Cointelegraph

The road from believing “crypto is a scam” to “Bitcoin is a legitimate asset class” is a long way to travel, fraught with many a twist and turn.
Yet against all the odds, a surprising number of high-profile skeptics have undertaken the journey unscathed and, perhaps more remarkably, without ever admitting they were wrong.
The very naysayers who once warned of a “crypto apocalypse” have begun preaching the virtues of blockchain rails and launching tokenized products of their own.
From Bitcoin exchange-traded funds to tokenized gold, here are five of the biggest crypto backflips.
Born-again crypto converts
Larry Fink: 'Index of money laundering' to ETF king
Larry Fink may be the archetypal born-again crypto convert. In 2017, the BlackRock chief executive cast Bitcoin as an “index of money laundering,” nicely capturing mainstream finance’s view at the time of a market they believed was dominated by wild speculation and dubious flows.
As a side note: people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. While money laundering in crypto was estimated at $82 billion in 2025, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime estimates that roughly $800 billion to $2 trillion is laundered the old fashioned way each year.
It's not entirely clear why Fink decided to recalibrate but by 2020 he started acknowledging its potential, in 2023 he was actively defending BlackRock's crypto push, and today BlackRock has become one of the most important institutional access points to Bitcoin via spot ETFs, helping pull the asset into the heart of the regulated investment universe.
In his annual shareholder letters, Fink now waxes lyrical about tokenization and writes impassioned OpEds about how it is set to transform the financial system.
Reluctant but will make money anyway
Jamie Dimon: still hates Bitcoin, loves the rails
If Fink is a born-again believer, Jamie Dimon sits squarely in the reluctant and still skeptical camp.
The JPMorgan chief has called Bitcoin a “fraud,” crypto investors “stupid,” and warned that BTC will blow up on more than one occasion, not to mention using Congressional hearings as a platform to reiterate his distaste for the asset.
But watch what he does, not what he says as JPMorgan has quietly become one of Wall Street’s biggest blockchain infrastructure providers.
The world’s largest bank has built out its Onyx division, rolled out JPM Coin, experimented with linking bank infrastructure to crypto wallets, and developed tokenized collateral platforms to move cash and securities around more efficiently.
Oh sure, Dimon still trashes Bitcoin in public, but JPMorgan now sells many of the rails that make institutional digital asset markets viable.
Peter Schiff: gold forever, but now onchain
Peter Schiff hasn’t softened his rhetoric as prices and adoption grow. If anything, each Bitcoin rally only amplifies his warnings about bubbles, “greater fools,” and inevitable collapse. It's a highly effective form of advertising for Schiff's beloved gold industry.
Peter Schiff's infamous “greater fools” comment. Source: Peter Schiff
Yet even the perpetual goldbug has edged into the digital asset world by launching a tokenized gold platform, T-Gold.com, in December 2025, that uses blockchain to represent vaulted bullion as transferable tokens.
The product lets users buy physical gold and silver stored in segregated vaults and receive digital tokens representing specific quantities of the metals, with ownership recorded on a blockchain.
For Schiff, this is not apostasy but reinforcement: a way to tell crypto-native investors “you can keep the rails, but swap the asset for something with thousands of years of monetary history instead.”
Nouriel Roubini: Technodollars, not Bitcoin
Nouriel Roubini, once known in crypto circles as “Dr. Doom,” might seem like an unlikely candidate for any kind of crypto conversion.
He has spent years describing most digital assets as “useless,” warning of a “crypto apocalypse,” and cataloguing the sector’s governance failures, conflicts of interest, and investor harm.
Yet this week, he published a whitepaper co-authored with Atlas Capital and announced USAFi, a tokenized instrument marketed as a regulated permissionless security, designed to embody what he calls the “Technodollar.”
USAFi whitepaper. Source: Atlas AI Labs
Roubini insists this is “not a reversal,” telling Cointelegraph he “remains skeptical of unbacked crypto assets whose value depends primarily on speculation rather than fundamentals.”
The Technodollar, he argued, is about “modernizing the financial system through regulated, asset-backed digital instruments that can be trusted by institutions and individuals alike.”
He added that he still believes most crypto assets “suffer from excessive speculation, weak governance, conflicts of interest, and insufficient investor protections.”
Don’t understand it, but happy to cash in
Donald Trump: vibes over whitepapers
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Donald Trump belongs in a category of his own. The same politician who once said Bitcoin “seems like a scam” and warned that it could undermine dollar hegemony later rebranded himself as the “crypto president.”
Trump has flirted with nonfungible token drops, launched his own meme coin and one for his wife, and pitched himself as the defender of domestic crypto innovation against overreaching regulators (all while reportedly pocketing over $2.3 billion from his various crypto endeavors since 2024).
Trump promised to end Joe Biden's war on crypto. Source: Vivek Ramaswamy
He may not be able to tell you the difference between proof-of-work and proof-of-stake, but he does understand his constituencies.
The crypto industry has matured into an important voting bloc, and its donors are increasingly strategic. What matters is the ability to read a room full of HODLers and say the right words about freedom, innovation, and firing Gary Gensler.
What changed: faith, incentives, or both?
Born-again converts like Fink have reframed crypto and tokenization as extensions of their existing mission, encouraged by clear demand and the opportunity to graft new fee streams onto enormous asset management franchises.
The reluctant skeptics, on the other hand, have tried to draw bright lines between “bad crypto” and “good digital finance,” and the opportunists, well, they’ve learned that even a shallow embrace of digital assets can unlock both support and riches.
Of course, whether these moves represent genuine intellectual evolution or a simple instinct to follow the money remains to be seen. But perhaps the bigger question is: which crypto skeptic will be the next to see the light? Is it too much to hope that Warren Buffett will review his famed opinion about Bitcoin that it is "rat poison squared?"
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Strategy is adopting a new capital framework that allows it to monetize part of its Bitcoin holdings to fund dividends, build cash reserves and repurchase securities while maintaining its long-term Bitcoin strategy.
In a Monday 8-K filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Strategy introduced its “Digital Credit Capital Framework,” which includes a Bitcoin monetization program and changes to its STRC preferred stock dividend policy.
The company has raised the STRC annual dividend rate to 12% from 11.5% and authorized separate buyback programs for preferred securities and its Class A MSTR common stock. Strategy said it may sell Bitcoin (BTC) to raise as much as $1.25 billion to increase its cash reserve, pay dividends and debt costs, as well as fund stock buybacks.
The filing comes amid a volatile stretch that has seen the value of MSTR shares slide almost 50% year-to-date while the price of STRC on Friday dropped as low as $71.25, a 28.75% discount to par, according to TradingView data. Grayscale's research head Zach Pandl last week said Strategy should sell $3 billion in Bitcoin to cover its cash obligations.
Ahead of Monday's Nasdaq open, investors had bid up MSTR share price more than 5.5%.
Strategy boosts cash reserve to $2.55 billion
A key part of the new framework is the company's cash reserve, which it said has grown to $2.55 billion, or enough to cover about 17 months of preferred stock dividends and interest payments.
Under the new policy, the reserve can only be used for those payments and must be maintained at a minimum of 12 months unless the board approves otherwise.
Source: Michael Saylor
Strategy executive chairman Michael Saylor said the existing cash reserve, combined with the $1.25 billion Bitcoin monetization capacity, gives Strategy up to $3.8 billion in dividend coverage, or nearly 26 months.
