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Brian Armstrong made the media rounds before and after he announced Coinbase was pulling its support for a major US crypto bill, reportedly facing off with Jamie Dimon in Davos. JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon reportedly confronted Brian Armstrong during a coffee chat at Davos last week, telling the Coinbase CEO to stop lying about banks trying to sabotage the digital asset market structure bill under consideration in the US Congress. According to a Thursday report from The Wall Street Journal, the confrontation between Dimon and Armstrong occurred at the World Economic Forum last week when the Coinbase CEO was having coffee with former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair. Dimon reportedly interrupted Armstrong, saying the CEO was “full of s—,” referring to TV interviews in which the Coinbase CEO accused banks of interfering with the US market structure bill. Banking industry advocates have opposed allowing stablecoin rewards under the legislation. However, many in the crypto industry, including Armstrong, have push...
Bitcoin short positions continued to pile up as BTC price dropped near $81,000, potentially providing the liquidation fuel for a revenge rally back above $90,000. Bitcoin’s (BTC) price has dropped 14.5% in the past 16 days, pushing the Crypto Fear & Greed Index to 16 (Extreme Fear), which is its lowest rating year-to-date. While selling has dominated markets over the past two weeks, Bitcoin derivatives data suggest the current trader positioning may lead to a recovery. Analysts are now weighing whether the latest sell-off has created conditions for a relief rally. Key takeaways: Read more
The blank-check company has yet to name an acquisition target, but the listing creates a new public vehicle tied to the US-based crypto exchange. Kraken-backed KRAKacquisition Corp has completed an upsized $345 million initial public offering, listing its special purpose acquisition company units on Nasdaq to pursue future mergers or acquisitions. According to a Friday announcement, the special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) sold 34.5 million units at $10 each, including the full exercise of the underwriter’s over-allotment option. Each unit consists of one Class A ordinary share and one-quarter of a redeemable warrant exercisable at $11.50 per share. The units began trading on the Nasdaq Global Market under the ticker symbol KRAQU on Wednesday. Read more
Europe narrows crypto tax gaps, US lawmakers revisit market structure, and institutions push DeFi into compliance territory. The European Union’s new crypto tax reporting regime under DAC8 is intentionally focused on enforceable targets, leaving decentralized finance (DeFi) outside its scope for now. Colby Mangels, a former adviser to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and now Taxbit’s global head of government solutions, said the rules prioritize identifiable intermediaries such as custodians and exchanges, which will be required to collect and report standardized user activity data under the OECD’s Crypto Asset Reporting Framework (CARF). However, the DeFi carve-out may not last. Mangels said tax authorities are increasingly drawing on Anti-Money Laundering (AML) frameworks to define accountability in crypto markets, and regulators are closely watching whether DeFi platforms can be classified as virtual asset service providers. Read more
Technical charts tilt toward further downside for Bitcoin and altcoins if BTC’s critical $80,000 fails to hold. Does data suggest that bulls are buying the dips? Key points: Bitcoin’s break below $84,000 tilts the advantage in favor of the bears, opening the doors for a potential fall to $74,508. Several major altcoins have slipped below their support levels, signaling that the bears are attempting to take charge. Read more
Proof-of-reserves shows assets at a single point in time, but it does not prove solvency, liquidity or sound governance. Here is what PoR misses and what real trust looks like. At its core, proof-of-reserves is a public demonstration that a custodian holds the assets it claims to hold on behalf of users, typically using cryptographic methods and onchain transparency. If every crypto exchange can publish a proof-of-reserves (PoR) report, why can withdrawals still be delayed or halted during a crisis? Read more
