The reduced AI model costs could democratize access, intensify competition, and accelerate the integration of safety measures in AI development.

The post OpenAI, Anthropic, and xAI slash model costs as safety-first AI development becomes financially viable appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

The record open interest signals robust market confidence and could accelerate Hyperliquid's growth, impacting crypto derivatives trends.

The post Hyperliquid open interest hits record $18B, reflecting market growth appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Qatar's diplomatic success with Belgium and Rwanda may enhance its influence in Gulf and US-Iran negotiations, impacting regional stability.

The post Qatar champions diplomacy as Belgium and Rwanda restore ties appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

New Era's strategic pivot to AI data centers and securing long-term power contracts could redefine its market position and investor confidence.

The post New Era Energy & Digital stock surges over 60% amid neocloud momentum appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Trump's involvement in Ukraine peace efforts could shift diplomatic dynamics, potentially influencing market perceptions of a ceasefire.

The post Trump focuses on Ukraine peace efforts, says Finnish President appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Bitcoin Magazine

Bitcoin Investors Buy Nearly $1B in BTC ETFs as Bull Market Returns

The Bitcoin bulls are back — if ETF flows are to be believed. 

U.S. bitcoin exchange-traded funds received $999 million in new investment on Monday, according to Farside Investors data. 

That’s the most in one day since October 6, when the funds received over $1.2 billion and the price of the leading cryptocurrency hit a new all-time high of $126,080. 

Bitcoin’s price recently stood at $86,552 after scraping $87,330 on Monday. Over the past seven days, the coin’s price has surged by nearly 13%. 

Bitcoin ETFs in the U.S. — approved by the SEC in 2024 — have helped investors get exposure when they couldn’t before. Now, Wall Street firms can quickly buy shares of funds managed by the likes of BlackRock, Fidelity, Morgan Stanley, and others. 

When big investment hits the funds, the price often moves significantly — as what happened on Monday. 

Bloomberg ETF analyst James Seyffart on Monday said that the average ETF buyer is now in profit after the estimated ETF cost basis surged above $81,72 for the first time since January.  

The ETF to receive the most of Monday’s investment — $381.4 million — was BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin trust. The ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF received $289.1 million; Fidelity’s Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund took in $238.8 million. 

Investors have a renewed interest in Bitcoin after the artificial intelligence stock rally cooled and the U.S. Department of the Treasury in August said it would at least double the size of its liquidity-support buyback operations. 

Analysts said the move pushed 30-year Treasury yields down, weakened the dollar, and made assets like bitcoin more attractive. Following the announcement, the bitcoin price had its best run in years. 

A Tuesday report from crypto market data firm CryptoQuant said that the leading cryptocurrency crossed above its 365-day moving average, a signal that the asset has finished being in a bear market.  

This post Bitcoin Investors Buy Nearly $1B in BTC ETFs as Bull Market Returns first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Mathew Di Salvo.

Bitcoin Magazine

Bitcoin’s Bull Run Is Back — and the Data Agrees

Bitcoin’s run this weekend would have observers believing that the bull market is back. But the data also backs it up. 

A new report from data firm CryptoQuant shows that the leading cryptocurrency crossed above its 365-day moving average — a signal that the asset has finished being in a bear market. 

Bitcoin’s price surged in August and had its best run in years, spurred by an announcement from the U.S. Treasury saying it would at least double the size of its liquidity-support buyback operations. Its run cooled but then last week shot up again and was recently trading for $86,598 after trading as high as nearly $87,330 on Monday. 

“This crossover is the definitive technical signal that has marked the start of Bitcoin’s bull markets in past cycles, and it is the first time price has reclaimed the 365-day moving average since March 2023,” the report read. 

It added that the moving average is a “cycle-defining” line and confirmed the start of bull runs in previous years. 

“Its track record across cycles is why this reclaim carries real weight rather than being a routine bounce,” the report added. 

The report continued that long-term holders appear to have finished selling, making the way for new investors to enter the market. 

Bitcoin notched a record of $126,080 in October of last year but then began to sink later that month after the biggest liquidation event in crypto history saw over $19 billion in bets closed. 

In the first half of this year it continued its plunge after the Federal Reserve made it clear it was in no hurry to lower interest rates and investors increasingly threw money at artificial intelligence-related stocks to get returns. 

But the so-called debasement trade — where investors throw money at an asset to hedge against a currency losing its value — is hot again. Bitcoin and precious metals like gold have done well when the dollar has weakened. 

And the Federal Reserve last week raised interest rates to get sky-high inflation in the U.S. under control. Investors shrugged the central bank’s move off and bought up the asset. 

Now, people seem more interested in buying an asset that can protect them from government debt and deficit. In August, total U.S. debt topped $40 trillion for the first time. 

This post Bitcoin’s Bull Run Is Back — and the Data Agrees first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Mathew Di Salvo.

Bitcoin Magazine

White Hats Move Over $4.5 in Bitcoins From Coldcard to Recovery Trust

White hats have moved bitcoin from the hacked Coldcard signing devices to a trust for would-be victims to reclaim, Galaxy Digital’s Alex Thorn has said. 

Writing on X on Monday, Thorn said that the funds were taken by white hats to protect potential victims. They are now apparently sitting in an address controlled by Crypto Recovery Trust, a Wyoming Trust created to help white hats return funds to victims. 

A total of 52.37 of the bitcoins — worth over $4.5 million at today’s prices — were moved. Thorn added that the funds represented 2.8% of the coldcard exploit. 

Criminals started taking bitcoin stored using Coinkite’s popular Coldcard hardware wallet on July 31. 

Canadian company Coinkite said that a firmware bug in Coldcard devices caused seed generation to fall back to a weak software Pseudorandom Number Generator instead of the hardware true random number generator, allowing hackers to essentially guess investor seedphrases. 

Galaxy Digital tracked the movement of funds and said 1,789.28 bitcoins were lost in the attacks. That’s $154.1 million in bitcoin at today’s prices. 

Earlier this month, Nick Bax of universal market protocol Ump Labs said that he was involved in helping recover the funds. 

“Finally able to say that at the end of July, I was involved in the rescue of ~50 BTC which were “imminently going to be stolen due to the COLDCARD entropy flaw,” Bax wrote on X. 

He added: “The funds are currently held by a Wyoming trust, which will ensure that funds are returned to their rightful owners.”

Since the attack, cautious investors have been moving their coins to other storage solutions — including exchanges.

Coinkite said in a statement that the bug in its software “silently went unnoticed” and “its potential impact grew with every release” of its products. 

Days after the first hack, the company urged investors to update their software or move their funds off the popular hardware wallet.

This post White Hats Move Over $4.5 in Bitcoins From Coldcard to Recovery Trust first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Mathew Di Salvo.

Bitcoin Magazine

Feds Probing Binance Over Iran’s Bitcoin Use: Report

Federal prosecutors — including the U.S. Department of Justice — are investigating whether Binance has allowed Iran to dodge sanctions by using its platform, according to a report from Bloomberg. 

The outlet, citing people familiar with the matter, reported Tuesday that feds were investigating whether  Binance Holdings Ltd., which operates the world’s biggest crypto exchange, knowingly allowed Iran-linked entities to trade. 

It comes after the U.S. Department of Justice last week said it is seizing and seeking to forfeit $61 million in cryptocurrency that it alleges came from black-market sales of sanctioned Iranian oil. The funds, according to the DOJ, were laundered through Binance by Chinese entities. 

Iran has been using bitcoin — and other cryptocurrencies — to skirt around U.S. sanctions. The U.S. in April started targeting crypto wallets linked to the Iranian regime, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement. 

Bessent went on to say that the Iranian regime’s crypto had been frozen — mostly in the form of Tether’s USDT stablecoin. 

And last week, the Treasury designated BitBank, an Iranian crypto exchange, as part of Operation Economic Outcast — the Trump Administration’s whole-of-government economic campaign against the Islamic Republic of Iran and its enablers.  

Iran started a bitcoin-backed insurance service for its counties shipping companies earlier this year. Bitcoin cannot be frozen, unlike many other cryptocurrencies. 

The Financial Times this month reported that the Middle Eastern country was using bitcoin to settle cross-border transactions through Iranian crypto exchanges after the central bank advised its countrymen to do anything necessary to help the economy.   

Binance, which has no headquarters but is incorporated in the Cayman Islands, ran into trouble with U.S. authorities after it allegedly allowed funds linked to virtual theft and terrorism to flow through its exchange undetected. 

It exited the U.S. market and agreed to pay $4.3 billion. Its CEO and founder Changpeng Zhao stepped down after pleading guilty to anti-money laundering violations but was later pardoned by President Trump. 

This post Feds Probing Binance Over Iran’s Bitcoin Use: Report first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Mathew Di Salvo.

Bitcoin Magazine

No Bitcoin Payments in Russia — But the Digital Ruble Is Open for Business

While bitcoin is banned for making payments in Russia, the government is keen on one type of digital money: its own central bank digital currency. 

The digital ruble has been available for transactions in the country since September 1, according to a Tuesday report from Tass. 

Citing a talk given by Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, the news agency said that it was all part of “developing a convenient, fast, and independent payment infrastructure” in Russia. 

Russia has been fast regulating digital assets this year. President Vladimir Putin in August signed a law regulating the circulation of digital currencies and digital rights in the country. 

The law states that only registered entities can operate as exchanges, and puts limits on the amount of crypto retail investors can use. 

But what about Bitcoin? 

President Putin in 2024 seemed to praise the OG cryptocurrency. “For example, Bitcoin, who can ban it? Nobody,” he said at a forum at the time. 

“And who can prohibit the use of other electronic payment instruments? Nobody, because these are new technologies.” 

The president has also spoken about how the country has “competitive advantages” when it comes to Bitcoin mining due to the abundance of cheap energy in Russia. 

Though the Kremlin still has a tight grip on what its citizens can do with it: Retail investors are limited to trading bitcoin and other liquid cryptocurrencies, capped at 300,000 rubles ($3,556) per year, according to the August law. Qualified investors have no restrictions. 

And using crypto as a form of payment has been illegal in Russia since 2022. 

Central bank digital currencies — or CBDCs — are a centralized form of digital money, issued by a central bank. Bitcoiners have long criticized the idea of such a product because it can be used by governments to surveil its citizens and ultimately even control their spending. 

U.S. President Donald Trump even signed an executive order in 2025 prohibiting federal agencies from establishing, issuing, or promoting a CBDC. 

But in Russia, a digital ruble is the best way for keeping citizens in check. The Bank of Russia settled early on an architecture that mixes a centralized ledger it controls with distributed-ledger components. The 2021 concept described the preferred model as hybrid — distributed ledgers combined with centralized components — and the full technical details have never been published. 

Bitcoin payments, on the other hand, are being used by companies in international payments to counter Western sanctions, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov admitted in 2024.

This post No Bitcoin Payments in Russia — But the Digital Ruble Is Open for Business first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Mathew Di Salvo.

Bitcoin options carrying roughly $16 billion in notional value expire on Deribit at 08:00 UTC on Friday, Sept. 25. Calls account for about $9.6 billion of that open interest and puts for about $6.4 billion.

Bitcoin trades near $86,300 heading into the settlement, after climbing above $85,000 this week. Two US economic releases and the expiry of CME's September Bitcoin futures follow within seven hours, stacking three separate tests into one trading day.

The equity side settled first

Ledn co-founder Mauricio Di Bartolomeo sees Friday as the second half of an expiry cycle that began on Wall Street.

He said in a note to CryptoSlate that quarterly expirations like September's are a two-act event. Options on BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust expired last week in IBIT's largest single expiration on record, and he described the book as heavily tilted toward calls.

In his account, Bitcoin's rally through $80,000 pushed many of those calls into the money, and dealers short those contracts bought IBIT shares to stay hedged.

Di Bartolomeo argued that this demand reached Bitcoin itself once it grew large enough to require new IBIT shares, a process that pulls spot Bitcoin into the fund through authorized participants. He expects the Deribit book to inherit the same setup.

He noted:

“If the move continues, the large call blocks at $85,000 and $100,000 are where the same dynamic kicks in on the Deribit book.”

Calls make up about 60% of Friday's expiring open interest. Estimating how dealers hedge that book requires an assumption about which side of each contract they hold, since exchange data records open interest in aggregate.

ByKaranteli's open-source gamma model, which its authors present as a map of possible hedging flows under one such assumption, places the largest call wall at $95,000 and the largest put wall at $60,000. It also puts the put-to-call ratio at 0.52 and the zero-gamma level near $71,000.

That zero-gamma level sits where dealer hedging flips character.

Above it, dealers who are net long gamma sell into rallies and buy dips, absorbing moves and pulling price toward heavily populated strikes. Below it, net short gamma forces dealers to buy as price climbs and sell as it falls, amplifying whatever move is underway.

With Bitcoin trading in the $86,000 zone, the model places the market comfortably inside the zone it treats as stabilizing.

Bitcoin options markets are pricing a moderate move

Deribit's DVOL index stood at 38.1 on Sept. 22, a reading ByKaranteli classifies as very low across five years of history. Friday's at-the-money implied volatility was also 38.1%, and skew was near neutral, with 25-delta puts and calls both priced near 39.2%.

At that level, a one-standard-deviation move through Friday works out to about $2,720, or 3.15%, placing a rough band between $83,600 and $89,100. That band puts $90,000 at its outer edge and leaves the $95,000 call wall as a distant target.

Deribit sets its delivery price using a 30-minute time-weighted average of its Bitcoin index between 07:30 and 08:00 UTC.

A 2026 study published in Finance Research Letters found intraday Bitcoin price reversals around Deribit expirations that held up under statistical testing, strongest when at-the-money open interest ran high and estimated gamma exposure was negative.

The same research recorded heavier trading in Deribit perpetuals and in the spot venues feeding the settlement index during those windows.

ByKaranteli's model places the market in positive gamma at current prices, a different condition from the one where the study found the effect strongest. A sharp move that reverses within two hours of 08:00 UTC would fit that documented pattern, and a move that holds through the afternoon's events would carry broader confirmation.

The afternoon handoff

US durable goods orders arrive at 12:30 UTC, four and a half hours past Deribit's settlement. The University of Michigan's final September consumer sentiment reading, which includes inflation expectations, lands at 14:00 UTC, and CME's September Bitcoin futures settle against the CME CF Bitcoin Reference Rate at 15:00 UTC.

The Fed raised its target range to 3.75% to 4.00% on Sept. 16, leaving both data points relevant to rate-sensitive assets.

Once Deribit's contracts settle, the hedges tied to them unwind or roll into October and December expiries. A macro surprise at 12:30 or 14:00 UTC then meets whatever hedging structure survives that reset.

If the expired book had been stabilizing price, the same surprise could produce a larger move than it did the day before.

US spot Bitcoin ETFs took in $159.5 million on Sept. 17, $433 million on Sept. 18 and $999 million on Sept. 21, according to Farside Investors.

