Из жизни альткоинов

Гендиректор крупного американского банка BNY Mellon Робин Винс (Robin Vince) заявил, что банки и крупные финансовые компании могут ускорить массовое использование криптовалют, став мостом между цифровыми активами и традиционными финансами.

Индивидуальные предприниматели-майнеры и добывающие криптовалюту физлица должны успеть до 30 апреля впервые отчитаться о доходах, сообщила Федеральная налоговая служба России (ФНС).

Recently, the XRP price has been in an uptrend, spurred on by the improving macro political climate and the Bitcoin price crossing $70,000. But while this move has brought some much-needed positive sentiment back into the market, one analyst is calling for caution during this time. The call points to the fact that the move above $1.4 might be only temporary and that the price downtrend will resume in short succession, trapping investors in their positions.

The XRP Trendline To Watch For A Lower Break

Over the last few weeks, the XRP price had formed an interesting trendline, which crypto analyst CasiTrades had called out. At a point, the XRP price was still trading above the trendline, suggesting that the trend was still very bullish. However, the digital asset has now seen its price fall below this trendline, putting it in a very perilous position.

CasiTrades explains that the price break below this trendline has seen it begin to act more like resistance at this level. If that is the case, it means that the price might not be able to break out of it, and if it is pushed down, then it could trigger another wave down.

The recent price recovery, the crypto analyst explains, could be a subwave 2 bounce. Such a bounce is historically short-lived and actually tends to give way to more declines. As a result, at the first sign of resistance, it is possible that the XRP price will be harshly rejected, triggering the next move down.

Such a move would eventually see no support above the $1, and this would leave room for the bears to drag the price further down. In fact, the crypto analyst says that the next major support on the leg down lies around $0.87. This would constitute a 40% crash from current levels at the time of writing.

As for levels to watch, CasiTrades says to keep an eye on $1.40-$1.41 for the B wave. For the C wave, the major levels to watch are $1.51-$1.55, and these targets are for the short-term. “Either we head down to $0.87, or we somehow break and hold $1.65 resistance,” the analyst stated.

South Korea’s Financial Services Commission (FSC) has flagged massive crypto outflows to overseas exchanges amidst tougher oversight from regulators.

Inside The South Korean Crypto Report

Around $60 billion (₩90 trillion) worth of crypto assets were moved out to foreign exchanges and private wallets during the second half of 2025, a Wednesday report from the country’s top financial regulator revealed. This represents a 14% increase compared to the first quarter of the year, which saw a $52.2 billion (₩78.9 trillion) outflow.

However, the amount subjected to the Travel Rule (outgoing transactions of ₩1 million or more per transaction by a registered business operator) decreased in a 23%, going from ₩20.2 trillion in the first half of the year to ₩15.6 trillion in the second half.

At the same time, wallet and custody platforms saw a modest uptick in user numbers (779, 20 more than those at the end of June 2025), but the value of assets they hold dropped sharply, partly because benchmark prices for several custodied tokens have fallen.

The number of accounts on South Korean crypto exchanges hit 11.1 million, a 3% increase from June 2025, while customer deposits jumped much faster, surging 31% to about $5.4 billion (₩8.1 trillion). But even with such an expansion, exchanges didn’t end up making more money. The 18 platforms still in operation booked roughly $253.4 million (₩380.7 billion) in operating profit for the second half, a 38% drop from the around $411.2 million (₩617.8 billion) they earned in the first six months.

South Korea Tightens The Crypto Leash: A Recap

This crypto exodus doesn’t necessarily come as a surprise in the light of the latest moves from South Korean regulators, which clearly paint them in crackdown colors. As covered by Bitcoinist earlier this month, the National Tax Service (NTS) announced they are moving ahead with an AI-driven system to track crypto investment gains as they prepare to start taxing virtual asset profits from January 2027. Authorities have also toughen oversight on major crypto exchanges, with Korean giants such as Korbit, Upbit and most recently Bithumb facing penalties and suspensions due to AML and KYC violations.

