Tether had ‘record-breaking’ web income in This fall, Polygon Labs does layoffs and hackers steal $112M of XRP

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Whats up and welcome again to the third version of the brand new and improved TechCrunch Crypto publication. As beforehand talked about, alongside our commonly scheduled information bits, I’ll be including some contemporary recurring segments and options — so when you like what you see (or don’t), let me know at jacquelyn@techcrunch.com.

Completely satisfied February, pals! We’ve made it by one-twelfth of the 12 months; that wasn’t so laborious was it? Solely need to do it 11 extra occasions to make it to 2025.

As January got here to an finish, hackers obtained busy and stole so much of XRP tokens, Polygon did layoffs, new experiences present demand for AI and blockchain to work collectively, Ethereum developer curiosity hit new highs final 12 months and Tether reported document revenue from the fourth quarter of 2023. Extra particulars under.

This week in web3

1. Polygon Labs lays off 60 staff, about 19% of its employees, CEO says
2. AI and blockchains may want each other to evolve, in keeping with new report (TC+)
3. Hackers steal $112 million of XRP Ripple cryptocurrency
4. Ethereum developer curiosity hit new all-time highs in 2023 regardless of a bear market (TC+)
5. Solana Cellular nonetheless has a protracted method to go till it hits breakeven (TC+)

Crunching numbers

This week the crypto market was fairly bullish as the 2 greatest cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, bitcoin and ether, rose 7% and 4.4%, respectively, on the week, in keeping with CoinMarketCap knowledge. The worldwide crypto market cap elevated 5.2% over a seven-day interval to $1.62 trillion.

Individually, Tether reported that within the fourth quarter of 2023 it introduced in a “record-breaking” web revenue of $2.85 billion, making up 46% of the full $6.2 billion in web income final 12 months. Tether is the world’s largest stablecoin by market capitalization and quantity and third largest cryptocurrency behind bitcoin and ethereum. Its complete belongings (which again its stablecoins) are at $97 billion, as of December 31, 2023. Its liabilities had been about $91.6 billion and it has about $5.4 billion of extra reserves, that are “absolutely masking” its excellent $4.8 billion in secured loans, the report added.

Should you’re pondering, “these are massive numbers,” you’re proper. See under.

Our favourite ‘Crypto Twitter’ put up

Following all of the discuss Tether…

This put up on X by Bitwise Asset Administration’s CIO Matt Hougan speaks for itself. Sorry Goldman Sachs, higher luck subsequent quarter:

Tether made more cash final quarter than Goldman Sachs. Tether: $2.85 billion Goldman: $2.01 billion

The newest pod

For this week’s episode, I interviewed Chris Dixon, normal companion at enterprise capital agency Andreessen Horowitz (a16z).
Chris has been on the agency since 2012 and based and leads a16z’s crypto workforce, which invests within the web3 world by 4 mega-funds with over $7 billion beneath administration. He’s additionally the writer of the just lately launched ebook “Learn Write Personal: Constructing the Subsequent Period of the Web.”
Previous to a16z, Chris co-founded two startups, SiteAdvisor and Hunch, acquired by McAfee in 2006 and eBay in 2011, respectively. He additionally attended Columbia College for his bachelor of arts diploma and masters in philosophy and has an MBA from Harvard College.
On this episode, we talk about the brand new ebook, how crypto’s notion has modified and what objective blockchains can in the end carry to the world.
We additionally dove into:

Massive Tech vs. crypto
Significance of decentralization
a16z web3 investments
Blockchain gaming
Embracing the longer term

Subscribe to Chain Response on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or your favourite pod platform to maintain up with the newest episodes, and please go away us a evaluate when you like what you hear!
Observe the cash

Squid raised $4 million in a strategic spherical to assist help cross-chain interoperability
Velar raised $3.5 million to construct a perpetual decentralized alternate on Bitcoin
Web3 gaming startup Yooldo raised $1.5 million, elevating its valuation to $13 million
Choices-focused protocol Ithaca Finance raised $2.5 million in pre-seed funding
Portal raised $34 million in a seed spherical to develop its decentralized bitcoin ecosystem

This record was compiled with data from Messari in addition to TechCrunch’s personal reporting.
What else we’re writing 
Need to department out from the world of web3? Listed below are some articles on TechCrunch that caught our consideration this week.

Why there’s no clear profitable pricing technique in B2B SaaS (TC+)
Three San Francisco supervisors obtain threats following YC President Garry Tan’s tweet
Apple Imaginative and prescient Professional to launch with over 600 apps and video games optimized for the brand new headset
Senate listening to with 5 social media CEOs was a missed alternative
Tech layoffs scale to three-quarter excessive (TC+)