🌅 Welcome!

Ethereum’s Merge was a resounding success, with the Merge block proposed in Slot #4700013 and finalized in epoch #146876 at 06:46:47 AM UTC. The most frequent graffiti since is “🐠Welcome to the New Beginning”.

FTX is looking to raise capital, Solana’s NFT ecosystem records a spike, and our Research team brings you the latest on ApeDAO.

This is the Delphi Daily. Welcome to the new beginning.

🚨 In Case You Missed It

The Merge is finally complete.
Coinbase announces crypto sentiment scorecards for members of congress based on publicly available statements.
Opera‘s web3 focused browser integrates MetaMask.
FTX is raising capital as it considers a retail-focused acquisition deal.

📊 Daily NFT Transactions Spike On Solana After y00ts NFT Mint

Solana experienced a 372% increase in NFT volume on September 6th and 279% increase in NFT transaction count on September 7th.
The network recorded NFT volume of 344k SOL, the highest daily volume since the previous all-time high set in May. This massive spike occurred just as the ‘y00ts: mint t00bs’ NFT collection was released.
The y00ts NFT collection’s total volume has reached 340k SOL, which represents 20% of the network’s NFT volume since the collection was launched.
Over the last 30 days, the y00ts collection ranks first in volume on Magic Eden, followed by other popular collections on Solana – Abracadabra (ABC) and DeGods. ABC also ranks second in transaction count at 42k, just behind GMers at 47k.
Looking past the recent surge in activity, Solana’s NFT ecosystem appears to be maturing and has started seeing increasing interest since August.
For more on Solana’s NFT ecosystem, Delphi members can read our NFT Insights report here.

⚡ ApeCoin DAO & The Imminent Launch of $APE Staking

ApeCoin DAO was established to fairly and inclusively steward the Bored Ape ecosystem’s growth and development. It was launched to much fanfare six months ago with an airdrop of $APE tokens to Bored Ape NFT holders (BAYC, MAYC, Kennel Club).
Today, it is worth revisiting ApeCoin DAO because of two upcoming events:
- A major token unlock on 16 September
- The imminent launch of $APE staking
Let’s quickly revisit the tokenomics for $APE. The total supply of $APE is 1 billion.
- 62% to the ecosystem fund, including the initial airdrop (the fund unlocks 7.3m tokens per month)
- 16% to Yuga Labs & charity (12 months initial lock-up — unlock starts 17 March 2023)
- 8% to BAYC founders (12 months initial lock-up — unlock starts 17 March 2023)
- 14% to launch contributors (Various schedules)
Currently, the circulating supply of $APE is ~314m tokens (31% of supply). Approximately 150m+ is in the DAO treasury, while the remaining 160m is circulating among users today.
The first major unlock for $APE outside the ecosystem fund will occur on September 17th when 25m $APE tokens will be released to launch contributors. This represents ~8% of circulating supply.
No information has been released on the “launch contributors” but it is reasonable to deduce that it includes investors such as a16z, Animoca Brands and FTX.
The million-dollar question is whether these launch contributors will sell their tokens once released. This will lead to significant sell pressure on $APE.
No one knows, but we can postulate that if they are long-term investors in Yuga Labs, there is a reasonable chance they will hold on to most of the unlocked tokens.
For more on ApeDAO, Delphi members can read our NFT Insights report here.

🐣 Notable Tweets

Rebuttals to Common Criticisms of Ethereum

Happy Merge Day 🐼

It’s been a long journey to get here.

And there have been a lot of critics over the years.

Here are 15 of the WORST takes that we’ve heard with rebuttals from @drakefjustin

🧵

— bankless.eth (@BanklessHQ) Sept 15, 2022

Difficulty, Forks and More During the Merge

How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Merge

or, everything you need to know for the next 24 hours

difficulty, forks, exchanges, protecting your nfts and more 🧵

— foobar (@0xfoobar) Sept 14, 2022