in Economy
Can the US stock market stand 3% US inflation?
Your browser does not support playing this file but you can still More
Aurelia Butler
More stories
Thetanuts Finance Launches Leveraged LRT Strategy Vault to Enable Further Composability with Pendle’s PT-eETH
Thetanuts Finance, the leading decentralized on-chain options protocol, announced that it has integrated Pendle Finance’s $PT-eETH offering to create a Leveraged LRT Strategy Vault on the Ethereum Mainnet. This marks the protocol’s first foray into the world of restaking and Liquid Restaking Tokens (LRTs), a fast-growing primitive within the Decentralized Finance (DeFi) industry that has already accumulated more than $10 billion in Total Value Locked (TVL).The leading LRT at present is EtherFi, which currently boasts more than $2.5 billion in TVL. It enables users to deposit $ETH, $stETH, $bETH or $cbETH in order to mint an LRT known as $eETH.By holding $eETH, users can increase their rewards with EigenLayer points and also protocol points such as EtherFi Loyalty Points. Moreover, there are additional opportunities available through third-party LRTs, such as the innovative Pendle Finance protocol, which seeks to increase $eETH yields even more by splitting it into $PT-eETH and $YT-eETH.$PT-eETH is a token that forgoes $eETH yields and points to instead earn a fixed ~20% APY. $PT-eETH can be redeemed for $eETH at a 1:1 ratio when it matures. As for $YT-eETH, this provides DeFi investors with leveraged exposure to $eETH yields and points that are streamed to holders on a perpetual basis until maturity, at which point the token decays to no value. At present, $YT-eETH holders can accrue 39x EtherFi points and 20x EigenLayer points. With its new offering, Thetanuts is integrating $PT-eETH to launch a Leveraged LRT Strategy Vault on Ethereum Mainnet.Holders of PT-eETH may either wait for their tokens to mature on June 27 before they can realize any gains, or exit their position earlier if the implied APY is favourable. While waiting for maturation, the Thetanuts Finance Leveraged LRT Strategy Vault provides $PT-eETH holders with the opportunity to earn additional yield by utilizing their $PT-eETH to generate additional yields via option premiums and rewards.With its Leveraged LRT Strategy Vaults, Thetanuts has created a novel mechanism in which users must “Zap” their $PT-eETH tokens and deposit them into the Thetanuts Finance v3 Lending Market, and borrow $ETH. This $ETH is then deposited into the $ETH Call (“ETH-C”) Basic Vault, where it generates additional Basic Vault Option premiums, but takes on short volatility risk. In this way, Thetanuts Finance’s Leveraged LRT Vaults give $PT-eETH holders the ability to utilize a valuable asset, which they could previously only hold until maturity. In total, they’ll be able to generate additional yield in five ways – EigenLayer Points, EtherFi Loyalty Points, Pendle $PT-eETH Fixed Yield, Thetanuts Finance $ETH-C Basic Vault Option Premiums, and $NUTS Rewards after Thetanuts Finance’s governance token goes live. Thetanuts Finance is proud to deliver a new industry-first with its innovative Leveraged LRT Strategy Vaults. The launch represents the first time an options market has created a new yield-generating tool for LRT-related staking products. Due to this, it’s highly likely there will be strong demand for the new product. There is currently 150,000 $PT-eETH (worth $577mm) that is currently in circulation.Thetanuts Finance will first launch its Leveraged LRT Strategy Vault on the Ethereum Mainnet, and will eventually integrate other LRT protocols – enabling a similar strategy with other LRTs as collateral assets. As with all DeFi investments, $PT-eETH short-call vaults are not entirely without risk, as depositors effectively take on short volatility risk. As such, there is a danger that their deposits could become worthless if the market for eETH or PT-eETH collapses.About Thetanuts FinanceThetanuts Finance is the leading decentralized on-chain options protocol focused on altcoin options. With the launch of Thetanuts Finance’s Leveraged LRT Strategy Vault, Thetanuts Finance will make its foray into the world of staking and Liquid Restaking Tokens.ContactDan [email protected] article was originally published on Chainwire More
- in Economy
What TikTok tells us about the paradox of markets right now
Stay informed with free updatesSimply sign up to the More
First EU Country Implements QANplatform’s Quantum-Resistant Technology
