Uncategorized
Crypto Daybook Americas: Bitcoin Buzzes With Anticipation Before Trump’s Inauguration
By Omkar Godbole (All times ET unless indicated otherwise)
The crypto world is buzzing as President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration nears. Bitcoin is holding above $100,000 and altcoins like SOL, ADA, LINK, XRP and LTC are shining as it’s not just about a potential strategic bitcoin reserve anymore. Reports suggest Trump could announce crypto as a policy priority.
Things are heating up for ether too. A blockchain address associated with Trump’s World Liberty Finance (WLF) project snapped up nearly $10 million of ETH this week, according to Arkham Intelligence. And keep your eyes on layer-1 blockchain Near Protocol’s NEAR. The token’s supply dynamics look bullish, with the ratio of staked to unstaked NEAR rising, according to data source Flipside.
Overall, the outlook for the crypto market is bullish, as Wednesday’s U.S. CPI report has eased inflation concerns, allowing traders to focus on Trump’s swearing-in. On-chain analysis from 21Shares shows there’s still plenty of upside left for BTC.
That said, consider the possibility of a price drop if a major announcement doesn’t materialize on Trump’s first day.
«The macroeconomic backdrop remains supportive, with unemployment trending downward, inflation showing signs of easing, and the market riding a wave of enthusiasm tied to Trump’s inauguration,» Valentin Fournier, an analyst at BRN, said. «We maintain a bullish outlook for Q1, though a correction could happen this week if the new administration doesn’t outline a solid action plan.»
Note that BTC is trading at a discount on Coinbase relative to Binance in a sign of weak demand from U.S. investors. Plus, Arkham Intelligence data shows a whale moved BTC worth over $1 billion to Coinbase on Thursday. Transfers to exchanges typically represent an investor intention to sell.
And watch out for inflation worries creeping back. The U.S. PPI, which shows price pressures building up in the pipeline, rose above the CPI in December for the first time since 2022. Stay alert!
What to Watch
Crypto
Jan. 17: Oral arguments at the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in KalshiEX LLC v. CFTC, where the CFTC is appealing the district court’s ruling favoring Kalshi’s Congressional Control Contracts.
Jan. 23: First deadline for a decision by the SEC on NYSE Arca’s Dec. 3 proposal to list and trade shares of Grayscale Solana Trust (GSOL), a closed-end trust, as an ETF.
Jan. 25: First deadline for SEC decisions on proposals for four new spot solana ETFs: Bitwise Solana ETF, Canary Solana ETF, 21Shares Core Solana ETF and VanEck Solana Trust, which are all sponsored by Cboe BZX Exchange.
Feb. 4: MicroStrategy Inc. (MSTR) reports Q4 earnings before the market opens.
Macro
Jan. 17, 8:30 a.m.: The U.S. Census Bureau releases December’s Monthly New Residential Construction report.
Building Permits (Preliminary) Est. 1.46M vs. Prev. 1.493M.
Building Permits MoM (Preliminary) Prev. 5.2%.
Housing Starts Est. 1.32M vs. Prev. 1.289M.
Housing Starts MoM Prev. -1.8%.
Token Events
Governance votes & calls
ApeChain is voting on a revamped governance process for 75% of the on-chain treasury to be directed to DAO treasury contract and the remaining 25% to the Ape Foundation for administrative and support purposes. Voting began Jan. 17 and will last for 13 days.
The Aave DAO is discussing a joint incentive program with Polygon that would require $3 million to enhance liquidity and adoption of Aave on the Polygon blockchain.
Unlocks
Jan. 17: ApeCoin (APE) to unlock 2.16% of its circulating supply, worth $18.1 million
Jan. 17: QuantixAI (QAI) to unlock 4.79% of its circulating supply, worth $21.28 million
Jan. 18: Ondo (ONDO) to unlock 134% of its circulating supply, worth $2.19 billion.
Jan. 21: Fasttoken (FTN) to unlock 4.6% of circulating supply worth $76 million.
