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A California man received a 70-month federal prison sentence Friday for laundering millions of dollars from a $263 million crypto theft, the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia announced.

Evan Tangeman, 22, of Newport Beach, admitted moving at least $3.5 million for a multi-state crew that drained more than 4,100 Bitcoin (BTC) from a single victim and funded an extravagant spending spree.

Inside the $263 Million Crypto Laundering Operation

The enterprise ran from October 2023 through May 2025, growing out of friendships formed on online gaming platforms. It included database hackers, organizers, callers, and residential burglars who targeted hardware wallets, according to court filings tied to the heist.

Tangeman, who used the aliases “E,” “Tate,” and “Evan|Exchanger,” converted stolen Bitcoin into fiat cash. He worked with Los Angeles real estate agents to procure mansions for co-conspirators.

Many were unemployed men under age 20 with no legitimate income. Some properties carried valuations between $4 million and nearly $9 million.

Lamborghinis, Rolexes, and Half-Million Dollar Bar Tabs

Members of the group spent stolen crypto on nightclub services, up to $500,000 per evening; Rolex watches valued between $100,000 and $500,000; and a fleet of exotic cars priced between $100,000 and $3.8 million.

Tangeman received a widebody Lamborghini Urus as compensation. Federal agents searching his home also seized a 2022 Rolls-Royce Ghost and a Porsche GT3 RS. The case echoes a wave of recent federal prosecutions targeting cryptocurrency money laundering networks.

“This criminal enterprise was built on greed so brazen it borders on the cartoonish. They stole millions, spent it on half-million-dollar nightclub tabs, Lamborghinis, and Rolexes,” U.S. Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro said in a statement.

Ninth Plea in an Ongoing RICO Case

Tangeman pleaded guilty to RICO conspiracy on Dec. 8, 2025, before U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly. His admission marked the ninth plea in the investigation.

After co-defendants Malone Lam and Jeandiel Serrano were arrested in September 2024, Tangeman directed Tucker Desmond to destroy the group’s digital devices.

Federal prosecutors continue to pursue additional defendants tied to the social engineering scheme. More sentencings expected in the months ahead.

The European Central Bank (ECB) signed agreements with three European standard-setting bodies to build the digital euro on open, non-proprietary infrastructure, directly challenging the dominance of Visa and Mastercard across the eurozone.

The deals with the European Card Payment Cooperation (ECPC), nexo standards, and the Berlin Group give the digital euro a free, shared technical foundation that any European payment provider can adopt without paying global card scheme fees.

Three standards, three layers of payments

CPACE, developed by ECPC, will handle contactless tap-to-pay transactions over near-field communication. Nexo standards connect merchant systems to the back-ends of payment service providers and acquirers, supporting in-store payment acceptance and ATM transactions. Berlin Group rules cover account-based transfers using identifiers such as mobile phone numbers, plus balance checks and merchant app integrations.

Approximately 80% of the European market already uses Berlin Group’s API framework standards, which underpin PSD2 open banking for banks and fintech apps. ECPC was founded in 2020 by six payment firms from France, Germany, Belgium, Bulgaria, Spain, and Portugal. Nexo is an international non-profit headquartered in Brussels.

Direct hit on Visa and Mastercard

The ECB said Europe lacks a single open standard across payment terminals. This leaves the region dependent on proprietary systems run by global card schemes and digital wallets. Adopting three open standards would allow national card schemes to expand beyond home markets. They could use existing terminals without rebuilding infrastructure.

European payment providers would gain the ability to scale across borders once the digital euro carries legal tender status. The move parallels efforts by Wero, which already operates in France, Germany, and Belgium with the explicit goal of reducing reliance on Visa, Mastercard, and PayPal.

Regulation gates the rollout

Piero Cipollone, ECB board member, called the agreements a step toward freer payment infrastructure.

He said they could give private firms alternatives to proprietary payment rails.

“The open digital euro standards will provide a European free alternative to current proprietary standards, make it easier for new European providers to enter the market and give European payment service providers and merchants the certainty they need to invest, innovate and compete across the euro area.”

Cipollone, ECB Executive Board member

The benefits will not arrive until EU co-legislators adopt the digital euro regulation. Without that legal foundation, the standards remain optional, and providers cannot count on a euro-area-wide scale for their future investments.

Bitcoin (BTC) is heading into the final week of April 2026 with a +13.71% gain so far. That leaves holders just half a percentage point short of the strongest April performance for the asset in five years.

Only a few days remain before the monthly close. BTC must add roughly 0.5% to surpass April 2025’s +14.08% return. That would secure Bitcoin’s best April since 2020.

April Joins a Familiar Pattern for Bitcoin

April has historically been Bitcoin’s strongest month. The average April gain stands at +13.11%, with a median return of +10.49%, according to Coinglass. The 2026 figure already sits above both benchmarks heading into the final week of trading.

The previous five Aprils tell a mixed story. Bitcoin gained +14.08% in 2025 and +34.26% in 2020, but it lost ground in 2024 (-14.76%), 2022 (-17.30%), and 2021 (-1.98%). The 2023 print of +2.81% rounded out a stretch where positive Aprils were the exception rather than the rule.

The current recovery also stands out against early-year weakness. Bitcoin lost 10.17% in January and another 14.94% in February before adding a small +1.81% in March.

April’s rebound has now reversed about half of those year-to-date losses. Improving ETF flows and a softer dollar print have helped.

Bitcoin Monthly returns,Source: Coinglass Sentiment Still Lags the Price Recovery

Despite the monthly gain, sentiment data shows that traders remain cautious. The Fear and Greed Index printed 31 on April 25, holding in Fear territory. The same gauge had touched Extreme Fear at 10 just one month earlier.

The reading of 26 last week was actually lower than today, indicating a slow recovery in conviction. Bitcoin is currently trading near $77,500, still about 38% below the ATH of $126,198 reached in October 2025. The gap explains the disconnect between the strong monthly print and the cautious sentiment showing in retail and derivatives positioning.

Persistent geopolitical risk has weighed on broader markets through April. US-Iran tensions and the wider Middle East conflict have kept BTC perpetual funding rates near zero or negative for stretches of the month. The pattern signals that traders have avoided chasing the rally with leverage.