QANplatform has announced that its quantum-resistant technology is being used for the first time by an EU country in the public sector. QANplatform’s technology protects government-owned cybersecurity infrastructure against quantum computing attacks. The announcement was made in Zug, Switzerland, with Johann Polecsak, Co-Founder and CTO of QANplatform, and QAN’s Intellectual Property (IP) holding company led by CEO Patrick Storchenegger. The partners are developing and implementing post-quantum cybersecurity (PQC) solutions based on the QAN blockchain platform’s post-quantum feature. It aligns with the NIST’s (US National Institute of Standards and Technology) quantum-resistant recommendations. The partners are implementing these PQC solutions into enterprise software. Image: Patrick Storchenegger and Johann PolecsakPlease download the images from SOURCE for better qualityThe past year has seen a dramatic improvement in quantum computing capabilities, marked by IBM (NYSE:IBM)’s Condor, the 1000+ qubit power-machine. The US White House has released its National Cybersecurity Strategy, emphasizing post-quantum cybersecurity as a key pillar, and in January 2024, NATO and the World Economic Forum also released strategies to prepare for the quantum era. The EU is anxious not to fall behind in the quantum race against its global competitors. To meet this challenge, the Quantum (NASDAQ:QMCO) Technologies Flagship was launched in 2018 with a €1 billion budget. The race between quantum technology and the development of cybersecurity countermeasures has made it imperative for the public sector to take proactive measures to address these security challenges.Note: For national security reasons, the name of the EU country described in this release cannot be disclosed, nor can specific details about the exact use case.About QANplatform: QANplatform is the quantum-resistant hybrid blockchain platform that allows developers and enterprises to build quantum-resistant smart contracts and web3 solutions on top of the QAN blockchain platform in any programming language. Alpine Esports, a Group Renault (EPA:RENA) brand, and inter alia in the Formula 1 Esports Series signed QANplatform as its Official Blockchain Partner. QANplatform was selected for the EY (Ernst & Young) Global Startup Academy 2023 Program, and backed by Qatar’s MBK Holding.Website | X | TelegramContactJevgenia [email protected] article was originally published on Chainwire More
Are investors shifting from gold to bitcoin? JPMorgan answers
Driven by strong interest in spot Bitcoin ETFs, BTC funds experienced an inflow of $10.6 billion so far this year, compared to a $7.6 billion in outflows for physical gold ETFs. However, JPMorgan strategists believe this is not the case where investors are shifting funds from gold to Bitcoin. “We disagree and instead believe that private investors and individuals have propagated both gold and bitcoin YTD rather than shifting from the former to the latter,” analysts said in a note.Analyzing ETF flows alone may offer a misleading perspective, potentially underestimating the acquisition of gold by individuals and private investors through bars and coins, while overestimating their investment in Bitcoin. JPMorgan strategists highlighted a notable trend where retail investors are transitioning from holding Bitcoins in digital wallets “to the convenience and regulatory protection of the new spot bitcoin ETFs.”“Beyond retail investors, speculative institutional investors such as hedge funds, including momentum traders such as CTAs, appear to have also propagated the rally by buying both gold and bitcoin futures since February, perhaps even more heavily than retail investors,” analysts wrote. More
BNB Chain Looks to Expand L2 Ecosystem; Introduces RaaS to Streamline Establishment of New L2 Blockchains
Rollup-as-a-Service (RaaS) will enable large-scale Dapps, enterprise and BNB Chain to establish custom L2s on BNB Smart Chain BNB Chain, the community-driven blockchain ecosystem that includes the world’s largest smart contract blockchain, today unveiled its Rollup-as-a-Service (RaaS) solution for building Layer 2 blockchains (L2s) on BNB Chain. RaaS provides large-scale Dapps, enterprise and BNB Chain itself with the technological infrastructure needed to deploy dedicated L2s on BNB Smart Chain (BSC), further expanding the L2 ecosystem. Rollup-as-a-Service is a significant advancement in the blockchain sphere. Specifically designed for Dapps and blockchain projects, RaaS offers a cost-effective and efficient pathway for building and deploying rollup networks. This approach not only facilitates further development but also enables the creation of unique ecosystems tailored to specific user bases.Projects from verticals like gaming, DeFi, AI, DePin, DeSoc and more can leverage BNB Chain’s RaaS offering by collaborating with specialized service providers such as AltLayer, NodeReal, and Movement Labs. RaaS on BNB Chain also offers versatility with rollup management and no-code deployment options.The L2s established via RaaS on BNB Chain will be built on BSC, which persists as the foundational Layer 1 blockchain (L1) and governance chain of BNB Chain. A DeFi hub, BSC combines a thriving L1 ecosystem with affordability, stability and the scalability demonstrated during its all-time high of 32 million daily transactions in late 2023. In addition to RaaS, the