The outcome of Trump and Netanyahu's talks could reshape Middle East diplomacy, impacting global markets and geopolitical stability.

The post Trump to speak with Israeli PM Netanyahu on Iran deal Saturday appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

A US-Iran peace deal could stabilize a volatile region, impacting global oil markets and setting a precedent for future diplomatic negotiations.

The post US and Iran set to finalize peace deal by Sunday afternoon appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

The settlement underscores the financial risks law firms face when associated with fraudulent clients, impacting legal industry practices.

The post Fenwick & West agrees to pay $54M to settle FTX fraud claims appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

The potential US-Iran agreement could reshape geopolitical dynamics, impacting global markets and highlighting crypto's role in international trade.

The post Iran moves closer to agreement with US as Trump pauses military action, crypto markets eye de-escalation appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

The potential US-Iran nuclear deal could reshape geopolitical dynamics, impacting global energy markets and the regulatory landscape for digital assets.

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Bitcoin Magazine

SEC Delaying Plan to Allow Crypto Versions of US Stocks: Report

The Securities and Exchange Commission has pumped the brakes on its highly anticipated “innovation exemption” for tokenized stocks, pushing back the release of the framework as it weighs input from traditional stock exchanges and other market participants wary of the plan’s sweeping implications, according to Bloomberg reporting.

The SEC, under Chair Paul Atkins, was preparing to release the so-called innovation exemption as soon as this week.

The framework would create a new regulatory pathway allowing digital tokens linked to publicly traded company shares to trade on decentralized crypto platforms — 24 hours a day, seven days a week — bypassing the constraints of traditional stock exchanges. 

The exemption is part of Atkins’ broader “Project Crypto” initiative, which aims to relax existing crypto restrictions in line with the Trump administration’s pro-crypto agenda.

The SEC was reportedly leaning toward permitting third-party tokens — digital representations of stocks like Apple, Nvidia, or Tesla — to be issued and traded without the consent of the underlying public companies. 

This means outside actors, not the issuers themselves, could create blockchain-based wrappers tracking a company’s share price and list them on decentralized finance (DeFi) platforms.

These tokens may not carry traditional shareholder rights like voting or dividends, though the SEC is reportedly considering requiring platforms to provide those rights or risk delisting.

Why the SEC is delaying

The timing of the exemption’s release has been pushed back as the agency weighs feedback from stock-exchange officials and other market participants who met with SEC staff in recent days. 

The World Federation of Exchanges — whose members include Nasdaq, Cboe, and CME Group — previously warned the SEC in a November 2025 letter that such exemptions could “dilute” existing investor protections and “distort” competition by giving crypto exchanges a regulatory shortcut unavailable to traditional markets. 

The group cautioned that granting legitimacy to tokenized stocks before full compliance implementation would “undoubtedly have negative — potentially acute — consequences” for U.S. markets.

The tokenization debate is unfolding against a backdrop of competing visions for the future of U.S. equity markets. Nasdaq, which received SEC approval in March 2026 for its own tokenized securities proposal, is pursuing a different model: one that keeps all trades on-exchange with full shareholder rights intact, built on the DTCC’s enterprise blockchain. 

The innovation exemption, by contrast, would sanction a parallel, crypto-native market running alongside the existing system — potentially fragmenting liquidity across dozens of third-party token issuers for the same underlying stock.

This post SEC Delaying Plan to Allow Crypto Versions of US Stocks: Report first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin Magazine

A Freshman Congressman from Nashville Wants to Make the National Bitcoin Reserve Permanent

When Rep. Matt Van Epps helped lead the American Reserve Modernization Act of 2026 this week, he framed the bill not as an abstract national security measure — but as a direct extension of what he sees happening in his own backyard.

“Nashville is one of the nation’s leading Bitcoin hubs,” Van Epps said in a statement to Bitcoin Magazine, pointing to Bitcoin Park, the city’s growing digital asset community, and the annual Bitcoin conference, set to return to Nashville in 2027. 

“Nashville is quickly emerging as one of the nation’s leading Bitcoin hubs, with a growing digital asset community, institutions like Bitcoin Park, and the annual Bitcoin conference, which is scheduled to come back to Nashville in 2027,” Van Epps said. “Supporting this bill means supporting the financial innovation taking place in my district.” 

For the freshman congressman from Tennessee’s 7th District — a West Point graduate and combat helicopter pilot who won his seat in a December 2025 special election — this is personal. The bill is, in his telling, a statement about what his district already represents.

Van Epps co-led the legislation alongside Rep. Nick Begich (R-AK), who introduced the American Reserve Modernization Act of 2026, known as ARMA. The bill would codify President Trump’s March 2025 executive order establishing a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve — giving it the force of statute rather than leaving it to the discretion of future administrations. 

The reserve would sit inside the U.S. Department of the Treasury and hold BTC seized through federal law enforcement forfeitures and civil penalties.

Van Epps’ central argument for the legislation is fiscal. “With a national debt of $39 trillion, this is an essential piece of legislation,” he said. Under ARMA, any future sale of Bitcoin from the reserve would be permitted for only one purpose: reducing the national debt. No transfers to other government programs, no discretionary spending — just debt reduction. The reserve, he stressed, “would be established without cost to American taxpayers”.

The bill also draws a firm line on property rights. Van Epps and Begich included language affirming that the federal government cannot interfere with an individual’s right to own, transfer, or self-custody digital assets — a provision that reflects the libertarian undertow running through much of the pro-Bitcoin caucus in Congress.

Van Epps: Bitcoin can fix some problems in the U.S. 

For Van Epps, the argument goes beyond portfolio management. He described the reserve as something with the potential to “solve major problems” for the country, with the national debt chief among them. Bitcoin’s fixed supply and its appreciation over time, in his view, give the United States a tool that gold certificates and traditional reserves cannot match.

The bill requires BTC in the reserve to be held for a minimum of 20 years — a provision designed to take the asset out of short-term political calculations and treat it as a generational balance sheet decision. 

Quarterly public Proof of Reserve reports and independent third-party audits would accompany the reserve, adding a layer of statutory transparency that the existing executive order lacks.

Eighteen original co-sponsors signed on, stretching across nine states. The Senate remains the harder terrain — competing crypto legislation is moving through committee there, and the path to 60 votes is unclear. 

This post A Freshman Congressman from Nashville Wants to Make the National Bitcoin Reserve Permanent first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin Magazine

Trump Media (DJT) Moves to Sell Bitcoin as Losses Reach $455 Million

Trump Media & Technology Group (Nasdaq: DJT), the parent company of the Truth Social platform, has transferred another 2,650 Bitcoin worth approximately $205 million to the exchange Crypto.com, a move widely interpreted as preparation for a potential sale of the company’s digital asset holdings.

The transfer, confirmed by on-chain data tracked by blockchain analytics firm Lookonchain, occurred in two transactions between roughly 1:22 a.m. and 2:22 a.m. GMT on May 22, originating from wallets labeled as Trump Media accounts by Arkham Intelligence.

The company has yet to issue any official statement confirming or denying the intent behind the move.

Trump Media originally purchased 11,542 BTC for approximately $1.37 billion at an average acquisition price of $118,522 per coin. 

With Bitcoin trading around $77,000 to $77,300 at the time of the transfer — well below that cost basis — the company is now estimated to be sitting on roughly $455 million in unrealized losses on its cryptocurrency holdings. Following the transaction, Trump Media’s visible on-chain holdings stand at an estimated 6,889 to 6,892 BTC, valued at approximately $533 million at current prices.

This is not the first time the company has moved Bitcoin off its books. 

Four months ago, Trump Media shifted 2,000 BTC valued at roughly $175 million — at the time, with Bitcoin trading near $87,378 — in what the company later characterized as a collateral movement.

Trump bitcoin ETF withdrawal

The latest crypto transfer comes just days after Trump Media withdrew its applications for a spot Bitcoin ETF and a combined Bitcoin-Ethereum ETF from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on May 20. 

The company’s fund sponsor, Yorkville America, filed for withdrawal, citing a decision not to pursue the public offering “at this time.” 

ETF analysts noted that the decision appeared driven less by regulatory headwinds and more by competition from established players like BlackRock and Morgan Stanley, which now dominate what has become a $57 billion Bitcoin ETF market.

The Bitcoin strategy has coincided with a dramatic deterioration in Trump Media’s financials. In its first-quarter 2026 earnings report, the company posted a net loss of $405.9 million on just $871,200 in revenue — a staggering widening from a $31.7 million loss during the same period a year earlier. The bulk of those losses, approximately $368.7 million, stemmed from non-cash unrealized losses on digital assets and equity securities.

DJT shares have fallen roughly 60% over the past 12 months and were trading around $7.95 to $8.15 on Thursday and Friday. 

The company, which was founded in 2021 and is headquartered in Sarasota, Florida, has struggled to build meaningful advertising revenue even as it has aggressively bet on crypto as a core pillar of its financial strategy.

This post Trump Media (DJT) Moves to Sell Bitcoin as Losses Reach $455 Million first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin Magazine

Happy Bitcoin Pizza Day, The 16th Anniversary of Laszlo Hanyecz Paying 10,000 BTC For Two Papa John’s Pies

Sixteen years ago today, a Florida programmer named Laszlo Hanyecz paid 10,000 Bitcoin for two large Papa John’s pizzas. At the time, those coins were worth roughly $41. On this Pizza Day, they are worth $777.87 million — down $328 million from last year’s anniversary price. 

Bitcoin Pizza Day, observed each May 22, marks the first commercial transaction using Bitcoin — the moment a digital currency stopped being a theoretical experiment and became a medium of exchange for real goods.

On May 18, 2010, Hanyecz posted on the BitcoinTalk forum with a straightforward offer: 10,000 BTC to anyone willing to order him two pizzas. Some forum users were skeptical — one pointed out he could sell the coins for $41 in cash. 

Hanyecz’s reply was simple: “I just think it would be interesting if I could say that I paid for a pizza in Bitcoins”. Four days later, a then-19-year-old forum user named Jeremy Sturdivant accepted, ordered the pies from Papa John’s, and collected 10,000 BTC via manual transfer. Bitcoin had its first exchange rate against a consumer good.

The $328 million bitcoin haircut

Every May 22, that fixed 10,000 BTC gets revalued at the day’s spot price — the cleanest annual benchmark crypto has. In 2024, the stack was worth $674 million. In 2025, it hit a record $1.106 billion, with Bitcoin trading at $110,568 on that day’s all-time high. Today, with Bitcoin near $77,300, the stack sits at $777.87 million — down 29.7% from last year.

The decline began on October 6, 2025, when Bitcoin reached a fresh all-time high of $126,000. Four days later, President Donald Trump announced 100% tariffs on Chinese imports and export controls on critical U.S. software. 

Within hours, total crypto market capitalization fell nearly $200 billion in a single session, Bitcoin dropped from $122,000 to $107,000, and approximately $19 billion in leveraged positions were liquidated — the largest single-day liquidation event in crypto history.

The worst start since 2018

Q1 2026 became Bitcoin’s third-worst opening quarter on record, closing down 23.2%, with spot Bitcoin ETFs bleeding $4.5 billion in outflows across the first eight weeks of the year. Iran tensions compounded the pressure, as U.S.-Israeli airstrikes on February 28 triggered a sharp risk-off rotation, trapping Bitcoin between $60,000 and $75,000 for much of March. 

Q2 has brought partial recovery — Bitcoin has climbed roughly 14% over the quarter — but the broader crypto market cap sits at $2.65 trillion today, down from $2.9 trillion just one week ago.

