Zyga's integration could catalyze institutional DeFi adoption on Solana by addressing privacy and compliance, potentially reshaping the market.

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Tesla's China FSD launch could accelerate AI development, but faces stiff competition from local firms with tailored autonomous solutions.

The post Tesla launches Full Self-Driving in China for $9,400 on Model 3 appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Meteora's onchain limit orders could enhance Solana's DeFi ecosystem by integrating trading and liquidity provision, potentially attracting more volume.

The post Meteora launches onchain limit orders for Solana traders to earn fees appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Russia's yuan bond strategy highlights a shift towards financial independence from Western markets, potentially altering global sanction dynamics.

The post Russia plans second yuan bond sale following Putin’s China visit appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

The joint nuclear drills heighten geopolitical tensions, impacting global markets and reinforcing Belarus's military alignment with Russia.

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Bitcoin Magazine

Blockchain.com Confidentially Files for U.S. IPO, Joining Wave of Crypto Listings

Blockchain.com Group Holdings Inc., one of the oldest companies in the crypto industry, has confidentially submitted a draft registration statement on Form S-1 with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for an initial public offering, the Dallas-based firm announced Thursday.

The number of shares to be offered and the price range for the proposed offering have not yet been determined. The IPO remains subject to market conditions and the completion of the SEC’s review process. They expect to go public before the end of 2026.

Founded in 2011 by three members of the original Bitcoin online forum BitcoinTalk.org, Blockchain.com is among the earliest institutions built around digital assets. The company initially tracked activity on the Bitcoin blockchain before expanding into a consumer wallet and exchange, and later into institutional products and services. 

Today, it supports more than 95 million wallets and counts more than 43 million confirmed accounts. The firm employs approximately 500 people and has been profitable on an adjusted basis for three consecutive years, according to the source familiar with its plans.

Crypto firms entering public markets

The filing marks the latest milestone in a sustained push by crypto companies into the public markets. In 2025 alone, Circle, eToro, Bullish, and Gemini — the Winklevoss brothers’ exchange — all went public, collectively raising an estimated $14.6 billion across at least 11 offerings. 

BitGo listed on the New York Stock Exchange in January 2026, becoming the first major crypto firm to go public this year. 

Kraken parent Payward Inc. filed confidentially for a U.S. IPO in November 2025 targeting a first-quarter debut, but shelved those plans in March as market conditions deteriorated. Grayscale remains among the firms still in the pipeline.

Blockchain.com’s path to a public listing has been a long one. The company initially considered going public as early as 2022, when it carried a valuation of $14 billion. But in 2023, it raised $110 million in a Series E round led by UK-based Kingsway Capital at a valuation that had fallen to less than half its 2022 peak — a sharp reset that reflected the broad crypto market downturn that followed that year’s industry collapses.

The confidential filing process, permitted under U.S. securities law, allows companies to prepare for public offerings away from market scrutiny while the SEC conducts its review. Should Blockchain.com complete its listing, it would add another veteran name to a rapidly growing roster of publicly traded crypto businesses.

This post Blockchain.com Confidentially Files for U.S. IPO, Joining Wave of Crypto Listings first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin Magazine

Unchained and Bitcoin Park Hit the Road For Bitcoin Pizza Day With “The New Rules of Bitcoin”

AUSTIN, Texas – May 20th, 2026 – In celebration of Bitcoin Pizza Day on May 22, Unchained, a Bitcoin financial services company founded in 2016 by Joe Kelly and Dhruv Bansal, and Bitcoin Park are hosting special screenings of “The New Rules of Bitcoin,” a short film produced in partnership with The Atlantic’s brand studio Atlantic Re:Think, in ten major US cities. The film highlights three core ideas: Bitcoin is not what you think, Bitcoin is long term thinking, and Bitcoin is true ownership. These ideas lay the groundwork for Bitcoin’s distinction from other cryptocurrencies, with its unique blend of long-term wealth preservation and direct, collaborative custody.

On May 22, 2010, a programmer paid 10,000 bitcoin for two large pizzas to be delivered to his home in the first documented real-world bitcoin transaction. An amount worth around $760 million today, highlighting Bitcoin’s incredible rise to become a mainstream global asset. 

Screenings will run this week in Fort Worth, Kansas City on Friday 5/22, 7 PM, at Buffalo State Pizza Company, Chicago, Washington D.C., Portland, Nashville, Austin, Tampa Bay, and Lexington, Kentucky on Friday, 5/22, 6pm at Goodfellas Pizza. Through The New Rules of Bitcoin Roadshow, Unchained and Bitcoin Park are equipping local meetups with a free screening kit, a discussion primer, and pizza sponsorship for the first 100 meetups— bringing Bitcoin’s story to communities face-to-face, just like on the original Pizza Day. 

“Bitcoin Pizza Day is a reminder that adoption happens peer-to-peer,” said Jonathan Sexton, the Chief Commercial Officer at Unchained. “Every new bitcoiner was, at some point, brought in by another bitcoiner. We made this film with The Atlantic to give the community a tool to share Bitcoin with a new audience, and to help people who are still unsure about bitcoin to give it another look. And the roadshow is the platform to help bring about the next wave of adopters.”

“Since 2022, we’ve experienced in-person meetups work to bring new people into the bitcoin ecosystem, meetup after meetup,” said Rod Roudi, co-founder of Bitcoin Park. “Bitcoin education is at the core of most meetups and this time, supported by a really cool new film. Grassroots, word of mouth is how Bitcoin spread in the first place, and it’s how it will continue to spread.”

This Pizza Day, Unchained is waiving the first trading fee on all new retirement accounts created before June 1st that move from any crypto competitor. To learn more, book a consultation with one of Unchained’s U.S.-based bitcoin experts here. 

About Unchained

Unchained is a Bitcoin financial services company founded in 2016 by Joe Kelly and Dhruv Bansal and headquartered in Austin, Texas. The company built its services around collaborative custody, a multisignature structure in which clients hold their own keys while Unchained provides the financial infrastructure around them. Since its first bitcoin-backed loan in 2017, Unchained has originated more than $1 billion in loans, secured more than 100,000 BTC on its platform, and reported zero capital losses.

The company offers vaults, IRAs, a trading desk, commercial loans, inheritance planning, and its Signature advisory service for individuals and businesses. Its Bitcoin IRA is the only retirement account in the market that gives clients direct key control. In 2025, Unchained received a Wyoming trust charter through its subsidiary Gannett Trust, expanding its fiduciary and wealth advisory capabilities.

Unchained’s open-source wallet Caravan remains available to the public as a standalone tool, independent of any commercial relationship with the company. To learn more, visit unchained.com. 

About Bitcoin Park

Bitcoin Park is a community-supported campus founded in 2022 with locations in Nashville, Tennessee and Austin, Texas. Its mission is to support and accelerate the grassroots freedom tech movement by creating a home for mission-obsessed Bitcoiners, builders, and freedom fighters to work, learn, collaborate, and build.

Programming runs on three rails of freedom tech — AI, energy, and bitcoin — across meetups, workshops, and summits spanning custody & treasury, energy & mining, grassroots adoption, healthcare, payments, policy, and more.

AI Freedom Lab anchors the AI rail — Bitcoin Park’s initiative advancing sovereign, collaborative, and decentralized infrastructure so anyone can build on their own terms.

The capstone is Imagine IF, a summit of summits, held in Nashville the first week of October each year — a call to action for dreamers, builders, and believers to shape the world we want to live in, where AI, energy and converge in service of human flourishing and creative optimism. Each “Imagine IF…” talk plants a seed for what’s possible when bold imagination meets human action. To learn more, visit imagineifnashville.com 

Media Contact 

Melrose PR | unchained@melrosepr.com

Disclaimer: This is a sponsored press release. Readers are encouraged to perform their own due diligence before acting on any information presented in this article.

This post Unchained and Bitcoin Park Hit the Road For Bitcoin Pizza Day With “The New Rules of Bitcoin” first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Bitcoin Magazine.

Bitcoin Magazine

5 Reasons Corporations Should Sell Bitcoin

Recently Strategy made headlines by saying that it might sell some bitcoin to meet business objectives. This came as a surprise to many people because of what was previously regarded as a hard-lined stance to never sell. Saylor even (jokingly) tweeted stuff like “Sell a kidney if you must, but keep the bitcoin.”

The reality is that bitcoin sales were always on the table for any bitcoin treasury company. The quip of “never sell” is an articulation of a long-term investment philosophy founded upon the extreme low time preference that is common in bitcoin discourse. But even within this discourse, there are frequently cases where almost everyone agrees it makes sense to sell, despite the ubiquity of the HODL meme. 

The simplest reasons involve improving one’s quality of life: buying a house to raise a family, paying for a trip to a place you’ve wanted to go, sending your kids to college, unexpected and severe medical bills. The list is very long. HODLing often isn’t as long. 

For a company, the reason to do anything (and indeed the reason for a company’s existence) is to improve shareholder value. 

Consider another group of bitcoin companies that have been selling. Our Q1 Report highlights that Bitcoin miners have sold 25,376 BTC in Q1 2026 to fund AI pivots. The value creation math is simple. Management believes that their AI capex will yield better risk-adjusted gains than the bitcoin they sold. Under these assumptions, it makes sense that they sold bitcoin to fund AI. In fact, this is reason 0: if there is a better investment than bitcoin, then selling bitcoin for that makes complete sense.

For Strategy—and all treasury companies that are focused on raising capital to accumulate bitcoin—there are clear cases where selling can create value. Let’s go through some of them. 

Reason 1: Bitcoin per share

Growing Bitcoin per share (BPS) is the goal of most treasury strategies. A period over period growth in BPS is called BTC Yield. BTC Yield is normally achieved when bitcoin is purchased, which increases the numerator in the BPS ratio. However, it can also be achieved when shares are purchased, which decreases the denominator in the BPS ratio. 

If shares trade at a discount to the bitcoin they represent, then selling bitcoin to buy back stock always leads to an increase in BPS. This is because the percent change in bitcoin holdings is still greater than the percent change in shares outstanding. 

The discount rule also applies in the case of ongoing obligations (such as preferred stock dividends or debt coupons) that cannot be funded with operating cash flow. If shares trade at a discount, then it is better to sell bitcoin to pay these obligations. This would lead to a smaller decrease in BPS. 

Reason 2: Cost of capital and raising capital 

Because ratings agencies have much sway over how capital markets allocate funds, their rules and guidelines need to be respected for greater ease in the capital formation process. In December we published a report on Strategy’s historic S&P credit ratings. In it we discussed the different options for companies to receive better credit ratings, which would ultimately help their credit instruments obtain a lower cost of capital. 

The cash reserve option, which was found in S&P’s comments and discussed in our report, was promptly adopted by Strategy. By January 2026, Strategy had about a $2.2 billion cash reserve, and this has meaningfully reduced investors’ fears of an inability to cover preferred dividends. 

In this scenario, it is perfectly okay for a company to sell some bitcoin to create the cash reserve to appease the market so that it can sell its credit instruments at lower costs of capital. This seems convoluted, but ultimately you have to meet your creditors where they are at to get them to give you their money. There is no way around it. 

Another corollary to that is bitcoin sales to retire debt. Debts are senior liabilities which reduce the attractiveness of preferred stock as credit instruments. If these can be retired, then preferred stocks could see a better cost of capital. 

In the long term, a better cost of capital could be worth a lot due to compounding and being able to service liabilities on more capital. For instance, it’s easier to compound if you pay 9% vs 11.5% — an extra 250 bps makes a very big difference over time. And you pay less for $1 billion borrowed at 7% than you do for $700 billion borrowed at 11%. 

Reason 3: Tax 

Bitcoin does not have a wash sale rule in the USA (at the time of writing). You can sell it to realize a loss and then immediately buy it and reset the cost basis lower. This lets you book a loss, which serves as a tax asset. In fact, Strategy actually did this exact thing back in December 2022 at the prior cycle’s bottom. 

Today this tax benefit still exists, so it is another very good reason to sell bitcoin. However, many might not see it as selling if the company immediately repurchases. But a company can easily combine the tax advantage of a realized loss with an action like a share buyback or debt repayment.

Reason 4: Proving it is possible 

Bitcoin is still quite new and this comes with a lot of FUD. Sometimes the FUD is just ridiculous but it still catches on. Strategy selling bitcoin is one such instance of ridiculous FUD: the idea is that they are propping up the whole bitcoin market, or that if they sell the entire bitcoin balance sheet model is instantly debunked. Therefore, if they can sell 50,000 BTC and prove that nothing serious happens to the bitcoin market nor the stock, then this can dispel such notions and make the market more receptive toward the corporate bitcoin balance sheet model.

