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Gemini Aims To Capture The DeFi, NFT Mania With Latest Addition

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DeFi and NFTs have been the talk of the town. To capture this growth, Gemini has become the latest platform to have jumped into the bandwagon.

The Winklevoss twins led cryptocurrency exchange, Gemini announced support for new decentralized finance [DeFi], gaming, non-fungible tokens [NFT], and infrastructure tokens on the 22nd of March. The new addition which will be supported for both trading and custody are Bancor [BN], 1inch [1INCH], Loopring [LRC], The Sandbox [SAND], Skale [SKL], and The Graph [GRT].

Furthermore, the Ethereum-based Enjin [ENJ], which is currently supported for custody, will also be available for trading, said Gemini.

With the latest development, the New York-based cryptocurrency exchange becomes the first regulated platform to offer trading and custody support in the State of New York for SAND and 1INCH. In fact, the additions have also increased the number of tokens and cryptocurrencies that Gemini trades all the way to 33 in total, along with another 10, that are supported for custodial services.

According to the official press release, deposits for the aforementioned crypto-assets are now open, and trading availability for all six new tokens and ENJ will soon follow. These are set to roll-out first on its API/FIX and ActiveTrader platforms for USD trading pairs.

Trading on Gemini’s mobile application as well as the website will open on a rolling, token-by-token basis for USD, GBP, EUR, CAD, AUD, HKD, and SGD trading pairs. The cryptocurrency exchange also noted,

“As the Decentralized Finance (DeFi) revolution has come into bloom, over the past weeks we have seen an explosion of interest around digital art and NFTs (non-fungible tokens), and we are excited to continue supporting the development of the space”

The latest news comes amidst rising decentralized exchanges [DEX] such as Uniswap, Sushiswap, 0x, Curve, Serum, that have managed to thrive in a short period of time threatening to disrupt the centralized counterpart.

Burnt Banksy NFT Makes Headlines After Selling For ~$400K

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The world of NFT or non-fungible tokens continues to take the center stage. This time, a piece of burnt Banksy artwork has made headlines. According to reports, a tokenized version of this destroyed painting was sold for nearly $382,000 on OpenSea, which happens to be a non-fungible token marketplace.

Binance-backed Injective Protocol reportedly bought the Banksy work and converted it into an NFT before burning it on a live stream video.

YouTube video

The said artwork by the pseudonymous England-based street artist is called “Morons” [White] [2006]. As seen in the above video, it depicted a crowded auction room with a framed piece right beside the auctioneer inscribed with the words “I can’t believe you morons actually buy this shit.”

This NFT was sold to an OpenSea user called ‘Galaxy,’ who also has four non-fungible tokens on display.

The latest OpenSea sale comes just a few days after the group had burned yet another artwork in a Brooklyn park. Sources close to the matter say that the artists purchased the piece of artwork for nearly $100,000.

The reason for burning Banksy’s physical artwork might come off as bizarre to many, especially the ones that are yet to familiarize with the concept of tokenization of art, here’s the explanation provided by the BurntBanksy collective:

“If you were to have the NFT and the physical piece, the value would be primarily in the physical piece. By removing the physical piece from existence and only having the NFT, we can ensure that the NFT, due to the smart contract ability of the blockchain, will ensure that no one can alter the piece and it is the true piece that exists in the world. By doing this, the value of the physical piece will then be moved onto the NFT.”

The rise of blockchain art can be attributed to the fact that blockchains are impossible to tamper with. Besides, the money secured for Banksy’s burnt piece will be left for a good cause.

According to Injectove Protocol, the team was still deciding as to which charity will receive the proceeds from the NFT sale.

Did Justin Sun Just Bid $2M On Jack Dorsey’s First Tweet NFT?

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Yes, he did!

The concept of non-fungible tokens or NFTs might seem daunting, but they are the rage all over the cryptocurrency realm. The fandom is all agog at how rapidly NFTs are slowly going mainstream.

