Elon Can Sell Anything

January 14, 2022

|In Weekend Recap

|By Osprey Team

A limited-edition Cyberwhistle, inspired by the Cybertruck, sold out within hours on Friday.

Tesla listed it for 300 DOGE (about $60) following Elon’s Tweet on Thursday,

Tesla merch buyable with Dogecoin.

This guy can sell anything, but struggles to deliver on time — Tesla delayed the Cybertruck to 2023.

Rio To Allocate 1% To Bitcoin

Rio de Janeiro Mayor, Eduardo Paes, wants to make the city a crypto kingdom.

Paes announced that Rio intends to invest 1% of its municipal treasury in various crypto projects.

The city also said it’s looking at providing tax breaks if citizens pay with Bitcoin.

We love to see it.

Rio is the 6th most populous city in the Americas, with 6.75 million people. That’s more people than Los Angeles and Houston combined.

Unrelated, Brazil is home to some of the greatest music in all the world, perfect for a relaxing Saturday morning or whenever you might be reading.

Consumer Prices Through the Roof

The road to hyperinflation has to go through 7%.

Kidding. 😉

US consumer prices increased to their highest levels since 1982, a year the Fed Funds Rate touched 21.5%.

Used cars and trucks were the greatest culprits, ramping a grotesque 37%.

Here’s a chart via CNBC:

This is probably nothing and all those fiat dollars printed since the early days of COVID will get digested no big deal. Still, we’d be remiss not to share that doozy of a chart.

Institutional Capital Pours In

This week, FTX unveiled its latest trick, FTX Ventures — a $2B venture fund focused on crypto startups.

FTX Ventures lead, Amy Wu, suggested that the fund could deploy the entire bag within a year.

Wu shared that she’s interested in crypto gaming, insurance, and security products.

Here’s the Wall Street Journal with more.

Cash App Adds Lightning

Cash app integrated the Lightning Network to reduce the cost and increase the speed of Bitcoin transactions.

As of January 12, 2022, the Lightning Network has 19,291 nodes, up more than 100% from this time a year ago.

This feels like such a sleeper story.

What’s New In NFTs?

Here’s a heartwarmer for you —

Ghozali Ghozalu staked his face in NFT history.

The 22-year old Indonesian snapped selfies everyday starting when he was 18 and listed the photos on OpenSea.

The NFT collection of 933 photos has a total trading volume of 321 ETH and has a floor price of 0.202.

Ghozali shared,

It’s really a picture of me standing in front of a computer day by day.

LooksRare, an emerging NFT marketplace, recorded more than $110M in NFT trading volume on its opening day.

The OpenSea competitor airdropped its LOOKS token to select OpenSea users prior to launch in an attempt to court new users. It may have worked, but it’s too soon to tell.

Here’s Decrypt with the details.

China is set to launch a state-backed blockchain, Blockchain Services Network (BSN), to support NFTs.

The Asian nation banned crypto last year and now seeks to capitalize on NFTs. So weird.

And here’s a feature NFT of the week — Sun Signals #0830 by Kevin Abosch

A Fund To Defend Bitcoin Developers

Jack Dorsey announced the development of a legal defense fund for Bitcoin developers.

In an open-email the Bitcoin Legal Defense Fund Board shared,

The main purpose of this Fund is to defend developers from lawsuits regarding their activities in the Bitcoin ecosystem, including finding and retaining defense counsel, developing litigation strategy, and paying legal bills. This is a free and voluntary option for developers to take advantage of if they so wish.

Read the full note here and here’s a great tweet that captured the event:

If that wasn’t enough — Block (formerly Square) shared that it will mine Bitcoin.

Federal Crypto Reports Coming Soon. We promise.

The US House Energy and Commerce Oversight Subcommittee announced that it will hold a crypto hearing next Thursday entitled, Cleaning up cryptocurrency: The energy impact of blockchains.

Meanwhile, Fed Chair Jerome Powell said that the Fed will release it’s crypto report “within weeks.”

Solana NFT IRL

Here’s a slick clip from Rob Petrozzo, co-founder of Rally Road, purchasing his first Solana NFT.

He shared,

Bought my first Solana NFT.

From a vending machine.

w/ Apple Pay.

90’s nostalgia 🤝 digital future

✨ ✨ ✨

See the full video here.

And check out our lightpaper on Solana here.

10,000 Reasons To Move To Arkansas??

Northwest Arkansas wants you to relocate.

The southern state has offered $10,000 in Bitcoin + a free bike to “tech professionals and other entrepreneurs looking to relocate to the region.”

Nelson Peacock, president and CEO of the Northwest Arkansas Council commented,

Northwest Arkansas is one of the fastest-growing regions in the country, and we’re now seeing more explosive growth in our tech sector. This expanded incentive offer — Bitcoin and a Bike — not only embraces the growing trend toward the use of cryptocurrency as a payment option by employers, but also helps increase our pipeline of talent to benefit tech employers, startups, cities, local businesses and the region overall.