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⌐◪-◪ → This Monday at 8 pm ET, Donald Trump plans to launch his DeFi project, World Liberty Financial, live on Rug Radio’s Twitter Spaces.

Yes, that’s right — Farokh and Rug Radio are cohosting an event with former President Donald Trump. Wild.

Crypto Twitter is still in shock, trying to form an opinion, but as usual, the audience is split. Some see this as a massive opportunity and bullish signal for the entire industry, while others think it's a grave misstep by Trump and his campaign.

While I remain optimistic, here’s why some think it’s a misstep by Trump:

• Trump is outspokenly anti-CBDC but is launching his own cryptocurrency as a potential president — a bit ironic.

• As someone often accused of being a serial grifter, launching a token on top of a forked project is not a great look.

One thing’s for sure — this is a massive win for fellow CryptoPunks Farokh and Loxely. It’s crazy to see how far they’ve come. Please join me in congratulating them on X on behalf of the entire Specs News family!

This could be the biggest crypto event of the year. Set a reminder below!

⌐◪-◪ → Holy shit — Azuki just announced the acquisition of Anime.com in what has to be one of the most bullish announcements of all time for NFT + Anime fans (me).

Azuki wants to reinvent the way anime is created and consumed, pairing its rich cultural history of art, technology, and storytelling with the emerging world of web3 — they’re calling this Anime 2.0, a new way to anime.

Sign up for their waitlist here.

Zooming out, we might see anime pave the way for Hollywood, showing the entire film industry what web3 enables in terms of movie financing, fandom attribution, and other unique consumer experiences.

For context, there are over 600M anime fans globally, and in my experience, they are some of the most engaged and die-hard fans in the world.

Don’t fade NFTs <> Anime. If you’re new to anime or a veteran looking for recommendations, join Specs.Chat below — I got you!

⌐◪-◪ → BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager with $9.1T under management, just called Bitcoin a hedge against global disorder, governments, banks, and fiat — everything people are afraid of.

This comes at an interesting time as global tensions rise ahead of the 2024 election. Some key statistics:

• Public trust in governments at historic lows (src)

• Death in armed conflicts is at a 30-year high (src)

I hate to fear-monger, but these are important observations. At the end of the day, “fear” might (sadly) be the accelerant Bitcoin needs to blow up.

I can’t think of a more solid seal of approval than BlackRock reaffirming, again and again, Bitcoin’s position as the new digital gold. The only things as bullish this year are the BTC ETF launch, pension fund adoption, and chatter of Bitcoin as a strategic reserve.

BlackRock isn’t just talking — their money is 100% where their mouth is. Just go check the chain.

Also, I still can’t believe Tether surpassed BlackRock in 2023 profits.

⛓️ Crypto & DeFi

• Sky to vote on ditching Wrapped Bitcoin over Justin Sun concerns

• ZKsync launches decentralized governance active on mainnet

• Mango Market collaborates on CKS Systems's unlimited order book

• WeWork founder’s climate firm refunds crypto holders after failed launch

• HTX exchange to integrate Lightning Network for Bitcoin payments

• Starknet community approves STRK token staking by EOY

• CoW Swap overtakes 30-day volume of Ethereum DEXs Uniswap

🏦 Wallstreet & VC

• Bitcoin ETFs record net inflows of $39M, BTC stays around $58K

• Grayscale XRP Trust starts trading, SUI to follow

• MicroStrategy buys 183K more Bitcoins for $1.1B

• Cypherpunk Holdings rebrands to SOL Strategies, goes all in on Solana

• Northern Trust launches blockchain carbon trading

• RWA’s hit record high of over $12B: Binance Research

• ParaFi Capital tokenizes part of $1B venture funding on AVAX

🏛️ Legal & Regulatory

• Bill proposes SEC-CFTC committee for US crypto regulations

• Kraken seeks jury trial to contest SEC's unregistered securities claim

• eToro settles with SEC, pays $1.5M limiting trading to BTC, BCH & ETH

🌎 Rest of the World

• Nigeria pressured by US to release detained Binance exec

• Federal Judge threatens former FTX exec Ryan Salame with sanctions

• Judge rules CFTC exceeded authority in blocking Kalshi’s election contracts

• England and Wales High Court rules USDT as property in legal case

• Singapore’s ride-sharing app Tada integrates TON for ride-sharing

🖼️ NFTs & Metaverse

• Magic Eden expands to Monad, its 5th chain

• Cozomo Medici temas up with Beeple to protect NFTs from SEC

• Fantasy and Predictdotfun partner up allowing betting on fantasy players

• Mortal 5/10 by XCOPY sells for 220 ETH

• Claynosaurz partners with mobile gaming giant Gameloft

• Prohibition Art announced winding down

• Treasure DAO proposal seeks migration from Arbitrum to ZKsync

• Binance to list Hamster Kombat’s token

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