This post Happy Bitcoin Pizza Day, The 16th Anniversary of Laszlo Hanyecz Paying 10,000 BTC For Two Papa John’s Pies first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin Magazine

Mark Cuban Sells Most of His Bitcoin, Calls It a Failed Hedge

Billionaire investor Mark Cuban has parted with most of his Bitcoin holdings, saying the asset failed to deliver on its core promise as a hedge against fiat currency weakness and geopolitical turmoil.

Cuban made the remarks during an interview with Front Office Sports, where he said Bitcoin “has lost the plot.” The Shark Tank personality and former Dallas Mavericks owner had long positioned Bitcoin as a superior alternative to gold, citing its fixed supply and decentralized structure. That conviction has eroded.

“I always thought it was a better version of gold than gold,” Cuban said. “But gold just blew up and went to $5,000. Bitcoin dropped.”

The billionaire pointed to price behavior during the U.S.-Iran conflict as the moment his confidence broke. Gold surged through the period of heightened tensions, setting a record above $5,500 per ounce earlier this year. 

Bitcoin, meanwhile, struggled to hold momentum. Cuban said he expected Bitcoin to rise each time the dollar fell. It did not.

“Every time the dollar dropped, Bitcoin should’ve gone up,” he said. “It’s not the hedge I expected it to be.”

Bitcoin traded near $77,500 on Thursday, down roughly 30% over the past year and 38% below its all-time high of $126,080 set in October. Gold, despite its own pullback from recent peaks, remains up more than 37% over the same 12-month stretch and commands a market cap above $31 trillion — the largest of any asset in the world.

Bitcoin has outperformed gold since the Iran conflict

The data does offer a counterpoint to Cuban’s critique. Since the first signs of U.S.-Iran conflict emerged in late February, Bitcoin has risen more than 16% while gold has fallen over 15%. Bitcoin’s defenders argue that framing matters — the asset’s performance depends on the window of analysis chosen.

Cuban acknowledged a distinction within the crypto space. He expressed less disappointment in Ethereum, which he sees as underpinned by real utility through decentralized finance and blockchain applications. He was categorical about meme coins and speculative tokens, calling them “garbage.”

His earlier crypto profile was broader. In 2021, he held a portfolio split roughly 60% Bitcoin, 30% Ethereum, and 10% in other assets. He was a vocal NFT enthusiast, displayed his wallets publicly, and even accepted Dogecoin as payment for Mavericks merchandise. He once predicted Dogecoin would reach $1 and function as a stablecoin.

Cuban said the crypto sector as a whole has disappointed him by failing to find mainstream utility. “It hasn’t found an application for grandma,” he said.

This post Mark Cuban Sells Most of His Bitcoin, Calls It a Failed Hedge first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin was created as a response to the kind of debt-financed monetary disorder now playing out across global bond markets. The original thesis was that when governments borrowed recklessly and debased their currencies, hard-money assets would absorb the resulting demand.

What that thesis left unresolved is the possibility that the debt spiral could tighten financial conditions strong enough to suppress speculative assets before the hard-money argument has time to play out.

In 2026, the long-term narrative and the short-term mechanics are running in opposite directions, and understanding why requires spending a few minutes with the most consequential number in global finance right now.

On May 20, the 30-year Treasury yield reached 5.18%. A $25 billion auction of new 30-year bonds on May 13 was awarded at 5.046%, the first time investors have received 5% on the long bond since 2007, driven by surging energy prices and rising expectations that inflation could prove more durable than markets assumed.

The last time yields were at these levels, Bear Stearns was still a concern, and quantitative easing was still a theoretical concept. Everything that's happened in markets since (the post-2008 era of suppressed rates, central bank asset purchases, near-zero borrowing costs) was predicated on yields eventually coming back down and staying there, and the current repricing is challenging that assumption across the entire curve.

America is borrowing money to pay interest on borrowed money

The inflation drivers behind this move are well documented: US Treasury yields moved higher as investors weighed the implications of more costly energy prices tied to the Iran war, with WTI crude settling above $106 a barrel and Brent climbing to $114.44.

Energy is a real factor, but the deeper structural force (and the one with more staying power) is the sheer volume of US government debt that has to be refinanced and issued into a market that's already repricing inflation risk. The US Treasury will likely have borrowed more than $2 trillion by the end of the fiscal year, with the Office of Management and Budget projecting a deficit of $2.06 trillion for FY2026, higher than the Congressional Budget Office estimates.

To service that borrowing, the Treasury paid out nearly $530 billion in interest between October 2025 and March 2026, more than $88 billion a month, a figure that's roughly equal to spending on both the Department of Defense and the Department of Education combined.

This problem feeds on itself. Interest payments on the national debt have been 6.1% higher than the previous year through the sixth month of FY2026 and have become the second-largest spending category in the federal budget, outpacing all budget categories except Social Security. The CBO projects those annual costs climbing from $1 trillion in 2026 to $2.1 trillion by 2036.

Meanwhile, the Treasury's own borrowing calendar keeps upward force on the long end, with $189 billion expected in the second quarter and $671 billion in the third, meaning the bond selloff has shelf life well beyond any individual Iran headline.

This is what the bond market is actually pricing: weak foreign demand, enormous supply, and an inflation backdrop that's giving the Federal Reserve very little room to maneuver. Futures markets now assign more than a 44% chance of a Fed rate increase by December, a sharp shift from expectations of multiple cuts earlier in the year. Barclays has moved its first expected Fed cut to March 2027. Rate cuts, which crypto markets spent most of 2024 and 2025 treating as a reliable tailwind, are now being actively repriced off the table.

How a Treasury auction ended up moving Bitcoin

Bitcoin's retreat below $80,000 last week shows how quickly the bond market has reclaimed control of crypto trading, even after lawmakers advanced one of the industry's most closely watched regulatory bills.

The CLARITY Act was expected to generate a sustained positive tone across the crypto market.

Instead, US spot Bitcoin ETFs saw roughly 14,000 BTC in weekly outflows, ending a six-week inflow streak, as hotter inflation data forced markets to reassess risk exposure. Spot net-volume on Binance dropped from approximately $50 million to $6.5 million, and on Coinbase from $30 million to $5.7 million.

This is a direct transmission mechanism. An institutional allocator who can now get 5% on a 30-year government bond, guaranteed, faces a different decision than one who was working with 3.5% yields two years ago. Rising Treasury yields raise the opportunity cost of holding a volatile, non-yielding asset like BTC, making institutional buyers more selective as government debt offers a stronger return profile.

Tokenized US Treasuries have hit a record $15.35 billion in on-chain market value, up roughly 70% year-to-date, as yield-sensitive capital finds a home that combines crypto infrastructure with bond-market returns.

This is the structural consequence of the ETF era that CryptoSlate has been tracking: Bitcoin is now embedded in traditional portfolio allocation frameworks, which means it responds to the same macro inputs as any other risk asset. Before ETFs, crypto traded largely on its own internal dynamics, driven by altcoin rotations, on-chain metrics, and retail sentiment.

Today, a Treasury auction that prices 20 basis points above expectations can move BTC faster than any on-chain development. As CryptoSlate noted in late April, Bitcoin's recovery rests on renewed institutional inflows and the assumption that liquidity conditions won't tighten again. And if Treasuries choose a direction before that assumption is tested, the bond market could drive Bitcoin's next move independently of any crypto-specific catalyst.

Strategy adds another layer of complexity here. JPMorgan estimated in early May that Strategy could purchase roughly $30 billion in Bitcoin through 2026 if it maintains its current purchasing pace, a figure that would put it alongside ETF flows and miner supply as one of the strongest structural forces in Bitcoin's demand.

The complication is that Strategy's capital structure, which relies on issuing equity and preferred stock to fund its Bitcoin purchases, becomes more expensive to operate as yields rise and borrowing costs across the system increase. The higher yields climb, the more the flywheel depends on sustained investor appetite for a model that converts yield demand into BTC demand.

The paradox Bitcoin was built for

There's a longer argument worth holding onto here, even amid the short-term pressure. The rotation out of traditional safe havens into Bitcoin as a perceived alternative store of value reflects the fiat debasement narrative gaining renewed traction as fiscal deficits expand and central bank balance sheets remain structurally large.

As sovereign debt sustainability concerns accumulate and the rate of American borrowing becomes harder to ignore, the long-cycle argument for Bitcoin as a monetary hedge tends to grow alongside it.

In the near term, 5% Treasury yields are a headwind: they tighten financial conditions, raise the opportunity cost of speculative positions, and drain the marginal liquidity that's historically fueled Bitcoin's larger rallies.

Across a longer horizon, though, the fiscal conditions producing those yields, deficits projected to increase from 5.8% of GDP in 2026 to 6.7% in 2036, with net interest payments growing each year in relation to the size of the economy, are precisely the conditions that make a hard-money, fixed-supply asset like Bitcoin compelling to a growing class of institutional holders.

For years, crypto markets obsessed over the Federal Reserve, watching rate decisions and dot plots as the primary macro input. What 2026 is making clear is that the Fed's room to maneuver is increasingly constrained by a bond market pricing in something more durable than a temporary inflation spike.

The next phase of Bitcoin's trajectory won't depend on what central bankers decide, but on whether global bond investors are beginning to lose patience with the American debt. Which is, if you trace it all the way back, precisely the scenario Bitcoin was designed to outlast.

The post Bitcoin’s hard-money thesis is colliding with 5% Treasury yields appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Bitcoin's price has dropped below $75,000 for the first time since mid-April, triggering a broad decline across digital assets.

Data from CryptoSlate showed that the largest digital asset fell more than 3% over the past 24 hours to as low as $74,255 after trading above $77,000 earlier in the session. The move placed Bitcoin back at a price zone last seen in April, when the market was still recovering from a wider risk-asset reset.

The decline also spread across the broader crypto market, where Ethereum fell about 5% to roughly $2,065, while Hyperliquid, one of the stronger performers in recent weeks, dropped more than 7% to about $55.

Other top digital assets, including XRP, Cardano, BNB, Solana, and Dogecoin, also traded lower as selling pressure widened across the market.

The reversal came despite recent regulatory momentum around the CLARITY Act, which had helped bolster expectations that a clearer US market structure could attract more capital to the sector.

Instead, market data showed that traders have shifted attention back to demand, fund flows, and leverage after Bitcoin failed to hold the $75,000 level.

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CLARITY Act will give crypto a new regulator before the CFTC has the staff to run it

The CLARITY Act would push crypto spot markets under the CFTC. The unresolved test is whether an agency down 21.5% in payroll FTEs can turn that mandate into rules, registrations, surveillance, and enforcement.

May 20, 2026 · Liam 'Akiba' Wright

BTC spot demand weakens as ETFs turn into sellers

Market analysts attribute the pullback to a combination of technical exhaustion and a sharp reduction in institutional appetite.

CryptoQuant head of research Julio Moreno said Bitcoin spot demand is contracting at the fastest pace since Jan. 10, pointing to a weakening base for the market as the price tested a critical technical zone.

That pressure is evident in US spot Bitcoin ETFs, which have recorded more than $2 billion in cumulative outflows over the past two weeks. The withdrawals mark one of the fastest two-week exits from the funds and remove a source of demand that had helped stabilize Bitcoin during earlier phases of the rally.

The shift in ETF flows is important because spot funds had served as one of the main channels for institutional allocation into Bitcoin.

When those funds receive inflows, issuers typically need to acquire Bitcoin to support the issuance of new shares. When the funds post outflows, that support can reverse, leaving the market more dependent on direct spot buying and derivatives positioning.

Ultimately, Bitcoin’s latest pullback came after the asset met resistance near levels that had previously capped rebounds.

With spot demand weakening and ETF flows turning negative, the move above $77,000 lacked the follow-through needed to sustain a move above the $75,000 threshold.