“Strategy expects to remain disciplined in its use of MSTR issuance, particularly when the stock trades at or near 1x mNAV,” Saylor added.
No Bitcoin purchases as Strategy raises $1.15 billion
The biggest public Bitcoin treasury company also reported that it did not acquire any BTC during the week ended Sunday, leaving its holdings unchanged at 847,363 BTC purchased for a combined $64.1 billion, at an average of $75,651 apiece. At last look, traders were paying about $60,018 to buy the token.
The company has added a net 3,625 BTC so far in June after buying 3,657 BTC and selling 32 BTC earlier in the month.
Source: SEC
At the same time, the company disclosed raising around $1.15 billion in net proceeds by selling 12.67 million MSTR shares.
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Bitcoin infrastructure company Breez has added a feature to its developer toolkit that lets users send USDC (USDC) and USDt (USDT) across more than 30 blockchain networks directly from a Bitcoin balance, without first converting or holding stablecoins.
According to an announcement shared with Cointelegraph, the feature uses the Lightning Network alongside automated conversion to route payments from Bitcoin (BTC) to USDC or USDT before delivering funds to the recipient's preferred blockchain.
When a user enters a recipient's wallet address, the Breez SDK identifies the destination blockchain, calculates a conversion route and displays the amount, network and fees before the payment is confirmed. The transaction is then routed through liquidity providers, including Flashnet and Boltz, which convert the sender's Bitcoin into stablecoins and deliver it on the recipient's chosen blockchain.
Roy Sheinfeld, CEO of Breez, told Cointelegraph the feature does not require USDT or USDC to be issued on the Lightning Network. Instead, it relies on "interoperability" to let users spend from a Bitcoin balance while recipients receive stablecoins on supported blockchain networks.
Breez said users continue holding Bitcoin until they initiate a payment, while recipients receive stablecoins on their preferred blockchain without requiring the sender to manage separate stablecoin balances. The feature is non-custodial and initially supports only outbound stablecoin payments, with support for receiving stablecoins from external blockchain networks planned for a future release.
The feature is designed to allow developers to add stablecoin payments without integrating multiple blockchain networks or requiring users to manage separate Bitcoin and stablecoin balances.
Bitcoin payment infrastructure expands
The launch comes as companies expand Bitcoin and the Lightning Network, a layer-2 payment network designed to make Bitcoin transactions faster and less expensive, into new financial and commercial applications.
In February, Secure Digital Markets, an institutional trading and lending desk, completed a $1 million Bitcoin payment to Kraken over the Lightning Network in less than half a second, demonstrating the protocol's potential for high-value institutional transfers. The transaction illustrated how Lightning is increasingly being tested for use cases beyond small retail payments.
That same month, Bitcoin infrastructure company Voltage introduced a US dollar-settled revolving credit line that embeds business credit into Lightning payment flows, allowing companies to settle repayments in either US dollars or Bitcoin. The product is intended to enable businesses to access working capital using Lightning for payments, without holding crypto on their balance sheets.
Event platform Satlantis also launched a Bitcoin-native ticketing platform with embedded Lightning wallets, allowing organizers to sell tickets and accept BTC alongside traditional payment methods.
In March, Tether-backed Bitcoin infrastructure startup Ark Labs in a $5.2 million funding round to develop technology supporting stablecoin issuance, transfers and settlement on Bitcoin.
Lightning adoption has continued to grow. A February report from River estimated the network surpassed $1 billion in monthly transaction volume in late 2025, up from around $12 million in 2021.
Lightning Network transaction volumes continue to grow. Source: River
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Prediction-market operators are bringing trading infrastructure in-house, a rapid shift that could trigger a wave of acquisitions across crypto platforms, sportsbooks, brokerages and standalone exchanges, according to analysts at Bernstein.
In a research report on Monday, Bernstein said the industry is going through “operational consolidation,” with major platforms moving to control more of the prediction-market stack.
“Every consumer platform that matters has merged the front and back end of the prediction-market stack,” they said. This includes distribution, brokerage, exchange and clearing. That convergence had placed businesses that historically operated in separate industries within a single competitive landscape.
Bernstein pointed to Robinhood routing major World Cup contracts through Rothera, the exchange it jointly owns with Susquehanna, and DraftKings launching DKeX and moving volume away from CME and Crypto.com infrastructure. The firm also cited Coinbase’s acquisition of The Clearing Company and its launch of event contracts as evidence that consumer platforms are seeking to control more of the prediction-market stack.
Owning the infrastructure allows platforms to retain fees that previously flowed to outside partners, making acquisitions a faster route to distribution, licenses, or completing missing parts of the stack. However, the same convergence that strengthens the case for consolidation could also heighten state and federal scrutiny by further blurring the regulatory boundary between financial trading and gambling.
Timeline of acquisitions. Source: Bernstein
Regulatory clash could constrain consolidation
Bernstein said regulatory scrutiny remains one of the main barriers to larger integrations across the prediction-market sector.
While combining crypto platforms with brokerages, sportsbooks and exchanges could improve margins and reduce reliance on outside partners, Bernstein said such deals could attract antitrust scrutiny and deepen disputes over whether sports event contracts should be regulated as financial derivatives or gambling products.
That could further stoke the jurisdictional conflict already playing out across several states. Minnesota enacted what the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) described as the first outright ban on prediction markets, while Illinois adopted legislation requiring platforms to obtain a state license before offering sports event contracts.
Valuation of online sports books compared to leading prediction markets.
Source: Bernstein.
Kalshi challenged both states’ restrictions, arguing that federally regulated exchanges fall under the CFTC’s exclusive authority.
The growing resistance suggests that consolidation may make commercial sense but remain difficult to execute until regulators and courts settle where federal derivatives oversight ends and state gambling authority begins.
Magazine: Bitcoin slides to $58K, XRP hits $1 but onchain data promising: Market Moves

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin published a technical essay outlining how cryptography could one day enable people to vote privately onchain without relying on a trusted group to manage ballots or reveal the result.
In a blog post on Monday, Buterin said a cryptographic approach called indistinguishability obfuscation (iO), combined with blockchain infrastructure, could support private and collusion-resistant voting with “almost no trust assumption.” The approach would replace threshold committees, which jointly decrypt voting data, with protected programs designed only to reveal the outcome.
Private onchain voting remains dependent on groups of operators safeguarding information and behaving honestly. Removing that dependency could make decentralized governance harder to manipulate, reduce the risk of insider interference and allow voters to participate without exposing how they voted, according to Buterin.
However, Buterin said the technology remains impractical. He said the most conservative constructions require what he described as “galactic” amounts of computation. He said faster approaches rely on less-tested security assumptions, which means that the idea presents a more long-term research direction rather than a deployment-ready system.
Source: Vitalik Buterin
How indistinguishability obfuscation could protect onchain votes
According to Buterin, iO is a form of cryptography that turns software into a protected program. People can run the program and receive the intended output, but they cannot inspect its internal code or extract the data stored inside it. Buterin described the concept as hiding the code rather than the information being processed.
For onchain voting, Buterin said an obfuscated program could contain the logic needed to process encrypted ballots and reveal the final tally without exposing individual votes, essentially removing the need for a threshold committee whose members collectively hold the keys required to decrypt the result.
Buterin said blockchains would still play a key role because an obfuscated program cannot prevent itself from being copied or independently maintain changing information.
