Weekly Rollup - February 18, 2025

• President Trump announced reciprocal tariffs will be implemented.
• Argentina’s President suspected of involvement in pump and dump of $LIBRA.
• Two more crypto-native appointments were made for prominent U.S. regulatory roles.
• DOGE and XRP ETF applications acknowledged by the U.S. SEC.
• Franklin Templeton expanded FBOXX to the Solana network.

Macro Market Updates:

Fresh consumer price index (CPI) data out of the U.S. this week signalled that the U.S. economy is still relatively strong. CPI for the 12 months ending 30 January 2025 came in just over forecast at 3%. Following the data release, U.S. Federal Reserve Governor Jerome Powell testified before Congress for the Fed’s Semiannual Monetary Policy Report. He reiterated a similar sentiment to other recent statements — that the economy is strong and rates will be kept on hold provided this continues and inflation doesn’t move towards 2%.

Powell’s statement is at odds with President Trump, who used a press conference this week to call for lower rates despite his second-term economic agenda of tariffs and the expansion of tax breaks likely to have an inflationary effect if implemented in full. On Thursday, 13 February, President Trump announced that he’s moving forward with reciprocal tariffs on U.S. trading partners. His team will now start calculating the duties charged by other countries, with full details expected by 1 April. The U.S. Dollar fell 0.7% on the news.

Crypto Market Sectors:

Staking services, generation 1 smart contracts and real-world assets (RWA) were some of the biggest gainers this week. One of the biggest gainers in staking services was Lido DAO, which grew by 16.5% on the week, while Radix was the winner amongst generation 1 smart contracts, gaining 18.6% on the week. Currency networks, including Telcoin (TEL) and Venus (XVS), and decentralised exchanges (DEX) like Pancake Swap (CAKE) led altcoin growth this week (more on that below). Many of this week's gains were due to specific developments on each network rather than wider market sentiment, given much of the market was relatively flat.

It was another lacklustre week for bitcoin, with the cryptocurrency declining by 1.2% on the week. Opening the week at US$96,481, price hovered around this level, then closed the week at US$96,119. Bitcoin is currently trading at US$96,106.

A number of disclosure filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) revealed the firms that have significant bitcoin asset investment product holdings. Mubadala Investment Company bought US$436 million worth of BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) shares in the fourth quarter of 2024. Similarly, the State of Wisconsin Investment Board holds US$335.9 million worth of IBIT. Barclays disclosed US$131 million in IBIT holdings, while Goldman Sachs holds almost US$1.6 billion across various bitcoin ETF products. The amount of exposure these sophisticated firms have to bitcoin asset investment products indicates the growing prominence of crypto ETFs in the market.

Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) has resumed buying bitcoin after a short break at the end of January. Between 3 February and 9 February, the company spent US$742.4 million on BTC. The company now holds 478,740 bitcoins at an average purchase price of US$62,473 per coin.

GameStop may be the next company to start stockpiling bitcoin. A report citing unnamed sources said the team is exploring investments in alternative assets, including bitcoin. GME gained 5.5% on the week.

Bitcoin asset investment products saw outflows of US$430 million due to this week’s macro developments. Short-bitcoin saw outflows of US$9.6 million.

Ethereum made minor gains this week. Opening the week at US$2,627, price broke US$2,760 to the upside before retracing.

Vitalik Buterin, Ethereum’s co-founder, outlined a long-term plan to address growing concerns about managing light clients on the rollup-centric ecosystem. His solution, based on Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) 3668, suggested that an Ethereum Request for Comment (ERC) could be used to allow Layer-2 networks to get a standardised way of communicating proof verification mechanisms without relying on centralised third parties. Buterin says this process would be easier and ensure verification is decentralised and flexible.

This week’s outflows across digital asset investment products saw US$7.2 million flow out of Ethereum products.

Everything is currency

• Telcoin (TEL) gained 80.5%, taking its market cap to US$941.8 million. The payments network soared throughout the end of the week when Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) deposits and withdrawals were made available for Telcoin users in the EU. This means EU residents can connect their bank account to their Telcoin wallet and gain access to over 100 digital assets. This week’s developments follow the company’s conditional approval of Telcoin Bank’s application from the Nebraska Department of Banking and Finance. Telcoin Bank is due to be operational later in the year.
• Venus (XVS) grew by 65.4%, which takes its market cap to US$146.9 million. The multichain decentralised money market gained on news that Unichain pools are live on the Venus network. Plus, weETH, the liquid staking derivative token, is now supported on the Venus network. These developments presumably fuelled growth this week as traders and investors gained access to more ways to make money on the network.

