Are you curious about the latest in the crypto world? Here’s a rundown of today’s key trends and events affecting Bitcoin prices, blockchain technology, DeFi, NFTs, Web3, and crypto regulations.
US presidential winner prediction market crosses $3 billion on Polymarket a day before the election
On November 5, just one day before the United States presidential election, the prediction market for the race surpassed $3 billion in total volume on the decentralized platform Polymarket.
As of 12:15 p.m. ET (17:15 UTC) on November 4, Polymarket’s data indicated a total betting volume of $3.13 billion. Bets on Republican candidate Donald Trump accounted for $1.2 billion, while Democratic candidate Vice President Kamala Harris attracted $782.5 million in betting volume. The platform's current winning odds for Trump and Harris stand at 56.3% and 43.8%, respectively, with Trump’s odds having decreased by more than 10% over the weekend.
This same prediction market crossed the $1 billion mark on September 24 and exceeded $2 billion by October 17.
The 2024 presidential election has played a significant role in driving Polymarket’s recent growth. According to The Block's Data Dashboard, the platform's trading volume grew by 368% month-over-month from September to October. October alone saw $2.5 billion in monthly trading volume and a record-high of nearly 235,300 active traders.
Amid this surge in interest in prediction markets, Robinhood Derivatives introduced event contracts in late October, allowing users to place bets on the outcome of the 2024 U.S. presidential election.
Kraken Verifies $21.5 Billion in Client Assets with Latest Proof of Reserves
Kraken recently completed its latest Proof of Reserves, allowing clients to verify that on-chain assets fully back their account balances.
This verification, conducted by an independent third-party accounting firm, is based on a snapshot taken on September 30, 2024. The attestation confirms that Kraken securely holds client assets for supported cryptocurrencies.
Kraken Confirms $21.5 Billion in Assets
The recent Proof of Reserves attestation included six widely held assets on Kraken’s platform: Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, USD Coin, Tether, and XRP. The assessment encompassed clients' spot and margin positions, futures balances, and on-chain staked amounts of eligible assets, specifically ETH and SOL.
In total, this attestation verified over $21.5 billion in client assets, with Kraken making these results publicly available on November 1, 2024.
Kraken initially introduced its Proof of Reserves system in 2014 and has committed to regular attestations since January 2022. This process is designed to assure clients that Kraken’s holdings are fully reserved with in-kind assets.
Clients holding any of the supported assets as of the snapshot date can personally verify their balances by logging into their Kraken Pro accounts.
Singapore advances asset tokenization with new MAS frameworks
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) recently announced a comprehensive initiative to accelerate the commercialization of asset tokenization. Drawing from various projects, the MAS has developed new frameworks to provide guidance and promote the industry’s growth.
Speaking at the inaugural MAS Layer One Summit, Deputy Managing Director Leong Sing Chiong highlighted the achievements of major financial institutions participating in Project Guardian. These institutions have successfully demonstrated the potential for tokenization in foreign exchange and fund markets, conducting over 15 trials across seven jurisdictions and involving six different currencies.
Launched in 2022, Project Guardian has already enhanced liquidity through capital raising, secondary trading, and asset servicing and settlement, MAS stated in an official release.
To support necessary infrastructure, MAS introduced the Global Layer One initiative in 2023, developed in collaboration with BNY Mellon, Citi, JPMorgan, MUFG, and Societe Generale-FORGE. This initiative will expand in the coming year to include Euroclear and HSBC, working toward establishing principles for usage and ecosystem development.
On November 4, Project Guardian’s industry group also released two frameworks to guide the implementation of tokenization. The Guardian Fixed Income Framework incorporates international standards and principles to facilitate the adoption of tokenization in debt capital markets.
OpenSea CEO teases new platform built ‘from the ground up’ a year after talk of version 2.0
Leading NFT marketplace OpenSea is preparing to reinvent itself as non-fungible token (NFT) trading volumes have plummeted to their lowest levels in over three years.
On Monday, OpenSea CEO Devin Finzer hinted at the revamped platform on X (formerly Twitter), stating, “We've been quietly building at OpenSea. To truly innovate, sometimes you need to step back and reimagine everything. So we built a new OpenSea from the ground up."
OpenSea also promoted the new platform on its X account, announcing a December launch and providing a link for users to join the waitlist. This new platform follows a challenging year for OpenSea; almost exactly a year ago, the company laid off half of its workforce as it began developing “OpenSea 2.0.”
Once the dominant NFT marketplace, OpenSea thrived during the bull market, with tokens from popular collections like Bored Ape Yacht Club sometimes selling for millions. However, OpenSea lost its top position in late 2022 to the rising competitor Blur. Despite efforts to regain market share, overall NFT trading volumes remain at their lowest in over three years, as indicated by The Block Data Dashboard.
EigenLayer bolsters restaking with Bitcoin yield, P2P.org payouts
EigenLayer, Ethereum's largest restaking platform, is expanding its restaking options to include additional yield opportunities, such as wrapped Bitcoin (BTC) and payouts from node operator P2P.org, according to separate announcements on November 4.
ARPA Network, a protocol built on EigenLayer, will begin distributing rewards to holders of uniBTC, a restaked BTC wrapper, as noted in a blog post. “By adding uniBTC as a supported asset, ARPA introduces new liquidity paths and reward opportunities for BTC holders,” ARPA stated.
Additionally, P2P.org, EigenLayer’s largest professional validator or “operator,” distributed $2.2 million in Ether (ETH) to restockers on November 4.
Restaking involves taking an already staked token used as collateral with a validator in exchange for rewards and applying it to secure other protocols concurrently.
EigenLayer currently secures numerous third-party protocols, known as actively validated services (AVSs), with over $10 billion in restaked collateral, according to DefiLlama.
In October, EigenLayer launched a rewards program in EIGEN, its native token, to drive restaking adoption. “Stakers will earn programmatic rewards based on the number of AVSs they support, and AVSs will pay fees to stakers and operators. As AVSs pay more, more value is allocated,” EigenLayer founder Sreeram Kannan explained to Cointelegraph in October.
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