Dogecoin co-founder slams memecoins, DAO aims to buy Denver Broncos, and BTC tourism surges 30% in El Salvador: Hodler’s Digest, Feb. 20-26

Coming every Saturday, Hodler’s Digest will help you track every single important news story that happened this week. The best (and worst) quotes, adoption and regulation highlights, leading coins, predictions and much more — a week on Cointelegraph in one link.

Top Stories This Week

Former Cisco employee launches DAO to buy Denver Broncos

A freshly launched decentralized autonomous organization dubbed BuyTheBroncosDAO is aiming to raise enough capital to purchase the NFL’s Denver Broncos for roughly $4 billion. 

The project is offering fans of various levels of wealth the chance to own a slice of the Broncos, as there is no minimum requirement on how much they need to contribute to participate to the DAO. 

“The purpose, essentially, is to establish an infrastructure so that fans from all walks of life can be owners of the Denver Broncos,” one of the DAO’s organizers and former Cisco employee Sean O’Brien told CNBC earlier this week.

Dogecoin founder speaks out against ‘meme coins’

Dogecoin co-founder Billy Markus blasted memecoin shillers this week, slamming projects that are not about memes or the community but are instead “made by people trying to get rich off of other people trying to get rich.” 

“Satire has some mildly clever elements to it. jokes are funny. spam advertising, lying about who is involved in a project, making up ridiculous promises, desperately trying to get Elon’s attention to promote you, etc. are not clever or amusing,” he said on Twitter. 

Markus highlighted Binance Smart Chain tokens, in particular, arguing that they have “made the internet worse in every way,” as he pointed to the mass amount of spammers who flood social media platforms with their dubious crypto advertisements.

Bitcoin plunges as Putin announces ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine

The crypto market tanked on Thursday following reports that the Russian government had invaded Ukraine, with assets such as Bitcoin, Ether and XRP dropping 7.3%, 9.5% and 9.2% respectively. 

The news of the invasion sparked major pushback from people across the globe, including members of the crypto community. Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, who was born in Russia, condemned the move on Twitter, stating: 

“This is a crime against the Ukrainian and Russian people. I want to wish everyone security, although I know that there will be no security. Glory to Ukraine.”

By Friday, crypto markets reversed their post-Russian invasion declines after the United States announced it would be implementing sanctions against major Russian banks.

Trudeau revokes emergencies act powers but the case for crypto grows

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau walked back the use of the Emergencies Act on Thursday. The order was invoked in the wake of mass protests across the country, including at critical border crossings between the United States and Canada. The order allowed the government to freeze $8 million from 210 bank accounts connected to Canadian “Freedom Convoy” protestors.  

The highly contentious situation in Canada appears to be calming down now, however, with Trudeau noting that “we are confident that existing laws and bylaws are now sufficient to keep people safe.” 

The move to invoke the Emergencies Act one week prior caused a lot of pushback and debate; it also reiterated the viability of crypto, as the protestors were able to fundraise around 21 BTC after being shut off from banks and popular crowdfunding platforms such as GoFundMe.

Tourism in El Salvador up 30% since Bitcoin adoption, minister says

Earlier this week Salvadoran Tourism Minister Morena Valdez claimed that the nation’s tourism industry surged more than 30% since the adoption of the Bitcoin Law in September 2021. 

In particular, Valdez stated that the influx of tourists from the U.S. has increased significantly to represent 60% of all travelers heading to the country at the tail end of 2021. 

“We did a poll to check the activity according to the before and after of Bitcoin. The tourism sector increased in November and December. This increased by more than 30%,” Valdez said in an interview with the local news agency El Salvador News English.

Winners and Losers

At the end of the week, Bitcoin (BTC) is at $39,335, Ether (ETH) at $2,718 and XRP at $0.71. The total market cap is at $1.76 trillion, according to CoinMarketCap. 

Among the largest 100 cryptocurrencies, the top three altcoin gainers of the week are Anchor Protocol (ANC) at 63.75%, Terra (LUNA) at 32.59% and Maker (MKR) at 4.13%. 

The top three altcoin losers of the week are Convex Finance (CVX) at -27.07%, Harmony (ONE) at -19.65% and Oasis Network (ROSE) at -19.41%.

For more info on crypto prices, make sure to read Cointelegraph’s market analysis.

Most Memorable Quotations

“Politicians who oppose Bitcoin are of the same brand as those who opposed the internet. It’s also an indicator of where they’re getting their money.”