At any rate, this would be the silliest reason to do it, but sometimes people come up with silly ideas that just need to be proven wrong. And one last point on this — the market is generally quite efficient; it is the media outlets and influencers that are incentivized to push sensationalist and poorly reasoned narrative out of whatever they can find. Real allocators with money rarely make decisions based on these “sources” over actual research.

Reason 5: Preferred buyback 

This is something people don’t really talk about at all. But in the event of a real de-peg of variable rate instruments, the company has the option to buy back the instrument at a heavy discount to par, thus retiring obligations with very high costs of capital.

This is basically closing a winning tax-free and borrow-free short position on the company’s own preferred stock. STRC for example is issued at $100. If the stock drops to $82 and Strategy sells a billion dollars of BTC to buy back STRC at $82 per share, then it basically pocketed a gain of 100 – 82 = $18 per STRC share shorted (issued) and then repurchased. And this gain isn’t taxable, nor did Strategy have to borrow the shares to do this short. 

STRC price action since IPO

The other important thing to note is that such a de-peg does not have to accompany a crash in the bitcoin price. If traders are heavily levered up on STRC (which is certainly possible given what this stock offers), a wick down can lead to stop losses and momentum algos that cause a cascade of selling. In this case, Strategy can sell BTC to retire some STRC shares before enduring a higher dividend (here I assume they would increase the dividend to get the shares back to par). 

Conclusion 

Don’t be surprised or scared about bitcoin sales. There are plenty of cases where it is in the interest of the company and shareholders to do so.

Bitcoin is money. Money creates optionality. Options are great when used well. 

This post 5 Reasons Corporations Should Sell Bitcoin first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Allard Peng.

Bitcoin Magazine

SpaceX Heads Into Historic IPO With a $1.45 Billion Bitcoin Treasury on Its Books

SpaceX filed its long-awaited S-1 with the Securities and Exchange Commission Wednesday — and it is bringing a substantial Bitcoin position into the public markets.

The Elon Musk-led aerospace company holds 18,712 BTC, valued at approximately $1.45 billion, according to the S-1. The coins were purchased at a cost basis of $661 million, or roughly $35,000 per coin — a price Bitcoin last touched in late 2023. 

That stake makes SpaceX the seventh-largest known corporate Bitcoin holder in the world, ahead of Coinbase.

SpaceX is targeting a Nasdaq listing under the ticker SPCX . The company has been valued in private markets at $1.75 trillion, a figure that would place it above Tesla by market capitalization and make it the largest public company to carry Bitcoin on its balance sheet.

SpaceX’s Bitcoin journey dates to 2021, when Musk added the cryptocurrency to the company’s financial assets around the same time Tesla made its own $1.5 billion purchase. 

The company has since trimmed its holdings — Arkham Intelligence tracked the stash as low as 6,095 BTC last year — before the S-1 confirmed a far larger position of 18,712 coins held as of December 31. 

SpaceX’s bitcoin gains

With a cost basis of $35,000 per coin and Bitcoin now trading above $77,000, SpaceX is sitting on paper gains of roughly $789 million. The position represents a small slice of a company that posted $18.7 billion in revenue in 2025, led by Starlink’s $11.39 billion contribution.

The IPO introduces new disclosure obligations. Under FASB fair-value accounting rules that took effect in late 2025, SpaceX will report its Bitcoin exposure in quarterly filings, making the position visible to every public market investor. Future financial reports will reflect unrealized gains or losses tied to Bitcoin price swings — the same volatility that led Tesla to sell the bulk of its own holdings in 2022.

Tesla, which Musk also leads, disclosed holding more than 11,000 bitcoins in its first-quarter filing, worth close to $900 million at current prices. 

When SpaceX lists, it will join Tesla on the short roster of public companies that treat Bitcoin as a balance-sheet asset — a cohort still dominated by Strategy Inc., which holds more than 843,000 BTC worth north of $64 billion.

The SpaceX S-1 is one of the most anticipated filings in years. For Bitcoin watchers, it is the most significant corporate disclosure of 2026.

This post SpaceX Heads Into Historic IPO With a $1.45 Billion Bitcoin Treasury on Its Books first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin Magazine

Foundation Raises $6.4M in Fulgur-led Round to Launch Passport Prime, a ‘Human Authority’ Device to Keep AI Agents in Check

Foundation has raised $6.4 million in a funding round led by Fulgur Ventures as it launches Passport Prime, a new hardware device designed to secure digital actions in an era of AI-driven automation.

The Boston-based company said the round included participation from Arche Capital and brings its total funding to $16.5 million, according to a note shared with Bitcoin Magazine. 

The capital will support expansion beyond Bitcoin self-custody into identity management, multi-factor authentication, and authorization systems for AI agents.

Passport Prime, which began shipping to pre-order customers in March 2026, is now available for general purchase. Foundation describes the product as the first example of “Human Authority Hardware,” a category of devices intended to ensure that critical digital actions require direct human approval through isolated, secure hardware.

The launch reflects a shift in security concerns as AI agents gain the ability to execute tasks across financial accounts, cloud systems, and enterprise tools. Foundation argues that existing approval methods — such as browser prompts or mobile notifications — cannot serve as trusted checkpoints when the same environment may host autonomous software.

Chief executive Zach Herbert said the rise of AI agents creates a new form of key management challenge. He argued that authorization must move to independent hardware with a verifiable display and operating system, rather than remain within software environments that can be compromised.

Passport Prime details

Passport Prime combines several functions into a single device, including a Bitcoin hardware wallet, FIDO authentication keys, two-factor authentication storage, a secrets vault, and 50GB of encrypted storage. The device is designed to act as a central approval layer for transactions, credential use, and data access.

The product runs on KeyOS, a Rust-based microkernel operating system developed by Foundation over three years. KeyOS is open source and includes a communication system called QuantumLink, which uses post-quantum cryptographic standards such as ML-KEM alongside ChaCha20-Poly1305 encryption on a dedicated Bluetooth chip.

Foundation is also opening its KeyOS developer platform to external builders. The platform includes a software development kit, documentation, command-line tools, and a simulator that allows developers to test applications without physical hardware. A developer unit can be requested for real-device testing.

The company plans to introduce a KeyOS app store by the end of the second quarter, aiming to create a distribution channel for security-focused applications built on the platform. Use cases include Bitcoin transaction policies, identity verification tools, enterprise signing systems, and approval workflows for AI agents.

Chief technology officer Ken Carpenter said the platform shifts hardware from a static key storage tool into a programmable security layer. He framed KeyOS as a foundation for applications that execute policy within trusted hardware rather than relying on external software controls.

Cake Wallet is the first external partner building on KeyOS, offering a cold storage application to its user base of more than one million. Foundation expects further integrations across financial services, identity systems, and AI workflows through 2026.

Passport Prime is priced from $349 and is available through Foundation’s website. The company positions the device as a control point for human decision-making as software systems gain greater autonomy.

This post Foundation Raises $6.4M in Fulgur-led Round to Launch Passport Prime, a ‘Human Authority’ Device to Keep AI Agents in Check first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Cryptocurrency exchanges are emerging as the clearest pressure point in Bitcoin’s long-running debate over quantum computing risk, sitting on millions of coins with publicly visible cryptographic keys.

Bitcoin quantum risk begins with a fundamental feature of its transaction verification: public keys are hidden until funds are spent.

Once a wallet signs a transaction, the public key required to verify that signature is permanently published to the blockchain. The risk compounds when a custodian reuses that address, leaves remaining balances in it, or continues directing deposits to wallets that should have been retired.

That exposure has reached a massive scale, with Glassnode noting that about 6.04 million Bitcoin, representing 30.2% of the asset’s circulating supply, are currently held in wallets with exposed public keys.

In Glassnode’s framework, public key exposure becomes the core metric for identifying wallets that would matter most in a future quantum-attack scenario.

The data does not imply an immediate threat because quantum computers remain years away from the scale required to break Bitcoin’s encryption.

However, the metric reveals exactly where the network’s vulnerabilities are concentrated if advances in quantum hardware eventually make public-key exposure a practical security concern.

According to Glassnode, roughly half of all Bitcoin held by labeled exchanges is susceptible under the firm's public-key visibility framework, compared with less than 30% of the non-exchange supply.

Notably, the exposure breaks down into two distinct categories, with the largest being operational risk.

This bucket covers 4.12 million Bitcoin and is tied directly to poor wallet management decisions, such as address reuse and partial spending without proper rotation of change outputs. Exchanges account for a significant portion of this risk, holding about 1.66 million exposed Bitcoin, equal to more than 8% of the total issued supply.

Moreover, data suggests custody standards are slipping as trading platforms expand their wallet infrastructure, deposit systems, and liquidity operations. The share of exchange-held Bitcoin considered operationally safe has steadily fallen from about 55% in 2018 to roughly 45% today.
That makes Bitcoin wallet security a measurable custody issue rather than a theoretical protocol debate.

Crypto exchanges vs Wall Street vs Sovereign wallets

A broader look at the data reveals that public-key exposure is wildly uneven across the global financial landscape, fracturing sharply along the lines of crypto-native platforms, traditional Wall Street institutions, and nation-states.

The clearest gap appears in crypto exchange wallets, where address reuse and legacy infrastructure leave large balances more visible on-chain.

Within the crypto sector alone, security standards vary drastically.

Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange by volume, holds 85% of its labeled Bitcoin balances in addresses where public keys have already been revealed, Glassnode found.

With users holding more than $40 billion in Bitcoin on the platform, per DeFiLlama data, that methodology places over $34 billion of those assets squarely in the exposed category.

Meanwhile, other major trading venues show even higher concentrations. Bitfinex, Crypto.com, and Gemini each have 100% of their labeled Bitcoin balances classified as exposed.

Coinbase, the largest US-based exchange, sits at the opposite end of the spectrum. The Brian Amrstong-led firm carries public-key exposure on just 5% of its Bitcoin reserves, placing it among the strongest large-scale custodians in the report.

Meanwhile, that same custody divide is glaringly apparent when comparing crypto exchanges to traditional finance heavyweights and retail-focused platforms.

Bitcoin ETF issuers like Fidelity maintain exposure levels near 2%, while rivals like Grayscale and WisdomTree have exposure levels of around 50% and 100%, respectively.

Other platforms, like Block’s Cash App, align with industry best practices, while Robinhood and Revolut flag nearly 100% exposure in their labeled wallets.

Government actors, meanwhile, display the strictest cryptographic hygiene of all. Wallets tied to the United States, the United Kingdom, and El Salvador have maintained zero quantum exposure, boasting safety rates above 99% for several years.

The split across these platforms confirms that the vulnerability stems from internal wallet architecture and address rotation policies, rather than from the inherent burden of managing massive liquidity.

A slow Bitcoin upgrade leaves exchanges with the first move

While the timeline for a quantum-capable attack remains fiercely debated, Glassnode’s data makes one thing clear: the crypto industry’s most immediate defense lies in basic operational hygiene, not protocol-level overhauls.

By separating the exposed supply into structural and operational categories, the data highlights that operational exposure, the largest vulnerability, can be drastically reduced without waiting for a complex change to Bitcoin’s consensus rules.

This means that trading platforms can immediately lower their risk profile simply by moving balances to fresh addresses, retiring used wallets, and tightening internal controls around change outputs.

This gives custodians a direct path to secure customer funds while the broader Bitcoin community debates longer-term cryptographic solutions.

Notably, Bitcoin itself cannot be refitted overnight. So any systemic migration to post-quantum signatures would require massive coordination across developers, miners, node operators, wallet providers, and custodians.

Given that consensus changes are intentionally slow, a broad cryptographic transition would likely unfold over several years.

Exchanges, however, have a much shorter path available to them right now.

As Bitcoin becomes increasingly embedded in spot ETFs, traditional brokerage accounts, and institutional custody products, the first line of defense against future quantum threats will not come from code upgrades, but from the entities holding the largest pools of customer coins.

Wallet hygiene is no longer a back-office detail; it is a highly visible test of whether Bitcoin’s custodial layer is prepared for a threat that, while uncertain in its timing, is already measurable on-chain.

Bitcoin quantum computing risk is therefore becoming a test of custody before it becomes a protocol-level emergency.

The post Bitcoin quantum computing risk centers on major exchange wallets, Glassnode data shows appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Hyperliquid price crossed $50 as the first spot HYPE exchange-traded funds drew stronger early demand than Bitcoin products on a market-cap-adjusted basis, giving investors a regulated way to express exposure to one of crypto’s fastest-growing trading venues.

Data from SoSoValue show the two HYPE funds attracted nearly $50 million of inflows and held about $60 million in assets during their first week of trading.

#10

Hyperliquid HYPE

$61.63

+19.96%

1D 7D 1M 1Y ALL

Market Cap $15.67B

24h Volume $1.42B

All-Time High $59.39

Sectors

Derivatives DEX Layer 1 Token

The absolute figures remain small compared with the largest Bitcoin funds, but the launch has stood out because the products are scaling from a much smaller token economy.

