Today's news tips:
AICC falls below $0.06, down 50.8% in 24 hours
Solayer community sale postponed to January 16
Wintermute Lianchuang: When prices rise, market makers usually sell in CeFi and buy back in DeFi
Regulatory/Macro
Zuckerberg calls on Trump to block huge EU fines on U.S. tech companies
According to Politico, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg called on incoming US President Donald Trump to intervene to stop the EU from imposing antitrust fines on US technology companies. He said on Joe Rogan's podcast that the EU has fined US technology companies more than $30 billion in the past 20 years, describing these fines as "almost like tariffs" and accusing the Biden administration of failing to effectively deal with the issue. Zuckerberg believes that the strength of US technology companies is a strategic advantage for the country, and the new government should take measures to protect these companies from overseas restrictions. He also hinted that Meta's recent termination of the third-party fact-checking program and the Diversity, Equality and Inclusion (DEI) project may be to cater to the policy direction of the Trump administration.
Bitcoin mining difficulty increased by 0.61% to 110.45 T, setting a new record high
CloverPool data shows that the difficulty of Bitcoin mining has been adjusted at block height 878,976 (2025-1-13 04:01:51), with the difficulty of mining increased by 0.61% to 110.45 T, setting a new record high. The current average computing power of the entire network is 1.19 ZH/s.
Financing
AI-driven crypto exchange VOOX receives $50 million investment from Pinnacle Capital
According to Cointelegraph, AI-driven crypto exchange VOOX announced that it has received a $50 million investment from Pinnacle Capital. This round of financing will be mainly used for infrastructure construction, strengthening security measures, and strengthening marketing efforts to attract users. At the same time, VOOX will accelerate its integration with artificial intelligence and actual needs. In addition, Pinnacle Capital will provide strategic guidance to ensure that VOOX meets key regulatory compliance requirements while optimizing its business model for sustainable growth. According to reports, VOOX Exchange is an AI-driven crypto exchange founded in 2022 and headquartered in Singapore. The platform offers cryptocurrency spot trading, margin trading, futures trading, copy trading, and AI trading strategies designed to optimize user returns.
Alpen Labs, a financial infrastructure on the Bitcoin chain, announced the completion of $8.5 million in strategic financing, led by DBA and Cyber Fund. Ribbit Capital, Castle Island Ventures and Geometry are the largest investors in its seed round of financing, and once again supported Alpen in this round of financing. This round of funds will help it accelerate the development of Bitcoin ZK Rollup "Strata" and release it to the mainnet in 2025. According to reports, Strata will be launched as an open platform to expand and promote the use of Bitcoin, which will unlock many practical functions for Bitcoin: simple self-custody, intuitive and privacy-protecting payments, interoperability, Bitcoin-backed lending and stablecoins, and many other on-chain applications. Strata will be open to the public from next month with the upcoming test network. Earlier in April last year , it was reported that Bitcoin L2 developer Alpen Labs completed $10.6 million in financing, led by Ribbit Capital.
Oh Completes $4.5 Million Seed Round and Plans to Launch Its Token on Solana in Q1 of This Year
According to CryptoSlate, the innovative platform Oh has completed a $4.5 million seed round of financing, and plans to empower the creator economy through the integration of AI and Web3 technology. This round of financing was led by well-known institutions such as Tangent, Big Brain Holdings, and Kosmos Ventures, and angel investors such as Yan Liberman of Delphi Ventures participated in the support. Oh focuses on providing disruptive solutions for creators and users through the personalized capabilities of AI and the decentralization and anti-censorship characteristics of Web3. Its core products include AI-driven OhChat, with users in 174 countries, and in the future it will also launch "superModels" - the next generation of AI digital creators with dynamic interaction and social capabilities.
The platform plans to launch an ecological token on the Solana blockchain in the first quarter of this year, providing creators and communities with a new model of staking rewards, tokenized income, and shared ownership.
AI
According to Bloomberg, in 2024, US AI startups raised $97 billion, accounting for nearly half of the total startup financing for the year, a record high. Several companies, including xAI and OpenAI, raised billions of dollars in financing, driving this growth. Global AI investment accounts for 35.7% of total venture capital. At the same time, startup financing in Europe and Asia fell to $61.6 billion and $75.9 billion, respectively, indicating that resources are more concentrated in the field of AI.
Project News
Upbit announced that it will terminate trading support for Steem Dollar (SBD) at 17:00 on February 12, 2025. This trading support termination applies to the SBD/KRW and SBD/BTC markets. According to Coingecko data, SBD fell 9.5% in a short period of time, possibly due to this.
