Author: NBTC

Bitcoin $BTC$94,897.15 has continued a selloff begun yesterday, now having retraced a sizable chunk of this week’s early gains. In mid-morning U.S. action on Friday, $BTC was trading at $94,300, down another 1.3% over the past 24 hours after having slumped a similar amount on Thursday. Ethereum’s ether ETH$3,281.74 declined the same amount, falling back to $3,200. The broad-market CoinDesk 20 Index lost 1.5% during the same period, with XRP$2.0434, APT$1.7712 and polygon (POL) down 3%-6%. After trading for weeks in a very narrow range around the $90,000 area, bitcoin breaking higher to nearly $98,000 earlier this week excited the…

The SEC has announced that from January 31, 2026, and until further notice, the agency will only be running with a very limited number of staff. The move aligns with the standard federal agency shutdown plan that comes into play during funding lapses. What the shutdown means for the SEC and crypto regulation The announcement means that there will be extremely limited operations at the SEC until further notice. With this, divisions like Corporation Finance, Trading and Markets, and Investment Management are unable to perform routine activities. It is possible for emergency matters to be handled by the minimal staff…

The AI economy payment and settlement layer, AEON, has implemented a strategic alliance with Bitget to allow the use of $BGB, as the native token of Bitget, to make payments over the Morph Network. The integration will enable $BGB to operate as a useful payment instrument in online and offline experiences to support the shift of crypto tokens to be more of a commerce tool than a speculative instrument. 🤖$BGB steps into the AI economy.In partnership with @bitget, AEON now supports @MorphNetwork and Morph-$BGB for real-world payments across 50M+ merchants.Bringing onchain value into everyday commerce and agentic economies.https://t.co/p3NxX7EsUv pic.twitter.com/D7v62h4pn7 —…

Saudi Arabia has just crossed a major threshold in real-world asset tokenization — and it did so without outsourcing control of its legal system.—The Kingdom has completed the world’s first end-to-end tokenized property deed transaction using droppRWA’s sovereign-grade infrastructure. Settlement that once took days was reduced to seconds — while ownership, compliance, and legal enforceability remained fully anchored to the Saudi state.Registry as Truth, Not a Digital WrapperWhat makes this transaction different from earlier “tokenized real estate” experiments is where authority lives.The Kingdom directly integrated its Real Estate Registry (RER) into the transaction layer, meaning the blockchain did not sit…

In a significant on-chain transaction monitored globally, World Liberty Financial (WLFI) has executed a substantial $5.03 million WBTC sale, converting 73 Wrapped Bitcoin to $USDC and immediately capturing the attention of cryptocurrency analysts and institutional observers. This move, reported by the blockchain analytics platform Onchainlens, represents a notable liquidity event within the digital asset ecosystem and prompts a deeper examination of institutional portfolio strategy. Consequently, market participants are now assessing the potential ripple effects and the firm’s future intentions. Analyzing the World Liberty Financial WBTC Transaction Blockchain data reveals that an address widely attributed to World Liberty Financial initiated the…

PNC Bank CEO Bill Demchak hit back against the growing push from crypto firms to offer interest on stablecoins, saying the tokens are trying to serve two roles at once — something traditional finance would not be allowed to do without strict oversight. “The fight right now in D.C. is over some terminology in the GENIUS Act that they’re trying to fix with the Clarity Act, with respect to whether rewards count as interest paid on stablecoins, which was forbidden in the GENIUS Act, as a practical matter,” Demchak said during the bank’s fourth quarter earnings call on Friday morning.…

India has announced its Union Budget 2026, ignoring calls for reform from industry experts to stick to its existing tax framework. According to the details shared by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, the country did not deem it fit to make any revisions concerning taxes from crypto transactions. Since the beginning of the year, there have been numerous calls by participants in the crypto industry in India for a review of the current crypto tax framework. According to most people, the Budget 2026 provided an opportunity for the country to carry out a tax reform that would encourage local and international…

TL;DR On-chain privacy is a dominant 2026 narrative, with apps seeing over $530M in weekly volume. Hush Protocol launches a quantum-proof privacy layer on Solana that generates yield via staking. Its CEO cites institutional adoption as the next major catalyst for privacy innovation on Solana. Onchain privacy is rapidly establishing itself as one of the dominant crypto narratives in 2026. DeFi users are flocking to privacy-preserving applications in record volumes, with leading onchain shielding apps peaking at over $530 million in weekly volume during January. Launched by Zenrock, Hush Protocol becomes the newest application to join Solana’s flourishing privacy sector.…

Hex Trust, a digital asset custodian, said it expanded its partnership with the Flare blockchain to give institutional clients a route into $XRP $XRP$1.3640-focused decentralized finance (DeFi) while allowing them to keep control of their assets. The hook up positions Hex as a front door for funds and firms that want exposure to Flare-based strategies but have avoided them due to operational and compliance constraints. It allows clients to mint and redeem FXRP, a wrapped version of $XRP for the Flare network, alongside staking of the native FLR token. Staking and token wrapping typically require direct wallet connections and signing…

Saturday has brought another market-wide crash in the cryptocurrency space, and Ethereum is among the poorest performers over the past day (and week). In the past few hours alone, the largest altcoin slumped below $2,400 for the first time since July 2. This means that the asset has plummeted by over 10% in the past day, and it’s down by a whopping 18% weekly. Recall that $ETH had reclaimed the psychological $3,000 level on Wednesday when it tapped $3,070 for the first time in several days. This came before the first FOMC meeting for the year, but the asset began…