GM. This is Milk Road, the Magic School Bus of crypto - we make learning fun and easy. Meet your teacher, Ms. Frizzle The Milk Man.

It’s Friday. We’re feeling like a million bucks. Let’s boogie:

• Post-Shapella update 👀

• Twitter 🤝 eToro

• Funding Friday 💰

Today's edition is brought to you by CoinTracker, the easiest software for filing your crypto taxes.

POST-SHAPELLA UPDATE 👀

Well folks, it’s official… Ethereum’s Shapella upgrade is complete.

How’d it go?

• There were no major network problems (phew)

• ETH hit $2k+ for the first time since August 2022

ETH 🎵 partied like it was 1999. 🎵

But now for the million-dollar question….

How much did people unstake so far? ~874,845 ETH (worth ~$1.8B.)

In total, 17.6M ETH (worth ~$33B) was unlocked. So only ~5% of the supply has been queued to be unstaked so far.

But there’s a catch: Only ~$100M can be withdrawn per day. So, the queue is more backed up than the lines at Disneyland.

It could take ~10 days to process it all, and that’s if the withdrawal amount stays the same. Now, I know what you’re thinking…

“Milk Man, you told me there wasn’t gonna be a lot of withdraws but… there’s over 1 BILLION DOLLARS in the queue!! Not mad, just disappointed.”

Well, let’s all just take a deep breath. Here are 4 reasons why this isn’t as bad as it looks:

1/ Most of these withdrawals are partial

There are two types of withdrawals - full and partial.

• Full - all the staked ETH

• Partial - the rewards from that staked ETH

Right now, most of the withdrawals are partial ones. This means that validators are withdrawing the rewards they got from staking, not the actual staked ETH.

Btw - the Milk Man predicted this is how it would play out. Most of the rewards (i.e. the yellow sliver below) are what’s being sold off right now.

2/ There have been spikes in deposits

Once the Shapella upgrade went live, there was a big spike in deposits.

This could’ve been some crypto whales or institutions that were waiting to see how the upgrade went. Once they saw everything was as smooth as butter, they jumped into the staking action.

In total, there’s been ~73,872 ETH (worth $155M) deposited since the Shapella upgrade went live.

Btw - the Milk Man also predicted the Shapella upgrade would serve as a catalyst for more staking. He’s 2/2 on predictions. Just call him Milkstradamus…

3/ Most of the withdrawals have come from Kraken

Kraken is a popular exchange where people buy and sell crypto. It also used to offer staking services, until the SEC forced it to shut down earlier this year.

Now that staking withdrawals are finally open, Kraken can actually unwind its staking business. Right now, it accounts for ~98% of all fully exited validators (i.e. it withdrew all its ETH and shut down its validators.)

It also looks like ~63% of withdrawals in the queue are from Kraken.

4/ Most stakers are still in the red

~70% of all stakers are down on their investments. (i.e. the price of ETH is lower now than when they staked their ETH.)

With the majority of stakers underwater in the Red Sea, it’s highly unlikely that they will want to withdraw their ETH and sell.

So to summarize:

• Most withdrawals are partial (i.e. rewards are being cashed out, not the actual staked ETH)

• There have been spikes in deposits

• Most withdrawals are coming from Kraken (its staking service got shut down, so this was expected)

• Most investors are still in the red on their staked ETH

All in all, not a bad first 24 hours. Wonder if “Shapella” will become 2023’s most popular baby girl name…

CRYPTO TAXES MADE EASY WITH COINTRACKER

With the tax deadline just around the corner (April 18th), the Milk Man has been feeling stressed. Between new terminology, calculations, and tracking down old information, crypto tax reporting is no walk down Milk Road.

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What sets CoinTracker apart from the rest?

• It integrates with over 500 exchanges, wallets and blockchains to generate compliant tax reports in minutes

• Supports advanced use cases such as staking, yield farming and liquidity mining

• Automates gain and loss calculations and aggregates all data

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Join over 1.7 million CoinTrackers in enjoying the peace of mind that comes with accurate and hassle-free tax reporting.

Sign up for CoinTracker today with coupon MILK30 at checkout for 30% off your tax plan.

TWITTER 🤝 REAL-TIME CRYPTO PRICES

Ladies & gents, Twitter has rolled out a brand new feature…. *drumroll*.....

Real-time crypto prices. That’s right, now you can check prices while doom-scrolling Twitter. Addiction1 🤝 Addiction2.

Twitter partnered up with eToro (a trading platform) to make it all happen.

The goal? Put an emphasis on social investing and create a community for crypto users. Now you and your friends can lose money *together*.

Here’s how it all works:

• Users search for prices using CashTags. CashTags are the symbol that represents a stock or token, like ETH. All you have to do is throw a dollar sign in front of it -> $ETH.

• Users get redirected to eToro if they want to buy the asset. And there’s rumors that Elon wants to integrate trading directly into Twitter down the road. 👀

Check it out for yourself:

This is cool because both platforms are very social, and Twitter is already a hotbed for crypto and stock investors.

We might not be a fan of all of Elon’s recent changes (especially firing our homie Rahul Ligma,) but this is a change we can get on board with.

FUNDING FRIDAY 💰

It’s Funding Friday! Raise the roof.

Crypto VC funding might be down ~80%, but crypto companies still raised $85M this week. Here’s who secured the bag:

Sei Labs got $30M to develop its crypto trading-focused blockchain network. It’s run by folks who used to work at Goldman Sachs, Robinhood, & Google. #StarPower

Opside got $4M for its ZKRollup-as-a-service. That makes things cheaper and quicker for developers.

RSS3 got $10M for its Web3-centric decentralized feed file protocol. The goal is to distribute Web3 info across the web via social media, search engines, and AI bots.

Lore got $4M for its platform that lets multiple creators co-own NFTs. Utility = unlocked

Check out the full database of companies that have raised money this week right here.

MILKY MEMES 🤣

That's a wrap for today. Meet us on Twitter to talk all about it. It’s kinda like a family BBQ but better - no screaming kids, awkward photos, or drunk uncles telling weird stories (@MilkRoadDaily)

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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.