This Week in Coins: Bitcoin and Ethereum Flat Again, Axie Infinity Sees Rare Jump

This week’s crypto market was another mixed bag as the industry continues to navigate the continued contagion from the FTX collapse. 

Bitcoin and Ethereum closed the week flat. That might be considered a win given the losses that some of the top coins have suffered. Bitcoin (BTC), down 1.5%, was the latest update as of Saturday morning. Ethereum (ETH) had lost 1.5% over the previous seven days. Most of the top 50 coin market caps were in red over the past week, or if they were green, down less than 2.

BTC fluctuated between approximately $17,300 to as low as $16,700 while Ethereum rose between $1,300 to $1,225 as bulls and bears fought for control. 

But a rare winner over the past seven days was Axie Infinity’s native AXS token. The token’s value has risen by 21% over the weekend to $8.50. CoinGecko. 

The AXS token is used in the popular play-to-earn crypto game, where users battle Pokémon-like creatures. 

AXS is the project’s governance token, allowing holders to vote on things like how the project’s treasury should be allocated, or proposed new features in the game. Another token is the Smooth Love Potion, which is a reward for players who win duels. 

This week’s spike follows the launch of the project’s Axie Contributors initiative. Roughly 700 “committed” members of the community will earn formal roles within the game’s governance model as part of Axie’s push for more informed discussions about how the game should operate.  

AXS is the native token behind the self-custody crypto wallet Trust Wallet. It has also been rallying after the AXS announcement. The TWT has almost reached $3 per CoinGecko over the past seven day, rising by roughly 6%. Like Axie Infinity’s token, Trust Wallet is a governance token used to vote on new development for the Binance wallet. 

Tokens for the decentralized exchange aggregator 1inch (1INCH), Chainlink (LINK), and Flow (FLOW), all round out this week’s biggest losers.

FTX contagion continues

The collapse of Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire last month is still causing damage in the industry, with several firms announcing more layoffs this week in the wake of FTX’s bankruptcy. 

Bybit, SwytfxAnd Koinly All announced a reduction of their workforce, citing contagion from the collapse FTX and ongoing bear markets. 

Maple Finance, which allows firms to set up a lending facility through smart contracts, was also affected by the layoffs. The platform Announcement this week that it would be cutting all ties with Orthogonal Trading after the latter “misrepresented” its exposure to FTX, leading it to default on its loans. 

M11 Credit, which created the Maple lending facility from which Orthogonal borrowed money, stated that “we believe Orthogonal Trading has intentionally mistated their exposure” and that it had committed a serious violation of the Master Loan Agreement. 

It wasn’t just M11 and Maple that got burned. The crypto insurance protocol Nexus Mutual was also borrowed from the same pool as M11, and is now a part of the Crypto Insurance Protocol. revealed losses of roughly $3 million in Ethereum due to Orthogonal’s default.

SBF is a term that refers to the ability to create a new type of SBF. he’s Finally, we’re going back To Washington D.C., to testify before Congress’ House Financial Services Committee. 

After a public back and forth on Twitter with the Committee’s Chairwoman Maxine Waters, the former CEO of FTX said that he would be “willing to testify” despite “a limit” to what he can say due to not having “access to much of [his] data—professional or personal.” 

The December 13th meeting is scheduled and will attempt to unravel the reasons for last month’s exchange crash.