Token Launches
Jan. 17: Solv Protocol (SOLV) to be listed on Binance.
Conferences:
Day 12 of 14: Starknet, an Ethereum layer 2, is holding its Winter Hackathon (online).
Day 5 of 12: Swiss WEB3FEST Winter Edition 2025 (Zug, Zurich, St. Moritz, Davos)
Jan. 18: BitcoinDay (Naples, Florida)
Jan. 20-24: World Economic Forum Annual Meeting (Davos-Klosters, Switzerland)
Jan. 21: Frankfurt Tokenization Conference 2025
Jan. 25-26: Catstanbul 2025 (Istanbul). The first community conference for Jupiter, a decentralized exchange (DEX) aggregator built on Solana.
Jan 30-31: Plan B Forum (San Salvador, El Salvador)
Feb. 3: Digital Assets Forum (London)
Feb. 18-20: Consensus Hong Kong
Token Talk
By Oliver Knight
Litecoin (LTC) led the pack over the past 24 hours after a Nasdaq 19B-4 filing paved the way to roll out an LTC exchange traded-fund (ETF). The token rose 17% to overtake bitcoin cash (BCH) in terms of market cap.
Ethereum developers confirmed that the mainnet Pectra upgrade will take place in March, with a series of hard forks planned on Ethereum testnets in February. The upgrade will improve wallet functionality and increase the native staking limit to 2,048 ETH from 32 ETH. This increase means larger stakers like Coinbase and restaking protocols will be able to control fewer validators, reducing complexity. Coinbase currently has tens of thousands of validators.
Altcoin whales are aggressively buying solana (SOL) in the lead-up to Donald Trump’s inauguration. One particular wallet, reported by Lookonchain, bought $2.49 million worth of SOL and withdrew an additional $3.94 million worth out of Binance. It then deposited a total of 144,817 SOL ($30.4 million) into lending platform Kamino before borrowing $20 million of stablecoins. This is effectively taking a long position on SOL as when the value of the underlying asset rises, the user will have to pay less stablecoin.
Derivatives Positioning
Litecoin is the best-performing coin in terms of futures open interest growth and positive CVD readings that imply net buying pressure.
HYPE stands out as overheated, with annualized funding rates in excess of 100%, according to Velo Data. The elevated funding rate indicates overcrowding in bullish bets.
BTC’s annualized one-month futures basis on the CME has climbed above 12%, surpassing ETH’s 11%. BTC, ETH CME futures open interest, however, remains little changed and well below December highs.
BTC, ETH options on Deribit show bias for calls.
Market Movements:
BTC is down 2.17% from 4 p.m. ET Thursday at $102,319.71 (24hrs: +3.15%)
ETH is up 3.13% at $3,424.04 (24hrs: +3.22%)
CoinDesk 20 is up 1.36% at 3,960.57 (24hrs: +4.36%)
Ether staking yield is unchanged at 3.1%
BTC funding rate is at 0.0092% (10.12% annualized) on Binance
DXY is unchanged at 109.02
Gold is up 0.67% at $2,730.60/oz
Silver is down 1.3% at $31.28/oz
Nikkei 225 closed -0.31% to 38,451.46
Hang Seng closed +0.31% to 19584.06,
FTSE is up 1.06% at 8,481.19
Euro Stoxx 50 is up 0.66% at 5,140.87
DJIA closed on Thursday -0.16% to 43,153.13
S&P 500 closed -0.21% to 5,937.34
Nasdaq closed -0.89% to 19,338.29
S&P/TSX Composite Index closed +0.23% to 24846.2
S&P 40 Latin America closed -1.41% to 2,230.95
U.S. 10-year Treasury is down 2 bp at 4.6%
E-mini S&P 500 futures are unchanged at 5,993.50
E-mini Nasdaq-100 futures are down 0.32% at 21,332.25
E-mini Dow Jones Industrial Average Index futures are unchanged at 43,496.00
Bitcoin Stats:
BTC Dominance: 57.49
Ethereum to bitcoin ratio: 0.0334
Hashrate (seven-day moving average): 784 EH/s
Hashprice (spot): $57.0
Total Fees: 7.34 BTC/ $731,223
CME Futures Open Interest: 178,755 BTC
BTC priced in gold: 37.8 oz
BTC vs gold market cap: 10.75%
Technical Analysis
The dollar index’s (DXY) rally has stalled, but the bullish trendline characterizing the uptrend from 100 is still intact.