A wave of leveraged liquidations erased hundreds of billions in value, reshuffling Bitcoin’s standing among the world’s largest investable assets. Bitcoin’s sharp reversal this week has pushed it outside the world’s 10 largest assets by market capitalization, underscoring how difficult price action has been in recent months as markets continue to digest the cryptocurrency industry’s largest forced liquidation on record. Hovering around $83,000 per coin, Bitcoin’s (BTC) market capitalization has slipped to about $1.65 trillion, ranking it 11th globally. That places it just behind Saudi Aramco, the state-run oil giant, and below Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC), according to market data trackers. By contrast, gold has surged to the top spot by a wide margin following a record-breaking rally, cementing its position as the world’s largest asset. The gains have been accompanied by explosive growth in gold futures activity, a trend highlighted in recent data by cryptocurrency exchange MEXC. Read more
An official said that Hong Kong authorities would work on a draft framework, and had begun processing license applications for stablecoin issuers and addressing crypto taxes. Christopher Hui, Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury of Hong Kong, said local financial regulators are planning to submit a draft framework related to digital assets sometime in 2026. In comments prepared for a Friday policy briefing of the Hong Kong Legislative Council's Finance Committee, Hui said the Financial Services and the Treasury Bureau and Securities and Futures Commission planned to submit a draft ordinance related to regulations for providers offering crypto advisory services. He added that the two regulators were consulting the public after releasing a digital asset consultation paper in December. In addition, Hui said that the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) had begun processing license applications for stablecoin issuers and would address reporting digital assets on taxes. Read more
The conditional approval moves the Latin American fintech into the bank organization phase as it seeks to expand regulated banking and crypto services in the United States. Nubank has received conditional approval from the US Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) to form a national bank, a step that allows the fintech to offer deposits, lending, credit cards and digital asset custody in the United States. The approval moves Nubank into the bank organization phase, during which it must meet capitalization and supervisory conditions and secure additional approvals from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Federal Reserve before launching operations. According to a company announcement on Friday, the US bank will be led by co-founder Cristina Junqueira, with former Central Bank of Brazil president Roberto Campos Neto serving as board chair. Nubank said it aims to fully capitalize and open the bank within 18 months, subject to regulatory approval. Read more
AI training is dominated by hyperscale data centers, but inference and everyday workloads are opening real space for decentralized GPU networks. Decentralized GPU networks are pitching themselves as a lower-cost layer for running AI workloads, while training the latest models remains concentrated inside hyperscale data centers. Frontier AI training involves building the largest and most advanced systems, a process that requires thousands of GPUs to operate in tight synchronization. That level of coordination makes decentralized networks impractical for top-end AI training, where internet latency and reliability cannot match the tightly coupled hardware in centralized data centers. Read more
Bitcoin's MVRV Z-score printed record lows on a rolling two-year basis, making BTC price more "undervalued" than at the pit of past bear markets. Bitcoin (BTC) may be “close to the end” of its correction as a classic BTC price metric beats records. Key points: Bitcoin’s MVRV Z-score is at record lows on two-year rolling time frames. Read more
US President Donald Trump nominated former Fed Governor Kevin Warsh to replace Jerome Powell as Federal Reserve chair, setting up a Senate confirmation fight. US President Donald Trump said Friday he will nominate former Federal Reserve Governor Kevin Warsh to succeed Jerome Powell as chair of the US central bank, setting the stage for a high-stakes Senate confirmation battle. The decision, announced by Trump on his social media platform Truth Social, confirmed Thursday reports that Trump would move ahead with the 55‑year‑old ex–Fed official and Morgan Stanley banker as his preferred candidate. The president said that he had known Warsh for a long time and had “no doubt” that he would go down as “one of the “GREAT Fed chairmen, maybe the best.” Read more
Ethereum slipped under $2,800 as charts and onchain data suggested downside risk remains elevated, with a potential move toward $2,100. Ether (ETH) could see another sharp drop after losing the support level at $2,800, with technical charts and onchain data suggesting the downtrend will continue. Key takeaways: Ether’s descending and symmetrical triangle setups converge at $2,100. Read more
