Onchain | Crypto

The CFTC ordered a trading ban for former Alameda and FTX executives, and US prosecutors opposed a motion from a US soldier accused of profiting from the removal of Nicolas Maduro. Update (Aug. 21, 9:50 pm UTC): This article has been updated to include information about the criminal case against Edward Zimbardi. On Tuesday, the US District Court for the Southern District of New York (SDNY) entered consent orders related to a 2022 enforcement action against former Alameda Research CEO Caroline Ellison and crypto exchange FTX co-founder Zixiao “Gary” Wang. The orders imposed by the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) required that Ellison and Wang receive a five-year trading ban related to their roles in the crypto exchange’s collapse. The CFTC also ordered that the Alameda CEO receive a 10-year registration ban, while Wang received an eight-year registration ban. Read more

A case tied to defunct crypto exchange FTX moves forward, a soldier seeks to dismiss over a Polymarket bet and a former congressman was ordered to pay $35,000 for manipulative trading. In a Friday filing with the US District Court for the Southern District of New York (SDNY) over campaign finance charges, Michelle Bond’s legal team asked the court to consider precluding evidence related to former FTX Digital Markets co-CEO Ryan Salame, her husband who is currently serving a 90-month sentence after he pleaded guilty in 2023. Bond faces campaign finance charges alleging that her unsuccessful 2022 congressional run in New York was partially funded by contributions from FTX facilitated by Salame. As part of the filings this week, Bond asked the court to exclude evidence of her husband’s guilty plea and “related plea materials,” in which the former executive admitted to making “political contributions in [his] name that were funded by transfers from the bank accounts” of an entity tied to FTX.  “The Court should p...

Users spent a record $324 million on onchain gacha in June, even as Bitcoin hit a 21-month low. The thrill of scoring a top Pokemon card from a random pack is becoming big business June 2026 was brutal for the crypto market. Bitcoin (BTC) fell more than 20%, hitting a 21-month low, while spot Bitcoin ETFs saw a record $4.5 billion in outflows. That did not stop users from spending a record $324 million on onchain gacha during the month, according to Blockworks Research. A year earlier, the monthly figure was closer to $50 million. Spending hit a new all time high in the depths of a bear market. While crypto prices were tanking, people were opening more and more packs of tokenized Pokémon cards — driven by the thrill, the hope of a profit or the urge to expand a collection. It’s an entire randomized Real World Asset (RWA) sector that’s flown under the radar… until now. Read more

TRM Labs said onchain gambling reached $51 billion in 2025, with repeat users and stablecoin flows helping the sector remain resilient during a broader crypto market pullback. Prediction markets overtook onchain gambling for the first time in the opening quarter of 2026, recording $36.6 billion in volume compared with gambling's $14 billion, according to TRM Labs. In a Wednesday report, the blockchain intelligence company said the shift followed a rapid expansion in both sectors. Onchain gambling reached $51 billion in 2025, while prediction markets climbed to $54 billion, putting the two categories at comparable scale heading into 2026.  Still, onchain gambling remained near record levels. Quarterly gambling volume reached an all-time high of $15 billion in the fourth quarter of 2025, then held at $14 billion in Q1 2026. Read more

One of the three convicted terrorism financiers sent $49,000 worth of stablecoins to a foreign exchange before it was routed to an ISIS-linked campaign. Onchain evidence was key to securing the conviction of three individuals for terrorism financing in Indonesia in 2024 and 2025, reflecting a clear shift in the way courts value onchain evidence. “Indonesian courts have demonstrated that cryptocurrency evidence — wallet addresses, transaction histories, on-chain flows — is not only admissible but can anchor a terrorism financing prosecution,” TRM said in a statement Sunday. TRM said terrorism financing networks have preferred cryptocurrency as a mechanism of choice to move money, as authorities and regulators have been slow to treat it with the same level of scrutiny as traditional fiat channels, but noted that this is now changing.  Read more

Perp DEX daily volume fell to $8.4 billion on April 4, its first sub-$10 billion level since September and the lowest since July, DefiLlama data shows. Onchain perpetual futures trading has cooled for five straight months since peaking in October 2025. Perp volume on decentralized exchanges (DEXs) fell to $699 billion in March 2026 from October’s $1.36 trillion, according to DefiLlama data. The decline has been steady across the period, with volumes slipping through November and December before losses extended through the first quarter of 2026.  Read more

Rising oil and gold volumes signal growing demand for onchain macro trading, but limited liquidity and depth still keep traditional markets in control. Onchain commodity trading is proving it’s more than a short-term spike, but limited liquidity continues to hold the market back from competing with traditional venues. Hyperliquid’s HIP-3 market recorded a new all-time high on March 23, with roughly $5.4 billion in perpetual futures volume across commodities and macro assets. Silver led the activity at $1.3 billion, followed by WTI crude oil at $1.2 billion, Brent crude at $940 million and gold at $558 million. Equity indices, including the Nasdaq and S&P 500, also saw notable volumes. Industry participants say the spike shows growing demand for macro exposure onchain. “Previously, onchain commodity futures were mostly a venue for crypto-native investors, that is no longer the whole story,” said Iggy Ioppe, chief investment officer at Theo. “The real tell is not just the volume, it’s when the volume shows up a...

Brent crude oil, the global benchmark stands at about $107 per barrel at the time of writing. Onchain perpetual futures linked to real-world commodities like precious metals and oil have surged in trading volume, signaling an investor rotation from altcoins to commodity-linked digital assets, according to a report published Thursday by digital asset bank Sygnum. Trading volume for oil and precious metals perpetual futures markets on the Hyperliquid decentralized exchange (DEX) accounts for over 67% of HIP-3 contracts in Q1 2026, also known as “Builder-Deployed Perpetuals,” on the Hyperliquid platform, according to the report. Previously, indexes accounted for about 90% of HIP-3 trading activity, but this has fallen to about 17%, according to Sygnum. Read more

Bitcoin shows signs of recovery as on-chain “buy the dip” signals rise. Explore BTC’s technical outlook, support levels, and price targets for traders. The post Bitcoin Price Prediction: Why the Onchain ‘Buy the Dip’ Signal Could Lead to a Liquidity Hunt appeared first on Cryptonews.