According to The Data Nerd, about 40 minutes ago, Huang Licheng (Machibigbrother) deposited 1,000 ETH (about $3.22 million) into Binance. The latest data shows that there are only 11 million FRIEND tokens (about $597,000) left in his wallet. Earlier news, data: Huang Licheng is still buying FRIEND and has a floating loss of $15 million.
The community sales platform Buidlpad announced that the start time of the Solayer community sale subscription will be postponed to 10:00 (UTC) on January 16, 2025, because the number of registrations far exceeded expectations, reaching 15 times the expected number. In order to ensure fair distribution and protect the interests of real supporters, the project will suspend KYC services and strengthen protective measures to deal with robots and farms, and may adjust the subscription form. This community sale aims to establish a long-term connection between developers and the community, and the first batch of LAYER tokens will be exclusively allocated to community members. Earlier today, Buidlpad also tweeted to emphasize that the Solayer community sale is only for real community members, robots and farms will not be eligible to participate, and called on related behaviors to stop wasting time and invest their energy elsewhere. The project will strictly maintain the fairness of the sale to ensure that the interests of supporters are not affected.
Bithumb announces listing of Zircuit (ZRC) Korean Won trading pair
According to the Bithumb announcement, ZRC (Zircuit) will be launched on the Korean won market on January 13, supporting Zircuit network recharge (not supporting other networks). Recharge and withdrawal will be open within 2 hours of the announcement, and trading will start at 4 pm (Korean time) on the same day.
According to the official announcement of ANIME, $ANIME tokens will be launched on Ethereum and Arbitrum in January 2025, with 50.5% allocated to the community. ANIME aims to transform the anime ecosystem into a community-owned creative economy through cooperation with decentralized brands such as Azuki, providing opportunities for more than 1 billion anime fans to participate. Members of communities such as Hyperliquid, Kaito and Arbitrum will be able to participate in token claims, and more details will be announced soon. Azuki also announced a partnership with the Animecoin Foundation to jointly promote the construction of an open anime universe. The Azuki community has demonstrated the unique value of Web3 for IP incubation through decentralized brand building, the creation of more than 100 sub-communities, global community activities and rich fan creations. This collaboration includes the upcoming Anime.com and $ANIME tokens, which aim to transform anime fans from passive consumers to true owners of culture.
Viewpoint
Wintermute Lianchuang: When prices rise, market makers usually sell in CeFi and buy back in DeFi
Yoann Turpin, co-founder of market maker Wintermute, shared his views on price discovery and market neutrality. He pointed out that price discovery is the process by which the market continues to search for the true price of an asset. In the crypto field, it mainly occurs in CeFi and OTC markets, but it is relatively rare in DeFi and only occurs when the token supply is launched. For example, on platforms such as Pump.fun, Wintermute did not participate because the token size was too small. Market neutrality means that participants do not benefit from price fluctuations. This strategy helps market makers maintain inventory balance. When prices rise, market makers usually sell in CeFi and buy back in DeFi; conversely, they buy in CeFi and sell back in DeFi, thereby ensuring that the prices paid by all parties in the market are roughly the same. Turpin also said that although he supports the DeFi ecosystem, to achieve more price discovery, it is necessary to significantly improve the user experience and give priority to guiding new users into the DeFi field.
Important data
AICC falls below $0.06, down 50.8% in 24 hours
According to GMGN.AI market data, AICC fell below $0.06, down 50.8% in 24 hours, and is now quoted at $0.005931. In addition, according to lmk.fun monitoring, $AICC continued to fall after reaching a peak of $400 million in market value two days ago. A large investor previously tried to buy at a bottom price of about $0.12, but has now suffered a loss of $160,000, a drop of 40%.
Arthur Hayes unstaked 7.95 million ENA from Ethena and then transferred it to Binance and Bybit
According to Onchain Lens, Arthur Hayes unsecured 7.95 million $ENA from Ethena, worth about $6.54 million. He then transferred 7.9 million $ENA (about $6.46 million) to Binance and Bybit, and transferred 125,826 $ENA (about $102,700) to his other wallets. This operation is expected to bring him a profit of about $5.42 million.
Aave: ZKsync Era market grew 160% in the past week
Aave announced that the ZKSync Era market has grown by 160% in the past week. To support this growth, Aave will increase the supply and lending limits of ZK, USDC, and WETH based on the recommendations of Chaos Labs.
Bitcoin network gas fee drops to 2 satoshis per byte, about $0.26
Mempool.space data shows that the current transaction fee (gas fee) of the Bitcoin network has dropped to 2 satoshis per byte, about US$0.26.
