Track market-moving stories before they get noisy

American Bitcoin Corp just added another 500 BTC to its treasury, pushing total holdings to 8,000 BTC. For a company that held roughly 5,401 BTC at the end of 2025, that’s a nearly 50% increase in about six months.

ABTC, a subsidiary of Hut 8 Corp that trades on Nasdaq, has been on a buying-and-mining spree that’s hard to ignore. The firm ranked as the 17th-largest public Bitcoin holder as of May 2026, and this latest addition likely nudges it a few spots higher on that leaderboard.

The accumulation playbook ABTC’s strategy combines mining output with strategic treasury purchases to build its stack. During Q1 2026 alone, the firm mined 817 BTC.

The holdings trajectory tells the story. At the end of 2025, ABTC sat at approximately 5,401 BTC. By mid-May 2026, that number had climbed to 7,500 BTC, representing roughly 30% growth in the first quarter and change of the year. Then came a bump to 7,300 BTC (reported alongside Q1 results), followed by additional purchases that brought the total to 7,500 BTC by mid-May. Now, with this latest 500 BTC addition, the company crosses the 8,000 BTC threshold.

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ABTC operates nearly 90,000 mining units as of May 2026.

The Trump connection and corporate maneuvering Eric Trump serves as co-founder and chief strategy officer. The company came into existence in 2025 following a merger with Gryphon Digital Mining.

ABTC executed a reverse stock split of 1-for-15, effective July 6, 2026. Every 15 shares got consolidated into one share, which mathematically boosts the per-share price. ABTC framed the move as addressing stock volatility and maintaining its Nasdaq listing.

Financing the machine ABTC has utilized financing through Bitmain, one of the world’s largest mining hardware manufacturers, and has pledged Bitcoin as collateral for miner acquisitions.

When you pledge your Bitcoin to buy more miners to mine more Bitcoin, you’re creating a feedback loop that works beautifully in bull markets. In bear markets, collateral calls, declining mining revenue, and hardware depreciation can compound quickly.

What this means for investors ABTC’s jump from 5,401 BTC to 8,000 BTC in roughly six months reflects a company that’s treating this as a land grab. The 17th-largest public Bitcoin holder designation puts ABTC among a cohort where most publicly traded companies hold zero Bitcoin.

The reverse stock split signals that the equity side of the business has faced pressure, even as the Bitcoin treasury has grown substantially. The Bitmain financing arrangement, where pledging Bitcoin to acquire miners creates leverage, amplifies both upside and downside. If Bitcoin prices decline meaningfully, ABTC could face margin pressure on those collateralized positions while simultaneously seeing reduced mining profitability.

Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.

President Donald Trump on Monday said he would not rule out the possibility of adding Bitcoin to the administration’s new Trump Accounts, telling reporters that “something could happen” when asked whether the government-backed savings programme could invest in the crypto asset, according to Reuters.

Trump Accounts are a federally backed savings and investment programme designed to give children an early stake in the US economy.

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The US Treasury has rolled out the nationwide launch of the Trump Accounts app, introducing full account functionality for families participating in the investment programme. Parents can now fund their accounts, monitor balances, review investment performance and manage contributions through the platform.

The app also includes 15 interactive financial education lessons covering key investment concepts, while adding features such as recurring deposits, linked bank accounts and personalised financial guidance. Treasury said the initiative is designed to expand stock ownership among young Americans and promote long-term financial security.

Officials said Trump Accounts are free to open, with contributions permitted from employers, charitable organisations and government programmes in addition to parents.

More than 50 companies have pledged to offer employer contributions, and enrolled families will be able to begin tracking investments from July 6.

Disclosure: This article was edited by Vivian Nguyen. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.

TLDR A $1,000 investment in the first spot XRP ETF is now worth about $457. Brazil’s XRPH11 has declined 54.3% since its April 2025 launch. U.S. spot XRP ETFs now manage about $1.05 billion in assets. XRP traded near $1.14 after gaining 8.5% over the past week. A $1,000 investment in the spot XRP ETF launched in Brazil now holds an estimated value of about $457. The fund has lost more than half its value since its April 2025 debut. Meanwhile, XRP traded near $1.14 after posting an 8.5% weekly gain.

Brazil’s Early XRP ETF Records Sharp Decline Brazil introduced the first regulated spot XRP ETF on April 25, 2025, through Hashdex’s XRPH11 fund. The product launched with about $40 million in assets under management. It invested almost all holdings in physical XRP.

The spot XRP ETF tracks the “Nasdaq XRP Reference Price Index” through direct XRP exposure. The fund started trading at higher levels before entering a sustained decline. As of July 3, XRPH11 traded at 9.14 Brazilian reals, or about $1.74.

The spot XRP ETF has declined 54.3% since launch based on market data. Therefore, a $1,000 investment has fallen to about $457. Assets under management also dropped to roughly $22 million to $25 million.

U.S. Products Expanded the XRP ETF Market Brazil’s spot XRP ETF remained relatively small within the global crypto exchange-traded product market. The country represented less than 1% of worldwide crypto ETP assets. Consequently, the fund generated limited buying pressure for XRP.

The spot XRP ETF market changed after several U.S. products launched in November 2025. Funds from Canary Capital, Bitwise, Franklin Templeton, Grayscale, 21Shares, and REX-Osprey entered the market. Those products attracted substantially larger investment flows.

The spot XRP ETF market in the United States now manages about $1.05 billion in assets. Collectively, those funds hold nearly 971 million XRP. Combined net inflows have exceeded $1.4 billion since launch, including $118 million during May 2026.

XRP Price Stayed Within a Narrow Trading Range Canada also expanded the spot XRP ETF market through the Purpose XRP ETF. The fund launched during June 2025 and now manages about 72 million Canadian dollars. That product increased regulated investment access outside the United States.

The broader XRP market still traded within a narrow range despite growing institutional participation. Prices moved mostly between $1.15 and $1.40 during recent months. Market performance largely matched broader cryptocurrency trends.

The spot XRP ETF story shows stronger institutional participation without a matching price recovery. XRP traded at $1.14 at press time after gaining about 1% daily. The token also recorded an 8.5% gain over the previous week.

Brad Garlinghouse called Strategy’s sliding preferred shares a damning indictment of financial engineering. Traders answered with an uncomfortable observation: Ripple also funds itself from the asset it champions, one billion escrowed XRP at a time. The feud between crypto’s two most leveraged evangelists says more about both companies than either intended.

Summary

Brad Garlinghouse criticised Strategy’s Bitcoin treasury model, prompting traders to argue that Ripple also relies on regular XRP sales from escrow to fund its operations. The report says both companies depend on recurring market demand for the assets or securities they sell, although their funding structures and financial risks differ significantly. Strategy’s model faces pressure from fixed dividend obligations, while Ripple’s escrow based funding is presented as more flexible but remains dependent on sustained demand for XRP. In the last days of June 2026, with Strategy’s flagship preferred stock trading roughly 25 percent below its $100 par value, Ripple chief executive Brad Garlinghouse decided to say what he thought about it. Financial engineering, he argued across a CNBC appearance and a run of posts, does not drive long-term value; utility does. The slide in Strategy’s preferreds was, in his words, a damning indictment of a model built on perpetually selling paper against Bitcoin.

The crypto market being what it is, the counterattack arrived within hours, and it did not come from Strategy. It came from traders pointing at Ripple’s own balance sheet. One widely shared critique put it in five words: two giants, same model. Ripple, the observation went, funds its operations by selling XRP released from escrow every month, tokens it received for nothing at the network’s genesis. Strategy funds Bitcoin purchases by selling preferred shares and debt against coins it bought on the open market. Both companies are, structurally, perpetual sellers of claims connected to the asset their communities want to appreciate.

The comparison is not perfect, and the imperfections are where it gets interesting. But the fact that it landed at all, and stung, reveals something true: the two loudest corporate evangelists in crypto both run treasuries that lean on their chosen asset, and each has built a machine that only works while the market keeps buying what the machine sells. Garlinghouse’s attack on Saylor was accurate. So was the response.

This is an autopsy of the feud: what Garlinghouse actually said, what is really breaking at Strategy, how Ripple’s own funding machine works, where the symmetry holds and where it fails, and why the fight matters for holders of both assets.

What Garlinghouse said, and why now The Ripple chief executive’s late-June comments were unusually pointed for a man who spends most of his public time on regulatory diplomacy. Utility drives long-term value, he argued, and financial engineering does not; companies that exist to hold an asset, funded by issuing securities against it, are running a trade, not a business. The specific exhibit was Strategy’s preferred stock complex, and above all STRC, the retail-focused instrument that had slipped to around 25 percent below its $100 par before a partial recovery toward $84.

He also reached for history. Michael Saylor had spent years dismissing XRP, at one point in 2022 calling it an unregistered security that would be regulated out of relevance, a comment the Ripple community has never forgotten and the SEC case ultimately did not vindicate. Garlinghouse returning fire in Strategy’s weakest quarter was, among other things, a settling of accounts four years in the making.

The timing was not random. Strategy’s model is under its most sustained pressure since the company began accumulating: Bitcoin spent June grinding to 21-month lows near $57,750 before a modest bounce, and the mathematics of the treasury trade turned openly ugly. The company holds 847,363 BTC at an average cost near $75,650, which at June’s lows put the position more than $10 billion underwater on paper for the first time in the current cycle. The market value of the company converged with the value of its coins, with the closely watched mNAV ratio touching 0.99, meaning the equity briefly priced the entire corporate structure at less than the Bitcoin inside it.

For a company whose whole premise is that its securities deserve a premium to their Bitcoin backing, an mNAV below one is not a data point. It is the thesis inverting.

Garlinghouse chose his moment the way prosecutors choose theirs, when the defendant is already bleeding.

Four years of accumulated grievance The feud reads as sudden only to observers who missed its long fuse. Saylor and Garlinghouse have been running opposed theories of crypto value since 2020, and each man’s theory requires the other’s asset to be a mistake.

Saylor’s Bitcoin maximalism was never quiet about XRP. His 2022 dismissal of the token as an unregistered security destined for regulatory oblivion came during the darkest stretch of the SEC lawsuit, when Ripple’s survival was an open question and the token was delisted across American platforms. The comment did not age well in its specifics; the 2023 ruling found XRP itself was not a security in exchange sales, the case settled, and by late 2025 the token had spot ETFs trading in New York. But it cemented a personal dimension that ordinary corporate rivalry lacks. In the XRP community’s memory, Saylor kicked them at the bottom, and Garlinghouse’s June offensive was received there less as analysis than as overdue payback.

The structural rivalry deepened as the companies converged on the same buyers. Strategy’s pitch to institutions is Bitcoin exposure through familiar securities; Ripple’s pitch, increasingly, is regulated crypto infrastructure, custody, stablecoins, prime brokerage, sold to the same treasurers and asset managers. Each chief executive now spends his public life arguing that institutional capital should flow through his door, which makes every stumble by one a sales document for the other. When Strategy’s preferreds slid, Ripple’s sales narrative improved by exactly that much, and Garlinghouse’s decision to narrate the slide personally was, among other things, marketing with a decade of receipts attached.

There is also a generational symmetry neither would enjoy hearing. Both men are the last of crypto’s founder-evangelist chief executives still running at full volume: survivors of multiple cycles, personally synonymous with their assets, and increasingly graded by markets that have stopped awarding style points. The 2026 bear market is auditing both legacies at once, which is why a single CNBC hit escalated so fast.

Neither side is arguing about a preferred stock. They are arguing about which of two life’s works the next cycle vindicates.

What is actually cracking at Strategy Strategy’s machine has three moving parts: buy Bitcoin, issue securities against the story, use the proceeds to buy more Bitcoin. The genius of the design in a bull market is reflexivity; every part reinforces the others. The problem in a bear market is the same reflexivity running in reverse.

