News Updates December 02, 2022
1. Scam Alert: Fake Cristiano Ronaldo and Binance NFT Drop Promoted on Twitter. As interest in soccer-themed cryptocurrency projects is triggered by the 2022 FIFA World Cup, more and more scammers are trying to get the most out of this short-lived hype. Fake Cristiano Ronaldo NFTs offered on Twitter Since Nov. 30, 2022, a dangerous scam campaign is running on Twitter. Fraudsters created a series of accounts and phishing websites to promote fake non-fungible tokens allegedly endorsed by football legend Cristiano Ronaldo.
The main Twitter account of this scam amassed almost 30,000 followers. What is most dangerous is that it uses real video with Cristiano Ronaldo that he created for a recent NFT release on Binance. Sammers managed to create a copy of this video and are using it to lure investors.
Also, they are actively retweeting the news about the collection of CR7 NFTs on Binance's NFT marketplace to confuse potential investors and soccer fans.
2. Cronos-Based Algorithmic Lending Protocol Rug Pulls $600K From Users.
The Cronos-based lending protocol seems to be the latest rug pull in the crypto industry.
CroLend, presenting itself as an algorithmic, autonomous lending protocol built on top of the Cronos network, has deleted all social media pages, the website doesn’t work, and its TVL has been drained to $0.
This prompted the community to argue that this is the latest example of a rug pull in the space.
Citing user information, PeckShield took it to Twitter earlier to inform that all relevant posts and sites associated with CroLend have been erased.
These include the Twitter account and Medium posts, while the website doesn’t work as of writing these lines.
According to DeFiLlama, the Total Value Locked on CroLend Finance has plummeted to $0 after peaking at almost $600,000 earlier.
Rug pulls are a rather common red dot in the cryptocurrency industry. As the name suggests, it’s basically an event in which the team behind the project siphons all the funds that have been deposited by users.
The number of such internal exploits has grown exponentially in the past few years, as previously reported.
3. What’s Up in Crypto: November 2022 Roundup.
In this cryptocurrency roundup by the Investfox team, we have looked at the top 30 cryptocurrencies according to their market capitalization, while looking at different statistics and facts behind them to determine which cryptocurrencies have performed the best this month, and which have failed the victims of the latest crypto market crash.
Coming from the highs of October, where almost every crypto inside the top 30 ended the month in profits, this month we have the complete opposite situation. Currently, we have 4 tokens that have shown profits while the remaining failed. Because of this, we are taking a closer look at this November crypto roundup.
Top 5 Gainers
While being named the Top 5 gainers, there are only 4 tokens that have shown positive results this month. The reasons as to why these 4 tokens have gained in value differ and now take a look why.
Litecoin + 30.8%
Litecoin has been around for a very long time and maintained itself within the top 30 constantly. But for some time now, the interest in Litecoin has become smaller and the price fell to an average of $50-$60. But recently Litecoin has started to grow again, and by the end of the month it averaged $72 and ended up growing by 30.2% in the past 30 days.
OKB + 26.3%
We were quite surprised when we saw that a token owned by the crypto exchange ended the month so high. With the collapse of FTX, most of the newer exchanges have been fighting for survival, with traders now having skeptical eyes, and would rather do their business with giants like Binance. So the appearance of OKB in this list is surprising because it is the native cryptocurrency of the crypto exchange OKX, the exchange on which FTX had some sort of effect. While crypto exchanges are failing, OKX has managed to open a new operational hub in the Bahamas and get registered as Digital Assets Business. This happened right around the time when the FTX collapse was taking place, meaning that OKX had shown positive signs in a time of uncertainty. This might have been disproved by lower trading volumes than before, but considering that crypto trading volumes are down in general, it should not be surprising that OKX will lose some as well.
Dogecoin + 14.4%
Dogecoin has been showing positive results for quite some time now. Being dubbed a meme token, has made many people sleep on this token. Dogecoin has been around since 2013, but it got popular with the help of Elon Musk when he made multiple tweets regarding his love for this token. After this token has been falling and rebounding multiple times and managed to remain inside the top 15 tokens almost every time. This recent surge is Dogecoins prices, just like many priors can be associated with Elon Musk.
The Open Network + 8.9%
For many, this might be the first time hearing about The Open Network, as this might not be as popular a token as others mentioned. The Open Network, also known as, TON, is a fully decentralized layer-1 blockchain. This blockchain was created by Telegram, which is one of the largest messaging applications in the world. It is known to have very fast transaction speeds combined with very low fees.
The reason as to why this token is growing can be attributed to the growth Telegram is going through right now. Compared to last year, the number of monthly active Telegram users has grown by 40%, as more and more people are joining the platform. This gives investors hope that TON is going to grow within, so taking a look at Telegram, might not be a bad idea, before making an investment.
Top 5 Losers
The number of cryptocurrencies that’s prices have grown in the past 30 days was low but on the other hand, we had a bunch of tokens that fell victim to FTX collapse or were already on the downward slope. Let’s take a look at which of these tokens has had the worst month.
Solana - 58%
The title of the biggest loser of the month goes to Solana, which managed to lose around 58% of its value in the last 30 days. Solana has had the worst years among any crypto inside the top 30, as it managed to lose an astonishing 92% of its value from the start of the year. With this huge downfall, the collapse of FTX, which had huge Solana holdings, might have been a final blow to Solanas goals of being the Ethereum killer.