focuses of the BNB Chain 2024 Outlook revolve around the “One BNB” multi-chain paradigm. This paradigm interconnects BSC, opBNB, and BNB Greenfield to address the need for an integrated tech stack facilitating the transition of applications to fully on-chain Web3 frameworks. About BNB ChainBNB Chain is a community-driven blockchain ecosystem that seeks to remove barriers to Web3 adoption. Powered by BNB, it includes the world’s largest L1 blockchain, the EVM-compatible BNB Smart Chain, and fosters a multi-chain ecosystem with BNB Greenfield and opBNB. Offering ultra-low gas fees and superior TPS, the BNB Chain ecosystem hosts thousands of dApps across DeFi, metaverse, gaming, SocialFi, NFTs and infrastructure, each of which adds value to its ecosystem.BNB Chain fosters impactful Web3 innovation with its BNB Chain Builder Support Program. This includes the MVB accelerator program, run in partnership with Binance Labs and CMC Labs.For more, follow BNB Chain on Twitter.ContactBNB [email protected] article was originally published on Chainwire More
MicroStrategy taking on debt to buy Bitcoin adds risk to crypto rally – JPMorgan
The impressive rise in cryptocurrency value hasn’t deterred MicroStrategy Incorporated (NASDAQ:MSTR), the largest corporate investor in Bitcoin, from increasing its holdings. Under the leadership of Michael Saylor, the enterprise software maker has recently accelerated its purchases, now possessing over 200,000 BTC.MicroStrategy is a provider of enterprise software solutions and services.The company specializes in business intelligence, mobile software, and cloud-based solutions. Its flagship product, the MicroStrategy analytics platform, offers advanced data analytics capabilities, allowing organizations to analyze vast amounts of data and make informed decisions.However, over the past few years, the company became widely known for its significant investment in Bitcoin as part of its corporate treasury strategy.Positioning itself as the “world’s first Bitcoin development company,” the firm has made it its mission to contribute to the Bitcoin network’s growth and development. The company channels its cashflows and proceeds from equity and debt financings into the acquisition of Bitcoin, which it holds as its main asset in treasury reserves.Earlier this month, filings with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) revealed that MicroStrategy acquired 12,000 BTC for $821.7 million, its second-biggest purchase since beginning its cryptocurrency investments nearly four years prior.This acquisition, executed between February 26 and March 10, was mainly financed using the $800 million generated from the sale of convertible notes recently by the company.This new purchase increased the company’s BTC holdings to around 205,000 tokens, with a current value of nearly $15 billion. JMP analysts said yesterday that the Bitcoin price could hit $280,000 over the next 3 years.More recently, on Wednesday, the business intelligence service provider announced its plans to issue an additional $500 million in convertible debt, which it will use for more Bitcoin purchases.If BTC continues trading around the current $73,000 level, it will allow MicroStrategy to buy approximately 6,800 additional tokens with proceeds from this new offering.After buying more than $1 billion worth of Bitcoin in Q4 2023, MicroStrategy continued its aggressive approach strategy into 2024, acquiring roughly the same amount since the start of 2024.As such, it is safe to say that the company itself has also played a noteworthy part in amplifying the cryptocurrency’s momentum.However, its strategy of buying more BTC through convertible-debt offerings adds risk to the currency crypto market rally, according to JPMorgan strategists.“We believe debt-funded bitcoin purchases by MicroStrategy add leverage and froth to the current crypto rally and raise the risk of more severe deleveraging in a potential downturn in the future,” said strategists led by Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou.Bitcoin was trading close to the $72,500 mark at the time of writing, up 72% year-to-date. More
- in Economy
Analysis-Putin grows war economy but incomes suffer ‘lost decade’