Nearly $1 billion in positions liquidated

The fall below $75,000 triggered a sharp liquidation wave across crypto derivatives markets, where traders using leverage were forced out as prices moved through key levels.

Data from Coinglass shows that $941 million in derivative positions were liquidated across the market within 24 hours, affecting more than 161,200 individual traders as prices sliced through key support levels.

Bitcoin-linked contracts were the hardest hit, enduring more than $378 million in liquidations. Ethereum derivatives traders saw approximately $255 million in positions forcefully closed.

The single largest liquidation order across all platforms occurred on the Bitget exchange, where a $32.4 million Bitcoin swap contract was wiped out.

Meanwhile, bullish traders absorbed the vast majority of the financial damage. Liquidations of long positions, which are bets that prices would continue to rise, accounted for roughly $870 million of the total wipeout. In contrast, traders holding short positions lost just $71.4 million.

The imbalance between long and short liquidations shows that the market had been positioned for higher prices before the selloff.

However, once Bitcoin price lost support near $75,000, forced selling added to the pressure already created by ETF outflows and weaker spot demand.

Bitcoin risk metrics signal peak pessimism

Following these developments, BTC's on-chain metrics suggest the market is entering a phase of significant historical stress that could further impact its price.

Joao Wedson, chief executive officer of data analytics firm Alphractal, highlighted a divergence in the risk-adjusted performance of the market's two largest assets.

According to Wedson, Bitcoin’s annualized Sharpe ratio has turned negative, indicating an environment of elevated pressure and poor return efficiency relative to the underlying risk. Ethereum’s Sharpe ratio, meanwhile, is hovering near zero, indicating a neutral environment that offers investors no clear premium for taking on exposure.

While the data paints a bleak short-term picture, Wedson noted a historical caveat. Prolonged periods in which the Sharpe ratio remains below zero typically represent the market's worst risk-to-reward phases, but these stretches of intense pessimism and low efficiency have frequently coincided with cyclical market bottoms.

The analytics firm cautioned that the current metrics do not guarantee the market has established a definitive floor.

However, the data confirms that digital assets have entered a zone of extreme risk, stress, and depressed sentiment.

The post Bitcoin price drop below $75K exposes the demand fracture behind crypto’s $941M liquidation wave appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Bitcoin trades 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and stablecoins can cross borders in seconds on a Sunday morning. And yet, if a major UK institution needed to move collateral, settle a high-value payment, or shift liquidity between clearing houses over the weekend, much of that activity had to queue up and wait.

In 2026, trillions of dollars in financial obligations still move through settlement infrastructure designed around the rhythm of a pre-internet economy, with business hours, weekday cycles, and overnight pauses baked into systems that predate smartphones by decades.

That's the problem the Bank of England wants to resolve. On May 18, the BoE launched a formal consultation on extending the operating hours of its payments infrastructure, as it works toward a long-term objective of near 24/7 settlement. The proposals cover RTGS, the Real-Time Gross Settlement system, and CHAPS, the UK's high-value payment network.

They're both part of a coordinated package that also includes a joint tokenization vision from the Bank and the FCA setting out shared principles for digital wholesale markets. The Prudential Regulation Authority also published letters setting out updated guidance on the treatment of tokenized asset exposures and on innovations in deposits, e-money, and stablecoins.

Taken as a whole, this is a coordinated signal that financial regulators in the UK have shifted from treating blockchain-native finance as a problem to manage toward treating it as a reference point for how markets should be redesigned.

The infrastructure of the UK's financial system

RTGS is the system through which UK banks hold and exchange reserves at the Bank of England, settling payment obligations in central bank money on a gross, real-time basis. CHAPS runs on top of it and handles high-value transactions: mortgage completions, corporate payments, and the settlement of financial market trades.  Both systems are extremely safe and have operated without systemic failure for decades.

However, they're also very temporally constrained. That's become a big problem as global markets have internationalized and as digital asset markets have demonstrated what continuously available settlement actually looks like. When RTGS and CHAPS go offline overnight and across weekends, capital gets trapped, exposures accumulate, and institutions hold precautionary liquidity buffers to cover the gap.

The BoE's consultation paper sets out two next steps toward near 24/7 settlement: an additional settlement day on weekends, most likely on Sundays, alongside settlement on certain UK bank holidays; and the lengthening of the settlement window on existing settlement days. Those changes wouldn't take place before 2029, and longer hours wouldn't be introduced until 2031. Regulators heard clearly from industry that a single-step full extension would be operationally punishing, so the BoE structured a phased pathway that lets companies build internal capabilities alongside the infrastructure changes.

The longer-term end-states under review include a 22×6 model and near-continuous 23.5×7 CHAPS settlement, which would bring the central settlement layer into close alignment with the always-on architecture that blockchain networks already use. Beyond the hours extension, the Bank is committing to launch a live synchronization service, targeted for 2028, working to enable tokenized equivalents of already eligible assets to be used as collateral both at central counterparties and in its own central bank operations.

That synchronization commitment is arguably the more consequential of the two. When the asset leg and the cash leg of a transaction can move simultaneously and conditionally on a distributed ledger, the entire counterparty risk changes. Tokenization reshapes the settlement problem because the asset leg can move faster than the cash leg under current infrastructure, and a synchronization interface at the central bank level closes that mismatch exactly where it needs to be closed for the change to carry systemic weight.

On the stablecoin side, the PRA's updated letter is a meaningful shift toward a lighter approach to wholesale stablecoins. Banks considering stablecoin issuance exclusively for wholesale customers are invited to engage with supervisors early, with the PRA signaling it'll take a “proportionate approach” to assessing proposals.

That's a big concession from a regulator that has historically insisted retail stablecoin activity must sit in a fully ring-fenced, insolvency-remote entity separate from the deposit-taking institution itself. For wholesale settlement specifically, the door is now more open than it has ever been.

What changes when UK capital can move around the clock

The market implications of near-continuous settlement run across several interconnected areas, and the most immediate involves collateral mobility.

Banks and large institutions move collateral constantly across repo markets, derivatives positions, clearing houses, and sovereign debt obligations, and today that movement is constrained by settlement system timing. Collateral that can't be repositioned on a Saturday night creates liquidity buffers that tie up capital for days at a time, and the cost of those buffers is ultimately borne across the entire system.

Extended settlement hours, combined with the ability to use tokenized equivalents of already eligible assets as regulatory collateral at central counterparties, would dramatically reduce that friction. The Bank has confirmed that policy guidance on exactly how tokenized collateral will qualify under UK EMIR is expected later this year.

The systemic risk implications are equally significant. Settlement failures and overnight exposures become particularly dangerous when credit conditions tighten quickly, and the 2008 financial crisis was partly a settlement crisis: counterparties couldn't trust that obligations would be met in time, so they stopped transacting altogether. An infrastructure capable of near-continuous atomic settlement changes that, as it compresses the window during which failures can cascade.

The FCA and Bank of England are currently working with 16 companies on the live issuance and settlement of tokenized assets through the Digital Securities Sandbox, the most advanced live tokenization testing environment of any G7 regulator. The sandbox runs through early 2029, with the application window expected to close around March 2027, and it's already hosting HM Treasury's pilot digital gilt instrument, DIGIT.

The BoE has also committed to expanding the sandbox's range of settlement assets to include regulated stablecoins, working toward a multi-money system in which stablecoins, tokenized bank deposits, and central bank money all operate across compatible rails.

A government running sovereign debt experiments on a blockchain sandbox of its own design is a pretty unambiguous statement of regulatory intent.

The global race no market can afford to lose

The UK's accelerating pace on all of this reflects pressure from multiple directions at once, and central banks arrived at these proposals by reacting to a market that scaled faster than incumbents expected.

The gap between digital asset architecture and regulated financial infrastructure widened to the point where it couldn't be papered over. The US started building clearer rails where crypto intersects mainstream finance most directly: payment stablecoins got a federal framework and an implementation path for banks. The EU has been turning MiCA into an operating standard, with supervisors tightening implementation timelines and pushing firms toward licensing at scale. Singapore has built digital asset infrastructure explicitly designed for institutional settlement use cases, and Middle Eastern financial centers have been aggressive in recruiting digital asset businesses with favorable regulatory frameworks.

Financial centers now seem to understand that if digital settlement infrastructure matures elsewhere first, the cost of catching up compounds with every year of delay.

The current situation in the UK clearly shows that urgency. The Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Cryptoassets) Regulations 2026 were enacted in February of this year, establishing the full statutory framework for regulating cryptoasset activities in the UK, with the new regime expected to come into force in October 2027. Revolut's pound stablecoin trial inside the FCA's stablecoin cohort sandbox puts the product in front of the company's 12 million UK users, and the FCA's selection of four firms to test stablecoin products and services, representing a range of use cases including payments, wholesale settlement, and crypto trading, is feeding directly into the final stablecoin rules expected later in 2026. The FCA's broader crypto roadmap has made the rulemaking pipeline far more legible to firms than it was even eighteen months ago, and that legibility is itself a competitive signal.

The risks embedded in all of this are real, and the Bank's consultation has been clear about them. Extending settlement hours introduces operational complexity and new cybersecurity exposures across the entire participant ecosystem. The synchronization interface needs to be built to RTGS-grade resilience standards, which is an unbelievably high bar, and liquidity management across an extended window changes the timing of reserve requirements and interest calculations in ways that still need to be fully worked through.

The BoE is now looking for industry feedback on the sequencing of these steps, with submissions due by July 3. Following that deadline, the Bank and FCA have committed to industry workshops, a summer feedback statement, and a cross-authority digital wholesale market roadmap before year-end.

For years, the only version of digital finance was the one where blockchain infrastructure developed alongside traditional markets as a parallel and largely separate system.

The Bank of England's proposals now tell us that era is drawing to a close. Central bank infrastructure is being redesigned to incorporate the architecture that digital markets demonstrated first (continuous settlement, programmable assets, atomic execution), and the process is now far enough along that concrete timelines exist where there were once only discussion papers. Whether the full vision plays out over five years or fifteen, the direction has become difficult to mistake.

The post Bank of England’s 24/7 settlement plan shows where tokenized finance can enter core markets appeared first on CryptoSlate.

While major cryptocurrencies remain mired in a prolonged slump, the native token of the decentralized exchange Hyperliquid has surged to a record high.

Data from CryptoSlate showed that HYPE crossed $60 for the first time, reaching as high as $62. This marks a 120% year-to-date gain and propels its market capitalization above $15 billion.

This comes as DeFiLlama data shows that the total value locked on the platform surpassed $5 billion for the first time since October 2025. At the same time, its open interest reached a six-month high of nearly $10 billion.

Market observers noted that this breakout was driven by a fundamental structural shift, with Hyperliquid rapidly evolving from a niche decentralized finance application into the primary on-chain Wall Street platform in the cryptocurrency sector.

By aggressively collapsing traditional finance silos, which typically separate brokerage, exchange, and custody services across different entities, the network is creating a unified venue that captures a new class of institutional capital.

How HYPE defied the broader crypto market gravitational pull

HYPE’s milestone arrives amid a broadly pessimistic period for digital assets, with Bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies struggling.

This is because the broader cryptocurrency sector has faced sustained downward pressure since September 2025.

To contextualize Hyperliquid's divergence from the broader market, the total crypto market capitalization has declined by 36.5% during this period. Major assets have mirrored this slide, with Bitcoin falling 33.4%, Ethereum dropping 53.3%, and Solana shedding 65% of its value.

For months, the market traded in sync, with alternative cryptocurrencies taking heavier losses than Bitcoin.

According to cryptocurrency analyst Aletheia, Hyperliquid was among the worst performers until January 2026. However, a sudden shift in trend, catalyzed by strong spot exchange-traded fund flows and institutional partnerships, decoupled HYPE from its peers.

