Cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase reported that its revenue had declined by 61% in the latest quarter as crypto prices dropped and trading volumes dropped. 

The San Francisco-founded company on Tuesday reported an after-tax loss of $1.1bn, compared with the $1.6bn net profit it registered in the middle of the crypto boom a year ago. 

The $446 million loss boiled down to a partial charge on cryptocurrency and venture capital investments.

Crypto Winter

Coinbase stock plummeted 5% in after-hours trading, having lost roughly 11% during the day. The collapse in bitcoin and other crypto prices sent the company into the red in the first quarter, leading it to lay off 18% of its staff in June. 

With the trading volume down another 30% compared with a weak first quarter, it suffered a $647m operating loss before the impairment charge and its net cash position fell by about $400m, to $2.8bn. 

In an attempt to ease Wall Street’s concerns about its financial condition in the middle of what it called a crypto “winter”, Coinbase published information concerning the amount of money it had spent and had allegedly not experienced any monetary losses despite the financial difficulties hitting it.

Coinbase predicted that it would maintain that same ratio this quarter, but then drop down accordingly in the next year.

Volatility Rocks

A spokesperson said the company understood investor concerns about stock-based pay and was “aligned” with shareholders on the issue. But she also said Coinbase took a longer-term view of the costs due to the volatility of crypto markets. 

Wall Street had been expecting a loss of $2.65 a share on revenue of $832m. Shares have been volatile in recent days, jumping more than 30% last week on an alliance with BlackRock. 

SEC investigation into Coinbase has stirred mixed feelings in the air with varying winter opinions. Will laying off more staff be a better solution or cause more damage as the workforce drops?

The Iranian Ministry of Industry, Mine, and Trade facilitated the nation’s first import of goods in cryptocurrencies.

The Middle East’s leading economy is one of the biggest importers of digital assets. Iran reportedly placed an order for coal mined worth $10 million this week through cryptocurrency.

Iran and Crypto Adoption

Reuters reported that the Iranian Ministry of Industry, Mines, and Trade had approved the first authoritative order for importing goods. Following this report, the Deputy Minister, Alireza Peymanpak stated:

“This week, the first official import order registration worth 10 million dollars was completed using cryptocurrency.”

Last year, the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) enabled banks, currency exchanges, and licensed miners to settle imports in cryptocurrencies. Furthermore, Iran further assured that its digital assets and smart contracts will be widely used in foreign trade in the following months.

Despite that, the Iranian authorities have not been so kind to the industry, and more particularly to the mining niche, in the recent past. A close observation could be the fight to shut out illegal mining powers and focus on mining projects from legal and monitored industries.

Iran and Power Sustainability

“Any use of subsidized electricity, intended for households, industrial, agricultural, and commercial subscribers, for mining cryptocurrency is prohibited,” Mohammad Bohlouli – a Tavanir Executive

Earlier this year, the authorities warned they might increase the sanctions on illegal BTC miners. 

In the spring of 2021, the Iranian government banned all bitcoin mining operations for four months to preserve the stability of its electricity network during the peak summer season. A month later, the country’s law enforcement agents raided an abandoned factory in Tehran and confiscated 7,000 BTC mining machines.

In December last year, the Iranian government halted crypto mining operations again, citing electricity blackouts during the winter.

Iran biggest challenge is electricity power diversion to illegal mining instead of households, businesses, and companies. Can Iran maintain this developing adoption of cryptocurrency irrespective of the power grid challenges?

Ripple Labs announced its Q2 2022 report detailing various product developments while illustrating options in the non-fiat market affecting its performance. A key highlight of the report was the confirmation of the company’s drive towards tapping opportunities in the non-fiat market. It also reiterated its focus on expediting the Ripple-SEC lawsuit.

The Ripple-SEC lawsuit has dragged on for years slowing Ripple’s future development, and XRP s price performance. Ripple stated that it is currently driving hard to have the lawsuit resolved. The company also noted that the lack of regulatory clarity is an issue that is affecting Ripple and taking a toll on the entire cryptocurrency market.

Ripple and NFT

Ripple’s actions have not been entangled in the SEC lawsuit against the organization. How so? The company confirmed that it is interested in exploring growth opportunities in the NFT market and aims to integrate NFT support into the XRP Ledger. 