Fear & Greed Index, Source: alternative.me One Week Left to Set the April Record

The final six trading sessions will decide where April 2026 lands in Bitcoin’s record books. A strong close would make it the second-best April since 2020, while a weaker finish would slot it behind 2025. With sentiment cautious and macro headlines unresolved, the path forward is far from certain.

A close roughly 0.5% higher by April 30 would be enough to clear 2025’s +14.08% mark. Whether Bitcoin can hold that level through the weekend remains an open question.

Thin liquidity and continuing geopolitical headlines could test the rally before the monthly close.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission sued New York to block the state from enforcing its gambling laws against federally registered prediction market exchanges.

The complaint filed in the Southern District of New York seeks a declaratory judgment confirming federal preemption, plus a permanent injunction barring state action against CFTC-registered designated contract markets.

Fourth State in CFTC’s Prediction Market Fight

New York joins Arizona, Connecticut, and Illinois on the agency’s docket. The CFTC sued the other three states earlier this month over parallel enforcement campaigns aimed at registered prediction market venues.

A federal judge in Arizona granted the agency a temporary restraining order halting that state’s criminal case against CFTC-regulated platforms. The CFTC has also filed an amicus brief in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals defending its preemption argument before appellate judges.

New York’s regulators previously hit registered platforms with cease-and-desist letters and civil suits. Chairman Michael Selig accused the state of disregarding longstanding federal precedent by treating CFTC-listed event contracts as illegal gambling products subject to state licensure rules.

Massachusetts Amicus Filed Same Day

The agency simultaneously filed an amicus brief in the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court in Commonwealth of Massachusetts v. KalshiEx LLC. Attorney General Andrea Campbell previously secured a preliminary injunction blocking Kalshi from offering sports event contracts to Massachusetts customers.

The brief argues the Commodity Exchange Act preempts state laws applied to CFTC-regulated markets. Selig said Congress assigned the agency sole authority over commodity derivatives, prediction markets included.

Kalshi recently prevailed at the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in a parallel New Jersey case, strengthening the federal preemption argument. Kalshi and Polymarket together face more than a dozen state and tribal challenges over sports and political event contracts.

Trading Climbs as Prediction Markets Go Mainstream

Trading activity on both platforms has climbed through early 2026, with sports event contracts emerging as the central flashpoint between state and federal authorities. Google Finance recently integrated Kalshi and Polymarket odds data, pulling prediction market pricing further into mainstream financial coverage.

Federal courts in New York and Massachusetts will now rule on whether the Exchange Act blocks state gambling claims. Their decisions, alongside the CFTC’s Ninth Circuit amicus and the Arizona restraining order, could shape national rules for a fast-growing industry that operates across every state.

Rep. Anna Paulina Luna accused former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of insider trading on Thursday, arguing that her reported 17,000% portfolio return since entering Congress is statistically impossible without access to nonpublic government information.

The Florida Republican posted the allegation on X, contrasting Pelosi’s stock market gains with the federal prosecution of a Special Forces soldier facing decades behind bars over prediction market bets tied to a classified mission.

Pelosi’s $280 Million Portfolio and the 17,000% Claim

The Pelosi household portfolio sits near $280 million, with returns since 1987 estimated around 17,000%. That cumulative gain dwarfs the Dow Jones Industrial Average’s roughly 2,300% over the same period and outpaces every benchmark Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has set during the same stretch.

Paul Pelosi has repeatedly drawn scrutiny for trading technology options before related legislation moved through Capitol Hill. The household reset its portfolio in January 2026, exiting Nvidia, Apple, Amazon, and Alphabet positions before re-entering through long-dated options on the same names.

STOCK Act Penalties Versus a 50-Year Sentence

Civil penalties under the 2012 STOCK Act remain at $200 per disclosure violation, and watchdog reviews show most late filings draw no fine at all.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has publicly called for an outright ban on congressional stock trading, a stance now shared by senators in both parties. Critics argue that without meaningful criminal exposure, the disclosure regime will continue to produce the kind of returns Luna highlighted.

Master Sergeant Gannon Van Dyke, the soldier Luna referenced, was indicted last week over roughly $409,000 in Polymarket profits tied to the Maduro capture operation.

He faces up to 50 years in prison on charges of commodities fraud, wire fraud, and unlawful monetary transactions.

Renewed Pressure for a Congressional Trading Ban

Luna’s post lands amid bipartisan momentum building behind legislation that would require lawmakers and their immediate family members to divest individual stock holdings within 180 days.

Whether the Van Dyke prosecution accelerates that effort or hardens partisan lines could shape how Congress confronts conflict-of-interest concerns in the coming months.

With midterm campaigns ramping up, both chambers face mounting pressure to enforce penalties beyond the STOCK Act’s $200 penalty.

US consumer sentiment has hit a record low, collapsing to 47.6 in April. That reading is the lowest in the University of Michigan’s 74-year survey history, deeper than pessimism recorded during the 2008 crisis or COVID pandemic shutdowns.

Economists blame the ongoing war with Iran, surging energy costs, and persistent inflation for the historic drop. The preliminary reading fell 10.7% from March, with every demographic group and index component registering declines across income, age, and political lines.

Inflation Expectations Spike as Oil Prices Climb

One-year inflation expectations jumped to 4.8% in April, a full percentage point above March’s reading. That figure marks the highest forecast since August 2025, according to the University of Michigan survey team.

Long-run inflation expectations also climbed to 3.5%, the highest reading since October 2025. Vanguard economists described the shift as a classic stagflationary shock. They linked it directly to the energy price surge from the Iran conflict.

Oil prices have driven transportation and food costs higher across the board. Household budgets now face mounting pressure as grocery bills and gasoline receipts continue to climb.

Treasury yields responded quickly to the data release. Investors priced in a slower pace of Federal Reserve rate cuts through the summer, reflecting entrenched inflation risk and mounting economic uncertainty.

Spending Pullback Threatens Broader Economy

Nearly 27% of US consumers have cut discretionary spending. An Ernst & Young Parthenon survey shared by the Kobeissi Letter flagged the pullback. Households are prioritizing essentials like food, medicine, and rent over non-essential purchases.

The sentiment collapse spans all political affiliations, income brackets, age groups, and education levels. That universality has alarmed analysts who view sentiment as an early indicator of household spending behavior.

