NFTs & DeFi 🗓

2023-04-24 20:41:01 CUPRA Unveils Electric SUV Coupe and Expands into Metaverse

CUPRA, the performance division of Spanish carmaker SEAT, has unveiled its first all-electric SUV coupe, the CUPRA Tavascan, and announced its foray into the metaverse with Metahype during its Exponential Impulse event in Berlin. The Tavascan SUV represents the future of CUPRA’s electrified models, while the brand’s expansion into the metaverse demonstrates its commitment to embracing innovative technology and creating unique experiences. The Tavascan is slated for a 2024 launch and will be produced at Volkswagen Group’s Anhui factory in China, with an annual target of over 70,000 cars sold. The Tavascan will have two power outputs, 286PS (210kW) and 340PS (250kW), with a range of around 341 miles, and can be charged from 10% to 80% in under 30 minutes using a 135kW charging point. At the same event, CUPRA revealed the virtual sports car CUPRA DarkRebel, which can be configured by the CUPRA Tribe. The brand also officially launched Metahype, its experience space in the metaverse, where users can collaborate, create, and experience various aspects of the CUPRA brand.

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2023-04-24 16:14:02 OpenSea Pro Retaliates Blur’s Dominance in NFT Market: Data

OpenSea Pro was rebranded and unveiled to court active traders from Blur. The latter was eating away at OpenSea’s market share since its launch last October. The counteroffensive proved somewhat successful as data suggest that the new “polished” NFT aggregator has surpassed Blur by daily transaction count. The launch of OpenSea Pro, an aggregator geared toward active traders, was highly tactical as it boasted zero fees for a promotional period and advanced order type in the wake of fierce competition from its rival. OpenSea being well-received could be due to the fact that pro traders are looking to benefit from the new NFT rewards in anticipation of higher opportunity costs. A potential airdrop could be another factor catalyzing this trend by enticing new users. Blur’s bidding and listing incentives, on the other hand, have become relatively saturated. Delphi Digital stated that it has become difficult to earn points, despite the 2x multiplier incentives that last through May 1. A majority of NFT trading volume originated from Blur in Q1 2023. Within six months, the platform managed to dethrone former market leader OpenSea. But there appears to be a rapid shift in the NFT landscape, thanks to OpenSea Pro’s release. Blur’s market share shrunk from 49.3% to 27.9% this month.

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2023-04-24 10:14:01 Blur fixes bug, affected NFT traders to get big bonuses

Blur’s chief executive officer (CEO), Pacman, has released a statement confirming that they had detected a bug at around 8 pm PT. Afterward, they disabled the bid to accept a functionality. In 30 minutes, 36 affected bids were received. The team fixed the issue and bids were enabled 30 minutes later at 11:05 pm PT. Meanwhile, bids above the floor will be canceled automatically before enabling bids are accepted. The affected traders will be refunded twice the difference between their bid price and the proper top bid in ethereum (ETH). For example, if the top bid was 14.5 ETH and the affected bid accepted price was 15.5 ETH, the refund will be 2 ETH. The affected traders will, however, not need to sell their NFTs to get the refund, as Blur will send the amount within 24 hours. The announcement’s response was mostly positive, with most enthusiasts calling it a “classy move” and professional. However, others were concerned about the security of funds on their platform. Blur offered traders a 50% refund after a user lost 70 ETH due to an issue with the user interface.

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2023-04-24 04:14:02 SHIB Metaverse Wants to Give 10 Lands to New Account Followers

Metaverse Shiba Inu, a relatively new player in the blockchain space, focused on creating a unique metaverse experience with the help of its native token, SHIBA, has made a recent move. The project has launched its Twitter account, where it will be sharing updates on its development progress and other relevant news. SHIB unveiled a glamorous artwork concept for its Rocket Pond Metaverse project after asking the crypto community. Interestingly, Metaverse Shiba Inu announced a contest to give away ten lands to lucky winners to promote the new handle. Participating crypto community members must follow the account and retweet the contest post by April 30. This contest is expected to help the project gain more visibility in the crypto community and attract more users to its metaverse platform. According to an official blog post, the atmosphere of Rocket Pond is reminiscent of a mountaintop resort, the YMCA, or a KOA campground, with a combination of modern conveniences and tourist attractions. Animal life coexists with crystal-clear rivers and resort structures that rise to the mountains.

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2023-04-23 20:52:02 Web3, Cross-Chain Mandala Plans NFT Release via Astar Network

The Mandala environment, which is full of folklore and uses various blockchain networks, is getting ready for its first NFT start on the Astar Network. The ‘Cyptonauts Collection,’ which was made by concept artist Bruce Zick, is what the Mandala company plans to use as the basis for their move into the Metaverse. Mandala gives a Metaverse that is cross-platform, cross-chain, and compatible. It includes TV, comic books, video games, and advanced virtual reality. The project runs on the Polkadot infrastructure, which allows multiple stacks. This makes it possible to connect different parachains, such as the Astar, Unique, and Talisman networks. Mandala is going to release its carefully made Cryptonauts NFTs through the Astar Network. The goal of the project is to use the Unreal Engine to make a AAA-level game with a high level of quality. The game will have a world that is beautifully drawn and represents the idea of “enlightenment.” So, it will work together with SingularityNet’s Sophiaverse in a way that allows them to work together. This will create a unique experience that is better than the sum of its parts.