The preferred stock complex is where the stress concentrates, because the preferreds are the instruments that carry mandatory-feeling obligations. STRC and its siblings pay rich fixed dividends, marketed to income investors as a way to earn double-digit yield on a Bitcoin-adjacent instrument. Those dividends must be paid in cash, and Strategy’s operating software business generates only a sliver of the required amount. The rest comes from issuing more securities, which works while prices cooperate and compounds the obligation when they do not. Analysis circulating from CryptoQuant put the company’s cash and equivalents against its dividend run rate at roughly 14 months of coverage, a runway, not a crisis, but a runway that shortens every quarter the capital markets stay closed to new issuance at acceptable prices.

The company’s response has been to reframe. A newly published Digital Credit framework recasts the preferred complex as a deliberate credit structure rather than an equity kicker, alongside disclosures of a cash position near $3.8 billion intended to reassure preferred holders that dividends are funded regardless of Bitcoin’s path. The reframing had an effect; STRC bounced from its lows toward $84. But a bounce toward 84 cents on the dollar is still a market pricing meaningful doubt into a par instrument, and the underlying arithmetic, fixed cash obligations against a volatile treasury asset, is unchanged.

The bond market’s verdict has been quieter but harsher than the equity market’s. Instruments marketed on the premise that Bitcoin’s ascent makes their coupons safe are being repriced on the premise that the coupons must survive Bitcoin’s descent, which is a different underwriting question entirely, and one the complex was never really sold to answer.

None of this means Strategy is broken. The company has survived worse drawdowns, holds an asset with a history of violent recoveries, and has never been forced to sell a coin. What has cracked is the premium, the market’s willingness to pay more than one dollar for a dollar of Strategy’s Bitcoin, and the premium was the engine. A treasury company at mNAV 1.0 is just a fund with expenses and a dividend bill.

Ripple’s machine, examined honestly To weigh the two giants claim, the Ripple side of the ledger needs the same unsentimental treatment.

Ripple received the bulk of XRP’s fixed 100 billion supply at the network’s creation. In December 2017, it locked 55 billion of those tokens into ledger-enforced escrow, releasing a maximum of one billion per month, a system whose mechanics are worth understanding in full because it is the load-bearing structure of the company’s finances. Each month, Ripple keeps a portion of the release, typically returning 600 to 800 million tokens to new escrows, and the kept portion, generally 200 to 300 million XRP, funds institutional sales, ecosystem investment, and operations.

Strip away the terminology and the structure is this: a private company holding tens of billions of tokens it did not buy, selling a bounded stream of them into the market, every month, for going on a decade. The July 1 release moved one billion XRP, worth about $1.04 billion, through the machine on schedule. The sales are real supply that holders absorb; back-of-envelope, the net release adds an effective inflation of several percent per year to circulating XRP. When Garlinghouse says utility drives value, critics answer that whatever the utility, the most reliable flow in the XRP market is Ripple selling.

The company’s defense is disclosure and discipline. The schedule is public, protocol-enforced, and has never been broken; the relock rate shows restraint; the sales increasingly go to institutional buyers off-exchange; and the proceeds built an actual business, spanning payments, custody, a stablecoin, and the institutional finance stack growing on the XRP Ledger. Ripple processed some $16 trillion in payments volume last year by its own telling, though almost none of it moved through digital assets, a caveat that critics note does heavy lifting.

The war chest the machine built is the part critics skip. A decade of escrow-funded operations left Ripple with cash, an investment portfolio, and acquisition capacity that let it buy its way into prime brokerage and custody during the bear market, spending when leveraged competitors were retrenching. Whatever the model’s fairness, its output is a company that does not need favorable markets to survive them, which is precisely the resilience Strategy’s structure lacks. The same tokens that fund the machine also hang over it: Ripple still holds tens of billions of XRP inside and outside escrow, a treasury whose paper value swings billions with every large move in the token, and whose eventual disposition is the largest known variable in XRP’s long-term supply.

The honest summary: Ripple’s funding model is a slow, transparent, rule-bound liquidation of a genesis grant. That is neither fraud nor utility. It is a financial structure, the very category Garlinghouse aimed at Saylor.

Where the symmetry holds The two companies rhyme in more ways than either community likes to admit.

Both are structural sellers of claims tied to their asset. Ripple sells the asset itself from escrow; Strategy sells securities collateralized by the story of the asset. In both cases, the community holding the asset provides the bid that the corporate machine sells into, and in both cases the machine’s health depends on that bid persisting. The dynamic is familiar from every corner of crypto where a large holder must sell to operate, from foundations to the miners whose forced selling set records this year: the entity most invested in the asset’s success is also its most dependable source of supply.

Both are bets that a corporate structure can capture value from a decentralized asset. Saylor’s claim is that Strategy transforms Bitcoin into yield-bearing instruments the traditional market can buy, and deserves a premium for the packaging. Ripple’s claim is that a company can build enough utility around XRP that the token appreciates despite the company’s own selling. Each asks holders to believe the corporate layer adds more than it extracts.

Both have concentrated key-man risk and evangelist chief executives whose personal credibility is a balance sheet asset. And both, crucially, have never been tested by the one scenario their critics model: a market that stops absorbing the machine’s output for years rather than months. Strategy has never had to sell Bitcoin into weakness; Ripple has never faced a market that could not soak up its net release. The 2026 bear market is the closest either has come, which is exactly why the feud erupted now.

Where the symmetry breaks The differences matter as much as the rhyme, and they cut in both directions.

Ripple’s advantages are structural. It sells an asset it was granted, not one it bought with leverage, so there is no cost basis to defend and no margin for a drawdown to destroy. Its obligations are discretionary; the company can slow sales, and owes nobody a dividend. Its escrow is a ceiling, not a floor, and a decade of relocking is a real track record of restraint. Strategy, by contrast, carries fixed cash obligations against a volatile asset, the classic shape of every leveraged treasury accident in financial history. On pure survivability, the comparison flatters Ripple.

Strategy’s advantages are about alignment. Saylor bought his Bitcoin; every coin on the balance sheet was paid for at market, and shareholders chose the leverage knowingly. Ripple’s XRP cost it nothing, which means every sale is nearly pure proceeds, and the buyers funding the company are, in the main, believers in the token the company was given. Critics of Ripple find that arrangement more troubling than Strategy’s, not less: Saylor is levered alongside his holders, while Ripple is structurally the counterparty to its own community. The SEC agreed in part, finding in 2023 that Ripple’s institutional XRP sales were unregistered securities offerings, litigation Strategy never faced for buying an asset regulators treat as a commodity.

There is also a difference in what failure looks like. If Strategy’s model fails, the damage is concentrated: preferred holders and shareholders eat losses, and Bitcoin absorbs a large forced seller. If Ripple’s model fails, meaning the market permanently stops absorbing escrow releases at viable prices, the company slows the machine and lives off its accumulated war chest and businesses, from custody to its stablecoin and consortium positions. One machine is fragile and aligned; the other is durable and extractive. Pick your indictment.

What breaking would actually look like Since both communities spend the bear market gaming the other machine’s failure, it is worth specifying, mechanically, what failure would require for each. The exercise is clarifying, because neither breaking point is where the rhetoric puts it.

Strategy does not break at any particular Bitcoin price. An unrealized loss, even the ten-figure one June produced, forces nothing by itself. The machine breaks at the intersection of three conditions: capital markets closed to new issuance at tolerable terms, the cash runway for preferred dividends exhausted, and Bitcoin still depressed when the runway ends. The CryptoQuant-style coverage math, roughly 14 months at recent burn, is therefore the number to watch, along with every successful or failed issuance that extends or shortens it. If the company reaches the runway’s end with markets still shut, the choices collapse to suspending preferred dividends, which detonates the income story the complex was sold on, or selling Bitcoin, which detonates the never-sell story the equity was sold on. Either detonation is survivable as finance and devastating as narrative, and Strategy is, before anything else, a narrative company.

Ripple’s machine breaks differently, because its obligations are soft. The company cannot be forced to sell escrow releases into a bid that is not there; it can relock more, spend reserves, and wait. What actually breaks the model is a demand-side regime change that outlasts the war chest: exchange volumes, institutional sales, and ETF absorption persistently below the net release for years, forcing the company to choose between starving its operations and visibly capitulating on price. The tell would appear first in the monthly relock data, months where Ripple returns far more than 800 million because it cannot place the difference, and in the ETF creations that have so far run inflows even through the June collapse. Ripple’s breaking point, in other words, is measured in years of demand drought, whereas Strategy’s is measured in months of dividend runway. That asymmetry, more than any quote from either chief executive, is the real difference between the giants.

The shared vulnerability is the reflexivity of reputation. Each machine runs on the founder’s credibility with a specific buyer base, income investors for Saylor, the XRP faithful and institutional partners for Garlinghouse, and credibility is the one input that cannot be relocked or refinanced once spent. Public feuds draw down exactly that account, which is the best argument that this fight, entertaining as it is, was unwise for both.

What the feud is really about Beneath the personal history, Garlinghouse and Saylor are arguing about the only question that matters for corporate crypto: what entitles a company to trade at a premium to the assets it touches?

Saylor’s answer is packaging and leverage: transform a volatile commodity into instruments with yields, durations, and risk profiles that traditional capital can hold, and the transformation deserves a spread. The 2026 drawdown is testing whether that spread survives an mNAV of one, and the original exchange that started this feud happened precisely because the test is live.

Bitcoin will evolve by changing less at the protocol layer and mattering more everywhere else.

The base layer will harden.
The capital markets will deepen.
Digital Credit will expand.

The world will build on Bitcoin. $BTC https://t.co/2ptwt4XJdu

— Michael Saylor (@saylor) July 6, 2026 Garlinghouse’s answer is utility and adoption: build payment corridors, custody, stablecoins, and bank integrations, and the token underneath appreciates on fundamentals. The awkwardness is that after a decade of building, XRP trades near $1.15, down roughly 70 percent over a year, while the company thrives, a divergence that suggests corporate success and token appreciation are far more loosely coupled than the utility thesis promises.

The stakes extend well past the two companies, because each man is the reference implementation for a sector. Strategy spawned an entire class of digital asset treasury companies, dozens of firms across Bitcoin, Ether, Solana, and beyond, that copied the playbook of issuing securities to accumulate tokens, and the whole class has compressed toward or below net asset value in the 2026 drawdown. If the original cannot hold a premium, the copies have no argument at all, and the capital markets window that funded the sector’s accumulation closes for everyone at once. Ripple, meanwhile, is the reference case for the token-issuer-as-operating-company model, the template every foundation and labs entity with a treasury full of its own token quietly studies. How the market ultimately judges a decade of escrow-funded operations sets the discount rate on every project financed the same way.

Neither man can point at the scoreboard right now. Strategy’s premium has evaporated; Ripple’s token has detached from its company. Both models produced billion-dollar enterprises, and both have so far failed, in this bear market, to produce what their communities actually bought in for.

The question holders should actually ask For all its entertainment value, the feud offers one genuinely useful lens to holders of either asset: identify the machine, then ask what keeps it fed.

Strategy’s machine is fed by capital markets. The question for its investors is not whether Saylor believes, but whether new buyers of preferreds and converts keep showing up at prices that let the dividends get paid without selling coins. Watch issuance windows, coverage runway, and the mNAV, because those are the machine’s vital signs, and the recent bounce in STRC is the market betting, tentatively, that the framework holds.

Ripple’s machine is fed by the XRP market itself. The question for its holders is not whether the company wins customers, but whether the demand side, exchange flow, institutional sales, the new ETFs that have been quietly absorbing supply, keeps outrunning a permanent, transparent seller. Watch the monthly net release against those flows, because that ratio, not partnership headlines, is what the last decade says actually governs the float.