US spot Bitcoin ETF flows turned negative for January after a series of outflows this week totaling nearly $1 billion, data from SoSoValue shows. Cryptocurrency investment products faced heavy outflows on Thursday as the total crypto market capitalization fell about 6%. Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) funds recorded nearly $1 billion in outflows, among the largest of the year so far, according to SoSoValue. Spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) led the sell-off, shedding $817.9 million, exceeding last Wednesday’s $708.7 million outflows and marking the largest daily outflow since November 2025. Read more
DeFi's composability creates cascading exploit risks while protocols handle risk idiosyncratically. Institutional adoption demands TradFi-style standardized frameworks. Opinion by: Robert Schmitt, founder and co-CEO at Cork DeFi has entered its institutional phase. As large investors dip their toes into crypto ETFs and digital asset treasuries (DATs), the ecosystem is gradually evolving into an institutional-grade financial system in its own right, with the introduction of new financial instruments and digital counterparts of well-established ones. DeFi’s current growth exposes mounting risks that could lead to trust roadblocks. For institutions to confidently onboard, the ecosystem must implement stronger risk guardrails and resilient infrastructure. Read more
A tentative deal in Washington has eased some shutdown fears, but with key votes still pending, crypto, gold and silver are trading through liquidity jitters and foreign policy risk. US Senate leaders and the White House said they have reached a bipartisan framework to avert a partial government shutdown, but the agreement still needs to clear key votes in Congress before funding actually expires. Negotiations had stalled over funding for the Department of Homeland Security and immigration enforcement, with the current stopgap spending bill set to lapse Friday at midnight Eastern Time, leaving lawmakers racing to finalize and vote on the package before the deadline. On Thursday evening, President Donald Trump stated that the “only thing” that could slow down the country was “another long and damaging Government Shutdown.” He said that he was “working hard with Congress” to secure the necessary funding. Read more
The move comes as the Ethereum Foundation enters a period of “mild austerity” while sticking to its core technical roadmap, Buterin said. Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin said he has earmarked 16,384 Ether, worth about $45 million, to support privacy-preserving technologies, open hardware and secure, verifiable software systems. In a post on X, Buterin said the funds were withdrawn from his personal holdings and will be deployed over the next few years. He framed the move as part of a broader shift as the Ethereum Foundation enters what he called a period of “mild austerity,” while continuing to pursue an aggressive technical roadmap. Buterin said he is also taking on responsibilities that might otherwise have been handled as special projects of the foundation. “Specifically, we are seeking the existence of an open-source, secure and verifiable full stack of software and hardware that can protect both our personal lives and our public environments,” he wrote. Read more
Still, Bitcoin often rebounds toward its energy value after long downtrends, with one model pointing to a fair price near $121,000. A Bitcoin (BTC) metric tracking the electricity cost to mine one coin is flashing a warning for the bulls, with a so-called “miner exodus” adding to the bearish outlook. Key takeaways: BTC could fall toward the $59,000–$74,000 miner cost zone. Read more
BTC could drop to as low as $50,000 in the worst-case scenario after BTC price failed to hold the important $84,000 support level. Bitcoin (BTC) has finally slid below a key support level at $84,000, which has held the price since mid-November 2025. Where will BTC price action head next? Key takeaways: Bitcoin dropped to a two-month low of $81,000 on Thursday, fueled by $1.6 billion in long liquidations Read more
The shift will take Binance’s insurance-style fund out of US dollar-pegged assets and into Bitcoin within 30 days, raising questions about user protection. Binance is shifting its flagship user protection vehicle, the Secure Asset Fund for Users (SAFU), from stablecoin holdings into Bitcoin over the next 30 days, re‑denominating the fund’s reserves into BTC. In an open letter to the crypto community, the exchange framed the move as an expression of its conviction that Bitcoin (BTC) is the core long‑term asset of the crypto ecosystem rather than just another trading product, and said it will rebalance the fund back up to $1 billion if market volatility drives its value below $800 million. That decision effectively makes the fund more exposed to Bitcoin price swings, raising questions about whether a sharp BTC drawdown could weaken the buffer precisely when a major security or insolvency event might require rapid payouts. Read more7217 items