Crypto

Ongoing strong demand for AI infrastructure “would likely sustain upward pressure on prices for technology products and electricity,” Federal Reserve policymakers said. Federal Reserve officials were split last month on whether to increase interest rates or keep them steady, with many seeing accelerating demand for artificial intelligence as a driver of inflation, according to meeting minutes released on Wednesday. The minutes covered the first monetary policy meeting under Fed Chair Kevin Warsh. Many Federal Open Market Committee members said that “ongoing strong demand for AI infrastructure would likely sustain upward pressure on prices for technology products and electricity,” according to the minutes.   AI-related inflationary pressure, colloquially known as “chipflation,” stems from the rising cost of semiconductors used by data centers. This surge in demand, along with data center competition for energy, has pushed up consumer prices for a wide range of electronic goods, devices and power, and may conti...

Despite the majority of nodes still operating on v3.1.3, roughly 61% of XRPL validators running on rippled versions have adopted the new upgrade.

Crypto venture firm Paradigm is widening its investment gaze toward AI and other frontier industries with its latest fund. Paradigm has raised $1.2 billion for its fourth fund, which will expand the crypto venture capital firm’s investments into artificial intelligence and related technologies. The company said on Wednesday that its latest fund will invest “first in crypto, and now across AI, robotics and other frontiers.” “We continue investing in crypto and the reinvention of markets and the financial system,” Paradigm added, highlighting its investments in the crypto perpetuals exchange Hyperliquid and the prediction markets platform Kalshi. Read more

Zapper provided crypto market data to over 2 million monthly active users and oversaw more than $13 billion in processed transactions during its peak. Decentralized finance (DeFi) analytics platform Zapper announced it will shut down next month, becoming the latest crypto platform to fold amid a market downturn. In a post to X on Wednesday, Zapper CEO Seb Audet said Zapper’s website, mobile app and API services would shut down on Aug. 3, marking the end of a seven-year run after receiving backing from the likes of billionaire investor Mark Cuban in 2021. “We evaluated a number of different options, pursued some to the fullest extent possible, and came to the realization that an orderly wind down is the best course of action,” Audet said. Read more

The size and scope of the US stock market “gives policymakers a strong incentive to backstop major drawdowns,” said Bitget Wallet COO, Alvin Kan. Crypto markets could benefit from increased liquidity if the US central bank steps in to support the $75 trillion equity market in a bear market, as it is "too big and too important to fail,” according to analysts. The US equity market has grown by 68% over the past five years and has added roughly $6 trillion in market value so far this year. However, analysts and experts, such as goldbug Peter Schiff, have warned that years of rapid growth could be setting up the market for a major correction. Such a correction could see the Fed "break decades of precedent" and buy equity ETFs to support the stock market, Bloomberg's ETF expert Eric Balchunas said on Tuesday, while other analysts said the resulting move to increase liquidity could set up an environment for cryptocurrencies to benefit. Read more

SpaceXAI's new coding model is cheaper and faster than Anthropic and OpenAI's flagships—and by Musk's own account, at least one generation behind them.

A proposed safe harbor could give early crypto projects more flexibility while building tokenized products.

Bitcoin faces renewed sell pressure amid an oil price surge, Japan economic contagion risks and a fresh round of selling from Strategy. Key takeaways: Bitcoin traded down 3.5% on Wednesday as new developments in the US-Iran war pushed oil prices higher and Japan’s bond markets faced renewed stress. That combination triggered broader de-risking across markets. At the same time, concerns over potential Bitcoin sales from Strategy intensified, with traders now bracing for a possible correction below $60,000. Read more

The investment firm said its fourth fund will back AI, robotics, and crypto startups as it broadens beyond digital assets.

Industry data shows trading activity and market value accelerating as crypto companies and traditional financial institutions expand tokenized equity initiatives. Tokenized stock transfers more than doubled over the past month to $8.41 billion, according to RWA.xyz data, as activity in onchain equity markets continued to accelerate. The sector's distributed value also climbed 43% over the same period to $2.16 billion, while the number of holders increased 17% to more than 409,000, according to the data platform. Growth was led by several of the market's largest tokenization platforms. Figure's distributed value surged 935% over the past 30 days, while Securitize's rose 332% and xStocks' increased around 62%. Read more

Binance-backed BNB Chain is restructuring its underlying architecture and setting a long-term goal of processing 1 million transactions per second while integrating protocol-level privacy. The strategic pivot aims to capture two distinct yet demanding emerging markets: traditional financial institutions and the nascent sector of autonomous artificial intelligence agents. This aggressive technical roadmap arrives at a […] The post BNB Chain makes 1,000,000 TPS moonshot bet on AI as BNB price slips to 2024 lows appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Hoskinson argues Cardano's years of research deserve recognition as Ethereum explores similar technical approaches.

XRP price prediction remains in focus as the coin experiences another quiet pullback. However, its validators are embracing the new upgrade. The post XRP Price Prediction: Validators Welcome XRP Ledger Last Upgrade appeared first on Cryptonews.

Bitcoin is looking slightly more optimistic but failed the breakout everyone was watching. Meanwhile, ETH just printed a weekly death cross for the first time in years.

The Bitcoin mining industry in 2026 looks very different from what it did just a few years ago. Post-halving pressure, rising network difficulty, and margin compression have reshaped the competitive landscape — and nowhere is that more visible than in the mining pool market. According to data from miningpoolstats.stream (as of June 23, 2026), just […] The post Bitcoin Mining Pools in 2026: Hashrate Consolidation Is Creating a Two-Tier Market — and Smaller Miners Are Feeling It appeared first on CryptoSlate.

EU officials reportedly plan to consider changes to the Markets in Crypto-Assets framework, dubbed by some as “MiCA 2.0,” in response to a US stablecoin law and rules on tokenized payments and deposits. European Union officials are reportedly planning to revise the Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) framework amid the implementation of a US law on stablecoins. According to a Wednesday report from Euronews, EU officials planned to revisit proposed changes to MiCA to broaden the framework's scope, specifically regarding non-EU companies issuing stablecoins.  The revised rules, which authorities will reportedly consider in 2027, were in response to the US government’s Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for US Stablecoins, or GENIUS, Act, putting pressure on EU officials to clarify how US stablecoin issuers could be regulated in member states. Officials will also reportedly consider expanding MiCA to include rules on tokenized payments and deposits. Read more

The washout reduced forced-selling risk, but spot volume and ETF creations still need to carry the next move. The post XRP cleaned out leverage, now ETF demand has to prove itself appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Bitcoin hovered around the $62,000 mark following a spike in oil prices, escalating hot war in Iran and traders’ move to cut risk ahead of a Federal Reserve policy statement. Bitcoin (BTC) trades slightly above $62,000 and is down nearly 2% over the past 24 hours amid a risk-off mood across global markets. The pressure is not coming from crypto exclusively and is more so attributed to a sharp selloff in semiconductor and AI stocks.  Renewed profit-taking from Samsung sent Asian markets reeling overnight, and military escalation between the US and Iran sent oil up around 5%. As a result, US stocks opened lower, and on Wednesday the Federal Reserve released the minutes from its June meeting, a report traders typically watch closely for clues on the timing of any rate cut.  Currently, markets price roughly a 73% chance the Fed holds rates steady at its next meeting on July 29, but the major takeaway for investors will be how the tone of the minutes frames the Fed’s view on inflation and interest rates.   Read mo...

BIP-110 has become a symbolic battle over Bitcoin's future direction, from censorship resistance to network governance.

Investors had backed away from Bitcoin since mid-May.