The Weekend Rip: Trading in the Dark

Bitcoin‘s new update, Taproot, launched yesterday. It was the blockchain’s first upgrade in four years.

Taproot added a number of security and privacy features to the world’s largest cryptocurrency. However, the blockchain’s newest big feature is arguably smart contract support.

Smart contracts are already a staple of many next-gen blockchains like Ethereum, Solana, and Binance Smart Chain. Taproot added smart contract functionality on Bitcoin’s core layer and the Lightning Network.

Alongside smart contract functionality, the blockchain has beefed up the security and efficiency. Taproot features a few unique features, including the MAST, which helps make smart contracts be more efficient and private. The network also has made complex transactions “indistinguishable” from simpler transactions, which means that it will be hard to censor or stop smart contracts or complex transactions from taking place.

Overall, Taproot doesn’t really feel like a substantial development for the Bitcoin network. However, it’s nice to know that the world’s first and most-valuable crypto is still forging its own path. $BTC.X rose just 2% this week.

U.S-listed Chinese tech stocks, which were battered earlier this year amid a regulatory crackdown, look ready to mount their comeback.

The KraneShares CSI China Internet ETF has fallen 32.4% this year, but signs of improvement are showing. $KWEB rose 8% this week and looks increasingly poised for a breakout as it rolls into the thick of earnings season.

Rideshare company $DIDI inspired confidence among investors when it reported earnings last week. The stock rose 16% on optimism that the company would relaunch its apps in China and beyond. 

Some investors are banking on that optimism snowballing after we see reports from $BIDU, $JD, and $BABA this week. All three rose last week on the positive report from DiDi.

However, investors will also have to grapple with turbulence in China’s property sector. That’s one reason why Chinese tech stocks might bounce before the broader market.

NFT platform OpenSea has officially mediated $10 billion worth of NFT sales on its marketplace. It underscores the explosive growth of NFTs and OpenSea, its flagship marketplace on Ethereum.

It’s an important milestone for NFTs (non-fungible tokens) — a type of asset in the crypto world that can be bought or sold like any other piece of property but doesn’t have a physical form. You can think of these digital tokens as certificates of ownership for virtual or physical assets.

Dappradar reports that 629,867 traders have contributed to the $10 billion in sales and the average sale price per NFT since OpenSea’s launch is $872.

Axie Infinity and CryptoPunks, both giants in their own rite, are the next biggest players by volume in the world of NFTs. Axie Infinity posted a total trading volume of $3 billion and a customer base of over one million. The Punks, arguably the origin of all NFTs, had a volume of $1.6 billion on its 10,000 pieces of algorithmically-generated artwork.  

Rarible and SuperRare fall far behind the rest, with$263 million and $177 million in volume, respectively. In contrast, the average sale prices on Rarible and SuperRare are higher than on OpenSea, suggesting that the latter two platforms are more popular for higher-ticket items.

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