Monday's rally also included about $647.9 million in short liquidations out of $746.6 million in total liquidations over 24 hours, while aggregate crypto open interest climbed 7.59% to $156 billion.

The rally is supported by spot buying through ETFs and fresh leverage on top of forced short covering.

Bitcoin's rally faces three tests

The bull case has Bitcoin climbing toward $90,000 before settlement while ETF inflows continue and funding stays positive at moderate levels. Traders roll expiring calls into October and December contracts, and price holds through the durable goods, sentiment, and CME events.

Under that path, the $85,000 and $100,000 call blocks Di Bartolomeo flagged become active on the Deribit book, and buyers replace the hedging flows that expired.

The bear case has Bitcoin stalling between $88,000 and $90,000 as ETF flows slow and perpetual futures open interest stays elevated. The strength built into expiry fades once the book settles, and a firmer-than-expected durable goods or inflation-expectations reading hits a market carrying fewer hedges.

In that scenario, Bitcoin slides toward the lower edge of the implied band near $83,600, with $80,000 as the next level beneath it.

Deribit's settlement opens Friday at 08:00 UTC and CME's closes it at 15:00 UTC. Bitcoin's rally holds through that window if the buyers behind it remain in the market once every hedge tied to the expiring contracts has cleared.

The post Bitcoin faces $16 billion options expiry Friday, then two more tests hit the rally appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Europe’s central banks want the European Union to rethink a rule designed to make stablecoins safer, but that can also link a token run directly to the banking system.

For reserve amounts tied to official currencies, MiCA currently requires issuers of non-significant tokens to keep at least 30% as deposits with EU credit institutions. The floor rises to 60% for significant tokens, according to the European Banking Authority’s technical standards.

Reuters and Cinco Días reported Sept. 22 that the European System of Central Banks wants that fixed minimum removed. Deposits would remain eligible, while reserve safety would turn on how much could become cash within one or five working days.

The position is input to the European Commission’s review of the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation. The consultation runs through Sept. 30, and the Commission says the responses may inform a later legislative proposal.

That leaves a policy question open: can Europe loosen the link between stablecoins and bank funding while preserving the liquidity needed for redemptions?

How MiCA’s deposit floor creates a two-way channel

Bank deposits give an issuer cash it can use when token holders redeem. Yet a deposit is also a claim on a bank, and a mandatory allocation makes the token’s reserve quality partly dependent on the condition of the institutions holding that money.

During the March 2023 banking turmoil, Circle held part of USDC’s reserves at Silicon Valley Bank, and uncertainty over access to those funds pressured the token’s peg. USDC’s market capitalization fell 26% over a month, according to an ECB analysis.

An issuer facing heavy withdrawals may pull large bank deposits at once, so stablecoin reserves that had looked like funding to a receiving bank can then behave like flighty wholesale money.

An ECB speech described how redemptions could force a stablecoin issuer to withdraw reserves and pressure a bank’s liquidity. An ECB working paper added that issuers may concentrate their deposits among a small number of banks.

Euro-denominated stablecoins had a market capitalization of about €450 million in January 2026, compared with roughly $300 billion for dollar-denominated tokens. Crypto-platform and stablecoin deposits also remain small relative to the assets of exposed euro-area banks.

The policy concern centers on the concentration and behavior of reserve deposits if adoption grows.

A fixed quota can create two reciprocal exposures. Bank distress can impair the reserves behind a token, while a token run can drain a bank's funding. The rule improves immediate access to money in ordinary conditions, but it also determines where stress first lands.

The reported ESCB alternative focuses on the redemption timetable. For official-currency tokens, it would use existing EBA liquidity buckets: at least 20% of reserves available within one working day and 30% within five days for non-significant tokens.

The thresholds rise to 40% and 60% for significant tokens. Those tests preserve a near-cash buffer while allowing issuers to meet it with a broader regulated mix of assets.

What a maturity test changes

The proposal would replace a rule about where a set share of reserves must sit with a test of how quickly the whole reserve can produce cash.

Under the EBA framework, withdrawable cash and reverse repurchase agreements that can be terminated within the relevant window can count toward the thresholds. Specified highly liquid financial instruments can also qualify, while short maturity alone does not make an asset eligible.

The EBA uses Liquidity Coverage Ratio categories to identify eligible instruments. Core Level 1 sovereign and public-sector assets sit in a 0% reference-haircut category, while extremely high-quality covered bonds carry a reference haircut of at least 7%.

For reserve valuation, the rules disapply those haircuts and instead require overcollateralization to cover market-value risks.

Draft safeguards cap an issuer’s deposit at one systemically important bank at 25% of reserves and 1.5% of that bank’s total assets. Qualifying securities and money-market instruments in the 0% reference-haircut category are capped at 35% of reserves when they come from one issuer.

The change could improve issuer economics because short-term sovereign paper or repo positions may earn more than bank deposits. The result would likely shift some reserves, income, and risk toward government-debt and funding markets.

Issuers would still have to satisfy liquidity, asset-quality, concentration and overcollateralization controls.

An issuer holding short-term sovereign debt or an overnight reverse repo has less direct exposure to the failure of a particular deposit-taking bank. A redemption wave would be less likely to begin with the withdrawal of one large wholesale deposit.

Heavy redemptions can force securities sales or repo unwinds. Concentrated holdings can carry stablecoin stress into sovereign or funding markets, while falling bond prices can weaken reserve values in the opposite direction.

The ECB’s analysis of stablecoin demand for sovereign debt says the effect depends on the issuer type, its asset mix, and the sector that supplied the money used to buy the token.

Reserve design therefore allocates rather than abolishes risk. A maturity-based rule may reduce the direct bank channel, but its safety depends on the credit quality, market depth and concentration of the assets used to meet redemptions.

Tether wins one policy argument while licensing stays separate

Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino said the reported ESCB position echoed Tether’s warning about MiCA’s mandatory bank-deposit share. On that point, the company said that concentrating reserves in commercial banks can transmit distress between an issuer and a lender.

Tether’s European position includes concerns about restrictions on non-euro stablecoins and other MiCA features. The company also wound down euro-backed EURT while calling for a more risk-averse framework, and USDT remains outside the group of tokens issued under a MiCA authorization.

Removing the deposit floor would leave the broader regime in place. Issuers would still face requirements covering authorization, governance, capital, audits, reserve segregation, redemption, and prudential supervision.

The proposal would neither confer an EU authorization on USDT nor settle Tether’s broader objections to the framework.

The more consequential shift concerns control over reserve allocation. Commercial banks would lose a guaranteed share of official-currency reserves, while issuers would gain discretion within a regulated menu of deposits, short-term securities and repo arrangements.

Sovereign-debt and funding markets could receive a larger share of the assets and yield as a result.

Europe’s decision is ultimately about the architecture of redemption safety. A deposit quota emphasizes the location of reserves and anchors much of it inside banks, while a maturity test emphasizes how quickly a diversified reserve can turn into cash.

The reported ESCB position favors the second model while retaining limits on eligibility, concentration and collateral.

That framework can weaken one link in the contagion chain. Its success would depend on whether issuers can meet redemptions under stress without turning a stablecoin run into disorderly sales elsewhere in the financial system.

The post EU central banks attack MiCA rules and stablecoin runs are blamed appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Solana generated more user fees than Ethereum in data provider DefiLlama's Sept. 22 dashboard snapshot, while Ethereum burned more fees. The split shows that users' spending can reach validators and applications without producing an equivalent benefit for someone simply holding the network's coin.

The data provider's Solana overview showed about $1.1 million in chain fees over 24 hours and $117,138 in reported chain revenue. Ethereum's overview showed $649,423 in fees and $226,298 in revenue.

For these two networks, the revenue measure tracks fees reported as burned, removing tokens from supply without paying holders cash.

Solana also led on displayed seven-day and 30-day fees, while Ethereum retained a smaller lead in reported burns. Yet the dollar ranking does not settle which token offers better economics: new issuance, network value, and the share of validator income reaching stakers all change the comparison.

DefiLlama's chain fee table put Solana at $23.6 million over 30 days, compared with Ethereum's $12 million. Its chain revenue table showed a burn comparison of $2.66 million for Solana and $2.8 million for Ethereum.

Exact window endpoints were not disclosed, and Ethereum's shared revenue table showed a different daily figure of $229,846. The comparison consequently applies to the displayed aggregates, with synchronization limits.

The longer windows also temper the daily headline. Ethereum's 30-day reported burn was only slightly larger than Solana's, even though its daily overview showed a much wider gap. Aggregate leadership over seven or 30 days does not mean either network led every individual day.

How fees reach validators, stakers and apps

Under Solana's fee rules, the base charge is 5,000 lamports per signature. Half of that base fee is burned, and half goes to the validator producing the block. The validator receives all priority fees, which users pay for transaction priority.

That allocation makes fee composition important. A rise in priority fees increases validator receipts without directing that stream to burning, so higher total fees can coexist with a comparatively small burn figure.

Ethereum burns execution base fees, while priority tips go to validators. DefiLlama's Ethereum data-collection code also includes blob fees in both total fees and reported burns. Two similar totals for user spending could affect supply differently, depending on the kinds of fees paid.

The data-collection programs, known as adapters, estimate parts of these reported burns. DefiLlama's Solana adapter estimates base fees by multiplying transaction count by 5,000 lamports, although the protocol charges by signature.

Ethereum's adapter uses each block's minimum effective transaction gas price as a proxy for its execution base fee and obtains blob fees separately from Dune. Neither estimate should be presented as a fully reconciled measurement of tokens destroyed.

Burning reduces supply relative to what it would otherwise have been, and it does not credit a holder's wallet, establish that total supply is falling, or guarantee a price gain. Those are separate questions from how much users paid to transact.

A validator's receipts are not automatically everyone's receipts when staking through it. Solana's staking documentation describes inflationary rewards distributed to validators and delegated stake accounts, with commissions affecting what delegators receive.

The yield also depends on total stake and validator performance. These newly issued rewards are separate from user fees.

On July 2, 2025, Solana staking infrastructure project Jito announced a live upgrade that lets validators distribute priority fees to their stakers. Validators' choices and commissions determine the distribution, and a sharing mechanism does not turn all chain fees into a uniform return for SOL stakers.

For an ordinary holder, the relevant distinction is between owning the asset and participating in a particular reward arrangement.

A passive holder receives no validator payment merely because chain fees rise, while a staker needs to know which rewards are included and what deductions apply before treating a quoted yield as fee income.

Applications represent another destination for economic activity. The Sept. 22 overviews showed $7.7 million in 24-hour app revenue on Solana versus $1.9 million on Ethereum. App fees were $18.2 million and $8.5 million, respectively.

DefiLlama's definitions separate app metrics from gas fees. They also define chain REV as chain fees plus maximum extractable value (MEV) tips. REV can describe a broader stream of transaction-related spending, but adding it to chain fees would count those fees twice.

Valuation and issuance change the investment question

Ethereum's larger dollar burn sits against a much larger token valuation. The same Sept. 22 overview snapshots displayed market capitalizations of $335 billion for ETH and $69 billion for SOL. Nearly comparable 30-day reported burns represent a larger fraction of Solana's displayed market capitalization.

A holder's yield requires a separate calculation. It compares a period's estimated burning with a valuation at one moment, and it says nothing by itself about tokens created during that period. A larger gross burn relative to market value can coexist with issuance that more than offsets it.

Ethereum's supply mechanics make that distinction explicit: net supply depends on issuance and burning. Its Merge explainer's roughly 1,700 ETH-per-day example assumes about 14 million ETH staked, so it cannot serve as a current September 2026 issuance measurement.

Without matched-period issuance for both networks, these fee tables cannot establish either a net supply advantage or a superior investment return.

Solana's accepted SGP-0002 proposal calls for increasing annual disinflation from 15% to 30%, but explicitly depends on SIMD-0550 acceptance and activation. Its current monetary effect depends on implementation.

For holders comparing SOL and ETH, the decisive missing evidence is a matched-period account of tokens issued and burned, alongside the fees actually distributed after commissions.

The September snapshot shows stronger fee generation on Solana and a larger reported dollar burn on Ethereum. Turning either observation into a return claim requires knowing how much reaches the holder, how much supply is added, and what valuation the buyer pays.

The post Solana flips Ethereum in fees, while ETH holds the burn lead appeared first on CryptoSlate.

XRP Ledger (XRPL) validators have put BatchV1_1 on a conditional path to activate at 14:06:41 UTC on Sept. 29, turning a security near-miss into a live test of the network's amendment process and its surrounding software.

On Sept. 22, xrpldashboard showed 30 of 35 trusted validators supporting the amendment, above its displayed 28-vote threshold. The majority first appeared on-ledger on Sept. 15.

Under XRPL's amendment rules, support must remain above 80% for two weeks. A fall to 80% or less ends the majority period, so the activation date remains conditional.

Sept. 29 is the first production test of whether XRPL's validator process, reference implementation, and client ecosystem converted a dangerous pre-mainnet flaw into usable atomic transaction infrastructure.

The validator firewall worked before mainnet

The original Batch amendment never activated on the XRP Ledger mainnet. In February, researchers found a critical authorization flaw while the amendment was still in its voting phase, and validators were advised to vote it down.

XRPL Labs' official vulnerability disclosure states that no funds were at risk.

The flaw sat in the loop that checked the accounts authorizing a batch. If the code encountered a signer for a newly created account whose key matched that account, it returned success immediately instead of continuing through the remaining signers.

An attacker could place that valid signer first, then add a forged entry purporting to authorize a victim account. If the amendment had gone live, the unchecked victim transaction could have executed without the victim's keys.

XRPL's response came in two stages. Version 3.1.1 marked the original Batch and fixBatchInnerSigs amendments unsupported, blocking their activation. BatchV1_1 later replaced them with a rewritten authorization path and additional defenses.

The episode was a failure caught at the boundary between software release and protocol activation.

The XRPL Foundation's final XLS-56 specification now requires a multi-account batch to contain the exact, complete set of BatchSigners whose authorization the inner transactions would ordinarily need, apart from the account whose normal signature authorizes the outer transaction.

Missing, extra, duplicate, or incorrectly ordered entries cause rejection.

Each BatchSigner also signs more than a loose collection of inner transactions. The payload binds the signature to the outer account, its sequence number or ticket, the selected batch mode, the ordered hashes of every inner transaction, and the BatchSigner account.

A multi-signed entry also binds each nested signer account. That prevents a valid signature from being lifted into a different outer transaction or reassigned to another participant.

The merged reference implementation adds enforcement around that design, including signer ordering and uniqueness checks, transaction-count bounds, rejection of directly submitted inner transactions, and protections for ledger replay.

Together, those changes address both the disclosed premature-success bug and adjacent ways that malformed or replayed batch data could cross authorization boundaries.

A Batch contains two to eight inner transactions. Each inner transaction carries no signature or fee and is marked so it cannot be submitted independently. The outer Batch selects exactly one of four modes:

• ALLORNOTHING: every inner transaction must succeed or none of their state changes commit.
• ONLYONE: the first successful inner transaction is the only one applied.
• UNTILFAILURE: transactions apply in order until one fails.
• INDEPENDENT: every inner transaction is attempted regardless of the others' results.