Buterin’s broader privacy push
Buterin previously connected iO with private voting in his Ethereum roadmap published in October 2024. He said the approach could provide stronger privacy and resistance to coercion. His latest essay expands on that earlier proposal by examining how the underlying cryptography could be constructed, the security assumptions it requires and the technical barriers preventing it from becoming practical.
In April 2025, Buterin proposed a more immediate privacy roadmap for Ethereum, calling for privacy tools to be integrated into existing wallets. The proposal also advocated for stronger protections against data collection by infrastructure providers that wallets use to access Ethereum.
Buterin also drew funding from his personal holdings to fund privacy-preserving technologies. On Jan. 30, he earmarked 16,384 Ether (ETH), worth about $45 million at the time, to fund initiatives focused on privacy, open infrastructure and self-sovereign tools.
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The European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) framework is producing uneven crypto licensing across member states and European Economic Area (EEA) jurisdictions, with Germany leading approvals under the new regime that takes effect on Wednesday.
Data from the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) interim register, compiled on Friday, shows Germany has 57 MiCA-authorized crypto-asset service providers (CASPs), accounting for about 23% of the 244 total licenses issued.
France follows with 26 companies, or roughly 11% of all approvals, placing it alongside the Netherlands as the bloc’s second-largest hub for MiCA licensing.
The pattern suggests that although MiCA is designed to create a single European crypto market, implementation remains fragmented across national regulators ahead of the July 1 transitional deadline.
France leads late-June approval wave
While Germany leads overall MiCA licensing, France has recently accelerated approvals, accounting for the largest share of last-minute authorizations.
According to ESMA interim data, France issued five CASP approvals between June 18 and June 22, the most during that window. In total, 11 approvals were issued across EU and EEA jurisdictions during the period, with Malta following France with two authorizations.
MiCA CASP licenses issued during the period from June 18-25, 2026. Source: ESMA
France’s authorizations include CASPs such as Bpifrance Investissement, RCUBE Asset Management, Paymium, Leonod and Meria.
The concentration of MiCA approvals in Germany, France and the Netherlands reflects broader patterns in Europe’s financial system. According to 2024 EU data, Germany, France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Ireland collectively accounted for around 72% of the financial assets and liabilities of financial corporations in the bloc.
Cointelegraph approached Germany’s Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin) for comment on the matter but did not receive a response by the time of publication.
Five EU states have not issued any MiCA licenses
Five EU member states, including Greece, Hungary, Poland, Portugal and Romania, have not issued any MiCA licenses as of June 26, according to ESMA interim register data.
Greece stands out after Binance applied for authorization in the country but later withdrew its application, shifting its eventually licensing plans to another MiCA jurisdiction.
European jurisdictions ranked by the number of approved CASPs under MiCA as of June 26, 2026. Source: ESMA
Poland is also notable, with delays in MiCA implementation legislation followed by three reported presidential vetoes, leaving the country without an active licensing framework by the time of the EU deadline.
In contrast, Italy dominated ESMA’s non-compliant CASP register as of June 26, accounting for an overwhelming majority of entries with 160 out of 162, while the Netherlands and Slovakia recorded one each, linked to MEXC and LWEX, respectively.
Additional reporting by Yohan Yun.
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Bitcoin (BTC) nears the end of June and Q2 2026 threatening to lose $60,000 support — can RSI divergences save bulls?
Key points:
Bitcoin RSI data is printing key bullish divergences that were absent from previous dips in 2026.
Traders remain concerned about a support collapse as analysis makes a key 2022 bear-market comparison.
Macro data hinges on the labor market and Iran peace deal, with a potential crypto tailwind due.
Where June fails, July historically comes through for Bitcoin bulls.
Onchain data sees Bitcoin’s “first bottoming flag” already present.
Bitcoin RSI divergence stands out in 2026 bear market
A classic BTC price leading indicator continues to boost the odds of a recovery as June comes to an end, TradingView data shows.
BTC/USD one-week chart with daily, weekly RSI. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
As Cointelegraph reported, relative strength index (RSI) cues across multiple time frames are locking in bullish divergences with price.
“$BTC is printing a bullish RSI divergence while a potential double bottom forms,” Bitcoin whale Gerla, owner of the Gerla trading group, told X followers about the four-hour chart on Sunday.
“This is getting interesting.”
BTC/USD four-hour chart with RSI data. Source: Gerla/X
The sense of anticipation is increasing across the trading community, with pseudonymous trader and commentator Heisenberg noting a key divergence between Bitcoin’s latest macro lows and previous dips in 2026.
“Small sample size but still noteworthy. Notice the last two oversold RSI divergences (in orange) formed bottoms,” they wrote alongside a chart on X.
“The last two recent drops (in blue) had no RSI divergences... UNTIL NOW... Is this the one?”
BTC/USD one-day chart with RSI data. Source: Heisenberg/X
RSI divergences have accompanied some of the most significant trend changes in Bitcoin history, including the end of its previous bear market in late 2022.
$60,000 sparks mid-2022 comparison
Bitcoin saw modest upside as the week began after sealing a weekly close below $59,500 — its first since September 2024. $60,000 is now increasingly acting as resistance, with bulls unable to exert significant momentum.
BTC/USD one-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
“Quite funny enough, this is not a bad start of the week for Bitcoin as it bounces upwards,” crypto trader and analyst Michaël van de Poppe responded in his latest X analysis.
“We need to see way more momentum, and a clear break above $61,000, however, the bullish divergence is there and shouldn't be ignored.”
BTC/USDT 12-hour chart with RSI, volume, MACD data. Source: Michaël van de Poppe/X
With the monthly and quarterly closes approaching, trader Killa suggested that upcoming BTC price action would be particularly significant within the long-term trend.
“A few more days and $BTC reaches my 5th pivot. For the past 18+ months, we've consistently seen major directional shifts around this point at the start of each month,” the explained on Monday.
“Whether it's a pivot low or a pivot high, this is a key time to start paying close attention.”
BTC/USD chart. Source: Killa/X
Data from monitoring resource CoinGlass puts June losses for BTC/USD at nearly 19% — the worst since the 2022 bear market and the sharpest of the year so far.
BTC/USD monthly returns (screenshot). Source: CoinGlass
On the fate of $60,000, meanwhile, commentator Exitpump argued that patience was required.
“Significant support and resistance levels rarely break on the first attempt. They usually require a lot of time, effort, and repeated tests before finally giving way,” they wrote at the weekend.
“60K now reminds me of 30K in 2022.”
BTC/USDT one-week chart. Source: Exitpump/X
Bitcoin spent several months interacting with the $30,000 mark in mid-2022 before finally losing it as support, putting in its bear-market low around five months later.
To the upside, Exitpump expected that a “full blown bull market will be back” once $86,000 reappears.
PMI stands out for crypto in week's macro prints
A mixed bag of US macro data makes for a “short but busy” four-day trading week to end Q2.
Wednesday will see the latest Manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) report from the Institute of Supply Management (ISM) — a potential tailwind for crypto markets.
This continues its breakout from a multiyear downtrend, and estimates see bullish data continuing with a score of around 54, albeit with a potential mild decrease versus last month.
US manufacturing PMI data (screenshot). Source: ISM
Another focus is the labor market as the market reacts to various employment numbers, including the June nonfarm payrolls report on Thursday.
“We have a short but busy week ahead,” trading resource The Kobeissi Letter summarized in a thread on X.
Kobeissi noted that the week would start with a reaction to geopolitical developments as the US and Iran agree to discuss their fragile peace agreement.
