CoinDesk

Crypto Venture Capital Firm Dragonfly Raises $650 Million Despite 'Gloom of a Bear Market'

UK Crypto Rules Too Slow to Support Global Hub Ambitions, Says Agant CEO

Andrew MacKenzie, CEO of stablecoin developer Agant, warned that the United Kingdom’s crypto regulatory timetable is too slow to support its ambition of becoming a global digital‑asset hub. While the government plans to pass comprehensive stablecoin legislation later this year,...

BofA Survey Flags Dollar Bearish Bets at over a Decade High. Here's What It Means for Bitcoin

Bank of America’s February survey shows investor exposure to the U.S. dollar is at its most bearish since early 2012, marking a record underweight stance. Historically, a weaker dollar has acted as a bullish tailwind for bitcoin, but since early...

'We Do Not Do Illegal Things': Inside a U.S.-sanctioned Stablecoin Issuer's Race to Build a Crypto Giant

A7A5, a Kyrgyzstan‑incorporated ruble‑pegged stablecoin, added roughly $90 billion to its circulating supply last year, outpacing USDT and USDC. The issuer’s affiliates and reserve‑bank partner are listed on the U.S. sanctions list, yet the firm claims full KYC/AML compliance and positions...

Crypto Mining Can Help Energy Volatility, Paradigm Responds to Policy Onslaught

U.S. lawmakers are proposing limits on data centers and crypto‑mining operations because of rising energy costs, but investment firm Paradigm argues Bitcoin mining can actually stabilize the grid. Paradigm’s report shows mining consumes only about 0.23% of global electricity and...

Harvard Cuts Bitcoin Exposure by 20%, Adds New Ether Position

Harvard Management Company trimmed its Bitcoin exposure by roughly 21%, selling about 1.5 million shares of the iShares Bitcoin Trust and reducing the holding to $265.8 million. At the same time, the endowment made its first Ether investment, buying nearly 3.9 million shares...

Nexo Re-Enters the U.S. Market Three Years After Its ‘Dead End’ Exit

Digital‑asset platform Nexo has re‑entered the U.S. market, launching a suite of regulated services powered by Bakkt. The company returns with $11 billion in assets under management, offering fixed and flexible yield accounts, a crypto exchange, and crypto‑backed credit lines with...

Hive, Riot Earnings Reports, Fed Rate-Decision Minutes: Crypto Week Ahead

This week’s crypto calendar is anchored by earnings from Hive Digital Technologies and Riot Platforms, both of which are expanding into high‑performance AI computing alongside their bitcoin‑mining operations. The Federal Reserve will release the FOMC minutes on Wednesday, accompanied by...

Metaplanet Operating Profit to Rise 81% in 2026 After Soaring 17-Fold Last Year on Options Writing

Metaplanet, Japan’s largest bitcoin treasury firm, posted a 17‑fold jump in operating profit to ¥6.28 bn in 2025, propelled by a surge in options‑writing premiums that lifted revenue 738% to ¥8.9 bn. Despite the earnings boom, a steep bitcoin price decline generated...

OKX Snags European Payments License for Stablecoin and Crypto Card Expansion

OKX has obtained a Payments Institution (PI) licence in Malta, bringing the exchange into compliance with the EU’s upcoming Markets in Crypto‑Assets (MiCA) regulation and the revised Second Payment Services Directive (PSD2). The licence authorises OKX to offer stablecoin‑linked payment...

Spark Looks to Build Building a Safe Bridge Between Onchain Capital and TradFi

Spark introduced Spark Prime and Spark Institutional Lending, extending more than $9 billion of stablecoin liquidity to hedge funds, trading firms and fintechs operating under traditional custody rules. The offerings combine over‑collateralized loan structures with a unified risk framework that spans...

Hong Kong Working to Allow Perpetual Contracts, Chief Regulator Says

Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) announced it will release a high‑level regulatory framework permitting trading platforms to offer perpetual contracts. The framework targets institutional investors and mandates robust risk‑management and conflict‑of‑interest safeguards. Brokers will also be allowed to...

Institutions Fuel Tokenized RWA Boom as Retail Looks Set to Follow Suit

Tokenized real‑world assets (RWAs) are now dominated by institutions, with U.S. Treasuries, money‑market funds and stablecoin‑backed collateral products leading the market. Panelists at Consensus Hong Kong 2026 highlighted the next frontier: tokenized equities, private credit, real estate and other illiquid assets aimed...