Aarika Rhodes, elementary school teacher and congressional candidate

“Companies won’t hesitate to spend tens of millions on marketing but won’t spend a fraction of it on making sure there is something left to market.”

Tree of Alpha, Twitter personality 

“It is interesting to note the deep bullishness for cryptocurrencies. Even in an extremely bearish crypto market in which values were to drop 80%, less than half of investors say they would reduce their investments or exit the market.”

Marion Laboure, director of macro strategy and thematic research at Deutsche Bank 

“I’m not entirely sure what the SEC is planning on proving in the XRP litigation.”

Joseph Hall, attorney and former managing executive for policy at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission

“If you’re not 100% sure you’ll always be on the right side of those in power, you’d better buy some #Bitcoin.”

Samson Mow, chief strategy officer at Blockstream

“We need Bitcoin to be legal tender in Mexico.”

Indira Kempis, Mexican senator

“Remember dogecoin was made 8 years ago. as satire. making fun of the idiotic coins. irony. satire. Current ‘meme’ coins aren’t even memes. they’re made by people trying to get rich off of other people trying to get rich. to each their own, but it is indeed a different thing.”

Billy Markus, co-creator of Dogecoin

“Institutions running algorithmic trading bots think BTC is a tech stock.”

Ki Young Ju, CEO of CryptoQuant

Prediction of the Week

Ethereum to $10K? Classic bullish reversal pattern hints at potential ETH price rally

Ether, the crypto industry’s second-largest asset by market capitalization, mostly traded between $2,750 and $2,350 this past week, according to Cointelegraph’s ETH price index. 

Although ETH’s price action experienced turbulence during the week, a chart pattern from market analyst and Twitter personality Wolf revealed a possible price target above $10,000. 

An ETH weekly candle chart from the analyst indicates a possible ascending triangle pattern playing out, which, long story short, could lead to ETH surpassing $10,000 based on how the chart pattern typically plays out. The chart from Wolf points to a target of about $13,250. Weekly chart patterns in general, however, typically take more time to play out than chart patterns crafted on shorter timeframes.

Other thoughts and observations about ETH were also mentioned in Cointelegraph’s Wednesday article, including the possibility for a bull trap — an upward price fake-out of sorts — which would invalidate Wolf’s bullish price target.

FUD of the Week

SafeMoon pump-and-dump lawsuit targets Jake Paul, Soulja Boy and others

A bunch of A-list celebrities and pesky influencers have gotten themselves into hot water over the promotion of an alleged pump-and-dump scheme tied to the BNB Chain-based SafeMoon token.  

In a class-action lawsuit, the team behind the token is accused of roping several popular figures to induce people to invest in SafeMoon via misleading information. Some of the more well-known names include musicians such as Nick Carter, Soulja Boy, Lil Yachty and YouTubers Jake Paul and Ben Phillips.

According to court documents, SafeMoon and its subsidiaries mimicked Ponzi schemes by duping investors into purchasing the tokens under the pretext of unrealistic profit potential. Notably, it is also alleged that the project’s execs promptly fled the project as SafeMoon’s price started to tank heavily last year.

Seller ‘rugs’ $30M CryptoPunks collection minutes before Sotheby’s auction

The FUD alarm bells went off among fine art collectors this week after 0x650d, the pseudonymous owner of the CryptoPunks NFT “Punk It!” collection, suddenly withdrew from their Sotheby’s auction just moments before it was slated to go live. 

The collection, which contains 104 CryptoPunks, is estimated to be worth $30 million and was said to be the “highest-profile NFT sale of all time.” In the aftermath of the canceled auction, the would-be seller appeared to make fun of Sotheby’s as they discussed their motives in a blaze and sarcastic manner. 

For example, 0x650d first posted “nvm, decided to hodl” on Twitter and followed that up with a meme that bore the caption “Taking punks mainstream by rugging Sothebys.”

Kazakh ministry halts illegal crypto mining operations

Earlier this week, 13 crypto mining operations accounting for a whopping 202 megawatts of power consumption were shut down by the Kazakhstan government. 

The Ministry of Energy of the Republic of Kazakhstan announced the shutdown on Monday as part of an ongoing move to regulate the local BTC sector and weed out illicit mining operations. 

Bitcoin mining has surged in popularity in the nation since China banned crypto mining last year, with Kazakhstan now accounting for the second-largest percentage of the global hash rate. While the government allows crypto mining, miners are legally required to obtain licenses, pay electricity bills on decent terms, and pay taxes.

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