“This week also marks the end of Q2 2026 with earnings season on the horizon,” it added.
In the latest edition of its regular newsletter, The Market Mosaic, trading resource Mosaic Asset Company suggested that seasonality could boost stocks next.
“The S&P 500 is about to enter one of the best months of the year for calendar seasonality,” it explained.
“While weakness in the back half of June is common, July ranks as the best performing month based on data going back nearly 100 years.”
S&P 500 seasonality data. Source: Mosaic Asset Company
Bitcoin has seen mixed correlation activity versus equities in recent months, with even crypto-industry analysis calling the BTC-tech stock relationship “overblown.”
“$BTC vs S&P 500 back at the level it held during the Yen Carry trade blowup and the initial June low,” trader Daan Crypto Trades observed this weekend, referring to BTC price downside triggers over the past year.
“If you believe in people trading relative values or ratios on different assets, then you will see that this is an important level to hold for $BTC relative to stocks. Because down here there is not much support left until you're at the late 2023 pre spot ETF rally levels.”
BTC/USD vs. S&P 500 one-week chart. Source: Daan Crypto Trades/X
Analysis expects July BTC price relief
While a copycat move by Bitcoin in the face of a stocks rebound is anything but guaranteed, history favors a return to strength as July begins.
Recent research by trader and analyst Rekt Capital reveals that in previous years, July price performance tends to offer a counterpoint to what occurred in June.
“If history repeats for Bitcoin, then the pattern may be as follows for next couple of months: June ends as a red month, July could be green in response, And August could therefore be red to cancel out July's upside completely,” he told X followers last week.
BTC/USD quarterly returns (screenshot). Source: CoinGlass
CoinGlass data confirms the divergence between June and July moves, with only three exceptions since 2013. Among them is 2025, when BTC/USD finished both months in the green.
So far this year, the pair is down 18.4% in June, its worst performance since the 2022 bear market.
As Cointelegraph reported, Rekt Capital believes that the latest bear trend still has months left to play out, with new lows possible as a result before a long-term floor is in. A chart uploaded to X put the bear market as 71% complete as of June 22.
BTC/USD one-month chart. Source: Rekt Capital/X
Bitcoin metric produces "first bottoming flag"
Opinions still differ when it comes to whether Bitcoin has already seen its bear-market bottom.
As Cointelegraph continues to report, market participants broadly agree that more progress is required before a convincing downtrend reversal enters.
In its latest research, onchain analytics platform CryptoQuant adds to that consensus — but with an early silver lining for Bitcoin bulls.
“Bitcoin is starting to show the first clear sign of a deeper market clean-up,” contributor I. Moreno wrote in a QuickTake blog post on Sunday.
Moreno referenced a lesser-known onchain indicator, the UTXO Block P/L Count Ratio Model. This compares the aggregate profitability of blocks of unspent transaction outputs, or UTXOs.
“In simple terms, it measures how broad the market’s profit base is beneath price. When the ratio is high, most UTXO blocks remain in profit. That usually reflects a market still carrying a large amount of unrealized gains, which also means higher distribution risk,” the post explains.
“When the ratio collapses toward the lower range, the opposite happens: profitability compresses, losses become more widespread, and the market starts moving into a more advanced reset phase.”
Bitcoin UTXO Block P/L Count Ratio. Source: CryptoQuant
The Ratio currently measures 5.9, marking its lowest level since 2022 and one of its lowest on record. Moreno called it “Bitcoin’s first bottoming flag” of the current bear market.
“The main takeaway is that BTC is finally showing evidence of a meaningful internal clean-up. But if history is a guide, the market may still need to absorb more stress before the bearish phase can fully exhaust itself,” he concluded.

South Korean brokerage Kiwoom Securities is reportedly in talks to buy a stake in Bithumb, making it the latest traditional financial firm in the country to seek exposure to a local crypto exchange.
The two companies are reportedly discussing a third-party allotment of new shares that would allow Kiwoom Securities to acquire new shares issued by Bithumb, Chosun Biz reported on Monday.
Cointelegraph contacted Kiwoom Securities and Bithumb for comment on the reported talks.
The development makes Kiwoom Securities the latest traditional finance (TradFi) company to seek entry into the crypto markets as South Korea's Financial Services Commission (FSC) prepares to announce new regulatory reforms in July, including a framework for tokenized securities, as the country prepares to bring them under its capital markets framework from 2027.
The developments are part of the amended Capital Markets Act and Electronic Securities Act, the country’s first tokenized securities framework, scheduled to take full effect on Feb. 4, 2027.
On Wednesday, the FSC folded token securities infrastructure into a broader overhaul of the country’s capital markets, as part of its efforts to modernize traditional financial markets and potentially bring blockchain-based investment products closer to systems used for mainstream securities settlement and trading.
Top five cryptocurrency exchanges in South Korea by daily trading volume. Source: CoinGecko
Bithumb is one of South Korea’s largest crypto exchanges by daily volume, CoinGecko data shows.
Korean brokerages target crypto exchanges
The reported Kiwoom talks come after several major South Korean financial firms moved to buy stakes in local crypto exchanges and exchange operators.
On May 29, Korea Investment & Securities (KIS) and OKX Ventures agreed to invest a combined 160 billion won ($106 million) to buy a 19.6% stake in South Korean crypto exchange Coinone.
A day earlier, Samsung Securities, Samsung SDS and Samsung Card acquired a combined 4% stake in Dunamu, the operator of South Korean crypto exchange Upbit, for 612.8 billion won ($408 million), Cointelegraph reported on May 28.
On May 15, Hana Financial Group said it would acquire a 6.55% stake in Dunamu from Kakao Investment for more than $668 million, making it the Upbit operator’s fourth-largest shareholder.
In February, Mirae Asset Consulting agreed to acquire a 92.06% stake in Korbit for 133.48 billion won (about $93 million), taking control of the majority of the exchange as part of its digital asset push.
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Galaxy Digital has cut its odds of the CLARITY Act becoming law in 2026 to 50%, warning that the US Senate is running out of time to move the crypto market structure bill before its August recess.
“We are reducing our odds of CLARITY Act passage in 2026 to 50-50,” wrote Galaxy's head of firmwide research, Alex Thorn, citing the lack of a unified Senate Banking-Agriculture text, no firm floor schedule and a narrowing legislative window before lawmakers leave Washington.
Thorn said the downgrade was about the bill's timing, not substance and added that the congressional competition for floor time “intensified” after US President Donald Trump abruptly canceled the signing of the bipartisan housing bill and said he would not sign it until Congress passed the SAVE Act, to introduce a proof-of-citizenship elections bill.
The downgrade comes after Galaxy lowered its previous estimate of the bill from 75% to 60% on June 9. On May 22, the company had raised its CLARITY Act estimate to 75%.
The CLARITY Act is set for a House hearing on July 17. The bill aims to establish the first regulatory framework for digital assets in the US, but it has been met with criticism. It cleared the Senate Banking Committee in May, with most Democrats and the banking industry pushing back, arguing that it would allow crypto firms to offer yields on stablecoins without facing the same requirements as traditional financial institutions.
Source: Alex Thorn
Congressional calendar squeezes crypto bill
The latest cut reflects mounting concern that even a bill with bipartisan support may not get enough floor time in a crowded Senate calendar.
Senate legislative schedule. Source: Senate.gov
The US Senate has entered a state work period from Monday until July 10. The Senate is also scheduled to begin its traditional August recess on Aug. 8 for five weeks before returning to Washington on Sept. 14, according to its legislative schedule.