Moreover, HYPE's rally has been further accelerated by market mechanics.

Blockchain analytics firm Santiment reported a severe spike in negative funding rates across exchanges, indicating a disproportionate number of traders opening short positions in anticipation of a price drop. Instead, HYPE continued to climb, triggering a classic short squeeze.

According to the firm, bearish traders were automatically forced to buy back their positions, adding upward pressure to the token.

Despite these liquidations, HYPE’s open interest, which measures the total value of active futures contracts, has remained elevated at $1.92 billion. Rather than collapsing after liquidation, open interest continued to rise as new buyers entered the market to replace liquidated short positions.

Institutional Validation and the ETF Catalyst

The primary catalyst supporting this sustained open interest is the introduction of traditional financial wrappers.

Earlier this month, asset managers including Bitwise and 21Shares launched exchange-traded funds tied to HYPE. These products allow traditional equity investors to gain exposure to the token without navigating decentralized exchanges or managing private keys.

The institutional uptake has been swift. Data from SoSoValue indicates these newly minted products are already managing $81.13 million in assets.

Bloomberg exchange-traded fund analyst Eric Balchunas noted that the suite of HYPE-related products recently saw trading volumes approach $100 million, jumping 42% since their mid-May launch.

Due to this strong demand, data from Velo indicates that over 40% of the token’s recent price gains occurred during US trading sessions.

However, this strong performance is occurring despite US residents being geofenced from trading directly on Hyperliquid.

Market experts have linked Hyperliquid's appeal for institutional investors to its quantifiable fundamentals. Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan said:

“Hyperliquid should be valued as a global super-app. Its addressable universe is not the $3 trillion crypto market, but the $600 trillion market for global assets.”

According to Hougan, Hyperliquid's platform covers every asset class, and its tokens capture real value. He added that the trading venue is “an early, credible look at what crypto becomes when it’s allowed to grow up.”

Hyperliquid's expanding trading footprint

Hougan's thesis about Hyperliquid is that the platform is becoming an all-encompassing financial app, as evidenced by its expanding asset offerings and underlying protocol upgrades.

The platform is pulling trading volume away from legacy markets by offering perpetual contracts on traditional commodities, pre-IPO equities, and outcome-based events in a single environment.

With ongoing geopolitical tensions, including the US-Israeli conflict with Iran, traditional commodity markets face weekend closures precisely when international news often breaks.

Traders have increasingly turned to Hyperliquid to hedge their positions, making gold, silver, and oil perpetuals a major segment of the exchange's volume alongside native digital assets.

Notably, open interest in this kind of trade has doubled over the last two months to a new all-time high of $2.6 billion.

Furthermore, the platform's pre-IPO trading feature provides a distinct utility that shields cryptocurrency traders from digital asset downturns.

By offering exposure to private companies like SpaceX, Hyperliquid provides diversification previously reserved for accredited traditional finance investors.

Meanwhile, its recent expansion into prediction markets via the HIP-4 upgrade is also helping to boost the platform.

Research firm Delphi Digital highlights that HIP-4 completes the platform's mission of collapsing brokerage, exchange, and custody into a single venue by introducing outcome contracts.

These binary options allow traders to express market views that standard perpetual futures cannot capture.

Historically, a trader taking a long position on Bitcoin ahead of a Consumer Price Index report could correctly predict the inflation data but still lose money if the market reacted unpredictably to the news.

The HIP-4 upgrade allows traders to place capital directly on the event outcome itself, bypassing the secondary price reaction entirely.

HYPE's road to $100

Considering all of the above, HYPE’s latest record high has pushed the $100 target from a fringe wager into a central question for traders tracking Hyperliquid’s rally.

Polymarket data show traders assigning a 70% probability that HYPE reaches new highs around $66, a 62% chance that it breaks $70, and a 30% chance that it reaches $100 before year-end. The odds of a move to $100 have doubled in the past week, reflecting how quickly sentiment has shifted.

For that trade to hold, several drivers need to work together. ETF demand must continue bringing in buyers beyond Hyperliquid’s native user base. Futures positioning must avoid becoming too crowded. Platform volume must stay high enough to generate fees. Total value locked, stablecoin balances, and open interest must remain strong enough to support the view that more capital is settling inside the venue.

Still, market analysts believe HYPE's current momentum could sustain its uptrend.

Shaunda Devens, a research analyst at Blockworks Research, said the speed of the move reflects an imbalance between aggressive buyers and a seller base that had already spent months distributing tokens in the prior range.

In that environment, higher prices can become self-reinforcing. Existing holders feel less pressure to sell as the market validates their position. Sidelined buyers feel more pressure to enter as the price moves away from them. That dynamic can push prices higher even as valuation multiples expand.

However, the risk is that the same reflexive setup can unwind quickly. If ETF demand cools, if open interest becomes too crowded, or if long-term holders begin taking profit, the market could lose some of the pressure that has driven the breakout.

The post HYPE’s path to $100 runs through Hyperliquid becoming crypto’s on-chain Wall Street platform appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Rio de Janeiro Civil Police launched an operation targeting a Comando Vermelho operational nucleus and found a crypto mining setup with roughly 30 computers arranged on shelves in a room on an apparently abandoned lot.

The farm drew power from a clandestine electrical connection running directly from a utility pole. The machines carried high-capacity fans and exhaust systems, including remote-monitoring hardware.

As G1 reported, police are investigating whether the faction used the structure for money movement or laundering.

The physical configuration already describes the possibility that a criminal organization with territorial control can convert stolen electricity into portable digital value.

Territorial control provides access to space and utilities, a clandestine electricity connection eliminates the primary operating cost, and the mining output converts directly into portable value.

Stolen electricity is the load-bearing element of that model, since mining only makes economic sense when electricity is cheap, subsidized, or free.

Cambridge's Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index methodology identifies electricity as one of mining's highest operating costs. Brazil's electricity regulator, ANEEL, reported that energy theft and other non-technical losses cost the country roughly $2 billion in 2024, with Rio de Janeiro among the states recording the highest levels of power theft.

At 1.5 kilowatts per machine, 30 computers would draw about 45 kilowatts, consuming about 32,400 kilowatt-hours per month. At $0.20 per kilowatt-hour, that is $6,400 in avoided monthly electricity costs, a real operating advantage delivered without payment.

The unknowns are the hardware type, the coin mined, the hash rate, and whether the crypto was ever cashed out. Stolen electricity removes one of mining's highest variable costs regardless of those unknowns.

Comando Vermelho's infrastructure evolution

The UK Home Office identifies Comando Vermelho as one of Brazil's two largest organized criminal groups alongside PCC, with territorial reach across urban favelas, border areas, and the Amazon.

The organization originated in Rio's prison system in the late 1970s, expanding into international cocaine trafficking and control of working-class neighborhoods where armed groups often manage basic services, including gas, internet, and transportation.

AP reported in 2025 that Rio police accused Comando Vermelho of coercing over 300 motorcycle drivers into using a clandestine ride-hailing app in Vila Kennedy, generating up to $200,000 per month, with revenue allegedly funneled through shell companies to finance drug trafficking.

On May 4, local news Folha reported that CV had intensified its presence in illegal gold mining near Brazil's border with Peru, treating gold as a profitable and stable alternative to cocaine and using the activity for investment and money laundering.

Each activity monetizes territory and controlled resources as a standalone revenue line, with transaction flows that run outside the cash-and-drugs channels investigators have historically targeted.

The Rio findings also sharpen the current picture of crypto crime in Brazil.

Folha reported on May 9 that Brazil's Federal Police seized $14 million in crypto in 2025, with seized assets appearing across drug trafficking, money laundering, human rights violations, environmental crimes, and online fraud.

On May 12, a national operation spanning 16 states deployed 165 search-and-seizure warrants and 71 arrest warrants focused on drug trafficking, criminal factions, and money laundering.

Chainalysis' 2026 Crypto Crime Report described the illicit on-chain landscape as having built large-scale infrastructure to help transnational criminal networks procure goods and launder crypto.

A Malaysian comparison provides the stolen power model with global context, as reports have noted that Malaysia's national utility, Tenaga Nasional, lost more than $1 billion to illegal power use by crypto miners between 2020 and August 2025.

Malaysian authorities responded with raids, smart meters, and databases of suspicious premises.

Where the grid trail leads

In the bull case, police link the setup to faction finances, locate wallet addresses or remote operators connected to CV leadership, and the case becomes the first documented example of a major Brazilian criminal faction running crypto production as a formal revenue line.

The investigative perimeter would then need to expand to include hardware procurement, power theft, cooling equipment, and utility access.

In the bear case, investigators identify independent operators who opportunistically used a CV-controlled area, find no faction wallet trail, and the setup generates too little revenue to function as a viable operation.

Investigators seize the machines, operators face energy-theft charges, and the case closes as a local footnote.

The configuration of clandestine power, remote monitoring, an abandoned lot, and a controlled neighborhood serves as a replicable model for anyone with access to a gang-controlled grid.

The power line shows that organized crime can build crypto-production infrastructure from territorial control, stolen electricity, and off-the-shelf hardware, forcing investigators to watch the grid as closely as they watch the blockchain.

The post Brazilian gang raid reveals a new crypto-crime model: turning stolen power into digital money appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Crypto Market Crash Intensifies as Bitcoin Loses $75K

The crypto market crash deepened today as Bitcoin broke below the important $75,000 level, triggering a broader selloff across major cryptocurrencies. After holding near higher support levels earlier this week, Bitcoin suddenly slipped under $75K, increasing market fear and pushing traders to reassess the short-term outlook.

The latest move also came with a sharp rise in liquidations. Around $400 million worth of long positions were reportedly wiped out in the past 10 minutes, showing how quickly leverage can worsen a market decline. When Bitcoin loses a key psychological level, forced selling from leveraged positions can accelerate the crash and put additional pressure on altcoins.

Bitcoin Crash Pulls Ethereum and Major Altcoins Lower

Bitcoin was not the only crypto under pressure. Ethereum also moved sharply lower, trading close to the $2,000 area as bearish sentiment spread across the market. A break below this level could increase fears of a deeper Ethereum correction, especially as ETH has already struggled to regain strong bullish momentum.

Major altcoins also followed Bitcoin lower. Solana, Dogecoin, Cardano, Chainlink, Sui, Bitcoin Cash, Toncoin and other large-cap tokens recorded notable losses, showing that the selloff is affecting the broader crypto market rather than one isolated asset.

This type of market movement usually suggests that traders are reducing risk exposure. When Bitcoin weakens and Ethereum fails to hold key support, altcoins often suffer even more because they are more sensitive to liquidity changes and investor sentiment.

Why Is the Crypto Market Crashing Today?

Several factors appear to be weighing on the crypto market at the same time. The first is renewed geopolitical fear, especially around US and Iran tensions. Reports suggesting that the US and Iran are still negotiating a possible deal helped create uncertainty, but the market remains nervous about any escalation. If tensions rise again, oil prices could increase, inflation fears could return, and the Federal Reserve may have less room to cut interest rates. That would be negative for risk assets like crypto.

The second factor is regulatory uncertainty. Recent delays around blockchain-based tokenized stocks and ongoing investigations into prediction markets have added pressure to the sector. The crypto market had been expecting more supportive regulation, but delays and political disagreements are now slowing down optimism.

The third factor is bond market stress. Rising yields in the US and Japan are making investors more cautious. Higher yields usually reduce appetite for riskier assets because borrowing becomes more expensive and liquidity conditions become tighter. For crypto, this can lead to weaker demand, especially when the market is already overleveraged.

