ARB Airdrop Sparks Frenzy, Balaji's Million Dollar Bet, and More

7 Highlights from the World of Digital Assets

Mar 20, 2023

We’re back? This week was one for the crypto history books with Balaji betting $1M that BTC would hit $1M within 90 days and Arbitrum announcing what could be the biggest airdrop of the year.

In this issue:

Arbitrum activity surges following airdrop announcement
Arbitrum project ARB allocations
How the ARB token will work
Balaji’s million dollar bet
Stacks brings scalability and smart contracts to Bitcoin
USDT supply surges as USDC and BUSD supplies fall
Trader Joe DEX volume grows

Arbitrum Activity Surges Following Airdrop Announcement

This week Arbitrum announced their highly-anticipated airdrop. Prior to the announcement, there were concerns that most network activity was from airdrop farmers and would drop off precipitously. Instead, on-chain activity pushed upwards.

Arbitrum daily transactions broke 1M for the second time:

Arbitrum DEX volume had its best week ever:

Arbitrum saw stablecoin inflows everyday since the announcement:

Arbitrum Project ARB Allocations

In addition to the community airdrop, a portion of ARB tokens will be given to native protocol. Nansen looked at DAO activity on Arbitrum to give a sense of which protocols will most benefit.

Nansen | 📍Paris Blockchain Week @nansen_ai

🚨 Regarding $ARB airdrop allocated to community-owned treasuries We need to clarify that this graph only represents one of the many metrics to understand DAO activity on Arbitrum & was NOT the unique input in the analysis Points were attributed to the protocols based on: 🧵

How the ARB Token will Work

Price predictions are fun, but how does ARB actually work and why does Arbitrum need a token? DefiIgnas lays out the role that ARB will play in the Arbitrum Ecosystem.

Ignas | DeFi Research @DefiIgnas

1/ Arbitrum just launched the $ARB token with self-enforcing on-chain governance. $ARB will play a crucial role in the progressive decentralization of the Arbitrum protocol. Here's how it works: 🧵

Balaji’s Million Dollar Bet

The other big crypto news of the week was Balaji’s headline-making bet. The tech billionaire publicly predicted that hyperinflation in the US, combined with mass bank collapses, would push BTC over $1M within 90 days.

Balaji @balajis

The BitSignal How do you ring the fire alarm on the internet? How do you show it’s not a false alarm? I am putting up the BitSignal. $1M in BTC to alert us to the stealth financial crisis. $1000 per tweet, for the best 1000. Reply with your charts, graphs, stats, memes! Bring… https://t.co/UCWeCBULDD

While this prediction is extreme (especially its accelerated timeline), it’s worth pointing out that in January 2020, Balaji accurately predicted how much of that year would play out:

Balaji @balajis

Going viral What if this coronavirus is the pandemic that public health people have been warning about for years? It would accelerate many pre-existing trends. - border closures - nationalism - social isolation - preppers - remote work - face masks - distrust in governments

Stacks Brings Scalability and Smart Contracts to Bitcoin

With BTC pumping and Bitcoin dominance rising, very few coins have outperformed it. Stacks (STX) is one of the few exceptions. As a Bitcoin Layer 2, Stacks enables scalability, smart contracts, and DeFi on Bitcoin. If we really see a massive Bitcoin narrative, protocols built on top of Bitcoin could be poised to benefit.

nnova.eth 🦇🔊 @NNovaDefi

We are Entering a New Era – The Build On Bitcoin Era. If Bitcoin is Digital Gold – Then @Stacks is The Shovel. This is a massive opportunity to be early. Stacks Bitcoin L2 Scaling Solutions. Here is all you need to know. Let’s dive in. ↓

To really go down the rabbit hole, I recommend this thread of threads with nearly 100 threads about the Stacks ecosystem:

the-advisor.btc/.eth/.lens @the_advisor_btc

My threads on Stacks ecosystem developments. The list will grow as I write more threads on #Stacks, so you will be able to check older or more recent writings. THREAD🧵 👇👇👇

USDT Supply Surges as USDC and BUSD Fall

Following the USDC depeg and regulatory action against BUSD, crypto holders have continued to move money to USDT.

Over the past 7 days USDT supply grew nearly 5% while USDC supply fell 11.4% and BUSD supply fell 2.6%.

Trader Joe DEX Volume Grows

Trader Joe, the leading DEX on Avalanche and a growing DEX on Arbitrum, has seen its volume trend upwards this month. All DEXs saw a major jump in volume on March 11th, but most haven’t sustained as much of that volume as Trader Joe has.

That’s all for this week. For more frequent content, follow me on Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram.

Until next time,

Patrick Scott

Dynamo DeFi