Korean Blockchain Fund Supports Web3 Game Developer Growth in Southeast Asia

Korea’s Changwon City Boosts Local Art Scene with NFTsOn Monday, South Korea’s Changwon City announced its plan to support local artists by promoting their work through non-fungible tokens (NFTs). This initiative aims to help artists adapt to the rapidly changing fine art industry, driven by state-of-the-art technology, and stay current with the latest trends.NFT ART in ChangwonThis project “NFT ART in Changwon” came to life after the city partnered with MetaGalaxia, a Korean NFT marketplace, earlier this year.Jung Hyun-sub, head of the city’s culture, tourism, and sports division, has encouraged local citizens to participate in the project and emphasized the city’s commitment to fostering the NFT industry, starting with a focus on local artworks.15 artistsThe application process for the project will run from May 1 to May 30, and 15 artists will be selected. Eligible applicants must be Changwon residents who have either majored or are currently majoring in fine arts or have publicly exhibited their artwork.Artists can submit various forms of artwork that can be turned into NFTs, including paintings, photographs, and videos. Those selected will benefit from registration as NFT artists on MetaGalaxia, digitization of their original artworks into NFTs, and promotion of their artworks and profiles across various social media platforms.© Pexels/Dom J

A crypto wallet reportedly tied to the multinational banking giant DBS Bank holds over 170,000 Ether, valued at nearly $650 million. Reporting on the matter subsequently prompted DBS to make a denial of any links to the wallet.Photo by Kanchanara on UnsplashClaim asserted, claim deniedOn May 30, blockchain analysis firm Nansen caused some excitement when it took to X, flagging a particular wallet address, identifying it as belonging to an Ethereum whale, taking matters a step further in asserting that the wallet belonged to Singaporean bank, DBS Bank. The submission of securities reports to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently by many large corporates led to disclosures from some within traditional finance in the United States of Bitcoin holdings via the spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) products which had been approved earlier this year. A substantial holding of ETH by Singapore’s biggest bank would have been a significant boost for proponents of Ethereum. However, DBS Bank promptly refuted these claims. A spokesperson for the bank subsequently issued a statement to Cointelegraph and Decrypt, stating: "In relation to the post, DBS does not have this position on our books."  Claim not retractedFor its part, Nansen has not retracted its claim. In response to Decrypt, Nansen analyst Edward Wilson stated:"We have it under good authority, via several independent sources, that DBS owns the private key of this wallet and these assets are most likely a part of their custody solution." Wilson told Cointelegraph that it had obtained this information from “a good source,” going on to state: “This is similar to how we see institutions, both crypto-native like exchanges such as Binance or Coinbase custody funds on behalf of their users and non-crypto-native custody funds. The institution is the custodian and is responsible for managing the security of the funds.” The Nansen analyst expressed even more confidence in the claim in response to CryptoSlate. Wilson stated:“Nansen is 100% sure this belongs to DBS – DBS owns the private key of this wallet and these assets are most likely a part of their custody solution.” DBS’s foray into crypto servicesIn 2020, DBS Bank unveiled a crypto trading and custody service, including a platform for conducting security token offerings. At that time, DBS Exchange clarified that while the exchange itself would not hold any assets, it would provide custody services to investors. Since launching its crypto division, DBS Bank has seen significant success. In 2023, DBS reported an 80% growth in Bitcoin trading volume, attributing this surge to the crypto market turmoil of 2022. In February of this year, the Singaporean bank moved to integrate its digital asset exchange business into a new global financial markets unit. In April 2023, DBS opened a branch of the bank on the metaverse. It demonstrated its Web3 credentials further in August 2023 by introducing a metaverse game to tackle the issue of global food waste.

Emurgo Looks to Fill in Missing Cardano Ecosystem ComponentsEmurgo, the Singapore-based commercial arm and a founding entity of the Cardano blockchain network, plans on working towards filling in the gaps relative to needed Cardano ecosystem components.So said Emurgo Founder and CEO Ken Kodama, in a recent discussion with Andrew Fenton, the Editor of Cointelegraph’s magazine. Emurgo is one of the three entities governing Cardano and has taken on the task of addressing what it perceives as “missing” components in the Cardano blockchain when compared to other leading blockchains.Photo by Traxer on UnsplashAddressing 21 categoriesKodama outlined a strategic shift in Emurgo’s approach, describing it as a transition to a venture studio model to address 21 specific categories that he and his team believe require attention. According to Kodama, the solutions to these gaps will either be built by Emurgo themselves or sourced through investments, hackathons, or grants to incentivize developers within the Cardano community. Kodama stated: “So, that’s what we need to focus on, shifting from where we are today into a venture studio model.”One area that the Emurgo CEO is looking to address is the need to introduce layer 2 solutions to enhance Cardano’s scalability. While other blockchains have seen significant development in this area, Kodama feels that Cardano needs to catch up. Therefore, it’s a priority for Emurgo to cultivate a similar environment within the Cardano network.Along those lines, Emurgo is exploring zero-knowledge rollups and optimistic rollups, indicating the firm’s commitment to exploring and investing in what is the latest cutting-edge blockchain technology. To this end, they’ve already organized hackathons centered around these themes.Developer proficiency issueThe Emurgo boss feels that one of these 21 shortfalls is more pressing than the rest. Kodama acknowledged that the barrier of having developers proficient in more obscure programming languages like Haskell and Plutus is a difficulty. He believes the current pool of developers with expertise in these languages is insufficient. To address this, Emurgo is keen to promote Aiken, a toolkit and a new programming language designed to facilitate the development of smart contracts on the Cardano blockchain.Another one of the highlighted gaps is the absence of a robust decentralized identity (DID) system for enterprise adoption within the Cardano ecosystem. Kodama voiced his concern in this respect, stating: “We don’t see that much DID application being built on Cardano. So, that’s the first gap, or primary gap that we need to fill in.”“Aiken and other programming language applicability are quite important to broaden the number of builders able to build on top of Cardano. We have been educating builders to code in Haskell and Plutus. We had more than 2,000 graduates. However, that’s not really enough,” Kodama added.Emurgo has high hopes for Aiken and similar programming languages that can be integrated into Cardano, with the aim of diversifying the pool of developers capable of creating smart contracts on the platform, using a variety of programming languages.