The crypto market was little changed-to-lower on Tuesday, with dogecoin (DOGE) and XRP leading declines among major tokens with losses of just over 3% in the past 24 hours. The CoinDesk 20 Index (CD20), a measure of the broader crypto market, fell 2%.

The lack of volatility comes as bitcoin (BTC) traders largely brace for the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting scheduled for Wednesday, which could set the tone for monetary policy and influence risk assets including cryptocurrencies.

The Federal Reserve’s decision on interest rates — widely expected to remain unchanged at 4.25%–4.50% — and any comments from Chair Jerome Powell could sway investor sentiment. A hawkish stance, signaling tighter policy or a slower path to rate cuts, might pressure bitcoin and lead to more pronounced losses in altcoins. Conversely, a dovish tilt hinting at future easing could spark a relief rally.

“A rate cut this Wednesday remains highly unlikely as the U.S. pivots away from fiscal dominance, where government spending fueled growth, toward [President Donald] Trump’s push for deficit reduction,” traders from QCP Capital shared in a broadcast message Tuesday. “The shift puts the burden back on monetary policy. While we do not anticipate a surprise cut, any dovish signal from Powell could be the catalyst that sparks upside momentum.

“Capital may be rotating out of Trump-driven momentum trades like NASDAQ and Bitcoin and into long-overlooked European and Chinese markets. Historically, crypto prices have lagged shifts in global liquidity conditions,” QCP Capital traders added.

Agne Linge of WeFi noted that broader market volatility remains elevated, with the crypto fear and greed index at 22 — indicating «extreme fear» — as investors grapple with uncertainties around inflation, trade wars, and geopolitical tensions.

“In the United States, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite recorded their fourth consecutive weekly declines last week, with the Dow Jones dropping by 3.1% to record its worst weekly turnover in about 24 months. While the previous week saw an unusual drawdown, more uncertainty lies ahead for the rest of the month,” Linge said, noting any macroeconomic headwinds could ultimately weigh down bitcoin prices.

At Bitget Research, chief analyst Ryan Lee said bitcoin remains in a tight range with a move to either $75,000 or $90,000 equally likely, based on how traders react to the U.S. rate decision.

“Bitcoin’s recent pullback has traders watching key support levels between $82,000 and $85,000. It’s a classic post-rally consolidation phase that is healthy but also a test of whether the recent momentum has real staying power,” Lee said in an email to CoinDesk. “Any unexpected FOMC moves could throw a wrench into the market.

“If sentiment turns bearish, we could see Bitcoin dip toward $75,000–$80,000, though a bullish macro backdrop could send it climbing back to $90,000,” he added.

Stablecoin protocol Level raised a fresh round of venture capital to expand its $80 million yield-paying stablecoin as yield-generating digital asset offerings are increasingly in demand with a cooldown in crypto prices.

Peregrine Exploration, the development firm behind Level, received another $2.6 million led by early backer Dragonfly Capital with Polychain also participating, founders David Lee and Kedian Sun told CoinDesk in an interview. New investors include Flowdesk, Echo syndicates Native Crypto and Feisty Collective by Path, and angel investors Sam Kazemian of Frax and Albert Chon of Injective.

The latest round followed a $3.4 million raise in August, bringing total venture capital funding to $6 million to date.

Level, with its lvlUSD token, is competing in the fast-growing stablecoin asset class, one of the hottest sectors in crypto and a darling among venture capital investments. Stablecoins—cryptocurrencies with a fixed price, predominantly tied to the U.S. dollar—are a key piece of infrastructure for trading and transactions on blockchains. However, the largest issuers do not generally offer yield to users earned on assets in the backing reserve. Tether, for example, reported $13 billion profits last year, in part from the U.S. Treasury yield backing its $143 billion USDT token.

That’s why a new generation of yield-earning stablecoins is getting increasingly popular among crypto investors. Ethena’s USDe, which generates yield on a market-neutral carry trade strategy harvesting futures funding rates, zoomed to above $5 billion supply in little more than a year. Meanwhile, tokenized versions of money market funds and Treasury bills, another stablecoin alternative, hit a $4.6 billion market capitalization.

Level’s stablecoin offers investors yield from putting the backing assets to work on decentralized finance (DeFi) lending protocols like Aave, while automating its reserve management. Users can mint lvlUSD by depositing Circle’s USDC or USDT stablecoins and lock up (stake) the tokens to lend out to generate yield on-chain. As of last week, annualized yield for staked version of lvlUSD stood at 8.3%, higher than tokenized money market fund yields. Meanwhile, lvlUSD has been integrated with DeFi protocols such as Pendle, Spectra and LayerZero, and can be used as collateral on Morpho.

«Their fully on-chain, transparent approach to yield generation sets them apart from competitors relying on opaque, centralized methods,» said Sven Wellmann of Polychain, one of the investors in the protocol.