It has also announced partnerships with major brands such as Lotus Automotive and the Balmain fashion brand to come up with NFT alternatives on XRPL.

One of the most intriguing aspects of this write-up is the observed fact that Ripple has at present joined with FLUF World to create a new blockchain called Root Network. This blockchain will incorporate XRPL and also use XRP for travel expenses. 

The cryptocurrency XRP has been stuck in a mixed performance since mid-June. As of 29 July, it was trading at $0.363, a slight improvement over last month’s 2022 low.

XPR Market Movement

On-chain metrics for XRP recorded spikes during a brief period on 28 and 29 July. People supported financing rates at Bitmex and Binance during this period, proving investors are interested in its growth.

The corresponding result is that stakeholders were positively impacted by the aforementioned report’s outcome. This can be noticed from whale transaction counts. For example, the whale transaction count metric registered 12 transactions worth more than $1 million in the last 24 hours at press time. This is the highest ranking that this metric earned this week.

XRP also maintained a reputation for high-dollar transactions, with values between $100,000 and $1 million. However, this category did not provide any notable spike in activity compared with the previous week.

A Harder Push

Ripple increased XRP sales by around 50 percent. The company sold approximately $408.9 million in XRP in the second quarter, adding to the 27.27 million it cut from selling holdings the previous quarter.

The Ripples XRP price drop could require a floor of technical support at $0.37 to prevent a decline and a fall. In case XRP fails to hold above this crucial demand level, it could probably lose ground up to $0.34 in a panic. However, the next few months will tell best.

Nigerians have been investing in cryptocurrencies to guard their capital against a weakening naira, which has led to the hack of the national currency to the lowest point in several years.

Abubakar Mohammed, a bureau de change operator, stated the naira dropped to 670 to 1 dollar on Wednesday in Lagos, the country’s main commercial area. That compares to 424.34 Naira listed on the official spot market as of 9:22 a.m local time.

Crashing Economic System

The largest economy in Africa operates a currency multiple exchange rate system centered on an official rate which is coordinated by the Central Bank of Nigeria. In addition, the nation also has a black market, where the exchange is regulated by supply and demand, making it a fairer reflection of the national value of the naira.

Despite the optimism diminishing in the Nigerian naira, people are flocking to cryptocurrencies since they are losing confidence in the currency. Aminu Gwadabe, president of the Association of Bureau de Change Operators of Nigeria, said by phone that the USD rate for crypto might be an indicator of the value of the local currency.

CBN Regulations

The largest economy on the continent, Nigeria, still abides by Central Bank of Nigeria regulations prohibiting banks from participating in cryptocurrency trading. Many Nigerians, however, share information about their cryptocurrency trading activities on the peer-to-peer market where transactions are priced in U.S. dollars.

The total price of the greenback was 687.6 naira on the morning of Wednesday, based on data from the world’s biggest cryptocurrency exchange, Binance Holdings, Ltd., indicating an impending weakening of this currency on the black market.

People are buying dollars to purchase digital assets, Gwadabe mentioned. “The USD buy rate on the crypto floor is moving at the same time as the local rate,” he added. 

The Binance platform shows Nigerian citizens conducted nearly $103,691 of cryptocurrency trades in 24 hours to 10:36 a.m. in Lagos on Wednesday. They traded more than $185 million of Bitcoin in the three months prior, accounting for about 25 percent of transactions on Paxful, a trading website.

Conclusion

Despite starting the day at N675, the exchange rate between the Naira and USD on Wednesday morning fell below the N710 threshold on the black market. 

The Naira crashes certainly comes along with some psychological pressure which includes exports getting cheaper to foreign customers and an expensive cost on imports.

The crypto market crash can’t be blamed for this impending financial disaster. So who is to be blamed?

June 2022 crypto crash has being one with major market threat. Thinking if buying the crypto dip is a good idea is a question that has crossed the mind of many.

Recalling the Terra Luna crash that collapsed and wiped over $500, current market evaluation drops below $1 Trillion.

A lot of crypto investors may have thought that May 12 was certainly the right time to consider buying the dip. However still, the price of Bitcoin has already began falling from $40,000 down to $28,000. Imagine buying then?

