Ukraine, Citadel, and cool stuff from the week

GM, and welcome to RollCall by Rollfi! 

The weekly newsletter that helps you navigate the world of crypto

It's Friday and we have some Netflix to binge, chores to put off, and NFT projects to ape into, so we'll keep this short. Here's a couple the top stories in crypto from the past week:

Ukraine & Crypto

Late last week, the Ukrainian government announced they were going to start accepting cryptocurrency donations to help fund their defense efforts against the Russian invasion. Then, earlier this week, the country's official Twitter account announced that they will conduct an airdrop to reward those who have donated.

Immediately after the announcement, more donations began pouring in and the total as of Thursday morning was over $50M. Then, Vice Prime Minister Mykhailo Federov, announced that they would be canceling the airdrop. However, Federov did mention that they will be releasing NFTs to support the Ukrainian Armed Forces "soon".

While some were upset over the announcement, most can understand that an airdrop is not the top concern for the Ukrainian government right now.

Ultimately, we see this story as an example of how cryptocurrency can be used to support causes one cares about from across the globe. 

Kenny G

...not that Kenny G

Remember Citadel? They were one of the companies at the center of the whole Gamestop, Robinhood drama last year. For context, Citadel Securities is a massive market maker, and their CEO Ken Griffin has been a pretty controversial figure over the past few years.

Last year, Griffin called cryptocurrency a "jihadist call" against the dollar.

Only a couple of months after that comment, he outbid ConstitutionDAO for an original copy of the constitution for a whopping $43.2M. Some saw this move as Griffin sticking it to the crypto folks, he says it was because his son asked him to.

Now, however, Mr. Griffin is changing his stance on cryptocurrencies. While he is not completely sold on crypto yet, Griffin cannot ignore the fact that "hundreds of millions of people in this world today who disagree" with his skepticism. With that, he said that it is "fair to assume" that Citadel will begin market-making in cryptocurrencies in the months to come.

Other stuff:

Before we part, here are some other interesting articles/tweets/projects we've come across this week in the web3 universe. 

• This Web 3 Reputation Market Map shows the digital reputation vectors that exist today

• This tweet from Paradigm Investment Partner on the diligence process for early-stage crypto investments

• This tweet thread on the future of NFT marketplaces

• This Web3 market map and database from Arcane Research

Glossary

We're confused too. We want to help decode the world of crypto for the curious.

• Ape - or apeing, means buying into a token or project without doing sufficient research (More here)

• Airdrop - a distribution of tokens to participants often used as a marketing tool or incentive to continue participating - similar to a giveaway

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