypto assets makes Tether a safer alternative to perform banking functions. However, Tether has been scrutinized for various reasons in the past couple of years, and new and better stablecoin alternatives are quickly emerging.

Wault finance and the commerce-backed stablecoin project

Wault finance is a community-driven decentralized protocol that emerged a few months ago in the DeFi space. As one of the first true cross-chain platforms, Waultt has grown enormously while offering multiple solutions to achieve a fast-growing decentralized ecosystem. These days, Wault is one of the largest platforms on BSC and Polygon where the ecosystem is based.

WUSD, the stablecoin developed by the protocol, is a unique solution that solves the volatility and over-collateralization problems of fiat-backed and crypto-backed stablecoin models without having to rely on non-crypto intermediary institutions like USDT. In simpler terms, WUSD is a careful research-based stablecoin pegged to the USD that has found a model which possesses the strengths of various stablecoin types without their weaknesses. Partially crypto-backed, yet improving on the instability of previous algorithmic stablecoins, WUSD possesses a new model as the first commerce-backed stablecoin. What this means is that WUSD is backed by a treasury, fully redeemable at any time. However, it does not try to extend its capital efficiency by inventing a governance token out of thin air like FRAX, but rather maintains a stable price through stability mechanisms that are reinforced by the ongoing commerce of the Wault platform.

In other words, the commerce-backed stablecoin’s peg is guaranteed by the active commerce within the Wswap DEX that is increasingly popular on both BSC and polygon. While the new stablecoin model would initially be collateralized 90% in USDT, the WEX token would be the active commerce element for the token and make up the remaining 10%. To put this in perspective, the WEX token is not a new token out of thin air; it has tens of millions of dollars in market capitalization already.

For every USDT deposit, 10% or 0.1 USDT will go towards purchasing and holding WEX in the treasury along with USDT; this way, the stablecoin would be 100% redeemable at any time. Rather than minting or burning the internal tokens(a potential vulnerability loophole DeFi protocols have faced), WUSD will use stability mechanisms such as the treasury, trading fee support, WUSD staking and emission support to make the stablecoin sturdy enough against market fluctuations.

Wault finance, a community-driven ecosystem

Since its launch in early 2021, Wault has quickly grown to become one of the largest and fastest-growing ecosystems on BSC and Polygon. From a scrutinous perspective, this is not much of a surprise, since the Wault DEX, Wswap, has the lowest fees (0.2%) on both networks. WaultSwap also allows users to provide liquidity in their pools to earn up to 300% in annual percentage yields (APYs) on both farms.

Yet, perhaps the most exciting of the ecosystem’s features is the 100% redistribution of protocol profits to the community. Through initiatives like this, Wault has shown a constant commitment to fully decentralizing every one of its features, including the native WEX token, the WEXpoly token, the WaultSwap DEX and the Wault Launchpad.

Undoubtedly, the clamor for decentralization in finance would create a better free and fair ecosystem where participants have a level playing field, and Wault is a proponent of this philosophy. While many projects have already existed and some are fading away, Wault has been a stellar example of how to lay a strong community-based groundwork for decentralized protocols within a short period.

July 22, 2021
XTEMCoin Analysis: A New Coin for Africa’s First Consolidated Exchange

The cryptocurrency industry is growing around the world, with the adoption still surging, even though the bull run that pushed it ended some two months ago, now. One surprising development, however, is the enthusiasm regarding coins like Bitcoin that African countries have expressed over the past several months.

Still, for countries that live in extreme poverty, for the most part, and whose people do not have another option to become a part of the global economy, it is not surprising that they are so willing to turn to any new way of earning, even one as risky as crypto. With that said, there are plenty of opportunities for crypto businesses in Africa, too. One project even found the need for the first consolidated exchange on the continent, and it is in the process of holding a token sale right now.

Introducing African Consolidated Exchange and its XTEMCoin

Africa’s first consolidated exchange is being launched by a company called T.E Markets Limited, whose goal is to build the exchange that would be developed as a synthetically indexed exchange. As such, it will open major investment opportunities for investors and traders alike.

Simply put, the goal here is to create an exchange that would solve one major problem noticed by the project’s founder and CEO, Ian Mvula. That problem lies in the fact that there is no one-stop shop for trading agricultural commodities of African origin, but also stocks, indices, cryptocurrencies, forex, and alike.

This lack is getting more and more noticeable as the rest of the world continues to see a number of platforms that are solving such problems emerge. Africa, where such platforms would be able to do the most good for its people, on the other hand, lacks them.

With the power of cryptocurrency and blockchain, however, not only can this be solved, but it can be solved in a decentralized way, which is where XTEMCoin comes in.

What is XTEMCoin?

XTEMCoin is an upcoming cryptocurrency that will act as a native coin for the platform, as well as a utility coin used for paying goods, services, and transaction settlements. XTEMCoin will also be used for a variety of other operations, such as staking, micro-finance, and mining, but also things like real estate, exploration, and beneficiation.

The project’s founder said that XTEMCoin will not be just another naked cryptocurrency with no real use cases, and he meant it. XTEMCoin seeks to offer safety and security in the local digital payment sector, and to finally give the people of Africa an opportunity to grow and profit by joining the global economy by using these emerging technologies.

As mentioned, the project is in the middle of its private sale, which started on Monday, June 28th, and it will last until 31st July. The coin is being sold at the price of $1.15 per unit, and the project hopes to raise $500 million by the time the sale ends. Once it goes live, it will slowly start receiving the mentioned use cases. Meanwhile, there are over 200 million potential users in Africa and beyond, all of which can be served thanks to the borderless nature of crypto. The project also has massive transaction speeds, so there shouldn’t be Ethereum-like problems, where transaction fees might skyrocket if too many people start using it.

In fact, the project has done a lot of research of other cryptocurrencies to figure out their mistakes and how to avoid them, the end result being XTEMCoin as it is right now — a project that aims to rewrite Africa’s story, and transform the continent from a struggling one into a prosperous one.

July 21, 2021