The runway to pass the bill is quickly declining, said Thorn, adding that the debate over the SAVE Act “injects another contentious, leadership-consuming fight into an already crowded queue.”
He added that the Senate is also working on two unfinished developments, including Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), to which the House failed to pass a reauthorization and the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for the fiscal year of 2027, which is considered “must-pass” legislation and is often the target of political debate.
At the beginning of June, over 200 crypto companies and organizations urged the US Senate to pass the CLARITY Act in a letter shared by crypto lobby group Stand With Crypto.
Later in June, a group of law enforcement organizations and a coalition of Catholic organizations reached out to White House officials with concerns that the CLARITY Act could create oversight gaps regarding illicit activity.
Magazine: How crypto laws changed in 2025 — and how they’ll change in 2026

The Bank for International Settlements has warned that artificial intelligence “exuberance” could have major financial consequences, as heavy reliance on debt financing in AI ventures raises the risk of cascading defaults if investor optimism fades.
The five largest hyperscalers are set to spend more than $1 trillion on AI-related capital expenditures from 2025 through 2026, and these commitments are outpacing earnings, the Basel-based institution said in its annual economic report released Sunday.
“Equity valuations are elevated, particularly for firms at the core of AI development ... sustaining such high growth could become increasingly challenging,” the bank said.
AI investment enthusiasm has surged with the recent SpaceX IPO and planned public offerings from Anthropic and OpenAI, leading some market observers to draw parallels to previous boom-bust cycles such as electrification exuberance in the late 1920s and the dot-com bubble in the late 1990s.
The global economy displayed “surprising resilience” in 2025 despite successive shocks, partly driven by AI investments, the bank said.
However, “perils have grown” in 2026, with concerns over the risks of persistent inflation, which rose to a three-year high of 4.2% in the US in May, according to TradingEconomics.
The sustainability of AI-related investments, “growing financial vulnerabilities and weakening fiscal positions,” has added to those perils, the BIS report said.
“Should inflation rise significantly or AI-led investment turn to a bust, the macroeconomic consequences could be amplified by existing financial vulnerabilities.”
Rapid AI boom raises questions about its sustainability. Source: BIS
If central banks tighten policy to contain inflation, this could precipitate a “sharp pullback in [AI] asset prices after a prolonged period of exuberant risk-taking,” which could trigger “disruptive macro-financial feedback loops,” the BIS said.
“A reversal of AI optimism could likewise have major financial consequences, given AI firms’ rising leverage and growing footprint in credit markets.”
A potential flashpoint for systemic risk
The BIS cautioned that a large correction in AI valuations could have more pronounced wealth effects and a “sharper consumption pullback” than in the past, given US market dominance. “Financial stability could also be at risk in the event of an AI bust.”
Nick Ruck, director of LVRG Research, told Cointelegraph that the BIS was right to flag the AI investment surge as a potential flashpoint for systemic risk, “as financing has relied on enormous debt and highly leveraged nonbank structures that can rapidly unwind and amplify this cycle into a crisis.”
“The current macroeconomic environment is already fragile from being stretched by inflation, record national debt, and disrupted commodity markets, so a bust of the AI capital stack could send shockwaves through an already strained global economy.”
The BIS also cautioned about stablecoins, which risk fragmenting the global monetary system and could weaken sovereign monetary control, it said.
Chipflation could compound the problem
The AI industry could also become a victim of its own success, as surging semiconductor and memory chip prices, driven by increasing AI data center demand outstripping supply, could compound inflation, which consumers will ultimately have to bear.
This phenomenon, known as “chipflation,” is causing prices for devices from smartphones to laptops to climb, Morgan Stanley analysts cautioned earlier in June.
In March, BlackRock reported that surging semiconductor prices were “posing upside risks to global goods inflation.”
Meanwhile, Apple is already passing costs on to customers by hiking prices. The tech giant announced Thursday that a wide array of products, from iPads to Macs and home devices, would see increases from 18% to nearly 33% due to soaring memory and storage chip costs.
Price jumps for DRAM chips defy deflationary price dynamics. Source: BlackRock
Magazine: AI is banking the unbanked in Africa... faster than crypto

The Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA), Dubai's crypto regulator, has granted its 50th virtual asset service provider (VASP) license.
On Monday, VARA said its latest approval went to tokenized assets platform Tribe Tokenisation FZE.
The milestone provides one measure of the growth of Dubai's crypto licensing regime, though license totals alone do not show how many firms are operational or the level of business they generate.
A VARA spokesperson told Cointelegraph that holding an active license does not necessarily mean a firm has completed its commercial launch. Newly licensed companies may go through a controlled operationalization period before offering services or onboarding customers.
At the end of 2025, VARA classified 39 licensed VASPs as fully operational. The spokesperson said the regulator is validating an updated figure for 2026.
Dubai's bid to attract crypto firms
Dubai has spent the past several years positioning itself as a global hub for digital asset businesses. As part of that effort, the emirate established VARA in March 2022 as a dedicated crypto regulator and has sought to attract crypto businesses through a standalone licensing framework.
Against that backdrop, Dubai's 50 licensed VASPs exceed the totals reported in Hong Kong and Singapore, two other jurisdictions competing to attract regulated crypto businesses. Each jurisdiction licenses different types of crypto businesses, meaning the headline totals do not represent identical categories of firms.
As of Friday, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) listed 37 major payment institutions (MPI) authorized to provide digital payment token (DPT) services. Singapore regulates DPT services within its broader payments regime rather than through a standalone VASP regulator like VARA.
List of licensed virtual asset trading platforms in Hong Kong. Source: SFC
Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) has listed 13 formally licensed virtual asset trading platforms. The count is narrower because the regime is specifically limited to platform operators.
The VARA spokesperson attributed Dubai's market growth to its activity-based regulatory framework and broader financial ecosystem, and said the regulator also considers transaction volumes, assets under management, employment and audited financial data when assessing market activity.
Magazine: Japanese pension fund tips 1% in crypto, G7 urges action on NK hackers: Asia Express

Ethereum’s first zero-knowledge rollup, Loopring, announced Sunday the closure of its decentralized exchange and automated market maker, ending all trading services and halting the relayer effective immediately.
In a post on X on Sunday, the team cited three main reasons for the closure: its failure to gain meaningful adoption, a lack of business development skills and being technologically surpassed by modern zkEVM solutions.
“To be honest, Loopring never gained meaningful adoption,” the team said. “As the first zk-rollup, we lacked a virtual machine – no composability, no real‑world payment use cases. That limitation kept our ecosystem from growing.”
Loopring was a technical pioneer of its time, raising $45 million in a 2017 initial coin offering and helping to prove that scaling Ethereum via zk-rollups was viable. But technology evolves fast in the crypto industry, and it was ultimately surpassed by the more capable successors it helped inspire, such as zkSync, Scroll and StarkNet.
The team said they are “engineers at heart,” not business operators, excelling at writing code but never developing the “passion or skills for business development.”
“External pressures – including major exchange delistings of LRC in 2026 – only accelerated the inevitable,” they said.
The team added that pressure from more advanced competitors, which are fully compatible with Ethereum smart contracts, “while our specialised architecture now feels obsolete,” compounded the decision to gracefully end it, “rather than running a hollow service.”
Loopring had already shut down its wallet services in July 2025, citing scaling challenges.
