Blockchain This Week – WEF Battles Climate Change with Web3,TBD and Circle, Christie’s 3.0, Chainlink, Walmart in Metaverse

WEF Launches Crypto Sustainability Coalition

An initiative that will assess how Web3 technologies can be used to fight climate change. The coalition has 30 entities, including businesses and education institutions.

TBD Partners With Circle

The goal is to solve “some of our biggest money challenges.” It includes ramps for fiat and crypto that can power cross border trades to self-custody of stablecoins.

Christie’s 3.0

Is the Ethereum based new NFT marketplace by 256 year old auction house Christie’s. Christie’s has partnered with Web3 firms Manifold, Chainalysis, and Spatial. The platform debuted with an auction featuring nine NFTs from artist Diana Sinclair.

Microsoft VC Arm to Fund Decentralized Data Warehouse

Space and Time, a decentralized data platform, has secured $20 million in the funding round led by Microsoft’s VC arm, M12. Set to launch later this year, Space and Time will integrate with Microsoft Azure.

Walmart’s Roblox Metaverse

Walmart has entered the metaverse with Walmart Land and Walmart Universe of Play on Roblox. Users can participate in theme based games and fashion shows, among others. Players also have a chance to collect digital assets and virtual merchandise.

SWIFT Partners With Chainlink

The interbank messaging system has partnered with the Web3 price feed provider on a cross chain interoperability protocol (CCIP). CCIP will enable SWIFT to communicate digital token transfers across various blockchain platforms.

Galaxy Digital and Chainlink

Galaxy Digital is collaborating with Chainlink to bring crypto price data on the chain. The data will be distributed to multiple blockchains for developers to build DeFi and other applications.

Chainlink’s Build and Scale

Chainlink is starting two programs ahead of its Dec 2022 LINK token staking launch. Its “Build” program enables the developers newly using the Chainlink platform to stake 3% to 5% of their native tokens to access Chainlink feeds. Whereas the “Scale” initiative allows existing users to reduce transaction costs of using the oracles.

Coinbase Partners With Chainlink

Coinbase and Chainlink have teamed up to launch pricing feeds for blue chip NFTs. Coinbase will provide floor price feeds for NFTs using its cloud service for applications to access real time NFT prices.

Estonia Issues Crypto License

First, since the new money laundering law came into force in March of this year. Striga Technology OÜ is the first company that is authorized to provide a virtual currency service under the country’s new regulatory framework.

California Allows Personal Records On Blockchain

Governor Gavin Newsom signed a law that gives Californians an option to have their vital records, such as birth certificates issued on Blockchain.

Australia Calls for eAUD Use Cases

The Reserve Bank of Australia and Digital Finance CRC have called for use cases for CBDC. The aim is to explore new business models where using CBDC can prove to be economically beneficial.

French CBDC Projects

The Banque of France announced new projects to explore wholesale CBDC usage by banks and financial markets. These projects cover a wide range of scope, including managing DeFi liquidity and settlements of tokenized assets.

Multiple Central Banks Team Up for Retail CBDC

The central banks of Israel, Norway, and Sweden have come together to work with the Bank of International Settlements (BIS) to explore retail CBDC. The results of the project, which will trial the use of CBDC in international retail and remittance payments, are expected in the first quarter of 2023.

FTX to Buy Voyager Assets

Crypto exchange FTX will buy assets of bankrupt crypto lender Voyager Digital. The winning bid includes $51 million in cash payments and $60 million in earnouts and incentives.

Celsius Saga

Another bankrupt crypto lender Celsius was in the news as well this week. First, its CEO Alex Mashinsky resigned, following which Celsius’s CEL token fell over 8%. Next, the creditors of Celsius moved to subpoena Equities First, which failed to return Celsius’ $439 million collateral when the lender tried to repay the loan. Finally, CEL jumped 15% when FTX’s Sam Bankman-Fried hinted that he was mulling over buying Celsius.

Village in Metaverse

Nedbank, the South African financial service giant, has purchased a virtual village in Ubuntuland. It plans to give its customers experiences beyond banking.

Crypto Vanity Address Exploit Continues

The vulnerability related to Profanity generated crypto vanity addresses that was the likely cause of last week’s Wintermute hack had been exploited again. This time it was by a hacker who stole over $950,000 worth of ether (732 ETH) from a crypto wallet and immediately sent it to Tornado Cash mixer.

Do Kwon, Terra

At the request of the South Korean authorities, Interpol issued a red notice for the runaway founder of collapsed Terra ecosystem, Do Kwon. Meanwhile, South Korean authorities have requested crypto exchanges OKX and KuCoin to freeze around $67 million worth of bitcoin tied to Kwon.

Revolut Wins FCA Registration

Crypto trading app Revolut obtained approval from UK’s FCA to offer crypto services in the country. Revolut, so far, was providing crypto buying, selling, and trading services under FCA’s temporary registration regime.