The rapid devaluation of NYC Token highlights the volatility and potential risks in crypto markets, raising concerns about investor protection and transparency.

The post Ex-NYC Mayor Eric Adams’ NYC Token tanks over 80% as team allegedly manipulates trading activity appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

The court's decision highlights ongoing tensions between state regulations and emerging digital platforms, impacting future market operations.

The post Court temporarily blocks Tennessee regulators’ action against Kalshi appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Exempting non-custodial blockchain developers from money transmitter laws could boost innovation and protect privacy rights in the US.

The post Senators Lummis and Wyden push bill to exempt non-custodial blockchain developers from money transmitter laws appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

NVIDIA and Lilly to invest $1B in AI lab to accelerate drug discovery with BioNeMo, robotics, and large-scale biomedical models.

The post NVIDIA and Lilly launch $1B AI lab to transform drug discovery and manufacturing appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Mitsui to debut Japans first aircraft and ship digital securities in 2026, expanding its blockchain investment platform as issuance surges.

The post Mitsui to offer retail access to digital securities tied to aircraft and ships appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Bitcoin Magazine

SEC Chair: Fate of Rumored Venezuelan Bitcoin Stash ‘Remains to Be Seen’

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Paul Atkins said today that it remains unclear whether the U.S. government will move to seize the widely discussed Bitcoin holdings rumored to be tied to Venezuela, an uncertainty that comes as Washington seeks to bring greater regulatory clarity to digital asset markets.

Atkins told Fox Business the question of pursuing the so‑called Venezuela Bitcoin stash — variously estimated at roughly 600,000 BTC, or about $56 billion to $67 billion at current prices — is “still to be seen” and is being handled by other parts of the administration. 

“I leave that to others to deal with. That’s not my focus,” Atkins said, underscoring that the SEC is not currently prioritizing asset confiscation.

Rumors in crypto and intelligence circles have pointed to a massive “shadow reserve” of Bitcoin allegedly accumulated by the Venezuelan government through gold sales, oil deals settled in stablecoins, and other transactions dating back to 2018.

If verified and under U.S. control, such a reserve would rank among the largest Bitcoin holdings globally. 

But independent blockchain analysts note that there is no verifiable on‑chain evidence yet linking wallets containing such amounts to Venezuela’s government, and publicly traceable addresses connected to state entities reflect only a tiny fraction of the rumored holdings.

Bitcoin and CLARITY Act update 

Atkins pivoted quickly from the Venezuela question to highlight ongoing legislative efforts in Congress aimed at clarifying the regulatory framework for digital assets. 

“This week is an important week because the Senate is taking up a bipartisan bill that will bring clarity and certainty to the crypto world,” he said, referring to a measure designed to delineate oversight responsibilities between the SEC and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).

The bill — backed by members of both parties and anticipated to be marked up this week — represents the next step in positioning the U.S. as a global leader in digital asset markets, Atkins said.

He also cited the Genius Act, passed late last year, as the first statute formally recognizing crypto assets under U.S. law, and credited it with helping to bring regulatory clarity to stablecoin frameworks.

Atkins expressed optimism that with clearer rules, markets will gain much‑needed certainty around products and oversight. 

He noted ongoing collaboration with the new CFTC chairman and reiterated the SEC’s commitment to enforcing future regulations once enacted. 

While ethical questions around public officials and crypto business interests remain under Congressional purview, Atkins said the immediate priority is a regulatory regime that reduces market ambiguity and supports investor confidence.

This post SEC Chair: Fate of Rumored Venezuelan Bitcoin Stash ‘Remains to Be Seen’ first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin Magazine

Iran’s Rial Collapses Against U.S. Dollar — Is Bitcoin Emerging as an Alternative?

Iran’s national currency, the rial, has completely collapsed against the U.S. dollar as the country’s economic crisis worsens. The value of one rial is now worth $0.00 right now.

On the open market, one U.S. dollar now trades for roughly 1.4 million rials, a collapse that has erased decades of purchasing power and fueled widespread unrest.

The currency’s plunge isn’t new, but the pace of decline in 2025 and early 2026 has been dramatic. Sanctions remain severe, oil revenues have shrunk, and political instability has driven investors and ordinary Iranians to seek alternatives to the rial and even to the U.S. dollar.

Inflation is soaring. Prices on food, medicine and basic goods have jumped sharply, forcing many families to spend a larger share of income just to survive. The official inflation rate climbed above 42% late last year, though actual costs for staples may be higher at this point.

The economic strain has spilled into the streets. Bazaar merchants and students have taken part in protests across cities from Tehran to Isfahan and Shiraz, condemning both economic mismanagement and political repression.

In the capital of Tehran, traditional supporters of the theocratic government have openly turned against clerical leadership as conditions worsen.

These protests have led Iran to impose telecom blackouts and jam satellite services, prompting citizens to turn to offline communication tools. Bitcoin focused apps like Bitchat and Noghteha enable secure messaging via Bluetooth and mesh networks without internet access, with Noghteha specifically adapted for Iranian users.

Iran needs Bitcoin 

Against this backdrop, Bitcoin’s profile in Iran has quietly risen. Long before the latest collapse, crypto adoption in the Middle East and North Africa was accelerating, partly as a hedge against unstable local currencies and restrictive financial systems.

In the past weeks, reports, mainly those from blockchain analysis company Chainalysis, have highlighted Bitcoin and crypto’s role in the unrest. State actors and private citizens alike have moved value through crypto channels, both to preserve savings and to evade the limitations of the rial and sanctioned banking system.

Chainalysis data shows Iranian‑linked services moved more than $4 billion out in 2024, a jump of about 70% year over year. Iranian centralized exchanges swelled with users looking to swap rials for any asset that holds value beyond the border

Industry voices are framing Bitcoin as more than a financial curiosity. Some analysts and executives point to Bitcoin as an “exit option” for Iranians who see the rial’s collapse as a failure of traditional money. These narratives emphasize Bitcoin’s fixed supply and global liquidity as shields against inflationary policies and external pressure.

Even so, obstacles remain. Iran’s government has maintained strict controls on digital finance, cracking down on unregistered mining and monitoring crypto platforms. Official policies often contradict private behavior, creating legal uncertainty for Iranians trying to use crypto as a safe haven.

It’s times like these that point to why we need bitcoin as a race. Bitcoin stands out as the tool it was created to be: resilient, borderless, free and censorship-resistant.

This post Iran’s Rial Collapses Against U.S. Dollar — Is Bitcoin Emerging as an Alternative? first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin Magazine

Bitcoin Price Climbs Near $92,000 as the Federal Reserve and DOJ Showdown

The Department of Justice has opened a criminal investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell — and the bitcoin price is reacting. The investigation is intensifying a months‑long feud between the White House and the U.S. central bank

According to Powell, the DOJ served the Federal Reserve with grand jury subpoenas and threatened a criminal indictment tied to his June 2025 testimony about a $2.5 billion plus renovation of Fed office buildings. 

Powell characterized the move as politically motivated, claiming it reflected pressure from the Trump administration to cut interest rates more sharply than the Fed’s data‑dependent stance.

President Donald Trump has publicly criticized Powell’s performance and denied direct involvement in the DOJ action, though he has reiterated his dissatisfaction with the Fed’s monetary policy. The widening dispute has rattled traditional markets, with U.S. stock futures sliding and safe‑haven assets like gold and silver surging to record levels.

This episode represents somewhat of an escalation in institutional tensions. Powell’s critics argue the DOJ’s action is valid and undermines the Federal Reserve’s independence, while defenders of the Fed emphasize the importance of insulating monetary policy from politcs. 

Bitcoin price reaction

Bitcoin’s price showed notable movement over the past 48 hours following the news. Over the weekend and into Monday, the bitcoin price was fairly stale but jumped to the $91,000–$92,000 range, at the time of writing. 

Bitcoin Magazine Pro data indicates the Bitcoin price reached an intraday high of roughly $92,400 between Sunday and Monday.

Across January 11–12, the Bitcoin price posted intraday gains of more than 0.5% on both days, signaling a gradual upward trend amid growing macroeconomic uncertainty. 

Following the news, the bitcoin price appeared to be behaving more like safe-haven assets than typical risk instruments, with Bitcoin’s price moving independently of broader market weakness, suggesting traders were positioning the asset as a hedge amid concerns over the Fed’s independence and U.S. monetary policy shifts.

From a longer-term perspective, Bitcoin remains well below its record highs above $126,000 reached in early October 2025, having retraced significantly in recent months. 

During the first week of January 2026, BTC mostly traded between $88,000 and $94,000, marking a consolidation range following late‑2025 weakness. 

Where does the bitcoin price go from here?

Fresh Bitcoin Magazine analysis shows that Bitcoin’s price faced resistance at $94,000 last week, failing to sustain gains and closing at $90,891. Sunday’s doji candle signals indecision and a potential bearish reversal. Bulls appear weak, lacking the momentum to break through resistance, while bears have gained a slight edge heading into this week.

Key support levels are now at $87,000 and $84,000. Bears will attempt to push the Bitcoin price below $87,000, testing $84,000, and a break below could accelerate a decline toward the low $70,000 range. 

Bulls may seek strength around the 0.618 Fibonacci retracement at $58,000 if supports fail. Resistance remains at $91,400 short-term and $94,000 long-term, with higher zones at $98,000–$103,500 and $106,000–$109,000.

This week, bears may pressure Bitcoin toward $87,000, while bulls will fight to maintain this support. A daily close below $87,000 would endanger $84,000 support, requiring significant buying to hold.

Looking ahead, price may remain range-bound between $84,000 and $94,000, with neither bulls nor bears in firm control. A close above $94,000 could trigger upward momentum, while a close below $84,000 could signal a deeper correction. 

Overall, market sentiment leans bearish, with volatility likely in the near term, according to analysts. 

The Bitcoin price right now is $91,749, with a 24-hour trading volume of 48 B. BTC is 1% in the last 24 hours. It is currently -1% from its 7-day all-time high of $92,356, and 2% from its 7-day all-time low of $90,129.

BTC has a circulating supply of 19,975,018 BTC and a max supply of 21,000,000 BTC. The global Bitcoin market cap today is $1,832,317,782,220, a 1% change from 24 hours ago.

This post Bitcoin Price Climbs Near $92,000 as the Federal Reserve and DOJ Showdown first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin Magazine

Breaking the Blackout: Iranian Protestors Use Freedom Tech to Bypass Regime Crackdown

Iran has been experiencing intense protests against the Islamic Republic regime in recent weeks. Authorities have responded with severe measures, including a nationwide telecoms blackout and jamming satellite services like Starlink, aimed at preventing coordination among demonstrators.

Iranians are embracing freedom tech tools; Bitchat, Noghteha, and Delta Chat for offline communication. Two of these apps trace their origins directly to Bitcoin, highlighting how technologies from this community provide practical solutions in high-stakes environments. Bitchat, built by Bitcoin pioneers Jack Dorsey and open-source developer Calle, operates over Bluetooth mesh networks and the Nostr protocol without needing an internet connection. Noghteha on the otherhand, is a closed-source fork of Bitchat, adapted for the Iranian context with full Persian/Farsi support, an enhanced user interface, and features tailored to local needs.

How Did Bitchat and Noghteha Gain Popularity?

Bitchat first gained widespread attention when Jack Dorsey announced it on X on July 6, 2025, describing it as a weekend project to explore Bluetooth mesh networks. The announcement generated immediate interest, reflected in surges on Google Trends for related searches. In September, Frank Corva wrote about Bitchat’s role in supporting Nepalese protestors during social media restrictions and unrest, where nearly 50,000 downloads occurred in a single day.