Piece of CAKE

• PancakeSwap (CAKE) gained 70%. This takes its market cap to almost US$826 million. The all-in-one multichain decentralised exchange (DEX) saw gains throughout the second half of the week, presumably due to Syrup Pool, a new finance pool, becoming available on the network. Also this week, PancakeSwap surpassed US$1 trillion in trading volume, demonstrating the network has significant liquidity and investor interest.

Connected computing

• Golem (GLM) gained 52.5%, taking its market cap to US$372.6 million. The open-source, decentralised computing platform descended to a key area of support in recent weeks to US$0.235. Price since grew by 90% before retracing. The gains are presumably due to price trading around key levels and continued investor interest in decentralised computing and networks developing technology for the AI sector.

DeFi gains

• Orion (ORN) grew by 38.8%. This takes its market cap to US$31.5 million. The gains are presumably due to the launch of the network’s first real-world asset (RWA) native stablecoin, rwaUSD, and the launch of the Lumia Prism Mainnet going live. Orion completed its token swap and rebranding to Lumia in late 2024.

Layer 1 wins

• Kaspa (KAS) gained 30%, taking its market cap to US$2.8 billion. The gains are presumably due to its Coinbase Advanced perpetual futures listing and price finding support around US$0.82. The team also released an update outlining new integrations and development and tech updates on the network.

U.S. Federal Reserve Governor Jerome Powell’s Hawkish sentiment this week saw US$415 million flow out of digital asset investment products. It’s the first week of outflows after a 29-week streak following the U.S. presidential election, which saw US$29.4 billion flow into these products. Most of the outflows occurred in the U.S., with US$464 million leaving funds, reflecting the impacts of the Fed’s statements coupled with inflation data coming in slightly above forecast.

Solana led the way with inflows this week, with US$8.9 million flowing into products for the altcoin. XRP and Sui followed with US$8.5 million and US$6 million of inflows, respectively.

Crypto ETF developments

• New York State Senator James Sanders Jr. (D-NY) introduced a bill this week seeking to establish a crypto task force to reassess the state’s stance on crypto given the shifts in federal policy. The bill is under review by a Senate committee. If passed, the bill would allow for a 17-member panel to assess crypto’s effects on state tax revenue, the environment and market transparency. The state has previously tried to establish a crypto task force with similar objectives, with the latest attempt in 2023 vetoed by Governor Kathy Hochul.
• Opposition members of the Argentinian Government are calling for the impeachment of President Javier Milei. He spruiked $LIBRA on his X account on Friday, 14 February, saying the project would boost the growth of the country’s economy by funding small businesses and entrepreneurs. The coin soared from around US$0.21 to US$5.54 within 45 minutes. The first $LIBRA buyer bought at US$0.216 around the same time as Milei’s X post. The same user sold 37 minutes later, making a profit of US$6.5 million before the coin rapidly declined to below US$1. The timing has raised speculation that Milei, or someone known to him, was the buyer who effectively pumped and dumped $LIBRA.
• Franklin Templeton expanded its OnChain U.S. Government Money Fund (FBOXX) fund to the Solana network. The US$594 million money market fund offers tokenised assets, including U.S. government securities, cash and repurchase agreements. The fund’s BENJI token maintains a consistent price of US$1, making it similar to a yield-bearing stablecoin. The main competitor to FBOXX is BlackRock’s USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL), which launched on Ethereum in the second half of 2024.
• The U.S. SEC has opened public consultation on four Solana ETFs. Canary Capital’s Solana Trust was the latest filing this week, seeking public comment to bring SOL investment products to the public via traditional financial institutions. VanEck, 21Shares, and Bitwise have each made similar applications. A 21-day review period now follows, where the SEC can approve, deny or extend its decision deadline.
• The SEC acknowledged Grayscales Dogecoin ETF filing and Grayscales XRP ETF proposal. While the SEC has acknowledged these filings, there is a 240-day review window, including an initial 45-day review, that will commence once the filings get Federal Register publication.

• Eric Council pled guilty in federal court to aggravated identity theft and access device fraud. The twenty-five-year-old man hacked the U.S. Security and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) X account in January 2024 and posted that bitcoin spot exchange-traded products had been approved. He faces up to 15 years in prison for identity theft plus three additional years for impersonating a federal agency.
• Ex-Bitfury Chief Legal Officer Jonathan Gould has been tipped to lead the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. And a16z’s Head of Crypto Policy, Brian Quintenz, has been selected by President Trump to lead the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Gould and Quintenz are the latest of several crypto-native professionals to take up a prominent regulatory position in President Trump’s administration.