February 8, 2023

Virtual world The Sandbox’s SAND token has surged 20% following an announcement on Tuesday stating that the Saudi Arabia Digital Government Authority would be partnering with the platform. Sebastien Borget, co-founder of The Sandbox, tweeted the news offering little detail regarding the nature of the agreement. “We look forward to exploring, advising and supporting mutually each other in activations of the Metaverse,” he added. The Sandbox’s SAND is also approaching its unlock scheduled for Feb. 14, that will release 12% of the token’s supply.

(SAND 24-hour price chart)

Chiliz, the blockchain-based sports token that allows fans to own tokens tied to respective teams, has validated the genesis block of its new layer-1 blockchain, according to a blog post. The Chiliz blockchain is EVM-compatible (Ethereum Virtual Machine) and will focus on non-fungible tokens (NFTs), Play2Earn games, and Watch2Earn sports events as well as live event ticketing payments. The Chiliz token (CHZ), which currently has a market capitalization of $1.13 billion, is said to be the "fuel" for the newly-released blockchain. Token holders will receive rewards for staking (delegating) on the network. It surged by as much as 20% in the minutes following the announcement.

Three Arrows founder Kyle Davies refused to comply with a court subpoena for the books and records of his former crypto hedge fund Three Arrows Capital, a New York court was told in a Tuesday night filing. Davies was accused of stonewalling a probe into the company, which managed as much as $3 billion in assets before collapsing last year, while “shamelessly” promoting new crypto ventures. Davies and co-founder Su Zhu “have refused to meaningfully engage,” said a filing. Davies and Zhu “have made only selective and piecemeal disclosures” and “refusal to cooperate violates their duties owed to Three Arrows,” it added.

Crypto markets are known to be fueled by narratives, and artificial intelligence (AI) is the latest trend.

Prominent traders on Crypto Twitter are heralding AI-based tokens as the sector that might lead the next bull market cycle. They may be right to this point: AI-related cryptos are up an average of 80% in the past week alone, CryptoSlate data shows.

Among the biggest gainers have been tokens such as Artificial Liquid Intelligence (ALI), Fetch AI (FET) and Singularity Net (AGIX), which have surged as much as 220%, according to a previous CoinDesk report.

Much of the recent gains in AI tokens emerged after the public launch of chatbot ChatGPT and image generation software Dall E in mid-2022. Both are traditional software that do not use cryptocurrencies or blockchain and were introduced by OpenAI, which recently raised $10 billion from Microsoft at a $29 billion valuation.

Such institutional interest has helped create a compelling argument for crypto traders to bet on AI-focused tokens as the next growth sector.

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