It’s the morning after an amazing Melbourne Aus DeFi Association event. It was meant to be nothing more than say 20 people or so as as we planned it very last minute but I reckon we got around 75 in the end. We had planned on this being a panel event with our partners Sensand (represented by Peter the CEO) along with Fireblocks (represented by Shane Verner) and then Aus DeFi/NotCentralised (with Arturo aka Numbers) on the panel. I was the MC and just a few minutes in we had the first sign that the audience in Melbourne needs far more of these DeFi related events with the first questions coming through. We did not plan on making this completely audience interactive but as with all things web3, we pivot and go with the flow and the panellists were great. We had such a good back and forth with various questions ranging from how you explain blockchain to the untrained (you make relatable analogies) to how quantum computing will affect this space (we’ll have far more to worry about than just crypto, SSL anyone?). We had some great guests in the crowd and even an impromptu appearance and set of insights shared by Steve Vallas, CEO of Blockchain Australia.
So, I’m still coming down from the high that was this event but I have to thank the Melbourne squad for representing. Keep an eye out as we plan more of these events and set them up to be more regular. Melbourne has been patiently waiting, and it will be rewarded.
Anyway, the posts are still rolling in on Twitter but check out a few of these below. Here’s one below but more at the end of this newsletter.
Also this week, we had our 2nd weekly (regular) Twitter Spaces event and you can check it out here. How good is it that Spaces are recorded! Ignore the troll 20mins from the end. I thought I could sniff out trouble when they started speaking over a few other people and even after giving them a bit of courtesy, it turns out our Spidey senses were right. They were a troll. So much good vibes though from the rest of the talk so check it out.
Elsewhere, we saw continued news about the contagion that’s been going on in the state of DeFi including a report from Nansen highlighting that the depegging of Staked ETH (stETH) was likely caused by the Terra Luna events. Lining up the charts they showed the price ETH/stETH fell as volumes for ETH rose indicating that as people felt pressure, they moved their funds into ETH and away from what they saw as riskier bets. Lessons included needing to know what you’re actually trading, not over leveraging yourself and despite the issues being seen here, there’s a positive with being able to see things on chain versus having things opaque (like Celsius).
That’s it folks, another week another Captain’s Log. We’ll see where we end up next week in this journey. Thanks for coming along!
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