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Across the past week, a majority of the cryptocurrency market has been a mixed bag, with minor losses and gains seen throughout the top 100, breaking the recent price downturns. With this minimal amount of movement, the news side of crypto has been littered with controversial and interesting stories, with the recent Merlin smart contract scam leading smart contract auditing firm, CertiK, to state that they are going to reimburse victims of the scam. In addition, <a href="/price/polygon-matic" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Polygon</a> has announced the deployment of their zkEVM PoS bridge, in a historic breakthrough for the network. On a more negative note, Coinbase has also sued the SEC in a bid to get further clarity on cryptocurrency regulation.
## The Latest News
### Crypto Security Firm Vows Refunds For Merlin DEX Scam Victims
CertiK, a smart contract audit firm, has announced their plans to compensate victims of this week’s exit scam involving their former client Merlin. The Merlin scam recently shook the space after the theft of nearly $2 million from the developers of the smart contract that CertIK had audited occurred. CertiK announced their plans to “[explore] a community compensation plan” after members of the Merlin team swiped funds from the project’s smart contract this week. CertiK has stated that more details about the plan will be released in the near future. 

It has been reported that the Merlin scammers are likely ‘based in Europe’ after CertiK revealed that they are planning to cooperate with law enforcement to track down the rogue developers liable for the scam, which has led them to offer a 20% bounty (worth around $400k) for the return of the stolen funds. 
![](https://gimg2.gateimg.com/image/article/16826468871.png)
Merlin DEX Logo (Image Courtesy of CryptoDaily)

### <a href="/price/polygon-matic" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Polygon</a> Commemorates New zkEVM Bridge
The <a href="/price/polygon-matic" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Polygon</a> network has integrated a PoS bridge to its zero-knowledge <a href="/price/ethereum-eth" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Ethereum</a> Virtual Machine (zkEVM), according to an announcement on April 26th. The <a href="/price/polygon-matic" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Polygon</a> Bridge for zkEVM has adopted a comparable user experience to that of <a href="/price/polygon-matic" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Polygon</a> PoS but with some innovative enhancements, such as a visible progress bar, a transaction panel with color-coded completion status, a time estimate for pending transactions, and a filter. 

In addition, an improved finality of the zkEVM <a href="/price/polygon-matic" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Polygon</a> Bridge is reported to allow users to claim funds on the <a href="/price/ethereum-eth" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Ethereum</a> mainnet in between 30.60 seconds. As per the developers, bridges using zero-knowledge technology are better than competing technologies as they are based entirely on smart contracts, without the need for mapping. It is likely that this upgraded bridge can enhance <a href="/price/polygon-matic" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Polygon</a>’s scalability of the <a href="/price/ethereum-eth" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Ethereum</a> network.
![](https://gimg2.gateimg.com/image/article/16826469082.png)
<a href="/price/polygon-matic" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Polygon</a> Logo (Image Courtesy of Logotyp.us)

### Coinbase Sues SEC To Try And Get Clarity On Crypto Rules
Following several months of back-and-forth conflict between crypto exchange powerhouse, Coinbase, and the US Securities And Exchange Commission, it has been reported that Coinbase has sued the SEC in a bid to get clarity on crypto regulation. Coinbase has demanded that the SEC be required by the court to publicly respond to a petition it filed in July 2022 which requested that the commission provide clearer crypto regulation. 

Coinbase’s July 2022 petition requested that the SEC propose and adopt clearer regulatory guidelines for the cryptocurrency industry in the US through its formal rulemaking process. As a result, more than 1,700 entities and individuals submitted comments on the petitions in an echo of support for the notion. However, the SEC has failed to offer a specific public response to the petition in spite of doubling down on crypto enforcement actions. 
## Current Project Trends
Based on data provided by CoinMarketCap, the top-gaining project across the past week was Rari Governance Token (RGT), an asset that acts as a native token for the non-custodial DeFi robo-advisor Rari Capital. As a result, RGT has accelerated by 678.67% in the past 24 hours and a notable 568.54% across the past week. 
## The Current BTC Trend
![](https://gimg2.gateimg.com/image/article/16826469383.png)
Weekly <a href="/price/bitcoin-btc" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">btc price</a> Data (Data Courtesy of Coinmarketcap)

