Messari Updates
this is actually good news
Your daily snapshot from the Messari screener.
We recently doubled the size of our research team and our engineering team. That plus a few other operational items this week led to a couple of misses on our scheduled sends. (Both of which were my fault. Mea culpa. We’ve cleaned that up.)
Below the fold, we’ve got a double feature of news covering everything you need to know from yesterday and so far today.
Otherwise, we’ve got some updates…
Messari Updates
It has been a rough twelve months in the crypto markets. Actually, come to think of it, it’s been rough basically since we began writing this daily last September.
I do believe, though, that we (in general, and as a company) may be through the worst of this particular bear market. I want to thank all of our loyal subscribers who supported us through the depths by providing daily feedback, sharing our research with colleagues, and of course, paying us money.
You helped us beat the bear.
As we head into the second year of Unqualified Opinions, we’re making some changes that I think will prove beneficial to our free and paid subscribers alike.
Pro vs. Basic
There are a number of excellent resources for crypto coverage these days - whether you’re looking for news, research, memes, whatever.
We’re not trying to be all things to all people. Instead, we're going to double down where we think we’re strongest: data-driven content and curation.
As such, and starting on October 1, we'll be simplifying things and switching to two subscription tiers: Pro and Basic.
Basic (free):
For the vast majority of you, nothing will change!
In fact, our daily curation will be available Monday through Friday mornings rather than just Monday and Friday. These pieces will be shorter and sweeter than our recent Pro subscriber posts with short above the fold pieces written by yours truly (TBI), regular infographics, summaries of our podcast interviews, insights from our asset research, and three to five “must-read” news and analysis tl:dr’s for the day.
Clean, easy, snappy.
You’ll also get basic access to our tools on messari.io, starting with our lightning-fast screener (basic charts are coming soon, too).
Pro ($30/month, $300/year):
With more resources, we’ve reflected on what products will be most valuable to our premium subscribers.
My sense is that paying subscribers will extract more value from Messari via our daily summaries (Basic), plus a much meatier weekly research insight and event calendar (Pro), plus significant improvements to our hosted tools (Pro).
It's difficult for us, or any single source, to consistently put forth a truly valuable daily research piece. We’d rather acknowledge that, and instead focus on delivering one A+ report per week, surfacing the best third-party analyses in between. Like an air traffic controller tasked with protecting your daily info traffic. This, of course, is in addition to the Pro tools (full-featured screener, advanced charting, comps analysis, alerts, analyst calls, portfolio tools, etc.) that we’ll be rolling out over the next 6-12 months.
We recognize the Pro product feature set is still being built (we know how important charts are to you, we’re on it), so are reducing our Pro rate from $700 to $300 annually. This will help us further build our community, and increase the accessibility of these tools to smaller investors. Click here to sign up for Pro and see all the features.
Monthly subscribers will see their rates cut automatically. In addition, we’re happy to issue prorated refunds for annual subscribers to reflect the lower rates, or you can simply pay that forward, and we’ll pass along those Pro comps to students.
(We do expect to release a (more expensive) enterprise package in 2020.)
Enterprise API & Research:
There’s always a third tier. If you’re looking for bespoke data products or research on a given asset, trend, tech, metric, etc. email us at research@messari.io, and we will consider enterprise-level engagements ($10,000 minimum).
Some of the things we’ve rolled out recently include a “fork monitoring” service, governance studies, and subscription research around our supply curve details (inflation + liquid market cap estimates). Many of these products started as bespoke research that we later productized, so let us know if you have ideas or requests!
Coverage
With respect to ongoing research coverage, there are three themes we're going to dive deeply into with roughly equal weighting this year, all of which will be more relevant for professionals than mere retail subscribers:
Bitcoin (its macro positioning, global market structure, and derivatives)
Crypto Finance (DeFi, lending, fundraising/secondaries, staking)
The Smart Contract Wars (tracking soon-to-launch unicorn ETH comps)
With a larger research team, more advanced data tools, and a reduced publishing load, we’re going to deliver best-in-class Pro reports every week beginning in October.
I’m excited, and hope that you are, too.
Until tomorrow…
-TBI
P.S. Share. Subscribe. Spread the love. Tweet at me or Messari for requests, feedback, comments, or questions.
🔍 [Messari Insight] Hedera Hashgraph among the three most valued Smart Contract Platforms by Y+10 Liquid Marketcap
Hedera Hashgraph has officially launched its public network after testing with a small group of clients since Dec. 2018. If the entirety of the supply (50,000,000,000 HBARs) was minted at launch, only a small portion is currently transferable. With a current Liquid Inflation rate of 372.75%, and only 4.01% of the Y+10 supply issued, Hedera Hashgraph Liquid Supply will increase more than any other Smart Contract Platform.
At current price levels, Hedera Hashgraph will be the third-highest market cap Smart Contract Platform in 2029, right after Ethereum and EOS.
