In this week Crypto Weekly Recap :

  • Tezos (XTZ) is booming!
  • BoredApe Yatch Club mets Play To Earn
  • Nike goes NFT
  • Russia might follow China and ban crypto

#1 All eyes on Tezos: it’s exploding with novelties

As we’re anticipating the mass adoption of blockchain, news like this is music to the ears of the crypto community. Self-upgradable and energy-efficient blockchain Tezos made the headlines for several reasons recently. 

On its Twitter handle, it announced new partnerships, new plans in the roadmap, and the 8th & last upgrade in the chain.

Here’s the breakup:

👉 New partnership with Pantone, best known for its color standards used in graphic design, product design, fashion design, printing, and manufacturing. Pantone and Tezos are to explore the digital art world in the Pantone Color of the Year initiative. The project aims to show how color trends in the digital realm are reflected in the physical world and vice versa.

👉 New partnership with NFT marketplace, Rarible. Tezos’ NFTs are now available on the exchange, which gets us closer to a multi-chain NFT market.

👉 New partnership with gaming giant, Ubisoft. In-game NFTs are a reality with Ubisoft Quartz, and it’s all built on Tezos. Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Breakpoint features the first NFTs of this type.

👉 Tezos’ native token, XTZ trading volume is increasing steadily. XTZ is trading at $5.21 with a market cap of USD $4.5 billion and a 24-hour trading volume of $867 million.

👉 Tezos launched its last and 8th upgrade ‘Hangzhou’ and achieved a new milestone. 

👉 NFT platform ‘OneOf ‘ is also built on Tezos. It has tied up with the Recording Academy to release digital collectibles to commemorate the 64th, 65th, and 66th GRAMMY Awards. 

Clapping and cheering, go Tezos!

#2 Massive play-to-earn NFT game coming soon

One of the most valuable and best-known NFT projects around is Bored Ape Yacht Club. The exciting news is that its creator, Yuga Labs is now partnering with Animoca Brands to turn the most popular NFT collection into a play-to-earn game.

This is a powerful partnership when you consider the fact that Animoca is the publisher of The Sandbox, an upcoming metaverse game, as well as an investor in a variety of play-to-earn games and crypto projects, including Axie Infinity and NBA Top Shot from Dapper Labs.

The Bored Ape Yacht Club game is set to launch in Q2 2022Y. Yuga Labs confirmed that Bored Ape NFT owners will be benefited but it’s not yet clear if the game will be open to all or exclusive to NFT owners.

#3 Sportswear giant enters metaverse by acquiring a leading digital apparel startup

The NFT marketplace is constantly growing, and Nike has made a major move to become part of it by purchasing RTFKT, NFT fashion and collectibles startup.

The acquisition seems to be a wonderful match. Just consider the fact that RTFKT’s top product so far has been a hybrid NFT/physical shoe collectible inspired by the iconic CryptoPunks NFT collection. The initiative made waves in March 2021 when a digital footwear collaboration with NFT artist FEWOCiOUS sold for $3.1 million.

Nike’s move is a great example of how sports, art, gaming, and culture can blend in the metaverse.

#4 Russian Central Bank likely to Impose a Ban on Cryptocurrency to promote its CBDC

The Russian Central bank is likely to ban crypto investments in the country. The banning proposal is under consideration and soon might be imposed. This proposal is freshly under consideration to promote the use of CBDC which is soon to be launched. 

Bank of Russia has developed a ruble-backed central bank digital currency (CBDC) and plans to launch its pilot program in early 2022. The Central bank is under discussions with market players & will further take this proposal to get approved by lawmakers, The ban would be applicable only to new purchases of crypto assets not to past purchases.