Decentral Block Post

Update (April 26 at 8:57 PM UTC): This article has been updated to include updates from Loopscale.

Solana decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol Loopscale temporarily halted its lending markets after suffering an approximately $5.8 million exploit. 

On April 26, a hacker siphoned approximately 5.7 million USDC (USDC) and 1200 Solana (SOL) from the lending protocol after taking out a “series of undercollateralized loans”, Loopscale co-founder Mary Gooneratne said in an X post. 

Loopscale has since “re-enabled loan repayments, top-ups, and loop closing”, but “[a]ll other app functions (including Vault withdrawals) are still temporarily restricted while we investigate and ensure mitigation of this exploit,” Loopscale said in an April 26 X post.

The exploit only impacted Loopscale’s USDC and SOL vaults and the losses represent around 12% of Loopscale’s total value locked (TVL), Gooneratne added. 

United States Senator Jon Ossoff expressed support for impeaching President Donald Trump during an April 25 town hall, citing the President’s plan to host a private dinner for top Official Trump memecoin holders. 

“I mean, I saw just 48 hours ago, he is granting audiences to people who buy his meme coin,” said Ossoff, a Democrat, according to a report by NBC News. 

“When the sitting president of the United States is selling access for what are effectively payments directly to him. There is no question that that rises to the level of an impeachable offense.”

Senator Ossoff said he “strongly” supports impeachment proceedings during a town hall in the state of Georgia, where he is running for reelection to the Senate.

The Senator added that an impeachment is unlikely unless the Democratic Party gains control of Congress during the US midterm elections in 2026. Trump’s own Republican Party currently has a majority in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. 

Opinion by: Raullen Chai, co-founder and CEO of IoTeX

The United States and other superpowers are on the brink of a financial evolution. With President Donald Trump’s recent executive order establishing a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve (SBR) and a US Digital Asset Stockpile (DAS), the conversation around digital assets in government reserves is gaining momentum.

Countries like Czechia have also followed suit with their sovereign digital asset reserve plans. While Bitcoin (BTC) and select altcoins are being considered, the discussion remains incomplete without including decentralized physical infrastructure network (DePIN) tokens.

DePIN represents a new paradigm in infrastructure development, where communities, not corporations, build and operate essential networks like telecommunications that self-govern and distribute rewards to their individual contributors. 

If it were to include DePIN tokens in its DAS, the US could use blockchain technology to create a self-sustaining infrastructure economy that strengthens technological leadership.

Crypto investor sentiment has seen a significant recovery from global tariff concerns, but analysts warn that the market’s structural weaknesses may still result in downside momentum during periods of weekend illiquidity.

Risk appetite appeared to return among crypto investors this week after US President Donald Trump adopted a softer tone, saying that import tariffs on Chinese goods may “come down substantially.”

However, the improved investor sentiment “does not guarantee that Bitcoin will avoid volatility over the weekend,” analysts from Bitfinex exchange told Cointelegraph:

“Sentiment improvements reduce fragility, but they do not eliminate structural risks like thin weekend liquidity.” 

“Historically, weekends remain vulnerable to sharp moves — especially when open interest is high and market depth is low,” the analysts said, adding that unexpected macroeconomic news can still increase volatility during low liquidity periods.

Related: Trump fought the bond market, the bond market won: Saifedean Ammous

DeFi Development Corp (formerly Janover) aims to raise over $1 billion worth of capital to invest in Solana, the industry’s sixth-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization.

The Nasdaq-listed firm, previously a real estate financing platform connecting commercial property lenders and buyers, announced its plans in a Form S-3 registration statement filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on April 25.

The filing states that the funds will be used for general corporate purposes, including Solana (SOL) token acquisitions.

DeFi Development Corp S-3 filing. Source: SEC

According to the filing, the company may use proceeds from the offering to purchase more Solana, noting:

“Solana does not pay interest, but staking rewards can be earned on Solana. The ability to generate a return on investment from the net proceeds from this offering will depend on whether there is appreciation in the value of Solana following our purchases of Solana with the net proceeds from this offering.”

The company also warned that fluctuations in Solana’s price could lead to it converting the tokens into cash at a value “substantially below” the net proceeds raised.

World Liberty Financial (WLFI), the crypto firm associated with the family of US President Donald Trump, made waves when it debuted late last year.