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2023-04-23 16:24:59 BAYC NFT Returns To The Lowest Price In The Last 2 Years

The floor price of the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) collection has dropped to a 16-month low of 44.5 Ether (ETH). In an unexpected turn of events, the floor prices of numerous blue-chip NFTs fell below their value for the first time in over a year. For the first time since November 2021, the floor price of BAYC has gone below 50 ETH, raising worries among NFT investors. The decrease has raised concerns about the market’s long-term viability for a collection whose floor price peaked at more than 144 ETH. According to NFT Price Floor, the BAYC floor price on April 22 was 44.5 ETH and is presently trading at 49.4 ETH. Trading volume across marketplaces has also decreased significantly, and despite Blur and Opensea keeping the NFT industry alive, the total weekly trading volume has been less than $300 million. The biggest reason for falling floor pricing is undoubtedly diminishing demand, as dealers’ weekly presence has decreased to November 2021 lows. Not only BAYC but also Wrapped CryptoPunks and Mutant Ape Yacht Club (MAYC) have lost more than 10% of their value in the last week. NFT prices have fallen due to a variety of causes, including decreased demand, greater supply, and the influence of crypto market swings.

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2023-04-23 10:25:00 Yuga Labs Wins Battle With The Impersonator Ryder Ripps

Yuga Labs, the creators of the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC), has won a significant legal fight with Ryder Ripps, the co-creator of the copycat NFT project RR/BAYC. Yuga Labs sued content producer Ryder Ripps and the NFT RR/BAYC collection in mid-2022, saying he infringed on intellectual property rights by advertising “similar” digital art pieces, such as the Bored Apes Yacht Club (BAYC) collection, in order to fool viewers and benefit themselves. In May 2022, Ryder Ripps and Jeremy Cahen produced the BAYC derivative NFT collection RR/BAYC as a parody and protested against Yuga Laboratories. The project makes extensive use of footage from the BAYC NFTs. On February 6, 2023, Thomas Lehman, a smart contract developer and the owner of a website that sells counterfeit collections agreed to a settlement with Yuga Labs to end the legal struggle. Yuga Labs desires to hold Mr. Ripps and Mr. Cahen responsible for their violation via an evil and unjustified campaign of falsehoods, and Mr. Lehman’s rejection of their acts is appreciated. Nevertheless, the transaction seems to have failed.

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2023-04-23 04:24:01 Marvel Studios Founder Announced The Release Of NFT Collection

According to CoinDesk, Mythos Studios, an intellectual property (IP) entertainment firm formed by David Maisel, the founding chairman of Marvel Studios, has announced the release of the Ekos Genesis Art Collection, which is currently available in a virtual gallery at ekos.io. The auction will run 88 minutes and celebrates the 15th anniversary of the theatrical premiere of “Iron Man,” the first picture in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, for producer Louis D’Esposito. Bidding will begin at 10 Ether (ETH) and then decline by 0.5 ETH every four minutes until the price reaches 0.5 ETH. If the whole collection has not already sold out, the price will be reduced to 0.2 ETH during the last eight minutes of the auction. A Dutch auction is a sort of auction in which the price begins high and gradually drops until a bidder accepts the current price. It is a prominent approach in financial markets and has gained popularity in the NFT industry owing to its simplicity and transparency. The Ekos Genesis Art Collection is the newest addition to the thriving NFT market, and it comprises one-of-a-kind artwork from a diverse group of brilliant artists.

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2023-04-22 20:41:01 Toy Manufacturer Mattel to Launch P2P Marketplace for Virtual Collectibles on NFT Platform

On April 20, the American toy manufacturing company Mattel announced an update to its virtual collectibles platform, which will go live on April 27. The peer-to-peer platform, called Mattel Creations Virtual Collectibles, will coincide with the Hot Wheels NFT Garage Series 5, featuring some of Hot Wheels’ most popular car designs. Series 5 includes 40 different cars, and the digital collectibles will be sold in packs for $25 each. The toy manufacturer Mattel, Inc. (Nasdaq: MAT) is continuing to expand into the non-fungible token (NFT) realm with the latest update to its Mattel Creations Virtual Collectibles platform. The addition is a peer-to-peer (P2P) marketplace powered by the NFT company Rarible. Mattel collaborated with the wallet-as-a-service provider Magic and its blockchain partner Flow. The P2P marketplace launch will coincide with the launch of the Hot Wheels NFT Garage Series 5, a collection of digital collectibles designed by the same team that created the Hot Wheels die-cast cars.

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2023-04-22 16:14:00 London’s MetaGravity ropes in $9.5M to build, interoperable, decentralised compute infrastructure for metaverse

MetaGravity, a London-based provider of the next-generation virtual world and metaverse infrastructure, has raised $9.5M in a Seed round of funding from Sino Global, Spartan Group LLC (also backed Gunzilla Games), Market One Capital, and several other investors. The UK company will use the funds to expand its engineering and product teams to develop the infrastructure layer required to support massive metaverse experiences in the future. Founded by Rashid Mansoor (CEO) and Tobin Ireland (CBO), MetaGravity is building the distributed compute infrastructure for metaverse gaming and virtual world simulations. “MetaGravity’s mission is to create the base cosmology to birth the Metaverse – i.e. to re-invent the laws of virtual physics,” said Mansoor. “Using our deep knowledge of massively parallel compute and engine technologies, we’re creating the technical foundation for a scalable and decentralised metaverse. By going back to first principles and taking a completely fresh approach to concurrency, we have already achieved scale many factors beyond what was previously feasible.”

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