With as many as 33,000 branches, Starbucks has a global reach around the world and plays a key role in its industry. The company has become an icon of the comfortable western lifestyle and and for years has tried to be as close as possible to breakthrough financial technologies.
In previous years, it introduced a subscription program with its prepayment and deposit design making Starbucks a quasi-bank. Now the company is ready for new services in the cryptocurrency world.
Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz announced that the well-known coffee chain will would launch a new "digital venture" to expand its existing loyalty program. He added that “this new digital Web 3-enabled initiative will allow us to build on the current Starbucks Rewards engagement model with its powerful spend-to-earn Stars approach while also introducing new methods of emotionally engaging customers."
Unfortunately, at this point, we don't know details about the promotion of the new program. It seems like there has been speculation about introducing an NFT collection and a Starbucks token that could be exchangeable for the company's products. This scenario sounds plausible given management's statements. At the earnings conference, CEO Howard Schultz announced that Web3 will be part of the company's future, saying, "it will create a whole new set of digital network effects that will attract new customers and appeal to existing ones in our retail stores."
The theft of $6 million from Solana wallets was probably linked to Slope Wallet
According to CoinDesk data, wallets robbed in yesterday's hacking attack were all created or used within the Slope app: it provides Web3 wallet solutions and has long been in close partnership with the SOL ecosystem. The information was confirmed by Solana, which posted on its Twitter account that "it appears affected addresses were at one point created, imported, or used in Slope mobile wallet applications."
In that case, the problem itself does not seem to be with the ecosystem code but with the code of the third party granting the wallets, Slope. Crypto audit firm Zellic, while investigating the matter, has provided evidence pointing to errors in Slope's system. The company had been using a new system infrastructure for a week, which during that time could have leaked thousands of confidential information due to a software error.
At this point, 9,000 robbed "hot wallets" have been registered, the security of which has long been a matter of concern due to their permanent connection to the network. Losses are currently estimated at $6 million in various tokens. Solana (SOL) itself lost 4.5% yesterday on the Conotoxia MT5 platform and continues to decline today.
The consolidation continues
Major cryptocurrencies continue to consolidate, with no significant ups or downs. On the Conotoxia MT5 platform, Bitcoin is losing more than 2.2% today, while Ethereum is losing 1.4%, as of 12:00 GMT+3 on 04/08/2022. BTC is near a close support level around $22,650, and ETH seems to be drawing a short, few-days long flag formation, which could herald an upcoming potential big price move. Analysts seem believe more and more often that we are dealing with the so-called "bull trap" and further declines may be inevitable due to weak macroeconomic data.
Rafał Tworkowski, Junior Market Analyst, Conotoxia Ltd. (Conotoxia investment service)
Materials, analysis and opinions contained, referenced or provided herein are intended solely for informational and educational purposes. Personal opinion of the author does not represent and should not be constructed as a statement or an investment advice made by Conotoxia Ltd. All indiscriminate reliance on illustrative or informational materials may lead to losses. Past performance is not a reliable indicator of future results.
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