Across the past week, <a href="/price/bitcoin-btc" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Bitcoin</a> has been subject to significant volatility that has volleyed it above and below its 7-day SMA threshold and between the $27.2k and $29.9k zones. Entering the week at around $28.20k, <a href="/price/bitcoin-btc" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Bitcoin</a> immediately decelerated and sunk to around $27.2k, plummeting sharply below its 7-day SMA before bottoming at this level for a majority of the week. It wasn’t until the late hours of the 25th that BTC began to regain its footing and push closer to the $28k threshold and to the cusp of the 7-day SMA. In the following days, <a href="/price/bitcoin-btc" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Bitcoin</a> sharply accelerated and pushed itself to the cusp of $30k before falling and beginning to stabilize around $29.2k. Providing this upward momentum ensues for the remainder of the week, it is possible that <a href="/price/bitcoin-btc" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Bitcoin</a> can re-test the $30k zone and potentially push above this threshold.

In light of this, <a href="/price/bitcoin-btc" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Bitcoin</a>’s MVRV (market value to realized value) has continued to decline over the past week. Entering the week at 1.468, it began to fall throughout the 21st to the 25th, before enduring a brief uptick after reaching a low of 1.384 on the 25th that has continued to the 27th. As a result, BTC closed the period at 1.406. However, in spite of this decline, BTC’s MVRV remains at a higher level than the week prior, suggesting BTC’s valuation is continuing to move away from the undersold territory and that its true value is being realized. 
![](https://gimg2.gateimg.com/image/article/16826469554.png)
7-Day BTC MVRV Data (Data Courtesy of Blockchain.com)

## The Situation of ETH Staking
As of the 27th of April, the state of <a href="/price/ethereum-eth" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Ethereum</a> staking remains positive, which can be attributed to the impressive price performance across the past month, which has led it to increase by 11.58%. This increase comes in light of the recent deployment of the Shanghai Upgrade, which allowed all validators with staked <a href="/price/ethereum-eth" target="_blank" class="blog_inner_link">Ethereum</a> to progressively redeem their tokens and subsequent yield earnt. This led to a valuation increase prior to the deployment and subsequently, as well as an improvement within the community sentiment. While this valuation improvement has somewhat waned in the weeks following the surge, there still seems to be signs of a progressive uptick in value that could lead it to push against the $2,000 resistance, provided comparable momentum is displayed in the coming week.
![](https://gimg2.gateimg.com/image/article/16826469735.png)
(Data Courtesy of Dune)

Here are some key figures from across the past week to consolidate this: 

Total validators: 609,544
Depositor Addresses: 90,200
Total ETH Deposited: 16,353,927
Liquid Staking Percentage: 34.50%
Staked Share Of ETH Supply: 16.23%

## The Current Macro Situation
### US Economy Growth Slowed In Q1 As Fed Pushes Rates Higher
It was reported that the US economy only grew at a paltry 1.1% rate in Q1 as higher interest rates hammered the housing market and businesses decreased their inventories. From an estimate from the Commerce Department released on Thursday, there was evidence to suggest that the nation’s gross domestic product, which acts as the broadest gauge of economic output, weakened after growing 3.2% from July through September and 2.6% from October through December. Ahead of this data release, economists had predicted that the overall GDP would increase by a 1.1% rate in Q1, however, the economy’s growth ultimately fell short by 0.8%.
## The Current Web3 Trend
### Web3 Could Be The ‘Trust Layer’ To Counter AI Concerns
Cathy Hackl, chief metaverse officer at innovation firm Journey, stated during CoinDesk’s Consensus 2023 that the Web3 ecosystem has the potential to resolve AI’s trust issue. Hackl stated: “We can all admit there’s an issue with trust [in AI]. That is the massive opportunity for the Web3 community, being that trust layer.” As a result, Hackl has called for strategies to be refined to push Web3 into the mainstream as a means of improving current Web2 systems by migrating everything on chain, from fiat transactions to e-commerce, but add a privacy layer that could mitigate any of the concerns related to the growing prevalence of AI.


<div class="blog-details-info">
<div>Author: Gate.io Researcher: **Matthew Webster-Dowsing**
<div class="info-tips">\*This article represents only the views of the researcher and does not constitute any investment suggestions.
<div>\*Gate.io reserves all rights to this article. Reposting of the article will be permitted provided Gate.io is referenced. In all other cases, legal action will be taken due to copyright infringement.
</div>

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A brief analysis of the cryptocurrency market between April 21st and April 27th, 2023.

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Market Trend｜Polygon Commemorates New zkEVM Bridge; Coinbase Sues SEC To Try And Get Clarity On Crypto Rules