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GM. This is Milk Road, where we believe in love at first sight – especially when you check your portfolio and it's all green.

Today’s big news… BTC hit $51K for the first time since 2021. 

ETH is close to $2,800 for the first time in 20 months. 

And, I didn’t forget to buy the flowers this year. 

Life is good. This calls for a little morning rhyme (Valentine’s Day remix)....

🎤 Roses are red, my portfolio was too

Then I woke up this morning, to a beautiful green view! 🎤

Here’s what we else we got for you today:

• The Layer 1 War is heating up! 🔥

• Peter Thiel has returned 👀

• 1 new scam to look out for 🧐

• Ripple is purchasing Standard Custody & Trust 🍪

THE LAYER 1 WAR IS HEATING UP 🔥

Blockchains are like onions. They both make you cry and they both have layers. 

There are…

• Layer 1s like Ethereum, Bitcoin, and Solana. 

• Layer 2s like Arbitrum, Optimism, and Base. 

• And rumor has it, Layer 3s are coming soon. (At this rate, blockchains are gonna be a 6-layer dip by next year's Super Bowl).

Well, check it out. The Layer 1 Wars have been heating up recently. 

Here’s how the L1 tokens have performed over the last 3 months:

The surprising part? BTC and ETH haven’t been leading the rally over the last 3 months. The “underdogs” have…

• SEI (+450%): a blockchain specialized for trading. 

• RON (+220%): a blockchain specialized for gaming. 

• SUI (+200%): a blockchain specialized for financial services. 

The big takeaway: crypto has gone multi-chain. 

Different chains for different pains.

PETER THIEL HAS RETURNED 👀

Peter Thiel is back in the crypto game. In case you don’t know him, here’s his resume:

• Net worth: $7.4B.

• Co-founder of PayPal, Palantir, and Founders Fund.

• An early investor in Facebook, SpaceX, Stripe, and… BTC! 

• Has a “self-made” score of 8, according to Forbes. (No idea how that’s calculated, but #respect).

Peter spots winners early. Invests. And most importantly… knows when to sell and take profits. 

He first bought BTC in 2014, HODLed for 8 years, and then sold before the 2022 crash…profiting $2B in the process. 

Now, he’s back... According to Reuters, Founder’s Fund bought $200M worth of crypto before the rally started. 

🎵Guess who’s back, back again

Thiel is back, tell a degen🎵

So, what’d the fund invest in? $100M into BTC. $100M into ETH. (A balanced diet).

The big takeaway: Smart investors keep things simple. 

Founders Fund didn’t go buy “crypto’s new shiny object” or make 10,000 different bets. 

They stuck with the basics and made 2 bets…

1 NEW SCAM TO LOOK OUT FOR 🧐

This is Hayden Adams. He’s a crypto OG and founder of Uniswap. 

Hayden is super smart (way smarter than us), and even he almost fell for this new scam…

Stay safe out there, Roaders. Always double-check those transactions!

BITE-SIZED COOKIES FOR THE ROAD 🍪

On Friday, Feb 16th, NFT marketplace Universal Page will launch a Pro Pass. This limited NFT gives holders discounts on trading fees and unlocks extra features.*

Ripple inked a deal to purchase New York trust company Standard Custody & Trust. Through the acquisition, the payment platform secured a limited-purpose trust charter to expand the regulatory services it can offer clients in the US.

Aptos is launching a password-less passkey authentication for transactions. Passkeys are more user-friendly and mirror the ease of use in services like Apple Pay or Google Pay.

Sushi announced it’s launching a decentralized derivatives exchange called Susa. Devs will be able to create custom applications on top of the exchange, spanning from smart contract applications to full-fledged rollups.

Ethereum devs can now deploy apps on Sei’s parallelized EVM. Sei is hoping to lure developers with an execution environment it says offers the “best of Ethereum and Solana.”

PlayDapp lost $290M in 2 separate hacks over the last week. A double whammy.

Glenlivet Distillery is launching a new whiskey collection with NFTs. Each bottle in "The Twelve Elements" collection is paired with a unique NFT on the Ethereum blockchain - they’ll serve as digital certificates, ensuring proof of ownership.

*This is sponsored content

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DISCLAIMER: None of this is financial advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Please be careful and do your own research.