Crypto Liquidations Add More Pressure

The liquidation wave is one of the most important parts of this crypto crash. When traders open long positions with leverage and the market moves against them, exchanges force-close those positions. This creates additional sell pressure, which can push prices even lower.

That is why Bitcoin falling below $75K matters. It was not only a price move, but also a trigger point for leveraged traders. Once those positions started getting liquidated, the selling pressure spread quickly across Ethereum and altcoins.

If liquidations continue, the crypto market could remain volatile in the short term. However, if Bitcoin stabilizes and selling pressure slows down, a relief bounce could follow.

Bitcoin Price Prediction: What Comes Next?

For now, Bitcoin needs to reclaim the $75,000 level quickly to reduce bearish pressure. If BTC manages to move back above this zone and hold it, the market could attempt a recovery toward the $78,000 to $80,000 range.

However, if Bitcoin fails to recover and selling continues, the next important downside area could be around $72,000. A deeper break below that level would make the current crypto market crash more serious and could trigger another wave of altcoin losses.

Ethereum also remains important to watch. If ETH falls below $2,000, the market could see stronger fear across altcoins. But if Ethereum holds this level while Bitcoin stabilizes, traders may start looking for a short-term rebound.

Crypto Market Outlook

The crypto market crash is being driven by a combination of technical weakness, leveraged liquidations, geopolitical concerns, regulatory delays, and macro pressure from bond yields. Bitcoin’s break below $75K has now become the main signal traders are watching.

The next few days will be critical. If geopolitical tensions ease and Bitcoin reclaims lost support, the market could see a relief rally. But if fear continues and liquidations increase, the crypto crash could extend further before buyers step back in.

$BTC, $ETH, $SOL, $DOGE, $ADA, $LINK, $SUI, $BCH, $TON

Geopolitical instability in the Middle East has reached a fragile inflection point as the temporary ceasefire between the United States, Israel, and Iran faces severe strain. Following the intense military actions earlier this year under Operation Epic Fury, diplomatic channels are stalling. Analysts are monitoring critical warning signs that suggest the U.S. and Israel may resume offensive operations if diplomatic breakthroughs fail. Because digital asset markets operate continuously, this brewing friction has placed the cryptocurrency market on high alert for immediate macro-driven price discovery.

Warning Signs and the Impending Crypto Reaction

The primary warning signs of a potential renewed U.S.-Israeli military campaign against Iran include a breakdown in mediated peace talks, aggressive U.S. maritime interdictions, and escalatory threats from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Should these frictions trigger a fresh wave of kinetic strikes, the cryptocurrency market is highly likely to experience an immediate, leverage-driven "risk-off" liquidation. This initial shock typically causes sharp downward pressure across major digital assets before the market stabilizes to reprice the broader inflationary impact of the conflict.

Stalled Diplomacy and Maritime Interdictions

The current baseline of friction has shifted from open warfare to an aggressive game of economic and military brinkmanship. Mediated peace negotiations brokered by international intermediaries in Tehran have hit a significant wall. Representatives from both Washington and Tehran confirm that deep, unresolved gaps remain regarding Iran's highly enriched uranium (HEU) stockpiles and legal sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz.

This diplomatic impasse is translating directly into tactical friction on the water. U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) forces recently executed high-profile maritime operations, with U.S. Marines boarding and seizing the Iranian-flagged oil tanker M/T Celestial Sea and the sanctioned M/T Skywave on suspicions of breaching the American naval blockade. In direct response to these seizures, senior IRGC leadership issued explicit public ultimatums, threatening to expand the military theater "far beyond the region" if U.S. and Israeli airstrikes resume.

Concurrently, regional proxies continue to trade blows. The Israeli military has stepped up air campaigns targeting command infrastructure in the Levant, further indicating that regional forces are preparing for a potential breakdown of the April-instituted ceasefire.

What Happens to Crypto if Conflict Resumes

The crypto market already got hit by the current news as most cryptos lost more than 4% in the past 24 hours alone.

If the U.S. and Israel launch a coordinated offensive, the economic fallout will flow through specific market structure pathways, directly altering the digital asset landscape:

1. The Oil-Driven Inflationary Impulse

An escalation directly threatens infrastructure around the Strait of Hormuz. A disruption to global energy supplies instantly spikes crude oil prices. Higher energy costs reinforce a "higher-for-longer" inflationary outlook, prompting central banks to tighten global liquidity. When systemic liquidity contracts, highly speculative risk assets—including cryptocurrencies—traditionally face structural valuation compression.

2. The 24/7 Liquidation Cascade

Because traditional equity and commodities exchanges observe fixed operating hours, cryptocurrency markets serve as the primary, real-time macro barometer during weekend or overnight geopolitical shocks. If a military strike occurs when legacy markets are closed, investors universally utilize liquid crypto pairs to hedge systemic risk. This triggers an immediate unwinding of leveraged long positions. Forced margin liquidations accelerate downside volatility, creating rapid intraday price drops.

3. Asymmetric Regional Demand vs. Institutional Flight

While global institutional capital typically flees volatile assets in favor of cash-equivalent stablecoins, local dynamics paint a different picture. In directly impacted jurisdictions, domestic trading volumes often spike as citizens look to convert deteriorating fiat currencies into borderless digital assets or alternative settlement networks to preserve short-term purchasing power.

The broader digital asset market is grappling with an aggressive correction, leaving major cryptocurrencies vulnerable to deeper losses. The macroeconomic environment has taken a severe hit as multi-theater geopolitical instabilities threaten global trade and energy markets, triggering systemic risk-off behavior among institutional investors.

When the macro financial landscape suffers simultaneous systemic shocks, high-beta altcoin leaders inevitably bear the brunt of the volatility. Ethereum (ETH) is currently caught in this macro crossfire, experiencing a sharp downward trend that puts its multi-month market structure at serious risk.

Will Ethereum Crash Below $2,000?

For traders watching the charts, the threat of Ethereum dropping below $2,000 is highly probable. Driven by a broader market liquidation, ETH has broken multiple short-term support levels over the last week. Whether the asset plunges below the psychological $2,000 mark depends entirely on technical defense at the current horizontal support and how rapidly global military and regulatory escalations unfold over the weekend.

What's Happening with Wars?

A crypto crash is rarely triggered by a single technical malfunction; it is almost always the byproduct of capital flight from risk assets due to major global developments. Today, two major geopolitical flashpoints are driving the sell-off:

1. The US-Iran Strike Threat and Inflation Risks

According to reports from CBS News, the United States is actively positioning assets for potential military strikes against Iran. This has severely choked commercial traffic through the crucial Strait of Hormuz. The imminent threat of an expanded conflict has driven crude oil prices upward, reigniting aggressive consumer price index (CPI) inflation fears. Consequently, expectations for Federal Reserve interest rate cuts have vanished, forcing investors to price in a prolonged hawkish era that drains liquidity from the crypto markets.

2. China's Massive Naval Deployment Near Taiwan

Adding heavy pressure to global markets, Taiwan's National Security Council Chief Joseph Wu confirmed that China has deployed over 100 navy, coast guard, and military vessels across regional waters stretching from the Yellow Sea to the South China Sea and Western Pacific. This aggressive military maneuvering follows a high-stakes summit in Beijing between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, where the "Taiwan problem" took center stage.

Compounding the anxiety, the U.S. Navy officially paused a scheduled $14 billion weapons sale to Taiwan to conserve munitions for the worsening Middle East theater. This leaves the self-governed island exposed. A potential Chinese military blockade or attack on Taiwan threatens the heart of global semiconductor supply chains, forcing global markets into a defensive panic and accelerating capital flight out of alternative assets like Ethereum.

Ethereum Price Prediction: Will ETH Coin Crash?

A close examination of the daily ETH/USD chart reveals a distinctly bearish market structure that has been building momentum throughout the month.

• Moving Average Cross Failure: The daily candles show a clear rejection from the 9-day and 21-day Moving Averages ($2,125 and $2,236 respectively). The faster moving average crossing below the slower tracker has acted as dynamic resistance, capping any attempts at a bullish relief rally.
• The Highlighted Drop Zone: As emphasized by the yellow highlight on the chart, Ethereum has printed consecutive, large-bodied red daily candles. This aggressive selling pressure has pushed the asset down to a current price of $2,037.
• RSI Breakdown: The Relative Strength Index (RSI) has plunged deeply into oversold territory, currently registering at 29.64. While an oversold RSI typically hints that a temporary bounce is due, in a high-volume macro sell-off, it can remain depressed while price continues to drift lower toward primary liquidity pools.

Traders looking to navigate this volatility and lock in liquidity can benchmark top-tier trading venues using our crypto exchange comparison.

Two Potential Market Scenarios for Ethereum

With the price hovering just above the critical psychological threshold, the market is facing two distinct structural paths over the coming days.

Scenario 1: The Bearish Breakdown Below $2,000

If the macroeconomic or geopolitical triggers worsen—such as the materialization of rumored military strikes in Iran or further naval incursions around Taiwan—the crypto market will face another wave of automated liquidations.

In this scenario, the immediate horizontal support line at $2,000 will break. Given the lack of dense historical order blocks immediately below $2,000, a breach of this level will likely trigger stop-losses and panic selling. This would swiftly drive the price down to test the major macro support line visible at $1,800 (marked by the green line on the chart), representing an additional 11% drop from the psychological boundary.

Scenario 2: The Oversold Support Bounce and Reversal

Conversely, if geopolitical tensions ease, the Strait of Hormuz reopens cleanly, and China de-escalates its naval positions, the technical setup favors a strong defensive stand by bulls.

The $2,000 level is a major structural pivot point. Because the RSI is already hovering in deeply oversold territory ($29.64), the selling pressure could exhaust itself right at the threshold. A successful defense of the $2,000 support would spark an aggressive short-squeeze, pushing Ethereum back up to retest the $2,125 resistance zone and the descending moving averages by next week.

Strategic Overview and Key Takeaways

As the market navigates this intense volatility, protecting your spot holdings from counterparty platform risk is vital. Reviewing cold-storage infrastructure via our hardware wallets comparison remains a recommended practice for risk management during market-wide crashes.

The cryptocurrency market has entered a sharp correction, erasing recent gains and catching many retail traders off guard.  Bitcoin (BTC) has plunged below the critical $75,000 support level, triggering a broader wave of liquidations across the altcoin space.

Why Are Cryptos Crashing Today?

For investors asking why cryptos are crashing right now, the sudden downturn is not tied to a single isolated event. Instead, it is the result of a simultaneous breakdown in geopolitical stability, fading momentum for favorable U.S. regulatory legislation, and severe stress building up in global fixed-income markets. These factors have collectively forced institutional investors to scale back risk, putting downward pressure on token prices.

Top 3 Reasons Behind the Crypto Crash

1. Escalating Geopolitical Tensions with Iran

Geopolitical instability remains a premier driver of financial market volatility. Recent reports from major media outlets, including CBS News, indicate that the United States could execute new military strikes against Iran. This comes amidst an ongoing conflict that has already heavily restricted commercial traffic through the vital Strait of Hormuz.

The immediate economic fallout of an expanded military intervention is felt in the energy sector. Crude oil prices, which have hovered near the $100 per barrel mark, face immediate upward pressure. Higher energy costs directly accelerate consumer price index (CPI) inflation. For the Federal Reserve—now led by newly appointed Chairman Kevin Warsh—resurgent inflation fears diminish the probability of anticipated interest rate cuts. Instead, it forces the central bank to maintain a hawkish stance or even consider further interest rate hikes, which historically drains liquidity out of speculative environments like cryptocurrency trading.