BatchV1_1 can support atomic all-or-nothing flows, but not every batch is atomic in that narrow sense. Developers can also use it for ordered fallbacks or independent bundles.

Activation shifts risk to implementation

The most immediate integration trap is that an outer Batch can return tesSUCCESS even when one or more inner transactions fail. Clients must inspect each inner transaction's metadata and result code to determine what happened.

That distinction is important outside ALLORNOTHING mode, where partial or independent execution is intentional.

BatchV1_1 support shipped in xrpld 3.3.0 on Aug. 6. Once the amendment activates, a server that does not understand the new rules becomes amendment-blocked. It can no longer reliably validate the ledger or participate in consensus until it upgrades.

An issue filed against xrpl.js documented that version 5.0.0 built Batch signatures using the older payload, omitting the outer account, sequence, and participant binding. BatchV1_1-enabled nodes rejected those signatures with temBAD_SIGNATURE.

The xrpl.js release history records compatible support in version 5.1.0.

The wallet and indexer rows reflect integration guidance in the detailed XLS-56 rules. The protocol can reject a malformed signature, but it cannot force a wallet to explain a complex bundle clearly or an explorer to present every inner result in context.

The specification also flags front-running as an area still under investigation. Stronger authorization prevents a party from forging another account's approval, but it does not eliminate every risk created by packaging several market-facing actions into one ordered submission.

What Sept. 29 will prove

If the majority holds, activation will show that XRPL's validator process can stop a dangerous amendment, route operators to a disabled release and later move a repaired replacement through the same governance machinery.

It will also begin a real-world test of whether servers, signing libraries, wallets and data infrastructure agree on the new transaction format and its results.

It will not prove that applications have adopted BatchV1_1, that users want the feature, or that network transaction demand will increase. The amendment vote and software releases establish protocol availability, but they don't provide evidence of additional XRP buying.

The useful signals will come after activation: whether outdated nodes become blocked, whether signing failures cluster around old client versions, whether wallets present multi-account batches intelligibly, and whether explorers report inner outcomes without mistaking outer success for complete execution.

XRPL's validators passed the first test by preventing the original Batch flaw from reaching mainnet. The conditional Sept. 29 activation asks whether the ecosystem learned enough from that near miss to operate the replacement safely.

The post XRPL fixes critical pre-mainnet flaw, but client apps remain at risk appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Circle is doubling down on Binance after USD Coin (USDC) stablecoin customer balances on the exchange nearly quintupled since their first agreement.

On Sept. 22, the companies announced a new five-year commercial agreement alongside Binance’s $100 million equity investment in Circle, extending a relationship that has turned the world’s largest crypto exchange into one of USDC’s most important distribution channels.

The agreement focuses on expanding USDC access, particularly in emerging markets, and replaces arrangements signed in November 2024 and August 2025.

Binance bought 1.237 million Circle Class A shares at $80.84 each, a 5% discount to Circle’s Sept. 17 closing price, and agreed to a two-year restriction on selling, pledging, or hedging the shares. The commercial agreement runs through September 2031, although either company can terminate it earlier under specified circumstances.

The longer commitment follows a sharp expansion in USDC’s presence on Binance. Customers held about $1.5 billion of USDC on Oct. 1, 2024, shortly before Circle entered into its original Binance agreement in November.

Binance’s latest Sept. 1 Proof-of-Reserves snapshot shows customer USDC balances at about $7.1 billion, up roughly 376%, or almost fivefold.

USDC itself has not grown nearly as quickly. Circle reported $39.7 billion of USDC in circulation on Nov. 29, 2024, around the time it struck the first Binance agreement. DeFiLlama currently puts circulating USDC at roughly $74.4 billion, up about 87%.

That means Binance customer balances have grown from the equivalent of less than 4% of global USDC supply at the start of the partnership to almost 10% today.

USDC closes part of Tether’s Binance lead

USDC’s expansion on Binance has also substantially outpaced Tether’s growth on the platform.

Binance customers held $21.4 billion of USDT in the Oct. 1, 2024 reserve snapshot, compared with $1.5 billion of USDC. That left roughly $14.30 of USDT on Binance for every dollar of USDC.

By Sept. 1 this year, customer USDT balances had risen to $32.3 billion, while USDC reached about $7.1 billion. The ratio had narrowed to approximately 4.5-to-1. USDT customer balances increased about 51% over the period, compared with USDC’s roughly 376% increase.

Circle’s regulatory filings show the shift gathering pace after the original deal. USDC represented 5% of stablecoins held on Binance on July 1, 2024, 10% by Jan. 1, 2025, and 22% by July 1, 2025.

The figures show that Binance became a substantially larger USDC distribution channel during the partnership, even as Tether remained the dominant dollar token on the exchange.

Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire said the latest agreement was designed to push that distribution further.

He wrote on X:

“As the world’s largest and most widely used wallet for stablecoins and onchain finance, the partnership will accelerate global and emerging market preference and adoption of USDC. The internet financial system is expanding everywhere and this partnership will help to expand access to this new financial system to hundreds of millions of people and businesses around the world.”

Circle has paid heavily for that distribution

The growth on Binance has come at a high cost, leaving the economics behind the renewed partnership as the bigger unanswered question.

Under the November 2024 agreement, Circle paid Binance a $60.25 million upfront fee and agreed to monthly incentive payments based on USDC held on the platform and in Binance’s treasury.

Those payments ranged from an annualized mid-double-digit to high-double-digit percentage of a fixed rate reset quarterly at a discount to three-month SOFR. Binance also agreed, subject to certain exceptions, to keep $3 billion of USDC in its treasury, with treasury incentive payments requiring at least $1.5 billion to remain there.

Circle expanded the relationship again in August 2025 around USDC held through its Modular Smart Contract Wallet infrastructure. The agreement provided for incentives equal to a high-double-digit percentage of a fixed rate tied to three-month SOFR.

The new five-year contract consolidates and replaces both previous arrangements, with Circle continuing to pay Binance a monthly incentive tied to USDC held in the wallet. Neither the new fee rate nor any minimum balance commitments have been disclosed.

In a note shared with CryptoSlate, Clear Street analysts Owen Lau and Nikhil Vijay said the agreement improves Circle’s visibility over one of its largest distribution channels outside Coinbase but leaves its net economics unclear.

An additional $1 billion of USDC at a 3.5% reserve return would produce about $35 million in gross annual reserve income. If Binance receives a high-double-digit share, as in earlier terms, Clear Street estimates Circle could retain only about $4 million to $7 million.

The issue is increasingly important for Circle’s margins. The company generated about $668 million of reserve income in the second quarter while reporting roughly $410 million of distribution and transaction costs, equivalent to about 61% of reserve income. Non-Coinbase distribution costs also increased as activity expanded across new and existing partnerships.

Binance was already a significant contributor to that bill. Circle said distribution costs specifically related to Binance increased by $152.1 million in 2025 as the relationship expanded.

Binance becomes a shareholder

The latest agreement changes the relationship again by making Binance an investor in the company whose stablecoin it is paid to distribute.

The $100 million investment gives Binance an equity interest in Circle while preserving the balance-linked incentive structure. Clear Street compared the arrangement with Circle’s distributor-shareholder relationship with Coinbase, although Binance’s roughly 0.5% stake is much smaller.

Meanwhile, Binance CEO Richard Teng framed the investment as a longer-term commitment to the stablecoin. He noted:

“Trust in this industry is earned through regulation, transparency, and delivery. Today, in recognition of all three, Binance commits $100M to Circle and extends our partnership for five years. This partnership is about bringing a stable, reliable digital dollar within reach of anyone with a phone.”

The next test will come from the balances and costs behind those ambitions. Clear Street said it will watch reported Binance USDC holdings and Circle’s non-Coinbase distribution expenses when third-quarter results arrive.

With Binance customers now holding more than $7 billion of USDC, those disclosures could show how much Circle is paying to preserve a channel that has grown from less than 4% of global USDC circulation to almost 10% in under two years.

The post Circle pays millions for Binance distribution while its margins collapse appeared first on CryptoSlate.

When you place a sell order on a crypto exchange and the platform rejects it without comment, the fault is rarely yours. More often the trading pair sits in a state that the exchange itself publishes, but which appears nowhere on the buy screen. The most important of these states is called cancel only, and it means this: existing orders can only be cancelled, new ones are no longer accepted. You cannot sell in that pair any more.

This analysis was compiled by cryptoticker.io on September 23, 2026. We pulled the public market directories of three trading venues and counted the status fields programmatically. The result at Kraken: 82 of 1,450 trading pairs are listed as cancel only, spread across 45 underlying assets. The delisting notice of August 27, which we reported on September 3, named 21 tickers. The remaining 24 assets appear in no announcement we could find.

What cancel only means at a crypto exchange

Every trading pair on an exchange carries an operating state. Kraken publishes it in the status field of its public market directory and lists five possible values in its own API documentation. Three of them are worth knowing.

online is the normal case: the order book accepts buy and sell orders, market and limit orders work as usual. cancel only, according to the documentation, means that only the cancellation of existing orders is permitted. A new order, in either direction, is rejected. post only allows only orders that are placed into the order book and are not executed immediately against an existing counterparty. A market order fails there, and so does a tightly set limit order.

The decisive difference from a delisting: a delisting is an announced decision with dates, which the exchange communicates to its customers. A status change to cancel only is, at first, no more than a technical state in the order book. It can be the run-up to a delisting, it can be the aftermath of a trading halt already carried out, and it can be a temporary measure. From the outside, the status field alone does not tell these apart, and that is precisely where the practical problem lies for you as a holder.

Our September 23, 2026 count: 1,450 trading pairs reviewed

The method in one sentence: on September 23, 2026, at around 4:00 UTC, we pulled the public market directories of Kraken, Bitvavo and Coinbase Exchange and counted the status fields reported by the exchanges themselves for each trading pair. All three requests returned HTTP 200.

At Kraken the directory covered 1,450 trading pairs. Of these, 1,351 were online, 82 cancel only and 17 post only. Mapping the pairs back to their underlying assets gives 623 normally tradable assets, 45 assets in the cancel only state and 11 in post only.

The 82 blocked pairs break down into 37 euro pairs, 44 dollar pairs and one pair against a stablecoin. For an investor in Germany the euro figure is the more relevant one: in 37 cases the direct route back into euros via the order book is currently shut. Anyone who bought these assets in euros cannot swap them back into euros that way.

45 underlying assets on cancel only: which tickers are affected

Kraken names the assets in the directory by ticker only. These 45 underlying assets were listed as cancel only at the time of our count, in alphabetical order: ACA, ACX, AI3, BKS, BNC, CLV, CQT, CXT, EGLD, EPT, ESX, GAIA, GHIBLI, HDX, HIPPO, HOUSE, IR, JUNO, KEY, KIN, KOBAN, KP3R, LOCKIN, M, MAT, MIR, MNGO, MULTI, NTRN, OMNI, RBC, RIZE, SBR, SCA, SIDEKICK, SLAY, TEA, TREMP, U2U, VANRY, VULT, WEN, WMTX, XTER and YALA.

Several of these tickers are short and therefore ambiguous. M, IR and KEY can hardly be identified with confidence without the full project name, and the exchange does not carry it in the directory. If you see one of these tickers in your account, match it against the project name in your portfolio view before you decide anything.

24 assets with no announcement: how our list differs from Kraken's notice

On September 3 we reported on a Kraken notice dated August 27 in which the exchange ended trading in 21 tokens as of September 11. Our article on the Kraken trading halt for 21 tokens lists the tickers in full. We set today's measurement against that list.

All 21 announced assets are on cancel only today: ACA, BKS, BNC, CQT, CXT, EPT, GAIA, HDX, IR, JUNO, M, MAT, MIR, MULTI, RBC, RIZE, SBR, SCA, VANRY, VULT and XTER. The state matches the announcement, since trading stopped on September 11 while the balances remain in the accounts.

The remaining 24 assets do not appear in that notice: ACX, AI3, CLV, EGLD, ESX, GHIBLI, HIPPO, HOUSE, KEY, KIN, KOBAN, KP3R, LOCKIN, MNGO, NTRN, OMNI, SIDEKICK, SLAY, TEA, TREMP, U2U, WEN, WMTX and YALA. Seventeen of them have a euro pair that is likewise on cancel only. Among them are assets that are no footnote in the market, such as EGLD, NTRN and KP3R.

What this means needs to be kept cleanly apart. What is documented: these 24 underlying assets carried the cancel only status at the time of our count, and we did not find them in the delisting notice cited above. What is not documented: why they carry that status. It could be a later notice that we do not have, a technical measure, or a quiet clean-up. We do not impute to the exchange an intention we cannot evidence. For you, though, the cause changes little about the practical finding: selling through the order book is currently impossible in these pairs.

post only and limit only: two further states that reject your order

Alongside cancel only there are two milder states that still cause a routine order to fail. At Kraken, 17 pairs were on post only, spread across eleven underlying assets: AIO, AKE, AUSD, BOS, EURR, GAIB, NODE, RLUSD, USDR, VELVET and XBT against USDR. It is striking that several value-referenced tokens and stablecoins are among them.

In practice, post only means this: a market order is rejected. You have to set a limit order that is not executed immediately, in other words above the best ask or below the best bid. Anyone unaware of the difference will take a rejected order for a bug in the app. At Coinbase Exchange we additionally found 23 products in the limit only state, in which nothing but limit orders is accepted.

Bitvavo and Coinbase Exchange: what halted, delisted and trading_disabled mean there

To put the Kraken figure in context, we counted two further trading venues using the same method. The states go by different names there, and the orders of magnitude are far apart.

Bitvavo listed 438 markets. Of these, 437 were on trading and a single one on halted, namely WMTX against the euro. That is the most revealing individual finding of the survey, because WMTX also appears on Kraken's list of blocked assets. Anyone holding this token currently finds no working euro order book at either venue.

Coinbase Exchange listed 838 products. Of these, 515 were online and 323 carried the delisted marker and were flagged as not tradable at the same time. Those 323 are not a snapshot of a current event, however: Coinbase keeps permanently discontinued products in the directory, so the number is an archive rather than a fresh occurrence. The meaningful slice is the euro pairs. Of 87 listed euro pairs, 54 were not tradable, leaving 33 usable euro order books.

That figure fits a survey of our own published on August 17, 2026: at that point 34 of 399 assets at Coinbase Exchange had a euro order book. The finding on euro trading pairs at four venues comes from our own house and is therefore not an independent confirmation, but a continuation of the same series of measurements. We cite it with date and origin so that you can place the numbers.

How to check your own account in five minutes

The list above is no substitute for checking your own portfolio, because status values change. Here is how to go about it.

First open the holdings overview of your account and note every asset that is not one of the large, broadly traded coins. Then, for each of those assets, try a limit sell order at a price well above the market, in other words an order that will not be executed. If it is accepted, the pair is tradable and you cancel it again. If it is rejected, the pair sits in a restricted state. The order of operations matters here: test first with an order that cannot be executed, not with a market order.

