The third week of 2023 brought us the continuation of the uptrend, which took the total market capitalization from $1.00 trillion at the start of the week to $1.07 trillion. Bitcoin is up nearly 10% in the past week, while the second-largest cryptocurrency, Ethereum, posted a weekly gain of just under 7%. The biggest gainer in the Top 10 cryptocurrencies was OKB, which appreciated by 17% last week and thus managed to overtake SOL (Solana) and re-enter the 10 largest cryptocurrencies by market capitalization. But you are probably wondering which coins are going to see an interesting price movement this week? Read and familiarize yourself with our top 3 coins to watch in week 4.
3. FTX Token (FTT)
FTX is a now defunct cryptocurrency derivatives exchange that offered futures, used ERC-20 tokens and OTC trading, but went bankrupt in November 2022. FTX Token (FTT) was the official token and the backbone of cryptocurrency derivatives exchange FTX and its ecosystem, fell from $26 to under $2 within days of the exchange crashing. FTT’s maximum supply was capped at 350 million tokens, but the FTX exchange used some of its profits to buy back and burn FTT, so the current circulating supply is 328.9 million. tokens. While users could once use FTT as collateral for futures positions, to get discounts on trading fees, or even staking tokens to earn additional rewards, the use cases for FTT have become very popular. limited following the collapse of its issuer.
New FTX CEO Sends FTT Price in Motion Again Hinting at Plausible Trade Recovery
The price of the FTT token saw a rapid decline of almost 95% after the FTX exchange was found to be built like a house of cards and collapsed in November 2022. Moreover, the collapse of the FTX exchange not only caused the price of FTT to plummet, but also caused billions of dollars to be wiped off the cryptocurrency’s total market capitalization. But after trading below the $1.50 valuation for more than a month, the FTT price is on the move and investors seem to be flooding in again. The reason for this renewed interest is the appointment of John J. Ray as the new CEO of FTX, who, in his first public interview after taking over the company, revealed that he plans to resume operations (c i.e. to restart the exchange and all its activities). FTT price is up 60% in the past week and more than 170% in the past month, outperforming almost all other top 100 cryptocurrencies in both time periods. The main question remains – is it possible for the FTX exchange to resume trading?
2. Nexo (NEXO)
Nexo started out as a centralized lending and borrowing platform that allows people to take out stablecoin loans as well as fiat cash loans by depositing their crypto holdings as collateral. The platform also offers high-yield interest accounts, which serve as a source of liquidity for platform loans. Over its history, Nexo has continued to expand its range of services, which now also includes a cryptocurrency exchange with over 300 trading pairs and a Nexo Card, which allows you to spend your crypto without selling it. Nexo Token is the native cryptocurrency of the ecosystem and the basis of the Nexo loyalty program. Users who hold a higher percentage of their portfolio in NEXO can benefit from lower trading fees as well as higher interest rates when lending and lower interest rates when borrowing. Additionally, Nexo has also pledged to buy and burn $50 million worth of Nexo tokens in its latest buyback program.
Nexo has settled the case with the US SEC for $45 million
After years of litigation, cryptocurrency lender Nexo has agreed to pay $45 million to settle a case with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) over the unregistered offering of its asset product crypto, the company announced on Twitter:
The SEC claimed that Nexo’s Earn Interest Product (EIP) constituted an unregistered securities offering, but from day one of the allegations, Nexo cooperated with the US regulator and even voluntarily stopped offering its EIP on the American territory. Nonetheless, the legal saga dragged on for a few years and only recently came to an end, with Nexo agreeing to pay a $45 million fine, payable over a 12-month period. Nexo representatives were pleased with the outcome and stressed that the settlement was reached on a no-admit-no-deny basis. The SEC also confirmed the news in its own Press release. The NEXO token rallied on the settlement announcement, gaining 16% in a single day on January 20 and peaking at a price of $0.85 per token. As of this writing, NEXO is changing hands at a price just below $0.84 and is up 12% in the last 7 days. Additionally, Nexo is one of the few remaining centralized cryptocurrency lenders in the market, as competitors Celsius, BlockFi, Vauld, Voyager, and several others went bankrupt or massively restructured their businesses during the 2022 bear market.
3. Kava (KAVA)
Kava is a high throughput layer 1 blockchain developed by Kava Labs. It is designed to use an innovative blockchain architecture of two co-chains working side-by-side to create a unified scalable network and facilitate a myriad of decentralized finance (DeFi) use cases. Kava’s own Tendermint consensus engine combines the smart contract capabilities of Ethereum with the interoperability of Cosmos to facilitate transactions for thousands of supported decentralized applications. To achieve cross-chain communication and asset transfers, the Kava ecosystem uses the IBC protocol and ChainLink’s decentralized blockchain oracle network. Kava Labs has also established close partnerships with industry leaders such as Binance, Kraken, and Ripple. The native token of the KAVA platform is used to transfer value on the network and plays a key role in the governance of the blockchain.
Coinbase listed KAVA just days before the planned launch of Kava 12
Kava got the top spot on our list this week due to the upcoming launch of Kava 12. According to Kava developers, the update which is expected to roll out on January 25 will be a total game-changer.
By implementing a new module called x/kavamint, the platform will give Cosmos channel DAOs much more control and flexibility over their shows. Additionally, Kava 12 will also improve the transparency of Kava DAO communities, giving all participants a clear overview of the community portfolio and fund flows. Kava 12 will also implement the ability to set burning mechanisms based on various channel parameters and a few other innovative features. The full list of features included in the new module is available here. Additionally, KAVA was recently listed on Coinbase. KAVA trades on the largest US-based cryptocurrency exchange start on January 19, but KAVA pumped over 15% already the day before, when the quotation was announcement on the official Kava Twitter. Kava representatives also pointed out that the listing will not only benefit KAVA but the entire Cosmos ecosystem. According to Kava Developers, all projects compatible with the Cosmos Inter Blockchain Communication (IBC) protocol will now enjoy a much shorter listing time on Coinbase, which could be reduced from the current 18 months to just 1 month. KAVA is currently trading at $1.05 and is up 24% in the last 7 days and 83% year-to-date. Will this positive trend continue and push the price of KAVA even higher?
Andrew is a writer who does most of his work on cryptocurrency-related topics. Although he is primarily interested in Bitcoin, he also follows major altcoins and the innovative ideas that new cryptocurrency and blockchain projects are bringing to the table.