Two giants, same model was meant as a gotcha, and it worked because it was half true. The fuller truth is sharper: two giants, two machines, one shared dependency. Both run on belief that renews monthly, and in a market like this one, belief is the scarcest collateral either company holds.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice. Digital asset markets are volatile and you can lose your entire investment. Always do your own research. Information current as of July 6, 2026.

While XRP holders everywhere else argue about ETF flows and price charts, one country quietly turned the token into working infrastructure. Regulated prepaid money on the XRP Ledger, a Deloitte-attested stablecoin, tokenized bonds paying XRP bonuses, and a financial giant that pays shareholder dividends in the token. This is what the utility thesis looks like when someone actually builds it.

Summary

Japan has built the world’s most extensive real world XRP ecosystem through SBI with licensed prepaid tokens, RLUSD distribution, tokenized bonds, and shareholder rewards. SBI Ripple Asia’s regulated prepaid token framework opens access to Japan’s 30 trillion yen prepaid payments market using the XRP Ledger. Japan is proving XRP’s infrastructure utility through regulated adoption even as the token’s market price remains driven largely by ETF flows and speculation. In March 2026, a Japanese travel company began selling prepaid payment tokens to ordinary consumers, issued on the XRP Ledger, under a license from Japan’s Financial Services Agency. No press cycle followed, no price candle marked the moment, and most XRP holders outside Japan never heard about it. It was, nonetheless, a first that the token’s global community has waited more than a decade for: real, regulated, consumer-facing money moving on the ledger, in the world’s third-largest economy, under the full supervision of a G7 regulator.

The company behind the license, SBI Ripple Asia, is one arm of a structure with no parallel anywhere else in crypto. SBI Holdings, the Tokyo financial conglomerate spanning brokerage, banking, insurance, and asset management, has spent a decade wiring Ripple’s technology and the XRP token into the machinery of Japanese finance: a joint venture for payments, an exchange business distributing RLUSD with audited reserves, tokenized corporate bonds that pay bonuses in XRP, bank remittance corridors, loyalty-point conversion, and, in a flourish no Western public company has matched, XRP paid out to SBI’s own shareholders as a benefit.

The result is a natural experiment the rest of the XRP world should study closely. Everywhere else, the token’s story in 2026 is financial: ETF flows, escrow releases, a price near $1.15 that has lost roughly 70 percent in a year. In Japan, and effectively only in Japan, the story is operational. One country took the utility thesis literally, and the gap between that country and everywhere else has become the sharpest lens available on what XRP actually is.

This is the anatomy of the SBI empire: how the alliance was built, what each piece does, what the 30 trillion yen prepaid experiment means, and what Japan proves, and fails to prove, about the token underneath.

JUST IN: Japan tokenizes prepaid payments on the XRP Ledger with SBI and Tobu Top Tours issuing tokens for the 30 trillion yen prepaid market pic.twitter.com/1zYYC57IeE

— crypto.news (@cryptodotnews) April 19, 2026 A decade of patient wiring The SBI-Ripple relationship is old by crypto standards, and its age is the point. SBI Ripple Asia was founded in 2016 as a joint venture to bring Ripple’s settlement technology to Japanese and Asian financial institutions, back when the pitch was replacing correspondent banking messaging. SBI Holdings became one of Ripple’s largest outside shareholders, and its chief executive, Yoshitaka Kitao, one of the token’s most senior corporate evangelists anywhere, a position he has held through two bear markets that silenced most of his peers.

What distinguishes the Japanese build-out is that it advanced through the regulator, not around it. Japan’s Payment Services Act and its licensing regimes for exchanges, stablecoins, and prepaid instruments are among the strictest in the world, drafted in the shadow of Mt. Gox. Every piece of the SBI-Ripple stack exists because it cleared that bar: the exchange arm is licensed, the stablecoin distribution is licensed, and the newest layer, prepaid tokens, required SBI Ripple Asia to register as a prepaid payment instrument issuer, which it completed on March 26.

The strategy compounds slowly and survives drawdowns, which is precisely what the rest of the XRP ecosystem has struggled to do. While the token’s price detached from Ripple’s corporate success everywhere else, a divergence now so stark that the company’s own funding machine has become the subject of open debate, the Japanese structure kept adding licensed capabilities through the decline. Bear markets kill speculative adoption; they barely register against regulatory roadmaps measured in years.

The depth of commitment shows in details that would be unthinkable at a Western firm. SBI has distributed XRP to its own shareholders as a shareholder benefit, a program renewed in 2026 with distributions beginning May 1, effectively paying dividends in the token to hundreds of thousands of Japanese retail investors. Whatever one thinks of the token, no other public financial conglomerate on earth compensates its owners with it.

The regulator that Mt. Gox built None of the SBI structure is intelligible without Japan’s regulatory history, because the country’s crypto framework was forged by catastrophe earlier and more thoroughly than anywhere else on earth.

Tokyo hosted the industry’s first systemic disaster: the 2014 collapse of Mt. Gox, then the world’s dominant Bitcoin exchange, which vaporized hundreds of thousands of customer coins and put crypto on the front page of every Japanese newspaper as a consumer-protection failure. The political response was not prohibition but codification. Japan amended the Payment Services Act to license exchanges years before Western peers had any framework at all, then tightened again after the 2018 Coincheck hack, building a regime of segregated custody, cold-storage mandates, listing reviews, and capital requirements that made Japanese licenses among the hardest and most valuable in the industry.

The same instinct produced the world’s first comprehensive stablecoin law, in force since 2023, which restricted issuance to banks, trust companies, and licensed money transfer agents, and the prepaid instrument framework that SBI Ripple Asia’s March registration slots into. Where American crypto policy spent a decade as litigation and Europe’s arrived only with MiCA, Japan built its rulebook early and then, crucially, stopped changing it. Predictability, not permissiveness, is the Japanese advantage: a firm that plans a five-year build on the Payment Services Act can trust the act will still be there.

That environment selected for exactly the kind of player SBI is. The compliance costs that strangle startups are a rounding error for a conglomerate; the decade-long timelines that venture capital cannot tolerate are ordinary corporate planning in Tokyo; and the regulator’s preference for long-standing, capitalized, domestically accountable issuers hands incumbents the field. Japan did not set out to build the world’s best jurisdiction for a Ripple alliance, but a decade of post-Gox rulemaking produced precisely that, and SBI was the institution positioned, and patient enough, to notice.

The history also explains the strategy’s export problem, which shadows everything that follows: the model works because the rules are stable and the champion is native. Neither condition can be shipped.

The prepaid breakthrough: 30 trillion yen in reach The March registration is the piece with the largest addressable prize, because Japan’s prepaid economy is enormous and structurally ready for tokenization.

Japanese consumers hold prepaid value everywhere: transit cards, convenience store balances, gaming credits, gift instruments, corporate points. The market’s annual scale runs around 30 trillion yen, roughly $200 billion, and it operates under the Payment Services Act’s prepaid instrument framework, a regime that already accommodates digital value issued against fiat. SBI Ripple Asia’s registration lets it issue those instruments as tokens on the XRP Ledger, converting a paper-and-database industry into on-chain balances without asking regulators for anything novel.

The first live deployment made the strategy legible: Tobu Top Tours, the travel arm of the Tobu railway group, launched a prepaid token for travel spending, issued and redeemed under the PSA framework, running on XRPL mainnet. A tourist’s prepaid travel balance is now a ledger asset, transferable and programmable within the license’s limits, settling on the same infrastructure that carries XRP itself.

Two properties make this bigger than one travel product. First, it is a template, not a bespoke integration; the registration covers a category, and every subsequent issuer, a retailer, a game publisher, a transit operator, can reuse the same rails. Second, it seeds the ledger with regulated, yen-denominated value at consumer scale, the raw material for the payments network Ripple has promised for a decade. Prepaid tokens do not require anyone to hold or even know about XRP, but they generate transaction flow, wallet adoption, and institutional operating experience on the ledger, the boring accumulation that the XRPL’s institutional finance stack needs far more than another partnership announcement.

The realistic caveat: 30 trillion yen is the market’s size, not SBI’s share, and incumbent prepaid giants will not concede it because a competitor found a better database. Japan’s cashless economy is already crowded with entrenched closed-loop systems, QR wallets with tens of millions of users, transit cards tapped billions of times a year, point programs woven into every retail chain, and each incumbent owns its float, its data, and its customer relationship precisely because its system is closed. The XRPL pitch to those players is interoperability and issuance cost, real advantages that nonetheless ask incumbents to open ecosystems they profit from keeping shut.

SBI’s likelier early wins are exactly what Tobu Top Tours represents: mid-sized issuers in travel, gaming, and regional retail for whom building proprietary rails never made sense, aggregated one license at a time. The breakthrough is the license and the template. The land grab is still ahead, and it will be fought store by store against some of the stickiest payment habits on earth.

RLUSD with a Japanese passport The second pillar arrived five days after the prepaid registration. On March 31, SBI VC Trade, the group’s licensed crypto exchange, began distributing Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin to Japanese customers, making it among the first foreign-issued stablecoins to enter Japan through the front door of its regulatory regime.

The distribution came with reserve attestations by Deloitte showing approximately $1.568 billion in assets backing roughly 1.49 billion RLUSD in circulation at the time of the review. In a country where the yen-stablecoin framework is strict enough that domestic issuance has moved slowly, a dollar token with a Big Four attestation and a licensed local distributor is a product with genuine institutional reach, and one whose paperwork alone signals which market it was dressed for.

RLUSD’s Japanese beachhead matters to the global picture more than its size suggests. Ripple’s stablecoin strategy, from its role in the Open USD consortium to its positioning against Circle and Tether, depends on proving RLUSD can win regulated distribution that rivals cannot easily replicate. Japan is the proof case: Tether has never cleared Japanese listing requirements, and the market’s stablecoin shelf is nearly empty. Being early on an empty, heavily regulated shelf is how USDC won Europe under MiCA, and SBI is running the same play for RLUSD in Asia.

The alliance stacked a third pillar the same quarter: tokenized corporate bonds. SBI issued 10 billion yen of its START digital bonds through BOOSTRY’s blockchain platform, retail-accessible instruments paying 1.85 to 2.45 percent, sweetened with XRP bonuses for bondholders through 2029. A conglomerate paying bond incentives in XRP is marketing, but it is also plumbing: it normalizes the token inside conventional Japanese retail finance, one coupon at a time.

The rest of the web Around the three pillars runs a mesh of smaller commitments, individually minor and collectively the texture of real adoption.

Banking: Tottori Bank, a regional institution, uses Ripple-powered rails for remittances, continuing the original SBI Ripple Asia mission of wiring Japanese regional banks into modern settlement. The corridor work is the oldest and least glamorous layer of the stack, and in some ways the most telling: regional bank integrations survive on reliability metrics and audit trails, not conference keynotes, and a rail that has cleared retail remittances under FSA supervision for years is the kind of reference customer that no marketing budget can buy. The regional banking sector, with its aging customers, thin margins, and heavy reliance on slow legacy transfer systems, has always been the most natural Japanese customer for the technology.

Consolidation: SBI has been in talks to fold Bitbank, one of Japan’s larger independent crypto exchanges, into its orbit, a move that would concentrate even more of the country’s licensed trading infrastructure inside the group. In a market where licenses are the moat, buying licensed capacity is buying distribution.

Loyalty: Rakuten’s vast points ecosystem connects to crypto conversion paths that include XRP, linking the token to one of the most widely held loyalty currencies in the country. Points-to-crypto is a small pipe, but it is a pipe pointed at tens of millions of ordinary consumers.