Also check whether the asset has an active euro order book at a second venue accessible to you. If it does, moving is an option. If it does not, that route falls away and only a withdrawal to your own wallet remains. If you are looking for a second venue, our overview of the best crypto exchanges helps with the choice, because it also lists euro connectivity and withdrawal routes.

Withdrawal instead of selling: which way out remains under cancel only

A blocked trading pair says nothing about whether withdrawing the balance still works. These are separate functions, and as a rule the withdrawal stays open longer than trading does. In Kraken's August 27 notice, three months lay between the trading halt on September 11 and the end of the withdrawal window on December 10.

That gap is the deadline that actually matters. Once it has passed, an exchange may liquidate a residual balance itself, and the proceeds of such a liquidation can be very low, because no liquid market need exist for it any more. For you, a clear order of operations follows: first establish whether a withdrawal window is running, then act. In the case of the stablecoin USDP being dropped by another exchange, which we reported on September 10, several weeks likewise lay between the end of trading and the end of the deadline.

If withdrawal is technically impossible because the network has been switched off on the platform, contact customer support and document the process with date and time. You may need that documentation later, in dealings with the tax office.

Self-custody after the withdrawal: what to watch with your own wallet

Withdrawing to your own wallet is often the only route left when a trading pair is blocked, and it shifts responsibility entirely onto you. Three points decide whether that goes well.

First, the wallet must support the specific network the token sits on. Many of the affected assets are not large coins with a chain of their own, but tokens on someone else's chain. Second, you need a small amount of that chain's native currency in order to be able to move the token at all later on. Anyone who withdraws only the token and keeps no fee reserve has it safely in custody but can no longer send it. Third, the recovery phrase belongs somewhere outside every device that is connected to the internet.

Which device makes sense for that depends on how many different chains you need to cover. Our hardware wallet comparison lists the supported networks per model, and with smaller tokens that is exactly the decisive point.

Tax on blocked pairs: what Section 23 of the German Income Tax Act does to the holding period

A blocked trading pair does not pause the holding period. Under Section 23 of the German Income Tax Act, the one-year period keeps running from the date of acquisition, regardless of whether you can currently sell the asset. For gains that is favourable, since after the year has elapsed a sale from private holdings is tax free.

With losses the picture reverses. A loss only takes tax effect once it is realised, and it is realised through a disposal. When the order book is closed, that is precisely what you cannot do. The loss stays on paper, and it cannot be set this year against gains from other private disposal transactions. Anyone who had counted on that should review their planning for the current year.

If the exchange liquidates a residual balance itself once the deadline has passed, that too is a disposal, only without your decision on the timing. The proceeds and the date then appear in the exchange's statement, and both belong in your records. Keep the documentation complete, because with small, illiquid assets tax tools frequently lack the price data, and then your own evidence is all that counts.

The December 31, 2026 cutoff date: why a blocked sale can get expensive

A draft bill from the German finance ministry proposes bringing crypto assets under the flat-rate withholding tax in future, while holdings acquired up to December 31, 2026 would remain under the existing rules. We have set out the details in our article on grandfathering and the December 31, 2026 cutoff date. None of it has been enacted; this is a draft.

For the case described here, a practical consideration follows all the same. Anyone wanting to reshuffle an asset before the end of the year in order to tidy up their tax position needs a functioning order book to do it. If the pair is blocked and no second venue exists, that option drops out, regardless of how the legislation ends up. That is no reason to rush, but it is a reason to look through the portfolio now rather than in December.

Limits of this analysis: what we could not check

We reviewed 1,450 trading pairs at Kraken, 438 markets at Bitvavo and 838 products at Coinbase Exchange, 2,726 entries in total, each on September 23, 2026 and each with HTTP 200.

Four things we could not check. We know the reason for not a single status value, because the directories do not supply it. We placed no test orders, but counted only the states reported by the exchanges themselves. We do not know whether a withdrawal window is running for the 24 unannounced assets, or when it ends. And we did not check whether the display in the apps and in the simplified buy screens reflects the same state as the order book, which in our experience can diverge.

Status values are snapshots, too. A pair that is on cancel only today can be online again tomorrow. The figures in this article therefore carry a date, and your own check inside the account cannot be replaced by any list.

Checking blocked trading pairs: what to take away

1. Go through your holdings for small assets. For every asset outside the large coins, use a limit order that cannot be executed to test whether the order book accepts orders. If it is rejected, the pair sits in a restricted state. You will find a second venue with euro connectivity in our overview of the best crypto exchanges.
2. Establish the withdrawal deadline before you do anything else. The trading halt and the end of withdrawals are two different dates, and only the second determines whether you still keep your balance in your own hands. If you are switching provider, the licensing is worth a look, which we set out in our comparison of regulated crypto exchanges.
3. Prepare self-custody while the withdrawal is still running. Check in advance that your wallet supports the chain in question, and put aside a small fee reserve in the network's currency. Which devices cover which networks is set out in our hardware wallet comparison.

Anyone who checks the state of their portfolio regularly notices a status change like this while routes are still open. Anyone who only looks when trying to sell notices it on the day when none are left.

(As of September 23, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)

Why Is the Cardano Price Up 30% This Week?

$Cardano has woken up in a big way. On September 17, ADA was trading around $0.196. Today it's sitting at $0.258 after tagging an intraday high of $0.262, which works out to a gain of roughly 31% in just seven days. That puts ADA among the strongest large caps of the week and well ahead of Bitcoin's own rebound.

The rally didn't come out of nowhere. The broader market has turned risk-on again, with $Bitcoin climbing as much as 7.7% to above $87,000 on September 23 while several large-cap altcoins moved higher as demand returned across the market. But $ADA isn't just riding the tide. It's clearly outrunning it, and that has traders asking whether this Cardano rally is the start of something bigger.

You can follow the move live on the CryptoTicker ADA chart.

What Is Driving the Cardano Rally Behind the Scenes?

Three forces are stacking up at the same time: derivatives traders piling in, shorts getting squeezed, and a genuine uptick in network usage.

On the derivatives side, CoinGlass data shows ADA open interest across exchanges has surged since mid-September, with outstanding contracts reaching 2.37 billion ADA. Cardano's funding rate also flipped positive on September 17 and climbed to 0.010%, meaning longs are now paying to hold their positions. Rising open interest alongside rising price usually signals fresh money entering, not just old positions shuffling around.

Bears have been paying the bill too. Shorts accounted for more than 80% of liquidated ADA positions, with $2.49 million of the $3.28 million liquidated over 24 hours coming from bearish bets. Every forced short closure is a market buy, which adds fuel to an already moving price.

On-chain, the picture is also brightening. CardanoScope recorded 33,919 transactions on September 21, up 71% from the weekly low of 19,844 on September 16, while active addresses hit a weekly high of 16,388.

What Cardano News Is Fueling the Sentiment?

The biggest narrative this week is payments for AI agents. The Cardano Foundation announced on September 21 that Cardano is now part of the official x402 SDK, allowing any app or AI agent to pay for an API call in ADA or any Cardano native token over a web request, with no account, API key or checkout page needed. This builds on the earlier launch, as the x402 payment protocol went live on Cardano on September 11.

It's also worth remembering where ADA is coming from. In late June, a flaw in the third-party SecondFi wallet (formerly Yoroi) exposed private keys, compromising roughly 16 to 20 million ADA across hundreds of wallets. That headline weighed on sentiment for weeks, so this week's rally also looks like the market finally moving past that chapter.

ADA Price Analysis: Major Breakout

After bottoming near $0.139 in late June, ADA has spent three months printing higher lows: roughly $0.155 in late July, $0.175 in mid-August and $0.19 in mid-September. That's a textbook recovery structure.

This week, ADA smashed through two major barriers in one move:

The 200-day EMA at $0.239 had been sloping downward and capping every rally since spring. On August 22, ADA spiked above it intraday but got rejected hard, falling back toward $0.19. This time, price has closed several daily candles above the ADA 200 EMA, which is a much stronger signal.

The $0.245 horizontal level is just as important. It acted as support in April and May, then turned into resistance after the June breakdown. Reclaiming it flips that zone back into support.

Together, these two levels form a support cluster between $0.239 and $0.245. As long as ADA holds above it, the bulls stay firmly in control.

Is the ADA Price Overheated After the Rally?

Here's the catch. The daily RSI is sitting at 72.89, which is officially overbought territory. The last time RSI pushed this high was in late August, right when ADA spiked into the 200 EMA and then dropped nearly 25% over the following weeks.

Overbought doesn't mean the rally is over. Strong trends can stay overbought for a while. But it does mean the easy part of the move is probably behind us, and a pause or pullback toward the $0.245 zone to cool things off would be perfectly healthy. With funding turning positive and leverage building, a sharp shakeout of late longs is also on the table.

Keep an eye on the US macro calendar as well. A US economic event is flagged on the chart for later this week, and any surprise could hit risk assets across the board.

What Are the Next ADA Price Targets?

If the breakout holds, these are the levels to watch on the way up:

• $0.262: Today's high and the first hurdle. It also lines up with the top of the August 22 wick.
• $0.285: The May swing high and the last major peak before the June crash. A daily close above it would confirm ADA is back in its spring range.
• $0.30: The big psychological target and a key horizontal resistance on the chart. This is where many traders will likely take profit.
• $0.35: The extended target if momentum really takes off. It would require a sustained altcoin run and continued strength in Bitcoin.

What Is the Cardano Price Prediction for the Coming Weeks?

• Bullish scenario: ADA holds the $0.239 to $0.245 support cluster, breaks above $0.262 and pushes toward $0.285 before testing $0.30. With open interest rising and shorts still getting squeezed, this is the path of least resistance as long as Bitcoin stays firm.
• Base scenario: ADA cools off after the overbought reading and consolidates between $0.24 and $0.26 for several days. That would let RSI reset and set up a cleaner attempt at $0.30 in October.
• Bearish scenario: ADA loses the 200 EMA at $0.239 on a daily close. That would suggest another August-style fakeout, opening the door to $0.22 and possibly the $0.20 area where the September rally started. The major floor remains the June low near $0.139, but a trip that deep would need a broad market breakdown.

Our Cardano price prediction: as long as the $0.239 level holds, the structure favors a move toward $0.285 to $0.30 in the coming weeks, with a short breather along the way being the most likely path.

Since September 22, 2026, the US bank SoFi has settled its entire card business through a stablecoin it issues itself, across Mastercard's global network. Nobody notices anything at the checkout, and nothing about your card in Germany changes on that day. The move matters for a different reason: for the first time, the settlement of a card programme of this size runs in production through a stablecoin issued by a licensed bank. That raises the question of when a European provider will attempt the same thing, and what would apply to you if one did.

This article sets out what exactly went live, where the stablecoin actually sits in the card process, and which rules would bite in Germany. The legal framework for that is not American but European: what a nationally chartered bank may do in the United States is, in the EU, an e-money token with a licensing requirement of its own.

What SoFi and Mastercard switched on for stablecoin settlement on September 22, 2026

SoFi has put stablecoin settlement into operation for SoFi Bank's debit and credit card business. Settlement runs on SoFiUSD, a stablecoin pegged to the US dollar that the bank issues itself. According to the company, this makes SoFi the first nationally chartered US bank to use stablecoin settlement in production on Mastercard's network.

The card programme being moved onto this rail processes an annualised volume of more than 25 billion US dollars, on the company's own figures. What is being converted is the running business, not a ring-fenced pilot.

Merchants do not have to hold SoFiUSD or change their point-of-sale systems. Anthony Noto, SoFi's chief executive, describes the merchant-side benefit this way: through the bank's business platform, any merchant can receive settlement amounts immediately in a SoFi bank account and convert them into cash around the clock at no cost. Sherri Haymond, who is responsible for digital commercialisation at Mastercard, frames the step as a move from trials into production.

The two companies announced the partnership in March 2026. As the next stages they name cross-border payments and remittances by migrant workers, along with talks with larger US merchants. No date for a European launch appears in the announcement.

Settlement, not the payment itself: where the stablecoin really sits in the card process

Settlement is the step at which money actually moves between the banks involved after a card payment. It has little to do with the moment at the till.

A card payment runs through three separate stages. First authorisation: within seconds, the terminal asks whether the card is valid and has funds. Then clearing, in which the transaction data are reconciled between the acquiring bank and the card issuer. Only after that comes settlement, where amounts are bundled and balances squared, traditionally through central bank money and correspondent banks, often with a day or more of delay.

It is precisely this third stage that SoFi replaces with a stablecoin. The customer at the till still pays in dollars, the merchant is still credited in dollars, and no token appears on any statement. What changes is the transport layer behind it: it runs over a blockchain instead of the classic banking route, which means it is no longer tied to banking days.

That distinction matters because it separates the process cleanly from what is sold in Europe as a crypto credit card. There, crypto assets sit with the provider, and at the moment of payment they are sold and converted into euros. With SoFi it is the other way round: the customer has nothing to do with crypto, while the bank switches to tokens in the background.

SoFiUSD: what makes a stablecoin issued by a licensed bank different

A stablecoin is a token that pegs its value to a reference, usually a sovereign currency, and is meant to hold that peg through backing reserves. The decisive difference between individual stablecoins rarely lies in the technology. It lies in who issues them and which supervisor that issuer answers to.

With the well-known dollar tokens, the issuer is usually a specialist company that holds the reserves with custodian banks. With SoFiUSD the issuer is the bank itself. Deposit-taking, card issuing and token issuance therefore fall into one and the same supervised entity, and the reserves sit in-house rather than with a third party.

Whether that model is more robust cannot be inferred from the launch alone. All that is demonstrable is the structural difference. How strongly the coupling of issuer and trading venue, or issuer and bank, is currently reshaping the stablecoin landscape is also visible in Binance's stake in Circle, which we reported on September 22.

Why the US launch counts for your card in Germany

Directly, the move does not affect you. SoFi is a US bank, you cannot get its cards in Germany, and SoFiUSD is not an authorised e-money token in the EU.

Indirectly the matter is more interesting, because Mastercard runs a global network and explicitly talks about extending stablecoin settlement to further partners. As soon as a European bank or a European card issuer takes the same route, a rulebook applies that does not exist in that form in the United States. The questions you would then have to ask can already be answered today, and that is what the rest of this article is about.

E-money tokens under MiCA: who may issue a euro stablecoin in the EU

Under the EU Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation, MiCA for short, an e-money token is a crypto-asset that aims to keep its value stable by referencing exactly one official currency. A euro stablecoin falls into that category, and so does a pure dollar token distributed in the EU.

The central hurdle sits in Article 48 of the regulation: as a rule, only a credit institution or an electronic money institution may issue an e-money token. A technology company without one of those authorisations is out of the running as an issuer. On top of that come requirements for the reserve and a right of redemption: as a holder, you can redeem your tokens with the issuer at par at any time. The full text of the regulation is freely available via EUR-Lex.

