• Specs News
  • Posts
  • 10/9/23: Gary Wang Pulls No Punches 🔪👋📉

10/9/23: Gary Wang Pulls No Punches 🔪👋📉

Author

Valko
October 09, 2023

Top News ⌐◪-◪

  • 🔪 FTX co-founder Gary Wang gives bombshell testimony

  • 👋 Yuga Labs announces layoffs amid organizational restructuring

  • 📉 Ethereum Foundation wallet swaps 1,700 ETH for $2.7M today

Bankman-Fried's House of Cards? FTX Co-Founder Gary Wang Spills the Beans on Alleged Misuse of Client Funds – Bitcoin News

Gary Wang delivered a riveting testimony to prosecutors, alleging that CEO Sam Bankman-Fried diverted billions from customer accounts.

⌐◪-◪ → Week 1 is over, closing out with some banger testimonies from Gary Wang (FTX’s ex-CTO). Fun fact: Gary and SBF go way back, back to math camp where they’d sneak out after curfew to make cheessecake brownies. My favorite testimony was how Gary calculated (fabricated) the size of their insurance fund. Click here a full breakdown of Gary’s bombshells. Lastly, I’m very jealous of Gary’s lack of direct reports.

Yuga Labs announces US layoffs as part of broader restructuring

Yuga Labs announced layoffs and CEO Daniel Alegre sent an email to the company detailing a restructuring of teams.

⌐◪-◪ → Yuga announced a round of layoffs on Friday, but failed to decline how many people were affected. While this isn’t very transparent of them, it’s a good reminder that Yuga Labs is a private company, not a DAO. Despite the layoffs, it’s clear that Yuga is doubling down on Otherside after their spatial computing investment last week and the Meebits playtest this weekend.

Ether Slides as Ethereum Foundation Swaps $2.7M ETH on Uniswap

The Foundation periodically sells tokens to cover costs, creating a temporary sell-off event in markets.

⌐◪-◪ → There is a lot of bearish sentiment around the Ethereum Foundation’s decision to sell $2.7M ETH, but I’m not that worried personally. It seems like they sell on an as-needed-basis to cover operational costs, regardless of whether we’re in a bull or bear market.

Peripheral Vision ⌐◪-◪

⛓️ Crypto & DeFi

  • Vitalik says, ‘Trust is our product. We’re okay being the tortoise

  • Ethereum upgrade EIP4844 delayed to early 2024

  • Maker proposes new Uranium-backed stablecoin

  • Deribit to provide customers with contracts on more tokens

  • Pfizer-backed DAO launches community-funded biotech firm

  • Blocknative CEO calls out increasingly centralized nature of Ethereum

  • Sam Altman says BTC is a superlogical step on the technology tree

  • Joe Rogan thinks Bitcoin can become a global currency

🏦 Wallstreet

🏛️ Legal & Regulatory

  • OpenSea unaware of any involvement in AnubisDAO's $60M rug pull

  • SEC argues crypto has ‘no innate or inherent value’ in Coinbase case

  • Head of CFPB says US financial infra incentivizes surveillance

  • SEC vs Binance hearing scheduled for Thursday this week

  • RFK says fiat currency was invented to fund the cause of war

  • SBF's ex-girlfriend, Caroline Ellison, to testify in court on Tuesday

  • FTX used random math to fabricate size of their insurance fund

  • FTX consultant used personal wallet to save $400M from being stolen

  • DOJ says SBF’s investment in Anthropic AI is irrelevant to his case

🌎 Rest of the World

  • Coinbase, OKX, & Binance partner with UK firms to tackle regulations

  • UK tightens crypto regs and adds Huobi and KuoCoin to warning list

  • HTX hacker returns 5,000 ETH, exchange compensates them $400k

  • Binance introduces copy trading feature for futures markets

🖼️ NFTs & Metaverse

  • Yuga Labs conducts playtest for Meebits in Otherside

  • Calladita, an NFT-funded film, lands a global sales deal

  • Star Arena drained of $3M in $AVAX after hack on Friday

  • DeGods announces new strategy called ‘The Comeback’

Specs Frens ⌐◪-◪

Thank you for the shoutout @seanbonner!

If you like Specs → give us a shoutout on 𝕏!

We feature our top shoutouts right here, in every issue.