With the DEX closure, the team said it will be calculating and publishing all final user balances, then distributing funds directly to users' Ethereum wallets in batches and covering gas fees.
Loopring's total value locked is about $8 million, down almost 99% from the $760 million peak in November 2021, according to L2Beat. Its native token, LRC, has collapsed by a similar amount to $0.01 from its all-time high in the same month of $3.75.
Loopring's total value locked has collapsed over the past five years. Source: L2Beat
One of Loopring’s biggest milestones was a 2021 partnership with GameStop to power its NFT platform, launched the following year.
Crypto winter bites deep this year
The demise of Loopring adds to the growing list of crypto closures this year, as the bear market deepens and previous-cycle narratives no longer apply.
More than 60 crypto projects and protocols have already shuttered services in 2026, according to RootData. Some of the more notable ones include a16z-backed decentralized self-custody solution Entropy, app-chain infrastructure protocol Syndicate and AI blockchain platform Yupp.
Magazine: Bitcoin slides to $58K, XRP hits $1 but onchain data promising: Market Moves

Crypto treasury company Sharplink, which resumed buying Ether last week after an eight-month pause, has bought a total of $62.4 million worth of Ether since Thursday.
Onchain data from Arkham shows that after Sharplink bought 5,000 ETH on Thursday, it bought another 5,000 ETH (worth $7.9 million) on Friday, followed by 29,196 ETH (worth $46.7 million) across three over-the-counter transactions on Saturday.
Source: Lookonchain
The three-day buying spree adds to evidence that Sharplink has revived its active Ether accumulation strategy. The crypto treasury company was once a close competitor to Bitmine as the world’s largest ETH treasury company.
Sharplink declined to comment on the reason and timing of the Ether purchase when first contacted on Thursday.
Sharplink backs Ethlabs
However, the purchases came the same week that both Bitmine and Sharplink backed a new research and development nonprofit that aims to make Ethereum ready for institutional use.
Sharplink said on Monday that the organization, Ethlabs, was formed to “ready Ethereum for the next phase of institutional adoption,” with the company joining Bitmine, Ethereum co-founder Joe Lubin and other Ethereum contributors in backing the initiative.
“As stablecoins, tokenized real-world assets, funds and autonomous AI commerce move on-chain, they are converging on Ethereum as the neutral, credibly permissionless settlement layer for the global economy,” Sharplink said. “Ethlabs exists to ensure the network is ready to absorb that demand at scale.”
Ether slump
The purchases also come as the cryptocurrency is down 22.8% month-on-month, and nearly 50% compared to the start of the year, allowing Tether stablecoin USDt (USDT) to briefly surpass Ether in market capitalization last week.
Meanwhile, US spot Ether ETFs recorded their seventh week of outflows last week, recording $12.9 million in net outflows, driven mainly by withdrawals from BlackRock’s iShares Ethereum Trust (ETHA).
Magazine: Bitcoin slides to $58K, XRP hits $1 but onchain data promising: Market Moves

Bitcoin (BTC) continued its battle to reclaim $60,000 into the weekend as chart cues fueled hopes of a recovery.
Key points:
Bitcoin RSI signals spark comparisons to the end of the 2022 bear market as a bullish divergence filters through.
Analysis sees "encouraging" evidence of buyers defending the market at $60,000.
Some traders still see new lows coming, but these could take until August.
Analysis on Bitcoin RSI: "It's 2022 again"
Data from TradingView showed BTC/USD cooling volatility after returning above the $60,000 mark.
BTC/USD one-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
A series of higher swing lows on hourly time frames combined with encouraging readings from the relative strength index (RSI) indicator.
On the four-hour chart, a bullish divergence was occurring, where RSI makes higher lows while price makes lower lows. This caught the attention of market participants, who began to anticipate a BTC price reversal as a result.
unknown node
Uploading a chart comparing the current bear market with 2022, pseudonymous trader Rod argued that history was repeating itself.
“Once you see it, you can't unsee it,” they wrote in a post on X.
“It's 2022 again.”
BTC/USD one-week chart with RSI data. Source: Rod/X
At the time, a weekly RSI bullish divergence kicked in while BTC/USD set its bear-market low of $15,600 — an event that subsequently provided a durable market floor.
Four-hour RSI, meanwhile, fell to just 11.4 at the start of June, marking one of its lowest levels on record.
BTC/USD four-hour chart with RSI data. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
On Friday, crypto analyst Lukasz Wydra added daily time frames to the mix of RSI bull signals.
“The bullish RSI divergence on the Bitcoin chart has now been officially confirmed. It may still deepen, but at the same time we can clearly see that Binance continues to defend the price,” he told X followers.
Wydra described the RSI signals as an “encouraging sign.”
BTC/USD one-day chart. Source: Lukasz Wydra/X
New BTC price lows remain popular target
Other traders stuck to existing predictions of further downside pressure entering sooner or later.
Niels Klaver, cofounder of crypto platform STABL Agency, repeated calls for a trip to $55,000 “before any big move” to change the status quo.
BTC/USD comparison. Source: Niels Klaver/X
Trader and analyst Rekt Capital suggested that a relief bounce could characterize the market next month thanks to July typically contrasting with June price action.
Once it confirmed the 50-month exponential moving average (EMA) as new resistance, BTC/USD would then see “August cancellation of relief and additional downside due to $60k weakening as support,” he wrote this week.
BTC/USD one-month chart with 21, 50EMA. Source: Rekt Capital/X

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) warned that the rapid expansion of stablecoins risks fragmenting the global monetary system and weakening sovereign monetary control, urging central banks and the financial industry to accelerate the development of tokenized forms of central bank and commercial bank money as a safer alternative.
In its Annual Economic Report published Sunday, the Basel-based institution delivered a sharp assessment of the approximately $316 billion stablecoin market, arguing that tokens pegged to fiat currencies lack the institutional features required to serve as safe, reliable money at scale.
BIS pointed to structural vulnerabilities in reserve asset management and warned that a significant migration from commercial bank deposits into private digital tokens could reduce bank funding and constrain credit to the real economy.
The report also provides a signal to policymakers that the current regulatory approach to stablecoins may prove insufficient if private digital currencies continue expanding. Rather than positioning stablecoins as a durable foundation for the future monetary system, BIS said that tokenized commercial bank deposits, combined with tokenized central bank money operating on regulated infrastructures, offer a more robust path toward modernizing payments while preserving monetary stability.
Demand for foreign stablecoins connects FX markets with crypto ecosystem. Source: BIS Annual Economic Report 2026.
The report focuses particular attention on "stablecoin dollarization," that is, the growing use of dollar-denominated stablecoins in economies with weaker domestic currencies. According to BIS, this trend could weaken monetary sovereignty, erode the effectiveness of domestic monetary policy, reduce bank intermediation and increase exposure to volatile cross-border capital flows, particularly in emerging market economies.
Related: BIS Project Agorá shows tokenized payments can settle in seconds
BIS raises fresh concerns about public blockchains' limits
The report also delivers one of BIS's strongest critiques yet of public permissionless blockchains such as Bitcoin and Ethereum as a foundation for the monetary system. It argues that decentralized networks relying on distributed validation and lacking a central governance structure struggle to meet the requirements for scalability, legal accountability and settlement finality expected of systemically important financial infrastructure.
BIS raises concerns on rising fragmentation across layer 1 and layer 2 networks.
Source: BIS Annual Economic Report 2026.
