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Crypto investor and blockchain researcher
The crypto market moves fast, and keeping up can feel difficult. That is why we have gathered the week’s biggest stories in one simple recap. Discover the events, trends, and updates that shaped the market over the past few days. Ready to see what happened? Let’s get started.
Bitcoin Japan Sets Aside ¥662 Million for Its First BTC Purchase
Bitcoin Japan plans to add Bitcoin to its corporate treasury after approving a financing package that could raise as much as ¥9.66 billion. However, the company does not intend to place the entire amount into cryptocurrency.
Management has reserved around ¥662 million, equivalent to roughly $4 million to $4.5 million, for its first Bitcoin purchase. This allocation represents about 7% of the maximum proceeds, while the remaining capital will support operations, investments and broader business growth.
The company will issue convertible bonds with stock-acquisition rights to EVO FUND under a resolution approved on July 16. Bitcoin Japan expects to receive ¥1.5 billion on the initial payment date, although the full ¥9.66 billion depends on whether investors exercise the attached rights.
The transaction also revives an earlier Bitcoin plan that never received funding. A previous capital raise generated only 54% of the expected proceeds, leaving nothing available for the proposed purchase.
Although the allocation remains small compared with the treasury strategies of larger BTC holders, it gives the Japanese company room to test custody, accounting and reporting procedures before expanding its position.
Dormant Bitcoin Whale Moves 2,931 BTC as Older Holders Accumulate
A Bitcoin address that remained inactive for almost seven years transferred 2,931 BTC on July 12, instantly drawing attention from traders who monitor older supply. The coins carried a value of roughly $188 million at the time and moved into a new wallet.
Large transfers from dormant addresses often trigger fears of an incoming sale, especially when Bitcoin trades below recent highs. Nevertheless, a wallet movement alone reveals little about the owner’s intentions. The coins may enter an exchange, move to a new custodian or form part of an internal security upgrade.
Another notable activation occurred on June 16, when 2,373 BTC from the five-to-seven-year age band moved on-chain. Those coins were worth approximately $156 million at the time.
Traders therefore need to follow the destination rather than focus only on the transfer size. A direct exchange deposit could increase available selling supply, while movement between private wallets may have no immediate effect on order books.
Broader holder activity also challenges the bearish interpretation. Glassnode data showed that long-term holders returned to net accumulation in early July. Its Long-Term Holder Net Position Change reached approximately 74,054 BTC over the 30 days ending July 12.
Ethereum Foundation Cuts Staff and Reshapes Its Funding Model
The Ethereum Foundation has completed a major internal reorganization that reduces both its workforce and annual spending. The organization separated from 54 employees, equal to roughly 20% of its staff, while targeting an operating budget about 40% smaller in 2026.
Under the new structure, work will sit within five main clusters covering the protocol, access, users, community and institutional relationships. A separate management and operations function will oversee finance, legal matters, risk and internal coordination.
The Foundation wants each group to hold clearer responsibility for specific outcomes. Protocol teams will concentrate on Ethereum’s core technology, while the access cluster will support developers, documentation and infrastructure. User-focused work includes wallets, privacy and safety, whereas the institutional cluster will give companies and financial organizations a more direct route into the ecosystem.
The financial change carries greater long-term significance. Ethereum’s leadership wants to move toward an endowment-style model that spends approximately 5% of treasury assets each year by 2030, compared with a rate near 15% before 2026.
Independent teams may consequently take over more execution, research and public-goods work. Grant applicants could face tighter milestones, stronger co-funding expectations and closer alignment with the protocol roadmap.
Allbridge Core Halts Operations After $1.65 Million Solana Exploit
Allbridge Core paused its routing service after an attacker manipulated a Solana stablecoin pool and extracted approximately $1.65 million. The team also advised liquidity providers to remove funds from affected pools while investigators examined the incident.
On-chain evidence suggests that the attacker borrowed around $1.12 million in USDC through a Kamino flash loan. They then used the temporary capital to distort the balance of Allbridge’s USDC and USDT pool, creating an artificial pricing condition that allowed them to withdraw more value than they supplied.
Because flash loans begin and end within one blockchain transaction, an attacker can obtain substantial capital without posting traditional collateral. The loan itself does not cause the vulnerability, but it allows someone to exploit weak pricing or accounting logic before other market participants can react.
Trackers recorded a withdrawal of roughly $2.24 million during the transaction, although this represented peak movement rather than the confirmed net loss. The attacker repaid the original loan, transferred the remaining funds from Solana to Ethereum and reportedly began routing them through privacy tools.