Venture and events: Ripple has committed a $500 million fund for Japanese and Asian corridor development, and the ecosystem’s confidence shows in the calendar: XRP Tokyo 2026, staged with participation from investors including a16z, made the city the token’s de facto global capital this year. Even the group’s hedging tells a story; SBI signed a memorandum with Fasset that contemplates multi-network token issuance, a reminder that the conglomerate’s loyalty is to its strategy, not to any single ledger.

Talent and standards flow through the same mesh. Japanese engineers trained on XRPL integrations inside SBI subsidiaries seed the domestic developer base; the group’s participation in industry associations shapes how Tokyo writes the next round of token rules; and every licensed deployment produces compliance playbooks that shorten the path for the deployment after it. None of this appears in any adoption dashboard, and all of it is why institutional ecosystems, once rooted, prove so hard for competitors to displace.

Ripple, for its part, keeps feeding the region: its acquisition of BC Payments Australia on March 11 extended licensed payment capacity in the neighboring corridor, the kind of unglamorous license-shopping that built the Japanese position in the first place.

JUST IN: Rakuten Wallet launches $XRP as a listed asset and payment method starting from April 15, allowing users to buy with Rakuten Points and spend at over 5 million merchants in Japan pic.twitter.com/cYTZajrmyO

— crypto.news (@cryptodotnews) April 13, 2026 Kitao’s long bet Institutional strategies this durable usually trace to one person, and in this case the person has never hidden. Yoshitaka Kitao built SBI out of the SoftBank orbit in the late 1990s into one of Japan’s most aggressive financial groups, and he adopted the Ripple thesis early, publicly, and with a conviction that has outlasted every cycle since. He has used shareholder meetings to talk price targets, put XRP into the group’s shareholder benefit program, and steered corporate development, the joint venture, the exchange arm, the mining and Web3 subsidiaries, around the thesis for a decade.

The bet’s texture is worth appreciating. Kitao committed a regulated, listed conglomerate to a foreign startup’s token in 2016, when the token had no legal clarity anywhere, then held the position through the SEC lawsuit that made XRP untouchable in America, through delistings, through an 80 percent drawdown, and through the 2026 slide. Japanese corporate governance gives a founder-chairman latitude that few Western boards would extend, and Kitao has spent that latitude on patience. The feud now raging between Ripple’s and Strategy’s chief executives over whose model creates value has a quiet third participant: the only major institution that took the utility thesis and actually financed a decade of it.

The dependence runs both directions. For Ripple, SBI is not one partner among many; it is the distribution, licensing, and political capital behind effectively every Japanese achievement the company can point to, which is why Ripple’s regional commitments, the $500 million corridor fund, the Tokyo flagship events, concentrate there. For SBI, Ripple’s technology and token are a differentiator no domestic rival can copy quickly, a moat made of licenses and relationship-years.

Which is also the risk. Kitao is in his mid-seventies. The strategy’s continuation is a succession question as much as a market one, and conglomerates have a long history of new management quietly unwinding a founder’s signature enthusiasms. The Fasset memorandum’s multi-network language, and the group’s general drift toward network-agnostic tokenization, read naturally as institutional hedging around exactly that mortality, corporate and personal. The empire is real. It is also, in the end, one man’s conviction wearing a conglomerate’s balance sheet.

What Japan proves, and what it cannot The Japanese experiment is the strongest evidence anywhere for the utility thesis, and its limits are just as instructive as its successes.

What it proves: the technology clears real regulatory bars. The XRP Ledger now carries licensed consumer prepaid money, a Deloitte-attested stablecoin, and tokenized bonds inside a G7 regulatory perimeter. The perennial skeptic’s claim that no serious regulator would ever bless the stack is, as of this spring, simply false. It also proves the institutional patience model works: a decade of joint-venture building through the regulator produced compounding capabilities that no bull-market partnership spree ever has.

What it cannot prove: that any of this accrues to the token’s price. Prepaid tokens settle in yen value; RLUSD is a dollar instrument; tokenized bonds pay yen coupons. XRP itself is the bridge and gas asset of the ledger they run on, and holders’ monthly reminder of the supply side arrives from escrow regardless of how many travel tokens Japan issues. The uncomfortable arithmetic of 2026 is that the year of Japan’s breakthroughs was also the year XRP fell to $1.01 lows, because the flows that price the token, ETF creations, exchange speculation, escrow absorption, dwarf the ledger’s operational activity and will for years.

The 2026 market backdrop makes the divergence vivid. Spot XRP ETFs launched in the United States in November 2025 to a $1.3 billion opening surge, saw their first outflows in the spring, then settled into a steady multi-week inflow streak even as Bitcoin funds bled through June, leaving roughly a billion dollars under management. Those flows, plus the escrow’s net release, plus exchange speculation, are the entire visible price formation of XRP, and not one of the three has anything to do with a travel token in Saitama. Japanese adoption enters the price, if ever, through a channel so long and indirect, ledger activity to institutional confidence to allocation decisions, that no honest analyst would model it inside a single cycle.

There is a second, subtler limit: the Japanese stack mostly does not need XRP the asset even where it uses XRPL the network. Prepaid instruments are yen claims; RLUSD is a dollar stablecoin with its own reserve economics; bond bonuses denominated in XRP are marketing budget, not settlement demand. The ledger burns trivial XRP in fees and uses it as a bridge only where a corridor chooses it. The utility thesis, stated carefully, was always that ledger adoption would eventually require the asset at scale. Japan is proving the adoption half at a pace no other country matches, and leaving the requirement half exactly as unproven as it was.

The honest framing is that Japan has built the world’s best answer to the wrong question, if the question is next quarter’s price, and the world’s only serious answer to the right one, if the question is whether XRP’s infrastructure ever hosts a real economy. Both questions have constituencies, and they talk past each other daily.

The lonely experiment The sharpest fact about the SBI empire is its solitude. Nothing comparable exists in the United States, where XRP’s 2026 story is entirely financial, ETFs, escrow, and litigation memories. Nothing comparable exists in Europe, where Ripple’s presence is licenses without a champion. The model requires a specific, rare configuration: a large domestic financial group with equity in Ripple, a regulator with clear token frameworks, and an executive willing to spend a decade on it. Japan had all three. No second country currently has two.

The near-misses elsewhere underline how demanding the recipe is. The Gulf states have friendly regulators and sovereign capital, but no domestic conglomerate has married its balance sheet to the token; Ripple’s licenses there are doors without a house behind them. Korea has retail enthusiasm and, soon, won-denominated stablecoins, but its regulatory posture toward foreign-token infrastructure remains cautious, and its chaebol have their own chains to champion. The United States has the ETFs and now the legal clarity, but American institutions buy exposure, not plumbing; nobody is issuing licensed consumer money on XRPL between the coasts. Each jurisdiction supplies one ingredient. Only Japan supplies all three, and it took ten years even there.

That solitude cuts both ways. It makes Japan the indispensable proof case, the one jurisdiction the utility thesis can point to without hedging. It also makes the thesis fragile in a way believers rarely price: a strategy embodied in one conglomerate and one 70-something evangelist is a strategy with key-man and key-country risk. If the SBI experiment stalls, succession, strategy drift, or simply the gravitational pull of that Fasset-style multi-network hedging, there is no second Japan behind it.

For now, the experiment is accelerating, not stalling: three new licensed pillars in a single spring, a consumer market of $200 billion newly addressable, and a shareholder base literally paid in the token. Whether that ever moves a chart is the question the rest of the XRP world obsesses over. Japan, characteristically, is not waiting for the answer. It is issuing the next token and the one after that.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice. Digital asset markets are volatile and you can lose your entire investment. Always do your own research. Information current as of July 6, 2026.

A major decentralized finance transaction on the Ethereum network ended with an estimated $2 million loss after a large swap was routed through a low-liquidity pool. According to blockchain analytics group Lookonchain and security firm GoPlus Security, the user exchanged 1,126.44 ETH—worth about $2.01 million at the time—in a single transaction.

Price impact from pool route deepened lossesInstead of receiving assets close to the original amount, the trader ended up with just 5,776 LIT tokens, valued at around $14,200. GoPlus Security clarified that the loss was not caused by a hack or a standard front-running scenario. Rather, it resulted from a backrunning arbitrage mechanism operating within the same block, exploiting price inconsistencies caused by the trade. GoPlus Security is widely recognized for its work on blockchain and smart contract risk assessment.

GoPlus Security emphasized that this was not a security breach or typical front-running, but rather price manipulation from a backrunning arbitrage opportunity occurring within the same block.

The ill-fated swap was routed through the AVAIL/WETH pool on Uniswap V3. With extremely limited liquidity in this pool, the large ETH order instantly pushed the AVAIL token price far above its actual market value. This forced the trader to purchase the token at a dramatically inflated price, resulting in severe losses.

Backrunning arbitrage within the same block draws attentionThe transaction continued across additional trading routes. After the AVAIL tokens were swapped for USDC, the trader then bought LIT on Uniswap V4. However, due to unfavorable price execution along each step, almost the entire value of the original ETH was wiped out.

As explained by GoPlus Security, after the large swap disrupted prices in the AVAIL/WETH pool, a backrunning participant acquired AVAIL at or near the fair market value from another source. That trader then sold the tokens into the artificially inflated pool, extracting more than 1,072 WETH as profit.

Glossary: MEV (Maximal Extractable Value) refers to the extra profit gained from prioritizing and ordering transactions during block production. A “backrunner” is a participant who quickly moves in to profit from temporary price swings caused by a large order.

On-chain data showed that roughly 1,018 ETH was subsequently sent to Titan Builder as a block producer payment.

Low liquidity raises risk for large tradesBlockchain records reveal that about 1,018 ETH was later paid to Titan Builder as a block builder fee. This highlights how MEV participants can seize pricing imbalances during block production to generate significant revenue. Titan Builder stands out as a key transaction organizer within the Ethereum block-building ecosystem.

The incident has reignited debate about the risks associated with processing large orders through pools with limited liquidity. When a sizable transaction passes through such markets, even a single order can cause rapid and extreme price fluctuations. While arbitrageurs often restore price equilibrium after the fact, users may end up paying far above the true market value during these episodes.

Ultimately, this example underscores the need for smarter routing technologies in decentralized trading. Systems that avoid illiquid pools and better estimate transaction costs on a route-by-route basis could help prevent similar costly errors in the future.

Disclaimer: The information contained in this article does not constitute investment advice. Investors should be aware that cryptocurrencies carry high volatility and therefore risk, and should conduct their own research.

BitTorrent has unveiled a long-term BTT token buyback and burn program that will use 100% of revenue from its decentralized services for quarterly market purchases starting in the third quarter of 2026.

Summary

BitTorrent will use all revenue from its decentralized services to buy back BTT every quarter starting in the third quarter of 2026. Repurchased BTT tokens will be permanently burned, with on chain transaction details published after each quarterly burn. The company said additional revenue from BTTInferGrid is expected to increase the funds available for future BTT buybacks. According to BitTorrent’s official announcement, all revenue generated by its decentralized services will be allocated to buying back BTT tokens on the open market every quarter, with the repurchased tokens permanently removed from circulation through scheduled burns.

📢 Announcement on the Launch of BTT Buyback Program

We are excited to announce the launch of BitTorrent’s long-term BTT Buyback Program starting in Q3 2026.

As part of this initiative, 100% of revenue generated from BitTorrent’s decentralized services will be allocated to… pic.twitter.com/h0hAMDLrRV

— BitTorrent (@BitTorrent) July 6, 2026 The company said the first round will begin with buybacks during the third quarter of 2026. The corresponding token burn is scheduled for the middle of October, when BitTorrent also plans to publish the total number of tokens destroyed, the percentage of total supply affected, and the on-chain transaction hash verifying the process.

Each quarterly burn report will be released during the middle of the first month of the following quarter, allowing users to independently verify the transactions on-chain, according to the announcement.

