Biggest coins hit all-time highs

Bitcoin hit a new all-time high of about $63,215 earlier this morning, according to CoinGecko. BTC fell below $63K a short time later. Ethereum, just now, hit a new high. ETH got to roughly $2,230 about 8:30 a.m. (EST).

Coinbase going public tomorrow seems to have woken animal spirits. The crypto exchange is expected to wind up worth as much as $100 billion when all is said and done and "NASDAQ:COIN" settles into existence as a centralized asset.

Is this an apex with "normies" catching on or just another milestone on the road to being able to tell skeptics "we told you so" for decades to come?

Hyped in savvier circles is the debut, today, of ThorChain, dubbed the first truly native cross-chain DEX (Cointelegraph).

ThorChain's native token, RUNE, has risen 15% in the past day.

Polkadot (DOT) gets lumped together with Cardano (ADA) as they both challenge Ethereum for smart contract superiority. But DOT set itself apart this past week.

Billed as the "Internet of Blockchains," DOT fell 9.6% over the prior seven days while ADA rose 9.3% during that same period, as of this morning. ETH is up 6%.

Stablecoin enormity Tether (USDT) recently announced plans to put down roots on the Polkadot network in a move that has been heralded as striking the perfect recipe for DeFi projects in need of stability, scalability and affordability. The timing of said DOT/USDT fusion remains unknown.

The technical analyst known as Byzantine General can be forgiven for a 45-tweet-long thread sifting among a multitude of Bitcoin indicators. It's a thoughtful, rigorous analysis. Plus, in tweet 1/45 there is plainly a head’s up that 44/45 contains a quick take-away summary, as follows: “derivs a bit overheated; constant strong spot bid; institutional driven flow; no peak retail euphoria yet; mainstream adoption getting very real; Coinbase IPO could be volatility catalyst.”

The thread drew a little friendly fire.

"45 tweets, seriously bro? You are on the wrong platform," replied one follower.

Born in St. Louis, Missouri, and raised in Dakar, Senegal, Akon dreamed of making it in the music business. So he ditched college, struck up a friendship with Wyclef Jean and cut a debut R&B/hip-hop album which produced a series of hit songs. In 2006, Akon's song, "The Sweet Escape," in collaboration with Gwen Stefani, went to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100. Although vocally there wasn't much for Akon to contribute, beyond shouting "woo hoo! wee hoo!" throughout the track. These days, the singer/songwriter/producer is busy creating a digital city in Senegal. Akon's crypto, Akoin, in collaboration with the Stellar Consensus Protocol, could economically empower a second "Akon City" which is now being proposed for Uganda. Akon's primary role in these ambitious projects is focused on attracting investors (The Daily Chain).

 Big Board Fomo: The New York Stock Exchange announced it is issuing NFTs commemorating first trades of important stocks, baffling many in the crypto community (Decrypt). As Messari’s Dan McArdle pointed out, boom cycles tend to leave legacy players feeling left out and so then they “somehow manage to find the least-meaningful way to participate.”