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TA Highlight

Although the shadow of the Fed rate hike still hangs over the cryptocurrency market, this week, influenced by the Russian-Ukrainian war, the cryptocurrency market saw an opportunity to surge.

The West continues to impose various financial and economic sanctions on Russia, resulting in poor international liquidity of Russian domestic assets. Cryptocurrencies have become an important medium for international financial behavior within Russia. And thanks to the emergence of this major utility scenario, cryptocurrencies, especially Bitcoin, saw a leap in price.

On February 28, Bitcoin opened at $37,705.00 and closed above the $43,000 mark to $43,169, with the highest price of the day topping $44,000. Major good news diluted the fear of a rate hike, and the BTC market was bullish.

After 28 days, the cryptocurrency market entered a state of adjustment and the price of the currency began to fall. In the last three days, the price has shown a reversal triangle. BTC spot price may bottom out further, and the price support line may be at $37,000.

If the currency price approaches $37,000 again, the Bitcoin spot price may form a double top structure on the daily.

Crypto Alerts

Musk hinted to call on McDonald's to accept $DOGE

On March 2, in response to a cartoon posted by Dogecoin community member @dogesupporteam calling on merchants to accept Dogecoin payments, Musk responded on social media and directly @McDonald's official account, hinting to call on McDonald's to accept Dogecoin payments as soon as possible.


AMC to accept $DOGE and $SHIB payments via BitPay

AMC customers will be able to pay for their movies next month using two popular memecoins Dogecoin ($DOGE) and Shiba Inu ($SHIB) via BitPay.

AMC CEO Adam Aron tweeted a short while ago that "BitPay will be available for AMC online payments on our website by March 19 and on our mobile app by April 16, possibly a few days earlier."

The company began accepting Bitcoin, Ethereum, Bitcoin cash and Litecoin for payments last November, and promised that Dogecoin would launch soon.


Polkadot Founder Has Donated About $5.8 Million Worth of DOT to Ukraine

Gavin Wood, the founder of Polkadot ($DOT), has posted on social media the transaction records of his donation to the official DOT address in Ukraine.

According to Polkascan, the number of DOTs in the official Ukrainian address has reached 309,939.7, with a total value of about $6 million, of which 298,367.2 were donated by Gavin Wood.


OpenSea confirms blocked users based on US sanctions list

On March 4, NFT Marketplace OpenSea blocked Iranian users, a spokesperson said, adding that OpenSea's terms of service explicitly prohibit sanctioned users or users from sanctioned regions from using OpenSea.

If OpenSea finds that an individual has violated OpenSea's sanctions policy, OpenSea would take prompt action to ban the account in question.

Current U.S. sanctions prohibit U.S. companies from providing goods or services to any user in countries on the sanctions list, including Iran, North Korea, Syria and now Russia.

Market Updates

CME to Launch Micro Bitcoin and Ether Options

The Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) Group announced plans to launch micro Bitcoin and Ether options on March 28, with the products currently awaiting regulatory review.

It is understood that the new micro options contracts will be one-tenth the size of the respective base specifications for $BTC and $ETH, and are designed to offer more trading options to a wider range of market participants.

In previous news, CME had launched micro Ether futures on December 6, 2021.


Ukraine to Launch NFT to Support Ukrainian Armed Forces

Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov tweeted, "After careful consideration we decided to cancel airdrop. Every day there are more and more people willing to help Ukraine to fight back the aggression. Instead, we will announce NFTs to support Ukrainian Armed Forces soon. We DO NOT HAVE any plans to issue any fungible tokens."

Earlier, Masha Efrosinina, a local Ukrainian TV host and honorary UNFPA ambassador to Ukraine, said that the Ukrainian Defense Ministry has proposed to reward Russian soldiers who surrender to Ukraine with cryptocurrency or cash worth 5 million rubles (about $60,000).


eBay may accept crypto payments after allowing NFT sales

E-commerce giant eBay, which aims to be a marketplace for Gen Z and millennials, is looking into the possibility of adding cryptocurrency as a means of payment.

eBay CEO Jamie Iannone told TheStreet that the company may make an investor day on March 10 The announcement was made.

As previously reported, eBay said it would allow digital collectibles such as trading cards, images or video clips to be sold on its platform as NFTs.


PoS (Proof of Stake) Selected as one of MIT's "Top 10 Breakthrough Technologies for 2022"

MIT Technology Review's "Top 10 Global Breakthrough Technologies" for 2022 was officially released recently.

Among them, PoS is listed, which is the only blockchain technology selected. The article mentions that proof of stake provides a way to build networks that do not require much energy.

Ethereum has built a new blockchain for the system and the system has been running in parallel.

What needs to happen now is a "merge" that moves the Layers that actually perform transactions and hold user assets over, and in the process discards proof of work.

If successful, Ether's proof-of-stake blockchain could create the conditions for a widely used energy-efficient technology.

Global Headlines

Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister accepts DOGE donation and publishes wallet address

On March 2, Mykhailo Fedorov, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Digital Transformation of Ukraine, announced the acceptance of $DOGE donation and published the wallet address.

Shibetoshi Nakamoto, founder of Dogecoin, replied: "I have sent some. Dogecoin holders are usually not rich, and Dogecoin itself is usually used for small transactions, but we are a group of caring and passionate people who are willing to help".


Federal Reserve Chairman Powell: Congress needs to take action on cryptocurrencies

On March 2, Federal Reserve Chairman Powell stressed the need to take action on digital currencies.

Existing central bank digital currencies are effectively instruments of speculation. The question of whether the benefits of central bank digital currencies will outweigh the costs remains unanswered.


France Finance Minister Le Maire: Sanction areas against Russia will include cryptocurrencies

EU finance ministers, led by Le Maire, have agreed to strengthen sanctions against Russia.

The area of sanctions against Russia will include cryptocurrencies.

There is a big consensus among EU leaders that cryptocurrencies cannot be ignored and should not be a loophole in terms of sanctions against Russia.

Gate.io Weekly Blogs:

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Mirror’s Creator Economy：How does the Write-to-Earn Mode Work？



Author: Byron. B & Charles. F & Peter. L (Gate.io Researchers)
* The article only represents the researcher’s views and does not constitute any investment advice.
* Gate.io reserves all rights to this article. Reposting of the article will be permitted provided Gate.io is referenced. In all other cases, legal action will be taken due to copyright infringement.