A renewed bounce from the trendline support could create a headwind to risk assets.
Crypto Equities
MicroStrategy (MSTR): closed on Thursday at $367 (+1.77%), up 3.26% at $378.98 in pre-market.
Coinbase Global (COIN): closed at $281.63 (+2.44%), up 2.68% at $289.28 in pre-market.
Galaxy Digital Holdings (GLXY): closed at C$28.77(+3.01%).
MARA Holdings (MARA): closed at $18.3 (+0.83%), up 3.17% at $18.88 in pre-market.
Riot Platforms (RIOT): closed at $13.29 (-1.29%), up 3.24% at $13.72 in pre-market.
Core Scientific (CORZ): closed at $14.63 (+0.69%), up 1.71% at $14.88 in pre-market.
CleanSpark (CLSK): closed at $11.18 (-0.18%), up 3.58% at $11.58 in pre-market.
CoinShares Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI): closed at $24.60 (+0.12%), up 2.93% at $25.32 in pre-market.
Semler Scientific (SMLR): closed at $58.24 (+3.8%), up 2.76% at $59.85 in pre-market.
Exodus Movement (EXOD): closed at $37.87 (+7.1%), up 5.62% at $40 in pre-market.
ETF Flows
Spot BTC ETFs:
Daily net flow: $527.9 million
Cumulative net flows: $38.04 billion
Total BTC holdings ~ 1.14 million.
Spot ETH ETFs
Daily net flow: $166.59 million
Cumulative net flows: $2.64 billion
Total ETH holdings ~ 3.57 million.
Source: Farside Investors
Overnight Flows
Chart of the Day
The chart shows trends in NEAR’s circulating supply staked or locked in the blockchain in return for rewards, versus supply unstaked.
The rate at which NEAR holders are staking their coins is increasing, creating a bullish demand-supply dynamic for the token.
While You Were Sleeping
Bitcoin’s ‘Coinbase Premium’ Muted Amid Reports Trump Plans to Designate Crypto a National Policy (CoinDesk): President-elect Trump is reportedly planning to prioritize cryptocurrency with an executive order, but the BTC price differential between Coinbase and Binance signals a lack of enthusiasm among U.S. investors ahead of his Jan. 20 inauguration.
XRP Volume Overtakes Bitcoin on Coinbase as U.S. Investor Interest Grows (CoinDesk): XRP accounted for 25% of Coinbase’s trading volume in the past 24 hours, driven by rising U.S. interest and speculation about an XRP ETF.
Bitcoin Miners Have Started 2025 on a Strong Footing, JPMorgan Says (CoinDesk): JPMorgan notes that 12 of 14 monitored mining stocks delivered stronger returns than bitcoin early this year, supported by a 51% annual hashrate surge.
BOJ Likely to Keep Hawkish Policy Pledge, Raise Rates Next Week, Sources Say (Reuters): Markets predict an 80% likelihood the Bank of Japan will raise the interest rate to 0.5% next week, the highest since 2008.
China Hits 5% GDP Target but Trump Tariffs Threaten Further Growth (Bloomberg): China achieved 5% GDP growth in 2024, driven by stimulus and strong exports. Upcoming U.S. tariffs and weak domestic demand may hinder future progress.
European Markets Near an All-Time High Ahead of Earnings Season (Euronews): European stocks rose this week, with Germany’s DAX hitting record highs over the past two sessions. The Euro Stoxx 600 gained 0.81%, driven by strong luxury and technology earnings and expectations of looser ECB policy.