WLFI caused a stir when it launched ahead of the president’s inauguration. Observers have accused the project of front-running important crypto-related events, like the White House Crypto summit, and presenting a conflict of interest.

Trump is in a unique position to influence outcomes that would affect his portfolio, but WLFI is not insulated from the broader market trends, which have seen crypto and stock prices drop amid significant macroeconomic concerns.

The Trump administration will soon mark 100 days in office. Here’s what WLFI has been up to, and how the president’s crypto investments are shaking out.

The “gold paper” for WLFI features flattering Trump imagery. Source: WLFI

Over $4 trillion worth of real estate could be tokenized on blockchain networks during the next decade, potentially offering investors greater access to property ownership opportunities, according to a new report.

The Deloitte Center for Financial Services predicts that over $4 trillion worth of real estate may be tokenized by 2035, up from less than $300 billion in 2024. The report, published April 24, estimates a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of more than 27%.

The $4 trillion of tokenized property is predicted to stem from the benefits of blockchain-based assets, as well as a structural shift across real estate and property ownership.

Global tokenized real estate value, growth predictions. Source: Deloitte

“Real estate itself is undergoing transformation. Post-pandemic work-from-home trends, climate risk, and digitization have reshaped property fundamentals,” according to Chris Yin, co-founder of Plume Network, a blockchain built for real-world assets (RWAs).

“Office buildings are being repurposed into AI data centers, logistics hubs and energy-efficient residential communities,” Yin told Cointelegraph.

United States Senator Cynthia Lummis suggests the crypto industry may be celebrating too soon over the US Federal Reserve softening its crypto guidance for banks.

“The Fed withdrawing crypto guidance is just noise, not real progress,” Lummis said in an April 25 X post. Lummis called the Fed’s April 24 announcement — withdrawing its 2022 supervisory letter that had discouraged banks from engaging with crypto and stablecoin activities — “just lip service.”

Lummis is “not fooled”

Lummis, a pro-crypto advocate known for introducing the Bitcoin (BTC) Strategic Reserve Bill in July 2024, pointed out several flaws in the Fed’s announcement, even as Strategy founder Michael Saylor and crypto entrepreneur Anthony Pompliano suggested it was a step forward for banks and crypto.

Source: Anthony Pompliano

She argued that the Fed continues to “illegally flout the law on master accounts” and still relies on reputational risk in its bank supervision practices. It comes as the Federal Insurance Deposit Corporation (FDIC) is working on a rule to stop examiners from considering reputational risk when reviewing a bank’s operations, according to a recent Bloomberg report.

Lummis also highlighted the Fed’s policy statement in Section 9(13), which hasn’t been withdrawn, stating that Bitcoin and digital assets are considered “unsafe and unsound.”

Spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETF) in the United States saw over $3 billion in inflows this week, marking the first full week of consecutive inflows in five weeks.

On April 25, the 11 spot Bitcoin (BTC) ETFs saw $380 million in inflows, bringing the total for the week to around $3.06 billion over five consecutive inflow days, according to Farside data. The last time spot Bitcoin ETFs had a full week of inflow days was the trading week ending March 21.

Strong inflow week turns April into positive month

ETF analyst Eric Balchunas said in an April 24 X post that “ETFs are on a Bitcoin bender.”

“What’s really notable here is just HOW FAST the flows can go from 1st gear to 5th gear,” Balchunas said, forecasting that some of those flows may be due to the “basis trade back in effect.”

Source: Satoshi Stacker

Amid ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty, spot Bitcoin ETFs have experienced a volatile April, with nine out of the 18 trading days so far being outflow days. 

Strike CEO Jack Mallers said his new role as CEO of Bitcoin treasury firm Twenty One Capital won’t distract him from heading Strike, revealing the platform processed over $6 billion in volume in 2024.

“This is not a shift in my commitment; it’s an extension of it,” Mallers said in an April 25 letter to Strike investors.

Every decision based on if it is “good for Bitcoin”

“If Bitcoin wins, humanity wins. Every business decision I make starts with one question: Is this good for Bitcoin? Twenty One exists because I believe it is good for Bitcoin and, therefore, good for the world,” Mallers said.

Mallers explained that Strike, a Bitcoin payments platform, and Twenty One Capital have different goals. He said Strike focuses on making “Bitcoin accessible globally,” while Twenty One aims to increase “Bitcoin ownership per share (BPS) and pioneer Bitcoin-native financial tools.”

