Featured on TE - chunky and data rich analysis of expected net yields for small validators under the current Ethereum 2.0 specs, by Collin of ConsenSys. Tldr? Not particularly attractive.
+ Someone looked into the returns liquidity providers are getting on Uniswap.
Long essay where Joey Krug of Pantera/Augur outlines their investment thesis which is interestingly all about open finance: "The killer apps from the decentralized/parallel financial system use cases are already live. They work, they’re just slow and expensive."
Simple yet thought provoking framework by Chris Dixon of A16Z, who argues new technologies always come in weak/strong pairs. Applies to crypto too.
"Weak technologies adapt to the world as it currently exists. Strong technologies adapt the world to themselves. Progress depends on strong technologies."
Joel of Placeholder shares some thoughts on funding teams vs funding networks, the latter requiring being active in secondary markets to support price levels or cool off heated markets.
After being live on testnet since September last year, Veil is ready for mainnet next week (same day as Grin coincidentally, or purposely).
This is a big moment for Augur, as it gets a consumer grade front end that takes away most of the UX frictions of interacting with the default Augur app and enriches the experience with additional features (like the option to settle immediately instead of waiting for Augur reporting). This also shows the power of Ethereum modularity, with smart contracts from Augur and 0x together enabling a new user experience (while unlocking a potentially lucrative business opportunity).
Interestingly one of the first live markets will be on Grin's price and hashrate, so the many who are invested in mining operations will have an opportunity to hedge themselves.
Veil also announced their Seed round, led by Paradigm and participated by Sequoia and 1confirmation.
(Disclaimer: we are personal LPs in 1confirmation).
This is one of the obvious business opportunities in crypto as projects start to hit mainnet and generate actual usage. Great to see a few great quality teams going after it.
The Scout team is building BI tools for the Ethereum blockchain so that teams can generate and learn from custom KPI dashboards without having to reinvent the wheel internally.
There's now a secondary marketplace for distressed CDPs that allows owners to avoid the liquidation fee or getting liquidity without having to pay back DAI (on Kovan testnet for now).
And there seems to be a nascent market for vanity CDP #s too...
Fairly complicated, but a new framework to build crypto-derivatives.
It's comprised of fiat tokens issued on-chain by reputable third-parties (??), decentralized oracles for any external data feeds and financial contract templates based on ACTUS.
We've featured Totle before (the DEX aggregator), and they've now announced their round from Arrington XRP, NEO Global Capital (NGC), and Goren Holm Ventures.