The move has also strengthened Hyperliquid price momentum by linking ETF demand with a token economy that remains far smaller than Bitcoin’s.

Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas said trading volume in the Hyperliquid ETF rose each day after launch and was running at roughly eight times its first-day level. He said the pattern suggested organic interest rather than a short-lived opening burst.

That demand has arrived as investors reassess Hyperliquid’s position in the broader digital-asset market.

The platform began as a crypto perpetual futures exchange, but has expanded into non-crypto markets, including commodities, equity-linked products, S&P 500 futures, pre-IPO contracts, and prediction markets.

For ETF buyers, HYPE has become a proxy for that expansion. The token is being treated less as a simple exchange asset and more as exposure to a trading platform trying to move crypto rails into markets that have historically sat inside traditional finance.

Hyperliquid price outperforms broader crypto market

The early flows have already placed HYPE in rare territory among new crypto fund launches.

That makes the Hyperliquid ETF launch an early test of whether institutional demand can extend beyond Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana products.

Crypto analyst Aletheia said the first two spot HYPE ETFs outperformed Bitcoin spot ETFs on three of their first six trading days, after adjusting for inflow market capitalization.

The comparison came during a weak stretch for Bitcoin-focused products, which registered more than $1 billion of net outflows over the same reporting period.

Meanwhile, the HYPE products also beat Ethereum funds on five of those six days. Solana funds remained stronger across four of the six sessions, indicating that HYPE’s early demand has been notable, though not consistently ahead of every competing crypto ETF category.

The adjusted-flow comparison narrows the focus from headline dollars to demand relative to asset size. Bitcoin ETFs still dominate the market in absolute terms, with deeper liquidity, broader access for advisers, and a longer trading record.

However, relative to Hyperliquid’s token economy, the first week of HYPE ETF activity showed unusually strong demand for a new crypto fund category.

The fund activity also changes HYPE’s market structure. During the first six trading days, the ETFs bought 2.5 times as much HYPE as Hyperliquid’s Assistance Fund bought and burned, Aletheia said.

That means ETF issuers are already creating more open-market buying pressure than one of the token’s existing internal support mechanisms.

The Assistance Fund buys and burns HYPE, reducing supply over time. ETF issuers create a separate demand channel because they must acquire HYPE to support fund exposure.

The result is a blend of native protocol demand and traditional-market demand, a structure that only a small group of crypto assets have achieved through regulated products.

The flows remain early and could fluctuate as the funds move beyond launch week. Still, the first six sessions have moved HYPE into a different part of the market conversation.

Its performance is now being judged not only by crypto-native trading activity on Hyperliquid, but also by ETF inflows, secondary-market volume, and institutional allocation behavior.

Why institutional interest followed Hyperliquid

The demand for HYPE ETFs reflects a broader shift in how investors are valuing Hyperliquid.

The platform is increasingly being viewed as a financial infrastructure trade rather than a narrow crypto derivatives venue.

Data from Dune Analytics show roughly half of Hyperliquid’s volume now comes from non-crypto assets, including stocks, oil, S&P 500 futures, pre-IPO markets, and artificial intelligence-linked companies.

Hyperliquid data also show real-world asset trading on the platform reached a record $2.6 billion in open interest, roughly double the level from two months earlier.

That growth suggests users are moving beyond crypto perpetuals and using the platform for broader macro and equity-linked exposure.

Hyperliquid also gained attention during the US-Iran conflict because its 24/7 markets allowed traders to navigate Middle East geopolitical risks during weekends, when standard financial exchanges were closed.

Market participants could trade synthetic versions of traditional assets, including US equities and commodities, while conventional venues were offline.

That use case has strengthened the institutional argument for the platform.

Considering this, Bitwise Chief Investment Officer Matt Hougan has described Hyperliquid as crypto’s new “super app,” arguing that the platform is targeting the $600 trillion global asset market rather than only the roughly $3 trillion crypto economy.

He has pointed to its exposure across crypto, equities, commodities, foreign exchange, prediction markets, and structured products as evidence of a broader market design.

According to him:

“Hyperliquid has become the ‘super-app' Atkins envisioned—a ‘non-SEC regulated platform' offering investors exposure to ‘a variety of asset classes.'”

That framing helps explain why ETF demand appeared quickly.

Traditional investors already understand the exchange business model as they can compare trading volume, fee generation, market share, and user growth with public companies such as CME Group, Robinhood, and other financial platforms.

Hyperliquid gives them a crypto-native version of that model, with an added feature: token demand is directly tied to platform activity.

Fee growth gives HYPE a clearer valuation story

Meanwhile, market observers have also pointed out that Hyperliquid’s fee profile also supports institutional interest.

Market observers have pointed out that the platform accounts for roughly one-third of revenue across the top 10 protocols and captures about 43% of all chain fees, or about $11 million per week.

Most of that revenue comes from perpetual trading fees. Notably, nearly all of it is used to buy back HYPE in the open market, giving the token a direct link to platform activity.

That fee stream gives the Hyperliquid token a more direct economic link to platform activity than many earlier governance assets.

Hougan stated that this structure separates HYPE from many earlier DeFi tokens. First-generation governance tokens often struggled because protocol growth did not always translate into token value. Holders could vote on governance matters, but they often lacked a clear economic connection to fees, cash flow, or buybacks.

According to him, HYPE was launched with a different design. As trading activity rises, buybacks increase. As buybacks increase, investors have a clearer basis for connecting platform growth with token demand.

That gives ETF investors a more direct story to underwrite. They are buying exposure to a trading platform with rising volume, increasing penetration of the non-crypto market, and a buyback mechanism that links revenue to the token.

Hougan has estimated that Hyperliquid’s annual revenue is running around $800 million to $1 billion. At a market capitalization of around $10 billion to $11 billion, that places HYPE at roughly 10 to 14 times the buyback stream.

The comparison is imperfect because token holders do not have the same legal rights as equity holders. Still, it gives investors a framework for valuing HYPE against trading-platform businesses rather than older DeFi governance assets.

That valuation framework helps explain why the ETFs attracted demand so quickly. HYPE offers a high-growth exchange thesis, a token-linked buyback model, and exposure to a platform moving into markets far larger than crypto perpetuals alone.

HYPE outperforms broader crypto market

Against this backdrop, HYPE's market performance has significantly diverged from the broader crypto market.

Data from Tradingview shows that HYPE is now up more than 120% this year and has pushed above $50, its highest level in roughly eight months.

The move has left it ahead of major crypto assets and crypto-linked equities, including Bitcoin, ETH, XRP, Solana, BNB, Dogecoin, and Coinbase, all of which are down by double digits year-to-date.

In fact, HYPE's fully diluted valuation of $54.6 billion has flipped Solana's $54.3 billion.

Blockchain analytics firm Santiment said:

“HYPE’s open interest (which measures the total value of active futures contracts that are still open) has remained extremely high, currently above $1.92B.”

The firm further explained that improved price performance reflects several overlapping catalysts. This includes the recently advanced CLARITY Act, which improves sentiment around the US regulatory outlook for digital assets.

At the same time, Coinbase and Circle named Hyperliquid an official USDC deployer, strengthening the platform’s stablecoin rails. Additionally, the launch of synthetic pre-IPO products added another growth narrative, while ETF inflows gave traditional investors a new access point.

The result is that HYPE is trading more like a growth-linked market infrastructure token than a broad crypto beta asset.

Still, the platform's risks remain substantial.

Hyperliquid is unavailable to US users; its newer non-crypto products are still in their early stages, and synthetic exposure to private companies or real-world markets could invite closer regulatory scrutiny.

The platform also needs to show that demand can persist beyond launch-week ETF activity and high-volatility trading windows.

The post Hyperliquid price crosses $50 as HYPE ETFs outpace Bitcoin on adjusted inflows appeared first on CryptoSlate.

The tariff refund trade has moved from court hypothesis to Treasury accounting, and the macro picture looks more consequential than traders initially framed it, with traders increasingly watching whether the process can improve Bitcoin price's macro outlook.

The US Customs and Border Protection had processed $35.46 billion in tariff refunds as of May 11, including interest, validating 86,874 applications covering 15.1 million entries and finalizing 8.3 million shipments.

Up to $166 billion in IEEPA tariff collections qualify for repayment, money owed to more than 330,000 importers across roughly 53 million entries, with a Supreme Court ruling having stripped the President Donald Trump administration's authority to impose them.

The processed pool already represents about 21% of the potential maximum, and the rest of the eligible volume is large enough to move both reserves and pricing behavior if payments proceed quickly.

Most Bitcoin framing around the refund pool follows a channel in which money leaves the Treasury General Account, bank reserves rise, and risk assets catch a bid.

Fed Governor Christopher Waller's balance sheet explanation confirms the accounting, noting that when the Treasury makes a payment, the Fed debits the TGA and credits the recipient bank's reserve account, so refund disbursements paid from existing cash balances push reserves higher without any new issuance.

The TGA held $758.8 billion on May 15, against reserve balances of approximately $3.10 trillion for the week ended May 13. A full $166 billion payout would equal roughly 5.3% of current reserves.

That liquidity shift matters because Bitcoin liquidity conditions remain tightly linked to reserve balances and Treasury cash movements.

BofA's public tariff commentary says the effective US tariff rate peaked at 11.3% in October 2025, fell to 8.7% in March 2026, and the bank expects it to settle between 6% and 8% by year-end.

The bank reads the lower tariff path as a supply-chain event, in which firms may delay future price increases, and the pricing benefit flows to corporate margins rather than to consumer rebates.

Government refunds flow directly to importers, and the disinflationary channel runs through importers, supply chains, and future CPI prints.

Why both channels need to work for Bitcoin price

Persistent inflation pressure and elevated Fed rates continue to shape the broader outlook for Bitcoin's price rally.

April CPI rose 3.8% year over year, and core CPI rose 2.8%, while energy prices climbed 17.9% and gasoline 28.4%. March PCE rose 3.5% year over year against a core reading of 3.2%.

The Dallas Fed estimated that tariff collections added approximately 0.8 percentage points to 12-month core PCE inflation through March 2026, and that core inflation excluding tariff-related effects would have been 2.3 percentage points.

The EIA expects Brent crude to hold around $106 per barrel in May and June on Strait of Hormuz disruption risk, with global oil inventories set to fall by an average of 8.5 million barrels per day in the second quarter.

Drewry's World Container Index surged 12% to $2,553 per 40-foot container in the week of May 14, driven by higher transpacific and Asia-Europe rates. In that environment, refund cash flows toward energy and freight absorption first.

Bitcoin price was trading near $77,507, below its 200-day moving average of around $82,000, with CoinShares recording $982 million in Bitcoin product outflows during the week of May 18.

The Federal Reserve held rates at 3.50%-3.75% in April, with inflation still elevated, and markets were pricing in extended holds or possible hikes.

A modest disinflation signal could ease the yield constraint at the margin, and the reserve boost from TGA outflows would need that yield backdrop to cooperate, allowing liquidity to flow into risk assets rather than into bond supply.

When both channels fire

If $125 billion to $166 billion in refunds processes quickly and primarily from existing TGA balances, the reserve injection reaches 3% to 5% of current balances, enough to shift reserve optics without requiring new issuance.

At the same time, if importers deploy refunds to absorb higher freight and energy costs and keep price-hike schedules off the calendar, the Dallas Fed's 0.8% tariff contribution to core PCE begins to unwind at the margin.

Even a partial reversal of that contribution, such as the realistic base case of core PCE relief sitting around 5-15 basis points, given that BofA still sees services and energy driving the bulk of inflation, would be enough to ease the yield path that has capped Bitcoin's recovery.

In that scenario, Bitcoin price reclaiming the 200-day moving average near $82,000 becomes a macro-driven trade, one where reserve dynamics and inflation data drive the setup.

The refund pool delivers the Bitcoin argument through two simultaneous conditions: TGA balances falling faster than Treasury rebuilds them through bill issuance, and importers gaining enough margin breathing room to defer scheduled price hikes.

Both outcomes feed into the same Bitcoin price argument of lower yields, stronger Treasury liquidity, and improving risk appetite across risk assets.

In the bear case, refund processing could be slow, legally contested, or unevenly distributed across importers. Firms with the largest refund claims may direct cash toward balance-sheet repair rather than pricing decisions.

If Treasury simultaneously replenishes the TGA through bill issuance, reserve balances stay flat, and the liquidity channel closes. Energy and services inflation can dominate any relief in goods prices and keep core PCE well above the Fed's 2% target through year-end.

In that scenario, Bitcoin stays a yield-sensitive risk asset, the yield constraint from elevated rates holding firm. BofA's 3.1% year-end core PCE forecast already prices in some tariff reversal, so even a fully processed $166 billion refund pool may land as expected.

