Our special guest Ben Rodriguez (Senior Protocol Specialist, Coinbase Cloud) helps us navigate the Ethereum layer-2 landscape post-Dencun Fork, as the total value locked on these networks has picked up sharply in recent weeks. But there still seems to be some congestion-induced fee volatility on these L2s despite the fact that EIP-4844 helped reduce fees. We also discuss EigenLayer with respect to the upcoming launch of actively validated services as well as the tradeoffs inherent in liquid restaking tokens.Separately, our senior CES sales traders Georg Toropov and Greg Sutton walk us through the markets and flows, covering the recovery in bitcoin performance after some big outflows from spot BTC ETFs. Altcoins are similarly retracing in sympathy. Other key themes:
 

• The Federal Reserve kept three rate cuts for 2024 in their dot plot and increased US growth expectations
• Flows last week suggest that many institutions actually feel underallocated to this space, indicating the pain trade may be higher
• Some ETH related news as BlackRock launched a digital liquidity fund on Ethereum, while the Ethereum Foundation received an enquiry from an unidentified “state authority”
• Funding rates in perpetual futures markets for bitcoin are normalizing from levels as high as 60-70% in bitcoin back down to sub-20% levels

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Host: David Duong, Head of Institutional Research
Special Guest: Ben Rodriguez, Senior Protocol Specialist, CoinbasePanelists:
Greg Sutton, Senior CES Trader
Georg Toropov, Senior CES Trader