Owing to this, several well-known players were FOMOing as the craze showed no signs of slowing down. Today, we are talking about none other than Tron Foundation’s Justin Sun! He has updated his bet on Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey’s first-ever tweet, not once, not twice, not even thrice, but four times!

Dorsey’s NFT

For the uninitiated, Dorsey had listed the tweet for sale on the Ethereum based Valuables NFT marketplace on the 6th of March. While many hopped onto the train, the latest being the Silicon Valley billionaire who made a grand entry to the scene, it was actually Justin Sun whose highest bid stole the show.

The young crypto mogul first placed a bid of half a million dollars. Hours after which he updated it to $700k, then $1 million on the same day, then finally rising his bets all the way to a whopping $2 million for the piece.

The back-to-back tweets was enough to let the cryptocurrency community know that he really really wanted Dorsey’s NFT which reads “just setting up my twttr”.

Joining in the weekend buzz was Mike Novogratz, the CEO of Galaxy Investment Partners who went on to tweet that,

“Say what you want about Justin Sun, but the kid has gumption. And a lot of balls.”

The tech entrepreneur and Tron founder is now the highest bidder after this extravagant splurge of $2 million on the NFT. But this is not his first wild investment. Sun had previously placed a record-breaking $4.5 million bid to Warren Buffett’s Glide Foundation.

He had also donated $50k in Bitcoin to Anthony Pompliano’s Barstool Fund, and being the “big-mouthed” that he is, Sun wasted no time to tweet about it.

NFTs take the center stage

Digital art, collectibles, and virtual real estate have taken over the cryptocurrency industry by storm.

Celebrities, especially from the music industry, has been the early adopter of the space. Be it, Mike Shinoda, Snoop Dogg, Lil Yachty, Carl Cox, or Soulja Boy, the NFT market has emerged as a strong contender.

Not Everyone Is A Fan Of The Burgeoning NFT Market

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We are on the brink of the NFT revolution. Like any other space, the non-fungible asset class also attracted a fair share of critics. The Co-founder and CTO of Casa Jameson Lopp said that he sees no value in these non-fungible tokens.

Lopp’s original tweet read,

“I didn’t see the value of NFT art 5 years ago and I still don’t today. But I’m just one person.”

However, he did go on to clarify that ownership of scarce items that can be used in a variety of virtual worlds makes sense to him.

A similar sentiment was shared by Bitcoin proponent and podcast host John Carvalho, who commented,

“Part of the reason for high interest in art NFTs is the market of people wanting to sell worthless things at scale is huge, and pairs very nicely with the shitcoiner environment of VCs priming their projects with liquidity”

He went on to claim that “it’s a trap where issuers of NFT can use their own money to buy their own listings.” Carvalho also added,

“This creates an appearance of real hype and demand. It’s a trap.

What exactly is NFT?

A quick primer for the uninitiated. A non-fungible token is essentially a special type of cryptographic token which represents something unique and is non-fungible in nature. It can be used to create verifiable digital scarcity.

This marketplace which includes artworks and other digital collectibles are the game-changing applications that will one day lead to digital assets overtaking the physical collectibles market.

Anything can be sold using NFT, anything our imagination can come up with.

Several investors has signaled their growing interest in this corner of the crypto economy. The entry of big names such as Linkin Park’s Mike Shinoda, Lil Yachty, Carl Cox, and Soulja Boy, which has only added fuel to an already red-hot rally.

Despite the massive success of this space, not everyone is optimistic about what the NFT market has to offer.

For instance, Litecoin [LTC] creator Charlie Lee, believes that non-fungible tokens are unsustainable unlike “real art”.

He argued that NFTs are non-finite tokens and there is zero cost to create an unlimited number of tokens.

Contrastingly, real-world art needs effort and time to create much like the fact that great artist can only create thousands of pieces of art in his/her lifetime. Is this limitation that creates scarcity, which helps keep the value high.

More Than $100 Million Crypto Collectible NFTs Sold In A Month

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Not long ago, NFTs or non-fungible tokens were called fads by the naysayers. But the monumental boom in the market might has witnessed high-profile investors supporting the purely digital art form.

