Vladimir Okhotnikov

Although the Web3 Gaming Cap Fell by 86% From Its Peak in 2022, I Believe That 2024 Will Be a Turning Point for the Blockchain Gaming Industry There are reasons for optimism. Despite the drop in market value to $4-7 billion, every day 1.2 million unique wallets interact with gaming protocols, generating 15-25 million transactions. This is a colossal potential, I should tell you! Moreover, positive trends have emerged. Optimism, OP Stack and Starknet are growing in popularity for game development and the TON network is promising. In 2023, 76 new gaming-oriented blockchains will be launched. Of course, there are also difficulties. Attracting players to Web3 is 77% more expensive than traditional gaming. And only 5% of projects can boast an audience of more than 100 people who come in to play every day. However, the market potential is enormous. And with the right approach, blockchain games have a bright future. #GameFi #Metaverse #Web3 #Blockchain #DeFi #Crypto

Buffett about the stock market In an annual letter to shareholders, the legendary investor Warren Buffett formulated the state of stock markets. He wrote that today the behavior of the markets can be compared to the casino, and this was not the case when he was young. Buffett’s strategy is well known: before investing in stocks, he studied the company’s performance in detail, identifying strengths and weaknesses, and deepened into production problems. This is what he calls the work of the investor - to do, first of all, the company, and the stock is considered a piece of paper describing this company. However, much has changed over the past decade. Stock markets have become dominated not by investors, but by speculators, that is, traders interested in quick earnings.  Stocks have become increasingly distant from companies. Of course, there is a dependence, smart reports on indicators and characteristics are regularly published, but decisions of traders are increasingly made based on th

Crypto Exchanges vs SEC Litigation between US Securities and Exchange Commission and major crypto exchanges is ongoing.  The SEC, following the position of its head Gary Gensler, accuses Coinbase, Binance and Kraken of illegal work as unlicensed securities trading activities. So far, illegal trading in securities is the commission’s favorite accusation. Usually, it classified cryptocurrency to securities without any special checks and expertise. If there is cryptocurrency, then it is a security. The exception is Bitcoin, but it is a dubious asset that suspicious people use for dark causes. However, Ripple managed to prove in court that at least monets traded on the stock exchange cannot be considered cryptocurrencies. And then there is the decision of the futures commission that defined Ethereum as commodities. In the current situation, a court ruling in favor of the SEC would mean an additional control circuit over the crypto business.  In fact, crypto exchanges fight for the right to

Hackers versus MicroStrategy: Another X Account Hacked Hackers again used the network X (former Twitter) for their malicious purposes. A message advertised for the MSTR token appeared on the MicroStrategy account. It was claimed that the token consumes less gas and airdrop was declared. The token is supposedly backed by Bitcoin assets and is therefore guaranteed to be safe. The message of such a company was taken very seriously by the vast majority of users. They followed a phishing link, entered their wallet details and... lost a total of $440k. It turned out that MicroStrategy’s account was banally hacked. The intruders placed a phishing link that provided them with sufficient traffic of visitors. Scammers loved social network X. Classic stories of hacking you surely remember is Vitalik Buterin’s case, whose account was hacked and also advertised as a phishing site. True, casualties were slightly higher - around $800K. Perhaps the loudest case occurred with the SEC. There the Skamers

The SEC Was Accused of Unlawful Regulation - The Judge To Determine When Will Be the End of the Regulator’s Fight Against Unregistered Crypto Securities CFAT and Lejilex state that the SEC is exceeding its jurisdiction and the purpose of the complaint is to confirm that transactions in digital assets are not sales of securities requiring registration . Once the case has been assigned to Judge Reed O'Connor, an appointee of former President George W. Bush with a history of ruling in favor of LGBTQ rights challenges, there is reason to believe things will go downhill. Unfortunately, the appointment of Judge Reed O'Connor, known for his decisions regarding the rights of the LGBT community, raises legitimate concerns about bias in the Lejilex v. SEC case. Let me remind you that O'Connor was appointed during the administration of George W. Bush, whose presidency was marked by many failures, including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, launched under the false pretext of fighting

European Central Bank against Bitcoin The European Central Bank issued a statement reiterating its negative assessment of Bitcoin.  ECB CEO Ulrich Bindseil and Councillor Jürgen Schaafö stated that Bitcoin has never become a currency and is not suitable for investment, and therefore its cost is strictly zero! The ECB refuses to recommend Bitcoin because it expects it to collapse soon.  The ECB emphasized that the approval of the Bitcoin ETF does not change its negative outlook. Moreover, the European regulator says that the growth of the crypto market is dangerous and will only lead to losses for investors. Why is Bitcoin Growing? European bankers have the answer: the reasons for the rally were the US Federal Reserve policy of interest rates, the approval of the ETF and the halving of remuneration for mining. This is difficult to argue with. And why, in the opinion of Eurobankers, Bitcoin is not suitable as an investment asset? Because it does not yield dividends, trading volumes are r

Fight for the ETF The epic with the approval of Bitcoin-ETF ended with a convincing victory of the combined team of crypto community and investment funds. The SEC, which had protected investors from the invasion of cryptocurrency hordes for several years, wavered and yielded. SEC head Gary Gensler did not hide his frustration and critical attitude towards cryptocurrencies. Now it seems that the second series of cryptocurrency epic has begun. Encouraging themselves by the success of Bitcoin-ETF, several companies have applied for Ethereum-ETF. And that could be a problem. We are about to see a fascinating sparring of two opposing positions. One is SEC head Gary Gensler. His position on cryptocurrencies is well known: he claims that all cryptocurrencies except Bitcoin are securities, and Bitcoin itself is a suspicious asset that is used to launder funds, fund terrorism, and other nefarious purposes. However, there is the opposite position. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC)