Markets pricing extended holds or hikes keep financial conditions tighter than the reserve number alone would imply. Bitcoin outflows continue while BTC price holds or loses the $75,000-$78,000 support zone.

The refund pool is large enough to matter, but it gives Bitcoin price a macro tailwind only when reserves rise faster than Treasury replaces them. Importer margin relief slows future price hikes enough to give the Fed room to signal an extended pause.

Tracking CBP's weekly processing totals alongside the TGA balance and core goods inflation prints offers the cleanest real-time read on whether the two-channel thesis is playing out or stalling at the margin.

The post Bitcoin price to get a macro boost as BofA says tariff refunds could cool inflation appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Cardano's next hard fork is arriving at a moment when crypto markets no longer reward blockchains for roadmap promises alone, especially as ADA price performance increasingly tracks real developer and DeFi activity.

Protocol Version 11, known as Van Rossem, is already live on the Preview testnet and targets a mainnet governance action submission on May 29, with enactment timing depending on successful infrastructure readiness.

Intersect submitted the PreProd hard fork governance action on May 8, but the Hard Fork Working Group withheld its ratification recommendation due to readiness concerns about Ogmios, a critical infrastructure dependency that keeps the May 29 mainnet target conditional. The vote also becomes a live test of Cardano governance coordination under the Conway-era framework.

Intersect describes V11 as an intra-era hard fork, with Plutus, ledger, and node enhancements that keep Cardano within the Conway era, while ADA holders maintain full wallet and token access throughout the transition.

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What Cardano V11 actually changes

Plutus is Cardano's smart contract scripting environment, and it gets the deepest set of modifications. The upgrade expands Cardano smart contracts functionality through broader Plutus compatibility and lower execution costs.

V11 makes all built-in functions available across Plutus V1, V2, and V3, adds case expressions for common data types, and introduces new built-ins, including arrays, optimized multi-asset value operations, modular exponentiation, list handling, and BLS12-381 multi-scalar multiplication.

Intersect says these changes collectively improve script performance and reduce execution costs, making contracts easier to run and write in the current era.

CIP-133 proposes efficient multi-scalar multiplication over BLS12-381, V11's most forward-looking addition, a curve widely used in ZK proofs, SNARK systems, and cryptographic signature schemes.

MSM of 10 G1 points consumed 7.74% of a transaction's computational budget in testing, while operations above 129 points exceeded what a single transaction could contain.

By adding MSM as a native built-in, V11 provides Cardano with better infrastructure for applications that rely on expensive elliptic-curve operations, including ZK bridges, privacy-preserving dApps, and cross-chain verification tools.

IOG has already tied this primitive work to its Halo2-Plutus verifier and the Midnight-Cardano ZK bridge, giving the cryptographic additions a visible product roadmap.

Modular exponentiation, covered by CIP-109, adds the second cryptographic layer. The CIP notes that existing on-chain implementations of certain inverses can consume 5% to 9% of the CPU budget on mainnet, and adding modular exponentiation as a built-in reduces both transaction size and execution cost for applications relying on it.

Intersect says V11 enforces VRF key uniqueness at the ledger level, preventing two stake pools from reusing the same VRF key, reducing potential attack vectors, and making enforcement automatic.

Intersect's FAQ confirms that the Cardano mainnet is in governance bootstrapping and that, for V11 governance actions, only the Constitutional Committee and stake pool operators can vote under current rules, with full DRep participation in a later phase.

May 29 becomes a test of SPO and CC coordination, with clean execution serving as the more immediate signal of Cardano's governance maturity.

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Why Cardano's DeFi usage gap is the real benchmark

Cardano DeFi activity remains modest relative to competing smart contract ecosystems.

ADA was trading near $0.249, with a market cap of around $9.2 billion, down roughly 5.8% over the past 7 days and approximately 92% below its all-time high. The distance traces at least partly to Cardano's activity footprint relative to its capitalization.

Cardano carried roughly $129 million in DeFi total value locked (TVL), $46.7 million in stablecoin market cap, and $615,138 in 24-hour DEX volume.

Against those numbers, Solana ran over $6 billion in TVL, $15 billion in stablecoins, and $1.14 billion in 24-hour DEX volume, while Ethereum carried $43.4 billion in DeFi TVL, and $164.8 billion in stablecoins.

Cardano trades at roughly 72x TVL compared to Solana's approximately 8x and Ethereum's roughly 6x, a ratio that leaves little room for disappointment if developer adoption of V11's improvements runs slower than expected.

Ethereum's Layer 2 networks carry approximately $40.3 billion in total secured value according to L2BEAT, with rollups accounting for $33.5 billion.

Cardano's ZK-related additions arrive in a market where ZK infrastructure is already a core competitive narrative, meaning V11 must translate its primitives into developer adoption and application volume.

Where Cardano usage either validates or stalls V11

If PreProd readiness resolves and the May 29 governance action proceeds cleanly, V11 could become the technical foundation for a credible Cardano developer narrative through the second half of 2025.

The bull case runs through three channels, the first being builders adopting the new arrays, cost-model improvements, and MSM built-ins in real contracts. The second is Cardano's stablecoin base and DeFi TVL climbing from a low floor, and the third is DEX volume and active addresses tracking application activity.

At 72x TVL, even modest liquidity inflows would quickly compress the ratio. The ZK and privacy application layer gives V11 a differentiated narrative in a segment still settling its architectural standards.

ADA could re-rate as a credible catch-up trade if those primitives attract developers who see Cardano's cost model as competitive against Ethereum L2s and Solana.

V11 arrives with the usage gap intact, and governance or infrastructure delays compound the problem.

If Ogmios and other dependencies take longer to clear, the mainnet timeline slips, and May 29 passes as a missed coordination signal.

Even with clean mainnet activation, developer adoption of the new primitives takes time, and investors are sorting catalysts quickly. Cardano's TVL and DEX volume show a chain where technical upgrades have preceded sustained usage growth.

If V11 follows that pattern of technically delivered but slow to generate application activity, ADA stays rangebound against faster chains and Ethereum's Layer 2 networks, with the market pricing the upgrade as necessary infrastructure.

The execution test

Van Rossem provides Cardano with a better scripting environment, stronger cryptographic primitives, and a more rigorous stake-pool security model.

The mainnet governance action on or around May 29 will test whether Cardano's decentralized coordination can deliver on a concrete technical commitment, with SPOs and the Constitutional Committee providing the first governance coordination of this scale under bootstrapping rules.

TVL, stablecoin supply, DEX volume, and active contract deployments once V11 activates will determine whether the upgrade earns a market response or files into the record as another well-built feature set awaiting users.

The post Cardano’s May 29 hard fork vote brings ADA’s DeFi weakness into view appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Bitcoin's 2026 macro setup just flipped from waiting for relief to pricing a renewed threat.

As of May 20, 2026, CME FedWatch showed a 54.1% chance of a rate hike at the December 2026 Federal Open Market Committee meeting, against 44.4% odds of no change and only 1.5% odds of easing.

For Bitcoin, the important signal is the direction of travel, not the precision of one futures-market snapshot.

The trade many holders expected was simple: inflation would cool, the Federal Reserve would eventually ease, liquidity would improve, and Bitcoin would benefit from both its hard-money narrative and its new access point inside brokerage accounts through spot ETFs.

That setup now has a more difficult opponent: a rates market that has stopped treating easier money as the obvious next step.

The Fed's latest policy anchor raises the stakes. On April 29, the central bank held its target range at 3.50% to 3.75%.

If December futures are leaning toward a higher target range from there, the market is debating renewed tightening rather than only fewer cuts.

That turns Bitcoin near $77,000 into more than a price level. It becomes a test of whether ETF-era BTC demand can absorb a stronger dollar, higher Treasury yields, and visible fund outflows at the same time.

The macro trapdoor opened under the ETF trade

The rate move is already showing up outside crypto. The Treasury Department's May 19 curve showed the 10-year yield at 4.67%, the 20-year at 5.19%, and the 30-year at 5.18%.

Those levels make cash and government debt more competitive with assets that do not pay income.

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At the same time, Reuters reported that the dollar was heading for its largest weekly gain in more than two months as rising energy prices and Treasury yields fueled Fed hike bets. The report said traders were then pricing more than 55% odds of a December hike.

For Bitcoin, that combination weakens the liquidity case from several sides. A higher 10-year yield raises the hurdle for holding a volatile non-yielding asset.

A stronger dollar tightens global financial conditions. A Fed path that tilts back toward hikes delays the easier-money story that helped support risk appetite.

The current market snapshot shows how large the test has become. CryptoSlate's aggregate market page showed the crypto market near $2.57 trillion, with 24-hour volume around $70.49 billion and BTC dominance at 60.3%.

Its Bitcoin price page shows BTC around $77,300 on May 20, roughly 38.7% below its October 2025 all-time high.

Before spot ETFs, Bitcoin's macro sensitivity was harder to read through traditional portfolio plumbing. Price, derivatives, stablecoin liquidity, and exchange flows all counted, but they did not show the same regulated wrapper behavior that equity and bond investors already understand.

The ETF era changed that. Spot Bitcoin funds gave investors a familiar way to hold BTC, and they also gave the market a daily scoreboard for marginal demand.

That scoreboard has turned red again. Farside Investors showed U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs posting $648.6 million of outflows on May 18 and another $331.1 million on May 19.

Together, that is nearly $980 million leaving the products across two trading days. The move followed earlier CryptoSlate coverage showing $1 billion in weekly exits that ended a six-week inflow streak.

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That flow reversal does not prove that the ETF demand channel has disappeared. It shows that the buyer base has become easier to stress-test.

If higher yields and a stronger dollar keep pulling capital toward defensive or income-producing assets, spot ETF flows can show whether Bitcoin's regulated demand is pausing, rotating out, or merely waiting for the next macro signal.

The distinction is important. A temporary outflow run after a strong inflow period would look like risk management.

A longer stretch of redemptions while Fed hike odds remain elevated would point to something more uncomfortable for bulls: ETF-era demand may be more rate-sensitive than the hard-money narrative alone suggests.

Bitcoin's price map is now part of the Fed story

The $76,000 area has become the near-term support zone to watch, with a break raising the risk of a slide toward $70,000.

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On the upside, the failure to reclaim the $82,000 area has kept the rally from clearing a level that would make the latest weakness look like routine consolidation.

Those levels now carry a macro meaning. A hold near $76,000 to $77,000 while ETF outflows continue and Treasury yields stay elevated would suggest that structural demand is still absorbing pressure.

It would not settle the digital-gold debate, but it would show that buyers are willing to defend BTC even when the rate-cut story is losing force.

A break would send a different signal. It would make the recent ETF outflows look less like tactical hesitation and more like a transmission channel from the bond market into Bitcoin.

In that version of the story, BTC is trading less as a simple inflation hedge and more as a liquidity asset whose marginal buyer is still sensitive to the same forces moving equities, credit, the dollar, and Treasurys.

That is the uncomfortable part of Bitcoin's mainstreaming. The ETF wrapper did not just bring more capital into the market.

It made Bitcoin easier to compare against everything else a portfolio can own. When Treasurys offer higher yields, and the dollar is rising, BTC has to justify its place in portfolios without relying only on the promise of future liquidity relief.

This does not invalidate Bitcoin's longer-term scarcity case. A market worried about inflation, deficits, and sovereign debt can still leave room for a fixed-supply asset.

But that argument is easier to hold over the years than over trading days. In the short run, ETFs, yields, and the dollar are setting the test.

The next signal is whether the outflows become a pattern

One December hike would not automatically break Bitcoin. The more practical warning is that the market has started pricing punishment before many holders had finished positioning for relief.

That makes the next few data points unusually important. If FedWatch pricing stays above the 50% line for a December hike, the macro pressure remains live.

If Treasury yields or the dollar keep rising, the hurdle for BTC exposure stays high. If ETF outflows continue, the institutional demand channel that supported Bitcoin's mainstream adoption will look more cyclical than many bulls expected.

The opposite path is still possible. A retreat in yields, a softer dollar, or a return to ETF inflows would weaken the bearish interpretation quickly.

A reclaim of the $82,000 area would also change the tone, especially if it happened while rate-hike odds remained elevated.

For now, Bitcoin is caught between two claims about what it has become. One says ETF-era BTC is maturing into a macro asset that can survive a hawkish Fed repricing because structural demand is deeper than before.

The other says the new access channel has made Bitcoin more exposed to the same allocation math that governs conventional risk assets.

The market is now testing both claims in real time. A Fed futures curve that has stopped pricing relief and started pricing renewed tightening has turned Bitcoin's $76,000 to $77,000 zone into the place where the ETF-era thesis has to prove its resilience.