Noghteha, on the other hand, saw rapid adoption in the first week of January 2026. Before the full internet shutdown, Google Play recorded more than 70,000 downloads of Noghteha in the space of three days, with numbers likely increasing through peer-to-peer sharing, sideloading, and Bluetooth transfers afterward.

Promotion of Noghteha reached a broad audience through Iran International, an opposition satellite TV channel based outside Iran. The station, a major source of information and coordination guidance from figures like opposition leader Reza Pahlavi, broadcast details about the app.

The developer Nariman Gharib, a digital-political activist, released the app independently, without government or private funding, as a response to the regime’s tactics.

But Why Fork Bitchat?

The Iranian regime employs highly sophisticated information warfare tactics. As Ziya Sadr, a prominent Bitcoin researcher and former political prisoner, explains: “The regime sets up phishing attacks, creates fake download links, and uses influencers on social media to misguide people into installing malicious versions of the same app.”

This persistent threat is likely the main reason the Noghteha developer chose not to release the app as fully open-source, and perhaps it also explains the app’s release timing, just before the internet shutdown. By releasing so close to the expected blackout, there was an opportunity to distribute a new, closed-source version into as many hands as possible before the regime could interfere with downloads or seed malicious alternatives.

Noghteha remains compliant with Bitchat’s MIT license, which allows modifications and redistribution with proper attribution. This approach is an attempt to quickly protect protesters from regime sabotage.

Calle, Bitchat’s co-creator, doesn’t quite see it that way. He’s concerned about the closed-source elements, donation requests, and security risks in adversarial settings—points that are valid and hard to dispute. 

Yet the interaction raises a worthy question: Is Bitchat cypherpunk enough to counter the regime’s potential undermining of it, where openness itself could be weaponized? In that sense, does Noghteha achieve something that Bitchat can’t, and should that be the case, can Bitchat be adapted to become more resilient against such tactics?

Ultimately, it’s inspiring to see Bitcoin gaining prominence on the international stage, alongside freedom tech tools rooted in the cypherpunk principles of privacy through cryptography. Cypherpunks and, more recently, Bitcoin developers have pioneered technologies that excel in high-stakes scenarios, empowering individuals to maintain communication and autonomy amid oppression. With many of these tools released under permissive open-source licenses like MIT, they invite cloning and repurposing to fit various needs. While closed-source adaptations introduce new risks, they also can also generate valuable lessons, potentially guiding future enhancements to better withstand information warfare tactics.

The events in Iran demonstrate how innovations from the Bitcoin ecosystem adapt and thrive, offering real support to those navigating censorship, blackouts, and repression through resilient, user-focused tools.

Editor’s Note: A Warning on Security Users should proceed with caution. Noghteha is a closed-source application. Calle, the original developer of Bitchat, has explicitly warned against using the app due to the inability to verify its code or security. However, reports from the ground indicate it is being widely and successfully used by protestors.

This post Breaking the Blackout: Iranian Protestors Use Freedom Tech to Bypass Regime Crackdown first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Conor Mulcahy.

Bitcoin Magazine

Bitcoin Bears Hold $94K Resistance as Price Drops to $90,891 Weekly Close

Bitcoin Price Weekly Outlook

Bitcoin buyers made a nice push to $94,000 resistance again last week, but the price promptly sold off again from this level to close the week out at $90,891. Sunday’s close gave us a doji candle, indicating indecision and a potential reversal back in the bears’ favor. The bulls are once again looking lethargic as they lack the follow-through necessary to overtake resistance. Bears are in the driver’s seat heading into this week. Look for them to try to push the price down through the $87,000 support level to make another attempt at breaking $84,000 support.

Key Support and Resistance Levels Now

The bulls are looking for support at the $87,000 level to hold if bears manage to keep the push lower going here. $84,000 still sits as strong support below here, but will weaken with any further pressure. If the bears can manage to break this support, the price is sure to accelerate down to the low $70,000 area, with a close below $68,000 required to lose this support level. Below this zone, bulls will look to gain some sort of strength off the 0.618 Fibonacci retracement at $58,000.

Bears will look to defend the $91,400 level as resistance over the short term here. The resistance at $94,000 has done its job so far, but it will be under heavy pressure if bulls can muster the strength to get the price back up there. Above $94,000, there is a resistance zone that stretches from $98,000 up to $103,500. Above here, we have another resistance zone from $106,000 up to $109,000 at the 0.618 Fibonacci retracement from the drop from the top down to $80,000.

Outlook For This Week

Wounded bulls need some help to hang on to momentum this week. Look for the bears to push the price down to $87,000 early in the week and possibly below it. Bulls will try to stop the price from closing any days below $87,000. If the bears manage a daily close below here, $84,000 support will be under heavy threat, and the bulls will need buyers to step up to the plate with some big volume to hold this support level once again.

Market mood: Bearish – After a weekly shooting star doji candle close, the bulls’ momentum has faded. The bears have tilted control slightly in their favor to start this week.

The next few weeks
Price action may remain choppy and confined within a range over the next few weeks. Bulls need to see a close above $94,000 to break above this range and look for upward momentum, while bears need to see a close below $84,000 to try to break down below this major support level. Between $94,000 and $84,000 is now a neutral zone, where bulls and bears may battle back and forth. Neither side is poised to take firm control of the price action until either of these boundaries is broken.

​Terminology Guide:

Bulls/Bullish: Buyers or investors expecting the price to go higher.

Bears/Bearish: Sellers or investors expecting the price to go lower.

Support or support level: A level at which the price should hold for the asset, at least initially. The more touches on support, the weaker it gets and the more likely it is to fail to hold the price.

Resistance or resistance level: Opposite of support.  The level that is likely to reject the price, at least initially. The more touches at resistance, the weaker it gets and the more likely it is to fail to hold back the price.

Shooting Star Candle: A candlestick that occurs after an uptrend, marked by a long wick upwards above the candle body and a smaller wick (or no wick) to the downside. The long wick up indicates strong selling near the highs. This candle can often indicate the end of an uptrend.

Doji Candle: A candlestick that closes at nearly the same price at which it opened. This candle indicates indecision, and can signal a reversal in price action if it occurs after an uptrend or downtrend.

Fibonacci Retracements and Extensions: Ratios based on what is known as the golden ratio, a universal ratio pertaining to growth and decay cycles in nature. The golden ratio is based on the constants Phi (1.618) and phi (0.618).

This post Bitcoin Bears Hold $94K Resistance as Price Drops to $90,891 Weekly Close first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Ethan Greene - Feral Analysis and Juan Galt.

An Ethereum price collapse could break the blockchain’s ability to settle transactions and freeze over $800 billion in assets, a Bank of Italy research paper warns.

The paper, authored by Claudia Biancotti of the central bank’s Directorate General for Information Technology, outlined a contagion scenario where ETH's price collapse degrades the blockchain’s security infrastructure to the point of failure.

Such a breakdown, the report argues, would trap and compromise tokenized stocks, bonds, and stablecoins that major financial institutions are increasingly placing on public ledgers.

Essentially, the paper challenges the assumption that regulated assets issued on public blockchains are insulated from the volatility of the underlying cryptocurrency.

According to the report, the reliability of the settlement layer in permissionless networks like Ethereum is inextricably tied to the market value of an unbacked token.

The validator economics trap

The paper's core argument rests on the fundamental difference between traditional financial market infrastructure and permissionless blockchains.

In traditional finance, settlement systems are operated by regulated entities with formal oversight, capital requirements, and central bank backstops. These entities are paid in fiat currency to ensure trades are finalized legally and technically.

In contrast, the Ethereum network relies on a decentralized workforce of “validators”. These are independent operators who verify and finalize transactions.

However, they are not legally mandated to serve the financial system. So, they are motivated by profit.

Validators incur real-world costs for hardware, internet connectivity, and cybersecurity. Yet, their revenue is denominated primarily in ETH.

The paper notes that even if staking yields remain stable in token terms, a “substantial and persistent” drop in the dollar price of ETH could obliterate the real-world value of those earnings.

If the revenue generated by validating transactions falls below the cost of running the equipment, rational operators will shut down.

The paper describes a potential “downward price spiral accompanied by persistent negative expectations,” where stakers rush to sell their holdings to avoid further losses.

Selling staked ETH requires “unstaking,” which effectively deactivates a validator. The report warns that in an extreme limit scenario, “no validators means that the network does not work anymore.”

Under these conditions, the settlement layer would effectively cease to function, leaving users able to submit transactions that are never processed. So, assets residing on the chain would become “immovable,” regardless of their off-chain creditworthiness.

When security budgets break

Meanwhile, this threat extends beyond a simple halt in processing. The paper argues that a price collapse would drastically lower the cost for malicious actors to hijack the network.

This vulnerability is framed through the concept of the “economic security budget”— defined as the minimum investment required to acquire enough stake to mount a sustained attack on the network.

On Ethereum, controlling more than 50% of the active validation power enables an attacker to manipulate the consensus mechanism. This situation would enable double-spending and the censorship of specific transactions.

As of September 2025, the paper estimates Ethereum’s economic security budget was approximately 17 million ETH, or roughly $71 billion. Under normal market conditions, the author notes, this high cost makes an attack “extremely unlikely.”

However, the security budget is not static; it fluctuates with the token's market price. If ETH’s price collapses, the dollar cost to corrupt the network falls in tandem.

Simultaneously, as honest validators exit the market to cut losses, the total pool of active stake shrinks, further lowering the threshold for an attacker to gain majority control.

The paper outlines a perverse inverse relationship: As the value of the network’s native token approaches zero, the cost of attacking the infrastructure plummets, yet the incentive to attack it may increase due to the presence of other valuable assets.

The trap for ‘safe’ assets

This dynamic poses a specific risk to the “real-world” assets (RWAs) and stablecoins that have proliferated on the Ethereum network.

As of late 2025, Ethereum hosted more than 1.7 million assets with a total capitalization exceeding $800 billion. This figure included roughly $140 billion in combined market capitalization for the two largest dollar-backed stablecoins.

In a scenario where ETH has lost nearly all its value, the token itself would be of little interest to a sophisticated attacker.

However, the infrastructure would still house billions of dollars in tokenized treasury bills, corporate bonds, and fiat-backed stablecoins.

The report argues these assets would become the primary targets. If an attacker gains control of the weakened chain, they could theoretically double-spend these tokens by sending them to an exchange to be sold for fiat while simultaneously sending them to a different wallet on-chain.

This brings the shock directly into the traditional financial system.

If issuers, broker-dealers, or funds are legally bound to redeem these tokenized assets at face value, but the on-chain ownership records are compromised or manipulated, the financial stress transfers from the crypto market to real-world balance sheets.

Considering this, the paper warns that the damage would not be confined to speculative crypto traders, “especially if issuers were legally bound to reimburse them at face value.”

No emergency exit

In conventional financial crises, panic often triggers a “flight to safety,” in which participants shift capital from distressed to stable venues. However, such a migration may be impossible during a collapse of blockchain infrastructure.

For an investor holding a tokenized asset on a failing Ethereum network, a flight to safety could mean moving that asset to another blockchain. Yet, that presents significant obstacles to this “switch in infrastructure.”

First, cross-chain bridges, which are protocols used to move assets between blockchains, are notoriously vulnerable to hacks and may not scale to handle a mass exodus during a panic.

These bridges could come under attack, and further rising uncertainty could cause assets to be “speculated against,” potentially causing “weaker stablecoins” to de-peg.