2. Diminishing Odds for the Clarity Act and SEC Delays

On the domestic front, regulatory headwinds are shifting from tailwinds to obstacles. In a matter of two weeks, political forecasting models tracking the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act of 2025 (H.R. 3633) saw the odds of the crypto market structure bill passing into law drop from a promising 75% down to 50%. The bill is highly anticipated by institutional players because it establishes a clear federal rulebook, distinguishing digital commodities under CFTC jurisdiction from securities.

Compounding this regulatory friction, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) officially delayed a highly anticipated plan that would grant innovation exemptions for crypto firms to trade tokenized stocks on public blockchains. The regulatory pushback, driven by concerns over third-party token compliance and investor protection, has dampened short-term institutional optimism. Investors looking to benchmark exchange infrastructure before deploying capital can monitor institutional grade platforms via our crypto exchange comparison.

3. Global Bond Market and Debt Stress

The third pillars of the downturn rests heavily within the fixed-income markets. Government bond yields worldwide are surging to multi-year highs. The yield on the U.S. 10-year Treasury note has neared 4.7%, while the 30-year yield touched 5.19%. Concurrently, Japanese government bond yields are testing new heights as international debt holdings shift.

High sovereign debt yields present two distinct problems for crypto assets:

• Increased Cost of Capital: High yields make corporate and margin borrowing significantly more expensive, reducing the amount of speculative capital flowing into alternative assets.
• Risk-Free Return Competition: When traditional, government-backed bonds offer reliable yields near or above 5%, institutional capital frequently rotates out of volatile risk assets (like Bitcoin and altcoins) and into the safety of debt instruments.

Bitcoin Price Analysis: What Happens Next for BTC?

From a technical perspective, Bitcoin's failure to maintain its footing above $75,000 exposes the asset to further downside risk over the weekend.

If military strikes manifest over the weekend, the immediate emotional reaction from algorithms and spot traders will likely push BTC toward the primary support zone between $72,000 and $72,500. Conversely, if geopolitical headlines calm and no strikes occur, the market will likely experience an aggressive short-squeeze and reversal heading into the next weekly candle open.

During periods of heightened market volatility and rapid price movements, keeping your long-term assets secure in cold storage is paramount; you can explore market-verified security options via our hardware wallets comparison.

Harvard University's endowment fund has aggressively scaled back its exposure to cryptocurrencies. According to recent regulatory filings, the world's largest academic endowment fund reversed its bullish stance on crypto assets during the first quarter of the year.

The move highlights an emerging divergence among Wall Street's elite regarding the long-term viability of spot crypto products. While some multi-billion-dollar entities continue to accumulate digital assets, others are rapidly taking profits or mitigating risk amid a choppy macroeconomic landscape.

What Did Harvard Sell?

The latest Form 13F filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) reveals that the Harvard Management Company (HMC) completely eliminated its $86.8 million position in BlackRock’s iShares Ethereum Trust (ETHA).

Compounding this full exit, Harvard also downsized its position in BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) by roughly 43%. The endowment offloaded approximately 2.3 million shares of the spot Bitcoin ETF, leaving it with 3,044,612 shares valued at approximately $117 million at the end of the quarter.

Understanding Institutional Rebalancing and 13F Filings

To contextualize Harvard's recent trades, it is essential to define what these regulatory disclosures mean. A Form 13F is a quarterly report required by the SEC from institutional investment managers holding at least $100 million in equity assets. It offers the public a snapshot of long positions in U.S. listed equities, options, and exchange-traded funds (ETFs).

While these filings provide transparency, they feature an inherent time lag. The data disclosed in mid-May reflects the portfolio architecture exactly as it stood on March 31. Therefore, any tactical adjustments made by Harvard during the second quarter remain unknown to the public until the next reporting cycle.

Why Did Harvard Dump Its Ethereum and Bitcoin?

Harvard's rapid exit from Ethereum after only one quarter of exposure points to several macroeconomic and internal crypto headwinds that occurred early in the year.

Underperformance and Volatility of Crypto Assets

The primary catalyst behind the sudden divestment appears to be the lackluster price action of major cryptocurrencies relative to standard equities. Ethereum experienced notable downward pressure during the first quarter, dropping significantly from its late-2025 local highs. Faced with an asset that underperformed projections, Harvard's risk management protocols likely triggered an automated stop-loss or a tactical rotation to preserve endowment capital.

Ecosystem Uncertainties at the Ethereum Foundation

Beyond price action, internal governance matters within the Ethereum ecosystem have raised eyebrows among institutional investors. A series of high-profile departures at the Ethereum Foundation—including key long-time researchers—created a narrative of organizational turbulence. Critics and analysts have argued that competing Layer-1 blockchains are aggressively capturing market share while the Ethereum Foundation remains heavily focused on ideological parameters rather than refining native tokenomics to appeal to Wall Street.

A Rotational Play Toward Artificial Intelligence (AI)

The capital freed up from selling crypto news-driven assets did not sit in cash. The 13F filing indicates that Harvard actively pivoted its portfolio toward booming tech and hardware manufacturing. HMC significantly increased its equity exposure to top-tier semiconductor and AI infrastructure firms, ramping up allocations in:

• Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC)
• NVIDIA (NVDA)
• Broadcom (AVGO)

The Broader Institutional Landscape: A Divided Frontier

Harvard's retreat does not necessarily point to a universal institutional rejection of crypto. Instead, the broader 13F data outlines a severe fragmentation in how major funds view the asset class.

For example, sovereign wealth funds took the exact opposite approach during the same period. Abu Dhabi's Mubadala Investment Company expanded its spot Bitcoin ETF allocations by 16%, pushing its net holding close to $566 million. Concurrently, banking giants like JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo reported increased stakes in both Bitcoin and Ethereum spot funds.

Conversely, hedge funds like Millennium Management and Capula Management mirrored Harvard's conservative approach by significantly paring down or entirely liquidating their respective spot crypto trust shares.

Project Nova is coming later this year with a cleaner look, compact mode, and a toggle to make AI features disappear entirely.

Bitcoin touched its lowest price in a month overnight following an awful week for ETFs, which shed over $1.25 billion this week.

Milei's government unveiled a social digital twin to overhaul public policy—announced via a video full of AI slop, grammatical errors, and a deepfake of a minister.

A real astrology engine disguised as a fortune teller. A scammer-punishment machine loaded with the Shrek screenplay. A tool that reads any book and maps every idea to your actual life. These are not normal skills.

User losses weren’t immediately clear.

The chance of Bitcoin dropping below the $50,000 mark has increased to 40% according to predictions from Kalshi traders.

Despite the token removal, the SHIB burn rate stayed negative, reflecting a slowdown compared to previous burn activity levels.

This comes at a critical period for the Cardano ecosystem as governance decisions become increasingly central to the blockchain’s long-term direction.

Chainlink reveals multiple integrations within its ecosystem as it expands its services across five blockchain networks to boost adoption.

Peter Schiff predicts pain ahead for Bitcoin, doubling down on skepticism.

TLDR:

• CFTC Chair Michael Selig says the government cannot and should not seize people’s crypto assets.
• The Genius Act is now law, while the Clarity Act pushes forward to protect crypto market structure. 
• Bitcoin, Ether, Solana, and Zcash are classified as digital commodities under CFTC guidelines.
• Selig confirms the chance of crypto being made illegal in the United States is now slim to none.

Commodity Futures Trading Commission Chair Michael Selig has publicly stated that the U.S. government should not seize crypto assets belonging to citizens.

Speaking in a May 13, 2026, interview with Mark Moss, Selig outlined a regulatory vision that centers on private property rights.

He stressed that statutory protections for digital assets are now a top priority. His remarks reflect the current administration’s broader push to position the U.S. as the global leader in digital finance.

Legislative Framework to Protect Crypto Assets

The administration is actively pushing two major pieces of legislation to safeguard crypto assets. The Genius Act, focused on stablecoins, has already been signed into law.

The Clarity Act, which addresses broader market structure, is still moving through the legislative process. Together, these laws aim to give crypto developers and users clear, enforceable protections.

Selig noted that statutory guidance is critical to prevent future government overreach. Without it, hostile regulatory actions similar to past administrations could return.

He directly referenced the need to avoid a repeat of “Operation Choke Point 3.0.” That effort previously pushed crypto businesses out of the U.S. banking system.

The CFTC has regulated Bitcoin futures since 2017 and plays a central role in classifying digital assets. According to Selig, the agency views Bitcoin, Ether, Solana, and Zcash as digital commodities.

Other categories include stablecoins, NFTs, digital securities, and digital tools. This classification system is designed to bring regulatory clarity across the crypto space.

Selig was direct about the risk of crypto being banned in the U.S. “The chance of that happening in the US is now slim to none,” he said during the interview.

He credited the current legislative push as the reason for that confidence. Clear statutory rules, he argued, make hostile government action far harder to execute.

Self-Custody and Private Property Rights for Crypto Holders

A key theme in Selig’s remarks was the right to self-custody crypto assets. He argued that true ownership of digital assets depends on individuals holding their own private keys.

The administration has already issued no-action letters for self-custodial wallet providers. This move shows a practical commitment to protecting that right.

Selig also tied crypto ownership directly to American founding principles. “The US was founded on the principle of private property, which extends to digital assets,” he stated.

The government, in his view, should not create barriers to owning or accessing one’s crypto. This position marks a clear shift from regulatory approaches seen in prior years.

On the administration’s broader ambition, Selig was equally clear. “The US is already the crypto capital of the world,” he said, adding that clear regulations are essential to maintain that status.

Losing ground to other countries, he warned, is a real risk without the right legal framework in place. The Clarity Act and Genius Act are meant to close that gap.

The administration is also encouraging public engagement through comment letters and task forces. Builders and everyday users alike are being invited to shape future policy.

“Getting statutory guidance in place is really important,” Selig emphasized. The long-term goal is a digital finance ecosystem that keeps the U.S. firmly ahead on the global stage.

The post CFTC Chair: U.S. Government Cannot Seize Your Crypto Assets appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR:

• Bitcoin whale holdings dropped 18,447 BTC worth $1.42B in just 96 hours, per Santiment on-chain data.
• Whale wallets slipped from 5.245M to near 5.23M BTC, reflecting quiet distribution at elevated prices.
• Downside liquidity near $74K has been largely swept, leaving a thin pocket remaining near $73,500.
• Short liquidation clusters stacked near $78K now act as the market’s strongest upside magnet.

Bitcoin whale holdings have recorded a sharp decline over the past four days, with large wallets offloading 18,447 BTC worth approximately $1.42 billion.

The movement has drawn attention from on-chain analysts tracking distribution behavior at elevated price levels.

Largest Bitcoin Holders Are Quietly Trimming Exposure

On-chain data from Santiment shows total whale balances slipping from roughly 5.245 million BTC to near 5.23 million BTC across 96 hours. The visual shift on the chart is subtle. The market weight behind it is not.

These wallets belong to funds, OTC desks, miners, and long-term holders, not retail participants reacting to short-term noise.

Their decision to reduce Bitcoin whale holdings while prices remain elevated is a calculated move, not a panic response. 

Four possible drivers explain the pace: strategic profit-taking, portfolio rotation, macro uncertainty hedging, or redistribution into strong demand.

Santiment has consistently flagged this pattern across previous cycles. When large holders trim balances while retail sentiment stays optimistic, volatility tends to follow.

The divergence between whale behavior and crowd confidence has historically served as a market timing indicator rather than a crash trigger. 

Redistribution can support healthy consolidation by spreading supply from concentrated hands into broader circulation.

Still, the fact that Bitcoin’s smartest money is no longer accumulating aggressively is a signal the market cannot ignore.

Liquidation Data Builds the Case for an Upside Move

The liquidation heatmap adds a different layer to the current setup. Bitcoin has already swept through most of the downside liquidity near the mid-$74,000 region, clearing out overleveraged longs through forced deleveraging. That flush has left the immediate lower range notably thin.