Historically, weak sentiment precedes reduced consumer spending, which accounts for roughly 70% of US economic activity. The Federal Reserve now faces growing pressure to balance inflation risk against slowing growth.

Crypto markets have felt the strain indirectly. Bitcoin slipped below $66,000 during the war’s peak, though the asset has since clawed back losses as ceasefire hopes improved risk appetite.

President Donald Trump announced a fragile ceasefire with Iran shortly after most survey responses were collected. Whether that agreement holds could determine if May’s reading recovers or falls further.

The coming weeks will test whether asset markets, including the K-shaped crypto market, can decouple from deteriorating household confidence.

XChat, the standalone messaging app from Elon Musk’s X, climbed to the top spot on the US App Store, edging out OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Anthropic’s Claude within hours of its iPhone debut.

The leap to No. 1 hands Musk an early win in his bid to fold messaging, AI, and crypto-ready payments into a single app under the X brand.

XChat tops the free app chart

The App Store screenshot, shared by X head of product Nikita Bier on Saturday morning, showed XChat first, ChatGPT second, and Claude third. Bier reposted the chart with a brief caption.

Bier joined X last year to lead consumer growth and previously took social apps TBH and Gas to the top of the chart.

The chart performance puts a private messenger ahead of two of the highest-profile US AI assistants. ChatGPT had held the top free spot through much of the past year, with Claude tracking it closely.

XChat is built in Rust with what X calls Bitcoin-style encryption. The app offers end-to-end encrypted chats, voice and video calls, and file transfer without requiring a phone number.

Group chats hold up to 481 members, with X targeting a 1,000-seat cap in the coming weeks. The integrated Grok assistant lets users summarize files and draft messages inside conversations.

X Money and Crypto Rails are Next?

The download surge matters because XChat is one piece of Musk’s broader stack. X has said its X Money wallet, built with Visa, will roll out shortly after the messaging launch.

The roadmap covers peer-to-peer fiat transfers first, with crypto support flagged for a later release. That would put XChat users a tap away from on-platform payments. X has secured money transmitter licenses in more than 40 US states, clearing one regulatory hurdle for the rollout.

The launch positions XChat against WhatsApp, Telegram, and Signal on messaging, with PayPal and Venmo entering the picture once payments go live. For traders, the pairing matters most when Cashtags and X Money sit alongside group chats.

Whether XChat holds the No. 1 spot past the launch news cycle will depend on retention, not headline downloads. The next test arrives once X Money rolls live and the promised crypto rails switch on inside Musk’s broader vision. Holding the chart will be the harder challenge once the launch news fades.

AI has trimmed US monthly payroll growth by roughly 16,000 jobs over the past year, according to new research from Goldman Sachs economists, nudging the unemployment rate up by 0.1 percentage point.

The analysis separates jobs at risk of being replaced by AI from those where the technology augments human workers. That distinction reveals a far more uneven labor market than headline figures suggest.

The Jobs AI Is Replacing

The study from Goldman Sachs economist Elsie Peng combines a displacement score with an IMF complementarity index. The result pinpoints roles where AI substitutes for workers rather than simply overlapping with them.

Telephone operators, insurance claims clerks, and bill collectors face the highest substitution risk, Peng writes. Customer service representatives and data entry staff sit close behind. These occupations have already shown declines in operating costs and job postings at exposed firms.

Occupations most exposed to the AI substitution effect, Source: Goldman Sachs

However, the costs are not distributed evenly. The research finds the employment drag falls mainly on younger, less experienced workers. They compete most directly with AI systems on tasks that once served as entry-level pathways into white-collar work. Entry-level hiring in professional services has cooled sharply over the same period.

Where AI Creates New Work

Still, not every exposed role is shrinking. Looking only at occupations with high augmentation potential, Goldman Sachs estimates AI has added roughly 9,000 jobs per month. That modestly lowered the unemployment rate.

Education workers, judges, and construction managers top the augmentation list. These roles require physical presence, judgment, or interpersonal skills that AI cannot fully replicate. Studies cited by Peng show firms in augmented sectors have posted stronger productivity growth and more job openings.

Payroll employment by industry exposure to AI, Source: Goldman Sachs

Peng frames the pattern through Jevons paradox, the 19th-century observation that efficiency gains can raise total demand. When AI cuts the cost per unit of output, buyers often want more. That pulls additional workers back into exposed sectors.

However, the aggregate figure may also understate AI’s role in job creation. Hiring tied to data center construction and wider productivity gains from AI adoption are not captured in Goldman’s current estimate.

That leaves the true net effect on US employment an open question as corporate AI spending continues to climb through 2026. The next monthly jobs report should offer a fresh data point on whether the substitution trend is accelerating.

A researcher has made a small but notable step toward breaking the cryptography that secures Bitcoin, but the claim has already sparked pushback over how meaningful the result really is.

Project Eleven said it awarded a 1 BTC “Q-Day Prize” to Giancarlo Lelli for deriving a private key from a public key using a quantum computer. 

A Tiny Quantum Break, a Big Debate Over What It Proves

The test used a 15-bit elliptic curve, far smaller than the 256-bit standard used by Bitcoin and most blockchains.

The firm described the result as the largest public demonstration yet of a quantum attack on elliptic curve cryptography. It said the work shows the threat is moving from theory into early execution.

However, the scale gap remains large. A 15-bit key has a search space of just over 32,000 possibilities. Bitcoin’s security relies on numbers so large they cannot be brute-forced with current machines.

Critics quickly challenged the claim. A community note on the announcement argued the method relied heavily on classical verification, not purely quantum computation. 

In simple terms, the quantum system may not have done the hardest part of the attack on its own.

Community Note on Project Eleven’s Claims

That distinction matters. True quantum attacks would use Shor’s algorithm to efficiently solve problems that secure digital signatures. Partial or hybrid approaches do not yet prove that capability at scale.

Still, the result adds to a pattern. Earlier demonstrations broke even smaller keys. At the same time, research suggests the hardware required to attack real-world cryptography may be lower than previously thought.

For Bitcoin, there is no immediate risk. Yet the debate highlights a longer-term issue. Upgrading cryptography across decentralized networks is slow and complex, even if safer alternatives already exist.

For now, the takeaway is narrow. Quantum progress is real, but its practical impact remains distant—and contested.