SkyBridge's Scaramucci Is Buying the Bitcoin Dip, Calls Trump a Crypto President

Anthony Scaramucci, founder of SkyBridge Capital, confirmed the firm is actively buying Bitcoin during the recent market dip, purchasing at price points around $84,000, $63,000 and the current lower range near $68,000. The purchases come after Bitcoin fell from a...

Crypto PAC Fairshake Leaps Into First Midterm Senate Race with $5 Million in Alabama

The Fairshake political action committee, the crypto industry’s $193 million campaign‑finance powerhouse, has poured a $5 million independent‑expenditure boost into Rep. Barry Moore’s Republican Senate primary in Alabama. The funding, routed through the Defend American Jobs affiliate, will finance ads featuring Moore’s...

Ex-SafeMoon CEO Gets 8-Year Prison Sentence for Defrauding Investors

Former SafeMoon chief Braden John Karony received a 100‑month (eight‑year) prison sentence after a federal trial in New York. The Department of Justice ordered him to forfeit $7.5 million and two residences. He was convicted of conspiracy to commit securities fraud,...

Struggling Coinbase Gets Price Target Cut From JPMorgan Ahead of Thursday Earnings

Coinbase’s shares have fallen more than 50 % since Bitcoin’s October rally, prompting JPMorgan to lower its price target to $290 from $399 ahead of the Q4 earnings release. The new target still implies about 75 % upside from the current $1,655...

Tether Invests in LayerZero Labs as It Doubles Down on Cross-Chain Tech, Agentic Finance

Tether Investments has poured capital into LayerZero Labs, backing the interoperability protocol that powers its blockchain‑agnostic stablecoin USDt0. The token, built on LayerZero’s Omnichain Fungible Token (OFT) standard, has moved more than $70 billion across multiple chains in under a year....

Crypto Exchange Kraken Fires Chief Financial Officer Ahead of Long-Awaited IPO

Kraken moved chief financial officer Stephanie Lemmerman to a strategic advisory role, effectively removing her from day‑to‑day finance leadership as the crypto exchange readies a U.S. IPO. Robert Moore, formerly VP of business expansion, has stepped in as deputy CFO,...

Blockchain.com Wins UK Registration Nearly Four Years After Abandoning FCA Process

Blockchain.com has been added to the FCA’s register of licensed crypto companies under the trading name “BC Operations,” marking its return to the UK regulatory framework after withdrawing its licence application in March 2022. The registration permits the exchange to...

Jump Trading to Take Small Stakes in Polymarket, Kalshi: Bloomberg

Jump Trading is taking equity positions in the leading prediction‑market platforms Kalshi and Polymarket, according to Bloomberg. The firm will receive a fixed share of Kalshi’s equity, while its Polymarket stake will expand proportionally to the liquidity it supplies to...

I'm Not Confident We Hit a True Capitulation in Bitcoin, Derivatives Expert Says

Bitcoin briefly fell below $60,000 before rebounding to around $70,000, prompting debate over whether a capitulation event occurred. Derivatives analyst Greg Magadini notes that the 90‑day futures basis stayed near a 4% premium, far less bearish than the 9% discount...

LMAX Unveils New Exchange to Break the Wall Down Between Crypto and FX

LMAX Group launched Omnia Exchange, a unified multi‑asset platform that lets institutions trade any currency, crypto, stablecoin or digital asset directly against any other 24/7. The service removes size and type limits and offers settlement on traditional clearing rails or...

AI Is No Savior when Markets Get Tough … but It Can Help, Says Nickel Digital Chief

Nickel Digital Asset Management’s CEO Anatoly Crachilov says AI is a powerful tool but not a market savior, especially in volatile crypto conditions. A recent Nickel survey found 96% of executives at firms managing roughly $14 trillion rely on AI for...

U.S. Bitcoin ETFs Register Back-to-Back Inflows for First Time in a Month

U.S. bitcoin exchange‑traded funds posted back‑to‑back net inflows of $616 million, ending a redemption streak that began in mid‑January. The first day saw $471.1 million, followed by $144.9 million as bitcoin rallied from a $60,000 low to around $70,000. Despite a 50 % price...