In the Ether
On Friday, cryptocurrency exchange Bybit was allegedly hacked by North Korea’s Lazarus group, which drained nearly $1.4 billion in ether (ETH) from the exchange.
Following the hack, Arthur Hayes, BitMEX co-founder and claiming to be a major ether (ETH) holder, wrote a post on X to Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin on whether he will “advocate to roll back the chain to help @Bybit_Official.” Meanwhile, in an X spaces session, Bybit’s CEO Ben Zhou revealed that his team had also reached out to the Ethereum Foundation to see if it was something the network would consider, noting that such a decision should be based on what the network’s community wants.
Hayes’s post immediately provoked a fierce reaction from the Ethereum community, which was firm in its belief that it wouldn’t happen. Some even questioned whether the BitMEX founder was joking. CoinDesk reached out to Hayes over X to clarify his comments.
Ethereum members, like the core developer teams, are vastly against “rolling back” the network because it would override core elements of decentralization. If Buterin decided on his own that it would happen, then that would be seen as the end of Ethereum’s ethos, which heavily involves various developer teams and other community members when it comes to the health and state of the blockchain.
“Rolling back the chain would give ETH no purpose. What’s the point if you can just change rules,” said user @the_weso in a post on X.
Some outside the Ethereum community pointed to the 2016 DAO hack as an example when $60 million in ETH was stolen. The network went forward with a hard fork, splitting the old network into two, and the new chain continued on as Ethereum.
That hard fork was not a “rollback,” though; it was known as an “irregular state transition.” Ethereum technically can’t “roll back” the network because it relies on an account model, where accounts hold users’ ETH.
At the time of the hack, developers upgraded their nodes to a new client or software. Those who didn’t upgrade their nodes were still on the old chain, which became known as Ethereum Classic.
When the nodes upgraded to the new software, the stolen ETH could move from one Ethereum account address to the next.
“The ‘irregular state change’ that they implemented at the time of the DAO hard fork was this: they airlifted all the ETH in the DAO smart contracts out to a refund contract that would send you 1 ETH for every 100 DAO tokens you sent in,” wrote Laura Shin of Unchained in a post on X.
Major cryptocurrency exchange Bybit has seen total outflows of over $5.5 billion after it suffered a near $1.5 billion hack that saw hackers, believed to be from North Korea’s Lazarus Group, drain its ether cold wallet.
The total assets tracked on wallets associated with the exchange plunged from around $16.9 billion to $11.2 billion at the time of writing, according to data from DeFiLlama. The exchange is now looking to understand exactly what happened.
In an X spaces session, Bybit’s CEO Ben Zhou revealed that shortly after the incident, he called for “all hands on deck” to serve their clients with processing withdrawals and responding to inquiries about what was going on.
During the session, Zhou revealed that the security breach saw the hackers make off with roughly 70% of their clients’ ether, which meant that Bybit needed to quickly secure a loan to be able to process withdrawals. Yet, Zhou found that ether wasn’t the most withdrawn token, with most users instead withdrawing stablecoin from Bybit.
The exchange, Zhou noted, has reserves to cover these withdrawals, but the crisis deepened as, in response to the incident, Safe moved to temporarily shut down its smart wallet functionalities to “ensure absolute confidence in our platform’s security.”
Safe is a decentralized custody protocol providing smart contract wallets for digital asset management. Some exchanges integrated Safe, which allows users to maintain custody of their funds and has multisig functionality to enhance the security of their cold wallets.
While the exchange had reserves to back up users’ withdrawals, $3 billion worth of USDT was in a Safe wallet that had just been shut down as the wallet moved to understand the situation, according to Zhou.
On social media, Safe said that while it had «not found evidence that the official Safe frontend was compromised,» it was temporarily shutting down «certain functionalities» out of caution.
While Zhou and Bybit’s team were figuring out how to securely withdraw their $3 billion, withdrawals were mounting. Within two hours of the security breach, the exchange was facing requests to move over $100,000 off its platform, Zhou revealed.