Under the program, the funding source will come entirely from revenue generated by BitTorrent’s decentralized services rather than treasury reserves or newly raised capital. The company added that revenue available for future buybacks is expected to increase following the launch of BTTInferGrid, which it said will contribute additional income to the ecosystem.

Instead of holding the repurchased tokens, BitTorrent said all acquired BTT will be transferred to a designated burn address, permanently removing them from circulation after each quarterly buyback cycle.

The announcement described the initiative as a long-term mechanism that ties token buybacks directly to operating revenue while providing publicly verifiable records of every burn.

BitTorrent and its products, including BitTorrent and µTorrent, serve more than 100 million active users and have been installed on over one billion devices. The platform became part of the TRON ecosystem after TRON acquired BitTorrent and its products in July 2018, adding blockchain capabilities to its decentralized file-sharing network.

Justin Sun-linked firms remain in focus The latest announcement comes weeks after another company linked to crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun drew attention over compliance-related actions. 

In June, HTX delisted the USD1 stablecoin after stating that World Liberty Financial had frozen certain on-chain addresses associated with the exchange, prompting HTX to suspend USD1 trading and convert eligible balances into USDT at a one-to-one ratio. 

World Liberty Financial said at the time that it maintained risk-based sanctions compliance controls, while HTX disputed any connection between the sanctioned Huobi Global S.A. entity and its current exchange operations.

Spot Bitcoin ETFs traded in the United States recorded $526.64 million in net outflows between June 29 and July 2. With this latest development, the streak of withdrawals from these products has now reached its eighth consecutive week. This marks the longest continuous weekly outflow period seen since spot Bitcoin ETFs launched in the US.

Outflows continue in Bitcoin and Ethereum fundsThe cautious approach from institutional investors, combined with weaker momentum in Bitcoin, was clearly reflected in ETF data. According to SoSoValue, the total net assets of US spot Bitcoin ETFs fell to around $74.37 billion. In the same period, Bitcoin traded near $61,500. During June alone, outflows from these products totaled approximately $4.5 billion, underlining the sustained pressure in the market.

Wu Blockchain reported that US spot Bitcoin ETFs saw nearly $527 million in net outflows over the period from June 29 to July 2, bringing the outflow streak to eight consecutive weeks.

Spot Ethereum ETFs mirrored this trend. In the same timeframe, Ethereum ETFs experienced $13.67 million in net redemptions, also marking their eighth straight week of outflows. The simultaneous withdrawals from funds tied to the two largest digital assets signal that investor appetite for risk remains subdued across the sector.

Diverging trends in altcoin ETFsWhile Bitcoin and Ethereum products continued to lose assets, certain altcoin ETFs bucked the trend by attracting fresh capital. Spot Solana ETFs posted $5.75 million in net inflows for the week. XRP ETFs stood out with $17.19 million in new investments, representing the strongest performance in the altcoin ETF category. Hyperliquid ETFs also saw positive flows, gaining $4.32 million in net inflows despite a noticeable slowdown compared to previous weeks.

Glossary: SoSoValue is a data platform commonly used to track ETF flows and market metrics in digital asset markets. Net inflow refers to the difference between money entering and exiting a fund.

This divergence suggests that, rather than exiting the crypto ETF market entirely, some investors are reallocating capital toward alternative digital assets. Although Bitcoin remains the predominant option among institutional vehicles, select interest in altcoin-based products appears to be holding steady.

Brief signs of recovery prove short-livedDespite a weak weekly outlook, there were limited signs of recovery at the period’s close. On July 2, US spot Bitcoin ETFs attracted over $221 million in daily net inflows, breaking a 10-day outflow streak. However, this single-day shift was not deemed sufficient to reverse the broader eight-week trend.

Market observers attribute the prolonged outflows to macroeconomic uncertainty, rising interest rate expectations, and diminished risk appetite. With pressure persisting on Bitcoin, it appears institutional investors continue to scale back their exposure by redeeming ETF shares.

In the period ahead, ETF flows are expected to serve as a key gauge of institutional sentiment. Sustained net inflows could suggest renewed confidence in Bitcoin, while ongoing outflows may indicate demand will remain muted until broader market conditions improve.

Disclaimer: The information contained in this article does not constitute investment advice. Investors should be aware that cryptocurrencies carry high volatility and therefore risk, and should conduct their own research.

Circle printed roughly $3.5 billion worth of USDC on Solana last week, with a single $1 billion mint hitting the chain on June 16 alone.

Gross USDC issuance on Solana has already blown past $64 billion for 2026, and we’re barely into July.

What’s driving the demand USDC on Solana serves a sprawling set of use cases: DeFi trading, cross-border payments, and institutional settlements. The network’s low fees and high throughput make it a natural fit for the kind of rapid-fire transactions that stablecoin users actually need.

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Each token represents a dollar (or dollar-equivalent reserve) deposited by a customer who wants digital dollars on-chain. When $3.5 billion gets minted in a week, it means $3.5 billion in fresh demand showed up at the door.

The June 16 mint of $1 billion USDC in a single transaction is particularly notable. Transactions of that size typically signal institutional or enterprise-level activity, not retail users swapping tokens on a DEX.

The institutional angle is getting real Circle has enhanced its mint and burn capabilities with BNY Mellon, one of the world’s oldest and largest custodial banks. That partnership covers both Solana and Ethereum environments, giving institutions a familiar custody framework for handling USDC at scale.

Circle hasn’t issued any public statement about the specific June minting events. The data comes from on-chain tracking platforms that monitor blockchain transactions in real time.

What this means for investors With $64 billion in gross USDC issuance on Solana in 2026 alone, the network has established itself as a legitimate alternative for high-volume stablecoin operations.

For SOL holders, more USDC liquidity on the network means more transaction fees, more DeFi activity, and more reasons for developers to build on Solana. Stablecoin volume is one of the most reliable indicators of real economic activity on a blockchain, as opposed to speculative token trading that can evaporate overnight.

Tether’s USDT still commands the largest market share globally, but USDC’s growth on Solana, powered by Circle’s regulatory-first approach and institutional partnerships, is carving out a distinct lane.

Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.

Source: Binance EN

This is a general announcement. Products and services referred to here may not be available in your region. Fellow Binancians, Starting at approximately 2026-07-06 12:00 (UTC), Binance will suspend the deposits and withdrawals of token(s) on the Moonriver (MOVR) network to support its network upgrade to ensure the best user experience. The network upgrade will take place at the block height of 16,960,935, or approximately at 2026-07-06 13:00 (UTC). Please note: The trading of token(s) on the aforementioned network will not be impacted.Binance will handle all technical requirements involved for all users.Deposits and withdrawals for token(s) on the aforementioned network will be reopened once the upgraded network is deemed to be stable. No further announcement will be posted.There may be discrepancies between this original content in English and any translated versions. Please refer to the original English version for the most accurate information, in case any discrepancies arise. For more information, please refer to the announcement from the project team. Thank you for your support! Binance Team 2026-07-06

PANews July 6 news, according to an official announcement, the on-chain burn of GateToken (GT) for the second quarter of 2026 has been officially completed, with a total of 2,570,063.3829548 GT transferred to the burn address, valued at over 17.75 million USD. Since the Gate Chain mainnet launched in 2019, GT has been subject to a continuous burn mechanism. To date, a cumulative total of 189,947,219 GT has been burned, with a cumulative burn value exceeding 1.311 billion USD (based on quarterly average price). The total token supply has been significantly reduced by approximately 63.32% from the initial 300 million.

As the sole gas token of Gate Layer, GT’s usage frequency is steadily increasing. As the underlying infrastructure, Gate Layer provides high-performance network support for applications such as Gate Perp DEX, Gate Fun, Gate Meme Go, and Gate Swap. Additionally, Gate is continuously enriching its product ecosystem. Gate Stocks has established a 7×24-hour trading service system covering the three core markets of US stocks, Hong Kong stocks, and South Korean stocks, encompassing more than 12,500 stocks and ETF assets globally. It supports fractional share trading with a minimum investment of 0.01 share and offers dividend entitlements. The platform also supports cross-broker transfers for US and Hong Kong stocks, as well as corporate actions such as stock splits and reverse splits, further optimizing the stock investment service experience. Gate will continue to implement a long-term, stable GT burn mechanism, forging a tighter positive cycle between the token economic model, real usage demand, and ecosystem expansion.

Aave [AAVE] V4 has reached an important adoption milestone, highlighting continued demand despite a challenging DeFi environment. The protocol has now surpassed $250 million in deposits, reflecting strong early traction for its upgraded lending infrastructure.

This growth was driven by improvements in capital efficiency, enhanced risk parameters, and expanded lending options to attract additional liquidity. As well as growing the amount of deposits, it is also essential that the quality of these deposits remain high.

Source: Aave on X Some portion of the deposits to V4 were due to users moving their previous positions from V3. Yet, they did not all represent new capital entering the Aave ecosystem.

Despite this, there have been positive signs indicating that new deposits continue to flow into the platform. This is in addition to the migrated assets. For Aave to be able to sustain further growth, they need to continue to draw new capital into the platform.

Should V4 continue to outperform V3 in terms of true net additions of liquidity, then Aave can solidify its position as the dominant liquidity provider within DeFi.

Broader liquidity tells a different story Although Aave V4 continues to see record-breaking deposit numbers, the overall trend in liquidity is much more nuanced. The TVL previously reached an all-time high of about 13.4 million ETH. However, it fell dramatically due to the recent downturn in markets.

TVL has since bounced back to about 7.4 million ETH. Still far from the previous highs, this indicates that significant amounts of capital have been slow to recover even with improvements in investor sentiment.

Source: DeFiLlama That said, withdrawals are still outpacing some portion of the influx of new capital into V4, which is limiting how much liquidity grows as a whole.

While V4 has seen continuous updates to its protocols and has seen a recovery in TVL. Still, these indicators suggest a resilient position by V4 for future growth but do not show that V4 is structurally weak.

Moreover, cbETH deposits across Aave have increased lately. Deposits held near $18-$20 million through May before increasing to early July levels of approximately $70 million.

Source: TokenLogic This rapid increase indicates a strengthening demand for liquid staking collateral; additionally, it reinforces the liquidity and lending capacity of Aave.

Whether Aave can expand once again as a larger ecosystem will be determined by the ability to continue seeing net positive flows to the platform over time, excluding internal migration.

Final Summary Aave V4 growth depended on sustained net new liquidity, not internal capital migration. Aave’s liquidity was strengthening as cbETH deposits continued to rise across the protocol.

The spot @HyperliquidX ETFs posted net inflows of $4.32M for the week ending July 4, marking their weakest weekly performance since launching in mid-May 2026. While still positive, the figure represents a notable cooldown from the pace that made these products some of the most closely watched new ETFs in crypto this year.

A Strong Start That Has Slowed The suite of spot $HYPE ETFs, which includes Bitwise's BHYP, 21Shares' THYP, and Grayscale's HYPG, had an explosive debut. The products crossed $100M in combined net inflows within just 10 trading sessions of their mid-May 2026 debut, a pace that, on a market-cap-adjusted basis, no prior altcoin ETF had matched. Inflows accelerated sharply early on, jumping from $6.89M in the partial launch week to $68.02M for the full week ending May 22, a near 10x week-over-week surge.

The momentum continued into June. Spot Hyperliquid ETFs attracted $111M in net inflows on June 29 alone, even as U.S. spot Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs faced significant outflows. That single-day figure dwarfs the entire week's tally reported this week, underscoring how sharply the pace has moderated.

Despite the slower week, the ETFs have seen remarkably few down days. According to @BSCNews, the products have recorded only two days of net outflows since launch (June 5 and June 30), a sign of durable if cooling institutional interest.