Agentic finance is gaining serious traction. AI agents are no longer just drafting reports or surfacing ideas. They are placing trades, settling payments, and transacting on behalf of users and enterprises. The pace has accelerated sharply in 2026.

As adoption scales, Jody Mettler, COO of BitGo, says that from an institutional standpoint, four controls must be in place for agentic transactions.

Agentic Finance Arrives From Every Direction

Recent weeks have seen a wave of agentic AI launches pushing autonomous systems closer to live financial activity. Most recently, Coinbase’s x402 launched Agentic.market.

It is a marketplace and discovery layer for the x402 agentic commerce ecosystem, letting humans browse services via a web UI and AI agents autonomously find and integrate them through an MCP interface, with semantic search, live metrics, and no accounts required.

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Furthermore, enterprise software firm Aptean previewed AppCentral. This brings 10 AI agents to Microsoft Dynamics 365 customers across finance, supply chain, procurement, and production.

Basware has launched AI agents within its Invoice Lifecycle Management Platform, harnessing Agentic AI to transform invoice processing and bring fully autonomous accounts payable within reach.

“The future involves Agentic Finance, where AI entities transact on behalf of the enterprise to drive faster, smarter decisions and real business outcomes. This is the future we are creating at Basware and preparing our customers for today,” Basware’s CEO Jason Kurtz said.

Last month, Bybit rolled out the Bybit AI Trading Skill Hub, featuring 253 APIs. It delivers an all-in-one AI trading experience spanning market data, spot and derivatives trading, and account and asset management.

BitGo itself shipped the Model Context Protocol (“MCP”) server on March 23, giving AI development tools direct access to its documentation and APIs.

These launches collectively highlight a clear shift: agentic AI is moving from experimentation into real financial and commercial infrastructure, with autonomous agents now being positioned to transact, trade, and operate on behalf of businesses.

Meanwhile, a recent survey adds crucial demand-side evidence to the wave of agentic AI launches. NVIDIA’s sixth annual State of AI in Financial Services 2026 report, based on 800+ industry professionals, found that 65% of firms are actively using AI (up from 45% a year earlier).

In addition, 42% are using or assessing agentic AI, and 21% have already deployed AI agents. 

“Agentic AI systems can now autonomously route transactions to the most optimized payment networks, dynamically adjust retry logic based on real-time issuer signals, and make routing decisions under 200-millisecond routing that traditional rule-based systems simply can’t match. What makes this compelling is that every basis point improvement in authorization rates translates directly to revenue — there’s no ambiguity in measurement,” Dwayne Gefferie, payments strategist at Gefferie Group, said.

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Key Pillars for Institutional Agentic Finance

In an interview with BeInCrypto, Mettler welcomed the innovation but drew a sharp line on risk. From an institutional standpoint, she argued, agentic transactions demand specific controls to avoid becoming a “wild west.”

“While we’re looking at this and we are absolutely excited about what the future can hold here… we don’t want a financial crisis to happen because it’s just the wild west. So, there needs to be controls around it,” she said.

The first is identity. Institutions need to know who or what stands behind each agent acting on their systems. The second is permissions. Every agent needs limits on what it can access, authorize, or execute.

The third is policy and approval logic. Rules must govern which actions run autonomously and which require human sign-off. The fourth is auditability. A traceable record of every agent decision lets institutions and regulators reconstruct what happened if something goes wrong.

“Everybody’s entering into this era with some measured optimism, right? We need to look into it with where it can take us from a financial infrastructure standpoint, but also about the controls that you still need to have behind it,” she added.

As agentic finance scales, these four controls are likely to become the benchmark against which new systems are evaluated.

Three top Chinese AI firms have been told to reject US-origin capital without government approval. The directive reshapes how Washington money reaches Beijing’s strategic technology champions.

The instructions were issued by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) in recent weeks. Bloomberg first reported the guidance on Friday.

Beijing Cuts Off US Capital For Its AI Giants

ByteDance, TikTok’s parent and China’s most valuable private startup, was told to block US secondary share sales without state clearance.

The instruction carries weight given ByteDance’s complex ownership structure and pool of US institutional backers. Any secondary liquidity now funnels through Beijing.

Moonshot AI, considering a Hong Kong listing, was told to refuse US capital in funding rounds and deals without approval.

The restriction complicates pre-IPO planning for a firm widely seen as China’s answer to OpenAI. Any foreign allocation will likely tilt toward Middle Eastern and Hong Kong investors.

StepFun, a Tencent-backed startup focused on multimodal and generative AI, received the same guidance as Moonshot. The company is less globally known but ranks among Beijing’s strategic AI champions.

Why China Is Gating Its AI Firms

The guidance follows Meta Platforms’ roughly $2 billion acquisition of Singapore-based Manus, a startup with deep Chinese engineering roots.

Beijing imposed exit restrictions on the co-founders of Manus and reviewed the deal for potential technology export violations.

On Wednesday, White House science director Michael Kratsios accused Chinese entities of running industrial-scale campaigns to extract US AI models.

“Foreign entities who build on such fragile foundations should have little confidence in the integrity and reliability of the models they produce,” he stated.

The Trump administration signaled new enforcement against firms using model distillation, according to reports.

The capital divide between Washington and Beijing looks set to deepen. Beijing may formalize the guidance into a published regulation over the coming weeks.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent publicly defended plans on Friday to grant permanent dollar swap lines to Gulf and Asian allies. He framed the expansion as a counterweight to alternative payment systems eroding the dollar’s reserve status.

In a detailed public statement, Bessent said the discussions reflect routine Treasury diplomacy with partners holding large dollar reserves. He argued that extending the Federal Reserve’s swap network would reinforce dollar liquidity abroad and generate interest income for US taxpayers.

Why Gulf and Asian Allies Want Dollar Swap Lines Now

The timing reflects pressure from the Iran conflict. Meanwhile, strained oil revenues have tightened dollar funding for Gulf energy exporters that price shipments in USD.

UAE officials reportedly raised the idea of a swap line with Bessent and Fed contacts last week. President Donald Trump signaled on April 21 that a UAE facility was under active review.

Disruptions around the Strait of Hormuz have squeezed dollar liquidity for Gulf banks. In turn, that pressure is pushing allies toward the Fed for short-term support.