Sadly still, if you had considered buying at $28,000, you would be 30% down in your investment as the Bitcoin price barely holds above $20,000 today. Once again asking yourself, is buying the crypto dip now safe?

Why Buying the Crypto Dip?

Research pointed the reason for the first crash. While the first crypto crash was arguably caused by the depegging of UST from its $1 price, this second crypto crash is largely macroeconomic.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) put inflation at 8.6% in May following a report last week. This spooked all markets, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling 900 points and the S&P500 entering a bear market.The Nasdaq composite also fell 4.68% due to inflation being at its highest level since 1981.

Monday, June 13, Bitcoin price collapse from $27,000 to $22,000. Bitcoin price losses continued into June with Bitcoin trading at a low of $22,180 today. On Tuesday, the United States’ largest crypto trading platform Coinbase announced it was laying off 18% of its full-time staff.In some other news, SEC United State has already mentioned carrying out investigation as the crash maybe due to insider trading.

Buying the Crypto Dip as this time is a good investment and also a risky one. It’s very important you make research as the market movement is unpredictable.

The fast-coming 33rd edition of the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) hosted by Apple Inc has raised a lot of speculation and suspenseful thrilling news. Tech giant Apple has detailed news on showcasing the development of new software models and four new devices. The new software models to be revealed are iOS 15, iPadOS 15, macOS Monterey, and watchOS 8.

The Worldwide Developers Conference which will be held online between the 6^th to 10^th of June will feature some of the world’s leading experts and advocates in the digital industry. The NFT community confidently thinks there are high chances of Apple into the web 3.0 space with news of Apple NFT Trading Cards.

Pre Web3 Elements

At the WWDC, these trading cards are proposed to be stationed like Web2 elements but primarily for only collectible purposes without any tradable or intrinsic value attached. This caused no need for a surprise as CEO Tim Cook already mentioned the adoption of augmented reality and investment in tech merging sectors.

NFT Trading Cards

Publicity isn’t underscored as the giant forum MacRumours made a discovery. It was discovered that clicking on the Memoji characters featured an augmented reality mode and three (3) NFT trading card characters available to b claimed. As the company acknowledged cultural affiliating for mascot brand marketing and memes, Memoji maintains its spot as a consumer branding strategy.

The Twitter community never disappoints as spaces on web3 projects and Apple IOS has being talked about subjects.

Frankly, though, Apple Inc. is yet to confirm a press release and statements about its entry into the NFT space but speculations are high and seem highly positive. VR and AR functionality headsets are already in development all summing to an easy Memoji segment in the coming years.

Data has shown that over five million assets have now being minted on Cardano with a powerful plan on boosting it scaling capabilities. A lot of reasons has certainly triggered the sudden boost of Cardano.

Cardona (ADA) secured the sixth spot on CoinMarketCap’s listing as it outperforms Ripple (XPR) and Solana (SOL). Successfully drawing attention to it market trends, Cardano increased by 25.85% to $0.6539.

Cardano Performance

A lot of speculations has surrounded the up rise in trading volume as over 270% uptrend was seen yesterday. Increase in blockchain activity, launch of multiple apps on it blockchain and its DeFi ecosystem is a prime focus. A keen look at the DeFi activities lately shows an uptick attributing to a new future and bridge between Etherem (ETH) and Cardano (ADA).

This mentioned bridge was first brought to the limelight on May 25^th, 2022 by a tweet from @ioganofficial stating that a Beta version was underway. Gladly though, this might be the future talked about the project will soon support ERC-20 tokens along with the functioning USDC.

A Burn Note

Before @ioganofficial tweet on May 15^th about Cardano underway beta project on its DeFi, Cardano reached the $0.4 price level on May 12^th and also reversed without delay. The following week was no different as the price also dropped slowly to $0.44. However, this was slightly insignificant as it still topped with 10% above previous low and considered a minor retest.

Of note, there are roughly $158 million of this altcoin in total value locked across it varying decentralized apps. Defi Llama statistics also published its growth is roughly 25x lesser than Solana & 455x lesser than ETH.

Truly, the rapid rallying of Cardano lately and surprising surpassing of other token after the sudden depth to nil of the Luna Token has made some assume this is a potential fake-out, whereas other speculators disagrees with this speculations. Time only will entail.