At the center of BIS's critique is the economics of decentralized consensus. The report argues that public permissionless blockchains compensate validators through transaction fees that rise as network activity increases, making congestion, longer confirmation times and higher costs structural features of the system rather than temporary technical shortcomings. According to BIS, these characteristics undermine the efficiency and network effects that are essential for a unified monetary system.
The Basel-based institution further argues that permissionless blockchains lack the clear governance and accountability frameworks required for institutional finance. Without an identifiable entity responsible for maintaining the integrity of the system, resolving disputes or ensuring compliance with financial integrity standards, BIS contends that such networks face significant obstacles to supporting large-scale regulated financial activity.
Rather than rejecting tokenization itself, BIS advocates a "unified ledger" architecture that combines tokenized central bank money, tokenized commercial bank deposits and tokenized financial assets on programmable platforms operating within regulated legal and institutional frameworks.
By preserving the benefits of tokenization, including programmable transactions and faster settlement, while maintaining the institutional foundations of the existing monetary system, BIS said that financial markets can improve efficiency without sacrificing monetary stability, financial integrity or public trust.
Related: Why stablecoins and SWIFT may have to coexist

Bitcoin (BTC) is heading for its worst monthly loss since mid-2022, with BTC down roughly 18.5% in June as price struggles to hold the psychological $60,000 support level.
BTC/USD monthly chart. Source: TradingView
Will Bitcoin’s downside momentum extend in July, or is BTC preparing for a recovery?
Key takeaways:
Bitcoin’s liquidity map shows a major short-liquidation “magnet zone” near $67,600.
BTC has historically gained 7.6% on average in July, while midterm-year seasonality points to an even stronger 10.3% average return.
Bitcoin may hit $75,000 in July
July may become a "bullish month for Bitcoin," according to analyst Fleh, who predicted BTC price to rally toward $75,000 next month.
The bullish thesis is based on Bitcoin’s Binance BTC/USDT liquidation heatmap, which shows a large concentration of short liquidation levels sitting above the current price.
On the monthly chart, the strongest visible liquidity cluster sits near $67,645, where the chart shows around $247.39 million in liquidation leverage and roughly $2.26 billion in cumulative short liquidation leverage.
Binance BTC/USDT liquidation heatmap (1 month). Source: CoinGlass
For beginners, such clusters are often called “magnet zones.” When many leveraged positions are concentrated around the same price area, the market can move toward that zone because liquidations create forced buying or selling pressure.
In this case, significant liquidity sits above Bitcoin’s current price near $60,000.
If BTC rebounds and pushes toward $67,600, short sellers may be forced to close their positions. Since closing shorts requires buying Bitcoin back, that can add fresh upside pressure and fuel a short squeeze.
"I think $BTC bottoms here at 60k for now, targeting 75k to the upside before any chance of lower," Fleh said in a Saturday post.
BTC rises 7.6% on average in July
Bitcoin’s historical monthly returns also support Fleh’s bullish July outlook.
BTC has returned a 7.6% gain on average in July, making it one of its stronger months after a typically weaker June, which shows an average return of -1.40%, according to CoinGlass data highlighted by analyst CGT_Trader.
Bitcoin monthly returns tracking the July performance in since 2013. Source: CoinGlass/CGT_Trader
The trend has appeared even during bear market years.
For instance, Bitcoin rose 20.96% in July 2018 and 16.8% in July 2022. More recently, BTC gained 2.95% in July 2024 and 8.13% in July 2025, strengthening the case for another green month ahead.
A separate midterm-year seasonality chart also shows that- Bitcoin has averaged a 10.3% gain during the month, its strongest monthly return in such years.
Bitcoin performance by month during US mid-term election years. Source: More Crypto Online
That compares with an average 17% loss in June, pointing to the possibility of a post-sell-off mean-reversion bounce.
Based on Bitcoin’s current price near $60,000, its historical July average return of 7.6% projects a move toward roughly $64,500, while the stronger midterm-year average of 10.3% points to about $66,100.
A repeat of Bitcoin’s bear-market July rebounds from 2022 and 2018 would put BTC between $70,000 and $72,500, while a 2020-style July rally would bring Fleh’s $75,000 target within reach.
BTC's dip below the 200-week SMA may extend slide
Bitcoin’s ongoing drop below its 200-week simple moving average (200-day SMA, the blue line) near $62,445 raises the risk of further downside in July.
BTC/USD weekly chart. Source: TradingView
A similar loss of long-term moving-average support preceded deeper weakness during the 2022 bear market, when BTC continued lower before forming a bottom.
Bitcoin's bear flag breakdown raises the odds of a price decline toward $55,000 in July unless BTC quickly reclaims the 200-day SMA.
BTC/USD daily chart. Source: TradingView

The European Banking Authority on Friday unveiled a sweeping framework to penalize cryptocurrency issuers that violate the European Union’s digital-asset laws, signaling a tougher enforcement stance as the trade bloc finalizes its historic regulatory architecture.
The consultation paper published June 26 establishes a standardized playbook for hitting non-compliant issuers of what the EBA considers “significant” tokens with potentially multimillion-euro penalties. Under the proposal, the Paris-based watchdog will deploy a strict two-step process to determine fines, assessing the baseline severity of an infraction before factoring in aggravating or mitigating behavior.
The move represents the sharpening of teeth for the EU’s landmark Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation. Introduced to bring order to a historically freewheeling sector, MiCA is the world's first comprehensive regulatory regime for digital assets, forcing token issuers and crypto service providers to operate with bank-like compliance, consumer protections and capital reserves if they want access to the single European market.
The stakes for non-compliance are explicitly designed to be punitive. According to the EBA's consultation paper, final penalties could reach statutory ceilings of 12.5% of annual turnover for issuers of significant asset-referenced tokens and 10% for significant e-money tokens, or two times the profits generated by the violation, caps meant to deter even the largest global digital-asset operators.
Cover screenshot of European Banking Authority's 14-page consultation paper.
Source: EBA
The roll-out of the penalty framework comes at a critical juncture for Europe's digital asset industry, landing just days ahead of a crucial July 1 deadline. By the start of next month, cryptocurrency firms must have secured formal licenses from national regulators to legally offer their services or market stablecoins within the 27-nation bloc, ending a transitional grace period that allowed many operators to function under looser local rules.
Related: Binance faces EU service limits next week as MiCA rules take effect
Firms that fail to secure their regulatory passports by July 1 face the prospect of being forced to halt operations entirely or risk triggering the exact infractions, such as unauthorized public disclosures or organizational failures, that the EBA’s new framework is built to penalize.
Binance pushes “pause” on EU operations after license fail
The world’s biggest exchange operator, Binance, last week notified European Union users that access to key services will be restricted after the exchange failed to secure MiCA authorization from a member state before the July 1 deadline after it withdrew its MiCA license application in Greece.
Those restrictions include halting the onboarding of new EU users and limiting certain services for EU-based accounts effective July 1, according to exchange notices shared by users on social media.
Notice sent by Binance to customers in Poland. Source: IT_Tech_PL
The notices said users will still be able to withdraw their assets after that date, stating that “all digital assets are still available for withdrawal,” in line with applicable regulatory requirements.
Binance recorded $1.96 billion in daily net outflows on Wednesday, following its withdrawal announcement, according to DefiLlama data viewed by Cointelegraph on Sunday. The exchange then saw another $2.52 billion and $1.46 billion in net outflows over the following two days.