Household Debt in the US Reached a Record High - Americans Owed $17.5 Trillion in the Fourth Quarter of 2023 In 2008, the debt reached $9.294 trillion—a sum that has nearly doubled in 16 years. We know what this has led to in the past: bankruptcies of financial institutions, reduced production, rising unemployment and general economic decline. More than 8.7 million Americans have lost their jobs and the global economy has fallen into a protracted recession Guys, I came across an interesting post by Peter St Onge, Ph.D , which provides data from the New York Fed. In his post, he worried about the possibility of mass defaults as total household debt reached a historically high level of $17.5 trillion. Since the start of the pandemic, the data shows that this figure has increased by $3.4 trillion, which is approximately $30,000 per household. In addition to this, there is also a $10 trillion federal debt, which means an additional $80,000 per household. But I didn’t find anything surpris

Trump and Bitcoin Donald Trump, a US presidential candidate and ex-president of the United States, gave his first public positive review of Bitcoin. Three years ago, his opinion was exactly the opposite. He called Bitcoin a fraud and a fake, and that Bitcoin was guilty of dollar devaluation. Investments in cryptocurrencies, according to Trump, are insane, they will sooner or later collapse. Indeed, it is hard to call Trump, as he was three years ago, a crypto-enthusiast. The ex-president’s attitude to the crypto began to change in 2022, when he released his first NFT collection. Trump, with his usual practicality, sold it and earned almost a million dollars in a month. However, Trump prefers not to announce it publicly. The ex-president’s attitude to the crypt began to change in 2022, when he released his first NFT collection. Trump, sold it and earned almost a million dollars in a month. Since then, Trump has a cryptocurrency in his investment portfolio. Although, he prefers not to a

Binance will not be the same Well, that’s the big story. The judge approved a $4.3 billion Binance fine as part of a plea bargain. The former head of the crypto exchange Changpeng Zhao and the exchange itself agreed to plead guilty and pay a fine. For another 5 years Binance will be in a judicial supervision mode. The fight for the company, which lasted almost two years, is officially coming to an end. It all started out as a fantastic success story. In 2017, Zhao launched a crypto exchange project, and three years later, Binance became the leader in cryptocurrency traffic, making deals worth $10 billion a day. The rise of the stock exchange coincided with the beginning of a campaign to take control of the crypto business. Binance was the expected target - the stock exchange pursued an independent policy, demonstrating its strength. Regulators began to exert pressure, the company experienced licensing problems, investigations and litigation. Zhao resisted. The stock exchange was squeez

When Everyone Is Against Decentralization, But Buys Crypto Quietly — Vladimir Okhotnikov "There are still many unresolved issues in cryptocurrency and blockchain, including governance, tokenonomics, and regulation. I liked how Dixon in his book tries to convey the idea that blockchain is designed to be dominated by large technology companies. I agree with that," Vladimir Okhotnikov pointed out. Despite the current difficulties in the cryptocurrency space, we can firmly say that decentralization will eventually break the established order and the full potential of cryptocurrencies will be realized, even if it requires a tough fight with the SEC.

The emergence of meta-universes opens up completely new possibilities . This is still a virgin field that needs to be "plowed" and "sown" with the most effective technological solutions. The main problem in scaling blockchain is the many unresolved issues related to information security. People are still far from accepting the idea of decentralized finance. Many people do not know how to use crypto wallets and what to do with the initial sets. These issues need to be addressed from the very beginning," Vladimir Okhotnikov emphasized.

Digital Euro is very close The European Central Bank released a video highlighting the benefits of digital Euro.  In fact, if you start to advertise money, it means that something is wrong with it. Usually, money does not need advertising. If you expected the authorities to finally accept cryptocurrencies and officially launch their crypto, you are sorely mistaken. In fact, it is not called cryptocurrency.  Even if a blockchain is used, the digital Euro will lose its main property - decentralization. Like any CBDC, the new currency will be fully manageable. Moreover, it will be completely transparent for regulators. Each user will be watched day and night, every financial transaction will be known. That is, the state will know everything about their citizens. How they spend time, where they go, what their preferences are. All this is the dream of any authoritarian regime!  So democratic Europe is going to introduce a system of total control over its own citizens. I think it’s called to

The United States Senate is demanding the crypto user identification     It seems that the struggle of crypto enthusiasts and crypto skeptics takes a chronic form. Massachusetts Democrat Senator Elizabeth Warren presented a bill to Congress setting strict rules for the crypto industry. Senator Warren’s claims to cryptocurrencies are standard. She, like all authorities, does not like users' anonymity. Therefore, it is proposed to introduce procedures for mandatory identification of both miners and any crypto-platforms.  The bill deals with the crypto industry and measures for its regulation. Such ideas appear regularly. The authorities always have an interest in obtaining as much data as possible from their citizens, but citizens are not always happy with this. The bill provoked a strong reaction from the crypto community. Senate crypto lobbyists have said that America will lose hundreds of billions of dollars, and many businesses will move to countries with a more favorable busines

The Future Is Already Here - the Neural Network Draws Pictures, Makes Videos and Now Does a Movie Voice-over by Itself A new development from ElevenLabs - the neural network can now generate sound based on a text description. And when you combine this with Sora's video creation capabilities, you get real movies! Imagine, soon we will be able to come up with stories and characters ourselves, and AI will bring them to life. Ready-made videos with realistic pictures and voice acting without actors. This is only a small fraction of what artificial intelligence brings to us. Technologies are developing rapidly. And what seemed fantastic today will become commonplace tomorrow. I bet that very soon we will start creating our own films and cartoons using neural networks… #artificial_intelligence #neural_networks #video_generation #audio_generation #Sora #ElevenLabs #future_is_here #movie_creation #personalized_content