The reserve is subject to a split: part of the funds received must sit in segregated bank accounts, while the rest may be invested in safe, liquid financial instruments. Exactly how that split should look in future is currently in flux; the debate about the obligation to hold bank deposits in the reserve continues at European level.

Which MiCA obligations beyond issuance apply to companies working with crypto-assets in Germany is something we have pulled together in our overview of the MiCA licensing duties.

The interest ban under Article 50 MiCAR: why an e-money token pays nothing

Article 50 of the regulation prohibits issuers of e-money tokens from granting interest on those tokens. What is meant is not only classic interest. Other forms of remuneration and benefits that depend on how long and how much you hold are caught as well.

That is why stablecoin yields advertised in the EU regularly disappear or get restructured. If a provider promises you an ongoing payment on a stablecoin balance, it is worth looking closely at who is actually paying here and for what. We covered the line between a prohibited holding reward and a permissible transaction reward in detail, using the example of a stablecoin-based cashback card.

For settlement on card rails the interest ban plays a subordinate role, because nobody there holds the token any longer than necessary. But as soon as a provider offers to let you hold stablecoins yourself, it is the first rule against which you should measure their promises.

Authorised euro stablecoins: what is already being issued in the EU

The German case that comes closest to the SoFi model is EURAU. The issuer is AllUnity GmbH, a joint venture of DWS, Deutsche Bank's fund arm, the trading house Flow Traders and Galaxy Digital. BaFin granted AllUnity an electronic money institution licence on July 1, 2025, and the token went live on Ethereum in late July 2025. The company's announcement of the licence sets out the details.

Alongside it, EURC from issuer Circle and EURCV from Société Générale are among those in the market. We deliberately refrain from quoting a reliable, up-to-the-day figure for the number of authorised issuers: the tallies from different providers diverge considerably depending on the cut-off date and the counting method, and the only authoritative source is the register kept by ESMA, the European securities supervisor. You will find our own analysis of that register in the article on authorised stablecoin issuers; it reflects the state of play on the date it was compiled and is no substitute for looking at the register yourself.

In practical terms that means: before you use a euro stablecoin, check whether its issuer is actually listed there. A token distributed in the EU without authorisation can be pulled from trading venues at any time, and then all you have left is redemption or withdrawal.

Check the settlement currency: what a dollar token has to do with your foreign exchange fee

SoFiUSD is pegged to the dollar. For a US card programme with US merchants that follows logically. As soon as a card issuer in Europe were to move to dollar settlement, a currency conversion would sit there that today arises elsewhere.

On your card, what governs this is the billing currency of your card account, not the currency of settlement between the banks. If you pay in euros and your account is denominated in euros, no foreign exchange fee arises, whatever the banks square up in behind the scenes. If your account is denominated in another currency, or you pay outside the euro area, most issuers charge a fee on the turnover.

That is the one point you can and should actually look up in your card terms. Which models the providers of crypto-linked cards run is broken down in the hub on crypto credit cards.

Crypto card tax: why every payment is a disposal under Section 23 EStG

This is where the difference that costs the most money in Germany lies, and it concerns what is sold there as a crypto card, while the SoFi construction remains untouched by it.

If crypto-assets are sold at the moment of the card payment in order to provide euros, that is a private disposal transaction under Section 23 of the German Income Tax Act. If less than a year lies between acquisition and that payment, the gain is taxable once the exemption threshold for other private disposal transactions in the calendar year is exceeded. Every single coffee can therefore be a tax-relevant event, and the burden of proof lies with you. We set out the mechanics and the typical pitfalls in our article on crypto credit cards and tax.

With a stablecoin the price gain is usually small, because the token trades close to its reference. The obligation does not disappear because of that: swapping a stablecoin into euros or into another crypto-asset is also a disposal, and you still have to keep the documentation. Anyone paying regularly with such cards will struggle without clean records; you will find suitable tools in the hub on crypto tax software.

Pure stablecoin settlement between banks, as SoFi runs it, triggers nothing at all for you as a customer. You never hold the token, you never swap it, and no disposal transaction arises. That is the essential reason why this model stays unremarkable for retail customers, while crypto cards do not.

Custody and issuer risk: who holds the token when things get tight

With every stablecoin, everything hangs on the issuer and the reserve. If a token loses its peg, the blockchain will not help you; what matters then is whether the issuer redeems at par and whether the reserve is sufficient for that.

The fact that the issuer is a supervised bank shifts this risk, it does not make it disappear. With a bank, deposit protection and banking supervision come into play, while at the same time more is concentrated under one roof. For you as a German investor the simple principle holds: the longer you hold a stablecoin, the more issuer risk you carry, and for amounts you do not need in the coming days, a token is not the right place.

Where you buy crypto-assets in the first place, and how the platform in question is regulated, determines a considerable part of that risk. You will find an assessment of the trading venues authorised in the EU in the hub on regulated crypto exchanges.

Three markers that will show you the next stage

So that you can follow the story without reading every press release, these are the points at which it will be decided whether the model comes to Europe.

The first is a European card issuer announcing stablecoin settlement. That requires an authorised euro token, and the candidates for it are in the ESMA register. The second is SoFi's extension into cross-border payments, which both companies name as their next step; only there does the model touch recipients outside the United States. The third is the ongoing European debate about the composition of stablecoin reserves, because it determines how attractive issuing a euro token is for a bank in the first place.

For the crypto market as a whole, the launch changes little in the short term. If you want to follow the broader market picture, you will find our current assessment in the Bitcoin price prediction.

Checking stablecoin settlement: what to take away

1. Separate settlement from the payment itself. If only the settlement between banks runs through a token, nothing happens to you for tax purposes. If, by contrast, crypto is sold at the moment of payment, every payment is a disposal transaction. Which card runs which model is set out in the terms and broken down in the hub on crypto credit cards.
2. Check the issuer of every euro stablecoin. Only credit institutions and electronic money institutions may issue e-money tokens in the EU, and an ongoing payment on the balance is not permitted under Article 50 MiCAR. Anyone swapping regularly should record the transactions without gaps; the crypto tax software will help with that.
3. Hold stablecoins briefly. Such a token is a means of transport and not an investment, and every day in the token is a day of issuer risk. If you buy through a platform, make sure it is authorised in the EU; the overview is in the hub on regulated crypto exchanges.

(As of September 23, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)

An unknown token can be put through its paces in about half an hour, and doing so requires neither programming skills nor a subscription. The core of the exercise comes down to three questions: who stands behind the project, who owns the tokens, and how much of that can be looked up independently?

This guide works through nine checkpoints in order, from the European register to how holdings are spread across a handful of addresses. What it produces at the end is not a verdict on individual projects but a procedure you can apply again to every token that follows.

Why Due Diligence on Crypto Assets Works Differently Than on Equities

With a share, the capital market supplies the homework: audited annual accounts, notification thresholds, ad hoc disclosure duties, plus a supervised trading venue. With a freely traded token, that substructure is largely absent. The figures usually come from the project itself, and the cross-check is yours to organise.

That does not mean there is nothing to check. On the contrary: a public blockchain exposes things that would never be visible at a company. How many tokens exist, where they sit and when they last moved can be looked up by anyone. The skill lies in looking in the right places.

One point up front that puts the whole exercise in perspective: even a project that passes every checkpoint can end up worthless. These checks weed out the obvious cases and make the rest comparable. A total loss remains possible with any crypto asset, including the largest ones.

Checkpoint 1: Is the Provider Listed in the European Register?

The first look is not at the token but at the place where you intend to buy it. Since 30 December 2024, a company that holds, exchanges or brokers crypto assets for clients has needed authorisation under the European regulation on markets in crypto-assets. The European securities regulator ESMA maintains a central register under MiCAR for this, listing authorised service providers alongside whitepapers and companies that have drawn attention.

For issuers themselves, the rules differ by token type. For asset-referenced tokens the regulation requires authorisation from BaFin under Article 16(1)(a) MiCAR; for e-money tokens the procedure runs via a notification. Both categories can be viewed in ESMA’s interim register. What the duties for companies cover in detail we have compiled in our overview of the MiCA licensing obligations.

The opposite direction is just as revealing: supervisory authorities keep warning lists of providers operating without authorisation. How extensive that list has become and where the entries come from is set out in our article on the EU warning list for crypto providers. A hit there ends the review immediately.

Checkpoint 2: Is There a Whitepaper, and Does It Contain Anything Verifiable?

A whitepaper is a project’s self-description. Under MiCAR it is, for publicly offered crypto assets, a formalised document with fixed mandatory disclosures, and the supervisor expressly does not approve it: responsibility for the content stays with the provider.

Read it all the same, with one simple question in mind: which statement in here could be demonstrably false in twelve months? A document consisting solely of intentions, vision and market size contains nothing anyone could be held to. Concrete details on issue volume, use of funds, lock-up periods and responsibilities are the opposite of that.

Checkpoint 3: Who Are the People, and Are There Any at All?

Names on a project page are not evidence. It becomes verifiable only once those names can be found independently: in commercial register entries, in professional networks with a history, in conference programmes, in source code contributions with a long back story. If every trace outside the project’s own channels is missing, that is a serious signal.

Anonymity alone is no disqualifier, and the industry’s history demonstrates that vividly: Bitcoin came from a pseudonym. The difference lies in whether the work can be verified. Where nobody is liable, the program code must be open and the distribution of power must be auditable. An anonymous team plus closed source plus central control over the tokens is the combination at which a review ends.

Checkpoint 4: How Many Tokens Exist, and Who Owns Them?

The decisive figure is rarely the price but the distribution. Two terms help here:

• Total supply: how many units will exist in all.
• Circulating supply: how many of those are freely tradable today.

If the two diverge widely, a large share of the supply is still waiting for the market. Every later release increases supply without anything needing to change on the demand side. A look at the release schedule therefore belongs to every review.

Concentration in a Few Addresses

Public blockchains allow something no annual report offers: you can look up how the holdings are spread. Every block explorer shows the largest holders of an address. If eighty percent of the supply sits on a handful of addresses, the price hangs on the behaviour of a few participants. Strip out addresses that clearly belong to a trading platform, because those pool the holdings of many customers. Which tools make such analyses accessible without specialist knowledge is shown in the overview of analytics platforms.

Checkpoint 5: Does the Trading Volume Hold Up, or Is It Manufactured?

A high reported volume looks reassuring and is easy to produce. Trading against yourself generates turnover with no economic substance. Three cross-checks that cost little time:

1. Count the venues. If the entire volume runs through a single, unfamiliar trading venue, the figure carries little weight.
2. Look at the order book. Check how far the price would move on an order the size of your intended purchase. A book that already gives way noticeably at small amounts is thin, whatever the daily statistics say.
3. Check the ratio. Daily turnover on the order of the entire market value is unusual in established assets and deserves an explanation.

The practical test remains the same as with any new account: a small amount in, a small amount back out. A trading venue where the return path stalls is finished, regardless of any metric.

Checkpoint 6: What Happens Technically When You Connect?

With tokens traded on decentralised venues, a further danger arises that need have nothing to do with the project itself. Connecting a wallet to an unfamiliar application grants approvals, and some of them are unlimited. An approval once granted keeps working, long after you have closed the page.

Two rules suffice for everyday use: for such experiments connect only a separate wallet with a small balance, and read what the confirmation window actually says. What exactly is being signed there, and how an abusive approval can be recognised, we broke down in our article on wallet drainers and signature approvals.

Checkpoint 7: How Is It Being Marketed?

The marketing often reveals more than the product. Four patterns that show up regularly in supervisory practice:

• Return promises with a figure and a timeframe. Anyone guaranteeing a fixed return is making a statement about the future that nobody can keep.
• Time pressure. Countdown, limited places, bonus today only: pressure replaces the argument.
• Advertising through fame. Prominent faces and supposed media reports are interchangeable and often used without the knowledge of those concerned.
• Referral chains. When the reward depends above all on recruiting new participants, the earnings lie in the recruiting and not in the product.

None of these patterns is proof on its own. When several appear together, the probability is high enough to skip the purchase.

Checkpoint 8: Can the Token Actually Be Sold Again?

Getting in is easy with every project; getting out is not. So check before buying what the return path looks like: which venues list the pair against the euro or against an established asset? How deep is the book there? Are there lock-up periods during which a sale is ruled out? And does the platform impose conditions for withdrawal that did not apply at the time of purchase?

A common pattern with questionable offerings: deposits work smoothly, and only on withdrawal do fees, taxes or verifications appear that were nowhere to be seen beforehand. Additional demands at the moment of payout are an alarm signal, not a formality.

Checkpoint 9: What Applies for Tax If It Does Go Wrong?

This point comes last because it is readily forgotten. Crypto assets held privately fall in Germany under private disposal transactions pursuant to section 23 of the Income Tax Act. A gain is taxable if no more than a year lies between acquisition and sale, and remains tax free if the total gain from all private disposal transactions in a year stays below 1,000 euros.

What matters on the loss side is that it can be evidenced at all. So from the very first purchase, record when you bought at what price, through which platform and to which address. Anyone wanting to claim a loss later needs exactly these records, and retrospectively they are often no longer obtainable once a platform has disappeared.

A word on expectations: a token that has become worthless does not automatically disappear from your tax file, and the treatment of such cases is disputed in detail in Germany. Anyone with larger amounts at stake settles that with tax advice rather than with a forum post.

The Half Hour in the Right Order

Taken together, this yields a sequence that sticks in the mind because it works from the outside in:

1. Look up the trading venue in the European register and cross-check the warning lists.
2. Read through the whitepaper for verifiable commitments.
3. Search for the team outside the project’s own channels.
4. Compare total supply, circulating supply and the release schedule.
5. Look at the distribution of the largest holdings in the block explorer.
6. Cross-check trading volume and order book depth.
7. Read and limit the approvals when connecting the wallet.
8. Put the marketing patterns in context.
9. Settle the return path and the record-keeping before any money moves.

One failed point is not yet a verdict. Three failed points give you a decision, and a reasoned one.

Checking a Crypto Project: What to Take Away

1. Check the trading venue first, not the token. An authorised provider removes no price risk, but it removes the question of whether your money even arrives where it is meant to. The overview of regulated crypto exchanges is the starting point for that.
2. Look at the distribution before you look at the price. Total supply, circulating supply, the release schedule and the largest holders say more about the risk than any forecast. What lets you analyse that without specialist knowledge is set out in the comparison of analytics platforms.
3. Settle the return path and the custody in advance. Check trading pairs, lock-up periods and withdrawal conditions, and decide where the tokens should sit after the purchase. For longer-term holdings, the hardware wallet comparison is worth a look.

(As of September 23, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)

Setting up your own crypto wallet takes about twenty minutes and comes down to four moves: choose the wallet type, generate the wallet, back up the recovery words offline, and use a small test amount to check that funds travel out and back. The third move decides everything that follows, because it is the only one nobody can catch up on for you.

This guide walks through each of those steps, explains the terms at the point where you first meet them, and closes with what a self-custodied wallet means in legal and tax terms in Germany.