The incident places fresh attention on stablecoin pools, which rely on carefully designed curves to maintain prices near parity. Even a short-lived imbalance can create a profitable opening when the protocol calculates trades incorrectly.
Uniswap Governance Moves Closer to Activating Fees on V4
Uniswap tokenholders began final voting on two proposals that could change how the decentralized exchange earns revenue and expands across new networks. The first would begin activating protocol fees on Uniswap v4, while the second would extend the fee framework to Robinhood Chain.
Both votes entered their final on-chain stage on July 19. The v4 proposal represents the first half of a planned process, which means governance would still need to approve detailed settings, including eligible pools, fee rates and operational controls.
Uniswap currently allows liquidity providers to collect fees from swaps. Once protocol fees take effect, selected pools could direct part of that income to the protocol instead. This would reduce the share received by liquidity providers unless higher trading volume offsets the difference.
Governance would control the collected funds and could use them for development, audits, grants or other ecosystem programs. The current proposals do not automatically introduce UNI buybacks, token burns or direct payments to holders.
Robinhood Chain adds a separate growth angle. Uniswap deployed its v2, v3 and v4 infrastructure when the network launched on July 1, and early figures indicated substantial trading activity during its opening days.
Cardano Opens Core Development to Multiple Independent Teams
Cardano wants independent engineering teams to share responsibility for its core infrastructure, reducing the network’s historical dependence on Input Output Global. The transition covers protocol development, testing, maintenance and technical coordination rather than block production alone.
IOG has led much of Cardano’s research and engineering since the network began. Although this approach supported careful development, it also created a central operational bottleneck whenever upgrades, specifications or releases required action from one primary organization.
The emerging system distributes work among specialized groups while common standards keep their contributions compatible. Intersect, a member-led Cardano organization, will coordinate committees, working groups, funding programs and requests for proposals. Meanwhile, the Cardano Foundation will continue supporting documentation, standards, education and network reliability.
CIP-1694 provides the governance foundation for this model. It defines roles for delegated representatives, stake-based voters and the constitutional committee, creating a formal route from community decisions to technical implementation.
Multiple teams could improve resilience because one contractor’s delay would no longer stop every development track. Competition may also produce new ideas and encourage clearer documentation.
However, decentralizing engineering introduces coordination risks. Node software, ledger rules, wallets and smart-contract tools must follow consistent specifications, testing procedures and release schedules.
Exchanges and infrastructure providers will expect predictable upgrade calendars before installing new versions. Shared test suites, compatibility checks and clearly assigned ownership will therefore determine whether Cardano gains flexibility without fragmenting its technology.
Kraken Introduces USD-Settled Bitcoin and Ether Options
Kraken has launched Bitcoin and Ether options for eligible professional and institutional clients, giving trading desks another way to manage crypto exposure without settling contracts in digital assets.
The European-style products track XBT/USD and ETH/USD, settle in US dollars and allow exercise only at expiry. Kraken offers weekly, monthly, quarterly and semi-annual maturities, which gives institutions several timeframes for hedging risk or building volatility strategies.
Trading initially operates through a request-for-quote system. Instead of relying entirely on a visible order book, clients request prices and receive quotes for specific trades, an approach that often suits larger orders where desks want to limit market impact.
Kraken has set minimum order sizes at 0.01 BTC and 0.1 ETH. Initial position limits stand at 10 BTC and 100 ETH, while price increments start at $1 for Bitcoin contracts and $0.10 for Ether contracts.
The platform calculates settlement through a 30-minute observation period before 08:00 UTC on expiry day. Traders must account for that window when adjusting delta exposure or closing related futures positions.
Portfolio margin comes enabled by default, allowing offsetting positions across options and other products to reduce collateral requirements. Clients can also use more than 30 supported currencies through Kraken’s unified wallet.
Fees follow the exchange’s notional-based derivatives structure, although Kraken caps the charge at 12.5% of the option premium paid.
Citadel Securities Invests $400 Million in Crypto.com
Citadel Securities will invest $400 million in Crypto.com through a transaction that reportedly values the cryptocurrency platform at approximately $20 billion. Crypto.com describes the deal as its first institutional funding round since the company launched a decade ago.
The exchange plans to use the capital to expand beyond conventional cryptocurrency trading, with tokenized securities, derivatives and additional financial products forming central parts of its strategy.
Citadel Securities brings more than funding to the relationship. As a major global market maker, the firm has extensive experience in pricing, routing orders and managing liquidity across complex markets. Its involvement could help Crypto.com build infrastructure capable of supporting institutional trading, although neither company has detailed the investor’s operational role.
