Weekly Review: Bitcoin Falls Below $42,000 as Solana Unveils New Web3 Smartphone

The leading cryptocurrency dropped below $42,000, Solana opened pre-orders for the Saga 2, the Blast team announced the launch of a testnet, Ethereum developers activated the Dencun hard fork on the Goerli testnet, and other events of the past week.

Bitcoin Price Falls Below $42,000

The leading cryptocurrency began the week below $43,000, dropping to $41,000 on January 19. At the time of writing, digital gold is trading at $41,600.

Most digital assets in the top 10 by market capitalization ended the week in the “red zone.” The main losses were seen in Solana (-6.3%) and Cardano (-5.7%).

The total market capitalization of the cryptocurrency market is $1.72 trillion. Bitcoin’s dominance index is 51.1%.

Solana Opens Pre-Order for Saga 2

Solana Mobile announced the second version of its Web3 smartphone — Saga Chapter2. The device is now available for pre-order at a price of $450. Its specifications remain unknown.

The “Founder’s Window” pre-order will be available for a limited period. After it closes, a new application phase will begin at a higher price. Shipments are scheduled for the first half of 2025.

Like the original, Chapter2 is designed as a crypto smartphone tailored for the Solana ecosystem. The phone features a built-in wallet application with additional security features and access to decentralized applications.

Each Saga device is linked to a “genesis token” — an NFT that created a channel for distributing rewards to its holders. The company hinted at similar functionality in the second version but did not specify how it would be implemented.

The announcement of the new smartphone was warmly received by users. Many shared screenshots of pre-orders on X. Within two days, Solana Mobile received over 30,000 applications.

Blast L2 Protocol Team Announces Testnet Launch

On January 16, the second-layer solution Blast launched a test network while initiating a developer competition.

The total value locked in the network exceeded $1.3 billion with 103,000 active wallets. Blast has become one of the largest L2 protocols, despite its invitation-only system.

The Big Bang competition aims to attract new developers to the project. From January 17 to February 17, teams can compete for a special airdrop.

Additionally, the winning applications will be integrated into the main Blast network at launch. The competition will be judged by the project’s core developers and other representatives of the crypto industry.

Topics to Discuss with Friends

• A user paid a $173,000 fee for a bitcoin transaction.
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• DEX aggregator Jupiter scheduled a second airdrop.
• Donald Trump’s NFTs will appear as bitcoin “inscriptions.”

Ethereum Developers Activate Dencun Hard Fork on Goerli Testnet

The core Ethereum team deployed the Dencun update (Cancun-Deneb) on the Goerli test network. However, the hard fork was not completed as planned.

The upgrade implemented EIP-4844, which includes the Proto-Danksharding option, designed to scale the network by creating a new type of transaction for large binary data arrays. It is expected to reduce fee sizes for L2 solutions based on Rollup technology.

The full deployment of the upgrade was not completed, presumably because about one-fifth of client operators did not update their software (there were several).

Grayscale CEO Predicts Most Bitcoin ETFs Will Fail

Most of the 11 spot bitcoin ETFs approved by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) are likely to fail, according to Grayscale CEO Michael Sonnenshein.

He believes that only “two or three exchange-traded funds may achieve some critical mass.”

“I don’t think the market will ultimately have those 11 spot products that the SEC approved,” said Sonnenshein.

Grayscale owns one of the largest bitcoin ETFs — GBTC, which manages assets worth over $25 billion. In total, spot exchange-traded funds hold about $27 billion or 632,000 BTC in digital gold.

Also on ForkLog:

• The TUSD stablecoin lost its peg to the dollar.
• Bitcoin mining difficulty decreased by nearly 4%.
• Binance conducted a burn of BNB worth $636 million.
• A $15 billion XRP transfer to Bitfinex turned out to be a failed exploit.

Anthony Scaramucci Predicts Bitcoin at $170,000 by 2025

The price of the leading cryptocurrency will exceed $170,000 next year, according to SkyBridge Capital founder Anthony Scaramucci in Davos.

“If bitcoin is at $45,000 during the halving, which is roughly where it is now, the asset will reach $170,000 by mid or late 2025. […] Wherever the price is on the day of the halving in April, multiply it by four — bitcoin will reach that mark in the next 18 months,” the expert noted.

He stated that the drop in digital gold prices below $42,000 is due to investors moving assets from GBTC to new exchange-traded funds approved by the SEC.

What Else to Read?

This week, ForkLog explained what restaking is and how to earn from it, as well as the differences between monolithic and modular blockchains.

In the traditional digest, we compiled the main events of the week in the field of cybersecurity.

The decentralized finance sector continues to attract increased attention from cryptocurrency investors. ForkLog gathered the most important events and news of recent weeks in a digest.