Supply Lock-Up Continues Perhaps more telling than weekly flow figures is the cumulative supply impact. The spot $HYPE ETFs now collectively hold 2.28% of $HYPE's current circulating supply, a meaningful concentration that reduces the float available to open-market participants. The two leading funds have attracted over $137M in total, validating institutional demand for the asset.

Part of the structural appeal for ETF investors is $HYPE's built-in buyback mechanism. Hyperliquid runs a mechanism called the Assistance Fund, with 99% of trading fees from the exchange's perpetual and spot markets flowing into it, and the fund spending that money buying $HYPE on the open market. That dynamic, combined with ETF inflows locking up supply, has drawn comparisons to the demand structures seen in early Bitcoin and Ethereum ETF cycles.

Whether this week's softer inflow number signals a sustained deceleration or simply a pause after June's record-setting activity remains to be seen. What is clear is that the $HYPE ETF category, barely two months old, has already redefined expectations for altcoin ETF launches.

Sources:
CNBC: Bitcoin is cratering, but a new Wall Street crypto hype is on the rise
CryptoNews: Hyperliquid Price Prediction 2026
FXStreet: Hyperliquid Price Forecast, Easing ETF Flows

Something is building inside the @Litecoin ecosystem. The chain has now reached a total of 409 million unique addresses, with some 22 million of those created in just the past six months. That works out to roughly 5.37% of all $LTC addresses ever created, generated in half a year.

On-Chain Data Points to Real Momentum Address growth of this scale is one of the cleaner signals of organic network expansion in crypto. It suggests new participants are arriving, not just existing holders reshuffling funds. According to BitInfoCharts data, active Litecoin addresses grew roughly 7.5% between February 2026 and recent weeks, even as the token's price remained under pressure. The same data shows around 180,915 transactions processed in a 24-hour window, with an average fee of just $0.0023, figures that support Litecoin's payment-focused use case.

On-chain charts show that $LTC consistently ranks second only to $BTC in daily transactions, maintaining roughly 30 to 40% of Bitcoin's transaction count over the past four years. That kind of sustained throughput gives the address growth figure more weight. It is not simply a vanity metric.

A Broader Ecosystem Building Behind the Numbers The address surge is arriving at a moment when the wider Litecoin ecosystem is expanding on multiple fronts. A mid-year review highlighted that the network surpassed 400 million lifetime transactions, with hashrate growing nearly four times since the 2023 halving. Nasdaq-listed Lite Strategy also invested $1 million into LitVM, a zero-knowledge Layer-2 aiming to bring smart contracts and DeFi to Litecoin without altering its base layer.

On the institutional side, the Canary Litecoin ETF (LTCC) launched and began trading, giving institutions and retail brokerage clients regulated exposure to $LTC for the first time, though assets under management remain modest at around $5.5 million. MEI Pharma also acquired 929,548 Litecoin, establishing a $110.4 million Litecoin treasury.

Address growth alone does not guarantee price performance. As of late June 2026, Litecoin was trading around $42, down roughly 45% year-to-date, though it remains one of the more liquid assets in the market with over a decade of uninterrupted operation. Still, the pace at which new addresses are being created points to a network that is broadening its base regardless of near-term price action.

Sources:
StealthEX: Litecoin Price Analysis and 2026 ETF Outlook
CoinPedia: Litecoin Retail-Driven Growth
CoinMarketCap: Latest Litecoin Network Updates

Glamsterdam, @ethereum's next major hard fork, has reached its final devnet stage with ten Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs) locked in. Core developers call it the most significant protocol change since The Merge.

Two EIPs Driving the UpgradeTwo proposals sit at the heart of the upgrade. Enshrined Proposer-Builder Separation (ePBS), defined in EIP-7732, integrates the block-building process directly into the Ethereum protocol. This removes the current 80 to 90 percent reliance on third-party relays like MEV-Boost, reducing centralization risks and ensuring a fairer, more transparent distribution of Maximal Extractable Value (MEV).

The second headliner is EIP-7928, Block-Level Access Lists (BALs). Block-level Access Lists let blocks declare the accounts and state they will touch, enabling faster parallel execution and raising the L1 transactions-per-second ceiling.

Beyond the two headliners, the package also contains EIP-7708 (ETH transfers and burns emit a log), EIP-7778 (block gas accounting without refunds), EIP-7843 (a SLOTNUM opcode), EIP-7954 (raising the maximum contract size from roughly 24 KiB to 32 KiB), EIP-7975 (eth/70 partial block receipt lists), EIP-8024 (backward-compatible SWAPN, DUPN and EXCHANGE opcodes), EIP-8037 (state-creation gas-cost increase), and EIP-8159 (eth/71 Block Access List Exchange).

Gas Limit and TimelineTogether, the two headline proposals clear a path toward a dramatically higher gas ceiling. The 200 million gas limit is the design target for what Glamsterdam unblocks, not a value the fork itself enforces. Validators set the limit via standard gas-vote signaling, which they currently coordinate around the 60 million range, and would step it up only as nodes prove they can handle the larger blocks without degraded propagation.

The final devnet is the last major engineering phase before client releases, security reviews, and public testnets. Holesky and Hoodi will fork before mainnet, and only after multi-client stability holds for several epochs across those networks. Past forks have run two to four months of public-testnet seasoning, putting a mainnet window broadly between September and December 2026.

Ethereum Foundation contributors note Glamsterdam is proving trickier and slower than Fusaka, so a slip remains possible. No firm mainnet activation slot has been set. What is clear is that $ETH's base layer, if the upgrade lands on schedule, will be materially more capable heading into 2027.

Sources:
The Defiant: Ethereum's Glamsterdam Upgrade Enters Final Devnet Phase
Datawallet: Ethereum Glamsterdam Upgrade and EIPs Explained
Kiln: Glamsterdam, Ethereum's Next Hard Fork Explained

The @Cardano_CF has signaled it is exploring integration with OpenUSD (OUSD), the newly announced stablecoin consortium that counts Visa, Mastercard, BlackRock, and Stripe among its more than 140 founding partners. The development positions Cardano as a potential participant in what is shaping up to be the broadest cross-industry stablecoin alliance assembled to date.

Brale as the Bridge The Foundation's current connection to OpenUSD runs through @brale_xyz. The Cardano Foundation's formal tie to OpenUSD currently runs through Brale, a compliant stablecoin issuance platform that secured a launch partner slot in the new consortium. The Foundation highlighted that relationship publicly, welcoming the announcement of OpenUSD and Brale as a launch partner. Brale already maintains a working relationship with the Cardano ecosystem, having partnered with the Cardano Foundation in 2025 to support compliant and native stablecoin issuance on the network.

The Foundation made clear that Brale is not the end of the story. It is exploring additional integration options, signaling that Brale may represent only one of several possible pathways into the OpenUSD ecosystem, with further details to be shared as discussions progress.

What OpenUSD Is, and Why It Matters for $ADA Open Standard, the company behind OpenUSD, announced the stablecoin with Stripe, Visa, BlackRock, and over 140 other businesses signed on as partners. Once live, OpenUSD will let businesses mint and redeem the stablecoin with no fees or volume caps, while returning most reserve earnings back to participating partners. Unlike most existing stablecoins, it will be run by Open Standard, a separate company whose board is made up of its partner businesses. Open USD is expected to go live later in 2026.

Cardano is not listed among OpenUSD's public launch partners, which include Visa, Mastercard, Ripple, MoonPay, Stripe, and more than 140 other companies. Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson went further than the Foundation in explaining the gap, tying Cardano's absence not to any external rejection but to internal governance choices made by the network's delegated representatives, known as DReps, who had previously rejected proposals specifically designed to accelerate commercialization.

Being part of a major stablecoin initiative like OUSD could significantly boost Cardano's DeFi activity, liquidity, and overall network utility, while the outcome of these integration efforts could influence Cardano's competitive position against other blockchain networks already in the consortium, such as Solana and Polygon. The Foundation says more integration options are being actively explored, with details to come.

Sources:
Fortune: Stripe, Visa and over 140 businesses to launch Open USD stablecoin
Brale: Brale x Cardano Foundation Native Stablecoin Infrastructure
Cryptonomist: Cardano Open USD Integration

What Zipper Actually ChangesStellar's Protocol 27, named Zipper, is set for a mainnet validator vote on July 8. The upgrade centres on a single but consequential change: making authentication delegation a first-class feature on Stellar, meaning one account can officially authorise another to act on its behalf.

Before Zipper, delegation existed on Stellar only as an accidental side effect. Developers who tried to use it faced a tangle of manual steps, extra simulation passes, and bloated transaction sizes, so most teams avoided it entirely. Zipper turns that workaround into a clean, supported tool.

In practical terms, the upgrade opens the door to features that have been difficult or impossible to build cleanly until now. Cheaper transactions and more flexible account designs, including social recovery, delegated signing keys, and modular multisig, become practical to build. Transactions also become smaller and cheaper because all delegated signers bundle into a single authorisation entry instead of requiring separate ones.

On the security side, CAP-0071-02 adds address-bound Soroban credentials, closing a narrow replay vulnerability where accounts sharing private keys could be exposed to cross-account signature reuse.

Laying the Ground for Protocol 28Zipper's significance extends beyond what it ships on day one. CAP-0071-01 is explicitly foundational to CAP-0072, which adds contract-based authentication to classic Stellar accounts. The delegation mechanism introduced here is the same one that more visible features in future protocols will depend on.

The Stellar Development Foundation has confirmed that Protocol 28 will bring contract-based authentication to classic Stellar accounts, the standard ones most users hold today, and the delegation mechanism in Zipper is a direct prerequisite for that. In effect, what validators are being asked to approve on July 8 is as much an infrastructure decision as a feature release.

The release timeline ran as follows: Stellar Core shipped June 5, RPC and Galexie on June 10, SDKs between June 5 and 11, Horizon on June 12, and the testnet upgrade on June 18, ahead of the mainnet protocol vote on July 8.

Sources:
Stellar Development Foundation: Zipper, Protocol 27 Upgrade Guide
Stellar Docs: Software Versions and Protocol Features
GitHub: Stellar Core v27.0.0 Release Notes

Multiple networks move at onceIn the span of just two weeks, three major blockchain projects have taken concrete steps toward quantum-resistant infrastructure. @trondao deployed post-quantum signatures on testnet, @NEARProtocol shipped quantum security as part of its 2.13 upgrade, and the $XRP Ledger continued advancing a structured, multi-phase post-quantum roadmap. The moves reflect a broader shift across the industry: networks are no longer waiting for a cryptographic emergency to begin hardening their systems.

NEAR Protocol's upgrade 2.13 adds FIPS-204, a NIST-approved signature scheme built to withstand quantum attacks. NEAR's account model, controlled by rotatable access keys, enables a seamless rotation to quantum-safe signing. The protocol-level upgrade is designed to be transparent to users, meaning NEAR token holders and decentralized application users need take no action.

On the $XRP side, Ripple has introduced a multi-phase roadmap to prepare the XRP Ledger for a post-quantum future, with a target for full readiness by 2028. The approach involves active testing of quantum-resistant cryptography and a hybrid rollout that runs alongside existing systems, with Ripple working alongside Project Eleven to accelerate development including validator testing and early custody prototypes. The roadmap also includes a contingency plan to enable a secure migration to quantum-safe accounts if current standards are compromised before the 2028 target.

Why the urgency now The push responds in part to research from Google Quantum AI suggesting that quantum computers could crack current blockchain cryptography with fewer resources and on a faster timeline than previously estimated, with some scenarios placing a credible threat window as early as 2032. If future quantum computers became capable of breaking current encryption standards, cryptocurrency wallets and blockchain infrastructure could face serious vulnerabilities, and although experts continue debating the timeline, many believe preparation must begin years before such systems become commercially viable.