Compare all Smart Contract Platforms' Liquid Supply Schedules on this dedicated Messari Pro Screener.
[Messari Research] Returns of top tech IPO's and token launches in 2019
2019 has been a busy year for high profile Initial Public Offerings as well as token launches. With the recent launch of Hedera Hashgraph ($HBAR) we took a look at how they have performed to date.
Despite only having traded for a few days, Hedera is already down 39%. While a substantial loss for early investors, it is not unprecedented even for public equities as Uber, Slack and Lyft have all lost 30% or more in their couple months of a public listing. Newly launched cryptoassets as a whole have fared worst with Cosmos ($ATOM), ThunderCore ($TT), and Algorand ($ALGO) having all lost over 50% of their value since being traded. Bitfinex's exchange token ($LEO) is the exception, likely due to its value being tied to a revenue-generating company. (share or read more)
Quick Bits (Don't read that, I read it for you)
Choke Points (Exchange News)
🇦🇷 Huobi Group, the parent company of the Huobi cryptocurrency exchange, has announced the official launch of Huobi Argentina, The Block reports. Huobi Argentina will launch the local cryptocurrency exchange in mid-October with a fiat gateway to trade Argentine pesos for cryptocurrencies via credit cards, wire transfers, and digital payment services. (share or read more)
🧐 Cboe BZX Exchange withdrew its VanEck/SolidX bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) proposal on Tuesday, CoinDesk reports. According to a filing dated Sept. 17, a proposed rule change to publicly list shares of the VanEck SolidX Bitcoin Trust was withdrawn on Sept. 13. This filing marks the second time VanEck and SolidX withdrew the proposed ETF. The companies withdrew the same ETF proposal in January after a prolonged government shutdown threatened to force a rejection. (share or read more)
Startup Signals (ICOs, Cryptos, and Startups)
📱Messaging app LINE has officially launched a cryptocurrency exchange service for its 80 million users based in Japan, days after the platform received final regulatory approval, CoinDesk reports. The Shinjuku-based messaging provider said in a statement on Tuesday that the new exchange, called Bitmax, is now live with trading for five crypto assets: bitcoin ($BTC), ethereum ($ETH), ripple ($XRP), bitcoin cash ($BCH) and litecoin ($LTC). (share or read more)
🇰🇵 North Korea is in the early stages of developing its own cryptocurrency in a bid to avoid crippling international sanctions, VICE News reports. The digital currency, which doesn’t even have a name yet, will be “more like bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies,” said Alejandro Cao de Benos, the official in charge of North Korea’s cryptocurrency conferences, and a special delegate for the Committee for Cultural Relations for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK). “We are still in the very early stages in the creation of the token. Now we are in the phase of studying the goods that will give value to it,” said Cao de Benos, adding that there are “no plans to digitize the [North Korean] won for now.” (share or read more)
The Powers That Be (Legal/Reg/Policy)
🏛 Coinbase’s vice president Dorothy D. DeWitt will now serve as director of the division of market oversight at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). CFTC Chairman Heath P. Tarbert announced on Tuesday that DeWitt will take responsibility for the CFTC’s oversight over derivatives platforms and swap data repositories, as well as other new platform-traded products. (share or read more)
💰Craig Wright, the Australian entrepreneur who controversially claims he is Satoshi Nakamoto, is moving to settle a case that looks set to cost him billions in bitcoin, CoinDesk reports. Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart ruled in late August that Wright must turn over half of his bitcoin holdings and intellectual property from before 2014 to Kleiman’s estate. Now, before that decision is finalized, Wright has filed with the Southern Florida district court requesting more time to negotiate a settlement with the Kleiman estate. (share or read more)
👮♀️ U.S. law enforcement has charged an early supporter of the ethereum project and former paid advisor to Overstock’s tZero with extortion, CoinDesk's Will Foxley reports. Steven Nerayoff, an attorney and founder of blockchain consulting firm Alchemist, was arrested Wednesday morning by the FBI and was scheduled to face charges before a federal court in Brooklyn in the afternoon. The FBI also arrested Michael Hlady, an Alchemist associate. (share or read more)
✋ The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has sued ICOBox and its founder Nikolay Evdokimov for allegedly violating securities laws during its 2017 token sale and while facilitating other ICOs. According to the agency, Evdokimov raised $14.6 million during the sale of ICOBox's ICOS token. The ICOS token was supposed to give holders discounts and other benefits for token sales on the site but the SEC claims "as of the date of ICOBox’s offering, ICOBox had yet to support a single token sale to completion.” In addition to the token sale, ICOBox facilitated $650 million of ICOs for others, therefore, acting as an unregistered broker according to the SEC. (share or read more)
Did I miss something?
Send me the link, your twitter handle and your best imitation compression algorithm write up. If I like it, I’ll include your bit next issue (with attribution).
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