The layer one (L1) battle is starting to heat up again and multiple protocols have seen their token values rise in recent weeks as traders venture out to see what life is like outside of the Ethereum (ETH) network. One L1 protocol that has seen its token price climb to a new all-time high this week was NEAR, a community-run cloud computing platform focused on interoperability and lightning quick transaction speed. Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView show that, following a pullback that hit a low of $13.10 on Jan. 9, the price of NEAR climbed more than 50% …

Bitcoin (BTC) and most major altcoins are facing selling at higher levels and buying on dips, indicating the possibility of a range formation. On-chain analysis firm Whalemap said that a “reclaim of $46,500 will look like a trend reversal,” for Bitcoin as the previous accumulation phase of 90,000 BTC was at this level. Fidelity Digital Assets said in its annual report that the “massive “ Bitcoin accumulation by Bitcoin miners suggests that the “Bitcoin cycle is far from over.” The report went on to add that more sovereign nations may “acquire Bitcoin in 2022 and perhaps even see a central …

Frax Share (FXS) has been one of the few altcoins to pull off a dominant price performance amid the down market of late 2021 to early 2022. In the month between Dec. 14 and Jan. 14, FXS was up 128% against the U.S. dollar and 159% against Bitcoin (BTC). In addition to this impressive feat, FXS topped the charts of historically bullish trading conditions on multiple occasions throughout this period. What is behind the token’s recurring strong trading outlook? Governing a stablecoin ecosystem FXS is the utility token underpinning the Frax ecosystem — a stablecoin protocol that seeks to occupy …

Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced that Tesla now accepts Dogecoin (DOGE) as payment for the company’s merchandise. DOGE-eligible products in the Tesla store can be purchased by sending DOGE to Tesla’s Dogecoin wallet. While it's accepting DOGE, the firm also clarified that they are not taking any other crypto. The company states that it cannot detect other assets but DOGE on its website. The business tells customers that "non-Dogecoin digital assets sent to Tesla will not be returned to the purchaser." Additionally, items purchased with DOGE “cannot be returned, exchanged or canceled.” Tesla considers all sales made through DOGE as …

North Korean crypto hackers siphoned off nearly $400 million in crypto through cyber attacks in 2021 according to new data from Chainalysis. The type of crypto stolen has also seen a sea change according to the Jan. 13 report from the blockchain analytics firm. In 2017, BTC accounted for nearly all the crypto stolen by the DPRK, but it now accounts for just one fifth: “In 2021, only 20% of the stolen funds were Bitcoin, whereas 22% were either ERC-20 tokens or altcoins. And for the first time ever, Ether accounted for a majority of the funds stolen at 58%.” …

Shiba Inu (SHIB) seems to be preparing for a bullish breakout as a falling wedge pattern begins to form. The price of SHIB has been trending lower inside an area defined by two contracting trendlines while accompanying a decline in trading volume. That shows that investors have been less concerned about the downtrend. As a result, falling wedges typically provide an ideal springboard for an upside break once the price closes above the structure's upper trendline. On Thursday, SHIB showed signs of following a similar topside break. Notably, the token briefly closed above the falling wedge's upper trendline, hitting an …

Last week, Vitalik Buterin, Ethereum (ETH)'s co-founder, voiced his disapproval regarding the emergence of cross-chain bridges, citing security vulnerabilities due to their interdependency. In the days that followed however, developers working on cross-chain technologies largely dismissed his skepticism. In a statement to Cointelegraph, Kadan Stadelmann, chief technology officer of atomic swap blockchain Komodo, responded to Vitalik's critique: "What we ultimately need is true decentralization. For example, instead of relying on one or two trusted bridges that have a single point of failure, it would be better to work towards a future where we have numerous bridges that are secure, trustless, …

The cryptocurrency market faced another day of erratic price movements on Jan. 13 after Bitcoin (BTC) bulls were soundly rejected in their bid to push the price above $44,000. This led to an abrupt sell-off that has thrust the price back into the high $42,000 range. Despite the mid-day struggle faced by Bitcoin and many of the other large market-cap cryptocurrencies, several small-cap altcoins managed eek out notable gains. Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView shows that the three biggest gainers over the past 24-hours were Cream Finance (CREAM), Electroneum (ETN) and Rari Governance Token (RGT). CREAM token holders …

Polygon prices look poised to rise by at least 30% in the wake of a key Jan. 18 upgrade that would push a considerable portion of its native MATIC token out of circulation. Dubbed EIP-1559, the improvement proposal originally came to light as part of Ethereum's so-called London Hard Fork upgrade on Aug. 5. The proposal effectively started destroying, or "burning," a part of the fees paid to miners via Ether (ETH). Traders and investors raised their bids for Ether before and after the EIP-1559 upgrade, noting that it made Ether a deflationary asset for the first time in history. …

Terra’s native staking token, LUNA, was one of the best-performing cryptocurrencies of 2021, with gains north of 13,000%. Terra has also surpassed Binance Smart Chain (BSC) in total locked value with $17.62 billion, making it the second-biggest DeFi chain just after Ethereum. Much of this growth is due to Terra’s ecosystem, with a community of developers continually building decentralized applications on top of Terra. But it may come as a surprise to know that before there were hundreds of apps built on Terra, there were only two that existed at the start of 2021 in the Mirror Protocol and Chai. …

Bank of America digital asset strategist Alkesh Shah has predicted that Ethereum competitor Solana could become the “Visa of the digital asset ecosystem” in a Jan 11 research note. The Solana network launched in 2020, and has since grown into the fifth largest cryptocurrency with a market capitalization of $47 billion. An order of magnitude faster than Ethereum, it has been used to settle over 50 billion transactions and mint over 5.7 million non-fungible tokens (NFTs). Critics however argue its speed comes at the cost of decentralization and reliability but Shah thinks the benefits outweigh the drawbacks: "Its ability to …

Crypto assets within the Cosmos ecosystem have been on a run since the start of 2022 thanks to an intensified focus on brokering cross-chain compatibility with other blockchains. One decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol that has benefited from the current expansion plans is Osmosis (OSMO). Osmosis is the first decentralized exchange (DEX) servicing projects connected through the Interblockchain Communication Protocol (IBC) and data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro show OSMO price surged 123% from a low of $4.05 on Dec. 17 to a new all-time high at $9.24 on Jan. 7. Three reasons for the price growth seen in OSMO include a …