Zcash's Tachyon upgrade is also targeting quantum readiness, according to CoinDesk Research, adding another major protocol to a list that is growing quickly. The broader crypto industry is grappling with the same problem at different speeds. Algorand integrated post-quantum state proofs as far back as 2022, while Bitcoin's debate remains largely at the discussion stage given the complexity of coordinating protocol changes across a decentralized network with no central team. The pattern is clear: projects with more centralized coordination are moving fastest, while the more decentralized networks face a longer road.

The industry's posture has shifted from reactive to proactive. Waiting for Q-Day, the theoretical moment when quantum computers can break current public-key cryptography, is no longer considered an acceptable strategy for infrastructure built to last decades.

Sources
Ripple: Post-Quantum Readiness on the XRP Ledger
CoinDesk: Ripple wants the XRP Ledger to be quantum-proof by 2028
CryptoWisser: NEAR Protocol Upgrade 2.13 is Live on Testnet

If you wanted to build a toll booth on Solana, Jito already beat you to it. The protocol, which operates at the intersection of liquid staking and maximal extractable value infrastructure, has cemented itself as the closest thing Solana has to a monopoly on validator-level revenue capture.

As of early July 2026, Jito’s governance token JTO sits at a market cap of roughly $351 million, backed by a circulating supply of approximately 491 million tokens. Its MEV-optimized validator client is now running on more than 95% of Solana’s active stake, up from figures that sat between 60% and 94% in prior periods.

What Jito actually does, and why it prints money Think of Jito as a two-sided business. On one side, it runs JitoSOL, a liquid staking token that lets holders earn staking yields without locking up their SOL permanently. On the other side, it operates MEV infrastructure that allows validators to capture tips from traders who want their transactions prioritized.

JitoSOL currently holds around $2.92 billion in total value locked, with more than 14.5 million SOL staked through the protocol.

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October 2024 alone saw $78.9 million in MEV fees flow through the protocol. MEV fees have risen 42% as on-chain activity on Solana has accelerated through 2025 and into 2026.

Jito operates through two distinct entities: Jito Labs, the engineering and product arm, and the Jito Foundation and DAO, which governs the protocol and controls token-level decisions.

JTX: the new piece of the puzzle On June 26, 2026, Jito Labs launched early access to JTX, a self-custodial trading terminal built on top of Solana’s decentralized exchange ecosystem. The product is designed to improve liquidity routing across both spot DEX venues and perpetuals markets.

Approximately 80% of JTX protocol revenue is directed back to JTO holders through buybacks. Rather than accruing value to a foundation treasury or a VC cap table, the majority of trading fee revenue would actively reduce circulating supply, creating mechanical buy pressure on the token.

Jito already sits at the base layer of Solana’s validator infrastructure. Adding a trading terminal means it can now capture value at the application layer too.

What this means for investors and the broader Solana ecosystem Jito has outpaced competitors like Marinade in both the staking and MEV markets. The 95%-plus validator adoption figure means that when block producers on Solana choose how to order transactions, the overwhelming majority are using Jito’s tooling to do it.

For JTO holders, the current setup offers a few distinct value drivers. Staking yields flow through JitoSOL and benefit from MEV tip capture on top of base staking rewards. The JTX buyback mechanism creates a direct connection between trading volume growth and token supply reduction.

Jito’s revenue is deeply tied to Solana network activity and MEV opportunity. A sustained drop in on-chain trading volume would compress fee flows quickly. Regulatory scrutiny on MEV practices, which has already begun in Ethereum circles, could eventually extend to Solana as well.

A $351 million market cap against a protocol that handles $2.92 billion in staked assets and captured nearly $79 million in MEV fees in a single month is a ratio worth examining.

Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.

PANews news, July 5 — Token Unlocks data shows that tokens including PUMP, HYPE, APT and others will see large unlocks next week, specifically:

Pump.fun (PUMP) will unlock approximately 82.5 billion tokens on July 12 at 10:00 PM Beijing time, representing approximately 29.23% of the circulating supply and worth approximately $125 million;

Hyperliquid (HYPE) will unlock approximately 452,000 tokens on July 6 at 8:00 AM Beijing time, representing approximately 0.2% of the circulating supply and worth approximately $30.9 million;

Aptos (APT) will unlock approximately 11.31 million tokens on July 12 at 10:00 PM Beijing time, representing approximately 0.66% of the circulating supply and worth approximately $6.9 million;

RedStone (RED) will unlock approximately 40.85 million tokens on July 7 at midnight Beijing time, representing approximately 9.8% of the circulating supply and worth approximately $4.1 million;

Movement (MOVE) will unlock approximately 165 million tokens on July 9 at 8:00 PM Beijing time, representing approximately 4.29% of the circulating supply and worth approximately $2 million;

Linea (LINEA) will unlock approximately 1.08 billion tokens on July 10 at 7:00 PM Beijing time, representing approximately 3.63% of the circulating supply and worth approximately $2.7 million;

io.net (IO) will unlock approximately 13.29 million tokens on July 11 at 8:00 PM Beijing time, representing approximately 3.61% of the circulating supply and worth approximately $2.3 million.

Worldcoin's $WLD token has emerged as one of the worst performers in the current crypto cycle, slipping roughly 8% on the week and nearly 23% on the month even as many major altcoins stage a recovery.

A Planned Supply Cut Has Not Steadied the Price The losses have come despite a significant supply-side development from @worldnetwork. On July 24, 2026, the WLD token unlock rate will decrease by 43% under the existing unlock schedules. In practice, this will reduce the unlock rate across all token allocations from about 5.1 million WLD per day to about 2.9 million WLD per day. The cuts are split between two groups: the aggregate daily unlock rate drop includes a 50% cut in daily community token unlocks and a 32% reduction in daily team and investor unlocks.

The July 24, 2026, unlock rate decrease will happen automatically, coded into the on-chain contracts from the start. The team has framed the event as a tokenomics milestone, arguing that the most aggressive phase of emissions is now behind the project. Markets, however, have not yet responded with enthusiasm.

Supply Overhang and Regulatory Pressure Weigh on $WLD WLD has lost over 45% of its value since the start of 2026 and trades roughly 97% below its March 2024 peak near $11. The persistent underperformance reflects two structural headwinds. First, the token's circulating supply is already large: a total of 4.9 billion WLD, representing 49% of the token's 10 billion maximum supply, has been unlocked so far, with approximately 3.3 billion WLD in actual circulation. Even after the July 24 reduction, the market will still absorb nearly 2.9 million new WLD tokens daily, meaning demand must keep pace to prevent further price erosion.

Second, regulatory risk remains a persistent overhang. Worldcoin faces significant regulatory headwinds concerning its biometric data collection, with operations suspended or investigated in countries including Kenya, Spain, Indonesia, and Thailand.

Market reaction will ultimately depend on whether demand for WLD, from governance, staking, ecosystem incentives, or speculative flows, grows faster than the slowed unlock curve. Until that demand materialises, WLD's ongoing downtrend and weak sentiment may continue to weigh on price action, limiting the near-term impact of the reduced token unlocks.

Sources:
World Network: Tokenomics Milestone, WLD Unlock Rate to Decrease by 43% in July
BeInCrypto: Worldcoin Cuts Token Unlock By Half, Will WLD Price Rally?
Crypto.news: Worldcoin Eases Off the Gas as WLD Unlock Rate Drops 43%

https://99bitcoins.com/cryptocurrency/hyperliquid-review/

Hyperliquid, a decentralized platform for perpetual futures, now accounts for 8.7% of the global open interest in the perpetual futures market, combining centralized exchanges (CEXs) and decentralized exchanges (DEXs). The platform’s open interest stands at over $4.3 billion, with protocol fees reaching an annualized $1.3 billion, fully distributed to HYPE stakers. This growth has led market participants to consider a potential migration from traditional CEXs to DEX platforms like Hyperliquid. Prominent market-making firms such as Jump, Wintermute, and GSR are actively involved, running dedicated wallets on the platform.

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The shift in market share echoes the previous transition seen in 2020 when DEX spot trading captured and maintained over 8% market share. The presence of major firms as validators further strengthens Hyperliquid’s competitive position in the market. Alongside these developments, HYPE token valuations have been approaching all-time highs, suggesting confidence in the platform’s continued expansion.

Key Takeaways Hyperliquid’s significant share of global perpetual open interest suggests a shift in market dynamics, with decentralized platforms gaining traction. The participation of major firms as validators indicates institutional confidence in Hyperliquid’s market structure. The consistent rise in HYPE token value appears supportive of market sentiment favoring the platform’s growth prospects. What to Watch Observers are closely monitoring whether Hyperliquid’s growth will spur further movement of participants from CEXs to DEXs. Key indicators include any changes in market share metrics or notable shifts in validator participation. Developments such as partnerships with large enterprises or increased regulatory scrutiny could influence market dynamics significantly. Watch for announcements from Hyperliquid or shifts in CEX strategies that might affect the decentralized market landscape.

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Term Structure

Contract Odds Δ since publish Volume 24h December 31 37.5% — — View market → January 1 2027 4.6% — — View market → January 1 2027 3.5% — — View market → January 1 2027 65.5% — — View market → January 1 2027 8.1% — — View market → January 1 2027 4.5% — — View market →

Key Highlights XRP jumped more than 13% during the initial three trading days of July, advancing from approximately $1.03 to nearly $1.18. Legislative advancement of the CLARITY Act through the U.S. Senate enhanced positive sentiment surrounding XRP’s regulatory environment. Investment products tracking XRP attracted $6.55M in single-day inflows, with total cumulative inflows reaching $1.49B. Historical data reveals July as a consistently profitable month for XRP, averaging 10.4% gains since 2013. Technical analysis identifies critical resistance at $1.20, while support at $1.15 provides downside protection. XRP launched into July with impressive momentum, posting gains exceeding 13% within a mere three-day span. The digital asset advanced from lows near $1.03 to approach $1.18, capturing fresh interest from market participants.

XRP Price This upward movement coincided with a wider cryptocurrency market rebound. The aggregate crypto market capitalization increased 0.86% to reach $2.18 trillion. Bitcoin surged beyond $62,000, while Ethereum advanced above $1,700.

Disappointing U.S. employment figures contributed to the bullish market sentiment. The American economy generated merely 57,000 positions in June, significantly undershooting the anticipated 110,000. This development strengthened expectations for more accommodative monetary conditions moving forward.

Market analyst ChartNerd (@ChartNerdTA) highlighted a significant long-term technical formation via X, identifying an 8.5-year cup and handle pattern emerging on XRP’s price chart. He cautioned that overlooking XRP at the $1 level “could prove costly,” suggesting that sustained Fibonacci support within the handle formation could establish a pathway toward upper resistance zones. His analysis referenced Fibonacci extension targets at $8, $13, and $27.

$XRP 8.5 YEAR CUP & HANDLE ☕️

Ignoring $XRP around $1 on the macro could prove costly. Price is approaching FIB support within the handle structure under 8.5 years of resistance

If FIB support and the GC hold, it opens the path to attack resistance. FIB extensions = $8/$13/$27 https://t.co/r8v5HKDfij pic.twitter.com/s8yb16b4Sj

— 🇬🇧 ChartNerd 📊 (@ChartNerdTA) July 4, 2026

Legislative Developments Strengthen XRP Sentiment Advancement of the CLARITY Act through the U.S. Senate emerged as a primary catalyst for XRP’s appreciation. This proposed legislation carries implications for the regulatory classification of digital assets under American law.

Market participants reacted favorably to XRP’s inclusion within the SEC/CFTC Digital Commodities classification framework. This development prompted capital reallocation into XRP positions. Additionally, Ripple co-founder Chris Larsen’s financial stake in American Perpetuals Exchange Corporation — an entity associated with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand’s son — attracted market attention throughout this timeframe.

