Latest from Jacquelyn Melinek
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Nine crypto VCs on why Q1 investments were so hot and how it compares to previous bull market
If the 2023 crypto venture landscape was an ice-cold pot of water, the first quarter of 2024 is the part where the bubbles start to form right before water boils, Tom Schmidt, a partner at Dragonfly Capital, said to TechCrunch. And he’s not wrong: $2.52 billion in total capital has…
As AI proliferates and things on the internet are easier to manipulate, there’s a need more than ever to make sure data and brands are…
Crypto
Sam Bankman-Fried gets 25 years in prison for fraud and money laundering at FTX, ordered to pay $11B in forfeiture
Before sentencing, Bankman-Fried acknowledged in court that he made a “series of bad decisions,” but argued they were not “selfish” ones.
Welcome to TechCrunch Crypto, formerly known as Chain Reaction. This is the last edition of this newsletter. I want to personally thank each of you…
As the crypto space heats back up, so has funding for new startups. 0G Labs, a web3 infrastructure firm,” has raised $35 million in a pre-seed round, the team exclusively…
Crypto
A new web3 network is being built right now that wants to end Big Tech’s control of your data
Many of the people building web3 feel like the traditional web ecosystem has taken advantage of users and their data. While it benefits a number…
Crypto
Solana memecoin hype continues, Backpack’s beta phase was a success and Starbucks axes its NFT program
Welcome to TechCrunch Crypto. This week, Starbucks killed its Odyssey NFT program, Solana continued to see memecoin momentum and India faces more challenges with the…
Rails, a decentralized crypto exchange, has raised $6.2 million in attempts to fill the void FTX left behind after crashing in 2022, the startup’s co-founder and CEO Satraj Bambra exclusively…
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How crypto exchange Backpack climbed its way to success after its major investor FTX died
Backpack’s founders, who are building a crypto exchange and wallet, have experienced strong growth since launching in 2022. But the road wasn’t easy. FTX co-led Backpack’s $20 million strategic investment round in September 2022. Less than two months later, in November 2022, FTX collapsed. “We lost 80% of the operating…
Starbucks launched Starbucks Odyssey in 2022 as its initial foray into the web3 world.
Two months ago, media giant Fox Corp. partnered with Polygon Labs, the team behind the Ethereum-focused layer-2 blockchain, to tackle deepfake distrust. Fox and Polygon…
Crypto
Bitcoin hits new high, Solana price jumps as memecoins mania rises and Worldcoin faces heat in Spain
Welcome to TechCrunch Crypto, formerly known as Chain Reaction — it was an eventful week in the crypto world.
Crypto
Former web3 gaming founders raise $2.5M for their NFT marketplace to retain users even when there ‘isn’t money to be made’
Even though NFT sales volume is still down 88% from 2022 all-time highs (and down 38% year-to-date), Pallet Exchange is building a new type of NFT marketplace focused on user…
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Solana’s price rises to $160, highest level since January 2022 as memecoin mania rises
The token behind Solana, a layer-1 blockchain that’s competitive with the Ethereum blockchain, has been through the wringer after it plummeted from a high of about $260 in late 2021 to a low around $8 in early 2023. But like every good movie with a character redemption arc, Solana has…
Featured Article
Blockchain startup Sei Labs creates an interesting solution to make Ethereum faster
Sei Labs, a startup co-founded by a former Robinhood engineer and a former VC from Coatue, has launched a new open sourced project that offers a novel and exciting approach to make Ethereum faster and less expensive for developers. On Wednesday, Sei launched The Parallel Stack, a public good project…
Crypto
Bitcoin hits new all-time high of $72,700 but one index warns we’re in ‘extreme greed’ territory
The crypto scene continues to remain so hot that bitcoin is hitting one new high after another. It surpassed $72,700 on Monday. This was initially driven by the approval of…
Zora, an NFT-based social network platform, is continuing its expansion beyond the crypto-sphere into the hot artificial intelligence market, Dee Goens, the startups’ co-founder, said…
Welcome back to TechCrunch Crypto. It was an eventful week: bitcoin’s price hit a new high, Spain’s data protection authority banned Worldcoin and Binance raised…
The NFT sector has not yet returned to the glory of its 2022 heyday, but that hasn’t stopped the evolution of the tech. For instance, OpenSea has partnered with the…
It’s been a busy year so far for bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, and it’s only March. The digital currency hit a new all-time high for the first…
There’s no reputation system in the decentralized world of web3, so it’s hard to figure out which entities and individuals to trust and depend on.
Crypto
Bitcoin jumped and Coinbase’s app crashed, while Aptos eyes Hong Kong and Telegram rolls out rewards with TON
Welcome to TechCrunch Crypto. Here’s the biggest news this week: bitcoin’s price jumped and Coinbase’s app crashed, Telegram rolled out a plan to pay out…
Crypto
Asymmetric Financial has a plan to unlock Bitcoin’s trillion-dollar potential with dedicated DeFi fund
As the digital asset industry picks up steam again, some crypto funds are looking to home in on specific sectors. Crypto fund Asymmetric Financial is creating its Bitcoin DeFi Venture…
NFTs don’t always get taken very seriously, particularly now that AI and content creators are hogging the spotlight, but not everyone is so quick to…
Featured Article
Coinbase cites stablecoins, Base as key 2024 priorities after crushing Q4 estimates
After disclosing better-than-expected financial results in its fourth-quarter earnings report, U.S.-based Coinbase has big plans. The second-largest crypto exchange told its investors that it intends to lean heavily on its work with the popular USDC stablecoin this year, lever its recently launched layer-2 blockchain Base as a way to experiment…
Crypto
Crypto VC exits were low in Q4 2023, Phantom MAU’s reach new highs and spot bitcoin ETF volumes are still rising
Welcome to TechCrunch Crypto, formerly known as Chain Reaction. This is our fifth edition with of course, regularly scheduled news bits, but also some recurring…
New PitchBook data makes it clear that if the larger startup market is suffering from an exit-drought, crypto startups are possibly even more parched.
Phantom, a crypto wallet heavily used in the Solana ecosystem, has seen its user base more than triple over the past year.
Crypto
As spot bitcoin ETF volumes continue to rise, Bitwise Asset Management predicts a high ceiling for growth
Bitwise runs the Bitwise Bitcoin ETP, currently the fourth-largest spot bitcoin ETF by market cap. But the road to this point wasn’t easy.
Crypto
Farcaster hype grows, Bluesky opens to the public and SEC’s Hester Peirce is open to new token proposals
Hello and welcome back to the fourth edition of the new and improved TechCrunch Crypto newsletter. Let’s get into the big headlines.