The post Bitcoin is left stranded as Fed projections flip to 54% chance of rate hikes this year appeared first on CryptoSlate.

In a move that could fundamentally alter the plumbing of the United States financial ecosystem, President Donald J. Trump has officially signed an executive order titled "Integrating Financial Technology Innovation into Regulatory Frameworks." The directive aims to systematically dismantle the regulatory walls that separate financial technology (fintech) firms and digital asset companies from traditional banking infrastructure.

President Trump Orders Crypto Integration Into US Payment Systems

The executive order explicitly instructs federal financial regulators to update and streamline rules to merge digital assets and innovative technologies into traditional finance. For the digital asset markets, the immediate focus is on eliminating the "gatekeeper" status held by legacy tier-1 commercial banks, which have historically dictated which tech firms could access dollar liquidity and payment rails.

Streamlining Fintech Partnerships and Licensing

Under the first core mandate of the executive order, the heads of all federal financial regulatory agencies—including the SEC, CFTC, and OCC—have exactly 90 days to review existing guidelines, supervisory practices, orders, and no-action letters. The objective is to identify and modify rules that unduly impede fintech firms from entering into operational partnerships with insured depository institutions, broker-dealers, and investment advisers. Furthermore, the order demands a streamlined application process for alternative entities seeking national bank trust charters and federal insurance.

The Federal Reserve Master Account Mandate

The most critical aspect of the order is directed toward the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. The central bank has been requested to deliver a comprehensive evaluation within 120 days regarding the legal, regulatory, and policy frameworks that govern access to Reserve Bank payment accounts and payment services.

Crucially, this evaluation must explore how non-bank financial companies and uninsured depository institutions—specifically those managing digital assets—can directly access the Fedwire system and other central bank payment rails.

Why Fed Payment Access Matters for Crypto

For over a decade, the digital asset industry has suffered from localized "debanking" measures, often referred to by industry executives as Operation Chokepoint 2.0. Because digital asset firms could not gain direct access to Federal Reserve Master Accounts, they were forced to rely on intermediary partner banks under a Banking-as-a-Service (BaaS) model.

This infrastructure configuration introduced notable structural vulnerabilities:

• Counterparty Risk: Crypto companies remained exposed to the solvency and risk tolerances of third-party regional banks.
• Layered Transaction Fees: Multiple intermediaries increased the net cost of settlement for end-users transferring capital between fiat and digital assets.
• Single Points of Failure: Regulatory crackdowns on a handful of fintech-friendly partner banks routinely disrupted liquidity pipelines for the entire digital asset economy.

By evaluating direct access to Reserve Bank payment accounts, the administration is laying the groundwork for digital asset custodians and stablecoin issuers to settle transactions directly at the central bank level. This could effectively harmonize the legal standing of compliant digital asset institutions with that of traditional commercial banks.

The Broader Impact on Digital Assets and Markets

The regulatory restructuring comes at a time when institutional adoption of digital assets is already accelerating. Following the conditional approval of several crypto-related national trust bank charters by the OCC, this executive order provides a clear policy runway for top-tier digital asset service providers.

Institutions utilizing deep liquidity pools across major assets will benefit from more robust fiat on-ramps and off-ramps. Traders checking the Bitcoin price or assessing overall market shifts can expect reduced tracking errors and tighter spreads as institutional settlement bottlenecks disappear. For those seeking safe custody options amid these sweeping systemic upgrades, evaluating secure storage via the hardware wallets comparison remains a recommended baseline.

Furthermore, direct integration into payment channels gives clear utility advantages to compliant stablecoin issuers and settlement networks. This operational framework complements legislative progress in Washington, positioning the domestic digital dollar ecosystem to effectively scale commercial settlement speeds.

A major wave of geopolitical relief is sweeping through global financial markets. According to an official White House Pool Report, US President Donald Trump stated that the United States is currently in the "FINAL STAGES" of negotiations to end the ongoing conflict with Iran. This sudden pivot toward de-escalation comes just days after tense rhetoric left markets bracing for renewed military strikes.

For macro investors and digital asset traders, this news represents a significant reduction in the global risk premium. Historically, severe geopolitical tension in the Middle East drives institutional capital toward defensive postures. A verified breakthrough in these peace talks removes a massive layer of uncertainty, clearing the path for an immediate risk-on rally across both equities and digital assets.

Crypto Markets React as Geopolitical Risk Fades

The cryptocurrency market has historically acted as a highly sensitive gauge for global liquidity and macroeconomic sentiment. Following the distribution of the pool report, digital asset markets showed immediate signs of positive momentum.

With the threat of a widening conflict officially being neutralized at the diplomatic table, capital is expected to rapidly rotate back into high-beta risk assets. Analysts suggest that the timing of this diplomatic breakthrough could not be more ideal for crypto bulls, as market liquidity had been tightly coiled waiting for a clear directional catalyst.

Technical Outlook: Bitcoin Targets $82,000 After $80,000 Reclaim

From a technical perspective, $Bitcoin has been consolidating just under key overhead resistance. The macroeconomic relief provided by the Trump-Iran development is the exact fundamental driver needed to push the asset over the edge.

Key Levels to Watch

• The $80,000 Psychological Barrier: Reclaiming this level convincingly will confirm that the correction is over and that buyers are firmly back in control.
• The $82,000 Target: Once $80,000 flips from resistance into support, the path toward $82,000 is open, backed by short-liquidations and fresh retail momentum.

Traders looking to capitalize on this volatility should keep a close eye on live updates via the CryptoTicker BTC Tracker. Furthermore, evaluating market execution costs across the CryptoTicker Exchange Comparison Matrix will be vital as trading volumes spike in response to the news.

The cryptocurrency market is closely examining its structural footing following a sharp correction from recent all-time highs. After a powerful multi-week expansion that propelled the digital currency past key milestones, the asset encountered aggressive overhead resistance.

For market participants assessing bitcoin news today, the primary focus centers on the daily candlestick chart structure. After breaching the psychological $80,000 mark and posting local highs near $83,000, the daily Bitcoin price underwent a clear multi-day retracement. The premier digital asset is hovering at $77,371, registering a modest intraday green candle (+0.80%) as buyers attempt to stabilize the market at a historically significant technical crossroads.

Bitcoin Daily Chart Analysis: Understanding the Moving Average Breakdown

• The Price Action: BTC/USD hit an apex near $83,000 before breaking down beneath its short-term moving average, bottoming locally at a low of $76,440.
• The Technical Catalyst: A bearish crossover of the short-term Moving Average (MA 9) below the longer-term Moving Average (MA 21), signaling a momentum shift on the daily timeframe.
• The Macro Context: Over $800 million in bullish derivatives positions were liquidated as a strengthening US Dollar Index (DXY), rising 30-year Treasury yields, and unresolved geopolitical tensions in the Middle East chilled risk appetite.

The daily chart reveals that Bitcoin has slipped beneath its 9-day Moving Average (orange line at $78,502) and its 21-day Moving Average (green line at $79,301). This layout defines the current retraction as a structural shift: the moving averages have transitioned from dynamic support levels into immediate overhead resistance hurdles.

BTC Technical Analysis: Historical Consolidation Zones from April to May

Analyzing the asset's trajectory over the past two months showcases a clear technical rhythm marked by three critical consolidation zones highlighted by green circles on the daily chart:

1. The Early April Foundation

In early April, Bitcoin established a definitive macro floor inside the $65,581 demand zone. This area saw massive accumulation, forming a "higher low" structure that laid the groundwork for the subsequent impulse wave.

2. The Early May Launchpad

As April turned into May, Bitcoin aggressively broke upward, using the daily moving averages as a launchpad. A brief consolidation near the mid-$70,000 zone flipped prior resistance into support, sparking the parabolic run that ultimately targeted the major liquidity pocket above $80,000.

3. The Current Mid-May Rejection

After peaking at the $82,800 horizontal resistance line, buyers exhausted their momentum. The daily candles printed a series of lower highs, forcing a breakdown beneath the moving averages. The current consolidation loop near $77,371 mimics past consolidation structures, determining whether bulls can engineer another structural rebound.

Why Is Bitcoin Dropping?

Supporting this structural view is the Relative Strength Index (RSI 14), which sits at a cool 46.96. This reading confirms that the extreme overbought conditions present during the run to $83,000 have been completely erased. The indicator has dipped below the 50-median line, confirming that short-term sellers hold the operational edge, though the asset is far from technically oversold.

This technical cooldown coordinates perfectly with shifted institutional sentiment. Spot Bitcoin ETFs saw over $1 billion in net weekly outflows for the first time since January, as macro traders cut risk profiles due to soaring bond yields and shifting timelines regarding Federal Reserve interest rate paths. Simultaneously, high liquidations on derivative platforms forced over-leveraged longs to unwind, compounding the spot price decline.

Bitcoin Support Levels to Watch: Technical Targets for Bulls and Bears

As Bitcoin fights to reclaim its bullish posture, two distinct scenarios present themselves on the daily timeframe:

• The Bullish Recovery Case: To nullify the immediate bearish momentum, buyers must drive daily candle closes back above the moving average cluster between $78,500 and $79,300. Reclaiming this zone would re-energize a run toward the $82,800 ceiling.
• The Bearish Continuation Case: The absolute line in the sand for the current bullish macro structure rests at the $76,086 horizontal support. A decisive break below this level could accelerate selling pressure, opening the door for a deeper correction toward the low $70,000s.

During periods of heightened daily volatility, executing trades on liquid and fundamentally sound platforms is imperative. Traders can verify fees and pairs using our updated crypto exchange comparison. For long-term market participants looking to insulate their assets from counterparty risk during market shakeouts, utilizing premium cold storage setups remains a gold standard; discover optimal models in our hardware wallets comparison.

As of May 19, 2026, the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization is hovering at $2,116.7, leaving many retail and institutional investors asking a blunt question: Is Ethereum a bad investment?

To understand why sentiment has flipped so aggressively to the bearish side, one only needs to look at the historical comparisons circulating through the trading community. A popular visual contrast highlights Ethereum’s valuation exactly five years ago versus today.

At first glance, a 50% decline over a five-year horizon paints a grim picture for an asset often touted as "ultrasound money." However, evaluating whether an asset is a poor investment requires digging beneath the surface of raw price data into technical indicators, macroeconomic pressures, and on-chain health.

Is ETH Coin a Bad Investment?

Whether $Ethereum is a bad investment depends entirely on your trading time horizon and risk tolerance.

For short-term swing traders, ETH is currently exhibiting a highly volatile, bearish structure that carries significant downside risk toward the $2,000 support level. For long-term investors, however, historical data and on-chain fundamentals suggest this deep correction represents a classic cyclical re-accumulation phase rather than a permanent structural failure.

Ethereum Price Analysis over the Years

Looking at the multi-year ETHUSD chart, the asset has established a wide, macro-scale trading range. Following its peak near $4,946 earlier in the cycle, Ethereum has retraced roughly 57%, landing it back into the critical liquidity pocket between $2,000 and $2,300.

Key Support and Resistance Levels

• Immediate Support ($2,088): This represents the critical 0.5 Fibonacci retracement level. Daily and weekly candle closes must defend this area to prevent a deeper capitulation event.
• Psychological Floor ($2,000): If $2,088 fails to hold, the active impulse wave is highly likely to flush out leveraged long positions down to the flat $2,000 support mark.
• Primary Upside Target ($2,462 - $2,561): A successful defense of the current floor exposes a path to the 0.618 Fibonacci level, which acts as the initial validation gate for a structural trend reversal.

A significant silver lining on daily timeframes is the Gaussian Channel, which has recently flipped from purple (bearish) to green (bullish). Statistically, when ETH sits at the lower boundary of a green Gaussian Channel—similar to the market structure observed in mid-2025—it has historically served as a Launchpad for multi-month rallies.

Macroeconomic Headwinds: Why is Crypto Crashing?

The current downward trajectory of the broader crypto market is not happening in a vacuum. Ethereum’s price drop is heavily correlated with shifting global macroeconomic factors and sudden geopolitical escalations.

1. The Crude Oil Price Shock

The single biggest short-term headwind for Ethereum right now is the price of oil. Since late February, crude oil has surged over 66%, climbing from $65 to over $110 per barrel (Brent crude).

This massive energy spike triggers immediate inflation anxieties across traditional financial systems. When inflation threats loom, central banks—including the Federal Reserve—are forced to keep interest rates elevated for longer. This directly drains liquidity out of high-beta risk assets like technology stocks and cryptocurrencies. The inverse correlation between ETH and crude oil recently hit an all-time high of -0.40, showcasing exactly how macro factors are suppressing token valuations.