Second, the ecosystem's decentralized nature makes coordination difficult. Unlike a centralized stock exchange that can halt trading to cool a panic, Ethereum is a global system with conflicting incentives.

Third, a significant portion of assets may be trapped in DeFi protocols.

According to DeFiLlama data, about $85 billion is locked in DeFi contracts at the time of writing, and many of these protocols act as automated asset managers with governance processes that cannot respond instantly to a settlement-layer failure.

Furthermore, the paper highlights the lack of a “lender of last resort” in the crypto ecosystem.

While Ethereum has built-in mechanisms to slow the speed of validator exits — capping processing to about 3,600 exits per day — these are technical throttles, not economic backstops.

The author also dismissed the idea that deep-pocketed actors like exchanges could stabilize a crashing ETH price through “massive buys,” calling it “very unlikely to work” in a true crisis of confidence where the market might attack the rescue fund itself.

A regulatory dilemma

The Bank of Italy paper ultimately frames this contagion risk as a pressing policy question: Should permissionless blockchains be treated as critical financial market infrastructure?

The author notes that while some firms prefer permissioned blockchains run by authorized entities, the allure of public chains remains strong due to their reach and interoperability.

The paper cites the BlackRock BUIDL fund, a tokenized money market fund available on Ethereum and Solana, as a prime example of early-stage traditional finance activity on public rails.

However, the analysis suggests that importing this infrastructure comes with the unique risk that the “health of the settlement layer is tied to the market price of a speculative token.”

The paper concludes that central banks “cannot be expected” to prop up the price of privately issued native tokens simply to keep the settlement infrastructure secure. Instead, it suggests that regulators may need to impose strict business continuity requirements on issuers of backed assets.

The most concrete proposal in the document calls for issuers to maintain off-chain databases of ownership and to designate a pre-selected “contingency chain.” This would theoretically allow porting assets to a new network if the underlying Ethereum layer fails.

Without such safeguards, the paper warns, the financial system risks sleepwalking into a scenario where a crash in a speculative crypto asset halts the plumbing of legitimate finance.

The post Ethereum’s hidden ‘death spiral’ mechanic could freeze $800 billion in assets regardless of their safety rating appeared first on CryptoSlate.

On Sunday night, a lot of people in markets did the same thing at the same time: they opened a video and listened to a central banker sound like he was reading from a crisis manual.

Jerome Powell said the Federal Reserve had received grand jury subpoenas and that the Trump administration had threatened a criminal indictment over testimony tied to a renovation project.

Powell called it a political pretext aimed at pressuring the Fed to cut rates.

The Associated Press framed it as an unprecedented escalation and a direct hit to the idea that the Fed makes decisions without political pressure.

That phrase, “Fed independence,” can sound like a textbook concept until you watch it get repriced in real time.

By Monday morning, the classic safety valves started hissing.

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Gold punched to a record around $4,600 an ounce, the dollar slipped, and equity futures leaned lower.

Reuters captured the tone across global markets as “stocks wobble, dollar dips,” which is about as polite as wire copy gets when traders are really saying, “What happens if the rulebook changes?”

Crypto did what it often does when the macro story shifts from numbers to trust.

Bitcoin and Ethereum climbed around 1.5% and 1.2% before retracing amid the dollar’s sharpest drop in three weeks.

This is the part where the usual crypto macro script, “rates up, Bitcoin down,” stops being enough.

Because the shock here is bigger than the next Fed meeting.

It’s about whether the institution that sets the price of money can be leaned on, scared, or bent. That sounds abstract. Markets have a way of turning abstract things into a line item.

Independence risk is a price, even if nobody admits it

Every cycle has a moment where crypto traders learn that “macro” is about more than a dot plot.

Sometimes it’s a liquidity story. Sometimes it’s a currency story. Sometimes it’s a story about what people believe will still be true in a year.

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Jan 2, 2026 · Liam 'Akiba' Wright

Central bank independence sits in that last bucket.

If investors believe the Fed’s reaction function can be changed by legal threats or political pressure, they start demanding compensation. They demand it in places that matter for crypto.

The International Monetary Fund has been unusually blunt on this theme.

According to the IMF, political pressure can erode credibility, unmoor inflation expectations, and trigger broader instability.

It has also laid out the case for protecting independence as a long-run anchor for price stability and trust.

Trust is the input. Pricing is the output.

When that trust gets questioned, the market doesn’t wait for a constitutional seminar.

It goes shopping for hedges, reprices volatility, and adjusts what it thinks future policy will look like under pressure.

That creates a new volatility channel for Bitcoin. The channel is governance risk.

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The three ways this can hit Bitcoin in 2026

If you want a useful framework, you can think about Fed-independence risk as three overlapping transmission lines.

They can reinforce each other or fight each other, and that helps explain why crypto can move like gold one day and like a levered tech proxy the next.

1) The dollar credibility channel

When independence comes under strain, investors start asking uncomfortable questions about the future path of policy and the long-run commitment to price stability.

That shows up in the dollar.

Reuters described the dollar index falling as investors weighed the political and fiscal risk implied by the escalation.

Gold tends to benefit when the market wants an asset that feels outside the political blast radius.

The Financial Times linked the record gold move directly to fears around Fed independence.

Crypto’s relevance here is emotional as much as financial.

Bitcoin’s origin story is tied to distrust in institutions, and whenever the world’s most important central bank looks like it’s under pressure, that narrative wakes up.

2) The term premium channel

There’s a nerdy phrase that becomes a headline the moment institutional trust gets questioned: term premium.

Term premium is the extra compensation investors demand for holding long-dated government bonds, above what they expect short-term rates to average over time.

It’s where “this feels riskier than it used to” often ends up living.

The New York Fed publishes a widely used estimate called the ACM term premium.

The San Francisco Fed publishes an alternative decomposition for Treasury yields that also separates expected short rates from a term premium component.

If the long end sells off without a big change in near-term rate expectations, term premium is usually part of the story.

That matters for bitcoin because term premium is the bond market’s way of shouting, “uncertainty is rising.”

Some sell-side research has been connecting that to Bitcoin directly.

Geoff Kendrick at Standard Chartered has argued that bitcoin’s relationship with the 10-year term premium has strengthened since early 2024, and he has used that lens in his medium-term Bitcoin framing.

3) The plumbing channel, rates volatility and liquidity

Even if you never look at the word “independence,” you still feel it in the mechanics of markets.

Independence risk tends to lift uncertainty. Uncertainty lifts volatility. Volatility tightens risk budgets, and tighter risk budgets change how much leverage the system can carry.

In rates, the shorthand for this is MOVE, the Treasury volatility index.

ICE describes MOVE as a leading indicator of fixed-income volatility, based on options tied to rates.

When rates vol rises, it bleeds into cross-asset positioning.

That hits crypto through leverage, funding, and forced unwinds.

In practice, it can also overpower the “Bitcoin as a hedge” story in the short run, because liquidations don’t wait for narratives to resolve.

This is why Bitcoin can catch a bid on the first headline, then puke if the move triggers broader deleveraging.

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Why 2026 turns this into a calendar trade

The market can live with noise. It struggles with deadlines.

2026 has deadlines.

Powell’s term as chair ends in May 2026, which turns succession into a pricing input.

There’s also a legal storyline sitting on the calendar.

The Supreme Court is set to hear arguments tied to President Trump’s attempt to remove Fed Governor Lisa Cook, with oral argument scheduled for January 2026, according to Mayer Brown’s legal analysis of the Court’s order.

ABC News also reported the Court would take up the case and allow Cook to remain for now.

Put those together, and independence risk stops being a vibe.

It becomes something with dates, and dates create trades.

What crypto markets should watch, a practical dashboard

If you want a clean way to cover this without turning the piece into a data dump, you can describe it as a “trust dashboard.”

These are the inputs that will tell you which channel is dominating week to week.

Watch the dollar as the global referendum.

Reuters already pointed to the dollar weakness as traders digested the escalation.

In future episodes, pay attention to DXY and to dollar performance against the Swiss franc and euro.

These are classic “trust” pairs that tend to move when people want distance from US political risk.

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Watch long-end yields for term premium behavior.

Pull the daily series from the New York Fed’s term premia page, and cross-check with the San Francisco Fed’s yield premium decompositions.

Term premium rising on governance headlines is a tell that the market is pricing a lasting credibility risk.

Watch rates volatility as the liquidity tripwire.

MOVE is the simplest, headline-friendly proxy.

ICE’s own definition is a useful one-liner for readers who don’t live in bond options.

If MOVE rises while bitcoin rallies, that suggests the credibility-hedge story is overpowering the deleveraging story.

If MOVE rises and bitcoin falls, the plumbing is winning.

Watch gold and bitcoin together, then watch who leads.

Gold already surged to a record on the independence headlines.

When gold leads, and Bitcoin follows, markets are often in “credibility hedge” mode.

When Bitcoin leads, and gold is flat, crypto is usually trading as liquidity beta.

Three scenarios for 2026, with signposts

Nobody gets to forecast politics with precision. Markets don’t need precision. They need ranges and signals.

Here are three scenarios that cover most of the plausible space, and the signposts that would show up in the dashboard.

Scenario A: Institutions absorb the shock

The legal fight drags, the Fed’s operational independence holds, and the market treats the episode as a flare-up that fades.

In this world, term premium stabilizes, MOVE stays contained, and the dollar stops reacting to each headline after a few cycles.

Crypto implication: Bitcoin goes back to trading mostly on liquidity, growth, and risk appetite.

Signposts: steady ACM term premium, muted MOVE, no sustained dollar trend after headlines.

Scenario B: Chronic pressure becomes the baseline

Pressure becomes recurring, the market starts to price a standing governance premium, and every new legal step triggers another small repricing.

The dollar weakens on shocks, gold stays well bid, and term premium drifts higher because investors keep demanding more compensation for uncertainty.

Crypto implication: Bitcoin’s identity stays split.

It rallies on credibility angst, sells off on liquidity squeezes, and volatility becomes part of the package.

Signposts: repeated dollar dips in “feud” moments, a persistent bid in gold, term premium gradually rising in decompositions.

Scenario C: Markets price a reaction-function shift

Leadership outcomes and legal precedent convince investors that policy can be steered.

This is the world where term premium can jump, inflation expectations can become jumpier, and cross-asset volatility rises.

There’s historical research that helps explain why markets take this seriously.

Work on Nixon-era pressure on Fed Chair Arthur Burns documents how political interference can shape policy choices and outcomes, and it’s often cited as a cautionary episode. Nixon

Newer academic work has built datasets on presidential interactions with Fed officials and estimates the macro effects of political pressure shocks.

Crypto implication: Bitcoin can get a medium-term bid as a credibility hedge, while still suffering brutal short-term drawdowns when the plumbing tightens.

Signposts: higher term premium in ACM, higher rates vol in MOVE, sustained weakness in the dollar, and larger swings in risk assets.

A final detail markets will keep circling, the rate cut backdrop

It’s easy to forget this when the headlines are dramatic, but the base macro context still matters.

Some major forecasters are already penciling in easing during 2026.

Goldman Sachs has published a rate-cut outlook for 2026 in its research commentary, including a path toward lower policy rates across the year under its macro assumptions.

That matters because independence risk can change how the market interprets cuts.

If cuts come from a weakening economy, that’s one story. If cuts look like they are arriving under pressure, that’s a different story, and it can push investors into hedges even while nominal rates fall.

Crypto traders don’t need to become Fed historians to trade that difference.

They just need to watch what the bond market is charging for uncertainty.

Because this week’s Powell moment was a signal that a new kind of macro risk has entered the chat.

