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Week Ahead Industry Previews: Fourth Week of March 2023

Kean
Kean
March 27, 2023 · 6 minutes 
Here’s a rundown of the most noteworthy industry events and project developments to look out for in the coming week

Polygon will release the zkEVM mainnet beta version on March 27th. According to Polygon, its zkEVM is EVM compatible and has passed 100% of the Ethereum test vectors applicable to zkEVM. Developers can copy and paste Ethereum code and use it to build on Polygon zkEVM without changing anything, and all Ethereum tools can seamlessly collaborate with Polygon zkEVM.

The South Korean government’s Legislation and Judiciary Committee will begin deliberating on the “Virtual Asset-related Bill” on March 28th, and a public hearing will be held in April to hear from experts. There are currently 18 virtual asset-related bills pending in the South Korean National Assembly’s Legislation and Judiciary Committee, including 11 legislative bills related to virtual assets, 4 amendments to the Electronic Financial Transactions Act, 2 amendments to the Specific Financial Information Act, and 1 bill to establish a Financial Services Commission.

The Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) of Hong Kong released a 200,000-word consultation paper on the “Guideline on Virtual Asset Trading Platforms” on February 20th, allowing individual investors to trade high market capitalization tokens on SFC-licensed exchanges, subject to safeguards such as knowledge tests, risk tolerance assessments, and reasonable risk exposure limits. The consultation period for the paper will end on March 31st, with the goal of allowing retail trading under the new cryptocurrency exchange licensing regime on June 1st. In addition, new virtual asset-related criminal offenses in Hong Kong will come into effect on April 1st.

The Avalanche Cortina upgrade will be activated on March 30th at 23:00, and the latest version of AvalancheGo will migrate X-Chain to run Snowman++ consensus, making X-Chain compatible with Avalanche Warp Messaging and making it easier for exchanges to support X-Chain. The Cortina upgrade also simplifies batch staker rewards and increases the C-Chain gas limit. The batch staker reward simplifies the cost allocation for validators with a large number of stakers, processed in batches throughout the node’s entire validation period, and allocated when the node cancels its pledge.

March 27th

Project Updates:

  • Polygon will launch the zkEVM mainnet Beta version.
  • Web3 infrastructure provider, Ankr, will provide RPC connections after the release of Polygon zkEVM.
  • Law firm Rosen plans to file a class-action lawsuit against Bitcoin mining firm Argo Blockchain seeking the lead plaintiff role, with a deadline of March 27th, 2023.
  • Regulated debt securities startup, Obligate, will open to the public.
  • EOS EVM will launch the final testnet.
  • y00ts will begin migrating to Polygon, and users who migrate within the first 24 hours will receive rewards.
  • Covalent will support Polygon zkEVM.
  • Avalanche will release the pre-release code for the Avalanche Cortina upgrade on the Fuji testnet.
  • Kraken will suspend ACH deposits and withdrawals.

NFT Minting:

  • The metaverse game Realm Hunter will launch its Genesis Pass on MagicEden for minting.

Events:

  • Polygon Guild x Newman Capital- HK Meetup will take place in Hong Kong.
  • The 2023 Hong Kong Web3 Impact Innovation Summit “Softbank Night” will be held at the Hong Kong Science Park, hosted by Softbank Global Holdings Group and Hotchain Culture Media.

Token Unlocks:

  • XCAD Network’s token, XCAD, will unlock 2,400,000 tokens (approximately $4.46 million), accounting for 1.2% of the total supply.
  • Yield Guild Games’ token, YGG, will unlock 16,872,453 tokens (approximately $4.41 million), accounting for 1.687% of the total supply.

March 28th

Project Updates:

  • The second phase of the Celestia modular blockchain network testnet Blockspace competition will begin.

NFT Minting:

  • XLABEL will collaborate with Edgar Rice Burroughs, the original creator of “Tarzan,” to release a Tarzan NFT series called “Tarzan: Lord of the Apes.”

Events:

  • Decentraland will host the second annual Metaverse Fashion Week from March 28th to 31st.
  • OpenDAO will airdrop governance token AOS on March 28th.
  • BNB Chain will launch the Web3WonderWomen new mentor program.
  • DcoreumCN will hold a Twitter Space event on “Web3.0 – Technology that enables enterprises to take off” on March 28th at 8:00 pm.

Important Events:

  • The South Korean Presidential Committee on Policy Planning will propose and discuss “virtual asset-related bills” on March 28th.
  • European Parliament members must debate the Anti-Money Laundering Bill file by March 28th.

Token Unlocks:

  • Clearpool’s token, CPOOL, will unlock 31,167,410.19 tokens (approximately $1.15 million), accounting for 3.117% of the total supply.

March 29th

Project Updates:

  • The full-chain wallet project, Everywhere Finance, will conduct an airdrop on March 29th, and the snapshot date will be announced on the day of the airdrop.
  • Blockchain technology company Stratis will launch a new NFT ticketing platform, Ticketsphere, on March 29th.
  • The NFT market, Formfunction, on Solana will close on March 29th.
  • Bitget will launch an Arbitrum token ARB recharge trading activity from March 22nd at 11:00 to March 29th at 18:00.