2. Geopolitical Tensions & Liquidations

Recent political friction in the Middle East has triggered widespread risk-off behavior. Warnings regarding stalled ceasefire talks led to over $580 million in overnight liquidations across the crypto market, forcing leveraged traders to sell off assets rapidly and driving the spot price of Ethereum straight through its $2,200 support floor.

Divergent On-Chain Data: Price vs. Ecosystem Health

While the spot price looks weak, Ethereum's underlying network fundamentals tell a completely different story. There is a glaring divergence between negative price action and positive ecosystem growth:

• Record Staking Participation: Despite ETH declining significantly year-to-date, the total supply of Ethereum locked in staking contracts has actually increased from 29% to 31%. Long-term holders are opting to earn yield rather than dump their tokens into the market.
• Supply Scarcity: This steady influx of staked capital actively removes millions of ETH from liquid circulation on cryptocurrency exchanges, lowering the structural sell pressure.
• Institutional Tokenization: Major financial institutions continue to deploy tokenized funds on the Ethereum mainnet. Financial analysts like Fundstrat's Tom Lee maintain that tokenization and the rise of decentralized, agentic AI applications will serve as the core structural drivers for Ethereum throughout the remainder of 2026.

Before executing a long-term strategy, investors should review their execution venue via an exchange comparison and ensure assets are secured using offline infrastructure, which you can verify in our comprehensive hardware wallets review.

Ethereum Price Prediction: What Lies Ahead?

The Bearish Case

If crude oil remains above $110 and institutional capital continues to flow out of spot ETH ETFs, the asset will likely lose the $2,088 Fibonacci support line. This will drag the price down to the psychological floor of $2,000, where a broader market panic could temporarily wick the price down to $1,850 to sweep liquidity.

The Bullish Case

If Ethereum successfully prints a daily close above the current $2,116 node and the broader markets stabilize from geopolitical shocks, a relief rally to $2,462 is expected via Elliott Wave analysis. In the longer term, assuming the green Gaussian Channel structure mirrors past cycles, the current $2,100 level could be remembered as a generational macro bottom before an eventual push toward five-digit valuations.

Verdict: Is Ethereum a Bad Investment?

Ethereum is not a bad investment, but it is currently a painful one.

The asset is caught in a macro-driven liquidity squeeze. However, given its structural deflationary mechanics, expanding institutional tokenization use cases, and a rising staking ratio that locks up supply, the token retains some of the strongest risk-adjusted upside potential in the digital asset sector. Investors looking to enter the market should avoid over-leveraged positions and focus on dollar-cost averaging (DCA) around key structural support zones.

Track real-time valuations and historic performance curves directly on our ETH-USD Ticker Page.

Crypto Market Reversal Begins After Heavy Market Pressure

The crypto market is showing early signs of recovery after a sharp risk-off move triggered by geopolitical tension, stock market volatility, and renewed uncertainty around global liquidity. Bitcoin is currently trading near $77,000, with only a slight daily gain, while several altcoins are already turning green.

This creates an important question for traders: is this a real crypto market reversal, or just a temporary relief bounce after the latest sell-off?

The shift comes after President Donald Trump signalled that a potential Iran deal may still be possible, easing some immediate market fears. Reuters reported that Gulf and European markets moved higher after Trump’s comments calmed investor nerves, while oil prices also eased from recent highs.

Why Bitcoin Is Staying Flat Around $77K

Bitcoin remains the key market indicator, but its movement is still limited. According to the latest market data, BTC is trading around $77,000, up only slightly over the past 24 hours. This shows that traders are not fully convinced that the correction is over.

There are a few reasons why Bitcoin is not moving aggressively yet.

First, BTC was hit by macro fear after the market reacted to the geopolitical situation. Second, institutional flows remain a concern after reports of major Bitcoin ETF outflows. Third, Bitcoin is still facing technical pressure, with traders watching whether it can reclaim stronger resistance zones above the current range.

In simple terms, Bitcoin is stabilising, but it has not yet confirmed a strong bullish breakout.

Why Altcoins Are Turning Green Faster Than Bitcoin

While Bitcoin is moving sideways, some altcoins are showing stronger momentum. In the latest market performance, coins like Hyperliquid ($HYPE), Zcash ($ZEC), Bitcoin Cash ($BCH), and Chainlink ($LINK) are outperforming the broader market.

This usually happens when traders start looking for higher-risk, higher-reward opportunities after a market correction. Once Bitcoin stops falling, liquidity can rotate into altcoins that already have strong narratives or technical momentum.

For example, $HYPE is gaining attention due to its role in decentralized derivatives trading. $ZEC is benefiting from renewed interest in privacy-related crypto assets. $BCH is showing strength as one of the older Bitcoin-related coins, while $LINK remains tied to the broader real-world asset and oracle narrative.

This does not mean the full altcoin season has started, but it does show that selective altcoins are reacting faster than Bitcoin.

Crypto Market Reversal or Relief Bounce?

The current crypto market reversal still needs confirmation. Bitcoin holding above the $77K zone is positive, but the market remains fragile. A stronger recovery would likely require BTC to move back above key resistance levels, ETF flows to stabilise, and macro fears to ease further.

For now, the market appears to be in a cautious recovery phase. Altcoins are bouncing, but Bitcoin is not yet leading the move with strong conviction.

This is important because a real crypto market reversal usually needs Bitcoin strength first. If BTC stays flat while altcoins pump too quickly, the move could become unstable. However, if Bitcoin holds its range and gradually moves higher, altcoins could continue to outperform in the short term.

What Traders Should Watch Next

The next major signals are Bitcoin’s ability to hold the $77K area, whether ETH can recover above stronger support levels, and whether high-momentum altcoins can keep their gains.

Traders should also watch macro headlines closely. The latest market reaction shows that crypto is still highly sensitive to geopolitical developments, oil prices, stock market moves, and institutional flows.

If tensions continue to ease, Bitcoin may stabilise further and give altcoins more room to recover. But if new risk-off headlines appear, the crypto market could quickly return to selling pressure.

Conclusion: Altcoins Are Recovering, But Bitcoin Must Confirm the Move

The crypto market is showing signs of recovery, but the move is not fully confirmed yet. Bitcoin remains flat near $77K, while selected altcoins are already turning green and attracting fresh attention.

This makes the current setup interesting but risky. The altcoin rebound suggests that traders are slowly returning to risk assets, but Bitcoin still needs to prove that the market has moved beyond a simple relief bounce.

For now, the crypto market reversal is developing, but confirmation depends on whether Bitcoin can break out of its current range and bring stronger momentum back to the market.

$BTC, $ETH, $HYPE, $ZEC, $BCH, $LINK, $SOL, $XRP

Long-running crypto exchange Blockchain.com has confidentially filed to take its business public via the U.S. markets.

Missouri's top prosecutor accused Bitcoin ATM operator CoinFlip of “knowingly facilitating fraudulent transactions.”

The shutdown is the latest in a wave of crypto and tech cutbacks driven by weaker demand, tighter funding, and AI pivots.

DeFi exploits keep piling up in 2026. Here’s what experts say is behind crypto’s security crisis—and how it can be fixed.

New allegations claim that Jane Street made use of a private backchannel with Terraform insiders before Terra's collapse.

Hoskinson projects Cardano pivot to Bitcoin DeFi to bridge a $9 billion valuation gap amid stagnant TVL and backlash in Japan.

Dogecoin co-creator makes $20 Trillion DOGE Comment, sparking market attention.

XRP saw a substantial uptick in network activity that might become the foundation for a proper recovery.

SpaceX's S-1 filing reveals an unexpected $1.45 billion Bitcoin position ahead of its Nasdaq IPO, while XRP faces a volatility freeze and Dogecoin's founder downplays a $20 trillion target.

XRP whales have continued to stack up the altcoin in large quantities over the last seven days despite its weak price movement amid the bearish market conditions.

Key Highlights

• Shares of Infleqtion soared more than 30% following the announcement that the Trump administration would distribute $2 billion in quantum computing grants among nine firms, with Infleqtion receiving $100 million.
• A separate Letter of Intent was executed between Infleqtion and the Commerce Department’s CHIPS R&D Office for an additional $100 million to support neutral-atom quantum computing development.
• First-quarter fiscal 2026 revenue reached $9.5 million, marking a 14% increase compared to the prior year, while the company raised its annual revenue forecast to a minimum of $40 million.
• With $569 million in cash reserves and zero debt obligations, Infleqtion has recently deployed quantum computing systems to leading research facilities in the United Kingdom and Japan.
• The quantum computing industry rallied broadly on the news, with D-Wave Quantum (QBTS) climbing nearly 25% and Rigetti Computing (RGTI) advancing more than 24%.

Infleqtion (INFQ) completed its public market debut in February via a SPAC transaction and has quickly established itself as a notable player. Before today’s rally, shares were hovering around $14.04, representing a significant discount from the 52-week peak of $27.50.

Infleqtion, Inc., INFQ

The driving force behind today’s move: the Trump administration revealed plans to distribute $2 billion across nine quantum computing companies. Infleqtion’s $100 million allocation places it alongside major recipients including IBM ($1 billion) and GlobalFoundries ($375 million). These agreements also grant the federal government minority ownership positions in the participating companies.

Additionally, Infleqtion entered into a Letter of Intent with the CHIPS Research and Development Office at the Commerce Department for a separate $100 million allocation dedicated to advancing neutral-atom quantum computing capabilities. This funding remains subject to achieving specific milestones and completing necessary due diligence processes.

This represents substantial federal support for a company currently valued at $2.3 billion.

First Quarter Results Support Momentum

Infleqtion’s inaugural earnings release as a publicly traded entity provided investors with tangible evidence of progress. Revenue for the first quarter of fiscal 2026 totaled $9.5 million, representing a 14% year-over-year increase. The loss per share improved to $0.26, compared to $0.41 in the same period last year.

The company maintains a strong balance sheet with $569 million in cash and no debt. Management increased full-year 2026 revenue guidance to a minimum of $40 million.

CEO Matt Kinsella emphasized the company’s progress: “Quantum is gaining momentum as the market shifts toward deployable systems, real applications, and measurable customer value.”

Beyond financial metrics, Infleqtion has achieved several operational milestones. The company delivered enhanced quantum hardware to the International Space Station through a NASA resupply mission. It obtained a $2 million DARPA contract focused on developing software solutions for hybrid quantum computing networks. The company is also collaborating with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory on what could become the first orbital quantum sensor capable of measuring Earth’s gravitational field.

Neutral-Atom Technology Sets Infleqtion Apart

Infleqtion’s fundamental technology is built on neutral atoms — individual atoms suspended using laser arrays and functioning as qubits. This approach has rapidly gained recognition within the quantum computing community, largely following a groundbreaking Harvard University study published in December 2023. That research successfully demonstrated error correction utilizing neutral atoms and expanded encoded qubits from 2–3 to 48 within a single experimental framework.

Joe Fitzsimons, CEO of newly public Horizon Quantum (HQ), described the significance: “They’ve really kind of leapt onto the radar in the last two or three years.”

Infleqtion has successfully deployed both 100-qubit and 500-qubit systems to prominent research organizations in the UK and Japan. The company currently represents the only publicly available investment vehicle offering pure-play exposure to neutral-atom quantum computing technology. Pasqal, a French competitor in the neutral-atom space, is anticipated to pursue a public listing later this year.

The company’s product portfolio extends beyond quantum computers to include quantum sensors, atomic clocks, and its newly launched Quantum Spectrum line — atom-based radio frequency technology intended to serve as alternatives to conventional antenna systems.

The federal grant announcements lifted the entire quantum computing sector. D-Wave Quantum (QBTS) climbed approximately 25%, Rigetti Computing (RGTI) advanced more than 24%, and IonQ (IONQ) increased over 11% in pre-market activity.

The post Infleqtion (INFQ) Stock Jumps 30% on $100M Quantum Computing Grant and Federal Backing appeared first on Blockonomi.

Key Highlights

• Shares of Rigetti Computing climbed more than 23% following the Trump administration’s announcement of a $2 billion quantum computing initiative funded through the CHIPS Act.
• The company entered into a preliminary agreement with the Commerce Department for funding up to $100 million spread across three years.
• Under the agreement terms, the federal government will receive an equity position through newly created shares priced at a 15% markdown.
• D-Wave Quantum secured a similar $100 million funding commitment, part of a broader initiative involving nine quantum technology firms.
• The company reported $569 million in available cash with zero outstanding debt at the close of its latest reporting period.

Shares of Rigetti Computing (RGTI) experienced a dramatic surge exceeding 23% on May 21, 2026, following the Trump administration’s rollout of a $2 billion federal initiative supporting nine quantum computing enterprises — with Rigetti securing a preliminary agreement for as much as $100 million in support.

Rigetti Computing, Inc., RGTI

The capital allocation originates from the CHIPS and Science Act, overseen by the U.S. Department of Commerce. A wholly owned Rigetti subsidiary executed the preliminary, non-binding agreement on May 20, 2026.