A small liquidity pocket near $73,500 remains open. If price revisits that level, the sweep would likely be fast and mechanical rather than the start of a prolonged breakdown. With most weak longs already removed, sellers have fewer reasons to press further.

The real gravity sits overhead. Dense short liquidation clusters are stacked near $78,000 on the heatmap, representing heavily leveraged positions waiting to be unwound. In crypto markets, price gravitates toward liquidity. 

Right now, the largest concentration is above the current price. A sustained push upward could trigger a chain of forced short closures, adding mechanical buying pressure at each step.

Bitcoin appears caught between a shallow downside sweep near $73,500 and a far heavier upside target near $78,000.

With the liquidation phase largely exhausted below, the next major move may be a squeeze — pointing directly at those short positions stacked above.

The post Bitcoin Whales Dump $1.42B in Four Days Amid Short Squeeze Setup Near $78K appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR:

• ONDO’s market suggests deliberate whale liquidity hunting before trend commitment.
• The $0.45 resistance zone has rejected the ONDO price multiple times, absorbing every rally attempt at that ceiling.
• ONDO’s $0.35–$0.36 support continues holding structure, keeping the bullish continuation scenario technically viable.
• Broader market conditions, with equities near highs, frame the $0.45 rejection as profit-taking rather than fear-driven selling.

Ondo (ONDO) price analysis is drawing serious attention as back-to-back liquidation events on both sides of the market expose calculated whale positioning. This has left traders watching closely for the next decisive move from a pivotal price zone.

Liquidity Is Being Hunted From Both Sides

ONDO’s recent price action reads less like organic trading and more like a coordinated shakeout. After months of compression between $0.20 and $0.30, the asset broke sharply higher, dragging leveraged shorts into a painful squeeze near $0.40. Forced buybacks from those trapped positions amplified the rally beyond what fundamentals alone could justify.

The downside leg told a parallel story. Before that rebound materialized, long liquidations erupted near the $0.30 zone, purging overleveraged bulls in a single aggressive sweep. Markets rarely deliver that kind of one-two punch by accident. 

Large players routinely engineer these moves to accumulate positions at reset prices while retail traders absorb the losses.

What the liquidation map now reveals is a market with stacked vulnerability on both ends. Short clusters sit above $0.40, while long liquidation zones remain sensitive near $0.30.

Until one side breaks conclusively, ONDO could stay trapped in a high-tension range where the next catalyst — whether news-driven or volume-led — could trigger a rapid, outsized reaction in either direction.

Resistance Holds Firm, but Structure Stays Intact

The rally that carried ONDO back toward $0.45 initially looked promising. Price climbed steadily off $0.35 support, squeezing shorts and reclaiming lost ground with conviction.

Yet the moment it tagged the $0.45 resistance ceiling, sellers responded immediately, leaving a sharp upper wick as evidence of distribution into rally strength.

Technical readings reflect that slowdown without signaling collapse. RSI retreated from elevated levels following the rejection, and the MACD crossed into a mild rollover. 

Still, neither indicator points to a trend reversal — momentum cooling is the more accurate read at this stage. Crucially, broader market conditions offer little support for a fear-driven breakdown. 

Equities traded near record highs during the same stretch, while traditional safe-haven assets like gold and oil showed no unusual demand spike.

That context frames the $0.45 rejection as profit-taking after an extended rally, not distribution ahead of macro deterioration. 

Reclaiming $0.45 with volume behind it remains the cleanest path toward the next liquidity pocket, while a slip below $0.35 reopens a deeper corrective leg before any renewed expansion.

The post Ondo Price Analysis: Short and Long Wipeouts Flag a Showdown at $0.40 appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR:

• XRP whale transactions above $1M plunged from 157 to 67 in just nine days, per analyst Ali Martinez.
• Price is coiling tightly between resistance at $1.54 and key support at $1.29 amid fading volume.
• A dense liquidity wall between $1.60 and $1.85 is capping upside, while bids defend the $1.28 zone.
• RSI hovers near oversold levels without full capitulation, hinting that sellers are losing their grip.

The biggest players in the XRP market have pulled back sharply, with large-holder activity dropping 57.3% in just nine days.

Rather than signaling retreat, on-chain data and chart structure suggest the market may be quietly building toward its next directional move.

XRP’s Big Holders Go Quiet as Price Coils Into a Tight Range

Large-holder activity on the XRP network has dropped sharply, with transactions above $1 million falling from 157 to just 67 over a nine-day window, per data flagged by on-chain analyst Ali Martinez. 

The 57.3% contraction marks a meaningful shift in market behavior — one that typically precedes consolidation rather than collapse.

As these heavyweight participants stepped back, the market transitioned into a quieter, more measured state.

Price has been drifting between two well-defined levels — resistance at $1.54 and support near $1.29 — without mounting a convincing move in either direction.

Volume has steadily faded during this stretch, reinforcing the picture of a market in deliberate pause rather than distress.

The RSI has remained near oversold territory for an extended period without sparking a full breakdown, suggesting sellers are losing momentum rather than pressing a dominant position. 

Buyers, for their part, continue to absorb pressure near $1.29 with quiet persistence. It is a market holding its breath — and historically, that kind of stillness rarely lasts.

Liquidity Data Frames the Stakes of XRP’s Next Move

Pull up the liquidity heatmap, and the tension becomes immediately visible. A dense wall of resting sell orders sits between $1.60 and $1.85, represented by bright clusters that reflect heavy positioning from large participants. 

That overhead supply has consistently capped upside attempts, acting as a ceiling the market has yet to seriously challenge. Below the current price, the picture is equally telling. 

A layered bid cushion has formed around the $1.20–$1.28 zone, pointing to continued defensive positioning from market makers and larger players despite the overall slowdown.

XRP is effectively sandwiched — sell-side pressure above, buy-side support below — with neither camp willing to make the first decisive move.

The volume profile adds further context. Peak trading activity is concentrated right at the current price range, confirming that the market is settling into fair-value equilibrium. This is not a trending market — it is a loading one. 

A breakout above the $1.60 liquidity cluster could trigger cascading short liquidations and push the price sharply higher.

A confirmed breakdown below $1.29, backed by rising volume, would tell a different story — one where patience from large holders gives way to distribution.

For now, XRP sits at a crossroads, and the next move may carry significant weight.

The post XRP Whale Activity Falls 57% in 9 Days: Is a Breakout Loading? appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR:

• ZachXBT’s defense fund drew donations from Binance, Bybit, Paradigm, and Hyperliquid-linked wallets.
• Hyperliquid donated 10,000 HYPE tokens worth up to $600K; critical coverage slowed shortly after.
• ZachXBT sold roughly $3.87M in unsolicited meme tokens, drawing backlash over victim fund concerns.
• Polymarket wallets allegedly profited $1.2M ahead of a ZachXBT post, though no direct link was proven.

ZachXBT has built a reputation as one of crypto’s most trusted watchdogs, uncovering over $500 million in fraud across the industry.

Now, a viral thread on X has turned the spotlight on him. The thread raises questions about donor relationships, selective investigations, and financial conflicts of interest.

No court has ruled against him, and no official body has confirmed wrongdoing. Still, the allegations have sparked a broader conversation about accountability in crypto investigations.

Donation Patterns Draw Questions About Investigative Independence

After facing a lawsuit in 2023, ZachXBT launched a community defense fund. The fund reportedly attracted donations from prominent industry names.

Alleged donors included Binance-linked wallets, TRON ecosystem figures, Jesse Powell of Kraken, Sandeep Nailwal of Polygon, Optimism, Bybit, Paradigm, and Hyperliquid.

Critics noticed a pattern following those donations. None of the alleged donors later appeared as subjects in major ZachXBT investigations.

That observation has fueled accusations that financial support may have influenced which targets received public exposure.

Supporters of ZachXBT argue the defense fund was a legitimate community response to litigation. They maintain that the absence of investigations into donors does not prove any arrangement existed. The connection, they say, remains circumstantial.

Even so, the optics have raised serious questions. In an industry that prizes transparency, the lack of public disclosure around these donations has become a focal point for critics watching the situation closely.

The Hyperliquid Timeline Sits at the Center of the Controversy

The Hyperliquid case has become the most discussed element of the thread. Between December 2024 and January 2026, ZachXBT published multiple critical posts about Hyperliquid.

On January 18, 2026, the Hyperliquid Foundation donated 10,000 HYPE tokens to him, officially valued at approximately $254,000 at the time.

Critics place the value closer to $600,000. After the donation was made, observers noted that major critical coverage of Hyperliquid appeared to slow down. That timeline is what the viral thread used to build its central argument.

ZachXBT has not publicly addressed the full scope of these allegations in detail. The donation itself is documented on-chain, making it verifiable. What remains disputed is whether the timing reflects a conflict or simply a coincidence.

The Hyperliquid case also intersects with a broader question about disclosure standards. If an investigator receives funds from an entity they have previously criticized, transparency around that relationship becomes essential for maintaining public trust.

Token Sales and Polymarket Allegations Add Further Pressure

An anonymous developer launched a meme token called $ZACHXBT and sent 50% of the supply directly to his wallet. The market cap briefly reached around $88 million.

ZachXBT sold approximately 16,059 SOL, worth roughly $3.87 million, stating the tokens were unsolicited and he sold to avoid association.

Critics questioned why the proceeds were not redirected to fraud victims or investigation funds. That decision drew attention from community members who felt it conflicted with his stated mission. The response from his supporters was that unsolicited tokens carry no obligation.

A separate allegation involves Polymarket. The thread claims fresh wallets placed heavy bets before ZachXBT published an investigation, allegedly generating over $1.2 million in profit.

No direct evidence ties him to those wallets. However, the timing drew widespread attention across the community.

Taken together, these incidents have reopened a question the crypto space rarely asks: who holds investigators accountable when their funding sources intersect with the entities they cover?

The post ZachXBT Under Fire: Is Crypto’s Most Trusted Investigator Compromised? appeared first on Blockonomi.

Coinbase reportedly spent approximately $7.6 million on personal security for CEO Brian Armstrong in 2025, a more than 20% increase from the year before.

This is according to the company’s proxy filings cited in a report by Bloomberg, with the spending coming after physical attacks on crypto holders rose 75% last year. Per data from blockchain security firm CertiK, there have been 72 confirmed incidents and $41 million in known losses.

Crypto Firms Tighten Security After Wave of Violent Attacks

That $7.6 million figure stated in the Bloomberg piece exceeds what major Wall Street banks typically disclose for CEO protection. For context, Gemini reportedly spent around $2.5 million on security for the two co-founders, Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, in 2025 and has since signed a deal to protect the twins and their families for $400,000 per month.

Circle spent nearly $800,000 on its CEO, Jeremy Allaire, in 2024, while Robinhood spent approximately $1.6 million on Vlad Tenev. The rest of the industry reaction can be observed in other places as well. For example, during the Bitcoin 2026 conference in Las Vegas just last month, high-profile speakers could be seen walking around with personal bodyguards.

And to show how seriously the community is taking security, a workshop led by Bitcoin security expert Ben Perrin that taught attendees how to protect their digital assets under physical coercion, as well as how to use decoy wallets, time-lock mechanisms, and duress features on hardware wallets, was one of the most heavily attended at the conference.

It was the same a few weeks earlier at Paris Blockchain Week, where guests were escorted by a police motorcade to a VIP dinner while organizers doubled security around the event.

The threat is very real, as seen when a crypto holder known online as Sillytuna reported in March that armed attackers stole around $24 million in tokens after physically intimidating him and threatening him with kidnapping and sexual assault.