But that’s not all: last February, authorities signed a new cooperation agreement between the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) and nine major credit card companies, working alongside the customs service, to track and block card-based payments tied to illegal overseas crypto foreign-exchange schemes and cross-border fund outflows. Under the deal, officials will combine card-usage records with immigration data to flag suspicious patterns and cut off channels commonly used to move money into unregistered offshore exchanges. This sits on top of the FIU’s broader 2026 AML agenda, which includes expanding the Travel Rule to smaller transactions and tightening oversight of virtual asset service providers.

All points to Seoul wanting to stem capital flight and money laundering without killing Korea’s position as a major crypto hub, especially as they also move to normalize institutional and corporate participation. Tighter AML and cross‑border controls could reduce some offshore liquidity and arbitrage, but may also push sophisticated capital into more opaque channels or DeFi rails.

Cover image from Perplexity, BTCUSD chart from Tradingview

Комиссия по финансовым услугам Республики Корея (FSC) сообщила, что за вторую половину прошлого года с южнокорейских криптобирж на зарубежные платформы и в частные криптокошельки было выведено 90 трлн вон (около $60 млрд).

Основатель MN Trading Михаэль ван де Поппе (Michael van de Poppe) заявил, что после обвала в феврале биткоин последовательно формирует более высокие минимумы, что указывает на укрепление рыночной структуры.

Tether, the issuer of the biggest stablecoin, has signed on a Big Four accounting firm to complete its first independent audit after years of scrutiny.

Tether Signs Big Four Firm To Provide Assurance That USDT Is Fully Backed

According to a website announcement, Tether has entered a formal engagement with a Big Four audit firm for what the stablecoin issuer describes as the biggest inaugural audit of all time in financial markets. “This audit represents years of work to strengthen our systems so that Tether can meet the highest standards applied in global finance,” noted Paolo Ardoino, Tether CEO.

Tether is a cryptocurrency company that’s most popularly known for being the issuer of the stablecoin USDT. The firm’s token is the largest stablecoin in the sector by market cap and ranks third overall behind Bitcoin and Ethereum.

Over the years, Tether has faced criticism over the lack of transparency and how its stablecoin is backed. Back in 2021, the United States Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) fined the firm $41 million for falsely claiming that USDT was fully backed by US dollar reserves.

Now, with the audit, it seems the company wants to upgrade on this front. “For the hundreds of millions of people and businesses who rely on USD₮ every day, this audit is not just a compliance exercise; it is about accountability, resilience, and confidence in the infrastructure they depend on,” said Ardoino.

As for who the company that’s going to audit Tether is, the exact name is currently unknown. The announcement has just noted that it’s a Big Four firm, which means that it’s one of KPMG, EY, Deloitte, or PwC. Simon McWilliams, Tether Chief Financial Officer, noted:

The Big Four Firm was selected through a competitive process because the organisation is already operating at Big Four audit standard; the audit will be delivered.

Earlier this year, Tether launched a new stablecoin called USAT, specifically aimed at the US market. The company had previously stepped away from the nation following regulatory scrutiny. The new token, backed by dollars, complies fully with the country’s newly established stablecoin framework following the passage of the GENIUS Act last year.

As mentioned earlier, USDT is the largest stablecoin in the sector. Its market cap of $184 billion alone accounts for nearly 60% of the total stablecoin market cap. Meanwhile, the closest competitor, USDC, has a market cap of $78 billion.

Overall, the stablecoin sector has done relatively well during the last few months despite a bearish shift in the wider digital assets market, with its combined market cap currently sitting around an all-time high (ATH), according to data from DefiLlama.

Bitcoin Price

Bitcoin recovered above $71,000 earlier in the day, but the coin has seen another setback as its price has now returned to $69,300.

Блокчейн-исследователь ZachXBT раскритиковал компанию Circle — эмитента стейблкоина USDC — за блокировку 16 кошельков, которые, по его оценке, не связаны с незаконной деятельностью и использовались в рамках обычных бизнес-операций.

An Australian pension fund is exploring offering Bitcoin and other digital assets to its members as investment options.

A Rare Bitcoin Move

In what Bloomberg fittingly calls a “rare move”, Hostplus, a A$150 billion+ ($105 billion) Australian pension fund, is considering this cryptocurrency venture due to the high demand from some members, said Chief Investment Officer Sam Sicilia in an interview:

“There’s certainly a demand from some of our members who write in and say ‘why can’t I have access to cryptocurrency?’”