Swap Lines as a Shield Against Payment Alternatives

Bessent tied the proposal to countering rival payment networks. He pointed to BRICS-led initiatives and yuan-settled energy trade.

New permanent lines would create dollar funding centers in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and select Asian hubs.

That shift expands well beyond the Fed’s five existing partners. Those are Canada, the UK, the Eurozone, Japan, and Switzerland.

The move presents as low risk because Gulf states have stronger balance sheets than several current swap partners. However, skeptics may argue that the plan looks like a bailout and signals dollar weakness rather than strength.

The Fed’s formal extension of its standing facilities could depend on the coming governance decisions and political appetite.

If approved, the expansion would mark the largest change to the permanent swap network in over a decade.

Meanwhile, the effort parallels Bessent’s broader bet on dollar stablecoins and capital market reforms to preserve USD dominance.

Intel shares surged to a new all-time high on April 24 after investors received the clearest sign yet that the company may finally be benefiting from the AI boom.

The stock jumped more than 24% to around $83 in early trading, passing its dot-com-era peak from 2000 and lifting Intel’s market value above $416 billion. 

The rally followed stronger-than-expected earnings and guidance that suggested demand for Intel’s server CPUs is rising faster than Wall Street expected.

Intel Stock Price Chart (Weekly). Source: Google Finance AI Demand Is Moving Back Toward CPUs

The main driver is a shift in AI infrastructure. The first phase of the AI boom centered on GPUs, led by Nvidia. 

Now, more AI models are moving from training to deployment, where CPUs play a larger role.

Intel said demand from AI service providers was so strong in the first quarter that it sold chips it had previously written off. 

CFO David Zinsner said tight supply also allowed the company to raise prices and sell older inventory it had not expected to move.

That changed the market’s view of Intel. Investors are starting to see the company as a direct beneficiary of AI inference, where models answer user queries and handle more complex workloads.

Earnings Gave the Rally Fuel

Intel reported first-quarter revenue of $13.58 billion, above estimates of $12.42 billion. Its data center and AI segment generated $5.1 billion, also ahead of expectations.

Guidance mattered even more. Intel expects second-quarter revenue between $13.8 billion and $14.8 billion, compared with Wall Street’s $13.07 billion estimate.

Analysts responded quickly. At least 23 brokerages raised their price targets after the results, with HSBC pointing to demand for Intel’s Xeon server CPUs.

Can the Rally Continue?

The rally can continue if Intel proves this demand is durable. The Tesla 14A manufacturing deal and growing AI CPU demand give investors a stronger turnaround story.

Still, the stock now trades at around 90 times forward earnings, far above AMD and Nvidia. That leaves little room for disappointment.

Intel has momentum. To keep it, the company must show that today’s surge was the start of sustained AI-driven growth, not a one-quarter inventory and pricing boost.

ApeCoin (APE) price surged more than 80% on Friday to roughly $0.18, breaking out of a tight range around $0.10, drawing optimism from Yuga Labs confirmation of Michael Figge as chief executive earlier this week.

On-chain analytics firm Lookonchain flagged a newly created wallet that rotated out of ether and into a 5x leveraged long on 9.19 million APE, sitting on a $713,000 unrealized gain at the time of reporting.

Leadership Shift Reignites ApeCoin Price Rally

Yuga Labs, the company behind the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) and the Otherside metaverse, promoted longtime chief product officer Figge to the top role around April 16. Co-founder Greg Solano moved to chairman of the board.

Figge has been with Yuga since 2021 and joined from a background in film, animation, and digital art. His appointment coincides with fresh ecosystem plans, including a proposed Yuga Grails over-the-counter desk for high-end NFT liquidity.

Community sentiment around the token has shifted sharply in recent days. Billionaire BAYC collector Adam Weitsman, who holds thousands of Otherside deeds and multiple Mega Mutant Apes, has publicly reiterated confidence in the new leadership team.

Hyperliquid Trader Times the Rally

Data from Lookonchain shows the anonymous trader sold 75 ether worth $174,000 on Hyperliquid before opening the 5x APE position valued at $1.03 million.

The wallet has no prior transaction history, which fueled speculation about informed trading ahead of the move.

“We spotted this insider before $APE surged 80%! He is now up $713K,” Lookonchain reported.

APE had traded near $0.10 for months before Friday’s breakout, leaving it still roughly 99% below its 2022 peak. In it’s latest surge, the altcoin topped out at $0.1965, up 70% in the last hour.

ApeCoin (APE) Price Performance. Source: TradingView

Whether the rally holds will depend on how quickly Figge delivers on the roadmap and whether broader NFT volumes follow.

A US official said on Friday that the $344 million in Tether (USDT) frozen on Thursday was linked to Iran. The official tied the blacklisted addresses to transactions routed through Iranian exchanges and Central Bank of Iran wallets.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent confirmed a sanctions action targeting the same wallets, describing a broader push to cut off the financial channels Tehran uses as diplomatic efforts to end the war stall.

Two Addresses, One Iran Nexus

Tether said on Thursday it had supported US authorities in freezing $344 million in USDT across two addresses. The stablecoin issuer stated the move followed information shared by several US agencies about activity tied to unlawful conduct, coordinated through the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).

A US official reportedly told CNN that government analysts, working with blockchain analytics firms, observed material links to the Iranian regime.

That evidence included confirmed transactions with Iranian exchanges and flows routed through intermediary addresses interacting with Central Bank of Iran wallets.

The official added that Iran’s central bank has adopted increasingly opaque methods to hide cross-border digital asset activity. The effort aims to stabilize the rial and keep trade flowing under sanctions.

“We will follow the money that Tehran is desperately attempting to move outside of the country and target all financial lifelines tied to the regime,” read an excerpt in the report, citing Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent in a statement on Friday.

Iran Leans Harder on Stablecoins

The freeze fits a pattern documented by blockchain researchers. Chainalysis reported Iranian crypto holdings reached $7.8 billion in 2025, with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) holding roughly half of those assets by the fourth quarter.

The firm said the two frozen Tether wallets behaved like other known IRGC addresses when they were active, moving tens of millions of dollars in single transfers, often to private wallets.

Tehran has repeatedly relied on stablecoins to sidestep the traditional banking system.