In 2026, Fed independence has dates attached to it, legal arguments attached to it, and now a market reaction attached to it.

That makes it tradable.

Crypto markets should treat it like a factor, track it like a factor, and respect it like a factor.

The post Bitcoin just broke its classic macro correlation because the market is suddenly pricing a terrifying new risk appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin is making a case that the most valuable upgrade for the world’s second-largest blockchain may be learning how to stop upgrading.

Last November, Buterin reportedly argued that locking down parts of the base layer can reduce bugs and lower the odds of “surprises” for a network that secures hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of value.

This month, he sharpened the same message with a new framing: Ethereum, he argued, should be able to keep running safely and usefully even if the people who maintain it disappear.

That standard, which he has described as a “walkaway test,” is meant to make the base protocol behave more like the trust-minimized tools Ethereum was built to host.

That pitch lands as a cultural pivot for a network that has spent much of its history selling change as a feature. Ethereum’s roadmap has been defined by major, coordinated upgrades, from its early recovery after the 2016 DAO crisis to the move to proof-of-stake in 2022.

Buterin’s argument is that maturity looks less like constant reinvention and more like an architecture that can survive without continuous structural overhauls.

Borrowing Bitcoin’s best moat

Buterin’s push is easiest to understand as a form of “Bitcoin-ification,” not in the sense of copying Bitcoin’s feature set. Instead, it borrows what has become BTC's strongest institutional moat: credibility built on low rule-change risk.

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Bitcoin’s base layer has long been treated as a conservative settlement system where major changes are politically expensive and rare.

That slow-change social contract has become part of its product: fewer surprises, fewer governance shocks, and a simpler story for custodians, risk committees, and long-horizon holders.

Ethereum’s problem is that it can’t get there by cultural minimalism alone.

The chain is designed to host general-purpose applications, which creates different long-term failure modes. This is because state growth can price out ordinary node operators, transaction markets can be gamed, and complex block-building dynamics can concentrate power.

Buterin’s response to this is to try to “engineer” the conditions that would make stability defensible: do the hard work now, then reach a point where Ethereum could stop making structural changes without losing its core value proposition.

That is what he and some observers have called making Ethereum “ossifiable,” a network that can freeze without breaking.

Ossification isn’t paralysis

Buterin argued that ossification need not be an all-or-nothing proposition.

This means different layers of the network can slow down at different speeds. For context, the consensus layer could become more locked down while the Ethereum Virtual Machine, which runs smart contracts, stays more flexible, or vice versa.

Essentially, the practical goal is to redirect innovation away from the base protocol and into the surrounding ecosystem: layer-2 rollups, wallets, privacy tools, and user-facing apps.

Those systems can iterate faster, fail in more contained ways, and compete on design, while Ethereum’s base layer increasingly behaves like a stable settlement and security substrate.

Notably, that “move fast at the edges, slow down at the core” model is already visible in Ethereum’s scaling strategy. A significant share of the blockchain's activity sits on layer-2 networks that batch transactions and post proofs or data back to Ethereum.

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For Buterin, that division of labor is not a temporary hack but the long-run shape of the system: rollups innovate; the base chain becomes boring on purpose.

Still, Buterin’s call for stability also reads like a critique of the broader crypto culture, including parts of Ethereum, that he said rewards fast followers and favors copying what already works.

In that sense, “ossification” is not only a technical preference. It is also an attempt to protect Ethereum’s legitimacy: if the base layer is perceived as a moving target, the chain begins to look less like neutral infrastructure and more like a vendor-managed product.

Ethereum's checklist for credibility

Considering this, the walkaway framing turns Buterin’s ideas into a checklist of conditions that would remove the biggest reasons Ethereum might later be forced into high-stakes upgrades.

On Jan. 12, Buterin highlighted milestones that include quantum resistance and a scalability architecture that can expand over time through technologies such as zero-knowledge validation and data availability sampling.

He also pointed to the need for a long-term state design that avoids unbounded growth, plus a more general account model that can move beyond enshrined signature schemes and gas pricing resilient to denial-of-service attacks.

He added that Ethereum needs proof-of-stake economics that can remain decentralized and a block-building model that preserves censorship resistance even under future political and economic pressures.

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Under that view, the goal is not to end change, but to change the type of change the network undergoes.

Instead of frequent “BPO-style” forks that fundamentally alter the chain’s structure, future evolution would increasingly come from client optimizations and parameter adjustments. Those changes would tune throughput or efficiency without rewriting the social contract.

So, if Bitcoin’s rule-change risk is minimized primarily by governance culture, Ethereum is attempting to minimize it by closing off entire classes of future emergencies. It is a bet that a more engineered stability can, over time, become as underwritable as Bitcoin’s social stability.

The post Vitalik Buterin warns that Ethereum’s roadmap is now a liability unless the network does this one thing immediately appeared first on CryptoSlate.

On paper, South Korea has been one of the world’s loudest crypto markets for years. In practice, it has been a strangely narrow one.

If you were a regular person, you could trade on the big won exchanges. If you were a company with cash on the balance sheet, you mostly sat on your hands.

That is finally starting to change.

This week, Seoul Economic Daily reported that the Financial Services Commission shared a draft set of “listed company virtual asset trading guidelines” with an industry-government task force on Jan. 6. Regulators are aiming to publish a final version in January or February.

The practical headline is simple. Listed companies and registered professional investor corporations would be allowed to invest corporate funds into crypto again, after a ban that dates back to 2017.

The human version is messier, and more interesting.

If you run treasury for a Korean business, crypto has been something you could watch, research, and build around. But you could not really touch it at home without turning banking relationships into a compliance headache.

Korea’s regulators did not write “no” into one neat law for every corporate trade. Instead, they leaned on banks and “real name” account gatekeeping.

The outcome looked the same. Corporate money stayed out.

Now, the guidelines describe a controlled door opening.

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What changes, and who gets to buy

The draft framework is built around three big constraints.

1. The buyers.
   The entities explicitly named are listed companies and professional investor corporations. That means firms that meet registration standards under Korea’s capital markets framework, not small businesses opening an exchange account on a whim. The number being discussed is roughly 3,500 corporates that could qualify.
2. The size.
   The reported limit is an annual “deposit,” or investment cap, of up to 5% of a company’s equity capital. That is conservative by design. It keeps the first wave from turning into a national corporate Bitcoin treasury sprint, and it gives regulators a hard stop if volatility spikes.
3. The menu. Eligible assets would be limited to coins in the top 20 by market cap, based on semiannual disclosures tied to Korea’s five major exchanges. The inclusion of dollar stablecoins like USDT and USDC is still being debated.

There are market structure guardrails, too.

The report says regulators want exchanges to adopt standards around order types, including expectations for split execution and limits on orders that exceed certain price ranges. The goal is to reduce sudden liquidity shocks once corporates arrive.

If you are looking for the moment this shifts from “policy intent” into something you can trade on, that Jan. 6 task force sharing matters.

It signals the FSC is past the vibes phase and into the “here are the controls, here is the scope” phase. The report also flags an expectation that corporate trading could be allowed within the year.

Why this matters for Bitcoin liquidity, even with the handcuffs on

Korean crypto trading has been retail-heavy for so long that the market developed habits around it. Think bursts of momentum, crowded alt rotations, and sharp sentiment flips.

The reporting argues corporate participation could help cool the casino vibe by bringing in risk teams, committees, and longer time horizons.

Whether that optimism plays out or not, the liquidity impact is real. Corporate flow behaves differently than individual flow.

A retail trader sells because they are bored, scared, euphoric, or overlevered.

A treasury desk sells because a policy limit is hit, a quarter closes, a board asks for cash, or risk control says the position is oversized.

Those drivers show up on charts in slower, chunkier ways. That tends to thicken order books in majors like BTC and ETH.

There is a useful illustration in the Korean coverage.

It points to Naver, reported to have about 27 trillion won in equity capital, and notes that a 5% allocation would be big enough to buy more than 10,000 BTC at local reference prices.

That is not a prediction. It is a scale check, and it underlines why even a “small” cap can still translate into meaningful spot demand if large firms participate.

The flip side is just as important.

If corporates are allowed in, corporates are allowed out.

Korea is effectively building a two-way ramp for balance sheets, and that can become a new source of supply during stress. The guardrails around asset eligibility and execution look designed to keep that supply from punching holes in thin books.

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The bigger picture, Korea is trying to modernize its market plumbing

It is tempting to view this as a single crypto story. It fits better as part of a broader capital markets push.

South Korea has also announced plans to open its foreign exchange market to 24-hour trading starting in July 2026. The move is tied to a wider effort to improve market access and win an MSCI developed-market upgrade, according to Reuters.

The government is basically saying it wants global capital to move in and out of won assets with fewer frictions.

That macro goal sits comfortably next to a policy that makes domestic crypto markets deeper and more institution-ready.

It also explains why the crypto opening comes with so many constraints.

Korea wants more participation, and it wants it on Korea’s terms, inside a compliance perimeter regulators can defend.

The FSC has been laying groundwork for this approach for a while.

In a February 2025 release on corporate participation, the commission described setting up a task force with the FSS, the Korea Federation of Banks, and DAXA. It also laid out plans for internal control standards and guidelines for corporate entry, according to an FSC press release.

The Jan. 2026 draft looks like the continuation of that plan, with the investor universe moving from theory into operational rules.

What to watch next, because the fine print will decide the market impact

If you care about BTC liquidity, this story is less about a headline and more about the final scope.

Four details will tell you whether this becomes a steady bid, or a cautious pilot that markets will quickly stop talking about.

1. Which corporates count as eligible, and how strict the “professional investor” gate is in practice. If the list skews toward sophisticated treasury management, flows should be steadier. If it broadens fast, expect more uneven behavior.
2. How the top-20 universe is calculated and enforced. The reporting ties it to semiannual market cap disclosures across the five major exchanges, and the operational detail will matter, especially in fast-moving markets where rankings shift.
3. Stablecoin treatment. If USD stablecoins stay out, the market remains more domestically ring-fenced, and corporate participation will be more KRW-native. If they come in, you increase the number of ways corporates can manage liquidity and settlement, which tends to raise trading volume and tighten spreads.
4. Execution rules and banking rails. The report flags guardrails like split trading and controls on out-of-range orders, and the banking layer will decide whether this feels frictionless or bureaucratic.

Korea is not suddenly turning every chaebol into a Bitcoin whale.

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It is doing something more Korean than that. It is creating a framework, putting a cap on it, limiting what can be bought, and tightening the rules of the venue at the same time.

For Bitcoin, the direction of travel still matters.

Corporate balance sheets represent the kind of spot flow that can change liquidity in a way retail excitement usually cannot. Korea’s market is large enough that even a carefully rationed opening can show up in global BTC microstructure, especially during Asia hours.

The ban kept corporate Korea on the sidelines for close to a decade.

The guidelines being finalized now suggest the sidelines are no longer the plan. The next question is how wide the door actually opens when the FSC publishes the final text.

The post Bitcoin liquidity is about to get crunched by a new Korean law that legally excludes 99% of buyers appeared first on CryptoSlate.

NFT Paris was supposed to be the kind of week people plan their year around.

You book the ticket, you text the group chat, you lock in the flights before prices jump, you tell yourself the hotel bill is “work”, you start quietly hoping the market gives you a reason to feel optimistic again.

Then, with about a month to go, the organisers pulled the plug.

On the official site, NFT Paris and RWA Paris 2026 are now marked as cancelled. The statement is blunt, almost tired. “The market collapse hit us hard,” the team wrote, adding that after “drastic cost cuts” and months of trying, they couldn’t make it work this year.