What a Crypto Wallet Stores, and Why Your Coins Are Never Inside It

The name is misleading. A wallet is not a purse holding coins. Germany’s Federal Ministry of Finance puts it plainly in its letter of 6 March 2025: “No crypto assets are held in the wallet itself; they always remain on the blockchain” (paragraph 17). Keyring would be the more accurate translation.

What the wallet actually manages are two kinds of keys. The public key is the receiving address; the ministry compares it to an IBAN or an email address (paragraph 18). It may be known to others, because its only job is to assign balances on the blockchain. The private key is its counterpart: it produces the digital signature under every payment and is known to the holder alone.

From that follows the sentence this whole text rests on: whoever controls the private key controls the funds. The Federal Fiscal Court took the same view for tax purposes in 2023, attributing crypto assets to whoever is able to initiate transactions (judgment of 14 February 2023, IX R 3/22).

Three Terms You Need for the Rest

• Private key: the secret number used to sign a payment. Anyone who knows it can move the funds.
• Address: the public string others use to send you funds. The private key cannot be derived back from it.
• Recovery words, also called seed or recovery phrase: a list of twelve or twenty-four words from which every private key in a wallet can be regenerated. Whoever holds that list holds the wallet, regardless of the device.

There is, incidentally, no limit on how many wallets one person may have, and each blockchain generally needs its own, because address formats differ. Anyone holding Bitcoin alongside balances on other networks will therefore usually run several wallets side by side.

Custodial or Self-Custody: The One Question That Comes First

Before you install anything, you decide how your assets are held. There are exactly two options.

In the custodial model, a company holds the private key for you. Your access runs through a username, a password and a second factor. An account at a trading platform works this way. The advantage is convenience: a forgotten password can be reset, and support is reachable. The price is counterparty risk. If the company becomes insolvent, freezes withdrawals or loses control of its own keys, your funds are tied to that fate.

In self-custody, the key sits with you. Nobody can freeze your funds, but nobody can restore them either. There is no support desk to rescue you and no reset function. The recovery words are the entire contingency plan.

Both are legitimate, and both have their place. Many investors run a split approach: whatever is actively traded stays on a licensed platform, while the long-term holding moves into their own custody. Where the dividing line falls depends entirely on how firmly you have your own backup under control.

Software Wallet, Hardware Wallet or Exchange Account: Which Type Suits You

Within self-custody there are two practical designs, plus the exchange account as a third option with no keys of your own.

Software Wallet

An application on your phone, your computer or as a browser extension. The private key sits encrypted on the device. It is quick to set up, costs nothing and suits amounts whose loss would hurt without being existential. The weak point is the device itself: malware, a tampered browser extension or one careless click all strike exactly there. Which applications are common in German-speaking markets and how they differ is set out in our software wallet comparison.

Hardware Wallet

A small dedicated device that generates the private key and never releases it. Every payment is confirmed on the device itself, usually at the press of a button and with the receiving address shown on the device’s own screen. Even an infected computer cannot trigger a payment you do not approve on the device. Cost: roughly 50 to 200 euros depending on the model.

Exchange Account

No key of your own, but no setup effort either. For small amounts, and for anything due to be sold again soon, this is a legitimate route. As a permanent solution for larger holdings it carries the counterparty risk described above.

A rough rule of thumb from practice: up to a low four-figure amount, a cleanly configured software wallet is enough. Above that the device pays off, because the surcharge becomes small relative to the amount held.

Step by Step: How to Set Up a Software Wallet

The sequence is almost identical across all common applications. Take the twenty minutes in one sitting, without interruption.

1. Check the source. Download the application only from the operating system’s official app store, or from the address printed on the manufacturer’s site that you typed in yourself. Fake wallet apps are among the most common forms of fraud there are, and search results or ads are the usual entry point.
2. Generate a new wallet. On first launch, choose the option for a new wallet, not the one for a recovery. The application generates the recovery words directly on the device.
3. Write the words down. The application now shows twelve or twenty-four words in a fixed order. Copy them out by hand, numbered, and do not skip a single one. No screenshot, no notes app, no cloud, no email to yourself.
4. Check your transcript. Most applications then quiz you on individual words. Take that seriously, and afterwards compare word for word against your transcript once more. One transposition in the order makes the backup worthless.
5. Set a device lock. Assign a PIN or password for the application and switch on the device’s screen lock. That is no defence against malware, but it is one against a lost rucksack.
6. Send a test amount. Transfer a small amount to the new address, then send part of it back. Only once both directions have worked is the wallet ready for use.
7. Practise the recovery once. The step almost everyone skips: reset the application and restore the wallet from your handwritten list. After that you know the backup holds, rather than merely knowing it is lying around somewhere.

The Recovery Words: Twelve Words That Carry Everything

The word list follows an open standard called BIP-39. It defines a fixed vocabulary of 2,048 words that every compliant wallet draws on. That is precisely why the words are portable between manufacturers: if one provider disappears, the same wallet can be restored in a different application.

That portability is the reason the list must be treated so strictly. A password sits next to an account. This word list is the account.

Where to Keep the List

Paper is a good start and a poor finish: it burns, it yellows, and one flooded cellar is enough. Anyone securing an amount whose loss would genuinely hurt should stamp the words into a steel plate. Such plates cost a few dozen euros and survive fire and water.

For storage the rule is: at least two locations, physically separate, both under your control. A safe deposit box and your own home are a proven combination. How to put that into practice and which variants have held up is set out at length in our guide to storing your seed phrase safely.

The Passphrase as an Optional Twenty-Fifth Factor

Many wallets additionally allow a word of your own choosing, often called a passphrase. It changes the derived keys completely, is stored nowhere, and renders a found word list worthless on its own. The catch: if the passphrase is lost, the funds are lost too, even with the complete word list. For beginners that is one more source of error; for experienced users it is a sensible second wall.

Setting Up a Hardware Wallet: What Matters When You Unbox It

The sequence mirrors the software wallet, with four particulars that make the difference.

First, the source. Buy only directly from the manufacturer or from a dealer it names. Devices from the second-hand market, classified ads or third-party marketplaces are off limits, because a tampered device cannot be identified from the outside.

Second, the pre-printed card. If the device comes with a card of words already filled in, the device is compromised. A new device generates the words only during setup, and does so on the device itself. A supplied word list is the classic setup for a fraud.

Third, the display. The words appear on the device’s screen, never on the computer. If a website or a program asks you to type in your recovery words, that is an attack, without exception and no matter how genuine the page looks.

Fourth, the firmware. Install the current firmware via the manufacturer’s official application before you transfer any meaningful amount. Which models differ in German-speaking retail and what matters in the choice is summarised in the hardware wallet comparison.

After that the same rule applies as above: test amount out, part of it back, recovery practised once.

The First Transfer: Checking Test Amount, Network and Address

Most losses at the outset come not from hacks but from operating errors on the first transfer. Three checks prevent almost all of them.

The network. The same token often exists on several blockchains, and the addresses look confusingly alike. Pick the wrong network on an exchange and the funds land on a chain for which your wallet holds no key. Sometimes it can be recovered with effort, sometimes not. What remains possible in that case we wrote up in our piece on sending crypto over the wrong network.

The address. Copy the receiving address from the wallet, then compare the first and last five characters in the exchange’s input field. There is malware whose sole purpose is to swap copied addresses in the clipboard for its own. With a hardware wallet you additionally verify the address on the device’s screen.

The test amount. On the first attempt, send an amount whose loss would not trouble you, and wait for confirmation. The network fee for it is the cheapest insurance premium in the whole exercise.

What Is Permitted in Germany: BaFin, MiCAR and Self-Custody

One question comes up regularly: do you need a permit for your own wallet? No. In its guidance notice on crypto-asset services under MiCAR, the Federal Financial Supervisory Authority states clearly that “the custody and administration of one’s own crypto assets by the holder” is not covered, because such custody is not provided “for clients”. What requires authorisation is the service to third parties, not the handling of your own assets.

The flip side is this: anyone who holds assets for you has, since 30 December 2024, needed authorisation as a crypto-asset service provider under the European regulation on markets in crypto-assets. For a provider based in Germany, that status can be traced through the supervisor’s databases. It is the single most important check before funds are left sitting on a platform.

For you as a user, that yields a simple division of labour: for the custodied part of your holdings you check the provider’s authorisation, and for the self-custodied part you check your own backup. For neither is there a third party that steps in when things go wrong.

Tax: What the Tax Office Wants to Know About Your Wallet

The wallet itself triggers no tax. It becomes relevant as evidence. Crypto assets held privately count as “other economic goods”, and a gain on sale is taxable under section 22 number 2 in conjunction with section 23 paragraph 1 sentence 1 number 2 of the Income Tax Act if no more than one year lies between acquisition and disposal. The Federal Ministry of Finance letter of 6 March 2025 records this at paragraph 53 and also names the exemption threshold there: if the total gain from all private disposal transactions in a calendar year stays below 1,000 euros, it remains tax free. Until 2023 that threshold stood at 600 euros.

Three points bear directly on the wallet:

• The assessment is wallet-based. Under paragraph 62 a wallet-based view applies, and once a method for the order of use has been chosen it must be retained within a wallet until all holdings of that trading designation there have been sold. Anyone spreading holdings across several wallets must therefore track them separately.
• Reallocations belong in the records. The record-keeping duties at paragraph 103 expressly name documentation of the chosen order of use per wallet, as well as documentation of reallocations between wallets. A transfer between two of your own wallets is not in itself an acquisition, since the letter understands that term to mean acquisition for consideration from third parties (paragraph 54). It must be documented all the same, because otherwise neither the acquisition date nor the acquisition cost can be evidenced later.
• Addresses and cut-off date holdings can be requested. Paragraph 104 lists what the tax office may demand in an individual case: information on the source of funds, wallet holdings at cut-off dates such as 31 December, the wallet addresses used, and transaction hash values.

In practice that means: on the day you set it up, create a short overview listing the wallet, its purpose and the setup date, and export the transaction list once a year. That costs minutes in day-to-day running and saves days in hindsight.

Five Mistakes That Cost the Most When Setting Up

1. Backing up the words digitally. Screenshot, cloud password manager, a chat message to yourself: every one of these variants shifts the security of the wallet onto someone else’s account.
2. Never testing the recovery. An unverified backup is an assumption. The test takes five minutes and is the only proof.
3. Sending the full amount the first time. Without a test transfer, the first attempt carries the entire risk of the wrong network and a swapped address.
4. Approving permissions unread. Connecting a wallet to applications in the browser means signing permissions. Read what appears on the device screen, and abort if it says something other than what you expected.
5. Putting everything in one wallet. A separate wallet for day-to-day experimenting and one for the holding limits any damage to the part that is in motion anyway.

Setting Up a Crypto Wallet: What to Take Away

1. Decide on the custody model first. Work out which part of your holdings should stay custodied and which moves into your own control. For the custodied part you check the provider’s authorisation, and our overview of regulated crypto exchanges is the starting point for that.
2. Back up the recovery words before any funds move. By hand, in two separate locations, and in metal for larger amounts. Anyone wanting a dedicated device for it will find the differences between models in the hardware wallet comparison.
3. Test the route with a test amount and document it. Network, address, return path, plus a note recording the wallet and setup date for your tax file. Which application suits everyday use is shown in the software wallet comparison.

(As of September 23, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)

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Bitcoin is having its best September in 14 years, defying the cryptocurrency’s historically weak seasonal trend as its powerful recovery pushes the price toward the $90,000 level.

TLDR

• Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is reportedly a frontrunner to become President Trump’s next AI czar.
• Trump announced plans for an AI czar and a new “AI Force” on Sept. 19 but shared few details.
• Michael Kratsios, Scott Kupor and Sean Cairncross are also reportedly being considered.
• The White House called reports on unannounced personnel decisions “baseless speculation.”
• The role was last held by David Sacks, who also led crypto policy until March.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is reportedly a leading candidate to become President Donald Trump’s next artificial intelligence czar. The news comes days after Trump said he plans to create a new “AI Force.”

Semafor reported on Sept. 22 that Bessent is a frontrunner for the job, citing three people familiar with the matter. No appointment has been made.

Other officials reportedly under consideration include Michael Kratsios, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and Scott Kupor, director of the Office of Personnel Management. National Cyber Director Sean Cairncross is also on the list.

White House spokesperson Kush Desai pushed back on the reports. He told Semafor that “any reporting about personnel decisions that have not been officially announced by the administration should be regarded as baseless speculation.”

Trump Announces Plans for an AI Force

Trump announced the plans in a Sept. 19 Truth Social post. He shared few details about the AI Force’s structure, authority or membership.

The announcement did not explain whether the group would have regulatory power or how it would work with existing federal agencies. Trump has favored using existing laws to address AI misuse rather than adding new rules.

The White House’s National AI Policy Framework, released earlier this year, favored voluntary agreements with tech companies. It also called on Congress to override state AI laws seen as too burdensome.

Bessent’s Growing Role in AI and Crypto Policy

Bessent has become more involved in AI talks this year. According to Semafor, his role grew after financial institutions raised concerns that advanced AI could expose weaknesses in their operations.

This week, during meetings around the United Nations General Assembly, Bessent spoke with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng. They discussed a formal U.S.-China dialogue on AI, including a possible system to alert each other about AI incidents that pose national security risks.

In a CNBC interview earlier this week, Bessent said an AI czar could help put “context, shape and contours” around questions raised by AI. He said humans remain responsible for decisions involving AI systems.

Bessent has also been a key voice on crypto policy. In May, he urged lawmakers to advance the CLARITY Act and said the administration opposed a U.S. central bank digital currency.

He also told the Senate Finance Committee that the administration remained committed to developing the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve.

The AI czar role was previously held by venture capitalist David Sacks, who served as Trump’s AI and crypto czar. Sacks ended his term in March after reaching the 130-day service limit for special government employees.

Sacks still advises Trump as a co-chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.

Semafor reported that Bessent and Cairncross disagreed in May over Anthropic’s Mythos model. Keeping the Treasury post would not block Bessent from the extra role, as Interior Secretary Doug Burgum also holds an energy policy coordinating role.

OpenAI’s head of national security policy, Sasha Baker, said at a Sept. 22 Semafor event that a U.S.-China AI crisis line could be a “starting place” for cooperation.

Trump has not named a preferred candidate. The White House has not confirmed Bessent or any other official as the next AI czar.

The post White House Calls Bessent AI Czar Reports “Speculation” as Trump Plans AI Force appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR

• Shares of Archer Aviation climbed 4.79% on Tuesday, closing at $5.69 per share.
• The company’s Midnight aircraft will conduct public demonstrations at California’s International Air Show September 26-27.
• Archer successfully completed regional test flights exceeding 40 miles between Salinas and Hollister airports.
• The stock advance coincided with broader gains across technology and electric vertical takeoff and landing sectors.
• Investors should note ACHR remains a speculative, pre-revenue aviation company facing significant regulatory and funding challenges.

