Crypto weekly is authored by maaria bajwa and david blumenfeld

PRICE CHANGE: WTD/YTD
- Crypto Market Cap ($2.47T): -8% / -19%
- BTC ($70,701): -8% / -19%
- ETH ($2,089): -8% / -30%
- SOL ($87): -15% / -30%
- UNI ($3.48): -11% / -38%
- OP ($0.19): -18% / -29%
- COIN ($165): -15% / -27%
- Tether Mkt Cap ($186B): +1% / -1%
- USDC Mkt Cap ($73B): +4% / -4%
- BTC / ETH Dominance: 57% / 10%

THIS WEEK IN CRYPTO
- Treasuries surged this week, as weakness in the US job market led to de-risking across stocks, commodities, and cryptocurrencies, with crypto and software companies leading this week's losses. Link.

- Bitcoin briefly dipped below $60,000 this week, representing a roughly 52% drop since its all-time high of $126,000 in October. Link.

- Bitcoin extended losses as the unwinding of leveraged bets and broader market turbulence deepened a selloff that wiped out all of the gains since President Donald Trump's election. Link.

- The Crypto Fear and Greed Index hit "Extreme Fear" territory, its lowest level in 42 months since the collapse of the UST Terra / Luna stablecoin. Link. Index.

- Senator Cynthia Lummis urged banks to embrace stablecoins, calling them a faster, cheaper payment rail, after CLARITY Act talks stalled due to pushback from banks on stablecoin rewards. Link.

- With its significant price decline this week, bitcoin has returned roughly 73% since early 2021, trailing gold at 164% and the S&P 500 at 75%. Link.

- Thirty-day volatility in gold hit 44%, the highest level since the 2008 financial crisis, surpassing the roughly 39% for bitcoin. Link.

- Y Combinator, Silicon Valley's most prominent accelerator, will allow its startup cohorts to receive their $500,000 of funding in USDC stablecoins. Link. Link.

- Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin said the original idea of Layer 2’s acting as secure extensions of the ethereum mainnet had failed to properly materialize, and instead focus should continue towards improving scaling of mainnet with Layer 2’s pivoting towards specialization. Link. Link. Tweet.

- ENS Labs, the foundation behind Ethereum Name Service and the .eth domains, is cancelling the launch of its own Layer 2 blockchain and will deploy its upcoming ENSv2 update on the ethereum mainnet. Link.

- Digital Asset Treasuries are largely down on their holdings, with Strategy (BTC) and BitMine (ETH) holding the biggest paper losses of $9.2 billion and $8.4 billion respectively. Link.

- Multicoin co-founder Kyle Samani is stepping down from his role at the crypto venture fund, to "explore new areas of technology". Samani and Multicoin were early Solana investors. Link. Blog Post.

- Bitcoin treasury company Strategy said during its Q4 earnings call this week that it could cover all its convertible debt even if bitcoin fell 90% in value, and that it had enough cash to honor its dividends for the next 2.5 years. Link.

- The US Marshals Service is investigating the theft of around $25 million of cryptocurrency from the newly created US Bitcoin Reserve. The primary suspect is a relative of the primary custodian, Virginia based firm Command Services and Support, who won the contract in 2024. Link.

- Funding rates for bitcoin perpetual futures turned negative and fell to levels last seen in March 2023, a sign of persistent bearish positioning and weak demand to hold long bets. Link.

- Bitcoin's hash price index, which represents expected mining revenue per unit of computing power, dropped to its lowest level ever of three cents for each terahash leading many miners to unplug equipment and causing an 11% drop in mining difficulty. Link. Link.

- Sberbank, Russia’s largest lender, is reportedly preparing to issue corporate loans backed by cryptocurrency as collateral. Link. Link.

- Crypto.com is launching OG, a dedicated platform for prediction markets. Link.

- Asset management firm Bitwise filed with the SEC for a spot Uniswap (UNI) ETF. Link.

- Newly released documents from the Department of Justice reveal that convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was an early investor in Coinbase and Bitcoin infrastructure company Blockstream. Link. Link.