Hence, NFT trade is beginning to take notice. In yet another milestone more than $100 million in crypto collectible non-fungible tokens was sold in the last 30 days. This was revealed by the crypto-asset investment firm Paradigm co-founder Matt Huang.

NBA
More Than $100 Million Crypto Collectible NFTs Sold In A Month 2

According to the above chart compiled by CrytptoSlam, NBA Top Shot dominated the charts. The basketball based collection was rolled-out last October, and four months later, is went on to become top-selling NFT platform.

Next up was the living digital art collectible, Hashmasks followed by CryptoPunks, Sorare, and Art Blocks leading the top five spots in terms of sales according to the NFT data provider.

NFTs and Celebrities

Non-fungible tokens’ space has become the latest craze in the cryptocurrency realm. While the industry has witnessed a substantial rise in terms of institutional interest, the NFT marketplace has also found its ardent support base.

In fact, for the past several months, this sector has been beginning to build up a head of steam as big names continued to join in.

TWJ had earlier reported that American rock band, Linkin Park’s Mike Shinoda sold his first piece of crypto art using the non-fungible tokens. With this, Shinoda joined other popular artists such as Lil Yachty, Carl Cox , and Soulja Boy.

In addition, the famous Winklevoss Twins, Swish DJ Alesso, and 76ers owner Michael Rubin just debuted digital artworks alongside an all-star celebrity lineup such as Belgian DJs Dimitri Vegas and Like Mike last week. They launched the first collection of non-fungible tokens as part of the celebrity art collective ‘Ethernity’.

For the uninitiated, non-fungible tokens are generally an on-chain representation of items such as digital art, collectibles, in-game items

Linkin Park’s Shinoda Raises $30K From NFT Just Hours After Unveiling

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With NFT becoming the new disruptor in the art market, Linkin Park rapper Mike Shinoda has become the latest one to have taken on this concept of blockchain art.

The American Musician has shared his first-ever digital collectible piece called the ‘One-Hundredth Stream’ which was dropped on Zora, which is a site for buying limited edition art and other goods.

Reportedly, the auction for the digital art piece has received an offer of $30,000. Shinoda confirmed on Twitter that the entire sum will be donated to a scholarship that he funded at ArtCenter College of Design to benefit students based on artistic merit and financial need.

In a follow up tweet, Shinoda revealed that there was more to come and also went on to explain that the non-fungible token [NFT] contains the music created by the rap-rock icon.

“And if the contained song becomes more popular, then arguably the NFT becomes more valuable.”

He added that listing an item this way would likely be more profitable than releasing a song across the globe through traditional methods. He wrote,

“Here’s the crazy thing. Even if I upload the full version of the contained song to DSPs worldwide (which I can still do), I would never get even close to $10k, after fees by DSPs, label, marketing, etc,”

NFT Hype

Shinoda is not the first one to dip his toes into the flourishing space of NFT technology. He joined other popular artists such as Lil Yachty who secured a whopping $16,050 for his first collectible, Carl Cox who also released music as a token, and Soulja Boy who minted his first piece.

It is without a doubt that NFT has emerged as a strong contender to steal the spotlight in the 2021 crypto world.

A quick primer: NFT is a special cryptographically-generated token that leverages the blockchain technology to link with a unique digital asset that cannot be replicated. They are tokenized versions of a non-fungible asset such as artwork, real estate, or collectibles and possess properties and individual characteristics that make them unique and valuable.

NFT are not similar to the traditional cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, which are fungible.

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Linkin Park's Shinoda Raises $30K From NFT Just Hours After Unveiling 4

With respect to market capitalization, the non-fungible token industry saw a massive growth of 17% in the year 2019 and was forecasted to proliferate 50% by the end of 2020. According to NFT data resource NonFungible.com, the sales activity has risen dramatically especially since last September.

After a minor phase of cool off in late last December, the volumes have picked up yet again.