The Structural Problem Beneath the Headlines

The reason why crypto owners are so vulnerable boils down to the technology itself. As we know, public blockchains are pseudonymous and not anonymous, thus revealing ownership information for anyone with proper analytical tools to view. As such, leaked exchange data and chain analytics have together created, as Bloomberg put it, “a legible map of who holds what.”

For that reason, demand for protection services has responded accordingly. Executive Risk Services, a firm focused on the digital-asset industry, went from receiving client inquiries roughly once per quarter two years ago to about once a week now.

Meanwhile, Amsterdam-based Infinite Risks International, which provides bodyguards, armored vehicles, and social media monitoring to crypto holders, has seen more inquiries, more long-term clients, and more proactive requests, according to managing director Jethro Pijlman. According to the report, France has become a hotspot for crypto crime after a string of attacks on crypto entrepreneurs and their families.

Things have gotten so bad that last year, the country’s Interior Minister promised to establish a priority emergency number for the industry, with elite police units offering security briefings for crypto executives and their families.

The post Crypto CEO Security Costs Surge as Physical Attacks Rise 75% appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Cardano’s development began just over a decade ago, but it took a couple of years for the actual launch. Arguably, the even more important release of smart contracts, though, came in 2021 after the highly debated Alonzo upgrade.

Its native token has become a fan favorite among many crypto investors, but there are also a substantial number of doubters and critics.

Most Overvalued Network?

Satoshi Flipper, one of the most recognizable names on Crypto X with over 240,000 followers, shared another analyst’s viewpoint on the Charles Hoskinson-founded network with the caption, “Is Cardano the most overvalued blockchain on the planet?”

The underlying analysis questions the performance of the blockchain. It cited a DeFi total value locked (TVL) number of just $128 million, which is exactly what DeFiLlama shows as of press time, as well as 24-hour DEX trading volume of just $1.3 million, $26 million worth of stablecoins on top of it, and approximately 17k active addresses.

Eye Zen Hour described this as an “incredibly small on-chain economy relative to valuation.” The valuation itself is a $9 billion market cap for Cardano’s native token, which, despite its massive decline since its peak (to be discussed later), is still a top 15 altcoin by that metric.

Consequently, Zen Hour concluded that the market will eventually have to make an important decision on Cardano and ADA, whether it’s valuing an ecosystem or “just a memory from prior cycles.”

Cardano has a $9B market cap

I’m not joking when I say I don’t know a single real person active on Cardano. I don’t know many holding $ADA

The chain’s numbers are a bit scary:
> TVL: $128M
> 24H DEX vol: $1.3M
> Stablecoins: $26M
> ~17K active addresses

That’s an incredibly… pic.twitter.com/BWhn3fzQzZ

— eye zen hour (@eyezenhour) May 23, 2026

ADA’s Memory From Past Cycles

The aforementioned Alonzo update coincided with ADA’s most impressive price surge in Q3, 2021. At the time, the token was riding high alongside the rest of the market and charted a new all-time high of just over $3. However, it turned out to be a classic sell-the-news event, and ADA has been unable to recapture its former glory.

In fact, it hasn’t even come close. During the 2025 market-wide rally, bitcoin, as well as many altcoins, managed to post new peaks. However, ADA’s high was far from its 2021 record as it couldn’t break past $1.3. It currently struggles below $0.25, which represents a mind-blowing decline of over 92% since its 2021 ATH.

Although almost all crypto assets have slumped since last October, ADA’s crash has been more than just a correction, and being 92% away from its record doesn’t sound too promising for its vast community.

The post Is Cardano the Most Overvalued Crypto Project? Analysts Debate as ADA Dumps appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Bitcoin’s price calamity is not isolated, as, aside from all other macro and on-chain reasons, the exchange-traded funds tracking the asset’s performance experienced their worst weekly outflows since late January.

In fact, data from SoSoValue shows that May has turned red following two consecutive weeks of massive outflows.

Over $1.25B Pulled Out

The spot Bitcoin ETFs were on a highly impressive streak that began during the week that ended on April 2. The following six weeks were deep in the green. Moreover, 10 out of the 11 weeks at the time saw more net inflows than outflows.

However, this impressive trend broke during the week that ended on May 15, when investors pulled out $1 billion from the funds. The landscape worsened in the past five trading days, as the net outflows skyrocketed to $1.26 billion: the most since the end of January. Consequently, the cumulative net inflows dropped to just over $57 billion, out of the local peak at $59.34 billion marked just a couple of weeks ago.

Monday was the most painful day in terms of net outflows, with nearly $650 million in withdrawals. Tuesday followed suit with $331 million, another $70 million on Wednesday, $101 million on Thursday, and $105 million on Friday. Somewhat surprisingly, BlackRock’s IBIT bled out the most: $445 million on Monday, $325 million on Tuesday, $61.5 million on Wednesday, $104 million on Thursday, and $69 million on Friday.

As such, the total inflows for May have turned red, currently showing a $1 billion reduction.

Not Just the ETFs

Bitcoin’s price has also turned red for the month. After closing April with a notable 11.87% surge, May began on a positive note, and the cryptocurrency quickly spiked to a multi-month high of almost $83,000. Although it was rejected there, it managed to maintain the $80,000 level for several weeks before it broke down last weekend.

It has been unable to reclaim that level since then. Moreover, it plunged on Friday and earlier today to a monthly low of $74,200. Aside from the ETFs bleeding out, other reasons for BTC’s calamity could include war-related uncertainty and the possibility of new attacks, as well as other investors disposing of their assets.

As such, current data from CoinGlass shows that bitcoin is now over 1% in the red for May as it struggles below $75,500.

The post Bitcoin ETFs Suffer Biggest Outflows Since January as May Turns Red appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Ethereum has come under renewed selling pressure after failing to reclaim a key dynamic resistance cluster around the 100-day moving average and the lower boundary of the previous consolidation range.

While the broader market remains under pressure, ETH is now approaching a critical support region where short-term reactions may emerge. However, unless buyers quickly reclaim lost levels, the path of least resistance appears tilted toward further downside continuation.

Ethereum Price Analysis: The Daily Chart

On the daily timeframe, ETH faced a strong rejection from the confluence of the 100-day moving average near the $2.1K-$2.15K region and the broken wedge support structure, which had previously acted as dynamic support for several months.

Following this rejection, the asset decisively broke below the wedge formation, confirming a notable bearish structural shift in the market. This breakdown signals weakening bullish momentum and increasing dominance from sellers.

Currently, ETH is trading around the $2K psychological support zone after losing the important $2.1K level. The overall structure suggests that the recent move could evolve into a classic breakdown-and-pullback scenario, where price may temporarily retest the broken wedge boundary and the $2.1K-$2.15K resistance area before continuing lower.

If bearish momentum persists, the next major downside target lies near the substantial $1.8K support region, which previously acted as a strong demand zone during the February capitulation event. A break below that area could expose Ethereum to deeper corrections toward the lower macro support levels around $1.55K-$1.6K.

On the bullish side, reclaiming the 100-day MA around $2.15K would be the first sign that buyers are attempting to invalidate the recent bearish breakdown.

ETH/USDT 4-Hour Chart

On the 4-hour timeframe, Ethereum’s market structure remains clearly bearish, reflecting growing fear and uncertainty among market participants after the sharp impulsive decline from the $2.4K region.

The price has consistently formed lower highs and lower lows, while recent selling pressure accelerated after ETH lost the important ascending support trendline near $2.2K-$2.25K. This breakdown triggered another wave of liquidation-driven selling, pushing the asset directly into a key 4-hour order block located around the $1.95K-$2K support zone.

This region is highly important because it has served as a major reaction area for an extended period of time and likely contains significant resting liquidity. As a result, Ethereum could experience a short-term corrective bullish retracement from this zone before any continuation toward lower prices.

In the event of a rebound, the primary pullback target sits around the $2.1K-$2.15K area, which now acts as the nearest supply zone and potential pullback resistance. This region also coincides with the previously broken market structure, increasing the probability of renewed selling pressure if the price revisits it.

However, unless ETH manages to reclaim and stabilize above the $2.2K region, the broader short-term trend remains bearish, and any recovery rally may simply be considered a corrective move within a larger downtrend.

Sentiment Analysis

The latest Ethereum liquidation heatmap reveals a substantial liquidity concentration below the current market price, with the most significant cluster positioned around the $1.8K region. This zone has emerged as a major liquidity magnet, containing a dense accumulation of leveraged positions that could attract price action in the coming phase.

Historically, Ethereum tends to gravitate toward high-liquidity regions before establishing a meaningful reversal. The recent decline and weak recovery structure suggest that the market may still require a final liquidity sweep to fully reset positioning and flush out remaining leveraged participants. As a result, the $1.8K area becomes a critical level to monitor, as it holds the potential to absorb incoming selling pressure while clearing a large portion of resting liquidity.

From a market mechanics perspective, such liquidity grabs often occur before the beginning of a stronger impulsive trend. If Ethereum eventually taps into this zone, it could trigger panic-driven selling and forced liquidations, creating favorable conditions for large players to accumulate at discounted prices. Consequently, while short-term rebounds remain possible, the broader liquidity structure indicates that Ethereum may still be vulnerable to a deeper corrective move toward the $1.8K cluster before a sustainable bullish expansion can begin.

The post Ethereum Price Prediction: Will ETH Crash Below $2K This Week After Key Breakdown? appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Ethereum’s native token has taken the most recent crypto market correction hard, with the asset diving to just over $2,000 earlier today, which became its lowest price point in almost two months.

Moreover, it has dropped by 17% since its monthly high at $2,425, and the overall landscape seems quite bearish. Although Santiment Intelligence believes this could be the necessary factor for a major trend reversal, the current environment is nothing short of underwhelming, to say the least.

More Trouble Ahead?

After it was stopped at $2,400, $2,300, $2,200, and $2,100 earlier this week, the latest crucial support to give in was the $2,050 level during today’s decline. According to popular analyst Ted Pillows, this opens the door for more profound corrections. Moreover, he warned that if ETH loses the psychological $2,000 support as well, new lows “will just be a matter of time.”

Fellow analyst CW noted that a large amount of ETH longs were liquidated on the way down. More specifically, data from CoinGlass shows that the total value of liquidated ETH longs is over $250 million on a daily scale, second only to bitcoin’s $380 million.

CW added that as short positions closed, the Open Interest declined significantly and the Net Position Delta increased. They concluded that high-leverage longs are getting wrecked, while bearish bets are closing, which could lead to some market calmness.

During the decline, $ETH long positions were liquidated in large amount.

Subsequently, as short positions closed, the Open Interest (OI) decreased and the Net Position Delta increased.

High-leverage long positions are being liquidated, and bearish bets are closing. pic.twitter.com/bTYuT7tjnG

— CW (@CW8900) May 23, 2026

OG Whale Returns

The silver lining for the Ethereum ecosystem at the moment is the return of an OG whale, as reported by Lookonchain. The analytics company’s data shows that this market participant, who is known for pocketing a 376x return on their initial ETH investment from 10 years ago, has started accumulating again.

On-chain data reveals that this whale has acquired over $8 million worth of ETH at prices of around $2,050. Previously, they sold when the altcoin stood above $2,850.

As the market drops, another #EthereumOG who made $34.2M(376x return) is buying the dip on $ETH!

10 years ago, this OG received 12,001 $ETH from ShapeShift at just $7.58 each.

Over a year ago, he sold them for 34.3M $USDC at $2,856, making $34.2M in profit – a 376x return.… pic.twitter.com/vSfrYyo2Bl

— Lookonchain (@lookonchain) May 23, 2026

The post Ethereum Tanks to 2-Month Low: Whales Return but Sub-$2K Fears Mount appeared first on CryptoPotato.