Ember Nuggets Issue #31 - Instagram & NFTs 📱

Nugget #1: Instagram to Support NFTs

NFT support is coming to Instagram soon and a pilot may be available as early as today. Coindesk, the source of this story, stated that Instagram will not charge users extra to post or share NFTs on its platform, and will have integrations with Ethereum, Solana, Polygon, and Flow. The news was first teased earlier in the year by Mark Zuckerberg at SXSW.

The proliferation of NFTs on social media platforms will help bring the art, tech, and asset class to the mainstream public. Earlier this year, Twitter Blue allowed users to make NFTs their PFPs.

Nugget #2: Volatile Trading Week and the Markets Going Deep in the Red

The Federal Reserve hiked interest rates by 0.5% this week and signaled that half-point rate increases are on the table at other meetings this year. The Federal Reserve minutes led to a temporary relief rally post-meeting on Wednesday, but Thursday showed the biggest drop in the market in many years, wiping gains from the prior trading day.

In general, we have seen a broad market pullback in equities, with tech now faltering after an epic two-year run. Even with the job market remaining strong, we see people taking profits and moving capital to safer asset classes. The above has impacted crypto too, as Bitcoin and Ethereum have declined over the past week. At the time of writing, Bitcoin is down 9.4% while Ethereum is down 7.2% over the past week.

We remain optimistic about the long-term potential of the asset class, but the past week has really shown why our Bitcoin Defense portfolio can come in handy (down 0% over the past week).