Earlier this year, Tether and Circle blacklisted a hot wallet belonging to Iranian exchange Wallex, while US authorities sanctioned additional platforms accused of routing IRGC funds through USDT on the Tron network.

Debate Over the Real Impact

Not everyone is convinced the seizure meaningfully constrains Tehran. Daniel Tannebaum, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council and partner at Oliver Wyman, called the freeze “meaningful” but noted Iran has spent decades adapting to economic pressure.

“The way to get at Iran at this point, because Iran is truly sanctioned out, is to go with the third country actors enabling them,” Tannebaum told CNN, pointing to jurisdictions such as China as the more consequential choke point.

Intrusions targeting Iran’s own crypto infrastructure have also escalated in parallel.

Last year, pro-Israel hackers drained roughly $90 million from Iran’s largest exchange during military strikes.

Friday’s disclosure lands at a pointed moment for stablecoin policy. Tether said it now coordinates with more than 340 law enforcement agencies across 65 countries and has helped freeze over $4.4 billion in assets.

That reach being able to change how Tehran routes its next transfers is the question regulators and exchanges should watch moving forward.

Tom Lee’s Bitmine Immersion Technologies has bought 10,000 ether (ETH) from the Ethereum Foundation (EF) through an over-the-counter (OTC) transaction. The trade settled at an average price of $2,387, the foundation has confirmed.

The deal moves roughly $23.9 million worth of ether from the foundation’s treasury. The buyer is one of Ether’s most vocal institutional accumulators. It has also revived familiar criticism of the foundation’s selling cadence.

Foundation sells again from its safe multisig

The 10,000 ETH was left in a foundation-controlled safe wallet through an OTC block trade, according to the EF’s announcement. Proceeds at the stated average price of $2,387 amount to approximately $23.87 million.

The foundation said the sale funds core operations, including protocol research, ecosystem grants, and community funding programs.

It pointed to a treasury policy published last June that formalized periodic ETH sales as part of ongoing treasury management.

BitMine Accumulates What the Foundation Divests

On the other side of the trade sits a very public ETH believer. Tom Lee is the co-founder of Fundstrat and the chair of BitMine Immersion Technologies (BMNR).

He has steered the firm toward an aggressive ETH treasury strategy since 2025. The firm has become one of the more visible corporate buyers of ether on public markets.

The contrast has drawn fresh pushback. Pseudonymous researcher 0xfoobar argued the foundation is signaling weakness in its own asset by refusing to pay staff in ETH.

“There’s an element of dogfooding you’re strongly missing here. If the EF employees and contractors hate/misunderstand crypto so much that they’re unwilling to take payment in ETH, they shouldn’t be working there. Period,” the user wrote.

The sale tests the foundation’s argument that periodic divestments are routine operational housekeeping. Bitmine is emerging as a repeat institutional buyer of ether.

The contrast between Ethereum’s stewards and its biggest believers is becoming harder for the community to ignore. The foundation has yet to respond to the latest dogfooding critique.

XRP (XRP) is trading near $1.43 as multiple timeframes point to an imminent directional move, with a cup and handle on the 4-hour chart targeting $1.70 and a confirmed weekly golden cross backing a longer-term bullish thesis.

Daily volatility has compressed to near record lows while the Relative Strength Index (RSI) tightens inside a triangle stretching back to mid-2025. The setup resembles a classic accumulation phase before a powerful expansion.

XRP Weekly Channel and Golden Cross Build Macro Bullish Case

The weekly XRP chart shows the price on the lower boundary of an ascending parallel channel drawn on a logarithmic scale. The current bounce marks the third test of that support. Historically, prior tests in 2017 and mid-2024 preceded strong rallies.

A confirmed golden cross adds weight to the structure. Weekly golden crosses are rare and have marked sustained uptrends in past cycles. Crypto analyst XrpUdate expects XRP to run toward the channel midline, which currently sits in the $30 range.

Meanwhile, a clean loss of the channel support would invalidate the bullish case. Such a breakdown could open the door for a return to cycle lows.

“$XRP JUST CONFIRMED A GOLDEN CROSS Years of consolidation → ready to expand. The structure is screaming continuation. This is where smart money loads…”

Long-term XRP chart / Source: X Daily Volatility Collapse and RSI Triangle Point to Expansion

The daily chart shows XRP pinned to the 0.236 Fibonacci retracement at $1.42. Support sits at $1.30, and resistance at $1.53. The Fibonacci grid is anchored to the January rally top at $2.42.

Beneath the price panel, the Bollinger Band Width Percentile (BBWP) reading has collapsed toward zero and is flashing blue. Volatility this compressed has historically preceded sharp directional moves in either direction.

Declining volume through April reinforces the accumulation thesis. Long-term holders tend to absorb supply quietly during these phases before retail catches on.

XRP daily chart / Source: Tradingview

Confirming the setup, the daily RSI has formed a contracting triangle since July 2025. Resistance slopes down from the 88 print last summer. Support rises from the February 2026 low near 18.

The indicator currently sits around 55, almost dead-center inside the apex. A break above 60 would align with a bullish momentum shift. However, a drop under 45 would warn of further downside.

XRP daily RSI chart / Source: Tradingview XRP Price Prediction and the $1.70 Cup and Handle Target

The 4-hour XRP/USDT chart on Binance shows a cup and handle formation taking shape. The cup stretches from the March low near $1.30 to the April peak at $1.50. The handle is forming right on the 0.236 Fibonacci line at $1.42.

A clean break above the $1.50 neckline measures to a target of $1.6933. That target sits between the 0.382 and 0.5 Fibonacci retracements of the recent leg down. It represents roughly 18% upside from current levels.

The 4-hour RSI sits near 50, matching the neutral momentum seen on higher timeframes. That reading aligns with a late-stage accumulation pattern rather than exhaustion.

XRP 4-hourly chart / Source: Tradingview

If $1.30 gives way before the breakout, the cup and handle get invalidated. Hold the $1.30 floor, and the alignment across weekly, daily, and 4-hour charts favors a breakout.

The US Department of Justice (DOJ) has dropped its criminal investigation of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, ending a case that had frozen Senate work on the Trump nominee set to replace him.

US Attorney Jeanine Pirro announced the decision Friday, effectively reversing her public stance from two days earlier, when she pledged to appeal a judge’s order blocking her office’s grand jury subpoenas.