LONDON (Reuters) – When President Vladimir Putin ran for re-election in 2018, he promised a “decisive breakthrough” in living standards. Six years later, as Russians go to the polls again, he is recycling old promises with new deadlines.In a major speech last month, Putin pledged more than 11.5 trillion roubles ($125 billion) of spending on areas ranging from mortgage subsidies and tax breaks for young parents to sweeping upgrades to public infrastructure.He played up the fact that Russia’s economy expanded faster last year – with 3.6% growth in GDP – than any of the Group of Seven nations that have hit Moscow with waves of sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine.But other data paint a gloomier picture. Russia’s war-focused economy, where arms factories are working in three shifts round the clock, is faced with labour shortages, population decline and low productivity and investment.The breakthrough in living standards has not materialised. Real incomes have risen 7.6% since Putin made his 2018 promise but are still fractionally lower than they were in 2013.”With regard to our income, 2014-2023 can safely be called a lost decade,” wrote Yevgeny Suvorov, an economist at CentroCreditBank.In a February survey commissioned by the central bank, 28% of people said they don’t have enough money for food or they can buy food but can’t afford clothes and shoes.Inflation has accelerated well above the central bank’s 4% target in recent years – hitting 8.4% in 2021, 11.9% in 2022 and 7.4% in 2023 – and interest rates are at 16%.Soaring prices for eggs forced Putin into a rare apology in December. State statistics service Rosstat, in its releases this year, has started saying that prices “changed” rather than “rose”.BUDGET STRAINSThe cost of the war is straining the state budget, where a third of spending is now going on defence, and has forced the government to drain almost 6.5 trillion roubles in the past two years from its rainy-day savings pot, the National Welfare Fund.In the past two weeks Putin has signalled that taxes on companies and wealthier individuals will rise, even though his finance minister said as recently as October that basic taxes would not change for the next three years.A senior lawmaker, Anatoly Aksakov, said on Thursday that income taxes might rise to 17% and 20% for people earning over 5 million and 10 million roubles respectively, compared with a current top rate of 15%.The promises outlined by Putin in his Feb. 29 state of the nation speech will cost up to around 2 trillion roubles a year.But in several key areas he pushed back the dates for meeting previous targets or omitted to mention past pledges that have not been met.”All the new stuff is well-forgotten old stuff,” said Dmitry Polevoy, investments director at Astra Asset Management.For example, the number of Russians living below the poverty line of 14,339 roubles ($156.57) per month in 2023 dropped to 9.3% from 12.9% at the end of 2017 – a reduction that fell far short of Putin’s 2018 pledge to halve the poverty rate. Last month he set a new target of 7% by 2030.Economists say key drivers of a fall in poverty last year were higher wages – a reflection of labour shortages – together with increased benefits for families with children, higher salaries to attract contract soldiers, and compensation payments to the families of those killed and wounded in Ukraine.They said wages grew fastest in parts of the country with high concentrations of defence industry work.Putin said a shortage of workers was one of the main risks facing the economy, but did not set specific targets. Hundreds of thousands of people have fled the country or been called up to fight in Ukraine since the war began. Having set a target in 2018 to raise life expectancy to 78 by 2024, Putin reset the deadline two years later to 2030. Last month he repeated that goal, although Rosstat says average life expectancy was 73.1 years at the end of 2023 and is only expected to reach 78 in 2037. Another unmet target is labour productivity, which Putin said in 2018 needed to grow by at least 5% each year in the core sectors of industry, construction, transport, agriculture and trade.Rosstat’s measure of labour productivity dropped by 3.6% in 2022, the first year of the war, and data for 2023 will not be published until the end of this year. Putin said AI would be a key driver of productivity, but did not give any new numerical target.Since 2012, Russia has striven to increase capital investment to 25% of GDP, with Putin repeating that goal in 2018. But capital investment dropped to 19.7% of GDP in 2022 from 21.4% in 2017. Putin did not mention the 25% target this time around.In his speech, he also ordered an increase of at least two-thirds in the volume of Russian non-energy exports such as food, metals, fertilisers, machinery and equipment.Back in 2018, he had said these exports should double to $250 billion by 2024. If his latest target is achieved, they would reach $243.5 billion by 2030.Putin said Russia’s economy, now number five in the world by purchasing power parity, would soon move into the top four. But Polevoy said that ranked by GDP per capita – a more relevant measure of living standards – Russia was not far above the median of all countries.”There’s likely to be a growing tension in the coming years between President Putin’s twin goals of military success in Ukraine and achieving macroeconomic stability at home,” Capital Economics said in a report, with Russia’s loose fiscal stance to support the war causing the economy to overheat. “The economy can withstand a long war, but not necessarily a more intense one.”($1 = 91.5800 roubles) More