Tokenized securities may include blockchain-based versions of traditional instruments such as Treasury products, money-market funds, credit assets or equities. These products can offer faster settlement and programmable ownership, but their legal treatment depends heavily on the jurisdiction where an exchange issues or trades them.
Crypto.com will therefore need suitable licences, custody arrangements and compliance systems before launching products at scale. Derivatives add another layer because they require reliable prices, margin controls and clear liquidation procedures.
The investment also increases competitive pressure across large crypto platforms. Rival exchanges seeking institutional clients may need to improve execution quality, broaden regulated product ranges and demonstrate stronger controls as traditional financial firms deepen their involvement in digital markets.
Fake London Police Websites Helped Thieves Steal £4 Million in Crypto
Three men who impersonated Metropolitan Police officers and stole more than £4 million in cryptocurrency from eight victims have received prison sentences at Southwark Crown Court.
The group combined convincing phone conversations with police-branded websites that copied the appearance and language of official services. Callers claimed that criminals had compromised the victims’ funds, then created urgency by instructing them to follow immediate security steps.
Once victims trusted the supposed officers, the scammers directed them to fraudulent websites and requested wallet information or transaction approvals. In several cases, the victims transferred their own crypto because they believed they were moving it into a protected account controlled by law enforcement.
On July 16, Anthony Ikenwe, 29, and Kevin Nwamma, 25, each received six years in prison for conspiracy to commit fraud. The court also gave both men concurrent five-year sentences for money laundering.
Hamza Bashir, 23, received three years and nine months for conspiracy to commit fraud, alongside a concurrent three-year money-laundering sentence.
The operation relied on psychological pressure rather than breaking blockchain encryption. Personal information, formal language and copied police imagery made the requests appear credible while the caller discouraged independent verification.
Real police officers will not ask someone to reveal wallet keys or transfer cryptocurrency into a “safe” account. Anyone receiving such instructions should end the conversation and contact the organization through a separately verified number.
US Stablecoin Rules Remain Unfinished After GENIUS Act Deadline
American regulators passed the GENIUS Act’s July 18 deadline without publishing a coordinated set of final stablecoin regulations, leaving banks, issuers and trading platforms to prepare around proposals that may still change.
Several agencies have already outlined parts of the future framework. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency published a 39-page proposal on June 22, while FinCEN, the Federal Reserve, OCC, FDIC and NCUA jointly proposed customer-identification requirements for permitted payment stablecoin issuers.
However, the five-agency consultation remains open until August 21. An FDIC proposal covering Bank Secrecy Act and sanctions compliance also accepts comments through August 4, making synchronized final rules before those dates unlikely.
The delay matters because the stablecoin market now holds roughly $310 billion in circulating value. USDT accounts for about $184 billion, while USDC represents approximately $73 billion.
Banks considering stablecoin issuance, custody or reserve services must continue designing systems without knowing every final requirement. Non-bank issuers face similar uncertainty around customer checks, reserve controls, redemptions and regulatory reporting.
Compliance teams can still prepare by comparing the draft provisions with existing anti-money-laundering procedures, testing large redemption events and reviewing relationships with exchanges and banking partners.
Regulators must evaluate public comments before revising and publishing final language. Until that process ends, firms may delay product launches, limit available markets or build flexible controls that can accommodate several possible versions of the rules.
Bitcoin Developers Propose Timeline for Quantum-Safe Migration
Bitcoin developers have introduced BIP-361, a draft plan that would gradually retire cryptographic signatures vulnerable to future quantum computers and encourage users to move funds into safer wallet formats.
Jameson Lopp and five collaborators authored the proposal, formally titled “Post Quantum Migration and Legacy Signature Sunset.” It received its BIP designation on February 11, 2026.
Bitcoin currently relies on elliptic-curve cryptography, which prevents classical computers from calculating a private key from its corresponding public key. A sufficiently powerful quantum computer running Shor’s algorithm could theoretically solve that problem, allowing an attacker to spend coins from exposed addresses.
No existing quantum machine can perform such an attack against Bitcoin. Nevertheless, researchers worry that adversaries could collect public keys today and wait until more capable hardware arrives. As of March 1, over 34% of Bitcoin’s supply reportedly had publicly exposed keys.
BIP-361 proposes several stages. After activation, users would receive approximately 160,000 blocks, or around three years, to move funds before the network stopped accepting new transfers to vulnerable addresses. Five years after the initial trigger, the plan would reject legacy signatures entirely.
Developers continue discussing a later recovery phase involving zero-knowledge proofs and seed phrases. Project Eleven has already demonstrated a related proof system that runs in 243 milliseconds on ordinary hardware.