Quick Reversal After Courts Pushed Back

The probe began in January. Pirro’s office opened a grand jury inquiry into Powell’s June 2025 Senate testimony about the Fed’s headquarters renovation.

Prosecutors asked whether Powell misled senators about the scope of work on the Eccles and East buildings in Washington.

Reported costs for the project climbed to roughly $2.5 billion, up from an earlier authorization near $1.9 billion.

Inflation, asbestos and lead remediation, and historic preservation requirements drove most of the overrun. No charges were filed.

Chief US District Judge James Boasberg quashed the DOJ’s subpoenas on March 13 and reaffirmed the ruling on April 3. He wrote that prosecutors produced “essentially zero evidence” of a crime.

The judge also said the subpoenas served a “pretextual” purpose aimed at pressuring Powell over interest rate decisions. Pirro rejected that framing and said on April 22 she would appeal.

Two days later, her office referred the cost overruns to the Fed’s inspector general, an internal watchdog with access to procurement records.

“I have directed my office to close our investigation as the IG undertakes this inquiry…I will not hesitate to restart a criminal investigation should the facts warrant doing so,” wrote Pirro in the Friday afternoon post.

Tillis Ultimatum Cleared Warsh’s Path

The closure removes a political block on Kevin Warsh, the Trump nominee to succeed Powell when the chair’s term ends May 15.

Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, a Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, had withheld his vote until prosecutors walked away.

“I will oppose the confirmation of any Federal Reserve nominee, including for the position of Chairman, until the DOJ’s inquiry into Chairman Powell is fully and transparently resolved,” Tillis articulated in a late January post.

Tillis called the investigation “bogus” and “frivolous” during Warsh’s April 21 hearing. He said dropping it could be done in “five minutes.”

“If we want to get Mr. Warsh confirmed, we need to drop the investigation,” Tillis made the remark at Warsh’s hearing.

Warsh, a former Fed governor under George W. Bush, told senators he would not act as Trump’s “sock puppet.”

His confirmation would place a Trump ally atop the central bank weeks before the Federal Open Market Committee’s June meeting.

Powell had publicly described the probe as retaliation for Fed rate policy. His term as chair ends next month, though he can remain as a governor until 2028.

Former Fed officials and several market economists had flagged the case as a stress test for central bank independence.

The CLARITY Act Overlap

The decision reshapes the Senate Banking Committee’s near-term calendar. Tillis is also the lead Republican negotiator on stablecoin yield language in the Digital Asset Market CLARITY Act, the House-passed crypto bill now awaiting Senate markup.

He pushed the committee to delay the CLARITY markup from April to May, citing the need for more stakeholder input from banks.

The North Carolina Bankers Association had urged members to lobby his office for tighter restrictions on rewards tied to stablecoin balances.

Banks want a full ban on passive yield. Crypto firms want activity-based incentives preserved. A partial compromise allowing rewards tied to third-party platform usage has circulated but has not been finalized.

With Warsh’s confirmation no longer tethered to the DOJ case, committee bandwidth opens heading into the week of May 11, the earliest feasible window for the crypto markup.

Industry groups have warned that further slips could push meaningful market-structure reform into 2027, or worse, beyond 2030.

The Fed inspector general’s review and Warsh’s committee vote are the next pressure points. Whether the Powell case returns in any form may hinge on what the watchdog finds inside the renovation records.

Altcoins to watch this weekend are setting up for a concentrated volatility window. A major gala, a privacy coin consolidation, and a recent breakout showing distribution signals are converging across 48-72 hours.

On-chain positioning, derivatives flow, and chart structure create specific decision points over the weekend. BeInCrypto analysts have identified 3 altcoins to watch this weekend, led by interesting reasons and chart setups.

MemeCore (M)

The first of this weekend’s altcoins to watch is MemeCore (M). On-chain investigator ZachXBT flagged roughly 90% insider supply concentration a few days back. Yet, the token has kept running despite the call-out. M printed a fresh all-time high near $4.85 just hours ago, extending a vertical rally off the April 19 low of $2.79.

The 12-hour chart carries a conflicted structure. At first glance, the rally from $2.79 on April 19 to $4.85 on April 24 looks like a classic bull flag forming, a pole-and-flag continuation pattern that typically resolves higher.

However, the price also stalled near $4.73 a few days back before pushing slightly higher to $4.85, and that structure can equally be read as an approximate double top. The two readings point to opposite outcomes, which makes the consolidation level critical for altcoin traders tracking the setup.

Want more token insights like this? Sign up for Editor Harsh Notariya’s Daily Crypto Newsletter here.

MemeCore Price Analysis: TradingView

The volume tape favors the bearish read.

Between the March 25 swing high and April 24, price trended higher on lower volume, a divergence that typically precedes distribution-led corrections. A pullback to $4.36 or $4.06 could look like a flag consolidation and trigger dip buying.

However, a loss of the $2.79 low breaks the double-bottom base of the entire rally and projects a roughly 41% decline toward $1.64. The pullback can go deeper than flag traders expect.

Zcash (ZEC)

The second altcoin to watch this weekend is Zcash (ZEC). The privacy coin has picked up a fresh institutional tailwind. Foundry’s institutional Zcash mining pool, which launched around April 13, is now attracting meaningful hashrate, signaling that institutional miners are onboarding the network. That backdrop feeds a bullish technical setup already forming on the chart.

On the daily timeframe, ZEC is forming a cup and handle pattern, a bullish continuation structure where the cup marks the recovery from a low and the handle represents a shallow consolidation before a potential breakout. The cup formed with ZEC bottoming near $190.60 and rallying back to the local peak of $393.98 on April 10. Since then, the ZEC price has drifted into a tight handle consolidation, currently at $341.14 and pushing toward the handle’s upper trendline.

A bullish catalyst is lining up. The 50-day Exponential Moving Average (EMA) is closing in on the 100-day EMA, and a bullish crossover would add momentum to any handle breakout. The sloping-up neckline, the rising resistance that connects the cup’s two peaks, sits above $400.

Zcash Price Analysis: TradingView

The weekend setup favors an attempted push, making ZEC one of the most technical altcoins to watch over the next 48 hours. A daily close above $346, the 0.236 Fibonacci level, opens the path to $400. A break above $424, the 0.618 Fibonacci level, would confirm the cup and handle and project an 88.94% move toward $458, $502, and even $800 as the best-case scenario. However, a loss of $298 weakens the structure, and a break under $232 cancels the setup entirely.

