Crypto weekly is authored by maaria and david blumenfeld
PRICE CHANGE: WTD/YTD
- Crypto Market Cap ($2.89T): +3% / -15%
- BTC ($85,269): +2% / -9%
- ETH ($2,003): +6% / -40%
- SOL ($132): +4% / -30%
- UNI ($6.68): +10% / -49%
- OP ($0.85): +3% / -51%
- Tether Mkt Cap ($143B): 0% / +3%
- USDC Mkt Cap ($59.6B): +2% / +36%
- BTC / ETH Dominance: 59% / 8%
THIS WEEK IN CRYPTO
- The US Treasury Department has removed sanctions on cryptocurrency mixer Tornado Cash that were imposed in 2022, following a federal appeals court ruling last year that the Treasury overstepped its authority. Link.
- The total market cap for stablecoins reached over $230 billion, up 56% from the same time last year. Link.
- The SEC dropped its appeal in its case against Ripple Labs for alleged securities violations from the sale of its XRP token. Ripple estimates it has spent more than $150 million defending itself since 2020. Link. Link.
- Russia's Finance Minister confirmed that Russian companies are using bitcoin to evade Western sanctions. Link.
- The Senate Banking Committee will hold a confirmation hearing for SEC Chairman Paul Atkins on March 27. Link.
- Fidelity Investments is launching a share class of its Treasury money market fund that will be recorded on the Ethereum blockchain. Link.
- The Uniswap community approved two governance proposals, including $165 million in new foundation funding and a pathway for Uniswap to begin distributing protocol revenue to tokenholders. Link.
- Acting SEC chairman Mark Uyeda signaled the agency may rescind former chairman Gary Gensler’s proposal requiring investment advisers to hold crypto assets with qualified custodians like federal and state chartered banks. Link.
- The SEC issued guidance clarifying that proof-of-work cryptocurrency mining does not violate securities law and does not require registration. Link.
- SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce indicated that the agency may soon issue guidance that NFTs used as a fundraising mechanism may be exempt from securities regulations. Link.
- Tether is engaging with a "Big Four" accounting firm to audit its reserves backing the world’s largest stablecoin USDT. Link.
- Coinbase is in advanced talks to acquire Deribit, the world's largest crypto derivatives exchange, for between $4 to $5 billion. Link.
- Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) is selling $722 million in preferred stock to acquire more bitcoin, adding to its current holdings of 499,226 BTC worth over $41 billion (~2.4% of bitcoin's total supply). Link.
- Crypto venture deals have decreased by 60% since October 2024, with only 116 deals in February 2025 compared to over 300 in October, though investment value has remained stable at around $1 billion per month. Link.
- Hackers associated with North Korea's Lazarus Group are laundering $1.4 billion stolen from Bybit through multiple crypto mixers including Railgun and Tornado Cash, with 7.59% of funds now untraceable. Link.
- According to an internal State Department memo, the Trump administration plans to restructure USAID and implement blockchain technology in its procurement process. Link. Link.
- Ethereum Layer-2 MegaETH launched its public testnet this week. MegaETH aims to achieve 100k transactions per second, almost 2x higher than Solana’s theoretical limit. Link.
- Solana-based Pump.fun launched PumpSwap, its own decentralized exchange that can be used to start liquidity pools for meme coins on the platform. Raydium, which was providing the service previously, is launching LaunchLab, a token launchpad similar to Pump.fun. Link. Link.
- Pakistan’s recently formed Crypto Council announced the country is moving to legalize bitcoin and cryptocurrency through a regulatory framework aimed at attracting foreign investment. Link.
- Crypto exchange Kraken is acquiring retail futures trading platform NinjaTrader for $1.5 billion ahead of an anticipated 2026 IPO. Link.
- South Korea's Financial Intelligence Unit plans to sanction cryptocurrency exchanges including BitMEX, KuCoin, CoinW, Bitunix and KCEX for operating Korean-language websites without proper registration. Link.