Author: NBTC

Jeffrey Schmid has sought a tighter monetary policy. A rate cut is less likely in March 2026. Cryptocurrencies are below the expected price levels. Kansas City Federal Reserve President Jeffrey Schmid has come out in support of keeping the lending rate unchanged, at least in the next March meeting. He has based his statement on the grounds of the recent job data. It remains to be seen how investors react when allocating their funds to cryptocurrencies, which are going through turmoil at the moment. Jeffrey Schmid on Rate Cut Jeffrey Schmid, the President of Kansas City Federal Reserve, has noted…

E-Estate Group Inc. has announced that it has tokenized more than $100 million worth of premium property assets, marking an early milestone for the digital real estate platform as the broader tokenization market continues to gain momentum. E-Estate’s 2025 annual report puts the platform’s tokenized real estate portfolio value at $104.62 million by year-end, spanning 11 tokenized property projects across multiple jurisdictions. The company also reported 2,039,787 EST tokens sold out of 10,462,000 issued, indicating roughly 19.5% distribution across the active portfolio. Beyond the year-end snapshot, E-Estate’s report states the portfolio’s “actual value” stood at $152.32 million as of January…

The traditional four-year crypto cycle, long-tethered to bitcoin’s BTC$67,938.94 halving events, may be a thing of the past. Han Lin, founder and CEO of Gate and an early advocate of bitcoin, told CoinDesk on Thursday the digital asset market has matured into a global macroeconomic pillar that now moves in lockstep with U.S. equities and AI-driven technological shifts rather than internal supply shocks. Lin, who leads the world’s fourth-largest exchange with daily volume exceeding $2 billion, laid out his vision of an industry that has transitioned from an “existential threat” to the foundational infrastructure of traditional finance. The American Bankers…

Balancer Labs, the team behind the decentralized finance protocol Balancer, is shutting down after mounting financial pressure and a $116 million hack in November, with executives proposing continuation of the protocol under a leaner, more cost-effective structure. “After careful consideration, I have decided to wind down Balancer Labs. This is not a decision I take lightly,” one of Balancer Protocol’s founders, Fernando Martinelli, said on Monday, adding that Balancer Labs has become a “liability rather than an asset to the protocol,” as it has been operating without revenue. Balancer Labs CEO Marcus Hardt added that it was spending too much to…

Mantle has shot up 230% in total value locked over the past six months to hit $755 million, outpacing L1 rivals like Sui and Avalanche. It recently became the third-largest protocol on Aave for total lending and borrowing, with $1.34 billion secured in a month. Mantle has surpassed $755 million in DeFi total value locked (TVL), data from DeFiLlama shows, representing a 230% rise over the past six months. According to DeFiLlama, Mantle is available across 165 protocols with $753.65 in TVL at press time and $1.394 billion in bridged TVL. The network’s rapid surge in TVL has overtaken established…

The Fed implemented 25 basis point interest rate cuts at its final meetings in 2025. However, while the Fed paused interest rate cuts at its January 2026 meeting, there is no clear view on when rate cuts will resume. While some predictions suggest the Fed might not cut interest rates at all, UBS Global Wealth Management stated that a Fed rate cut is still possible, but there’s no need to rush. When Will the Fed Cut Interest Rates? According to Walter Bloomberg, UBS analysts predict that the Fed may cut interest rates if inflation falls despite stronger-than-expected non-farm payroll data…

Prediction market firms such as Polymarket and Kalshi have a new set of guidelines for U.S. operation, with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission laying out initial guidance and a proposed permanent rule Thursday for what the agency called “a proven source of reliable information for news media, sports leagues, financial institutions, and everyday Americans.” The agency had once been a legal adversary of the prediction markets, warning that certain betting ran afoul of derivatives laws and that the CFTC couldn’t function as a global policy force combating fraud and manipulation in political markets all over the world. But under Chairman…

YieldNest, a DeFi infrastructure provider for yield strategies, has introduced ynRWAx, a vault designed to integrate real-world credit returns into decentralized finance. The product focuses on combining tokenized assets with lending mechanisms commonly used in DeFi, including leveraged looping strategies. The vault targets an annual yield of about 11%, based on mortgage-backed private credit linked to residential real estate in Australia. The credit operations are managed by Kimber Capital, a licensed Australian investment firm specializing in structured lending. YieldNest delivers the on-chain architecture and integrations. ynRWAx is structured as a yield-bearing asset that allows users to gain exposure to off-chain…

The crypto market is beginning to return to the green zone as leading cryptocurrencies are beginning to show decent increases after the recent market crash. While there are multiple indications that the market is seeing shifting sentiment and is about to see broad market resurgence, data from SosoValue shows that $XRP ETFs recorded zero daily net inflows during their last trading session on Feb. 11. This silent movement of $XRP funds reflects a pause in investor activity, possibly out of caution, even as market watchers pointed to potential recovery signals in $XRP’s price. $XRP ETFs maintain $1.23 billion milestone despite…

Crypto finance is only now beginning to provide an environment that matches traditional finance: ways to earn steadier, more predictable returns — similar to bonds or savings products, according to Aave Labs founder Stani Kulechov and Ethena CEO Guy Young. “Most fixed income is like the distribution of risk in different formats … basically just slicing and dicing and distributing risk,” Young said during a panel at Digital Asset Summit (DAS) in New York. “This piece of DeFi was probably the least featured two years ago.” Until recently, crypto users mostly traded tokens or borrowed against them, often chasing high,…