Official Trump (TRUMP)

The third altcoin to watch is Official Trump (TRUMP). The Mar-a-Lago crypto conference is scheduled for Saturday, April 25. That hard date makes TRUMP the most event-driven of this weekend’s altcoins to watch.

Derivatives positioning hints at how traders are playing it. Despite TRUMP trading down roughly 14% over the past month, Binance’s seven-day TRUMP perpetual data shows cumulative long liquidation leverage at $11.26 million versus short liquidation leverage near $10 million. The mild long bias suggests traders are positioning for a Mar-a-Lago pop. However, if price corrects instead, that same long stack becomes forced-sell fuel on its way to liquidation.

Liquidation Map: Coinglass

The chart does not offer much support for the bulls. TRUMP trades at $2.85 inside a falling channel that has held since January 14, and the recent channel low of $2.70 on March 12 sits just below current price. The key decision level is $2.76. A break under $2.76 triggers the long liquidations and opens a deeper slide.

TRUMP Price Analysis: TradingView

A Mar-a-Lago bounce can push price toward $3.44, which represents a 20% move that still stays inside the bearish channel. Only a daily close above $3.86 flips the structure fully bullish. A break under $2.70 breaks the channel floor and exposes lower levels.

The 20th EU sanctions package imposed a sectoral ban on all Russian crypto services. From May 24, 2026, any transactions with Russian-registered crypto providers and exchange platforms will become illegal for market participants under EU jurisdiction.

The new sanctions coincide with Russian authorities’ plans to centralize the domestic crypto market: the bill ” On Digital Currency and Digital Rights ” proposes mandatory storage of cryptocurrencies in depositories and a ban on personal wallets. The combination of these two developments creates serious risks for Russian crypto investors.

BeInCrypto’s editorial team discussed the implications of the new restrictions with experts. Here’s how our interviewees believe the 20th sanctions package will impact Russia’s crypto industry.

Will all crypto that touches the Russian circuit now become “dirty”?

Mikhail Uspensky, a member of the State Duma’s expert council on legislative regulation of cryptocurrencies , believes that it is already considered de facto as such: large platforms, primarily European ones, refuse to accept cryptocurrency with a Russian connection.

However, not all experts share such a categorical assessment. Daria Mitrokhina, a leading lawyer for international projects at Right Side , clarifies that cryptocurrency used solely by Russian citizens or unsanctioned platforms will not carry the same risk of blocking as assets used through sanctioned platforms.

According to her, such cryptocurrency is not considered “dirty,” as it is defined as assets linked to criminal activity. However, it carries increased risk and is subject to sanctions, which, in her opinion, will make foreign platforms and countries even more cautious when dealing with Russians.

As a reminder, the 20th package also imposes sanctions on those who support and facilitate the circulation of Russian cryptocurrency on the international stage.

Olga Ocheretyanaya, a senior associate in the cryptocurrency regulation and mining practice at Right Side , takes a similar position . She believes that the EU sanctions’ focus on Russian platforms and exchanges, specific tokens linked to the Russian financial system, and sanctions-evasion infrastructure does not automatically render any asset that was once held by a Russian resident or passed through a Russian wallet “dirty.”

However, she warns that if the new regulations in Russia are implemented as currently formulated, it will inevitably result in all officially registered crypto platforms in Russia being sanctioned, and the wallets and cryptocurrency passing through them will be labeled .

Is it possible to comply with Russian laws and still avoid labeling?

Working with Russian sanctioned platforms with the subsequent goal of bringing cryptocurrencies to international markets is futile—it will likely result in blocking , warns Daria Mitrokhina. However, individuals still have the option to choose other platforms within the framework of legal compliance, excluding sanctioned services.

Will the authorities abandon plans to centralize the crypto market?

The idea of ​​introducing digital depositories is causing confusion and bewilderment among a large number of market participants , notes Mikhail Uspensky.

According to him, closing the internal loop with mandatory licensed custodians is a Russian innovation, born out of the habit of imposing securities regulations on the distributed ledger. The EU’s position should further alarm the bill’s authors:

“Transactions by centralized custodians will inevitably sooner or later create clusters/hubs in the blockchain that are easily tracked and marked with a ‘red Russian trace.’ A hack, leak, simple oversight, or other leak of data linking address identifiers to a Russian digital depository will cause problems for dozens, if not hundreds, of legitimate Russian residents seeking to buy crypto from a legitimate exchange,” warns Mikhail Uspensky.

However, lawyers believe the sanctions will have the opposite effect. The Russian Federation’s primary goals are to restrict the market from external influence, strengthen the ruble, develop its own payment systems, and increase independence from the international market, notes Daria Mitrokhina:

“Strengthening sanctions is more likely to accelerate than slow them down, based on the ‘they tighten them, we leave’ approach. We should now expect a focus on settlements with friendly countries and increased domestic oversight.”

Olga Ocheretyanaya agrees with this assessment: sanctions, on the contrary, are pushing Russian authorities to build their own closed circuit, leaving open the possibility of completely isolating external services.

Meanwhile, the question of how cryptocurrency within this circuit will be “cleaned” and how liquidity will be replenished remains open.

She also emphasizes that EU sanctions only affect those within their perimeter: European providers and users. In fact, Russia has long since established channels through Asia, the Middle East, and other friendly jurisdictions, and key flows will simply extend further into areas where EU regulations don’t apply.

Plans for cross-border settlements using the digital ruble

The creation of the digital ruble was initially not intended to circumvent sanctions, but rather to create its own payment system, recalls Daria Mitrokhina.

The initiative was aimed at working with neutral and friendly countries, as EU sanctions have long exposed Russia as an undesirable participant in their market.

The new sanctions package will likely not affect the plans for the digital ruble’s rollout, but will impact its geography and operational procedures. Plans will have to be adjusted rather than scrapped.

According to Olga Ocheretyanaya, the issue is not so much about EU sanctions prohibiting participation in the development of the necessary infrastructure for the digital ruble, but rather about reaching a fundamental agreement among BRICS members to use this instrument in settlements among themselves.

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