According to Level’s calculation, the protocol outpaced rival stablecoins’ yield offerings over the past month, which has helped its supply surpass $80 million in five months since its beta launch.

With the latest funding, Level plans to expand their team and marketing efforts while continuing to expand utility for lvlUSD beyond staking it, Kedian Sun explained. The protocol also plans to tap into Morpho to generate yield in the next few weeks.

With those efforts, lvlUSD could potentially push towards a $200-$250 million market cap, a key milestone the team wants to achieve, Sun said.

By Omkar Godbole (All times ET unless indicated otherwise)

Bitcoin (BTC) traded around its 200-day average of $84,000 as the notorious Hyperliquid whale exited its multimillion dollar short BTC position. Smaller coins like CAKE, TKX, OKB and ATOM contributed to market optimism with positive performances.

The SUI token struggled to extend Monday’s 6% surge, which was spurred by asset managers’ ETF filings with the SEC, showcasing growing institutional interest in the wider crypto market.

While some analysts declared the end of the bitcoin bull run, casting doubt about the sustainability of the recent bounce, data indicated otherwise, pointing to exhaustion in the ETF-led selling pressure.

On Monday, U.S.-based spot bitcoin ETFs attracted $275 million in investor funds, building on Friday’s $41 million influx. That’s the first back-to-back inflows since Feb. 7, according to data tracked by Farside Investors.

«This data reinforces the narrative that ETF-driven selling pressure is exhausting,» said Valentin Fournier, an analyst at BRN. «If this trend continues, we could see inflows gradually build momentum, further supporting bitcoin’s price.»

The Fed’s rate decision on Wednesday could introduce volatility into the crypto market with a dovish statement possibly spurring increased risk-taking.

«Post-FOMC, bitcoin is expected to trade within the range of $80,000 to $86,000 with 80% confidence, while ethereum is projected to fluctuate between $1,800 and $2,100 under the same confidence level,» according to Ryan Lee, chief analyst at Bitget Research. «These ranges reflect potential movements tied to macroeconomic signals, investor sentiment, and broader financial conditions.»

In traditional markets, European stocks edged higher before a German parliamentary vote on historic debt reforms. Gold remained firm above $3,000 per ounce, with BlackRock calling the yellow metal a better diversifier than Treasury notes in the ongoing macro environment.

Meanwhile, futures tied to the Nasdaq, S&P 500 and Dow traded unchanged to negative amid reports that the Trump-Putin call regarding the Ukraine peace deal would take place between 13:00 and 15:00 GMT. Stay alert!

What to Watch

Crypto:

March 18: Zano (ZANO) hard fork network upgrade; this activates “ETH Signature support for off-chain signing and asset operations.”

March 20: Pascal hard fork network upgrade goes live on the BNB Smart Chain (BSC) mainnet.

March 21, 1:00 p.m.: The SEC’s Crypto Task Force hosts a roundtable, open to the public, that will focus on the definition of a security.

March 24 (before market open): Bitcoin miner CleanSpark (CLSK) will join the S&P SmallCap 600 index.

March 24, 11:00 a.m.: Bugis network upgrade goes live on Enjin Matrixchain mainnet.

March 25: The Mimir upgrade goes live on Chromia (CHR) mainnet.

Macro

March 18, 8:30 a.m.: Statistics Canada releases February consumer price index (CPI) data.

Core Inflation Rate MoM Prev. 0.4%

Core Inflation Rate YoY Prev. 2.1%

Inflation Rate MoM Est. 0.6% vs. Prev. 0.1%

Inflation Rate YoY Est. 2.1% vs. Prev. 1.9%

March 18, 8:30 a.m.: The U.S. Census Bureau releases February residential construction data.

Housing Starts Est. 1.38M vs. Prev. 1.366M

March 18, 11:00 p.m.: The Bank of Japan (BoJ) releases its monetary policy statement.

Interest Rate Est. 0.5% vs. Prev. 0.5%

March 19, 6:00 a.m.: Eurostat releases (final) February eurozone consumer price index (CPI) data.

Core Inflation Rate YoY Est. 2.6% vs. Prev. 2.7%

Inflation Rate MoM Est. 0.5% vs. Prev. -0.3%

Inflation Rate YoY Est. 2.4% vs. Prev. 2.5%

March 19, 2:00 p.m.: The Federal Reserve announces its interest rate decision. The FOMC press conference is live-streamed 30 minutes later.

Fed Funds Interest Rate Est. 4.5% vs. Prev. 4.5%

March 19, 3:00 p.m.: Argentina’s National Institute of Statistics and Census releases GDP data.

Full Year GDP Growth (2024) Prev. -1.6%

GDP Growth Rate QoQ (Q4) Prev. 3.9%

GDP Growth Rate YoY(Q4) Est. 1.7% vs. Prev. -2.1%

March 19, 5:30 p.m.: The Central Bank of Brazil announces its interest rate decision.