The tentative award would support superconducting quantum computing innovation and development activities spanning a three-year period.

Under the proposed terms, the Commerce Department would acquire an ownership interest in Rigetti via freshly issued common shares. These shares would be valued at a 15% reduction from the minimum closing price recorded on designated dates.

This structure introduces potential shareholder dilution concerns. The agreement remains contingent upon finalization of binding contracts.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick stated the capital commitments “will build on our domestic industry, creating thousands of high-paying American jobs while advancing American quantum capabilities.”

Rigetti wasn’t alone in receiving federal support. D-Wave Quantum similarly executed a preliminary agreement for $100 million through the CHIPS Act program, incorporating comparable government equity provisions.

The industry-wide announcement propelled quantum computing equities higher across the board. QBTS shares similarly advanced more than 23% during the trading session.

Focus Areas for Federal Investment

The CHIPS-supported initiatives at Rigetti target critical technical challenges in expanding superconducting quantum architectures. The projects complement Rigetti’s development trajectory focusing on multi-chip processor designs and utility-grade quantum computing platforms.

Earlier this year, Rigetti introduced what the company characterizes as the sector’s most expansive multi-chip quantum system, designated Cepheus-1-108Q.

Rigetti’s valuation currently stands near $5.61 billion. Financial disclosures from the company’s latest quarter revealed $569 million in liquid assets alongside a debt-free balance sheet, positioning it favorably for the upcoming funding negotiations.

The most current Wall Street assessment on RGTI recommends a Buy rating with a $40.00 target price.

Executive to Present at Industry Event

Compounding the day’s positive momentum, CEO Dr. Subodh Kulkarni was slated to participate in a fireside discussion at the Canaccord Genuity Virtual Quantum Symposium on Thursday, May 21, 2026 at 12:00 PM ET.

The forum provided leadership an opportunity to address investors directly regarding the federal funding arrangement and corporate direction.

Broader market conditions also contributed to the upward movement. The S&P 500 climbed 1.1%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average increased 1.3%, and the Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.5% during the same session.

RGTI shares opened pre-market trading up 14.8% before expanding those gains throughout regular trading hours.

Typical daily trading activity for RGTI averages roughly 28.6 million shares. Current technical analysis indicators position the stock at a Hold rating.

The post Rigetti Computing (RGTI) Stock Jumps 23% Following $100M Federal Quantum Funding Agreement appeared first on Blockonomi.

Key Takeaways

• Workday delivers Q1 financial results Thursday evening; Wall Street projects earnings per share of $2.52 with revenue reaching $2.52 billion
• Shares have tumbled approximately 40% since January and declined 55.6% across the trailing twelve months, currently trading near $126.61
• Cantor Fitzgerald reduced its price objective to $160 from $200, pointing to lackluster channel feedback
• Market participants will scrutinize subscription revenue performance, competition from AI infrastructure spending, and results from the Flex Credits pricing strategy
• Eagle Capital Management maintains optimism on Workday, highlighting margin expansion potential and the founder’s CEO comeback as positive factors

Workday (WDAY) unveils its first-quarter financial performance Thursday evening, with expectations sitting at rock bottom.

Workday, Inc., WDAY

Shares ended trading at $126.61 on May 20, marking a decline of approximately 40% since the start of the year and sliding more than 55% across the past year. This represents a dramatic reversal for what was previously viewed as an enterprise software heavyweight.

Wall Street analysts are forecasting earnings of $2.52 per share alongside $2.52 billion in revenue — representing annual increases of 13% and 12.5% respectively. The revenue projection sits marginally beneath the $2.53 billion Workday delivered during the previous quarter.

Earnings per share forecasts have edged higher modestly during the last sixty days, though the adjustment remains slight. Confidence appears limited as Thursday’s announcement approaches.

Analyst consensus remains at Buy for the shares, with an average price objective of $178.16 — suggesting potential gains of roughly 41% from present levels. However, recent analyst activity paints a more reserved picture.

This Tuesday, Cantor Fitzgerald lowered its price target to $160 from $200. While maintaining its Overweight recommendation, the firm noted tempered expectations and disappointing channel intelligence.

At today’s valuation, WDAY commands merely 12.3 times projected fiscal 2027 earnings — representing a substantial markdown compared to the wider software industry.

Critical Factors for Investors

Three elements will determine market response following earnings. Primary among them: subscription revenue momentum and backlog dynamics. With Workday already serving 65% of Fortune 500 enterprises, opportunities for securing additional major corporate clients remain constrained.

Secondly, market watchers need clarity on whether AI infrastructure investments are diverting budgets from conventional HCM and financial management platforms. Cantor Fitzgerald specifically highlighted this concern — certain organizations seem to be reallocating resources toward AI projects rather than enterprise applications like Workday.

Thirdly, analysts seek preliminary indications that the newly introduced “Flex Credits” consumption-based revenue framework can compensate if traditional seat-based income faces headwinds.

Workday has invested approximately $3 billion in AI-focused acquisitions and positions its Illuminate platform as its agentic AI solution. Yet this strategic pivot introduces near-term revenue ambiguity, and investors currently demonstrate limited patience.

During the previous quarter, Workday exceeded revenue expectations and achieved a record 30.6% operating margin. Nevertheless, the stock declined following cautious full-year projections, with investors focusing on decelerating expansion rates.

Institutional Investors Remain Engaged

Eagle Capital Management featured WDAY in its first quarter 2026 shareholder correspondence, arguing the market applies an overly simplistic narrative across the entire software sector.

Eagle emphasizes that Workday currently operates substantially below normalized margin levels, creating expansion opportunities. They additionally view the founder’s return to the chief executive position as a potential driver for reinvigorated innovation.

Eagle’s overarching perspective: the software sector’s recovery will prove more selective than the downturn. While some enterprises will face genuine challenges from AI disruption — others, according to their analysis, will maintain stability or potentially prosper.

Seventy hedge fund portfolios maintained WDAY positions at the conclusion of Q4, increasing from 64 during the preceding quarter. This uptick indicates certain institutional capital continues identifying value at current price levels.

Workday’s market capitalization currently stands at approximately $30.47 billion. Thursday’s earnings call will reveal whether the narrative is finding footing or remains under continued strain.

The post Workday (WDAY) Q1 Earnings Preview: Can the Fallen Software Giant Rebound? appeared first on Blockonomi.

Key Takeaways

• Zoom’s fiscal Q1 earnings release scheduled for Thursday, May 21 after market hours
• Wall Street consensus calls for $1.42 earnings per share with revenue reaching $1.22 billion, reflecting 4.3% annual growth
• Shares advanced 2.1% Wednesday, closing at $99.42 ahead of the quarterly report
• Recent analyst moves include Baird’s upgrade to $105 and Citigroup’s increase to $122
• Street consensus target of $98.52 suggests minimal potential appreciation from present valuation

Zoom Communications (ZM) is set to unveil its fiscal first-quarter financial performance following Thursday’s market close, with investors paying careful attention. Shares finished Wednesday’s trading session at $99.42, marking a 2.1% daily advance.

Zoom Communications, Inc., ZM

The Street anticipates earnings of $1.42 per share alongside revenue totaling $1.22 billion. This revenue figure represents a year-over-year increase of 4.3%, though earnings per share would show a modest decline compared to the $1.43 reported during the comparable quarter last year.

Notably, both metrics would represent sequential decreases from the previous quarter’s $1.44 earnings per share and $1.25 billion revenue performance.

Zoom’s explosive pandemic-driven expansion phase has concluded. The critical question facing the company is whether its emerging product portfolio can compensate for slowing core growth.

Recent Analyst Price Target Adjustments

Several Wall Street analysts updated their positions before the earnings announcement. William Power from Baird elevated his price objective from $95 to $105 on May 19, expressing confidence in Zoom’s enterprise platform growth trajectory. Power maintains an 83% accuracy record, establishing him as a credible analyst covering the stock.

Citigroup’s Tyler Radke demonstrated greater optimism, increasing his target from $106 to $122 on May 15 while retaining a Buy recommendation. Needham analyst Joshua Reilly maintained his Buy rating with a $100 price objective.

Some analysts remain less convinced. Patrick Walravens at Citizens maintained a Market Perform stance, while Bernstein’s Peter Weed previously reduced his target from $90 to $88 in February.

The aggregate Wall Street view shows 16 of 29 analysts endorsing a Buy rating, though the consensus price target of $98.52 suggests minimal upside potential from current trading levels. This reflects somewhat conflicting sentiment.

Earnings per share projections have remained relatively stable throughout the past two months. The analyst community appears to be in a wait-and-see mode before the release.

Critical Factors in Thursday’s Report

The flagship video conferencing platform has reached maturity. Revenue expansion now registers in the low-to-mid single-digit range, requiring newer product lines to shoulder greater growth responsibilities.

Zoom Phone has surpassed 10 million seats while the Contact Center solution continues its market development phase. Market participants will look for sustained enterprise traction — the company added 105 customers with annual spending exceeding $100,000 in the previous quarter.

AI Companion capabilities are also drawing attention. Zoom has embraced artificial intelligence features, though questions persist about whether these innovations are generating meaningful upgrades or merely maintaining competitive parity with rivals such as Microsoft Teams.

Forward guidance will probably be the most consequential element of Thursday’s conference call. In the February report, Zoom exceeded revenue expectations at $1.25 billion but disappointed on earnings at $1.44 versus the $1.49 consensus forecast. Full-year earnings guidance also underwhelmed investor expectations.

With a forward price-to-earnings ratio of 16.09 and gross margins approaching 77%, the profitability narrative remains robust. The company’s market capitalization stands at $29.3 billion.

Russell Dicker assumed the role of chief product officer on April 15. His inaugural earnings call in this capacity adds another dimension of interest to Thursday’s proceedings.

The post Zoom (ZM) Stock Gains 2% Before Q1 Earnings: Wall Street’s Expectations appeared first on Blockonomi.

Key Takeaways

• On May 21, 2026, D-Wave Quantum entered into a Letter of Intent with the U.S. Department of Commerce for $100 million in potential CHIPS Act funding.
• Shares of QBTS climbed more than 22% following the announcement, building on a 17.9% gain during pre-market hours.
• This allocation represents part of a $2 billion quantum computing initiative by the Trump administration spanning nine companies, with IBM capturing $1 billion.
• D-Wave will issue common stock to the U.S. Department of Commerce equivalent to the funding amount received.
• The capital is earmarked for developing a 100,000-qubit annealing system and a 10,000-qubit gate-model system across D-Wave’s research facilities in the U.S. and Canada.

Shares of D-Wave Quantum (QBTS) experienced significant upward momentum following the company’s disclosure of a Letter of Intent with the U.S. Department of Commerce. The proposed agreement outlines $100 million in funding through the CHIPS and Science Act, sending the stock up more than 22%.

D-Wave Quantum Inc., QBTS

Prior to market open, QBTS shares had already climbed 17.9% in pre-market activity as news of the federal funding proposal circulated among investors.

The proposed capital injection would support D-Wave’s research and development operations in Florida, Connecticut, and Canada. The primary objective centers on accelerating the company’s roadmap for next-generation quantum computing systems.

More specifically, D-Wave aims to construct a 100,000-qubit annealing system alongside a 10,000-qubit gate-model system. Each of these milestones would mark substantial advancements beyond current quantum computing capabilities.

Investors should recognize an important caveat: the agreement remains preliminary. The funding requires finalized award documentation before it becomes binding. At this stage, the LOI represents a non-binding commitment rather than a guaranteed distribution.

Under the proposed terms, the U.S. Department of Commerce would acquire D-Wave common stock valued at the funding amount. This equity arrangement will dilute current shareholders when the shares are ultimately issued.

A Component of Washington’s Quantum Computing Strategy

D-Wave represents just one beneficiary in a much larger federal initiative. The company’s $100 million allocation fits within a comprehensive $2 billion quantum computing investment package from the Trump administration covering nine enterprises.

IBM secured the largest share at $1 billion. GlobalFoundries is positioned to receive $375 million. Both Rigetti Computing and Infleqtion are allocated $100 million each, matching D-Wave’s amount. Emerging player Diraq stands to receive $38 million.

The industry-wide nature of these awards triggered positive momentum across quantum computing stocks, with multiple companies experiencing gains alongside QBTS.

Broader market conditions also contributed favorable tailwinds. During the announcement session, the S&P 500 advanced 1.1%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1.3%, and the Nasdaq Composite increased 1.5%, creating a supportive environment for high-growth technology stocks.

Intended Use of Capital

D-Wave’s annealing quantum computers currently have commercial availability. The gate-model architecture represents emerging technology anticipated to achieve commercial readiness once it reaches 10,000 physical qubits.