The fund is still in design phase, Sicilia clarified, and there are yet several capital matters to resolve, especially around safeguarding consumers. Besides, its implementation would depend entirely on regulatory approval. The CIO, however, is not worried about the wait and is ready to give regulators room the time they need:

“We’d love to get regulatory tick off, even if it means waiting another six months. We are long-term investors. Six months doesn’t really move the dial for us”

Were it to become a reality, the plan could come to fruition as soon as next financial year. Sicilia explained that the fund would add bitcoin and the other digital assets to its Choiceplus investment option, which lets members manage their own retirement portfolios. At present, only about 1% of the fund’s total assets sit in Choiceplus.

Hostplus first looked at cryptocurrencies a decade ago, and since then both Bitcoin and the broader crypto scene have change and evolved immensely. But the other digital assets the fund plans to incorporate are not just in the crypto asset class: music rights are included in those other digital assets, the Hostplus’ CIO added:

“We’re now at the stage where we’re revisiting digital currencies, not just Bitcoin, but just the broader range of digital currencies”

A Trillion-Dollar Industry

As niche as it sounds, Australia’s pension industry is consolidating into fewer mega-funds and is projected to hit A$5.7 trillion by 2030, concentrating power in a handful of allocators. Therefore, even a limited crypto allocation in a large fund’s self-directed sleeve could be an important signal for global institutions watching pensions as a late-cycle adopter.

Only isolated cases like AMP’s move into Bitcoin futures in 2024 have broken ranks so far. Regulators and many CIOs continue to cite high volatility and drawdowns from prior peaks as the main reason to keep crypto away from “safe” retirement pots.

Large pools of capital are gradually testing Bitcoin as a store-of-value or diversification play, especially after the US opened retirement channels more to crypto and spot ETFs normalized institutional access, as reported by our sister website NewsBTC back in February.

Despite that even a small on-ramp from a fund this size could matter at the margin in a market increasingly driven by institutional flows, pension adoption remains slow and regulators are still skeptical. Traders should treat this as an early test case rather than a green light for broad superannuation FOMO into Bitcoin.

Cover image from Perplexity, BTCUSD chart from Tradingview

Одним из ключевых факторов, объясняющих узкий диапазон колебаний курса биткоина, является его накопление инвесторами, заявил аналитик ончейн-платформы CryptoQuant под псевдонимом Darkfost.

Michael Selig, Chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), announced on Tuesday the launch of an Innovation Task Force to provide clearer regulatory guidance to firms developing crypto, blockchain, and artificial intelligence (AI) products in the US derivatives markets. 

New CFTC Initiative 

According to the agency’s release, the newly established task force will work alongside the agency’s Innovation Advisory Committee and coordinate closely with other federal bodies, including the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and its Crypto Task Force, to craft practical rules for emerging technologies. 

Its mandate covers three broad areas: crypto assets and blockchain technologies; artificial intelligence and autonomous systems; and prediction markets and event contracts. 

Selig framed the initiative as part of a wider Commission effort to execute an “innovation agenda” that balances market development with appropriate oversight. The Chairman said: 

By establishing a clear regulatory framework for innovators building on the new frontier of finance, we can foster responsible innovation at home and ensure American market participants are not left on the sidelines.

Selig had underscored the urgency of the work in a social media post on Monday, saying that previous regulatory ambiguity had driven many crypto firms offshore and left the industry in limbo. 

Regulators Move To Clarify Crypto

The task force announcement follows recent joint action by the SEC and the CFTC to clarify the classification of crypto assets. That guidance, released amid the stalled CLARITY Act debate on Capitol Hill, seeks to resolve years of uncertainty by mapping how federal securities rules apply to different types of digital assets. 

Central to the guidance is a structured taxonomy that separates digital commodities, digital collectibles, digital tools, stablecoins, and digital securities. 

The agencies also emphasized that a token’s regulatory status can change over time: a non-security crypto asset can become subject to securities law based on how it is used or how its economic characteristics evolve, and conversely could cease to be treated as an investment contract.

Both regulators characterized this approach as a significant departure from previous enforcement actions under the Biden administration, providing firms and investors with a clearer framework for assessing compliance risks. SEC Chair Atkins stated: 

After more than a decade of uncertainty, this interpretation will provide market participants with a clear understanding of how the Commission treats crypto assets under federal securities laws.