They say all tickets will be refunded within 15 days. They also apologise to people who already booked flights and hotels, and they end with a message to their own staff, a public thank you, and a quiet attempt to help them land on their feet.

If you’ve been around crypto long enough, you’ve seen cancellations before. Events live and die on hype cycles. When the money is flowing, everyone wants a stage. When the money dries up, a conference is one of the first line items to get chopped.

Still, this one lands differently, because it sits on top of another reality that is getting harder to ignore in France, the rise in crypto-linked kidnappings, home invasions, and extortion attempts.

NFT Paris says it’s a market story. A lot of people in the community, especially those who have been reading the police blotter with fresh eyes, think it’s also a safety story, or at least safety is part of the background radiation now, the kind of thing that quietly changes behaviour, budgets, and what “going to an event” actually feels like.

You can hold both ideas in your head at the same time.

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The official reason is money, and the numbers have been ugly

NFT Paris doesn’t dress this up. It calls it a market collapse, it says the cuts weren’t enough, and it ends the chapter.

The broader NFT market context also points in the same direction. NFT trading never really returned to the cultural dominance of 2021, and the last stretch of 2025 was particularly soft. Data showing a slump in monthly sales, including a weak November figure in late 2025, which matters because events depend on sponsor confidence and a sense that people will show up ready to spend, not just ready to network.

You can feel this in the way crypto marketing has changed. The loud era of “buy a booth, throw a party, hire a DJ, print 10,000 hoodies” has been replaced by a colder question, what is the return, who are we actually reaching, and can we justify this to a finance team that no longer believes in vibes.

In that environment, a big public event becomes a fragile machine. If ticket sales come in late, if a few sponsors hesitate, if venue costs are locked in, the margin for error disappears.

Then there is the part nobody likes talking about, because it is grim

Across France, over the past year, there has been a string of cases that share a pattern, someone is perceived to have crypto, or to be connected to someone with crypto, and the crime is physical.

It’s not one incident but a sequence that stretches from the edges of the country back into Paris, and out again.

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On Dec 31, 2024, a home invasion in Saint-Genis-Pouilly targeted the parents of an influencer, the father was abducted and later found, reported by France24.

On Jan 21, 2025, Ledger co-founder David Balland and his partner were kidnapped near Vierzon, with a ransom demand in crypto, Reuters reported on the case, and it drew wider coverage in outlets like the FT.

A few days later, Jan 24, 2025, a crypto professional was kidnapped and held near Troyes, with arrests reported by LeParisien.

By May, the cases had moved into the city.

On May 1, 2025, the father of a wealthy crypto entrepreneur was abducted in Paris, and later rescued during a police raid, reported by France24.

On May 13, 2025, there was an attempted kidnapping in Paris’ 11th arrondissement, targeting the pregnant daughter of Paymium CEO Pierre Noizat, foiled in the street, covered by LeMonde.

There are more, including disrupted plots and assaults tied to crypto holdings, in Normandy, near Nantes, in Essonne, and beyond, reported by outlets like RFI, Europe1, and French regional press.

By late 2025 and early 2026, the drumbeat kept going, including cases in Val-d’Oise and Charente-Maritime, with reporting from LeDauphiné.

This matters because conferences are made of humans. Humans who wear lanyards with their names on them. Humans who post photos of where they are. Humans who meet strangers for “a quick coffee,” then walk back to hotels with expensive laptops, sometimes with big public personas attached to their wallets.

Even if you never experience a crime personally, the atmosphere changes when enough people start swapping stories, and when “keep a low profile” becomes standard advice.

There’s also the psychological shift. In the early NFT boom, the danger was financial, you might get rugged, you might overpay for a JPEG, you might wake up to a floor price collapse. Over the past year, the fear has started to look more physical, and that kind of fear travels fast through a community.

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So was NFT Paris cancelled because of safety, or because of the market?

The honest answer is that the organisers said market, and that is the only on-the-record reason we have from them.

But that doesn’t mean safety is irrelevant. It can be a silent cost. It can be a constraint that makes everything harder.

Security is expensive. Insurance is expensive. High profile speakers become harder to lock in when they are thinking about their families, not their flight connections. Sponsors have to weigh brand exposure against risk. Attendees have to decide whether they want to be visible at all, especially the kind of visibility that comes with VIP lounges, afterparties, and public appearances.

A market downturn already reduces the money available for events. A safety overhang can shrink the pool of people willing to participate publicly. Those two pressures can meet in the middle, and that is where an event breaks.

You can see the tension in one simple detail from the NFT Paris statement. The team specifically apologises to people who had already booked flights and hotels, it’s a very human line, it implies they know how many people had committed real money to being there. See the apology.

If you’re one of those people, your frustration isn’t theoretical. It’s a non-refundable booking. It’s time off work. It’s childcare. It’s the emotional cost of planning around something that disappears.

Paris is still hosting crypto events, which adds another layer

As of press time, Paris Blockchain Week is still selling tickets for April 15 to 16, 2026, on its official tickets page.

That matters because it suggests Paris is not closed for business. The city remains a magnet for institutional finance, regulators, and the broader “tokenization” narrative, even while an NFT-focused flagship event couldn’t make it to the starting line.

That split is telling.

NFTs are the retail facing corner of crypto culture. They live on sentiment and attention. When the market is quiet, the marketing budgets get cut first, and the community energy gets harder to manufacture.

Tokenization, RWAs, the institutional track, those stories have a different funding base, and a different audience. Even the forecasts are framed in years, not in weeks. McKinsey, for example, estimates tokenized financial assets could reach around $2 trillion by 2030, with a range of $1 trillion to $4 trillion, in a report on tokenization.

Whether those numbers land or not, the point is that institutions plan in long arcs, and conferences that cater to them can survive a cycle that wipes out the more culture-driven events.

NFT Paris tried to bridge those worlds by pairing with RWA Paris. The fact that both are cancelled in the same announcement feels like a signal that simply adding “RWA” to the masthead isn’t enough to fix the underlying event economics, especially when the community itself is splitting into different tribes, builders, traders, artists, compliance, and capital.

Community is learning what risk really means

There’s a moment in every crypto cycle where the story stops being about charts and starts being about people.

You can hear it in the NFT Paris statement, the line about their team, the way they say the staff “deserved a better outcome,” the way they offer to connect them with jobs.

You can hear it in the kidnapping reporting, because those stories are not about wallets, they’re about parents, partners, children, and the simple terror of being targeted in your own home, or in the street outside it.

That’s why the safety question keeps coming up, even when the official reason is market collapse. It’s because a conference is one of the most public things a community does. It’s the opposite of operational security. It’s a celebration of being seen.

When the mood shifts from “be seen” to “be careful,” the whole culture changes.

NFT Paris built something real, tens of thousands of attendees over four editions, a place where internet-native industries could meet in person, and turn usernames into handshakes. Now that chapter ends, and the industry has to sit with what it says about the moment we are in.

A soft market can kill an event quickly.

A fearful market can change what it means to show up at all.

The post Two major crypto events canceled after city hit by 18 violent physical attacks on crypto holders amid market downturn appeared first on CryptoSlate.

The cryptocurrency market is entering a high-stakes week, and $XRP is caught right in the crossfire. As of Monday, January 12, 2026, the Ripple token has slipped approximately 1%, trading near the $2.07 mark. While the broader market, including $BTC and $ETH, remains relatively flat, XRP is reacting sharply to a cocktail of political drama and looming legislative shifts in Washington.

XRP Price Analysis: Testing the Downtrend Resistance

Looking at the current XRP/USD daily chart, we can see a significant technical battleground. After the massive rally seen earlier in the year, XRP has been consolidating within a large descending wedge.

XRP/USD 1D - TradingView

• Resistance Breakout: The price is currently hugging a long-term yellow descending trendline. A clean daily close above $2.15 would signal a bullish breakout, potentially targeting the $2.40 and $2.80 levels.
• Support Zones: On the downside, there is a strong horizontal support zone (highlighted in yellow) between $1.80 and $1.90. If macro pressure intensifies, this is the "must-hold" area for bulls.
• Stochastic RSI: The momentum indicator shows a crossover in neutral territory, suggesting that the next move will likely be dictated by the fundamental news cycle rather than pure technical exhaustion.

Regulatory Storm: The Digital Asset Market Clarity Act

The primary driver for the current volatility isn't just "crypto news" but high-level political maneuvering. On January 15, the U.S. Senate Banking Committee is set to debate H.R. 3633, also known as the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act of 2025.

This bill is a massive deal for Ripple. It aims to define the jurisdictional boundaries between regulators, potentially ending the years of "regulation by enforcement" that has plagued the industry. For traders using a top-tier crypto exchange, the outcome of this session could determine whether institutional liquidity floods back into XRP or remains on the sidelines.

The Powell Probe and the U.S. Dollar

Adding to the "risk-off" sentiment is a bizarre turn of events at the Federal Reserve. Reports that the Justice Department might probe Fed Chair Jerome Powell over recent Congressional testimony have sent the U.S. Dollar Index (DXY) down 0.4%.

While a weaker dollar is usually a tailwind for crypto, the sheer uncertainty of a Fed leadership crisis is rattling markets ahead of tomorrow’s inflation report. When the "plumbing" of the financial system is under threat, even fundamentally strong assets like XRP tend to see temporary outflows as traders retreat to cash.

Ripple's Global Wins vs. Local Woes

It isn't all gloom for Ripple. Just last week, the company’s U.K. unit secured fresh approvals from the FCA, reinforcing its status as a regulated global payments powerhouse. However, until the U.S. clarifies its stance on the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, XRP will likely continue to trade as a "pure risk gauge."

The privacy-focused giant Monero ($XMR) has sent shockwaves through the market today, January 12, 2026, by reaching a monumental new All-Time High (ATH). In a spectacular display of strength, XMR shot up 20% in the last 24 hours, bringing its total gains over the past 7 days to an impressive 41%.

While many altcoins are struggling with regulatory headwinds, Monero continues to prove why it remains the king of the privacy sector. You can track the latest movements on our XMR-USD ticker page.

Why is Monero Pumping?

The recent price action suggests a massive capital rotation into privacy-centric assets. Reports indicate that recent turmoil within other privacy projects, such as Zcash, has led investors to consolidate their holdings into the more established and decentralized XMR. Additionally, as the global regulatory environment tightens, the demand for truly anonymous transactions has never been higher.

Before diving into the technicals, ensure your assets are safe by checking our hardware wallet comparison.

XMR Coin Technical Analysis: Breaking the $600 Barrier

Looking at the 1-hour chart provided, the momentum is undeniably bullish. Monero recently smashed through several key resistance levels that have held the price back for weeks.

XMR/USD 1H - TradingView

• The Breakout: After consolidating around the $420–$440 range earlier this month, XMR broke the psychological resistance at $480. This level has now flipped into a primary support zone.
• Vertical Momentum: The chart shows a nearly vertical "god candle" pushing the price toward $606.35. This parabolic move indicates strong FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) among retail and institutional buyers alike.
• Stochastic RSI: The Stochastic RSI is currently hovering in the overbought territory (around 84.34). While this suggests a potential short-term cooling-off period or minor correction, in a strong bull market, assets can remain overbought for extended periods as they "price discovery."

If you are looking to trade this volatility, compare the best platforms in our exchange comparison guide.

XMR Price Prediction: Future Highs and Lows

With $Monero now in price discovery mode, the old resistances have vanished, and we must look to Fibonacci extensions and psychological levels to predict the next moves.