Selic Rate Est. 14.25% vs. Prev. 13.25%

Earnings (Estimates based on FactSet data)

March 27: KULR Technology Group (KULR), post-market

March 28: Galaxy Digital Holdings (GLXY), pre-market

Token Events

Governance votes & calls

Arbitrum DAO is voting on registering the “Sky Custom Gateway contracts” in the “Router contracts” to enable users to bridge USDS and sUSDS through the official Arbitrum Bridge UI.

Frax DAO is voting on introducing the WisdomTree Government Money Market Digital Fund (WTGXX) as an on-chain reserve for Frax USD.

March 18, 8 a.m.: Binance to host an AMA session with VP of Product Jeff Li and Binance Angel Victor Balaban.

March 18, 9 a.m.: NEAR Protocol to host a governance talk session.

March 21, 11:30 a.m.: Flare to host an X Spaces session on Flare 2.0.

Unlocks

March 21: Immutable (IMX) to unlock 1.39% of circulating supply worth $13.96 million.

March 23: Metars Genesis (MRS) to unlock 11.87% of its circulating supply worth $242.9 million.

March 31: Optimism (OP) to unlock 1.93% of its circulating supply worth $27.47 million.

April 1: Sui (SUI) to unlock 2.03% of its circulating supply worth $147.65 million.

April 3: Wormhole (W) to unlock 47.7% of its circulating supply worth $121.48 million.

April 7: Kaspa (KAS) to unlock 0.59% of its circulating supply worth $11.28 million.

Token Listings

March 18: Jupiter (JUP) to be listed on Arkham.

March 18: Paws (PAWS) to be listed on Bybit.

March 18: Slingshot (SLING) to be listed on KuCoin.

March 19: Hamster Kombat (HMSTR) and DuckChain (DUCK) to be listed on Kraken.

March 31: Binance to delist USDT, FDUSD, TUSD, USDP, DAI, AEUR, UST, USTC, and PAXG.

Conferences

CoinDesk’s Consensus is taking place in Toronto on May 14-16. Use code DAYBOOK and save 15% on passes.

Day 1 of 3: Digital Asset Summit 2025 (New York)

Day 1 of 3: Fintech Americas Miami 2025

March 19-20: Next Block Expo (Warsaw)

March 24-26: Merge Buenos Aires

March 25-26: PAY360 2025 (London)

March 25-27: Mining Disrupt (Fort Lauderdale, Fla.)

March 26: Crypto Assets Conference (Frankfurt)

March 26: DC Blockchain Summit 2025 (Washington)

March 26-28: Real World Crypto Symposium 2025 (Sofia, Bulgaria)

March 27: Building Blocks (Tel Aviv)

March 27: Digital Euro Conference 2025 (Frankfurt)

March 27: WIKI Finance EXPO Hong Kong 2025

March 27-28: Money Motion 2025 (Zagreb, Croatia)

March 28: Solana APEX (Cape Town)

Token Talk

By Shaurya Malwa

Hackers attacked BNB Chain’s Four.meme launch platform, exploiting new meme tokens to drain liquidity by bypassing listing restrictions and creating unauthorized trading pairs on PancakeSwap, siphoning off funds around 04:00 GMT.

The attack preempted Four.meme’s curated token launches, buying small token amounts pre-launch, adding liquidity to PancakeSwap pairs, and rug-pulling them, targeting popular tokens like MubaraKing (87.90 BNB stolen) and others such as EDDY and Cocoro.

Four.meme suspended new token launches and promised compensation for affected users, though no smart contract vulnerability was found. Leaked early transactions enabled the hacker’s front-running, according to analyst Chaofan Shou.

The attack exploited a flawed token function allowing transfers during the bonding curve stage, a recurring flow cell manipulation issue, potentially affecting all Four.meme tokens despite only a few being hit due to their popularity.

Derivatives Positioning

Open interest in ETH, LTC, XRP and SOL perpetual futures increased in the past 24 hours alongside a flat-to-negative cumulative volume delta (CVD), indicating net selling in the market.

SOL, ADA and DOGE have also seen negative funding rates.

Both open interest and basis in BTC and ETH CME futures remain depressed at recent lows, suggesting a lack of confidence among institutions to deploy capital.

Deribit’s BTC and ETH options continue to showcase put skews for expiries out to end of April.