Its method cannot recover Satoshi Nakamoto’s estimated 1.1 million BTC because those coins predate the hierarchical wallet standard it requires.
Rare Bitcoin Cost-Basis Signal Points to Bear Market’s Final Phase
Bitcoin may have entered the closing phase of its bear market after a closely watched holder metric produced a signal that previously appeared before major recoveries.
CryptoQuant analyst Darkfost identified the change after the cost basis of short-term holders fell below that of active long-term holders and remained there through a required three-day confirmation period.
Short-term holders generally acquired their coins within the previous six months, while long-term holders kept them for longer. As Bitcoin declined, newer buyers continued entering at lower prices, pulling their group’s average acquisition cost from approximately $112,500 to around $69,000.
The crossover does not guarantee that prices will rise immediately. In previous cycles, it indicated that the market had reached a late bearish stage, where weaker demand and investor stress could persist before a broader reversal developed.
Bitcoin has also shown resilience near $60,000. The cryptocurrency recovered from a recent low of $57,747 and continued trading above that psychological level despite significant selling pressure.
Strategy’s reported sale of 3,588 BTC, valued near $216 million, failed to push Bitcoin below the support zone, suggesting that buyers absorbed the additional supply.
Traders now consider $67,248 the next important resistance. A sustained break above it could attract fresh demand and strengthen momentum, while rejection may keep Bitcoin inside its recent range.
Half of Bitcoin’s Supply Last Moved Above $59,000
Approximately 50% of Bitcoin’s circulating supply last moved when the cryptocurrency traded above $59,000, placing a large group of holders’ estimated cost basis close to a level that may influence future market behavior.
The figure does not mean that half of all Bitcoin buyers paid exactly $59,000. On-chain analysis records the market price when each coin last changed addresses, creating an approximate map of where active supply moved. Transfers between wallets can also affect the data even when no purchase occurs.
Still, the concentration shows that significant activity took place above the threshold. When Bitcoin approaches $59,000, many holders in that group may sit near break-even, which can shape their willingness to buy, hold or sell.
Some investors may defend the level because they view it as an attractive entry area. Others could sell after recovering earlier losses, turning the same zone into resistance. Market liquidity and investor sentiment will determine which behavior dominates.
The data may also reflect newer demand that absorbed supply at relatively high prices. However, it cannot distinguish every genuine acquisition from custody changes, exchange transfers or internal wallet reorganizations.
T. Rowe Price Crypto ETF Combines Bitcoin, XRP and Dogecoin
T. Rowe Price has launched an actively managed multi-asset cryptocurrency exchange-traded fund with approximately $15 million in initial capital, giving traditional investors exposure to a portfolio that includes Bitcoin, Ether, XRP and Dogecoin.
The TKNZ fund assigns its largest weighting to Bitcoin, which represents about 41% of the portfolio. Ether follows with 18.4%, while XRP accounts for 9.37%. Dogecoin receives a smaller 1.28% position despite remaining the world’s largest meme cryptocurrency by market capitalization.
The ETF directly holds digital assets through Anchorage Digital rather than using futures or other derivatives. It will not employ leverage, according to its fund documents.
Managers can select between five and 15 cryptocurrencies and adjust the composition as market conditions, liquidity or research views change. This structure gives the fund more flexibility than an index product that follows fixed allocation rules.
Several established cryptocurrencies, including Cardano, Shiba Inu, Avalanche, Litecoin, Chainlink and Hedera, did not enter the initial portfolio despite earlier consideration. However, the active mandate leaves room for future additions or replacements.
South Korean Retail Traders Lose $1.45 Billion in Leverage Rout
South Korean retail investors lost approximately $1.45 billion through leveraged trading during the past month, with people in their twenties and thirties accounting for 62% of the accounts that faced forced liquidation.
Margin pressure reportedly affected around 1.2 million leveraged retail accounts. Brokerages completely liquidated an estimated 320,000 to 460,000 positions after clients could no longer meet collateral requirements.
Data from the Korea Financial Investment Association showed KRW 451.9 billion in forced sales linked to unsettled trades between July 1 and July 13 alone. The figure highlights how quickly losses can spread when volatile prices collide with borrowed capital.
Leverage allows traders to control positions worth more than their original deposits, which increases potential profits during favorable moves. However, even a relatively small decline can erase the available collateral and force a platform to close the trade automatically.
Younger investors carried much of the damage, raising concerns about whether inexperienced market participants fully understood liquidation prices, interest costs and the speed at which leveraged losses can grow.
This article is not supposed to provide financial advice. Digital assets are risky. Be sure to do your own research and consult your financial advisor before investing.
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