Read how Microsoft, Meta, HSBC and American Express are betting big on crypto and metaverse.

After an uneventful start to the week, Bitcoin (BTC) has managed to reverse its losses mid week to reclaim the $40,000 level back again. The relief rally has occurred post the US Federal Reserve’s interest rate hike of 0.25% to curb inflation in the country. Typically an interest hike tends to negatively impact the high risk crypto markets as investors have greater access to yield from low risk avenues in the market. Yet, in contrast, the crypto assets market capitalization has grown by 4% in 3 days to currently stand at $1.8 trillion. In this article, we are going to briefly talk about the interesting stories that took place in the crypto asset market. 

Terra to buy BTC

Terra (LUNA), the seventh largest crypto asset by market capitalization, has been the talk of the town recently due to its impressive price action in the last 30 days despite the weak performance over the past week. The co-founder of Terra Do Kwon has announced plans to add $10 billion worth of BTC to the project’s reserves soon and believes it will open a new monetary era of the Bitcoin standard. 

He also added that the reserve BTC would be used to backstop short-term redemptions of TerraUSD (UST), the US dollar value pegged stablecoin of the Terra blockchain. Terraform Labs (TFL) donated 12 million LUNA to the Luna Foundation Guard (LFG) with an aim to keep the reserves growing in order to make it mathematically impossible for TerraUSD to undergo a depegging event (where UST loses its peg to the value of the US dollar).

Microsoft backs ConsenSys

ConsenSys, the parent company behind the popular Metamask wallet, has raised $450 million in a series D funding round led by ParaFi capital valuing the company at $7 billion, doubling its worth since its last funding raise in November. New investors including Temasek, SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Microsoft, Anthos Capital, Sound Ventures and C Ventures participated.

According to ConsenSys, the latest funding will be used to aid growth across the entire ConsenSys product suite and hopes to increase its team size from 700 to 1000 by the end of this year. The firm also plans to use some of the proceeds to roll out a plug-in extensibility system that will allow its products to integrate with a wide variety of protocols other than Ethereum. 

Meta, AXP and HSBC expands metaverse

Meta, the parent company behind Facebook and Instagram, is reportedly working on bringing non-fungible tokens (NFTs) to Instagram according to its CEO Mark Zuckerberg. The feature is being speculated to have the option of minting NFTs through Instagram though the specifics of when the implementation will begin remains unaddressed. This decision comes in the wake of NFT support brought by other platforms like Twitter and Reddit. 

After banking group JPMorgan and insurance broker IMA Financial Group set up shops in Decentraland, American Express (AXP) has sought a potential metaverse entry. The company filed trademark applications for its logos and items including the Centurion black card and “Shop Small” program. AXP is also interested to indulge in virtual payments and business transactions for digital media and NFTs.

Leading global bank HSBC has officially announced that it will acquire a piece of virtual real estate in the Sandbox (SAND) metaverse as a part of the larger partnership with The Sandbox to engage with sports, esports and gaming fans. HSBC joins an array of big-name brands and companies that have partnered with the blockchain gaming firm, including Warner Music Group, Gucci and Adidas. 

Disclaimer: This article was authored by Giottus Crypto Exchange as a part of a paid partnership with The News Minute. Crypto-asset or cryptocurrency investments are subject to market risks such as volatility and have no guaranteed returns. Please do your own research before investing and seek independent legal/financial advice if you are unsure about the investments.