McHenry Predicts Fast Crypto Deal as Witt Brokers Talks

Former House Financial Services Chair Patrick McHenry and White House adviser Patrick Witt told CoinDesk Live that a sweeping crypto market‑structure bill could be finalized within months, potentially reaching the president’s desk by Memorial Day. They highlighted growing bipartisan momentum in Washington,...

Farcaster Founders Join Stablecoin Startup Tempo After Neynar Acquires Social Protocol

Farcaster co‑founders Dan Romero and Varun Srinivasan have left the crypto‑social platform to join stablecoin startup Tempo after Neynar acquired Farcaster. Their exit follows the transfer of Farcaster’s infrastructure to Neynar, prompting the founders and key engineers to step away....

Cipher Mining and TeraWulf Are Buys, MARA a Sell, as Morgan Stanley Begins Bitcoin Miner Coverage

Morgan Stanley launched coverage of three listed bitcoin miners, giving Overweight ratings to Cipher Mining (CIFR) and TeraWulf (WULF) with price targets of $38 and $37, while assigning an Underweight rating to Marathon Digital (MARA) with an $8 target. The...

Tom Lee’s Bitmine Immersion Added 40,613 Ether Last Week as Prices Crashed

Bitmine Immersion Technologies, led by Tom Lee, added 40,613 ETH to its holdings last week, raising its total to over 4.3 million tokens valued at about $8.7 billion. The purchase occurred as ETH price fell from above $2,300 to just over...

Bitcoin Mining Difficulty Drops by Most Since 2021 as Miners Capitulate

Bitcoin’s mining difficulty fell 11 percent to 125.86 trillion, the steepest decline since the 2021 China crackdown. The drop follows a halving of Bitcoin’s price from its $126,000 peak and a 50 percent slump in miner revenue per terahash, now around $35. Winter...

Here's How Market Makers Likely Accelerated Bitcoin's Brutal Crash to $60,000

Bitcoin plunged from $77,000 to near $60,000 in early February 2026, erasing billions in market value. Analysts attribute the steep drop not only to macro pressures but also to market makers’ hedging actions in the options market. With roughly $1.5 billion...

Story Co-Founder Defends Token Unlock Delay, Says Project Needs ‘More Time’

Story Protocol co‑founder S.Y. Lee justified delaying the first major IP token unlock to August 2026, arguing the blockchain needs additional time to build usage and that on‑chain revenue is an inappropriate performance metric. The six‑month extension keeps team and investor...

$44B Bitcoin Blunder Puts South Korea Regulators on Alert over Local Crypto Exchanges

South Korea’s Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) is tightening crypto oversight after Bithumb mistakenly credited users with roughly 2,000 bitcoin each, a $44 billion error. The regulator announced investigations into high‑risk practices such as whale manipulation, pump‑and‑dump schemes, and suspended deposit trading....

Takaichi Triumph: Japan’s Record 56,000 Nikkei Surge Sends Bitcoin to $72,000, Gold Past $5,000

Japan’s Nikkei 225 surged past 57,000, climbing 3.4% after Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi secured a supermajority in the February 9 election. The win unlocked a $135 billion expansionary fiscal package focused on infrastructure spending and tax cuts. The so‑called “Takaichi Trade”...

Bitcoin Bulls Spot Bottoming Signs as Longtime Bears Take Victory Laps

Bitcoin slipped below $70,000 as the market entered a sharper free‑fall, prompting long‑time skeptics at the Financial Times and gold‑bug Peter Schiff to celebrate the decline. The article highlights the continued erosion of institutional exposure, noting MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin holdings are down roughly...

Odds of Jesus Christ Appearing in 2026 Double, Beating Return on Bitcoin

Traders on Polymarket have pushed the implied probability of the Second Coming of Jesus Christ in 2026 to roughly 4%, more than doubling the odds since early January. The binary contract, now trading at about four cents, has generated a...

Broad-Based Bitcoin Accumulation Emerges After Sharp Capitulation

Bitcoin dropped from around $80,000 to $60,000 in early February, triggering a sharp capitulation. Glassnode’s Accumulation Trend Score, which gauges buying pressure across wallet sizes, climbed to 0.68, indicating broad‑based accumulation for the first time since late November. The most...

