Crypto Highlights Week #47 – Global search volume for Bitcoin appears higher than in 2017

Crypto Highlights: SaTT goes open-source, Pickle Finance hacked, Grayscale assets holding hits $10 billion, US Government enlists USDC, Bitcoin rally intensifies: There is more in this week’s Crypto Highlights. 

Top Headlines Of The Week

• Amid the current Bitcoin rally, the global search for Bitcoin reached a new all-time high compared to the metrics recorded during the 2017 bull-run.
• The serial attacks on DeFi protocols continue as Pickle Finance suffers an exploit which saw $20 million being whisked away from the protocol. 
• SaTT en route to open source as we look to foster community participation and contributions from seasoned programmers. 

Top Stories Of The Week

$pickle in a pickle as attacker swipes $20 million in “evil jar” exploit

It is fast becoming a norm as each week now accompanies at least one DeFi attack. In the most recent hack, Pickle Finance has joined the long list of DeFi protocols that has suffered a major hack in the last 3 months. The attack resulted in the loss of $20 million dollars being whisked away from the farming project. 

Unlike other DeFi exploits that involve the use of flash loans to execute the exploit, the case of Pickle was different, the attacker swapped funds between a malicious copycat contract and the cDAI jar. Attacker reportedly created “evil jars, ” smart contracts which “have the same interface of traditional jars but do bad things.”

He then swapped funds between his “evil jar” and the real cDAI jar, making off with the $20 million in deposits. This attack is now a big blow to Pickle Finance who have been gaining increased adoption, clocking $75 million of total value locked in the protocol. Following the attack, Pickle Finance’ governance token has plunged over 50%, falling from $24 to $10 in a few hours.

Global search volume for Bitcoin appears higher than in 2017

Bitcoin has been in the spotlight for the past weeks. There has been growing institutional and retail interest and a large spike in the number of people entering the cryptocurrency industry each day. 

Relying on data extracted by Brad Michelson, a senior marketing manager at eToro, a major trading and investment platform: the current monthly global volume for Bitcoin searches has out-run the number witnessed in December 2017. 

Expanding on the information, Michelson said that Bitcoin-related monthly global search volume in November 2020 stood at 8.9 million. This is up 356% more than the BTC search volume recorded back in December 2017, which stood at 2.5 million. This data reveals that more people are getting interested in knowing what is fueling the current bullish sentiment, and as such, they are searching out how to benefit from the market trend. 

Does this metric translate to a bullish trend for the digital asset? The belief is that new investors entering the market fuels an increased demand for Bitcoin which leads to positive price action. 

US Government Enlists USDC for ‘Global Foreign Policy Objective’ in Venezuela: Circle CEO

Governments are beginning to adopt stablecoins starting with Circle’s USDC. Circle is reportedly working with the U.S government to bypass Nicolás Maduro and support the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela led by Juan Guaidó. There are reports that Circle is using its dollar-pegged stablecoin USDC to distribute relief funds to medical workers and other Venezuelan locals.

CEO Jeremy Allaire informed CoinDesk this was his company’s first government partnership:

“The partnership, obviously, is with the exiled government,” Allaire reported in an interview. “The history here is that many countries, including the United States, recognize President-elect Juan Guaidó as the president of Venezuela. Maduro did not accept the results of an election and maintained power.”

The move to reach a partnership with Circle became apparent after Maduro tried blocking the distribution of funds by the U.S. Treasury Department to the Venezuela residence. 

The U.S. Treasury Department has been trying to send these funds directly to Venezuelan residents, but this task has been made difficult after Maduro tried blocking the distribution of these funds. Good or bad faith; it’s exciting to see crypto stablecoins being adopted in areas of traditional finance that have suffered censorship. 

Exclusive From SaTT

SaTT smart advertising is in good company taking the open-source route

Basically, the term Open Source denotes that a product includes permission to use its source code, design documents, or content. Our decision to go open source is anchored on making SaTT a state-of-the-art project that draws insights and contributions from the community. 

This implies that any developer or programmer can contribute to the development of an open-source SaTT ecosystem, which is an intriguing and productive way of involving global talents and communities to collaborate and produce high-quality programs.

Living up to the names of projects like Ethereum, Hyperlegder, and MetaMask that has gone the open-source route, SaTT intends to be a community-driven project that anchors on a solid development framework and quality coding. As a blockchain-based advertising project, SaTT will be setting the precedence for others to follow in the route to decentralized advertising. 

This Week’s Mainstream Adoption

Grayscale’s Crypto Assets Under Management Break $10B

With $10 billion in digital assets under management, Grayscale Investment remains the largest cryptocurrency asset management firm in existence. The  $10.4 billion in assets held by the firm includes Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Ether, Horizen, Ethereum Classic, Litecoin, Stellar, XRP, and Zcash.

The total assets held by Graycales stood at $7.6 billion as of October 30, although Grayscale has added a chunk of crypto assets in the past days, however, the price appreciation across all cryptocurrencies has also accounted for the recent growth. Grayscale took in $262.3 million last week alone, Managing Director Michael Sonnenshein tweeted on Friday.

The assets are held across nine single-asset investment trusts and a diversified fund. Shares in these vehicles are offered directly only to accredited investors, but most of them can be publicly traded on over-the-counter markets.

This Week’s Market Sentiment

4 reasons why Bitcoin price is on the verge of a new all-time high

Bitcoin has been on a ‘tear mode’ since testing the $10k support repeatedly. The current Bitcoin rally is being fueled by institutional FOMO which has seen a couple of big players pull a massive investment in the digital asset. As at the time of writing, Bitcoin was holding strong around the $18k region. 

The four factors currently sustaining Bitcoin momentum are institutional demand, reduced selling pressure, a spot-driven market rally, and the significance of the $18,500 resistance breach. 

Based on the combination of these four factors, and the fact that global central bank policies of continued liquidity injections may likely raise inflation, the probability of BTC securing a new all-time high soon remains high.

On Nov. 18, Bitcoin crashed from $18,500 to around $17,200, minutes after reaching a two-year high. The sharp rejection on the day showed that large amounts of sell orders were filed above $18,500. Currently, Bitcoin is trading around the $18,000 region while traders keep betting on the probability of a potential all-time high before the next massive retracement. 

Meme Of The Week

We hope you enjoyed this week’s edition of crypto highlights. For a peek at our last edition of crypto highlights & blockchain news, click here.