As of this writing, the total crypto market capitalization had dropped to $2.35 trillion. This was led by drops in Ethereum (ETH), XRP, and Bitcoin (BTC) prices on Tuesday, amounting to 1.5%, 3%, and 2%, respectively. 

Featured image from OpenArt, chart from TradingView.com 

Директор по развитию цифровых активов в BlackRock Роберт Митчник (Robert Mitchnick) заявил, что в долгосрочной перспективе искусственный интеллект может оказать большее влияние на крипторынок, чем появление новых токенов.

Правительство Бутана перевело около 519,7 BTC (примерно $36,75 млн) на два кошелька, сообщили аналитики Arkham Intelligence. Один из адресов связан с торговой фирмой QCP Capital, что может указывать на подготовку к продаже активов.

Ущерб от нелегального майнинга в Краснодарском крае в 2025 году составил 18,2 млн рублей против 745 000 рублей годом ранее, сообщили в «Кубаньэнерго».

In a closed-door meeting on Capitol Hill, crypto industry leaders reviewed the latest text of the long-awaited crypto market structure bill, which focused on key proposals to address the stablecoin yield and rewards dispute.

Latest CLARITY Act Draft Says No To Stablecoin Yield

On Monday, the crypto industry got the first look at the latest version of the crypto market structure bill, known as the CLARITY Act, which addresses the main issue that has stalled the legislation over the past two months.

Industry sources shared details of the latest legislative text with the Journalist Eleanor Terret. According to an internal stakeholder email shared with Terret, the proposal would prohibit platforms from offering yield, directly or indirectly, for holding a stablecoin, or in a manner that resembles a bank deposit.

Notably, this restriction would broadly apply to digital asset service providers, including exchanges and brokers, as well as their affiliates. The proposal seeks to limit workarounds and prohibit any activity that is “economically or functionally equivalent” to interest, addressing concerns from the banking industry side.

It’s worth noting that the crypto market structure bill has been stalled since the Senate Banking Committee published its draft in mid-January. The text included several divisive policies, including significant restrictions for DeFi and the payment of interest on stablecoins.

The yield dispute became a major sticking point between the banking and crypto industries, leading to a prolonged negotiation period. The banking side has criticized the landmark stablecoin legislation, the GENIUS Act, for loopholes that could allegedly put the financial system at risk and distort market dynamics.

Ahead of the January draft, banks pressed lawmakers to include language in the CLARITY Act that bans yield on stablecoins from crypto exchanges, brokers, and related entities, rather than only issuers.

To address this issue, the Senate Banking Committee proposed that issuers offer rewards for specific actions, such as account openings and cashback, but prohibited interest payments to passive token holders. A month ago, the White House held a meeting to negotiate between the two sides.

As reported by Bitcoinist, Patrick Witt, executive director of the US President’s Council of Advisors on Digital Assets, reportedly brought a draft text that left earning yield on idle stablecoin balance “effectively off the table,” narrowing the debate to whether crypto firms could offer rewards linked to specific activities.

Terret’s report shared that the latest proposal would allow rewards based on user activity, including loyalty, promotional, or subscription programs, if they are not considered equivalent to interest from an economic or functional standpoint.

In addition, the latest version of the CLAIRTY Act would require the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), and the Treasury Department to collaborate to define acceptable rewards and establish anti-evasion regulations within a year.

Rewards Compromise Sees Mixed Reactions

The text has received mixed reactions from the crypto industry, with some calling the language more “restrictive.” One crypto industry leader who reviewed the text told Terret that the draft “is a ‘departure’ from what had been previously discussed with the White House.”

The unnamed source reportedly warned that the “economic equivalence” standard on stablecoin rewards is vague, risking a more restrictive interpretation by future regulators. Furthermore, they highlighted the potential challenges in structuring incentives due to limits on tying rewards to balances or transaction amounts. “Overall, this is a more narrow and restrictive approach toward crypto,” they stated.

On the contrary, another unnamed industry leader considers that the text is “largely in line with expectations.” They told Terret that the draft reflects a “balanced outcome” that preserves transaction-based incentives while making clear stablecoins cannot function like interest-bearing deposit accounts.