The organization presently supports over 100 commercial, government, and research clients through both on-site installations and its Leap cloud platform.

D-Wave submitted a Form 8-K filing with the SEC on the announcement date. Additionally, a Form 144 filing appeared on May 20, signaling potential insider sales of restricted securities. The company has historically described comparable filings as standard tax-related transactions rather than voluntary selling by executives.

The latest analyst coverage on QBTS includes a Buy recommendation with a $43.00 price objective. The company’s current market capitalization sits at approximately $7.14 billion.

The post D-Wave Quantum (QBTS) Soars 22% on $100M CHIPS Act Funding Agreement appeared first on Blockonomi.

Real Technologies (parent company of REAL Finance) has executed its first securities-tokenization agreement, marking the initial operational use of its infrastructure.

The deal activates a committed institutional pipeline exceeding $100 million in client assets.

The Details of the Initiative

The deal was signed with Factori AD, an EU- regulated investment broker that will route assets through REAL Finance’s tokenization infrastructure. Additionally, it will oversee OTC execution, custody arrangements, and all regulatory processes, including KYC and AML compliance.

Tokenization itself will take place on an EVM-compatible blockchain ahead of the planned launch of REAL Finance’s dedicated Layer 1 mainnet. Facilitating the initial transaction on existing EVM rails will enable the team to validate the operational workforce before migrating activity to its own network.

According to the plan, the pilot will test each stage of the process, including sourcing a regulated instrument, executing it via licensed channels, and later issuing the tokenized representation on-chain.

What’s important is that REAL Finance focuses on tokenizing real securities rather than synthetic exposure. Eligible instruments include public and private shares, derivatives, and bonds. In this setup, licensed brokers remain responsible for all regulatory obligations, whereas the company provides the on-chain settlement and transparency layer.

The first transaction involves equity derivatives of Alpha Bulgaria AD, specifically 5 million warrants currently valued at roughly €2.75 each. The entity is a publicly traded investment company listed on the Bulgarian Stock Exchange under the ticker ALFB and is headquartered in the capital, Sofia. International securities will be held at the Bank of New York, while Bulgarian assets will remain with the Central Depository in Bulgaria. 

REAL Finance said the process represents the first tranche of a broader pipeline. Factori AD has committed to directing more than $100 million in additional client assets for tokenization once the initial workflow is validated. Running the pilot before the mainnet launch is meant to demonstrate that the system works under real-world conditions and can handle higher volumes later on.

The Boss’s Take on the Matter

Speaking on the collaboration was Ivo Grigorov (Chief Executive Officer, REAL Technologies), who believes that signing this deal shows that REAL’s tokenization capabilities are operational and under contract with real securities and a regulated broker.

“The pilot allows us to validate the full model before we scale to service out multi0nine-figure committment asseets pipeline,” he added.

Valenting Dimitrov (Chief Operating Officer, REAL Technologie) also chipped in, saying:

“We designed the architecture around licensed custody, full compliance, and genuine instruments. This first executed deal, together with the committed flow, confirms institutional demand for the infrastructure we are building.”

The post REAL Finance Finalizes First Securities Tokenization Deal, Unlocking Over $100 Million in Institutional Demand appeared first on CryptoPotato.

XRP is trading at $1.37 as May draws toward its final week, having erased every gain from what briefly looked like the most promising technical setup of the corrective cycle. The breakout above the 100-day MA on the USDT chart has failed to hold, and a lower high has formed on the BTC pair. The levels that looked like support last week are now the targets that bulls need to reclaim just to get back to where they started.

Ripple Price Analysis: The USDT Pair

The USDT pair’s daily timeframe setup looked compelling last week. The asset was pressing the upper boundary of the long-term descending channel and holding above the 100-day moving average at around $1.45, with an RSI climbing toward 65.

Yet, this move has played out as a textbook rejection. XRP failed to post a single candle close above the channel, and the subsequent sell-off has brought the price back to $1.37. The 100-day MA, which was seen as dynamic support just days ago, is now the nearby overhead resistance at $1.40, sitting just below the descending channel ceiling.

The RSI has faded from 65 back to the 40s, wiping out the momentum that made the setup optimistic. The $1.20 demand zone below should now be watched as the potential floor, while a recovery back above $1.45 and the 100-day MA remains the minimum requirement to rebuild any constructive case. Yet, with the broader altcoin market breaking down, the path of least resistance points toward another test of support rather than another attempt at resistance.

The BTC Pair

The brief breakout above 1,800 sats that appeared on the BTC pair last week has proven to be a fakeout. XRP/BTC has slipped back to around 1,770 sats, creating a lower high at around 1,800-1,900 sats. The RSI, which had recovered from the extreme low of ~25 all the way to above 50 while demonstrating a bullish divergence, has also faded back toward 40. The relief bounce is losing energy before it accomplishes anything structurally meaningful.

The failed reclaim of 1,800 sats is the defining development on this pair. It confirms that the oversold bounce was corrective rather than structural, and that the broader downtrend in the ratio remains intact. The 100-day moving average at ~1,900 sats and the 200-day moving average at ~2,100 sats continue to decline well above, offering no nearby reference for a recovery.

Below, the lower channel boundary near 1,550 sats and the 1,500 sat horizontal support band remain the next downside targets if the current level gives way. With altcoin sentiment deteriorating across the board, there is little in the near-term macro picture to suggest that pressure is about to ease.

The post Ripple Price Analysis: Where’s XRP Going Next After Latest Rejection at the 100-Day MA? appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Ethereum is trading at $2.1k, and the chart tells a story that three months of cautious optimism can no longer paper over. The ascending channel that has provided the structural backbone for every bullish argument since the February bottom is getting broken to the downside.

Moreover, the US institutional bid that supported the recovery through March and April has quietly retreated to its most negative reading since the capitulation lows. Therefore, ETH is seemingly not pulling back. It is breaking down.

Ethereum Price Analysis: The Daily Chart

The ascending daily channel from the February low is failing. The asset is breaking below its lower boundary for the first time since the recovery began, and the 100-day moving average, which sat at approximately $2.2k and is still nearby, has been lost on a daily closing basis. The RSI has also declined below 40. This is its weakest daily reading since February’s capitulation, with no sign of a momentum floor forming yet.

The $1.8k demand zone is now the primary downside reference, having held as the absolute floor during February’s sell-off. Above, the lost 100-day moving average at the $2.2k zone now acts as immediate resistance. Reclaiming the $2.2k area on a sustained daily close is the minimum requirement to suggest this breakdown is a fakeout rather than a real structural shift.

ETH/USDT 4-Hour Chart

On the 4-hour timeframe, the inner symmetrical triangle has resolved fully to the downside, taking the $2.2k support zone with it, which was a level that held on two prior occasions. The price is now sitting directly on the lower zone at $2.05k–$2.1k, which aligns almost precisely with the daily ascending channel’s lower boundary.

The 4-hour RSI has bounced modestly from the oversold low reached during the sharpest leg of the recent sell-off, and is recovering to the 40s. This should be viewed as a dead cat bounce until proven otherwise.

The current area at $2k-$2.1k is the last meaningful support before $1.8k. A 4-hour close below this area removes the final technical argument for the ascending channel structure and opens a direct path to the $1.8k demand zone below.

On the other hand, a sustained hold and recovery back above $2.2k would be the first sign that the breakdown is being absorbed. However, given the momentum behind this move, that recovery needs to happen quickly.

Sentiment Analysis

The Coinbase Premium Index has fallen to -0.09, which is the deepest negative reading since February’s capitulation low, and a sharp reversal from the slightly positive territory that characterized the March and April recovery. US buyers returned during the recovery (+0.02 to +0.08), stepped back at $2.4k resistance (premium faded to zero in early May), and have now actively retreated as the breakdown accelerated (-0.09).

The -0.09 reading is not yet at the -0.20 extreme seen at the February bottom, which means there is further room for US institutional selling to intensify if the price continues lower. What it confirms is that the cohort of buyers who provided the demand floor through the recovery is not stepping in to defend current levels. They are absent or net selling.

Without the Coinbase premium returning to sustained positive territory, any bounce from the $2.05k–2.1k support is likely to be sold rather than built upon, and the structural requirement for a genuine recovery is a reclaim of $2.2k with a positive Coinbase premium. Unless this happens, the bullish case has no credibility to stand on.

The post Ethereum Price Analysis: ETH Is Not Simply Pulling Back, It’s Breaking Down appeared first on CryptoPotato.

[PRESS RELEASE – Kingstown, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, May 21st, 2026]

NOW Wallet, a non-custodial crypto wallet focused on security, multi-chain access, and seamless DeFi experience, now has direct access to perpetual futures and prediction markets built into the app. That means platforms like Hyperliquid, Aster, Lighter, GMX, and dYdX for perps trading, and Polymarket and PancakeSwap for prediction markets — all accessible without leaving the wallet.

Perps and prediction markets

Perpetual futures (“perps”) allow users to take positions on cryptocurrency price movements without holding the underlying asset. These instruments support features such as leverage, short positioning, and continuous trading, which have contributed to their widespread use in digital asset markets.

Prediction markets operate on a different model. Rather than tracking asset prices, they reflect the perceived likelihood of specific outcomes. Participants take positions on whether an event will occur, such as a cryptocurrency reaching a certain price level, a macroeconomic development, or other predefined scenarios. Market prices adjust as expectations change, and positions are resolved once the outcome is determined.

Both segments have expanded within decentralized finance (DeFi) in recent years.

Bring this into the wallet

Until now, accessing advanced DeFi trading tools meant a fragmented workflow — separate accounts on separate platforms, funds split across multiple places, constant switching between apps and browser tabs. It worked, but it wasn’t clean.

This update brings that access into one place. Users can connect to supported protocols directly through their wallet, fund trading balances, sign transactions, and manage positions — all while keeping self-custody of their assets. No centralised exchange accounts required.

The aim is straightforward: make on-chain trading more direct, less fragmented, and actually usable on mobile.

Part of a broader shift in crypto UX

Wallets started as storage tools. That’s changing. As more users engage with swaps, staking, trading, and prediction markets at the same time, the expectation has shifted — a wallet should be the access layer for all of it, not just a place to park funds between sessions.

Adding perps and prediction markets is part of that direction for NOW Wallet.

About NOW Wallet

NOW Wallet is a non-custodial multi-chain crypto wallet supporting storage, swaps, staking, fiat purchases, and dApp access across 70+ blockchain networks.

The feature is available now in the latest version of NOW Wallet.

Users can download NOW Wallet: https://walletnow.app/

The post Perps and Prediction Markets Are Now Available in NOW Wallet appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Two newly launched US-based exchange-traded funds tied to Hyperliquid’s HYPE token are seeing strong early momentum, as trading activity continues to rise since their market debut.

According to SoSoValue data, 21Shares’ THYP and Bitwise Asset Management’s BHYP have generated nearly $41 million in combined trading volume since launching earlier this month.

Rare Momentum Behind Hyperliquid ETFs

Weighing in on the sharp growth in activity, Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas said that both funds recorded another 50% increase in trading volume on Wednesday alone. In a post on X, Balchunas described the launches as “perfectly timed,” and added that most major asset classes, including stocks, bonds, gold, Bitcoin, and the broader crypto market, have declined recently. HYPE, on the other hand, has climbed 37% since THYP launched on May 12.

According to Balchunas, the steady increase in trading activity during the funds’ first week is “rare” for new ETFs, which often see initial excitement fade quickly after launch. 21Shares became the first issuer to launch a HYPE-linked ETF in the US with THYP on May 12, attracting $1.2 million in net inflows. BHYP followed on May 14 with $750,000 in net inflows and has continued trending upward since launch.

Grayscale Investments also entered the race for a Hyperliquid-linked investment product after filing for a HYPE ETF in March. The proposed fund is still under review by US regulators. Meanwhile, blockchain analytics platform Lookonchain reported that wallets linked to Grayscale bought and staked 510,387 HYPE tokens worth about $24.95 million over the past week.

A wallet linked to Galaxy Digital also bought 158,100 HYPE, which is worth around $8.8 million.

Hyperliquid Growth Trajectory

Zooming out, HYPE has gained nearly 40% so far this month, pushing its year-to-date returns to almost 123%. Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan recently described the platform as one of the most important crypto projects to emerge in recent years. He also believes that investors still underestimate both its long-term impact and the value of the HYPE token.

Hougan said Hyperliquid has evolved beyond a crypto perpetual futures exchange into a financial “super-app” which offers exposure to commodities, S&P 500 futures, pre-IPO stocks, and prediction markets. The exec added that nearly half of the platform’s trading volume now comes from non-crypto assets and could rise further by the end of the year.

The post HYPE ETFs See Rare First-Week Surge as Eric Balchunas Calls Launch Timing ‘Perfect’ appeared first on CryptoPotato.