Welcome to Flywheel, your #1 source for Bitcoin, Crypto and DeFi news, analysis and general vibe-metrics.

Here's what we got for you today:

1. USDC coming Apple iOS
2. Polymarket booming
3. GammaSwap announces its TGE
4. This Week on Flywheel

Tap Digital Dollars on Your iPhone

2024 is the year of mass crypto adoption.

The Bitcoin and Ethereum ETF's were launched, Pump.fun took Memecoins mainstream with grifter celebrities, and Polymarket is signaling the outcome of the US presidential election.

These are all major stories defining 2024, but the biggest catalyst for the coming decade was just announced this week after Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire posted this alpha:

With the upcoming release of iOS 18.1 later this year, Apple will allow approved third party apps to will be able to add contactless transactions instead of Apple Pay.

Some of the ideas floated in the press release were payments, ID badges, event tickets, car keys, hotel keys, closed-loop transit, and rewards cards.

This is a monumental event, as it will be the first time that third party devs will be able to use the NFC feature for more than just Apple Pay.

When USDC is added as a payment asset to the iPhone the entire stablecoin industry will receive a final stamp of approval for unfettered growth.

More than 45.4 million people use Apple Pay in the United States.. that's 1 in 5 Americans!

Internationally the number is even larger, with over 650 million people in 76 countries using the service.

Apple Pay accounts for 5% of global transactions and that number is estimated to hit 10% in 2025.

Apple's NFC payment technology is so ubiquitous at this point. Now with a simple software update, USDC and other Stablecoins will be able to seamlessly integrate into the largest payment network in the world.

Just to be clear, Circle hasn't been approved yet for integration, however, by opening up the NFC tap-to-pay any Web 3 wallet could potentially get approval.

This means that any crypto wallet that supports USDC could, as Jeremy writes:

"enable a UX where a receiving device (like a Point-of-Sale, or another iOS device) could receive the transaction info via a tap. This would allow a PoS to tell an iPhone what blockchain address it will accept USDC on, or the amount to pay, and then the iPhone-based wallet app could prompt the user to confirm a payment (like with FaceID) and initiate a transaction over the blockchain to settle the USDC. Combining this with high-performance and low-fee blockchain networks (most these days), this will open up a powerful pathway for direct to merchant USDC payments."

We're finally getting the point where you'll be able to readily pay for a cup of coffee with crypto using your phone with a single tap.

Wild.

All the metrics for stablecoin usage are increasing. We're hitting new all-time highs in total supply, holders, transfer volume and senders.

In just a few years Stablecoins are going to be just as common for payment as your banks debit and credit cards.

We're on the precipice of the greatest technological changes in money in almost a century.. and Circle and the other stablecoin issuers like PayPal, DAI, Frax and others are set to be the biggest beneficiaries.

Polymarket is booming

The race for best crypto app of the year is between Memecoins factory pump.fun and Polymarket, which is on-track for over over $400m in trading volume in August.

Active users of the platform have surpassed 40,000 monthly and with election season in full-swing, its popularity is exploding.

Open interest is an all time high, topping $80m. This is the chart to follow, as it represents the total amount of money supporting all of the bids and offers on the platform. If you're going to follow one metric, this is the best indicator of the overall success of Polymarket.

The question to ask going into the end of 2024 is whether Polymarket can keep its momentum after the culmination of the US Presidential elections.

Almost all of the open interest and volume for Polymarket is dominated in 2 markets, the Presidential Election Winner and Popular Vote Winner. Once these markets resolve in November, will there be continued interest?

Let us know on Twitter or in our Telegram group.

Gamma Gamma Hey! Airdrop alert

Friend of Flywheel, GammaSwap is set to launch their Token Generation Event (TGE) for the GammaSwap (GS) token.

According to their article, a 2% airdrop will be distributed to GammaSwap users. Another 5% is reserved for the Liquidity Bootstrapping Pool (LBP). 8% supply at launch is pretty low float, and there are extra conditions on the airdrop vesting.

Team + Investors + Treasury keeps 77% of the supply.

The team is targeting August 30th for their self-hosted LBP launch. The airdrop will follow shortly after.

GammaSwap's TVL sits at $4.5m has been able to capture over $6 million in Total Value Locked (TVL).

Additionally they have processed over $100 million in cumulative perpetual option volume.

GammaSwap was one of our earliest guests on Flywheel, appearing in January of 2023. We spoke with lead dev and founder Devin and its awesome to see them reach this point in their development cycle.

This Week on Flywheel

A Shiba’s Journey Into Crypto and Cosmos w/ AnonNgmi - Flywheel #117

Watch the full EP and dive into Anon's crypto journey and all the ups and downs that the dog has been through 🐕

Good Reads

• 100y gets deep in "The Road to PBS: MEV-Boost++, Optimistic Relays, and TEE-Boost"
• Adam_Tehc lays out the hard realities of Pump.fun traders
• Aryan Agarwal explains the current State of Consumer Crypto
• Ethresearch writes on "Decentralized and Verifiable Cloud Service on Ethereum"
• Paradigm is launching a Pump.fun competitor called Dub
• ZachXBT digs into a weird BTC transfer of 4064 BTC ($238M), most probably stolen