Algorand - 31.1%
Algorand is currently the 30th largest token by market capitalization, meaning it barely made this list. It is a blockchain system that aims to create the first blockchain that has decentralization, scalability, and security, with no compromises whatsoever. While most blockchains would usually pick two of these three factors and focus on them, Algorand wants to create a system that has all three.
The reasons as to why Algorand lost so much value can be attributed to multiple factors. The first of which has to do with the collapse of FTX, as almost every single cryptocurrency has suffered from this, and looking at the chart, we can see that Algorand also lost a big portion of its value during that period. Another factor that made Algorando end the month with big losses has to do with Algorando having ties with FIFA and FIFA World Cup. Algorando has been working closely with FIFA and has even managed to strike a partnership for FIFA Women's World Cup 2023. With the men's world cup going on right now, a big number of investors started to take out profits they have made by investing early, as they believe this is the high point of this project.
Avalanche - 28.3%
Avalanche ended October at a pretty strong high, this continued at the beginning of November, until the FTX scandal. Altogether, Avalanche is going through a pretty bad year, as it managed to lose almost 90% of its value dropping from $105 all the way down to $13 since January.
The reasons as to why Avalanche is struggling so much can be attributed to multiple factors. First of all, this year has not been good for cryptocurrencies in general, with almost every big token losing a good chunk of its value following the extreme highs of last year's November. Avalanche collapse can be attributed to the collapse of the Terra network, with whom Avalanche had close ties. Other than that, there are no major things that contributed to this fall, and most other problems are a bunch of minor problems and the loss of interest in Avalanche altogether.
Cosmos Hub (ATOM) - 25.1%
The fourth token in our list is ATOM and the network behind this project Cosmos Hub. Just like most other tokens, ATOM is going through a pretty bad year, losing around 75% of its value since the start of the year. Cosmos Hub is a network that helps different blockchains communicate with each other, and make transactions between these blockchains possible and cheap.
The reasons as to why ATOM had this sort of a month can of course be attributed to the collapse of the FTX. But as we can see from previous examples, just the collapse of FTX is not enough to make tokens lose so much value, and in ATOMs case the main problem behind this collapse is the ATOM 2.0 whitepaper. Cosmos Hub is DAO, meaning that decisions on the chain are made by people who hold ATOM tokens, through a voting system. During mid-November, Cosmos Hub had a major voting going on, with holders voting on the new ATOM 2.0 whitepaper. With the expectation being that voting will go through, people were somewhat shocked, when ATOM 2.0 was ultimately rejected by the community. But things don’t look so bad for this new proposal, as most people liked the different updates this whitepaper would bring to the network. The problem here was that community members believed that this was a rushed decision, and it needed more time and better planning. So it's not over for ATOM and Cosmos community, and we would suggest keeping an eye on this token.
Shiba Inu - 22.1%
The 5th token that lost the most in the month of November is Shiba Inu. The second largest meme token did not start this year on a good note, just like most other tokens, managing to lose almost 90% of its value from its peak in November 2021. While on the other hand, its bigger brother, Dogecoin is having a year to remember, as it managed to show consistent growth since the market collapsed early in 2022.
This huge drop off of Shiba is caused by multiple factors. First of all, the collapse of the FTX has played its hand in the price of Shiba. We also have high inflation of tokens as Shiba burn rates are down by almost 60%, as more and more tokens are entering the market, while not many are being burnt. Another contributing factor is the Ethereum Merge that happened in September 2022. This Merge caused huge speculations regarding the Ethereum network, the network on which Shiba operates. These speculations and uncertainty have played their part in Shiba’s demise, but things don’t look so bad.
Final Thoughts
This has been one of the worst months in the ongoing crypto winter. While there might have been months where we saw bigger drops, the fact here is that cryptocurrencies were taking off, with most tokens gaining big by the end of October. But with the sudden collapse of FTX the whole process has been halted and the market crashed once again.
This is of course a bad thing, but if we take a calculated approach, we might end up making good profits. Crypto winters are known as good filters, where bad projects die out, while good upcoming projects get spotlight in these tough times. Because of this, our suggestions would be to keep an eye on the market, take a look at different tokens and projects, study their community, and if you believe that this token is destined to grow, it might be the best time to invest.
4. Alibaba Signals Major Crypto Push By Joining This Blockchain Network
Alibaba Cloud has trumpeted a series of collaborations with popular networks and organizations in recent times, however with its latest collaboration with Avalanche, it has finally stepped into the crypto-space to further accelerate the tech giant’s support for Web3.
More Access To Cutting Edge Tech
On Friday, Avalanche announced the onboarding of Alibaba Cloud onto their public blockchain in order to support validators and provide state-of-the-art infrastructure.
As per the official announcement, the new partnership will enable users to launch validator nodes through the service, access computing, storage, and distribution resources through Alibaba Cloud’s suite of products.
APAC's largest cloud service provider, Alibaba Cloud, has expanded support for #Avalanche!
This integration enables developers to easily launch their own validator nodes, with access to @alibaba_cloud's plug-and-play infrastructure and suite of products.https://t.co/MlXTOYuJgG
— Avalanche
