The Week of Announcements
This week’s newsletter comes with a bunch of announcements, all of them hinting toward the growing adoption of crypto and web3 technologies. It starts with Meta announcing support for NFTs on Instagram & Facebook for the US users, Robinhood announcing Polygon as its choice of network for its web3 wallet beta, or SWIFT partnering with crypto data provider Chainlink on the cross-chain protocol in TradFi.
Let’s have a look at all these announcements and more in today’s edition of web3 Wednesday.
This week in web3 Wednesdays:
- Robinhood chooses Polygon for its web3 wallet beta launch
- SWIFT partners with Chainlink to enable cross-chain communication between blockchain and TradFi
- Facebook and Instagram users in the US can now connect their wallets and share their digital collectibles
- Now use an Ethereum wallet for email
- ENS registrations hit an all-time high in September
- McDonalds to start accepting Bitcoin and Tether in Lugano, Switzerland
Robinhood chooses Polygon for its web3 wallet beta launch
Robinhood announced the launch of its beta Web3 wallet, giving 10,000 waitlisted customers the ability to participate in the wallet’s testing phase. The trading app has chosen
Polygon as the first blockchain network to support its newly launched Web3 wallet.
Together, Polygon and Robinhood are opening access to decentralized finance (DeFi) for millions of U.S. users. As per the company, it chose Polygon to power the best possible trading experience because of the network’s scalability, speed, low fees, and robust developer ecosystem.
SWIFT partners with Chainlink to enable cross-chain communication between blockchain and TradFi
SWIFT, the interbank messaging system that allows for cross-border payments, is working with Chainlink, a provider of price feeds and other data to blockchains, on a cross-chain interoperability protocol (CCIP) in an initial proof-of-concept.
Chainlink’s CCIP will enable SWIFT messages to instruct on-chain token transfers, helping the interbank network to be able to communicate across all blockchain environments.
Facebook and Instagram users in the US can now connect their wallets and share their digital collectibles
As per the latest announcement by Meta, it has enabled digital collectibles to showcase NFTs on Instagram. This includes the ability for people to cross-post digital collectibles that they own across both Facebook and Instagram. Additionally, everyone in the 100 countries where digital collectibles are available on Instagram can now access the feature.
As per Meta, supported blockchains at this time include Ethereum, Polygon, and Flow. There are no fees associated with posting or sharing a digital collectible on Instagram.
Now use an Ethereum wallet for email
You might have heard of “login with Ethereum” or even used it across web3 apps. But now, let’s take it another step ahead and bring Ethereum email.
Well, here comes Skiff Mail – a privacy-first, end-to-end encrypted, open-source, web3-native email. Using Skiff Mail, you can send and receive email via their Ethereum addresses using the domain @ethereum.email - securely, privately, and for free.
ENS registrations hit an all-time high in September
Despite the bear market, it seems like the demand for .eth domains is growing faster than ever.
Just in the month of September, Ethereum Name Service (ENS) had a stellar growth rate with both registrations and renewals hitting all-time highs above 437,000 and 45,000 respectively.
McDonalds to start accepting Bitcoin and Tether in Lugano, Switzerland
McDonald’s started to accept Bitcoin (BTC) as a payment method in the 63,000-populated city of Lugano in the Italian-speaking region of Switzerland, which is becoming a hotspot for crypto adoption in Western Europe.
Tether has partnered with go crypto to bring Tether, Bitcoin and LVGA to the McDonald's restaurants across the town. This marks a great step in the direction of using cryptocurrency as legal tender.