“These are separate companies, but they share the same ethos: Bitcoin wins, we win,” he said.

Key points:

Bitcoin price pushed above $95,000, increasing the chance of a rally to $100,000.

Institutional investor demand is back, suggesting that the bearish trend could be over.

Select altcoins could break above their respective overhead resistance levels if Bitcoin remains strong

Bitcoin (BTC) bulls are trying to sustain the price above $95,000, but they are likely to face significant resistance from the bears. Will buyers succeed in pushing the price toward the psychologically important level of $100,000, or is a pullback around the corner? That is the big question on the traders’ minds.

Though the identities of many of the top holders of US President Donald Trump’s memecoin were still unknown, blockchain data showed significant outflows over the past seven days — during which time he announced a dinner and White House tour for certain tokenholders. 

According to data from blockchain analytics firm Nansen as of April 25, the TRUMP memecoin had seen more than $869 million in outflows in the last seven days compared to roughly $96 million in inflows among the top 500 changes. Some of the changes followed Trump announcing that the top 220 TRUMP holders could apply to meet him at a golf club dinner in Washington, DC, with fewer opportunities for a White House tour.

“It’s clear that more people took the opportunity to offload their Trump tokens than new buyers came in,” said Nansen. “There still appears to be some interest — either A) to secure the dinner ticket, or B) to capitalize on price volatility. As a result, a few new wallets have entered the top 250 holders, while some previous holders seem to have taken the opportunity to exit their positions.”

Top TRUMP memecoin holders as of April 25. Source: TRUMP token

Launched in January before Trump took office, his memecoin, and that of his wife, Melania, have seen criticism from US lawmakers and leaders in the crypto industry for potential conflicts of interest. At the time of publication, the identity of many of the top tokenholders and those who might apply to attend the dinner were unknown.

Who is investing in Trump’s memecoin?

As of April 25, the top tokenholder had 1,176,803 TRUMP memecoins worth roughly $16 million at the time of publication. The wallet holder, under the username “Sun,” had led to speculation that Tron founder Justin Sun — a Trump supporter and investor in the Trump family-backed crypto firm World Liberty Financial — could be among the dinner attendees. Cointelegraph reached out to Sun’s team for comment but had not received a response at the time of publication.

Stripe, a global payments platform, is building a new US dollar stablecoin product for companies based outside the United States, the United Kingdom and Europe in a move that may further expand the footprint of the dollar around the world.

Stripe CEO Patrick Collison confirmed the product on X, posting an invitation for companies interested in testing the solution. The move gained traction after Stripe recently received regulatory approval to acquire the stablecoin payments network Bridge.

Bridge's network competes with banks and companies that use the SWIFT system, a global financial messaging network that facilitates international wire transfers. Two former Coinbase executives, Zach Abrams and Sean Yu, co-founded the company in 2022.

Source: Patrick Collison

Related: Former Square, Coinbase execs raise $58M for Bridge stablecoin network

Stablecoin adoption grows in 2025

Stripe has a long-standing history with crypto, becoming the first major payments processor to integrate Bitcoin (BTC) in 2014. However, it discontinued support due to Bitcoin’s long transfer times and high transaction fees. The company began rebuilding its crypto team in 2021 as part of a renewed push into the space.

Stripe has recently accelerated that push. In October 2024, the company introduced a stablecoin payment option, which users adopted in over 70 countries on the first rollout day. In June that year, Stripe partnered with Coinbase to offer fiat-to-crypto conversions. Collison noted on X that Stripe's latest crypto initiative is something the company has "wanted to build for around a decade."

Semler Scientific has bought approximately $10 million worth of Bitcoin since Feb. 14, the healthcare technology company said in an April 25 statement. 

The company purchased 111 Bitcoin (BTC) for $10 million at an average price of roughly $90,000 per coin, Semler said. It holds a total of more than 3,300 Bitcoin worth approximately $300 million in aggregate. 

Semler said its Bitcoin purchases have earned stockholders a Bitcoin yield of 23.5% in the year to date. Bitcoin yield measures the ratio of BTC holdings to outstanding shares, reflecting growing exposure per share for investors.

“Semler Scientific uses BTC Yield as a [key performance indicator] to help assess the performance of its strategy of acquiring bitcoin in a manner Semler Scientific believes is accretive to stockholders,” it said. 

