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🐸 Bitcoin's new trend 👀

🐸 Bitcoin's new trend 👀

PLUS: The Secret Service's NFT collection

Alex M.
May 16, 2023

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GM everyone. This is 2036, the newsletter that makes you smarter on crypto in 3min/day.

Bitcoin is back on the map.

Earlier this year, bitcoin became home to Bitcoin NFTs.

But it didn’t stop there.

After the rise of memecoins on Ethereum that minted millionaires last month, bitcoiners got jealous and started creating their own new coins.

Today these have a market cap of $500 MILLION.

What are these tokens, and how can you get your hands on one?

Let’s dig in.

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Stories to read if you’ve only got 1 minute

1/ The US is eroding its long-term financial position

2/ Most top NFTs from 2018 are dead

3/ Still - the Secret Service has an NFT collection

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Up until recently, most NFTs were minted on the Ethereum blockchain.

But earlier this year, a developer found a way to inscribe Satoshis - one-millionth of a bitcoin - with text and images.

This protocol became known as Ordinals and created the first wave of NFTs on the Bitcoin blockchain (we wrote about them in February).

A lot of big NFT players, like Yuga Labs and DeGods, launched bitcoin collections.

But then things got interesting…

As you know, NFTs are non-fungible. Every NFT is different.

But now there’s a way to create fungible tokens - that are identical and interchangeable - on the Bitcoin blockchain using…text.

Enter BRC-20 tokens.

BRC-20 is an experimental token standard that sounds a lot like a Star Wars character but isn’t.

It allows anyone to create a token with a limited supply on the Bitcoin blockchain (something we explain here).

Now - here at 2036, we always welcome innovation.

But BRC-20 tokens have led to two main issues:

1/ The number of transactions has massively congested the bitcoin network, making it slower.

This forced Binance to pause withdrawals twice in the last week and has spooked the market over concerns around liquidity.

2/ Most of these new tokens are memecoins - completely useless tokens designed for fun or get-rich-quick schemes.

And who doesn’t love a memecoin? Last month, $PEPE exploded nearly 4 MILLION % in 4 days.

Over the last 24 hours, BRC-20 tokens did $200 MILLION in volume.

So how do you get in on the action?

BRC-20 tokens are experimental, and 99% of them will likely go to zero. So invest at your own peril.

But if you’re curious to play around, the best place to do it is on Unisat.

They have a marketplace where you can trade a bunch of different memecoins.

And if you’re looking for an overview of the most popular collections, you can find them here.

Now - we wouldn’t be a good crypto newsletter if we didn’t bring you the latest goods.

But BRC-20 tokens are still early and very speculative. They could go both ways from here. Maybe they’re the next trend, or maybe they’re just a fad.

We’ll keep monitoring the BRC-20s for you.

And, of course, we’ll update you if anything changes or a new trend pops up around the corner 👀

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