Responding to the situation, Zhou told his security team to engage Safe to “find a better way to get this money out.” The team ended up developing new software with code “based on Etherscan” to verify the signatures “on a very manual level” to move the stablecoins back to their wallet and cover the withdrawal surge.
The exchange’s team had to remain up all night to be able to fulfill withdrawals, according to Zhou. As the exchange managed to move the $3 billion in stablecoin reserves, it was facing a bank run of “about 50%” of all the funds within the exchange.
Zhou said that since the incident, the exchange has moved a significant amount of funds off of Safe cold wallets and is now determining what system it will use to replace Safe.
Pushing to «Roll Back» Ethereum Was not Off the Table
Since the security breach, Bybit has engaged authorities. During the session, Zhou said that the Singaporean authorities took the issue “very seriously” and that he believes it has already been escalated with Interpol.
Blockchain analysis firms, including Chainalysis, were engaged. Zhou said, “As long as Bybit is there and continues to track [the stolen ether], I hope we can get these funds back.”
Notably, he revealed that pushing to «roll back» the Ethereum blockchain, which was suggested by some industry players on social media, including BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes, had been on the table for some time if the community agreed with it.
“I had my team talking to Vitalik and the Ethereum Foundation to see if there’s any recommendations they can offer to help. I do really thank all these guys on Twitter asking if there is a possibility to roll back the chain. I’m not sure what was the response on their side, but anything that would help we would try,” Zhou said.
When asked if «rolling back» the chain is even possible, Zhou responded he doesn’t know. “I’m not sure it’s a one-man decision based on the spirit of blockchain. It should be a work in process to see what the community wants,” he said.
It’s worth noting that a blockchain «rollback» refers to a state change that would allow for the funds to be recovered. While rolling back the Bitcoin blockchain is technically possible, such a state change on Ethereum would be more complex, given its smart contract interactions and state-based architecture.
Nevertheless, any state change would require consensus and likely lead to a contentious hard fork, drawing criticism from the community. This would likely split the Ethereum blockchain into two networks, each with its own supporters.
As for what exactly caused the hack to occur, is still unclear. Per Zhou, Bybit’s laptops have not been compromised. He said the movements of the transaction’s signers have been scrutinized but appear to have been routine.
“We know the cause is definitely around the Safe cold wallet. Whether it’s a problem with our laptops or on Safe’s side, we don’t know.,” Zhou added.
Uncategorized
Binance Research Survey Shows 95% of Latin American Crypto Users Plan to Buy More in 2025
A vast majority of Latin American cryptocurrency users—95%—plan to expand their holdings in 2025, according to a Binance Research survey of more than 10,000 investors in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico.
The findings show that 40.1% of respondents are expecting to buy more crypto within the next three months, 15.3% are looking to do so in the next six months, and 39.7% within 12 months. Only 4.9% have no plans to keep on investing this year.
Latin America led the world in crypto adoption in 2024, growing by 116%, according to research from payments firm Triple-A quoted in the report. The region now has 55 million cryptocurrency users, making up nearly 10% of total cryptocurrency users.
This rapid expansion has been fueled by rising asset prices, regulatory advancements, and new financial products like spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs). Brazil has just last week become the first country to approve a spot XRP ETF.
Market performance has also bolstered investor confidence. «Latin America is a rapidly expanding region for the crypto sector, and the results of this research reinforce what we have observed in our operations,” Binance’s regional VP for Latin America, Guilherme Nazar, said.
Binance’s research shows that half of those inquired already use cryptocurrencies for over a year, with most entering the space expecting significant returns and searching for financial freedom.
Portfolio diversification, privacy, and protecting their money were also quoted as motives to invest in the space.
Read more: How a $115M Crypto Fund With Big Ambitions Plans to Invest In Latin America
Ethereum ‘Roll Back’ Suggestion Has Sparked Criticism. Here’s Why It Won’t Happen
Bybit Sees Over $4 Billion ‘Bank Run’ After Crypto’s Biggest Hack
Binance Research Survey Shows 95% of Latin American Crypto Users Plan to Buy More in 2025
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