Semler bought 111 BTC since Feb. 14. Source: Eric Semler

The company said it acquired its Bitcoin treasury for an average price of nearly $89,000. As of April 25, Bitcoin trades at approximately $95,000 per coin, according to data from Cointelegraph. 

In one of his first appearances as the recently sworn-in chair of the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Paul Atkins delivered remarks to the agency’s third roundtable discussion of crypto regulation. 

In the “Know Your Custodian” roundtable event on April 25, Atkins said he expected “huge benefits” from blockchain technology through efficiency, risk mitigation, transparency, and cutting costs. He reiterated that among his goals at the SEC would be to facilitate “clear regulatory rules of the road” for digital assets, hinting that the agency under former chair Gary Gensler had contributed to market and regulatory uncertainty. 

“I look forward to engaging with market participants and working with colleagues in President Trump’s administration and Congress to establish a rational fit-for-purpose framework for crypto assets,” said Atkins.

SEC chair Paul Atkins addressing the April 25 crypto roundtable. Source: SEC

Some critics of US President Donald Trump see Atkins’ nomination to lead the SEC as a nod to the crypto industry, acting on campaign promises to remove Gensler — the former chair resigned the day Trump took office — and cut back on regulation. Democratic lawmakers on the Senate Banking Committee questioned Atkins on his ties to the industry, potentially presenting conflicts of interest in his role regulating crypto.

Related: Atkins SEC era sparks massive industry optimism, crypto execs speak out

US President Donald Trump’s first 90 days in office have been miserable for Bitcoin (BTC) and the broader cryptocurrency industry. Despite positive regulatory developments, culminating in the first-ever White House crypto summit on March 7, digital asset prices have been dragged down by the currents of trade war and fear of recession.

However, crypto saw a huge sentiment shift this week amid reports that Trump was backing off on his full-scale tariff war against China. It also didn’t hurt that Trump’s media empire, Trump Media and Technology Group, inked a deal with Crypto.com for its forthcoming Made in America exchange-traded funds (ETFs).

This week’s Crypto Biz newsletter covers renewed inflows into Bitcoin ETFs, a potential crypto venture backed by Cantor Fitzgerald, and Coinbase’s possible pursuit of a federal banking charter. It wraps up with a look at Tesla’s decision to hold its Bitcoin position despite a disappointing earnings quarter.

Bitcoin ETFs see largest inflows since January

Capital is flowing back into US spot Bitcoin ETFs, highlighting a positive sentiment shift among institutional investors. 

According to Glassnode data, the 11 spot Bitcoin ETFs registered $381.3 million in net inflows on April 21, with the ARK21Shares Bitcoin ETF accounting for nearly a third of the total. 

Nasdaq has urged the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to hold digital assets to the same regulatory standards as securities if they constitute “stocks by any other name,” according to an April 25 comment letter. 

The exchange said the US financial regulator needs to establish a clearer taxonomy for cryptocurrencies, including categorizing a portion of digital assets as “financial securities.” Those tokens, Nasdaq argued, should continue to be regulated “as they are regulated today regardless of tokenized form.”

“Whether it takes the form of a paper share, a digital share, or a token, an instrument’s underlying nature remains the same and it should be traded and regulated in the same ways,” the letter said. 

It also proposed categorizing a portion of cryptocurrencies as “digital asset investment contracts,” to be subject to “light touch regulation” but still overseen by the SEC.

Nasdaq’s April 25 letter to the SEC. Source: Nasdaq

Related: Certain stablecoins aren't securities, SEC says in new guidance

New data from RWA.xyz, a platform tracking tokenized real-world assets, shows that six entities are responsible for 88% of all tokenized US Treasurys. The data suggests a concentration among a few funds as the market continues to develop.

The largest issuer of tokenized treasures continues to be BlackRock. The company's tokenized US treasury fund, called BUIDL, has a market capitalization of $2.5 billion, 360% higher than its nearest competitor. BlackRock disclosed a total of $11.6 trillion in assets under management in the first quarter of 2025.

Rounding out the top six are Franklin Templeton’s BENJI, with a market capitalization of $707 million, Superstate’s USTB at $661 million, Ondo’s USDY at $586 million, Circle’s USYC at $487 million, and Ondo’s OUSG fund holding assets worth $424 million. Together, those six funds account for 88% of all tokenized treasuries issued.