“This is the best possible result,” they reportedly affirmed, concluding that the text is “broader than the initial Tillis-Alsobrooks proposal, which would have been more restrictive on crypto.” Bank representatives will now review the draft at a similar meeting on Tuesday.

Управление по конфискации преступных активов Ирландии (CAB) получило доступ к считавшемуся утраченным криптокошельку с 500 BTC. Средства являются частью 6000 BTC, конфискованных у осужденного наркоторговца Клифтона Коллинза (Clifton Collins) по прозвищу «Дублинец».

Российский минфин рассматривает возможность распространения требований об обязательной репатриации экспортной выручки на криптовалюты. Об этом заявил замглавы ведомства Иван Чебесков.

The Solana Foundation announced on Tuesday the Solana Developer Platform (SDP), an application programming interface (API) toolset aimed to assist corporations and financial institutions in developing and deploying blockchain-native products on the newly released platform. 

Framed as an “AI-ready” environment, SDP boasts key infrastructure across the Solana ecosystem into a single interface intended to lower technical and operational barriers for institutional builders while ensuring compliance and scale.

Solana Dev. Platform Breakdown

According to the Foundation’s blog post, SDP is organized around three core API modules that together address issuance, payments, and trading use cases. 

The issuance module lets organizations create tokenized deposits, stablecoins under the United States’ GENIUS Act framework, and tokenized real-world assets (RWAs). 

The payments module supports orchestration of fiat and stablecoin flows — including on-ramps, off-ramps, and on-chain stablecoin transactions — to power business-to-business (B2B), business-to-consumer (B2C), and peer-to-peer (P2P) payment scenarios. 

A trading module, which the Foundation says will arrive later in 2026, is intended to enable financial flows such as atomic swaps, vaults, and on-chain FX. At launch, the issuance and payments modules are already live; the trading functionality will follow in a subsequent release, the blog post said.

Catherine Gu, Head of Product, Digital Assets at the Solana Foundation, emphasized that SDP aggregates protocol features such as token extensions for permissioning and privacy and directly integrates with Solana’s developer ecosystem. 

She noted the platform’s initial partner integrations and said the level of early interest from enterprises demonstrates strong demand for a simplified, compliant path to building on Solana.

Mastercard And Western Union Join SDP Pilots

Notably, the Foundation revealed that traditional finance (TradFi) giant Mastercard is tapping the platform for stablecoin settlement, and Western Union is experimenting with cross-border payments. Raj Dhamodharan, Executive Vice President, Blockchain & Digital Assets, Mastercard, stated on the matter:

As an early user of Solana Developer Platform, we’re helping enable direct stablecoin settlement for customers on select blockchain networks — beginning with Solana — combining the speed and programmability of blockchain with the reliability, security, and global reach of the Mastercard network.

To meet institutional needs, Solana selected a slate of infrastructure partners across four categories: node infrastructure, wallets, compliance, and ramps. 

Node providers such as Alchemy, Helius, QuickNode, and Triton are intended to abstract blockchain complexity and enable no-code or low-code onboarding.

The wallet cohort — including Anchorage Digital, BitGo, Coinbase, Crossmint, Dfns, Dynamic, and others — offers custody and experimentation options. 

Compliance partners such as Chainalysis, Elliptic, and TRM aim to ensure know-your-customer (KYC) and Travel Rule requirements are integrated. Ramps like Bridge, BVNK, and MoonPay support the payments module’s on- and off-ramp flows. 

The platform also supports out-of-the-box use by artificial intelligence coding tools such as Claude Code by Anthropic and Codex by OpenAI. 

At the time of writing, the blockchain’s native token, SOL, traded at $89.69, recording losses of 5% in the weekly time frame, according to CoinGecko data. 

Featured image from OpenArt, chart from TradingView.com 

Блокчейн-сыщик под псевдонимом ZachXBT опубликовал серию сообщений в соцсети X, в которых указал на возможную причастность российского внебиржевого брокера Александра Хинкиса к транзакциям на сумму около $4,7 млн, предположительно полученным хакерскими группами.

Как устроены реальные платежные коридоры с криптовалютой, где сегодня проходят невидимые «красные линии» комплаенса и санкционного контроля, и как выстроить рабочую схему так, чтобы платеж долетал до поставщика, а не зависал на проверках?