Helium Community Approves Move to Solana, Kraken CEO Steps Down to Focus on New Role—Top 5 Crypto Stories for Sep 22

Here’s a quick breakdown of the biggest news stories and developments in the cryptocurrency sector for September 22, 2022.

1. Kraken CEO Jesse Powell steps down

Kraken co-founder Jesse Powell will be stepping down from his CEO role at the company and will instead serve as the chairman of the board of directors. The CEO role will be assumed by current COO Dave Ripley, after the company completes their search for a new COO. Ripley has been in the COO role for six years.

In a press release issued by the exchange, Jesse Powell said that the move will allow him to spend more time to focus on Kraken’s products and user experience, and he also plans to advocate for the cryptocurrency industry more broadly.

Kraken was founded in 2011, which makes it one of the oldest cryptocurrency exchanges that’s still in operation. The exchange has successfully maintained its position near the top of the cryptocurrency exchange industry, although its trading volumes are significantly smaller than the likes of Binance or FTX. In the last 24 hours, Kraken handled $870 million worth of trades on its spot markets.

2. Helium community approves move to Solana blockchain

The community of HNT token holders has approved HIP 70, a plan to transition the Helium project over to the Solana blockchain. Currently, Helium uses its own layer 1 blockchain to coordinate payments for network usage and the distribution of token rewards to users who are maintaining the Helium decentralized wireless network. In total, 81.41% of the vote was in favor of the HIP 70 proposal.

After the proposal is implemented, the Helium ecosystem’s HNT, MOBILE and IOT tokens will be issued on the Solana blockchain platform. According to developers, the move will help the Helium project scale and free up resources that would otherwise be used to manage the Helium blockchain.

….and it’s official! HIP70 passes the @helium community vote connecting the world’s largest IoT network to LoRaWAN standard server components, bringing stability changes and moving its blockchain to the Rust powered high performance @solana ecosystem pic.twitter.com/EUx0huj6t4

— Jose Marcelino ?xNFT ? (@jmarcelino) September 22, 2022

3. Azuki founders are reportedly raising $30 million

The Block reports that Chiru Labs, the company behind the Azuki NFT collection, is planning to raise $30 million or more in a Series A funding round. Per the report, the round would value Chiru Labs between $300 million and $400 million.

Azuki is yet another example of the “PFP” NFT genere popularized by CryptoPunks. It consists of 10,000 algorithmically-generated characters in the style of Japanese anime. The collection’s floor price is currently 11.4 ETH, which translates to about $14,912.

The teams behind successful NFT collections have been taking the opportunity to raise significant investments from venture capitalists. The most extreme example is Bored Ape Yacht Club creators Yuga Labs, which raised a massive $450 million at a $4 billion valuation. When it comes to projects that are comparable in size to Azuki, Doodles has raised $54 million and Moonbirds creators Proof Collective have raised $50 million. 

4. FTX wants to raise $1 billion at a $32 billion valuation

The FTX cryptocurrency exchange is looking to raise $1 billion in a funding round that would value the company at $32 billion. Interestingly, this would imply that the company’s valuation hasn’t increased since FTX raised $400 million in January. CNBC cites sources with knowledge of the discussions as saying that FTX would utilize part of the fresh capital to make deals.

At $32 billion, FTX is likely the second-most valuable company in the cryptocurrency industry behind Binance. However, Binance’s exact valuation is currently unclear, as the company hasn’t been raising outside capital.

5. Opera web browser introduces support for Elrond blockchain

Crypto-friendly web browser Opera will be integrating support for the Elrond blockchain. The browser’s users will be able to access their EGLD and other Elrond-based tokens, and connect to decentralized applications built on top of the blockchain. 

This could bring Elrond closer to a large audience, as Opera claims to have more than 300 million users on their desktop and mobile platforms. Opera already supports several blockchain platforms, with some examples being Ethereum, Solana and Polygon.

The Elrond blockchain’s native asset EGLD currently has a market capitalization of $1.1 billion which makes it the 46th largest crypto asset by market cap.