Investment Fund Activity Supports Bullish Momentum XRP-focused investment vehicles registered $6.55M in daily inflows as of July 2. Total cumulative inflows climbed to $1.49B, while net assets under management stood at $987.91M.

Source: SoSoValue Spot Bitcoin ETFs similarly reversed their outflow trend on July 2, posting $221.72M in daily net inflows. This marked the conclusion of a 10-day withdrawal period, elevating cumulative net inflows to $51.08B. Ethereum spot ETFs contributed $29.08M in net inflows during the identical session.

Historical performance data compiled by CryptoRank demonstrates July’s track record as a consistently profitable period for XRP across seven consecutive years. Average July performance since 2013 registers at 10.4%. Notably, during July 2020, XRP surged more than 48%.

Examining the four-hour timeframe, XRP traded around $1.1714. The Relative Strength Index registered 79.91, positioning the asset within overbought parameters. The Chaikin Money Flow indicator displayed 0.21, signaling continued accumulation pressure.

Immediate resistance is established at $1.20, where a decisive breakthrough could enable progression toward $1.25. Should prices retract beneath $1.15, the subsequent support zone emerges at $1.10.

https://gemwallet.com/learn/beginners-guide-to-hyperliquid-trading-platform/

Hyperliquid, a decentralized perpetual futures platform, experienced significant activity as $116 million in net inflows into bridged assets occurred within 24 hours. This surge reflects a notable increase in DeFi liquidity and user engagement on the platform, aligning with recent trends in real-world asset activity. Hyperliquid’s native token, HYPE, has been near $65, marking a significant growth trajectory with returns exceeding 1,800% since its launch in November 2024. The platform’s expansion, including partnerships like the upcoming launch with VALR for cross-asset perpetual contracts, has further solidified its competitive position in the market.

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Key Takeaways Market activity suggests strong interest in Hyperliquid, consistent with pricing supportive of YES outcomes for reaching higher price targets. The recent net inflows may indicate increasing confidence in Hyperliquid’s growth potential and market positioning. Current market pricing implies a mixed outlook on Hyperliquid reaching specific price targets by the end of 2026. What to Watch Watch for further developments regarding Hyperliquid’s partnerships and volume, as these could impact price predictions. The upcoming launch with VALR and any new institutional engagements could significantly influence confidence in Hyperliquid’s price trajectory. Observers should also watch for any regulatory developments or shifts in market sentiment that could alter the current pricing landscape.

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What Price Will Hyperliquid Hit Before 2027

Contract Odds Δ since publish Volume 24h December 31 37.5% — — View market → January 1 2027 4.4% — — View market → January 1 2027 3.5% — — View market → January 1 2027 64.5% — — View market → January 1 2027 8.2% — — View market → January 1 2027 4.5% — — View market → Predictfun Fdv Above One Day After Launch

Contract Odds Δ since publish Volume 24h One day after launch 95.2% — — View market → One day after launch 86.5% — — View market → One day after launch 79.5% — — View market → One day after launch 77.5% — — View market → One day after launch 75.5% — — View market → January 1 2028 63.5% — — View market → January 1 2028 54% — — View market → January 1 2028 45.5% — — View market → January 1 2028 46.5% — — View market → January 1 2028 15.6% — — View market → January 1 2028 14.4% — — View market →

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin published a post stating that Ethereum researchers recently held a meeting in Berlin, continuing discussions with client teams initiated in Svalbard in April, to update the blockchain’s long-term protocol roadmap. Vitalik noted that "Lean Ethereum" is not a single upgrade, but a series of protocol evolutions to be rolled out gradually over the next 3 to 4 years—its impact is comparable to The Merge as Ethereum’s second major iteration, while the current phase may mark its third major evolution. He outlined core upcoming changes for Ethereum: replacing direct execution verification with recursive STARK proofs, integrating post-quantum cryptography, adjusting the consensus mechanism to a decoupled design of available chain and finality, and implementing multi-dimensional gas models alongside state structure restructuring. At the state level, Ethereum may form a "two-tier state structure" around 2030, consisting of ~2TB of traditional dynamic state and ~100TB of new scalable state to support scaling needs across different application scenarios. Vitalik emphasized that privacy capabilities will no longer be an add-on feature, but a core goal of protocol design. The system will also rely more on formal verification to boost security, and push the EVM toward higher-level abstractions, with the underlying layer potentially transitioning gradually to RISC-V or leanISA architectures. Key parameters including gas limits, blob sizes, and block times will be adjusted multiple times over the next few years, as Ethereum continues scaling via client optimizations and protocol upgrades. Vitalik concluded that Ethereum is entering a phase of continuous restructuring and scaling, aiming to complete underlying system upgrades without disrupting the existing application ecosystem.

Relevant content

The U.S. CLARITY Act has made further progress, while the county sheriffs' organization has shifted to a neutral stance.

The Major County Sheriffs Association (MCSA) has shifted its stance on the CLARITY Act from opposition to neutrality. In a letter to Senate Banking Committee Chairman Tim Scott and Senator Elizabeth Warren, the organization noted that some of its concerns about Section 604 of the bill have been addressed. Previously, the MCSA had warned that the provision could undermine, to some extent, law enforcement capabilities targeting illegal financial activities related to crypto assets. Section 604 is tied to the Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act, with its core focus on limiting liability for developers of decentralized protocols. Supporters argue that developers should not be held liable as intermediaries for user actions, while law enforcement agencies had earlier raised fears that the provision could create regulatory and enforcement "loopholes" that would hinder investigations into cases like money laundering, ransomware, drug trafficking, and terrorist financing. Despite the neutral stance, the MCSA still calls for including local law enforcement agencies in relevant research and coordination mechanisms in future revisions to boost digital asset crime investigation capabilities. Analysts say this change removes a key obstacle to the CLARITY Act’s progress, boosting its feasibility of advancing to a Senate vote. However, opposition from the banking sector to stablecoin yield products and DeFi regulation remains a major uncertainty.

16 minutes ago

Perspective: The next phase of tokenization will be "customized investment portfolios", rather than just improving settlement efficiency.

Thomas Sy, head of multi-asset solutions at New York Life Investment Management (NYLIM), stated that the next core application of tokenization will be "personalized portfolio construction" rather than just improving settlement efficiency or extending trading hours. NYLIM manages approximately $807 billion in total assets, with about $110 billion overseen by Sy’s team. He noted that blockchain technology will enable asset management firms to customize complex portfolio strategies for different investors at scale—a capability the traditional financial system currently struggles to deliver. Sy added that the future of asset management will center on "high customization," and blockchain is the only technological path capable of achieving this at scale. He emphasized that tokenization is not limited to putting ETFs, bonds or private credit on the blockchain; the key is to restructure the very way portfolios are built. He also pointed out that current portfolios often mix ETFs, bonds and private assets, but personalized strategies are difficult to scale due to operational complexity. Tokenization is expected to "embed customization logic into the assets themselves," reducing operational costs and boosting efficiency. Additionally, Sy said stablecoins have become a key entry point for traditional finance to access on-chain markets. Currently, the stablecoin market capitalization exceeds $300 billion, and they are being used for cross-border payments and fund management. He believes this trend will gradually drive institutional demand for on-chain yield-generating assets. On decentralized finance (DeFi), NYLIM is still researching related applications, but Sy stressed that institutional participation requires more mature infrastructure, including improved tokenized collateral, clearing mechanisms and prime brokerage systems.

16 minutes ago

US national debt has hit $39 trillion, sparking long-term concerns, with analysts warning the risk of an unsustainable fiscal path is rising.

The size of U.S. national debt has risen to around $39 trillion, with public debt equivalent to the total U.S. GDP. Annual interest payments have reached roughly $1 trillion, exceeding the defense budget. The U.S. Treasury system traces its origins to the debt consolidation reform promoted by Alexander Hamilton in 1790, when the federal government assumed the war debts of individual states and promised full repayment, thereby establishing the U.S. credit system and laying the foundation for the global status of the U.S. dollar and U.S. Treasuries. Today, U.S. Treasuries are regarded as one of the core assets of the global financial system, underpinning the reserve currency status of the U.S. dollar and widely held by central banks and financial institutions worldwide. However, as the debt scale continues to expand, market concerns about its long-term sustainability have intensified. According to calculations from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton Budget Model (PWBM), when the debt-to-GDP ratio exceeds around 210%, the fiscal system may face unsustainability risks. Currently, the U.S. ratio stands at roughly 100%, and the U.S. Congressional Budget Office projects it could rise to 175% by 2056. Analysts note that in scenarios of rising healthcare spending and persistent fiscal deficits, this risk threshold could be reached earlier, and the long-term stability of the debt structure is facing more stringent market and policy tests.

16 minutes ago

Iran’s new supreme leader remains unaccounted for, as Tehran continues to hold mourning events for Khamenei.

According to CNN, mourning events for late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei are ongoing in Tehran and multiple Iranian cities, drawing an estimated millions of participants, and will run through July 9. Meanwhile, the international community is uncertain about his successor. Reports indicate his son Mojtaba Khamenei has not made a public appearance, sparking concerns over the power transition and actual governance. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has also warned of security threats targeting the country in the coming days. On the regional front, abnormal shipping activity has been observed in the Strait of Hormuz, with multiple vessels turning back while attempting to transit, and the situation remains uncertain. Separately, U.S. President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have held a phone call and agreed to meet in the U.S. soon, with outside attention focused on further coordination between the two countries amid tensions with Iran.

16 minutes ago

Bitcoin broke through $63,000 this morning, erasing all losses from the end of June, with XRP leading gains among major cryptocurrencies.

Bitcoin rose above $63,000 earlier today for the first time in two weeks, up roughly 3.6% from last week and nearly erasing losses from late June. The rally unfolded during thin trading volume for the U.S. Independence Day holiday, with low liquidity widely seen as amplifying short-term volatility. Among major cryptocurrencies, XRP gained 5.3% to reach $1.18, notching a nearly 10% weekly rise and lifting its market cap to around $73 billion, overtaking USDC to become the fifth-largest crypto asset. On-chain data shows XRP holders’ average losses have hit an extreme historical level, leading some traders to view this as a sentiment reversal signal. Ether (ETH) climbed 3.2% to approximately $1,793, with a weekly gain of ~11.5%; Dogecoin (DOGE) rose 2.6%; Solana (SOL) added around 13.2% week-over-week, extending the broader rebound trend. Analysts attribute the rally to Federal Reserve officials signaling easing inflation pressure, weaker non-farm payroll data, and short covering, with Bitcoin bouncing rapidly from below $60,000 to above $63,000. The market’s future trajectory will hinge on upcoming U.S. inflation data and the return of institutional liquidity after the holiday.

16 minutes ago

BTSE has launched cryptocurrency trading platform BTSE Indonesia in Indonesia.

Blockchain trading and payments firm BTSE Group recently launched cryptocurrency trading platform BTSE Indonesia in Jakarta via a joint venture with PT Aset Kripto Internasional, and completed the rebranding of local licensed platform NVX. It is understood that BTSE will provide trading infrastructure and liquidity support, while the local Indonesian team will handle marketing, business partnerships, sales, and user growth. BTSE Indonesia stated that it has received approval from Indonesia’s Financial Services Authority (OJK) to operate as a regulated digital financial asset trading platform. The license is also expected to support its future expansion into cryptocurrency futures and other businesses in compliance with local regulatory requirements. Official data shows that Indonesia’s cryptocurrency trading volume from January to November 2024 reached 556.5 trillion Indonesian rupiah (equivalent to approximately $31.2 billion), with registered cryptocurrency users hitting 22.11 million as of November 2024.

16 minutes ago