EU move shows sharp contrast with US enforcement approach
The timing underscores the European Union's broader strategy to position itself as the dominant global standard-setter for digital finance, contrasting sharply with the regulation-by-enforcement approach seen in the United States. By laying out clear financial penalties right as the licensing mandate takes effect, authorities in Brussels are telling the market that the era of leniency is officially over.
The industry now has a three-month consultation window ending September 28 to lobby for changes to the EBA's penalty methodology. However, with the July 1 licensing cliff edge just days away, executives will have to navigate an unforgiving compliance environment long before the final fining guidelines are formalized under law.

Binance recorded over $400 million in net outflows during the week beginning June 22, as the cryptocurrency exchange announced the withdrawal of its Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) license application in Greece.
According to DefiLlama data viewed by Cointelegraph on Sunday, Binance's seven-day net outflows amount to 0.3% of its $133.3 billion in tracked assets. Excluding BNB, Binance's native token, the outflows equal 0.35% of the exchange's $113.8 billion in crypto assets.
Binance led tracked exchanges in weekly net outflows. Source: DefiLlama
Net outflows accelerated on Wednesday, when Binance announced its withdrawal from Greece's securities regulator, recording $1.96 billion in net outflows, followed by two more days of $2.52 billion and $1.46 billion.
The scale of outflows is not unusual for Binance, which regularly records billions of dollars in daily inflows and outflows. The data also does not identify the geographic origin of the fund movements.
The outflows came during the final week before the European Union's MiCA transition deadline. Starting July 1, Binance will restrict onboarding and some services for affected EU users.
Daily net flows in the billions of dollars are not unusual for Binance. Source: DefiLlama
MiCA winners are less clear than expected
Several rival exchanges have sought to attract Binance users ahead of the bloc’s deadline.
OKX, one of the most vocal exchanges courting Binance users, recorded $285.5 million in net inflows over the same period, according to DefiLlama’s rankings based on exchanges’ proof of reserves. The exchange received MiCA authorization in Malta in January 2025.
However, OKX was third in weekly net inflows, behind Bitget’s $710 million and Bitfinex’s $400 million. Neither exchange appears on the European Securities and Markets Authority’s (ESMA) interim MiCA register, which was last updated on Friday.
Binance says Europe still matters
CryptoQuant analyst Maartunn recently told Cointelegraph that euro trading accounts for just 1% of Binance’s spot volume, which may limit potential MiCA-related setbacks for the exchange.
However, Binance’s public messaging is that the company intends to continue pursuing a MiCA license, despite being on pace to miss the July 1 buzzer.
“As for Binance and Europe, we take this market seriously. It's a small part of our business, but an important one, and we're committed to the EU and our customers there,” Yi He, a co-founder of the exchange, said on Friday.
Meanwhile, Binance has started telling some EU users to move funds to self-custodial wallets or other exchanges.
A Binance representative told Cointelegraph that the restrictions vary depending on users’ jurisdictions and that no action is required for users not served through a local registered entity.
ESMA said in a June 23 statement that crypto service providers unlicensed by July 1 must take “immediate steps” to wind down EU activities, and limit services to actions to sell, transfer, relocate assets or close positions.
Magazine: AI is banking the unbanked in Africa… faster than crypto

Zach Pandl, head of research at Grayscale, said he hopes Strategy will sell at least $3 billion in Bitcoin to cover most of the company’s cash obligations for the next two years.
In a Saturday X post, Pandl argued that the move may restore market confidence in the company's capital structure.
Contrary to his hopes, Pandl said he expects a 50-basis-point increase to the dividend rate on Strategy’s preferred stock, STRC, adding roughly $100 million in annual obligations over two years. Pandl added that this scenario “probably does not help market confidence.”
Strategy faces an annual preferred dividend obligation of approximately $1.2 billion, driven primarily by STRC.
STRC is Strategy's flagship "digital credit" preferred stock designed to trade near its $100 par value, but has been sliding for weeks. On Friday, it fell to as low as $71.25, a 28.75% discount to par. Strategy’s common stock MSTR fared little better and closed Friday at $82.31, down 26.86% throughout the trading week.
Pandl said he expects Strategy to raise STRC's dividend rate but hopes the company sells Bitcoin instead. Source: Zach Pandl
Strategy's cash reserve under pressure
Strategy is the world’s largest publicly-listed corporate Bitcoin holder, placing its 847,363 BTC stash and financing decisions under the industry’s microscope.
According to Strategy’s latest 8-K filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, it acquired 520 Bitcoin for $34.9 million between June 15 and June 21.
Blockchain analytics company CryptoQuant argued in a Tuesday report that Strategy should pause Bitcoin purchases and focus on replenishing its cash reserve, which is down 38% in 2026.
The 8-K filing also revealed that Strategy increased its US dollar reserve by $300 million to $1.4 billion. This leaves the company with roughly 14 months of dividend coverage, down sharply from what was once a seven-year cushion.
Strategy said on Monday that it plans to continue replenishing its cash reserves to support the credit quality of its “digital credit” securities.
Alternatives to a Bitcoin sale
CryptoQuant added that the company has no obligation to sell Bitcoin to support STRC’s price, because it can deploy other methods to defend its stock, such as raising the current 11.5% dividend yield.
Bitcoin advocate Samson Mow argued in a Monday X post that STRC has a built-in "self-repairing mechanism.” Once the stock falls below its $100 reference price, Strategy halts new ATM issuance, cutting off the supply of fresh shares.
At the same time, a lower price mechanically boosts the yield for new buyers relative to what they paid, which Mow said should draw in fresh demand and pull the price back toward par over time.
Source: Samson Mow
Magazine: AI is banking the unbanked in Africa… faster than crypto

A sequencer bug was responsible for two outages of the Coinbase layer-2 network Base last week, according to a post-mortem.
The Base engineering team said in a Saturday post-mortem that they identified a bug in sequencer block-building logic that allowed “stale journal state” to persist after a transaction validation failure.
“An invalid transaction was received by the block builder and failed during execution, as expected, but erroneously did not clear the journal state that contained the accounts and storage slots that had been accessed,” said the team.
The Base layer-2 network runs a single sequencer, which means one bug can stop everything. It is a centralized blockchain component that decides the order of transactions and has been responsible for outages on other layer-2 chains, including Arbitrum, OP Mainnet and zkSync Era.
On Thursday and Friday, Base mainnet experienced two block production outages, the first incident lasted 116 minutes and the second lasted 20 minutes.
There was a complete halt of new layer-2 blocks, and the sequencer and validator nodes could not progress past the invalid block until sequencing was restored.
The team fixed the outages by applying a patch to the sequencers to ensure the journal state was properly updated during execution.
However, mitigation took longer than expected “due to infrastructure conditions unrelated to the original bug,” they said.
There was also a “race condition” after the system reset, which prevented the sequencers from catching up, causing the second outage.
Going forward, the Base engineering team plans to improve protocol “fuzz testing,” which involves bombarding the system with large volumes of random, malformed, or unexpected inputs to find bugs, and building “graceful recovery” so that validator nodes don’t need manual restarts during future incidents.
Not the first outage for Base
It is not the first sequencer-related outage for Base, which stopped producing blocks for 17 minutes in September 2024 and for around half an hour in August 2025.
Base is the second-largest layer-2 network by total value secured, which is just under $11 billion, according to L2beat.
Magazine: AI is banking the unbanked in Africa... faster than crypto