Why Machine-to-Machine Payments Are the New Electricity for the Digital Age

The article argues that machine‑to‑machine (M2M) payments will become the economic equivalent of electricity, powering a fully autonomous digital economy. Continuous micro‑transactions, enabled by blockchain’s near‑zero‑fee, low‑latency rails, will let devices buy data, power, and services in real time without...

SOL-Focused Forward Industries Has Had a Tough Run, but CIO Says It's Positioned for Success

Forward Industries (FWDI) has emerged as the largest public Solana‑focused treasury company after raising $1.65 billion in 2025, giving it a roughly $600 million SOL position at current prices. The firm carries no corporate debt, positioning it as an unlevered player in...

Cardano's Charles Hoskinson Reveals $3 Billion Unrealized Loss in Crypto Rout

Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson disclosed more than $3 billion in unrealized losses as the crypto market slumped, with Bitcoin sliding to roughly $60,000—a 16% drop—and the broader CoinDesk 20 index falling 17%. Cardano’s ADA token fell 15.6% over the same week. Hoskinson...

Crypto's Eligibility for 401k Retirement Funds Is Under Fire After Brutal Market Rout Wipes Out $2 Trillion

Bitcoin’s 50% plunge erased $2 trillion in market value, reigniting debate over crypto in 401(k) plans. An August executive order by former President Trump and supportive comments from SEC Chair Paul Atkins opened retirement accounts to alternative assets, including digital currencies....

Why Normalization of Digital Asset Treasuries Is the Next Big Business Trend

The article argues that the hype‑driven “wild west” era for corporate digital asset treasuries (DATs) is ending. Companies that merely raise cash to buy and hold cryptocurrencies are facing heightened investor scrutiny and regulatory pressure. Jolie Kahn emphasizes that robust...

Bitcoin Crashed to $55,000 on Bithumb After Exchange Accidentally Airdropped Users 2,000 BTC

South Korean exchange Bithumb experienced a flash crash when an internal error mistakenly credited users with 2,000 BTC each instead of a modest 2,000‑won reward. The phantom balances triggered a rapid sell‑off, pushing the BTC/KRW price to $55,000, about 15.8% lower...

China Expands Crypto Crackdown to Stablecoins, Asset Tokenization

Chinese regulators issued a joint notice expanding the nation’s crypto crackdown to include stablecoins and the tokenization of real‑world assets. The rules prohibit any entity, domestic or foreign, from issuing yuan‑pegged stablecoins abroad without explicit approval and require firms to...

Bitcoin Rises to $70,000, Extending Bounce From Thursday's Crash

Bitcoin surged past $70,000 on Friday, marking a 17% rally since yesterday’s $60,000 low and a 2.5% gain over the past 24 hours. The price jump lifted crypto‑related equities, with Strategy, Galaxy Digital and MARA posting double‑digit advances. Michael Saylor...

Bitfarms Shares Surge After It Ditches Its 'Bitcoin Company' Identity and Doubles Down on AI with U.S. Move

Bitfarms announced it will redomicile to the United States, rebrand as Keel Infrastructure and shift focus from Bitcoin mining to high‑performance computing and AI data‑center development. The move includes a planned Nasdaq listing under the ticker KEEL and a dual...

Weak Earnings Drag IREN, Amazon; Bitcoin Stocks Rebound in Pre-Market

AI‑focused companies IREN and Amazon posted mixed earnings, while Bitcoin’s rally lifted crypto‑related stocks in pre‑market trading. IREN’s Q2 revenue fell to $184.7 million and it recorded a $155.4 million loss, but secured $3.6 billion in GPU financing and a $1.9 billion pre‑payment covering...

U.S. Job Losses at 17-Year High Raise Positive Signals for Bitcoin Bulls

U.S. planned layoffs surged 205% in January, reaching 108,435 – the highest level since 2009 – signaling a rapid cooling of the labor market. Private indicators such as the Truflation inflation metric also point to weakening economic pressure, diverging from...

Jefferies Sees Few Signs of a Crypto Bottom yet Flags Upside for Tokens with Fundamentals

Jefferies says the current crypto sell‑off shows few signs of an imminent bottom, describing the dip as a liquidity‑driven correction rather than a collapse in blockchain activity. Bitcoin trades near $64,800, about 47% below its October 2025 peak, while ether hovers...