Archer Aviation (ACHR) shares advanced 4.79% during Tuesday’s trading session, settling at $5.69 as electric air mobility stocks rebounded. The upward momentum came amid heightened investor interest in Archer’s widening Midnight aircraft demonstration campaign.

Archer Aviation Inc., ACHR

The company’s Midnight eVTOL aircraft is set to perform public flights September 26 and 27 during the California International Air Show in Salinas. These appearances represent another phase of Archer’s “No Roads” demonstration initiative, designed to showcase routes relevant to future commercial operations.

Since establishing its flight testing operations in Salinas in 2021, Archer has leveraged this location as a strategic hub. The company’s roadmap includes expanding demonstrations throughout the Bay Area before proceeding to Los Angeles, Texas, and Florida markets.

Regional Test Flights Mark Operational Milestone

Earlier in September, Midnight successfully executed a roundtrip flight connecting Salinas Municipal Airport with Hollister Municipal Airport. The electric aircraft covered over 40 miles, achieved speeds of 125 mph, and completed individual legs in approximately 12 minutes.

Archer notes that conventional ground transportation for this route typically requires 40 minutes or longer. The company’s overarching vision involves transforming hour-long automobile trips into 10 to 20-minute air journeys using electric vertical takeoff and landing technology.

The forthcoming air show flights offer another opportunity to demonstrate this transportation paradigm publicly. Archer emphasized that these operations are proceeding in full cooperation with Federal Aviation Administration oversight.

Tuesday’s price appreciation wasn’t triggered by quarterly results or significant partnership announcements. According to MarketBeat, the gain partially reflected positive momentum across broader technology and eVTOL market segments.

ACHR reached an intraday peak of $5.71 before closing at $5.69. Combined with Monday’s 3.23% advance, the stock posted back-to-back winning sessions.

Regulatory and Financial Hurdles Persist

Sell-side analysts maintain generally optimistic outlooks regarding Archer’s long-term market potential. MarketBeat reports a consensus price target near $11.50, while TipRanks data referenced in available research indicates an average target of $11.60.

Nonetheless, Archer operates as a development-stage aviation enterprise with minimal commercial revenue generation. The company disclosed only $5 million in quarterly revenue during its August report while continuing to operate at a loss.

Regulatory certification represents a critical pathway dependency. Successful demonstration flights, while encouraging, don’t automatically translate to FAA approval for commercial passenger transport at scale.

Ongoing capital consumption and future funding requirements present additional risk factors as Archer builds aircraft production capabilities, manufacturing infrastructure, and operational networks. The stock’s beta coefficient of 3.23 underscores its pronounced volatility profile.

Recent insider transactions have drawn investor scrutiny, though certain disclosed sales were structured specifically to satisfy tax liabilities associated with equity compensation arrangements.

Currently, the most immediate catalyst remains the September 26-27 Salinas demonstration events. Market participants will monitor whether Archer can successfully translate flight testing achievements into certification approvals and commercial deployment milestones.

The post Archer Aviation (ACHR) Stock Rises 5% on Expanded Midnight eVTOL Demonstration Tour appeared first on Blockonomi.

Key Takeaways

• Harbor Capital Advisors introduced the Anthropic AI Lab Ecosystem ETF in August, targeting firms that supply infrastructure to the AI company.
• The fund’s portfolio includes semiconductor manufacturers, cloud service providers, and cryptocurrency mining companies linked to Anthropic’s data-center needs.
• Top positions feature Broadcom, AMD, Micron, Amazon, Alphabet, and Microsoft.
• Since inception, the ETF has risen approximately 5% and gathered $13.5 million in total assets.
• Anthropic’s public offering timeline has allegedly shifted to November as the company experiences explosive revenue expansion and fierce rivalry with OpenAI.

Those seeking investment opportunities in Anthropic ahead of its anticipated stock market debut can now access the AI powerhouse through an innovative exchange-traded fund. Harbor Capital Advisors debuted the Anthropic AI Lab Ecosystem ETF in August, focusing on enterprises poised to capitalize on Anthropic’s substantial infrastructure expenditures.

The fund doesn’t directly purchase Anthropic equity. Rather, it concentrates on organizations providing semiconductors, cloud services, data facilities, and power solutions essential for building and running Claude and Anthropic’s additional AI platforms.

ETF Strategy Centers on AI Infrastructure Beneficiaries

This actively managed investment vehicle features prominent chip manufacturers including Broadcom, Advanced Micro Devices, and Micron. The portfolio also encompasses cloud computing giants Amazon, Alphabet, and Microsoft—all strategically positioned as AI infrastructure requirements escalate.

The fund’s holdings reach beyond conventional tech equities. Cryptocurrency mining operations TeraWulf, Hut 8, and Riot Platforms appear in the portfolio following announcements of agreements involving data-center facilities connected to Anthropic.

This approach delivers exposure across multiple dimensions of AI infrastructure development instead of depending solely on Anthropic’s performance. Increased adoption of Claude could stimulate demand for microchips, cloud resources, electrical power, and data-center capacity.

The Anthropic-themed fund has appreciated roughly 5% since launching and has gathered approximately $13.5 million in managed assets. While modest compared to broader ETF industry benchmarks, it has drawn more capital than Harbor’s four other AI ecosystem offerings combined.

Market Anticipates Anthropic Public Offering

Anthropic is widely expected to pursue going public, though recent reports indicate the timeframe may have moved toward November. The organization has experienced rapid expansion as corporate clients and developers increasingly adopt its Claude models.

Anthropic’s annualized revenue run rate allegedly climbed to approximately $65 billion by late July, a dramatic increase from roughly $9 billion at 2025’s conclusion. During the identical period, OpenAI’s annualized run rate had surpassed $40 billion.

The rivalry between these AI leaders remains fierce. OpenAI’s GPT-6 Astra has secured significant enterprise adoption, while Anthropic continues pouring resources into new Claude iterations and attempting to balance expansion with profitability pressures preceding a potential public listing.

Consequently, the ETF delivers investor access to corporations that stand to gain from Anthropic’s spending habits even before the AI firm itself trades publicly. Nevertheless, fund performance hinges on these constituent companies rather than mirroring Anthropic’s valuation directly.

Harbor Broadens AI-Themed Investment Offerings

Harbor has rolled out comparable ecosystem ETFs centered on Meta, Google DeepMind, SpaceX, and OpenAI. Multiple funds feature overlapping positions such as Nvidia, Oracle, and Quanta Computer, though each portfolio reflects distinct AI company spending characteristics.

The asset manager has additionally introduced the Munificent Seven ETF, targeting energy corporations expected to profit from surging power consumption driven by AI data centers. Portfolio components include Chevron, ExxonMobil, Shell, TotalEnergies, ConocoPhillips, BP, and Equinor.

The energy-oriented fund has declined roughly 2% since launching amid falling petroleum prices. Its initial results underscore potential pitfalls associated with narrowly focused thematic strategies.

AI ecosystem ETFs can deliver focused exposure to rapidly expanding investment themes, though they simultaneously heighten concentration within technology and associated sectors. Investors maintaining broad market index positions may already possess substantial stakes in numerous identical companies.

Currently, the Anthropic ETF represents among the limited publicly available methods for obtaining indirect exposure to the company before its expected IPO. Its early momentum also indicates investors are seeking opportunities beyond standalone AI stocks toward the broader infrastructure ecosystem profiting from the sector’s accelerating growth.

The post New ETF Provides Backdoor Access to Anthropic Investment Before Public Debut appeared first on Blockonomi.

Key Takeaways

• AVGO shares declined modestly during premarket hours following news of China’s examination of its networking switches in government data centers.
• Reports indicate China’s SASAC has been conducting surveys to determine Broadcom switch deployment across state-run infrastructure.
• According to the Financial Times, Broadcom hardware may represent up to 90% of switching equipment at certain state-owned facilities.
• While no official prohibition exists, unofficial recommendations to decrease Broadcom dependency may emerge.
• The company’s primary AI expansion narrative continues to center on custom accelerators and networking solutions for leading American cloud providers.

Broadcom (AVGO) shares declined during Wednesday’s premarket session following news that Chinese regulators are examining the deployment of its networking hardware in government-controlled data centers. AVGO traded near $363, down from Tuesday’s closing price of $364.54.

Broadcom Inc., AVGO

According to the Financial Times, China’s State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission has recently been conducting assessments of Broadcom switch usage throughout state-controlled data center operations. Reuters noted it was unable to independently confirm the report, and neither Broadcom nor SASAC provided immediate statements.

The assessment allegedly discovered that Broadcom switches may comprise up to 90% of networking infrastructure at certain government-owned enterprises. This significant reliance appears to be attracting regulatory scrutiny as Beijing accelerates its campaign to shift government-affiliated entities toward domestically manufactured technology solutions.

What matters most for shareholders is that no official prohibition has been declared. Instead, the reporting suggests SASAC may provide unofficial recommendations encouraging state-controlled data centers to progressively decrease their reliance on Broadcom equipment.

Regulatory Scrutiny Impacts Critical AI Infrastructure Segment

Broadcom’s switching hardware facilitates server connectivity and enables high-volume data transfer within artificial intelligence data centers. Networking infrastructure has gained strategic importance as AI computing clusters expand and demand faster inter-accelerator communication.

China’s examination therefore focuses on a segment directly connected to Broadcom’s artificial intelligence expansion rather than an obsolete product category. Huawei, H3C Technologies, and Ruijie Networks were identified as potential domestic substitutes should Chinese government customers decrease Broadcom procurement.

This development aligns with Beijing’s broader technological independence initiative. Nvidia hardware has already faced restrictions in Chinese government-backed data facilities, while Broadcom’s networking solutions have maintained widespread adoption until now.

Should unofficial guidance materialize, the consequences might be more incremental than an immediate prohibition. Government-affiliated customers could transition away from Broadcom switches progressively during equipment refresh cycles rather than eliminating installed systems immediately.

A formal restriction would deliver greater near-term consequences by potentially eliminating future purchase orders from government-connected Chinese operations. Currently, however, no evidence suggests such a prohibition has been implemented.

Core AI Growth Trajectory Centered on International Markets

This Chinese regulatory concern emerges as Broadcom continues delivering robust AI performance in other regions. Third-quarter AI semiconductor revenue hit $16.7 billion, representing 221% year-over-year growth, with fourth-quarter projections reaching $21.7 billion.

Broadcom has also elevated its fiscal 2027 AI semiconductor revenue target to approximately $115 billion. The majority of this expansion is anticipated from custom AI accelerators and networking solutions delivered to major technology firms including Meta, OpenAI, and Anthropic.

This international growth trajectory provides significant balance against the Chinese concern. Broadcom’s fundamental AI growth mechanism doesn’t rely on Chinese government-backed data centers, meaning a gradual reduction in Chinese switch demand wouldn’t necessarily compromise the company’s broader AI momentum.

The investment consideration is that China remains a substantial technology marketplace, and forfeiting government-sector networking revenue could contract Broadcom’s overall market opportunity. It might also accelerate domestic Chinese vendors’ development efforts and intensify competitive pressure over time.

An additional risk involves potential expansion of the current examination beyond government-affiliated data centers. Should restrictions ultimately extend to commercial Chinese operations, the revenue implications could become more significant.

Presently, the report constitutes a possible challenge rather than confirmed revenue deterioration. Investors will monitor whether SASAC’s assessment findings translate into formal or informal procurement directives and the timeline for Chinese customers transitioning toward domestic networking alternatives.

The post Broadcom (AVGO) Stock Dips as Beijing Scrutinizes Network Equipment in Government Data Centers appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR

• Zcash (ZEC) reached $1,635.01 after an 11.16% gain in the latest session, extending a breakout that began in late August.
• Analyst Jesse Oslen spotted a bearish divergence and reversal candle, which could lead to a retest of support.
• The 20-day EMA near $1,262.71 is the key support level if the price pulls back.
• ZEC derivatives volume rose 9.74% to $7.66 billion, and open interest climbed 14.67% to $3.27 billion.
• 21Shares launched a physically backed Zcash ETP in Europe under the ticker ZCASH.

Zcash (ZEC) is trading near $1,635 after an 11.16% gain in the latest session. The token remains in a strong uptrend on higher time frames.

Some technical signals point to a possible short-term pullback. At the same time, derivatives activity is rising and a new investment product has launched in Europe.

Crypto analyst Jesse Oslen shared a chart on X showing a bearish divergence and a reversal candle on ZEC. He said the setup could lead the price to retest its trending support or move lower.

Oslen also said the pullback could be a chance to buy again. He noted that the higher time frames still hold a bullish structure.

ZEC Rally Stretches Far Above Key Averages

TradingView data shows ZEC spent the summer trading between about $390 and $530. The token broke out in late August and climbed sharply, reaching $1,635.01.

The 20-day exponential moving average (EMA) sits near $1,262.71. The wide gap between the price and this level shows the strength of the rally.

It also leaves room for a deeper drop if buying slows. Traders may watch this area closely if selling picks up.

The 20 EMA remains above the 50, 100, and 200 EMAs. This order of moving averages keeps the trend bullish, despite some short-term signs of exhaustion.

The MACD indicator also supports the uptrend. The MACD line stands near 189.87, above the signal line at about 164.28, and the histogram is positive and growing.

This shows buying momentum is still strong. Still, the bearish divergence flagged by Oslen suggests momentum may start to slow.

Derivatives Activity Climbs as New ETP Launches

Data from Coinglass shows ZEC derivatives trading volume rose 9.74% to $7.66 billion. Open interest climbed 14.67% to $3.27 billion.

Both numbers are rising together, which points to more traders entering the market. More money in leveraged positions can also lead to bigger price swings.

The data does not show whether traders lean bullish or bearish. It does show that activity around ZEC is growing.

Separately, 21Shares announced on X that it has launched a Zcash exchange-traded product (ETP) in Europe. The product trades under the ticker ZCASH.

The ETP is physically backed by ZEC. It lets European investors gain exposure to the token without managing wallets or seed phrases.

Zcash combines Bitcoin’s monetary model with privacy features. It uses cryptographic shielded transactions to protect user data.

For now, the 20 EMA at $1,262.71 is the key level to watch if ZEC pulls back. Holding above it could support a return of buying pressure, while a break below could lead to further losses.

The post Zcash (ZEC) Price: Token Hits $1,635 as 21Shares Launches European ETP appeared first on Blockonomi.

Bitcoin’s price ascent drove the asset to over $87,000 once again in the past several hours, but the bears were more persistent so far, pushing it down toward $86,000.

Several altcoins have posted major gains over the past day, including Ripple’s XRP, which has soared past $1.60, and Hyperliquid’s HYPE, which tapped a new all-time high close to $100.

BTC Stopped at $87.3K Again

After last week’s failed advancement vote on the CLARITY Act and the subsequent rate hike by the US Federal Reserve, concerns emerged about BTC’s ability to sustain its August breakout. After all, the asset was rejected at $80,000 on several occasions, and both of these developments pushed it south to a three-week low at $75,000.