Bullish Scenario (Future Highs)

If XMR maintains its current volume, the next major psychological target is $650. A successful consolidation above the current ATH could open the doors for a run toward $720 by the end of Q1 2026. This target aligns with long-term trendline projections from the previous 2021 and 2025 cycles.

Bearish Scenario (Future Lows)

No asset goes up in a straight line forever. If a correction occurs, the first line of defense for bulls is the $560 mark (recent local consolidation). If that fails, a deeper retracement could see XMR retesting the previous breakout point at $480. However, as long as the price stays above $415, the long-term bullish structure remains intact.

For more updates on how this affects the broader market, read our latest crypto news.

As crypto markets gain momentum in early 2026, comparisons to the 2021 bull cycle are everywhere. Traders point to familiar chart patterns and fractals, expecting history to repeat itself.

But while price action may rhyme, the broader market structure tells a very different story. From Bitcoin dominance and deeply discounted altcoins to macro-driven volatility and regulatory developments, this cycle is shaping up unlike any before.

So the real question isn’t whether this looks like 2021 — but whether it should be traded like it.

Why Comparing This Cycle to 2021 Can Be Misleading

Fractals focus on price patterns, not on conditions. And conditions have changed dramatically.

Just as the 2021 cycle differed from 2017, the current crypto cycle is evolving under a new set of drivers — macro policy, regulation, and capital concentration — that didn’t dominate previous bull markets.

Relying solely on chart similarities ignores these structural shifts.

Bitcoin Dominance Signals a Different Market Phase

One of the clearest differences is Bitcoin dominance:

2021 peak: ~40% BTC dominance

Current cycle: ~60% BTC dominance

This indicates that capital remains heavily concentrated in Bitcoin. In past cycles, major altcoin rallies typically occurred after Bitcoin dominance broke down sharply. That rotation has not happened yet.

For now, Bitcoin remains the primary beneficiary of liquidity.

Altcoins Are Entering This Cycle Already Oversold

In 2021:

• Altcoins were trading near all-time highs
• Alts/BTC and Alts/USD ratios peaked alongside Bitcoin

In the current cycle:

• Many altcoins are already down 80–90%
• Valuations are compressed, not euphoric

This changes the timing and structure of any potential altseason. Instead of topping with Bitcoin, altcoins are starting from deeply discounted levels — which could delay or fragment capital rotation.

Macro Conditions Have Completely Flipped

The macro backdrop is arguably the biggest divergence from 2021.

Last cycle:

1. Federal Reserve was hiking rates
2. Quantitative tightening dominated markets

This cycle:

1. Rate cuts are being debated
2. Political pressure on the Fed is rising
3. Inflation data drives daily volatility

Key events shaping the current outlook include:

1. US CPI releases
2. Supreme Court tariff rulings
3. Senate votes on crypto-related legislation such as the Clarity Act

Crypto is no longer insulated from macro. It is reacting to it in real time.

Dollar Weakness and Bitcoin Strength Are Back in Focus

Recent market behavior highlights a renewed inverse relationship:

• The US dollar is weakening
• Bitcoin is pushing higher despite volatility

This positions Bitcoin less as a speculative asset and more as a macro hedge, a role that was inconsistent during the 2021 bull market.

Gold at New All-Time Highs Changes the Narrative

Gold reaching a new all-time high around $4,600 is a major macro signal.

It reflects:

• Persistent inflation concerns
• Declining confidence in fiat currencies
• Capital rotation into hard assets

Bitcoin moving higher alongside gold strengthens the case that BTC is increasingly viewed as digital hard money — not just a high-beta risk asset.

What to Expect From This Crypto Cycle

Taking all signals together, this cycle is likely to unfold differently:

1. Bitcoin may continue to outperform longer than in past cycles
2. Altcoin rallies could be delayed, selective, and rotation-based
3. Macro data and regulation will drive volatility
4. Policy decisions may matter more than narrative hype
5. The cycle could be longer, choppier, and more uneven

Rather than a rapid replay of 2021, the market appears to be transitioning into a macro-driven, Bitcoin-led cycle.

Final Thoughts

Fractals may look familiar, but markets evolve.

Higher Bitcoin dominance, crushed altcoin valuations, macro sensitivity, regulatory influence, and weakening fiat confidence are reshaping how this cycle behaves. Expecting a carbon copy of 2021 risks missing what truly defines this phase of the market.

This cycle isn’t just about price patterns — it’s about liquidity, policy, and where capital seeks protection.

The prediction market Polymarket is currently flashing a massive signal for macro investors: traders have priced in a 90% probability of a 50 basis point (bps) rate cut in 2026. As the Federal Reserve navigates a complex economic landscape of cooling labor data and "sticky" inflation, the crypto world is watching closely.

But why does a central bank decision in Washington D.C. dictate whether $Bitcoin moons or crashes?

The Relationship Between Rate Cuts and Crypto

In the world of finance, interest rates are essentially the "price of money." When the Federal Reserve cuts rates, it becomes cheaper for businesses and individuals to borrow. For the crypto news cycle, this usually triggers a "Risk-On" sentiment.

Historically, the correlation works like this:

1. Liquidity Surge: Lower rates increase the global supply of money. This excess liquidity often flows into high-growth assets like Ethereum and Solana.
2. Search for Yield: When government bonds and savings accounts offer lower returns, investors move their capital into "riskier" sectors—like crypto—to find better yields.
3. USD Weakness: Rate cuts often put downward pressure on the US Dollar. Since Bitcoin is often viewed as "digital gold" or a hedge against fiat debasement, a weaker dollar typically pushes BTC prices higher.

Why Traders are Watching 2026

The high probability on Polymarket suggests that the market expects the Fed to pivot aggressively to prevent a recession. For crypto traders, a 50 Bps cut is a "double-edged sword." While it provides the liquidity needed for a bull run, if the cut is a panic response to a failing economy, even crypto might see initial volatility before a recovery.

Is the Bottom In?

While the 2026 outlook looks dovish (favorable for prices), remember that "the market prices in the future." This means the 90% odds on Polymarket might already be influencing current Bitcoin price action.

Michael Saylor, the Executive Chairman of Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy), has hinted at a massive new accumulation phase for the company’s treasury. In a cryptic post on X, Saylor teased the return of the "Orange Dots"—the famous visual markers on the firm’s tracking chart that represent new $Bitcoin purchase events.

Strategy Hits a New Milestone in 2026

As of January 2026, Strategy has solidified its position as the largest corporate holder of digital assets. Following a series of aggressive buys throughout late 2025, the company’s total stash has reached a record high.

According to recent filings, the firm now holds:

• Total Holdings: 673,783 BTC
• Total Value: ~$61.2 Billion (based on current market prices)
• Average Cost: ~$75,024 per $BTC

This latest hint follows a purchase of 1,286 BTC earlier this month, funded through the company’s massive at-the-market (ATM) share sale program. With over $11 billion still available in authorized stock offerings, the market expects the "orange dots" to start appearing more frequently.

Why the "Orange Dots" Are Trending

For MSTR investors, "Orange Dots" are more than just a meme; they represent a mechanical arbitrage strategy that has outpaced nearly every major index. By issuing stock and debt to buy Bitcoin, Saylor has turned a software company into a high-performance Bitcoin ETF.

However, the strategy isn't without its critics. Gold advocate Peter Schiff recently pointed out that with an average cost of $75,000, the firm’s unrealized gains are under pressure whenever the Bitcoin price dips toward the $80,000 range. Despite this, Saylor’s latest post suggests he remains unfazed by short-term volatility.

Market Outlook: Is $100,000 Next?

Bitcoin entered 2026 with a strong rebound, briefly touching the $93,000 mark. Analysts at Fidelity and CoinShares suggest that as institutional adoption ramps up, we could see a push toward $120,000 or even $175,000 later this year.

For retail traders looking to follow Saylor’s lead, choosing the right platform is key. You can check our latest exchange comparison to see where to buy safely. Additionally, as your holdings grow like Strategy’s, keeping your private keys offline is a must—take a look at our hardware wallets guide for the best security options.

On-chain data shows unexplained liquidity withdrawals as Eric Adam’s NYC token’s market cap continues to bleed.

The new platform aims to help Democratic campaigns win over crypto donors ahead of the 2026 mid-term elections.

The bill aims to define when and how crypto developers can face liability, as enforcement actions have intensified the debate.

Senate leaders have delayed a key vote on crypto market structure legislation, citing unresolved policy issues around stablecoin yield.

Warren says the Trump administration's move could expose retirement savers to higher fees, sharp losses, and weaker oversight.

Volatility is coming back to the market. Unfortunately, it is not favorable for all assets out there.

BitMine has continued to stake heavily on Ethereum, committing over $340 million to staking the leading crypto asset in just 24 hours.

Crypto news digest: Binance's top traders are bullish on XRP; SHIB just printed a mini golden cross; Satoshi-era miner moves $156 million in BTC.

SEC Chairman Paul Atkins has confirmed that the U.S. Senate will take up a landmark bipartisan market structure bill this week.

The amount of XRP sitting on Binance has declined as trading volume rockets 205.8%he temporary drawdowns.

TLDR:

• XLM forms inverse head and shoulders pattern targeting 30% rally toward $0.33 resistance level ahead
• Chaikin Money Flow remains positive during correction, indicating smart money accumulation continues
• Bullish divergence appears as MFI holds higher levels while XLM price makes lower lows recently
• Stellar’s Real-World Asset value grows 11% to nearly $986M, strengthening network fundamentals

Stellar’s native token XLM has declined approximately 34% over the past three months, yet technical indicators and network fundamentals suggest a possible trend reversal. 

The cryptocurrency is forming an inverse head and shoulders pattern on daily charts while maintaining positive capital inflows. 

Network activity continues expanding, with Real-World Asset value approaching $986 million on the Stellar blockchain.

Technical Pattern Points to Potential 30% Rally

XLM is developing a classic inverse head and shoulders formation across recent trading sessions. The left shoulder appeared in November, followed by the head formation in late December. 

The right shoulder emerged during January’s pullback, completing the traditional reversal structure. 

Market analysts typically view this pattern as a precursor to upward price movements when confirmed.

The projected target from this technical setup indicates a potential 30% advance toward $0.33. This measurement derives from the pattern’s depth and standard technical analysis methodology. 

Price action must break above the neckline resistance to validate the formation. Until that confirmation occurs, the pattern remains a developing structure rather than a completed signal.

Chart formations alone rarely drive sustainable price movements without supporting evidence. However, XLM’s pattern coincides with several fundamental developments on the Stellar network. 

The convergence of technical and fundamental factors often creates stronger conditions for trend changes. Traders monitoring these developments are watching for volume confirmation on any potential breakout attempt.

Capital Flows Remain Positive Despite Price Decline

Chaikin Money Flow readings have stayed positive throughout the recent price correction period. This metric tracks the relationship between price and volume to identify accumulation or distribution. 

Positive readings during price declines typically indicate that buyers are absorbing selling pressure. The persistence of these inflows suggests underlying demand remains intact despite short-term price weakness.

Money Flow Index analysis reveals buyers entering positions on each price dip. The MFI oscillator, which combines price and volume data, shows consistent support levels forming. 

A bullish divergence has emerged where price established lower lows while MFI maintained higher levels. This discrepancy between price action and momentum indicators frequently precedes reversals in market direction.

Stellar’s Real-World Asset ecosystem has grown nearly 11% since late December. The RWA value on the network now stands close to $986 million, reflecting increasing institutional engagement. 

This growth demonstrates practical utility beyond speculative trading activity. Network expansion provides fundamental support for potential price appreciation as adoption metrics strengthen across the blockchain platform.

