📔 Weekly Journal: Hong Kong BTC & Eth ETFs a Success 🇭🇰📈
[6 min read] Your weekend guide to getting ahead on the digital frontier. Today, the usual market news as well as why the Hong Kong BTC & Eth ETFs that launched this week were a huge success.
Welcome to this week’s Weekly Journal 📔, your guide to the latest news & innovation in emerging technology, digital assets, and our exciting path to the Metaverse. This is week 74 of the 520 weeks of newsletters I have committed to, a decade of documenting our physical and digital lives converge.
New subscribers are encouraged to check out the history & purpose of this newsletter as well as the archive.
Enjoy your weekend! 😎
- Ryan
🌐 Digital Assets Market Update
The Bitcoin halving is behind us, but its significance lies less in its effect on supply and more in its implications for the upcoming 12-18 months. Studies indicate that market bottoms tend to occur approximately 1.3 years prior to a halving, with peaks occurring roughly 1.3 years afterward, typically around 480 days later. These declines can be seen as regular pauses in the journey toward new all-time highs, consistent with the broader cyclical pattern of Bitcoin's ongoing rise.
🔥🗺️ 7-day heatmap below, which shows the current share of market for the top cryptocurrencies, alongside total marketcap (USD) and the change in price over the last week. During the week it dipped right down under $57k but has bounced back.
🎭 Crypto Fear and Greed Index is based on volatility, social media sentiments, surveys, market momentum, and a few other bits and pieces.
🗞️ Interesting news from this week
🇭🇰 Hong Kong SAR successfully launched its Bitcoin and Ether ETFs! On its first day, they amassed $292 million USD in assets, tracking ahead of Bloomberg's two-year prediction of $1 billion. Ether ETFs secured 15% of the market share, highlighting investor preference for fund size over lower fees. Initial reports suggesting under $9 million in assets were misleading; the bulk of the $292 million represents seed capital pre-launch, so it wasn’t recorded as day one volume. In the US, they push seed money off until the first day so the volume looks bigger! (source). This is a game changer because:
It provides a convenient way for mainland Chinese money to find Bitcoin exposure, because Hong Kong SAR is a “Special Administration Region” of China.
Unlike the US ETFs, Hong Kong’s are “in-kind” meaning you have the option to exit in the future and take your Bitcoin/Ethereum instead of having it sold and withdrawing cash. Why is this a big deal? Not selling to cash means in most cases this isn’t a taxable event, and in the future you wont sell your bitcoin, you will borrow against it (again, not often a taxable event).
🍊This week MicroStrategy launched MicroStrategy Orange, a decentralised identity (DID) platform on Bitcoin. Led by co-founder Michael Saylor, the system aims to establish immutable identities on the blockchain, enabling users to control and verify their identity without central authority. Potential applications include verifying users on social media and authenticating medical records. DID:BTC, using Ordinals inscriptions, stores identity data separately from other content, leveraging Bitcoin's security and scalability. The proposal allows for on-chain updates and deactivation if necessary.
📦 The rumours came true, Walmart Discovered its the retail giants initiative to sell "real world" goods within Roblox, and aims to broaden the scope of metaverse commerce beyond niche markets. This move, unprecedented on Roblox, carries wider implications due to Walmart's status and Roblox's massive user base. The curated selection of youth-oriented products, chosen in collaboration with top Roblox creators, underscores Walmart's commitment to adapting its merchandising strategy for the metaverse. This collaboration highlights the potential for mainstream retailers to thrive in virtual environments, influencing the future of digital commerce.
👓 Read of the Week
This week’s read is “The Rise of Nation State Mining” by Daniel Batten. Bitcoin mining is proving lucrative for nations beyond El Salvador's investment strategy. Three countries across continents are benefiting:
Ethiopia, known for exporting hydro-power, now sells electricity to miners for $31/MWh, expecting to earn $92M annually.
Paraguay's Senate redirected surplus energy to bitcoin miners, yielding over $100M yearly.
Bhutan, exporting 100MW to India, anticipates a sixfold increase by 2025.
While not all nations offer appealing rates to miners, Bitcoin mining aids energy and monetary independence, significantly boosting budgets. These examples are exciting to me in that they highlight the expanding impact and utility of Bitcoin mining worldwide.
🎥 Watch of the week
See the trailer for Walmart Discovered below. Don’t forget that highly interactive virtual worlds with thousands of concurrent users are always blocky and low fidelity due to the processing and network constraints of today’s technology. The slick 3D worlds of gaming will come with time, until then it’s a sacrifice to get functionality. It’s only going to get more realistic and immersive.
AI 🎨🤖🎵✍🏼
Ukraine has introduced Victoria Shi, an AI-generated spokesperson for its foreign ministry, a first in diplomatic history. Victoria, visually represented as a digital person, will deliver official statements written by humans but with AI-generated visuals. Dmytro Kuleba, the Ukrainian foreign minister, highlights the technological advancement and resource-saving aspect.
Victoria's appearance and voice are based on Rosalie Nombre, a Ukrainian singer, and former reality show contestant.
To prevent misinformation, statements will be linked to text versions on the ministry’s website via QR codes. Victoria Shi will address controversial issues like suspended consular services for men of fighting age, perhaps too squeamish for humans to address?
That’s all for the free version this week! If you have any organisations in mind that could benefit from learning about emerging technology, be sure to reach out. Educational workshops are one of many consulting services I offer.
DCA With Me 🤑
Dollar Cost Averaging is an investment strategy in which an investor regularly invests a fixed amount of money into a particular asset/asset class at regular intervals, regardless of its current market cycle. By doing so, the investor can reduce the impact of market volatility and potentially earn a better return over time. Motto = time IN the market beats trying to time the market
To experiment with this, I invest $50 NZD into a Digital Asset every week. Each week I will choose an asset that seems underpriced in the short term and has positive long-term potential. My timeframe is 3-5 years. I don’t give financial advice but if you want to follow along with me you can use my easycrypto.co.nz referral link to support this newsletter. Let’s dive into this week’s pick:
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Metaverse Field Guide to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.