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Author: NBTC

NBTC is the editorial account for NBTC News, covering Bitcoin, Ethereum, DeFi, blockchain infrastructure, exchanges, mining, regulation and digital asset markets. The editorial team focuses on clear sourcing, timely updates and practical context for crypto readers.

Russia passes law recognizing cryptocurrency as property in criminal cases

Members of the Russian parliament have passed provisions allowing the state to treat cryptocurrency as property as part of criminal proceedings. The new legislation unties the hands of law enforcement and judicial authorities in a growing number of cases requiring the seizure of digital assets. Russian lawmakers adopt law regulating crypto seizure The State Duma, the lower house of the Russian legislature, approved a law introducing a procedure for seizing and confiscating cryptocurrency in crime-related cases. The legislation, which amends the country’s Criminal Code and Criminal Procedural Code, recognizes digital currencies like Bitcoin (BTC) as property. On Tuesday, members of…

Legal

Spark looks to build building a safe bridge between onchain capital and TradFi

EMB: Feb. 11, 06:00 UTC Decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol Spark is pushing one of DeFi’s deepest pools of stablecoin liquidity further into institutional markets, unveiling new lending infrastructure designed to connect on-chain capital with off-chain borrowers that have largely stayed outside DeFi. The protocol introduced Spark Prime and Spark Institutional Lending in an announcement at Consensus Hong Kong 2025 on Wednesday. The new offerings extend more than $9 billion in deployed stablecoin liquidity into products aimed at hedge funds, trading firms and fintechs that operate under traditional custody and compliance requirements. Off-chain crypto lending is estimated at about $33 billion,…

DeFi

ETH could dip below $2k as buying pressure reduces: Check forecast

The cryptocurrency market has been ranging over the past two days, with many coins and tokens currently in the red. Bitcoin, the leading cryptocurrency by market cap, is stuck below the $69k level as it is up by less than 1% in the last 24 hours. Meanwhile, Ether, the leading altcoin by market cap, is down by 1% and is now trading around $2,011 per coin. BitMine adds more Ether to its treasury Copy link to section The bearish performance comes despite Ethereum ($ETH) treasury firm BitMine Immersion Technologies (BMNR) adding to its digital asset stash last week, acquiring 40,613…

Ethereum

Standard Chartered plans to launch crypto prime brokerage under its VC unit

Key Takeaways Standard Chartered is planning to launch a crypto prime brokerage under its venture capital arm, SC Ventures. The brokerage aims to serve institutional clients with services like custody, financing, trading, and clearing for digital assets. Standard Chartered, the leading British multinational bank, is considering launching a crypto prime brokerage that would sit under the bank’s venture capital unit, SC Ventures, Bloomberg reported Monday, citing people with knowledge of the plan. Talks about the proposed service are still preliminary, and plans have yet to be finalized, the people said. The lender has pursued a broad digital asset strategy through…

Regulation

CFTC's 'Top Cop' Legal Team Eliminated Amid Embrace of Crypto, Prediction Markets: Report

The CFTC office widely regarded as the regulator’s “top cop” has been reduced to non-existence—at the same time the Trump administration has sought to put the shrinking agency in charge of crypto and the exploding prediction market sector. The CFTC’s flagship Chicago office—which handles the agency’s most complex enforcement actions, and once employed 20 enforcement attorneys—had been slashed down to just a single enforcement lawyer, according to a new Barron’s report citing sources familiar with the office’s moves. On Monday, the final enforcement attorney remaining in the Chicago office resigned, a Barron’s reporter confirmed following the initial publication of the…

Legal

DeFi is not really decentralized, it is unavoidably centralized

HONG KONG — At the Consensus Hong Kong 2026 conference, the conversation surrounding decentralized finance (DeFi) took a sharp turn toward the pragmatic. The panel, "How Decentralized is DeFi Really?" saw industry leaders dismantle the "pure decentralization" myth in favor of a reality where temporary centralization is a survival mechanism. The "decentralization illusion" highlights the friction between DeFi’s permissionless ideals and its operational realities. While the goal is to replace intermediaries with smart contracts, most protocols exist on a spectrum rather than a binary state. Anand Gomes, head of Paradigm and Paradex, dismissed the idea of binary decentralization, instead framing…

DeFi

Ethereum price faces sub-$1,000 risk as liquidity remains lower

Ethereum price action is showing growing downside risk as weakening liquidity and fragile rebounds increase the probability of a deeper rotation toward the $900 range low. Summary Short-term bounces lack conviction, suggesting rallies may be corrective rather than trend-changing Liquidity dynamics favor a downside sweep, with clean lows still attracting price Volatility likely to expand, if balance breaks and price seeks deeper acceptance levels Ethereum ($ETH) price continues to trade in a vulnerable position, hovering around a critical support zone known as the point of control (POC). While short-term relief bounces have emerged on lower timeframes, these moves have lacked…

Ethereum

Brale Brings Regulated Stablecoins to Algorand

The Algorand Foundation announced that Brale has expanded its custom stablecoin issuance and orchestration platform to the Algorand blockchain. The move brings regulated stablecoin infrastructure to Algorand, a Layer-1 network focused on scalability, security, and fast finality. Brale is a U.S.-regulated stablecoin issuance platform. It allows businesses to launch and manage their own stablecoins with reserve management, compliance, and banking connectivity built in. Operating under U.S. money transmitter licenses, Brale combines custody, mint-and-burn processes, and compliance tools into a single system. Through APIs, enterprises and fintech companies can integrate stablecoins into payment, treasury, and finance workflows without maintaining blockchain or…

Regulation

FTX Founder SBF Requests Retrial! An Altcoin’s Price Soars! Here Are the Details

Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF), the founder of FTX and a central figure in one of the biggest scandals in the cryptocurrency world, has filed a new request for a hearing with the Southern District of New York Federal Court (SDNY). The application was registered as a “pro se” request, meaning a request made by the defendant on their own behalf. The petition submitted to the court was filed by Barbara H. Fried, Professor Emerita at Stanford University Law School. The document states that Bankman-Fried is seeking a retrial under Article 33 of the Federal Criminal Procedure Rule. A supporting legal memorandum…

Legal

STON.fi Opens TON DeFi to Bitcoin and Ethereum

STON.fi, one of the leading AMM protocols on The Open Network ($TON), announced that $TON-native representations of Bitcoin ($BTC) and Ethereum ($ETH) are now available within the ecosystem in a fully non-custodial DeFi format. The integration gives $TON users direct access to the two largest crypto assets, including the ability to swap them and provide liquidity, while maintaining full control over their funds. $BTC and $ETH are represented on $TON as wrapped assets issued in $TON-native format, each fully backed 1:1 by the underlying tokens and managed through smart contracts. Ethereum is available as wrapped $ETH (WETH), while Bitcoin is…

DeFi