However, the cryptocurrency rebounded swiftly and quickly reclaimed $78,000 by Friday morning. The bulls stepped up on the gas pedal later that day, driving it past $80,000. Unlike previous occasions, though, BTC managed to continue forward and challenged $82,000 on Saturday.

The latest escalation in the Middle East conflict as well as the Ukraine-Russia war halted its progress, and bitcoin slipped to $80,300. However, it didn’t slip below $80,000. Instead, it went on a wild run on Monday, adding $7,000 in value and surging past $87,000 for the first time since late January.

It was halted there, though, and dipped to $85,000 before it tried again, only for the same scenario to repeat. As of press time, BTC has been pushed to $86,000, while its dominance over the alts remains at 59% and its total market cap is still above $1.730 trillion on CMC.

BCH, UNI, BTW Fly

ETH, BNB, SOL, DOGE, and ADA have remained at the same levels as yesterday. HYPE broke its all-time high, setting a new one at $98. Ripple’s XRP has reclaimed the key $1.60 resistance. ZEC has rocketed past $1,600 after a 7% daily surge.

Even more impressive gains are evident from BCH and UNI. Both assets benefited from this CME announcement. The former has jumped by over 33% now, while the latter is up by 16%. BTW has increased by double digits as well. AAVE and MNT are also well in the green.

The total crypto market cap has added $50 billion daily and is up to $2.950 trillion on CMC.

The post HYPE Hits New ATH Close to $100, BTC Stopped at $87K Again: Market Watch appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Bitcoin’s relationship with traditional markets has changed sharply in a matter of weeks, with Santiment data showing that its correlations with stocks, the greenback, and even gold have all weakened.

The part with gold is particularly interesting, as both assets recently moved at the same pace, but BTC now appears to be trading far more independently of all major comparison alternatives.

BTC Breaks Away

Santiment’s analysis highlighted the breakdown in bitcoin’s correlations with major assets, including the precious metal and US equities, indicating that the cryptocurrency is no longer moving closely alongside any of them. This major change materialized over the past several days, after BTC rebounded from the dip to $75,000 following the failure of the CLARITY Act vote and surged to a multi-month peak of over $87,000.

The shift is quite striking because the opposite narrative, especially when compared to gold, dominated only a few weeks ago. As reported in early September, BTC’s 90-day correlation with the precious metal had climbed above 0.50 for the first time in approximately six years. The relationship with the Nasdaq 100, though, had dropped toward the 0.30-0.33 range, prompting suggestions that investors were treating bitcoin less like a high-beta tech asset and more like a scarce monetary hedger.

That interpretation made a lot of sense at the time since BTC and gold both benefited and rallied from renewed concerns over government debt, deficits, and currency debasement, while equities struggled to keep pace. However, that relationship has proved far less durable than it initially appeared, as gold has remained at essentially the same levels, while bitcoin has posted major gains.

Bitcoin Has Completely Broken Away From Stocks & Precious Metals

Bitcoin’s market cap has grown by +36.0% since August 18, dramatically separating from the S&P 500’s +0.8% and gold’s -1.5% performances in that same time. The breakout began as smaller 0.1-10 BTC holders… pic.twitter.com/L8UaFfSsZS

— Santiment Intelligence (@SantimentData) September 23, 2026

Independent Trade?

The reversal speed is arguably more significant than the absolute correlation numbers, as BTC’s strengthening relationship with gold was one of the market’s more notable macro developments just three weeks ago. The data from this week, though, complicates that narrative, as bitcoin has continued advancing even as the precious metal has pulled back from recent highs. At the same time, US stocks have followed their separate trajectory.

The cryptocurrency also absorbed both major negative developments from last week – the Fed’s hike and the CLARITY Act setback, before it rose above $87,000.

None of this means that BTC has permanently decoupled from macro markets. Its historical correlations have repeatedly shifted depending on liquidity, monetary policy, and investor positioning, but the data now shows that it doesn’t move like digital gold, a leveraged tech stock, or an anti-dollar trade; BTC moves on its own.

The post Bitcoin Just Broke Its Correlation With Gold, Stocks, and the Dollar: What Changed? appeared first on CryptoPotato.

[PRESS RELEASE – BELIZE CITY, BELIZE, September 23rd, 2026]

Cumulative BC Engine rewards have grown more than fourfold since late May, while the average daily pace of reward accumulation has increased by approximately 46% compared with the previous period.

BC.GAME’s BC Engine has reached another major milestone, with cumulative rewards earned by eligible $BC holders surpassing 8.6 million BCD, equivalent to more than US$8.6 million.

The milestone comes just over five months after BC Engine launched and brings cumulative rewards closer to the US$10 million mark.

More importantly, the latest data highlights the growing role BC Engine is playing within the wider BC.GAME ecosystem. What began as an hourly reward mechanism for $BC holders is increasingly evolving into a core ecosystem layer that connects platform activity, users, and commercial partners through recurring and measurable value distribution.

From Launch to More Than $8.6 Million in Five Months

BC Engine launched on April 8, 2026, introducing a model in which eligible $BC holdings participate in recurring settlement rounds, with BCD rewards distributed every hour.

Since launch, cumulative rewards have grown steadily.

On May 28, BC.GAME reported that BC Engine participants had earned more than 2.1 million BCD.

By July 28, cumulative rewards had surpassed 5 million BCD, representing an increase of approximately 138% from the late-May level.

As of September 18, 2026, total BC Engine rewards have now exceeded 8.6 million BCD.

Based on these disclosed milestone figures, cumulative rewards have increased by more than 309% since late May, reaching approximately 4.1 times the level reported less than four months ago.

The pace of reward accumulation has also accelerated.

Between May 28 and July 28, BC Engine added approximately 2.9 million BCD over 61 days, equivalent to an average increase of roughly 47,500 BCD per day.

Between July 28 and September 18, BC Engine added more than 3.6 million BCD over 52 days, lifting the average daily pace to approximately 69,000 BCD or more.

Based on these disclosed milestones, the average daily pace of reward accumulation increased by approximately 46% compared with the previous period.

While individual settlement amounts vary with activity across the ecosystem, the trend is clear: an increasing amount of value is continuing to move through BC Engine.

BC Engine Is Becoming a Core Value Layer of the BC.GAME Ecosystem

The significance of the US$8.6 million milestone extends beyond the total amount distributed.

BC Engine was designed to create a closer connection between activity within BC.GAME and the value shared with participants across the ecosystem.

Eligible $BC holdings participate in recurring settlement rounds, while users can track active balances, cumulative rewards, unclaimed BCD, and settlement history directly through the BC Engine interface.

This creates an ongoing relationship between platform activity and value distribution.

Rather than relying solely on one-off promotional incentives, BC Engine keeps value circulating through repeated settlement cycles, creating a mechanism that can support longer-term participation across the ecosystem.

As the system grows, BC Engine is increasingly becoming one of the most important value layers within BC.GAME.

For users, recurring rewards provide a tangible reason to remain engaged over time.

For $BC, the Engine creates a clear and continuing source of ecosystem utility.

For products and commercial partners across BC.GAME, the Engine provides an economic layer that can connect different parts of the platform within a shared value network.

In practical terms, BC Engine creates a reinforcing cycle:

Platform activity generates value.

$BC connects users to the ecosystem.

BC Engine redistributes value through recurring rewards.

Recurring rewards support deeper and longer-term participation.

This structure brings BC.GAME, its users, and ecosystem partners into a more closely connected value network.

Building Trust Through Measurable Value Distribution

One of BC Engine’s defining characteristics is that its growth can be measured through rewards that have already been generated through completed settlement rounds.

The more than US$8.6 million disclosed to date does not represent projected future rewards, unrealised token appreciation or calculations based on movements in the market price of $BC.

Instead, it reflects BCD rewards already earned through the operation of BC Engine.

This distinction is especially important in an industry where token-based reward models are often communicated primarily through future utility or projected value.

BC Engine gives participants a visible and measurable record of value already generated within the system.

The progression from more than 2.1 million BCD in May, to 5 million BCD in July, and now to more than 8.6 million BCD in September, shows that the mechanism is operating at increasing scale.

For users, recurring and transparent rewards can strengthen trust and support longer-term engagement.

For game providers and ecosystem partners, BC Engine creates a structure in which participation can contribute to a broader economic network rather than remain an isolated commercial relationship.

For BC.GAME, the model creates stronger alignment between platform activity, token utility, partner participation, and user retention.

As a result, BC Engine is becoming an increasingly important part of BC.GAME’s differentiation within the wider online gaming market.

BC.GAME Continues Its Global Expansion

The growth of BC Engine comes alongside BC.GAME’s continued international expansion.

In 2026, BC.GAME further expanded its regulated presence in Mexico, strengthening its local operations and deepening its connection with one of Latin America’s most important gaming and sports markets.

The company also announced Mexican football icon Guillermo “Memo” Ochoa as a brand ambassador, reinforcing BC.GAME’s connection with local football culture and supporting its wider localization strategy.

The partnership reflects BC.GAME’s approach to international growth: combining regulated market access, locally relevant cultural partnerships and product-led user engagement.

BC.GAME will also attend SBC Summit 2026 in Lisbon from September 29 to October 1, continuing to expand its network of commercial, technology and gaming partners across the global industry. The event is expected to bring together around 40,000 industry professionals in Lisbon. citeturn973300search1turn973300search0

For BC.GAME, these developments represent two sides of the same strategy.

Externally, the company is expanding into new markets and strengthening its global partner network.

Internally, BC Engine is helping build the economic infrastructure that connects platform growth with users, $BC holders, and ecosystem partners.

With cumulative rewards now exceeding US$8.6 million and moving closer to the US$10 million milestone, BC Engine is increasingly demonstrating the scale and value of that model.

About BC.GAME

BC.GAME is a global online gaming and entertainment platform offering casino, sportsbook and digital asset-based products across multiple international markets.

Since its launch in 2017, BC.GAME has continued to develop a crypto-native entertainment ecosystem built around product innovation, community participation and global partnerships.

$BC is the native token of the BC.GAME ecosystem. Through BC Engine, eligible $BC holders can participate in recurring BCD reward distributions, while the Engine provides an increasingly important connection between platform activity, users and ecosystem partners.

BC.GAME continues to expand its international presence while developing new products, partnerships and technology across gaming, sports and digital entertainment.

The post BC.GAME’s BC Engine Rewards Surpass $8.6 Million as Ecosystem Growth Accelerates appeared first on CryptoPotato.

The frog-themed meme coin PEPE has emerged as one of the top-performing cryptocurrencies over the past week, with its price rising by roughly 50% to a nine-month high of $0.0000049.

The token has already demonstrated its ability to deliver triple and even quadruple gains in the past, and many analysts now believe another move of that scale could be on the horizon.

‘The Frog is Waking Up’

X user Giannis Andreou noted that PEPE’s weekly chart is holding a higher low above its 2023 base, meaning the test now comes at $0.0000048-$0.0000055.

The analyst claimed the weekly candle “is still open,” arguing that a close above the upper boundary, followed by a successful retest, could strengthen the case for $0.0000065-$0.0000075.

“Clear that, and $0.000009-$0.0000105 becomes the next zone to watch. The bigger recovery scenario reaches $0.000013–$0.000016,” he added.

At the same time, the analyst warned that a rejection may lead to a drop to the $0.0000023-$0.0000032 range.

For his part, Crypto With Gopal argued that the meme coin’s price is testing the lower trendline after a rejection near $0.0000054, showing momentum is tightening. He believes that the setup remains bullish, but buyers must defend support and reclaim the upper resistance to initiate a further upswing.

X user Plazma also chipped in, estimating that PEPE had formed a golden cross on the 50-day/200-day moving average: a setup usually considered highly positive for the price.

The Dangerous Game With Meme Coins

PEPE’s price increase is impressive and could go even higher, but traders and investors who want to hop on the bandwagon should keep in mind that tokens like this are highly volatile and often driven more by hype and speculation than fundamentals. Recently, X user Crypto Bitlord warned people to stay away from memes, claiming 99% of them are scams.

“It’s hard for me to recommend anyone play that game because the statistics are against you,” he added.

PEPE has been on the market for more than three years and has built a solid community base, but no one can say for sure whether the project has a bright future or is a time-ticking bomb.

Meanwhile, CoinGlass data shows that over the past few days, investors have moved PEPE tokens from self-custody to centralized exchanges. That reinforces the bearish scenario since it increases immediate selling pressure.

The post ‘The Frog is Waking Up!’ PEPE Explodes 50% in a Week as Golden Cross Forms appeared first on CryptoPotato.

CME Group will launch Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Uniswap (UNI) futures on October 19, pending regulatory review, the exchange announced on Tuesday, and BCH climbed from $270 to $328 on Binance within 90 minutes of the 8:30 a.m. ET release. It kept surging in the following hours to $340, while UNI is currently up by 15% to over $10.

Each asset gets a full-size and a Micro contract: 250 BCH and 25 BCH for Bitcoin Cash, 10,000 UNI and 1,000 UNI for Uniswap.

The contracts join a single-asset lineup that already covers Bitcoin (BTC), Ether, XRP, Solana, Cardano, Chainlink, Stellar, Avalanche and Sui, and will trade on Globex, where CME began around-the-clock crypto trading on May 29.

“As crypto markets continue to mature, participants require broader, regulated tools to navigate evolving digital asset related price risk,” said Giovanni Vicioso, Global Head of Cryptocurrency Products at CME Group, adding that the contracts give clients exposure to “key crypto networks within our 24/7, regulated marketplace.”

BCH Jumps 28%, UNI Spikes

BCH is among the top performers on a 24-hour scale today, surging by 28% to a multi-month peak of $340. Bitcoin moved 1.1% over the same window on Binance, and the total crypto market cap gained 1.8% over 24 hours, per CoinGecko.

BCH closed at $216.74 on September 16 and is up 55% since then to $340, per CoinGecko, in the same stretch that took Bitcoin to an eight-month high above $87,000 on Tuesday, with BCH among the altcoins posting larger gains. The token remains 91.5% below its December 2017 peak of $3,785.82.

Uniswap’s token experienced a similar double-digit increase as well, currently showing a 15% surge since yesterday. As a result, it has topped $10.

UNI is up 64% over seven days and 105% over 30 days, per CoinGecko, after a 30% jump to a 10-month high near $9.20 on September 18, which followed the SEC’s innovation exemption for on-chain trading of tokenized stocks.

Crypto Volume Averages $8.3B a Day

CME reported first-half 2026 crypto futures and options average daily volume of 279,800 contracts, $8.3 billion in notional, with average open interest of 264,600 contracts, or $15.4 billion. The five altcoin futures added this year, Cardano, Chainlink, Stellar, Avalanche and Sui, have traded more than $1 billion in notional value year-to-date. August cryptocurrency ADV came in at 175,000 contracts, $12 billion notional, per the exchange’s September 2 volume report.

Noel Kimmel, President at Ripple Prime, said in the release that institutions managing crypto exposure “need around-the-clock access to regulated derivatives, underpinned by the clearing and financing infrastructure to match.”

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