Market Movements:

BTC is down 1.62% from 4 p.m. ET Monday at $82,676.40 (24hrs: -0.81%)

ETH is down 2.29% at $1,892.55 (24hrs: -1.1%)

CoinDesk 20 is down 2.25% at 2,582.56 (24hrs: -1.46%)

Ether CESR Composite Staking Rate is unchanged at 2.96%

BTC funding rate is at 0.0036% (3.89% annualized) on Binance

DXY is unchanged at 103.28

Gold is up 0.76% at $3,020.72/oz

Silver is up 0.82% at $34.07/oz

Nikkei 225 closed +1.2% at 37,845.42

Hang Seng closed +2.46% at 24,740.57

FTSE is up 0.44% at 8,715.59

Euro Stoxx 50 is up 0.85% at 5,491.99

DJIA closed on Monday +0.85% at 41,841.63

S&P 500 closed +0.64% at 5,675.12

Nasdaq closed +0.31% at 17,808.66

S&P/TSX Composite Index closed +0.94% at 24,785.11

S&P 40 Latin America closed +1.76% at 2,475.69

U.S. 10-year Treasury rate is down 1 bp at 4.31%

E-mini S&P 500 futures are down 0.29% at 5,715.75

E-mini Nasdaq-100 futures are down 0.38% at 19,963.00

E-mini Dow Jones Industrial Average Index futures are down 0.27% at 42,112.00

Bitcoin Stats:

BTC Dominance: 61.66 (-0.03%)

Ethereum to bitcoin ratio: 0.02285 (-0.31%)

Hashrate (seven-day moving average): 805 EH/s

Hashprice (spot): $47.08

Total Fees: 4.68 BTC / $386,699

CME Futures Open Interest: 151,030 BTC

BTC priced in gold: 27 oz

BTC vs gold market cap: 7.68%

Technical Analysis

The dollar index’s (DXY) decline continues with the key 61.8% Fibonacci retracement support breached in a positive sign for risk assets.

The breakthrough has exposed the next support at 102.32, representing the 78.6% Fibonacci level.

Crypto Equities

Strategy (MSTR): closed on Monday at $294.27 (-1.08%), down 1.54% at $289.75 in pre-market

Coinbase Global (COIN): closed at $188.96 (+3.19%), down 1.55% at $186.21

Galaxy Digital Holdings (GLXY): closed at C$17.35 (-3.5%)

MARA Holdings (MARA): closed at $12.97 (-1.59%), down 1.39% at $12.79

Riot Platforms (RIOT): closed at $7.76 (-0.77%), down 1.16% at $7.67

Core Scientific (CORZ): closed at $8.76 (-0.57%), down 0.8% at $8.69

CleanSpark (CLSK): closed at $8.12 (+1.88%), down 1.23% at $8.02

CoinShares Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI): closed at $15.37 (+0.46%)

Semler Scientific (SMLR): closed at $36.03 (+4.89%), up 2.19% at $36.82

Exodus Movement (EXOD): closed at $32.35 (+15.33%), unchanged in pre-market

ETF Flows

Spot BTC ETFs:

Daily net flow: $274.6 million

Cumulative net flows: $35.67 billion

Total BTC holdings ~ 1,120 million.

Spot ETH ETFs

Daily net flow: -$7.3 million

Cumulative net flows: $2.53 billion

Total ETH holdings ~ 3.509 million.

Source: Farside Investors

Overnight Flows

Chart of the Day

Pump.fun is a Solana-based marketplace widely used to create and distribute tokens, primarily memecoins.

Daily token deployment activity cooled to 29,475 transactions on Monday, down from 71,738 on Jan. 23.

Its a sign that the broader market slide has cooled speculative activities.

While You Were Sleeping

Bitcoin’s Bull Market Cycle Is Over, CryptoQuant’s Ki Young Ju Says (CoinDesk): Ki Young Ju forecasts 6-12 months of bearish or sideways price action due to declining market liquidity in a report suggesting BTC could drop to $63,000.

Metaplanet Continues Bond Issuance for Bitcoin Buys (CoinDesk): The Japanese firm issued 2 billion yen ($13.4 million) in zero-interest bonds using some of the proceeds to buy 150 BTC for $12.5 million.

Bitcoin Storm Could Be Brewing, Crypto OnChain Options Platform Derive Says (CoinDesk): Derive warned that market calm may be short-lived, citing uncertainty over Ukraine’s ceasefire and potential regulatory shifts under the Trump administration as triggers for volatility.

German Bonds Fall Ahead of Historic Vote on Fiscal Bazooka (Bloomberg): German bond yields rose ahead of Tuesday’s parliamentary vote on a major spending package amid concerns over rising debt issuance and inflation risks.

Trump Team Explored Simplified Plan for Reciprocal Tariffs (The Wall Street Journal): Trump officials debated a simplified three-tier system for reciprocal tariffs before opting for an individualized approach, with the final plan expected by April 2 alongside new industry-specific duties.

Europe’s defense spending spree risks debt crisis, warns Dutch politician (Financial Times): Pieter Omtzigt warned that the EU’s 800 billion euro ($875 billion) defense plan could lead to unsustainable debt and potentially trigger another eurozone sovereign-debt crisis.

In the Ether