Event Previews:

  • FTX proposed a $4 million bonus plan to retain employees. The plan will be discussed at a hearing on March 29th in Delaware.
  • “Shanghai Upgrade FlashDAO” will hold the “Shanghai Upgrade Talk” event from March 29th to April 12th.

Important Events:

  • The United States House of Representatives subcommittee plans to hold a hearing on the bankruptcy of Silicon Valley Bank on March 29th.

Token Unlocking:

  • Euler’s token EUL will unlock 114,028 coins (approximately $430,000), accounting for 0.419% of the total supply, on March 29th at 11:19:38.

Proposal Voting:

  • The Aave community’s ARFC proposal for “Deploying Aave V3 MVP version on zkEVM mainnet” will end voting on March 29th at 18:00.

March 30th

Project Updates:

  • Coinbase will suspend trading of six cryptocurrencies, including YFII and MIR, on March 30th at 0:00.
  • Avalanch Cortina upgrade will be activated on March 30th at 23:00.
  • Kraken will no longer support non-enterprise customers using Signature, and customers need to complete their withdrawals before March 30th.

Event Previews:

  • Bitget will launch an ARB Staking event on March 30th.
  • XLABEL and Edgar Rice Burroughs, the original creator of “Tarzan,” will launch the “Tarzan” themed NFT on March 30th.
  • “Shanghai Upgrade FlashDAO” will hold an online event, “Exploring Shanghai Upgrade EIP Technical Details,” on March 30th.

Proposal Voting:

  • The ApeCoin community proposed to launch two new NFT series, with the deadline for voting being March 30th.

Token Unlocking:

  • Galxe’s token GAL will unlock 192,307.69 coins (approximately $330,000), accounting for 0.096% of the total supply, on March 30th at 20:00:00.

March 31st:

Project Updates:

  • DeGods will migrate to Ethereum on March 31st.
  • The court has approved extending the exclusive rights of the submitted plan for Celsius until the end of March.
  • MATIC BEP2 on BNB beacon chain will be discontinued on March 31st.
  • Web3 data storage solution KYVE will launch its mainnet by the end of this quarter.
  • The Sorare fantasy football game will have to make regulatory adjustments by March 31st, 2023, as required by the French gambling authority.
  • Doodles 2 wearable NFT “Genesis Box” will be launched on March 31st.
  • Trader Joe and related Joepegs NFT market will deploy on BNB Chain by the end of March.

Important Events：

  • The deal for Alameda to sell $45 million in Sequoia Capital shares may end as early as March 31st.
  • Elon Musk: Twitter will open-source all the code used for tweet recommendations on March 31st.
  • Bitfront, the cryptocurrency exchange under the Japanese social media giant LINE, will stop operating, and the withdrawal deadline for users is March 31st.
  • The Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission’s “Virtual Asset Trading Platform Guidelines” invites market participants and stakeholders to submit their opinions by March 31, 2023.

Upcoming Events：

  • The Ethereum Foundation will launch a new round of funding activities around account abstraction from February 27th to March 31st.
  • VC firm MCV launches Crypto for Good Fund II, and the second round of applications is open until March 31st.

Token Unlocking：

  • The CryptoGPT token GPT will unlock 15,000,000 tokens (about $1.4 million), accounting for 0.5% of the total supply on March 31st at 20:00:00.

April 1st

Important Events:

  • The deadline for BlockFi customers to submit proof of claim information is April 1st.
  • The Hong Kong SAR Government appoints Kong Jianping, the founder of Nano Labs, as a new director of Hong Kong Cyberport Management Company Limited, from April 1st, 2023, to March 31st, 2025.
  • The Bank of Russia will launch a pilot project for the digital ruble on April 1st.
  • The Bank of Japan will start a pilot program for the digital yen in April.
  • The copyright commercial protection of the Uniswap V3 core code will expire on April 1st.
  • Hong Kong’s newly enacted virtual asset-related criminal offenses will come into effect on April 1st.

Project Updates:

  • The Aptos DeFi protocol Thala in the Aptos ecosystem will issue the THL token on Thala Launch on April 1st.
  •  Nexo will stop providing Earn Interest products to all US customers on April 1st.

Upcoming Events:

  • The HAPathon 2023 Tokyo Station, a global Web3 entrepreneurship competition jointly organized by PlatON, Alibaba Cloud, and HashKey, will be held from April 1st to 2nd.
  • “Shanghai Upgrade FlashDAO” will be held on April 1st.
  • The Harvard Business School China Summit will be held at Harvard University on April 1, 2023, Eastern Time.

Token Unlocking:

The Acala token ACA will unlock 27,433,333 tokens (about $2.81 million), accounting for 2.743% of the total supply, on April 1st at 15:00:00.