The post Can XLM Stage a 30% Comeback After Three-Month Correction Phase? appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR:

• Zand Bank integrates XDC Network to provide blockchain-based payments for corporate clients in UAE.
• Integration enables institutional-grade digital asset custody services pending regulatory approvals.
• ComTech Gold brings blockchain transparency and efficiency to precious metal trading markets.
• XDC Network transactions align with ISO 20022 standards for regulatory compliance and interoperability.

Zand, the UAE’s AI-powered digital bank, has completed its integration with XDC Network to offer blockchain-based payment solutions. 

The partnership enables corporate and institutional clients to access digital asset custody services and enhanced payment infrastructure. 

This collaboration marks a step forward in connecting traditional banking systems with blockchain technology for enterprise applications.

Enterprise Blockchain Infrastructure Meets Digital Banking

The integration allows Zand’s corporate clients to utilize XDC Network’s blockchain platform for institutional-grade digital asset custody. 

These services will become available following applicable regulatory approvals in the UAE. The partnership focuses on delivering faster and more transparent financial solutions for businesses operating in the region.

XDC Network brings enterprise-grade blockchain capabilities designed specifically for institutional use cases. 

The platform processes transactions aligned with ISO 20022 standards, which ensures compatibility with existing financial messaging systems. 

This technical alignment supports regulatory compliance and maintains interoperability with traditional banking infrastructure.

“We are entering a new era where blockchain technology can serve as the foundation for more efficient and inclusive banking solutions,” said Michael Chan, CEO of Zand. 

He added that the collaboration with XDC Network supports the bank’s vision of building blockchain-powered financial products. 

The integration helps bridge the gap between traditional finance and decentralized finance while advancing the digital economy.

Gold Trading Innovation Through Blockchain Technology

The partnership extends beyond payment infrastructure to include commodity market applications through ComTech Gold. 

This initiative targets the gold trading sector by introducing blockchain-based solutions for precious metal transactions. The platform combines traditional gold investment benefits with blockchain technology advantages.

ComTech Gold aims to bring transparency and programmability to gold trading markets. The blockchain-based approach can streamline processes that traditionally involve multiple intermediaries and complex settlement procedures. 

This application demonstrates how distributed ledger technology applies to physical commodity markets beyond digital assets.

“At XDC Network, we believe that digital banks and enterprise blockchain platforms can work together to redefine the future of finance,” stated Ritesh Kakkad, Co-Founder of XDC Network. 

He noted the partnership with Zand brings together compliance, innovation, and real-world utility. This proves blockchain is helping to power the next generation of global payments and asset tokenization.

The XDC Network announced the partnership through its official channels, confirming the successful integration completion. The announcement specified that transactions on the network maintain ISO 20022 compliance standards.

This technical specification ensures the platform supports future regulatory requirements and maintains compatibility with global financial systems.

The post Zand Bank Integrates XDC Network for Blockchain Payments and Digital Asset Custody appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR:

• TheCharlatan joins Bitcoin Core as the sixth trusted key holder, the first addition since the May 2023 expansion.
• At least 20 Bitcoin Core contributors supported the promotion with zero objections during the nomination process.
• The South African developer specializes in reproducibility and validation logic for Bitcoin Core software.
• Bitcoin Core’s governance evolved from Satoshi’s sole control to the current six-person maintainer structure.

Bitcoin Core has expanded its elite group of Trusted Keys maintainers for the first time since May 2023. The pseudonymous developer TheCharlatan, also known as “sedited,” received commit access to the master branch on January 8, 2026. 

This promotion brings the total number of keyholders to six, marking a significant milestone in the project’s decentralized governance structure.

TheCharlatan Joins Elite Group of Core Maintainers

TheCharlatan now stands alongside five existing Trusted Key holders with commit power to Bitcoin Core. Marco Falke, Gloria Zhao, Ryan Ofsky, Hennadii Stepanov, and Ava Chow comprise the other members of this group. 

The appointment process required consensus from the Bitcoin Core development community, with at least 20 members supporting the decision.

The nomination received unanimous support from contributors in a group chat discussion. The nomination statement described TheCharlatan as “a reliable reviewer who has worked extensively in critical areas of the codebase.” 

It further noted that he “thinks carefully about what we ship to users and developers and understands the technical consensus process well.” No objections arose during the nomination process, demonstrating broad support for his promotion.

Bitcoin Core’s 25-member GitHub development community maintains strict controls over commit access. 

Only these six PGP keys can approve changes to the software’s master branch. Developers sign all software updates with their PGP keys, ensuring authenticity and security.

Technical Contributions and Development History

TheCharlatan holds a computer science degree from the University of Zurich. The South African developer specializes in reproducibility and validation logic within Bitcoin Core. His work focuses on ensuring independently-verifiable paths from source to binary code.

His contributions to validation logic build upon Carl Dong’s work on the Bitcoin Core kernel library. This effort aims to separate validating and non-validating logic used to determine blockchain extensions. 

The work helps streamline the process of verifying whether new blocks extend the current best-work chain.

The history of Bitcoin Core’s commit access reflects the project’s evolution toward decentralization. Satoshi Nakamoto initially held sole commit privileges when Bitcoin launched in 2009. 

Control later transferred to Gavin Andresen, then to Wladimir van der Laan. Legal threats from Craig Wright prompted van der Laan to decentralize commit access among multiple maintainers. 

Wright subsequently lost his court battles over copyright claims to Bitcoin’s whitepaper. The current six-person structure emerged from that initiative and represents the standard governance model for Core development today.

The post Bitcoin Core Adds Sixth Trusted Key Maintainer After Three-Year Wait appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR:

• Strategy acquired 13,627 bitcoin between January 5-11, 2026, at an average price of $91,519 per coin.
• The company now holds 687,410 BTC with total acquisition costs reaching $51.80 billion at $75,353 average.
• ATM program raised $1.25 billion through sales of 6.8 million MSTR shares and 1.2 million STRC shares combined.
• STRC Stock captured 43% of trading volume for bitcoin purchases, demonstrating efficient capital formation.

Strategy has purchased 13,627 bitcoin for approximately $1.25 billion at an average price of $91,519 per coin during the week of January 5-11, 2026. 

The company now holds 687,410 BTC acquired for roughly $51.80 billion at an average cost of $75,353 per bitcoin. 

The acquisition was funded through the sale of preferred stock and common shares under the firm’s at-the-market offering program.

Preferred Stock Sales Generate Capital for Bitcoin Purchases

Strategy raised $1.247 billion in net proceeds through its at-the-market program during the same period. 

The capital came primarily from two sources: 6.8 million shares of MSTR common stock generating $1.128 billion and 1.2 million shares of STRC preferred stock producing $119.1 million. The STRC offering represents the Variable Rate Series A Perpetual Stretch Preferred Stock.

The company maintains substantial capacity for future issuances across multiple securities. Available amounts include $10.26 billion for MSTR stock, $3.92 billion for STRC stock, and $20.34 billion for STRK stock. 

Additional capacity exists with $1.62 billion for STRF stock and $4.01 billion for STRD stock. These preferred instruments carry fixed rates ranging from 8% to 10% annually.

The timing of these transactions coincided with increased market activity in Strategy’s securities. Trading volumes in STRC stock reached significant levels, providing the company with opportunities to raise capital while maintaining price stability. 

The preferred stock structure allows for continuous capital formation without requiring large single transactions.

Market Observer Highlights STRC Trading Dynamics

Adam Livingston, a market commentator, noted the potential scale of Strategy’s capital raising through STRC preferred stock. 

He suggested the company might have captured 40% of the daily trading volume. With total STRC volume of 1.76 million shares and a price near $100.07, this approach could yield approximately $70 million in a single day.

Livingston referenced that 43% of STRC trading volume from the previous week was converted into bitcoin purchases. 

This pattern demonstrates how Strategy uses preferred stock liquidity to fund its bitcoin acquisition strategy. The instrument trades within a tight price band around par value, reducing market disruption during issuance.

The preferred stock approach provides Strategy with what Livingston describes as deep liquidity and continuous capital formation capabilities. 

Unlike traditional equity offerings that may impact stock prices, the preferred shares maintain stable valuations. This structure enables the company to scale its bitcoin purchases without significant market friction or timing constraints.

The post Strategy Acquires 13,627 Bitcoin for $1.25 Billion, Total Holdings Reach 687,410 BTC appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR:

• Bitcoin fell 2.84% over seven days to $91,177 as DOJ opened criminal probe into Fed Chair Powell
• Trading volume surged to $44.35 billion as markets price in uncertainty over Federal Reserve autonomy
• Powell admitted legal threats could influence Fed decisions, raising concerns about policy independence
• Dollar weakness and gold surge create mixed signals for Bitcoin amid unprecedented central bank scrutiny 

Bitcoin has plummeted to $91,177.62 amid revelations that US Federal Prosecutors opened a criminal investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. 

The cryptocurrency dropped 2.84% over seven days as markets react to unprecedented legal scrutiny of America’s central bank leadership. 

Trading volume surged to $44.35 billion in 24 hours as uncertainty about Federal Reserve independence triggers widespread investor repositioning across digital and traditional assets.

Bitcoin Tumbles as Fed Independence Concerns Mount

The cryptocurrency market experienced sharp volatility following news of the Department of Justice probe into Powell. 

As of this writing, Bitcoin recorded a 1.03% decline in the past 24 hours as traders digest the potential ramifications for monetary policy. 

Financial analyst BitBull reported that prosecutors can now demand documents, emails, and testimony from the Fed chair regarding the central bank’s headquarters renovation project.

Market participants view this development as more than an administrative inquiry. Powell himself admitted that legal threats could affect Federal Reserve decision-making processes, according to reports circulating among crypto traders. 

This acknowledgment has triggered concerns that interest rate policies may no longer be determined solely by economic data. 

Bitcoin, often seen as a hedge against institutional uncertainty, initially failed to capitalize on the dollar’s weakness.

The investigation introduces unprecedented political risk into monetary policy calculations. Traders must now assess whether rate decisions reflect inflation data and employment figures or external pressures from prosecutors. 

This ambiguity creates challenging conditions for risk assets including cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin’s decline suggests investors are moving to sidelines rather than rushing into alternative assets during this initial uncertainty phase.

Crypto Markets Face Crossroads as Dollar Weakens

The dollar weakened against major currencies while gold surged to record highs, creating a mixed picture for Bitcoin. 

Historically, dollar weakness has supported cryptocurrency prices as investors seek alternatives to fiat currency. However, the current environment presents unique complications that challenge traditional market relationships. 

The threat to Fed independence represents systemic risk that transcends typical currency fluctuations.

Bitcoin’s performance in coming weeks will likely depend on how markets interpret the investigation’s progression. 

If traders conclude that Federal Reserve autonomy is genuinely compromised, capital could flow toward decentralized assets like cryptocurrencies. 

Conversely, heightened regulatory uncertainty might push investors toward perceived safe havens including gold and government bonds. 

The $44.35 billion trading volume indicates active positioning as market participants evaluate these competing scenarios.

Long-term implications for Bitcoin remain uncertain but potentially significant. A Federal Reserve operating under legal or political constraints could accelerate currency debasement concerns that originally drove cryptocurrency adoption. 

Yet the investigation also highlights regulatory risks facing all financial institutions, including crypto exchanges and protocols. 

The market must determine whether this crisis strengthens Bitcoin’s narrative as sound money or exposes all assets to unpredictable government intervention.

