RaaS #623: Ethereum Foundation Finally Stakes!

Metaplanet Loads Up on BTC Firepower, Venus Protocol Gets Exploited, and Moar!

Crypto lender BlockFills has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the US, marking another casualty in the ongoing shakeout of centralized lending platforms. The filing adds to the growing list of crypto lenders that have collapsed since the 2022 market downturn.

Following a $50M swap incident, Aave unveiled 'Aave Shield', a safeguard designed to automatically block trades with over 25% price impact. This defensive mechanism could set a new standard for protecting DeFi protocols from manipulation attacks.

Lighter, Ethereum’s leading perp DEX, is launching a referral pilot for select trading communities.

• Earn up to 3 bps (0.03%) of referred trading volume in USDC, paid weekly
• 2-month pilot: March 1 – April 30
• Target: new mobile users joining Lighter for the first time
• Limited slots: only 5 communities will be selected

Interested in participating? Reach out:
Telegram: @blingoh
Email: [email protected]

The Ethereum Foundation staked ETH for the first time ever three weeks ago, and just moved $10M ETH to a new address. The community is watching closely to see if this signals a broader shift in how the Foundation manages its treasury.

Your daily dose of bite-sized crypto news.

1. Tether AI team will release a "true breakthrough" this coming week.

2. OP_NET pushed mainnet from March 17th to March 19th.

3. World Liberty Financial's governance staking proposal passed with 99.12% approval.

4. LitecoinVM is launching its chain with Caldera to bring programmable execution to Litecoin.

5. SLOHM Finance raised $250K from 151 contributors to build the first treasury-backed reserve protocol on Bitcoin L1.

A hacker manipulated $THE's price and exploited Venus Protocol on BSC, leaving behind $2.18M in bad debt. The attack highlights ongoing vulnerabilities in price oracle mechanisms across DeFi lending platforms.

Metaplanet raised ~$255M from global institutional investors via a share placement at a 2% premium, with fixed-strike warrants that could generate up to ~$276M more upon exercise. The move gives them up to ~$531M in firepower toward their 210,000 BTC goal.

ShapeShift founder Erik Voorhees bought $56 million worth of Ethereum, according to onchain analysts. The significant purchase comes as ETH struggles to maintain momentum against Bitcoin's dominance.

We ain't giving up on Solana!

Top Gainers: G, UP, CFG, SN62, DRV.

High-signal reads are worth your time, all in one place.

1. The alpha most traders miss daily.

2. Why VCs are pivoting hard now.

3. What Jane Street knows that you don't.

4. The memecoin playbook nobody discusses.

5. Regulation is coming faster than expected.

The Australian Senate backed a crypto regulation framework, bringing platforms and custody providers under financial services oversight with new licensing requirements. Australia joins the growing list of nations establishing clear crypto regulatory rails.

Nebius signed a new AI infrastructure agreement with Meta worth up to ~$27B to accelerate the buildout of its core AI cloud business. The partnership signals continued institutional demand for AI compute infrastructure.

Wallets linked to Jane Street received $15.08M in BTC from BitMEX and LMAX Digital in the past 2 hours. The activity comes as the trading firm faces ongoing accusations of insider trading during the LUNA/Terra crash and deliberate BTC dumps at market open.

Jacob & Co released a $40,000 watch that can mine BTC. Because nothing says "decentralized money for the people" quite like mining sats from your wrist.

That’s all for today!