The post DOJ Investigation into Fed Chair Powell Sends Bitcoin Tumbling: What’s Next? appeared first on Blockonomi.

Crypto-focused YouTube channels are seeing their weakest audience engagement in more than four years. New data revealed that the overall view counts have continued to slide.

While crypto viewership is likely to return to 2021 levels eventually, experts do not expect a recovery this year.

Retail Exodus Hits Crypto YouTube

As per the latest data shared by analyst Benjamin Cowen, the 30-day moving average of views across dozens of major crypto YouTube channels has fallen to levels last seen in January 2021. The downturn is not limited to a single platform or algorithm change. Instead, it is a continued slide from post-2021 peaks, with recent activity dropping to a multi-year low.

YouTuber Tom Crown said the slowdown has extended across social platforms since October 2025, and sentiment is now comparable to prior bear markets. Another creator, Jesus Martinez, said he grew his channel steadily since early 2022, but even his best videos never matched the peaks he saw in 2021.

TikTok creator “Cloud9 Markets” weighed in, saying the decline in attention may also be due to repeated scams and pump-and-dump schemes involving “ponzi” altcoins, and added that retail investors are simply “tired of getting rekt.” Additionally, market commentator “MissCrypto” described the current Bitcoin rally as a “Ghost Town Rally,” while noting that the crypto is holding around $92,000 while public attention continues to drop. She said that this gap shows that institutions, rather than retail investors, are driving the market.

As a result, much of the conversation among retail investors has now shifted toward alternative assets, including precious metals.

Investors Pivot Towards Safe Havens

Petr Kozyakov, Co-Founder and CEO at Mercuryo, also confirmed that retail’s growing interest in precious metals is shaping both crypto price action and safe-haven demand. In a statement to CryptoPotato, the exec said,

“Bitcoin has surrendered early gains after breaching the $92,000 mark in Asia trading as the biggest cryptocurrency mirrors leading US tech stocks in a risk-off mode retreat. Markets appear to be weighing growing tensions between US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell and President Donald Trump.

Against this backdrop, and amid escalating geopolitical risks, traders are retreating to safe haven assets such as gold and silver. Meanwhile, in the digital token space, the narrative of increasing inflows into privacy coins, which so defined the final months of 2025, is continuing to play out with Monero and Zcash recording gains of 16 per cent and 4 per cent, respectively.”

The post Crypto Channels’ Viewership Slumps to Levels Not Seen Since 2021 appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Bitcoin (BTC) slipped below the estimated $101,000 miner breakeven level on January 12, even as on-chain data and macro headlines stirred debate about whether the market is setting up for a rebound.

The move has split opinion across the crypto community, with some analysts pointing to early signs of renewed demand while others warn that fragile technicals still leave room for further downside.

On-Chain Data and Macro Noise Shape the Near-Term Picture

Several analysts on X argued that Bitcoin’s pullback may be masking improving underlying conditions. According to Wise Crypto, on-chain capital flows appear to have bottomed and are now strengthening, while the price trades below miner cost, a zone that has often coincided with longer-term lows in past cycles.

Macro developments also added another layer of complexity, with reports from the New York Times saying that federal prosecutors had opened an inquiry involving Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, tied to a dispute over interest rate policy and a $2.5 billion headquarters renovation. While this news introduced political uncertainty, Bitcoin’s price showed minor positive movement, with VanEck’s Matthew Sigel noting it gained about 1% without any change to its fundamental issuance schedule.

From a technical standpoint, sentiment is more mixed. EGRAG CRYPTO pointed out that Bitcoin’s monthly RSI has slipped below the key 60 level, placing momentum in a neutral-to-slightly bearish zone, though the indicator is beginning to curl higher. Other traders, such as Crypto Chase, warned that hesitation around the $92,000–$93,000 area could signal a lack of urgency from buyers.

A Divergence Between Price and On-Chain Health

The price of Bitcoin has been relatively stable, showing a 1% increase over the last 24 hours but remaining down nearly 1% for the week. On a monthly basis, the asset is modestly higher, though it remains roughly 27% below its October 2025 peak near $126,000.

Nonetheless, on-chain metrics cited by CryptosRus suggest the market does not yet resemble a cycle top. Measures such as the Puell Multiple and MVRV are elevated but far from levels that previously marked overheated conditions, pointing to a mid-cycle pause rather than outright exhaustion.

Still, more cautious voices, including CryptoQuant contributor Sunny Mom, argue that losing key weekly moving averages above $101,000 has shifted the structure to the downside, with heavy resistance forming near $96,000.

For now, BTC sits at a crossroads between improving on-chain signals and unsettled technical levels. The primary bullish thesis rests on the combination of Bitcoin’s proximity to miner cost bases, quietly returning spot fund flows, and a macro environment where political pressure on the Federal Reserve could weaken the dollar’s standing.

The post Bitcoin Poised for Short-Term Rally as Price Dips Below $101K Miner Cost, Says Analyst appeared first on CryptoPotato.

More than half of all cryptocurrencies tracked on CoinGecko’s GeckoTerminal have now failed. Such a significant volume of collapse in token survivability is driven largely by excess speculation and market instability.

According to the crypto aggregator’s latest report, 53.2% of all cryptocurrencies listed on GeckoTerminal are classified as dead, and the majority of failures occurred in 2025.

Crypto Project Failures

Roughly 11.6 million tokens collapsed, which accounted for 86.3% of all cryptocurrency failures recorded between 2021 and 2025. The scale of the losses is a sharp break from previous years and indicates the growing fragility of a market increasingly saturated with short-lived projects, particularly within the meme coin segment.

CoinGecko stated that the fourth quarter of 2025 was especially destructive. During a period of these three months alone, there were 7.7 million tokens that failed, which represented 34.9% of all recorded project collapses. Interestingly, this surge in failures coincided with increased systemic stress following the October 10 liquidation cascade, when approximately $19 billion in leveraged positions were wiped out within 24 hours, which made it the largest single-day deleveraging event in crypto market history.

While market volatility intensified in 2025, the number of cryptocurrency projects continued to expand rapidly. The total number of projects listed on GeckoTerminal grew from just 428,383 in 2021 to nearly 20.2 million by 2025. The report attributed this explosive growth to the increasing ease of token creation via launchpads, which has lowered barriers to entry and encouraged a wave of low-effort meme coins and experimental projects.

Failure Rates Spiked After 2023

Yearly failure data revealed how sharply conditions deteriorated. In 2021, only 2,584 projects failed. The figure rose to 213,075 in 2022 and 245,049 in 2023. Failures accelerated significantly in 2024 and reached approximately 1.38 million before surging to more than 11.56 million in 2025.

Despite 2024 recording over 3 million new launches and the second-highest number of project closures, it still accounted for just 10.3% of total failures over the five years. CoinGecko found that before 2024, and before platforms such as Solana-based meme coin launchpad Pump.fun gained traction, annual crypto project failures remained in the low six figures, while the combined failures from 2021 to 2023 represented only 3.4% of all closures since 2021.

The post Over Half of All Crypto Tokens Are Now Dead: CoinGecko appeared first on CryptoPotato.

While the biggest meme coin by market capitalization saw a substantial uptick at the start of 2026, it has been on an evident decline over the past few days.

Some analysts think the downtrend might intensify, envisioning a potential 50% crash.

A Further Plunge?

On January 6, DOGE climbed to a local top above $0.15, but since then, the bears have regained control, and it is currently worth around $0.13 (per CoinGecko’s data).

The renowned analyst Ali Martinez paid special attention to the meme coin’s price performance and assumed that if the selling continues, it might find support at $0.06 (a 53% collapse from the ongoing levels). It is worth noting that a drop of that magnitude would mark the asset’s lowest level since November 2023.

The lack of serious interest in the spot DOGE ETF is also bad news for the bulls. Grayscale launched the first such product in the USA late last year, while Bitwise followed suit shortly after.

According to data from SoSoValue, these investment vehicles have attracted less than $7 million in cumulative net inflows to date. The figure is quite disappointing and suggests that big players such as pension funds, hedge funds, and asset managers remain reluctant to hop on the bandwagon.

For comparison, the spot XRP ETFs (which also debuted towards the end of 2025) have generated a cumulative net inflow of over $1.22 billion.

The Bullish Scenario

Contrary to Martinez’s pessimistic assumption, multiple other market observers believe DOGE’s price is on the verge of a major resurgence. X user CryptoPulse outlined three key factors, including strong breakout volume, the formation of an RSI golden cross, and MACD in a bullish zone, to predict that the meme coin might soar to $0.20-$0.21 in the short term.

Bitcoinsensus was even more optimistic. They argued that DOGE’s bull cycle is about to repeat, envisioning a 900% pump to as high as $1.80.

Meanwhile, whales have been on a buying spree lately, which is definitely interpreted as a positive element. X user CEO revealed that large investors have accumulated almost 140 million DOGE (nearly $20 million) in the span of just 12 hours.

Continuous efforts in the field reduce the asset’s circulating supply and could influence a price uptick (should demand remain the same or increase). Additionally, the whales’ actions might attract smaller players, who can distribute fresh capital into the ecosystem.

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Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin said on January 10 that Bitcoin maximalists were largely correct about digital sovereignty, arguing that today’s internet has drifted toward corporate-controlled systems that quietly weaken user power.

His remarks frame sovereignty as more than resistance to governments, casting it instead as a fight to protect privacy, attention, and autonomy from profit-driven online platforms.

From the Open Web to the Sovereign Web

Buterin’s comments came in response to a January 1 post by X user Tom Kruise, who predicted that the internet would split into three parts: an “open web,” a heavily controlled “fortress web,” and a smaller, encrypted “sovereign web” built on trust.

Buterin said he agreed with roughly 60% of that outlook, highlighting what he called a long-overlooked divide between user-controlled systems and what he labeled “corposlop.”

He described corposlop as a mix of corporate power, polished branding, and behavior that quietly works against users. Examples included attention-grabbing social feeds, large-scale data harvesting, closed platforms that block links to rivals, and repetitive, risk-averse media output. According to him, while these systems appear helpful on the surface, they are slowly stripping users of choice.

The Ethereum developer said early Bitcoin supporters sensed this risk years ago. Their resistance to ICOs, alternative tokens, and complex applications was rooted in keeping Bitcoin independent rather than wrapped in corporate incentives. However, he argued that where they went wrong was relying on heavy limits or state pressure instead of tools that expand user freedom.

The stance fits with Buterin’s recent criticism of major platforms, including a warning in December last year that X had turned into a magnet for hostility and algorithm-driven outrage. A month before that, he raised alarms about the social platform’s country-label feature, saying even small location leaks could harm vulnerable users.

What Building the Sovereign Web Could Look Like

Looking ahead, Buterin outlined what he believes a user-first internet should prioritize. That includes local-first apps that limit data sharing, social platforms that give people direct control over what they see, and financial tools that avoid pushing extreme risk-taking. He also backed open, privacy-focused AI systems that support human work instead of replacing it.

Zac Williamson, founder of privacy-focused blockchain Aztec, echoed those views in earlier posts, arguing that the attention economy has weakened shared understanding and turned users into products. While Williamson warned that changing incentives will involve conflict and trade-offs, he agreed that cryptography and decentralized systems offer a path forward.

Some community voices remain cautious. Mark Paul wrote that crypto began as an alternative to corporate-heavy tech but has often mirrored it, though he suggested the sector may still outgrow that phase.

For Buterin, the challenge now is cultural as much as technical, with a view to building tools that respect privacy, resist manipulation, and give people room to think and act on their own terms. His closing message was simple: reject systems that drain agency, and commit to software that puts users back in control

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