A chart of the top six tokenized treasury funds by market cap. Source: RWA.xyz

According to RWA.xyz data, the largest tokenized treasury funds have seen consolidation since the beginning of 2025. Of the top six funds, only Circle’s USYC experienced a decline in market cap over the past few months.

Notably, BUIDL’s market cap increased by 291% from Jan. 1 to April 24. It now makes up 41.1% of the total tokenized US Treasurys market cap.

Cryptocurrency firms and centralized exchanges are launching more traditional investment offerings, bridging the divide between traditional financial and digital assets.

With investors seeking more flexible product offerings under one platform, the “line is blurring” between traditional finance (TradFi) and the cryptocurrency space, as the two financial paradigms signal a “growing synergy,” according to Gracy Chen, CEO of Bitget, the world’s sixth-largest crypto exchange.

In the wider crypto space, Securitize partnered with Mantle protocol to launch an institutional fund that will generate yield on a basket of diverse cryptocurrencies, similar to how traditional index funds track a mix of stocks.

The developments come after crypto investor sentiment staged a significant recovery, moving from “fear” to “neutral” for the first time since January 2025.

Fear & Greed Index chart. Source: CoinMarketCap

Investor sentiment was bolstered after US President Donald Trump said that import tariffs on Chinese goods will “come down substantially,” adopting a softer tone in negotiations for the first time since the reciprocal tariff announcement.

Recent months have seen the ebb and flow of a certain pattern: US President Donald Trump will take some objectively harmful action to the US economy, and the markets will crash. Seeing this, Trump turns to Jerome Powell, chair of the Federal Reserve, and demands he lower the Fed Funds Rate — the rate at which the Fed lends money to banks. And the steely-eyed Powell will say, “No.”

Trump wants to lower rates because doing so is an effective cash injection into the United States economy, stimulating activity and lifting the market. This, he believes, will make him appear successful. Powell wants to follow rigorous economic standards to set rates to carefully balance the Fed’s dual mandates of maximizing employment and maintaining stable prices. 

He also wants to maintain the Fed’s independence from political pressure and, crucially, maintain the Fed’s appearance of independence from political pressure. If the markets believe that the central bank’s independence has failed in the US, it may become more difficult to sell US Treasury Bills, the United States’ sovereign debt. That is a problem in the fundamental sense that the US will have to pay more to borrow money, making it poorer — but it is an especially acute problem now because the US already has an enormous, $30-trillion pile of debt, which it has to periodically refinance.

If it is forced to refinance at higher rates because markets do not trust the US government anymore, then an ever greater percentage of GDP will be absorbed by the cost of interest, and, as the kids say, the United States will be cooked. 

That dance takes us to now. Last week, Trump repeatedly intimated that he would like to fire Powell, and the market didn’t like it. On Monday, Trump provoked a crash by calling Powell “a major loser” on Truth Social. In response, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has reportedly voiced concerns with the risks of firing Powell to Trump, who seems, for now, to have acquiesced, stating Tuesday that he would not fire his Fed chair. 

A high court in Nigeria has reportedly granted the country’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) the authority to arrest six individuals who were allegedly involved in investment fraud at a cryptocurrency exchange.

According to an April 24 report from Nigerian news outlet The Cable, the Federal High Court in Abuja approved the arrest and detention of six people who promoted the Crypto Bridge Exchange (CBEX), allegedly defrauding investors out of 1 billion naira, or roughly $620,000. The suspects in the cases did not appear to have been arrested at the time of publication. 

“[The defendants used] their company ST Technologies International Limited, promoted another company Crypto Bridge Exchange by making adverts, and lured unsuspecting members of the public to invest cryptocurrencies on the CBEX investment platform,” the EFCC reportedly said in its motion for the arrest.

The legal case marked another instance of Nigeria cracking down on representatives of crypto exchanges in the country. In February 2024, Nigerian authorities detained and arrested two Binance executives who were visiting to discuss the exchange’s activities.

Related: Nigeria still open to crypto business despite rocky past: Report

Opinion by: Daniel Ahmed, co-founder of Fasset and founding member of the Own Foundation

Crypto was born from a vision to decentralize power, democratize finance and build systems where equity prevails over exploitation. Somewhere along the way, however, the movement lost its moral compass. As speculation surged, purpose dwindled.

We must return crypto to its decentralized roots, a technological revolution built on long-term value, inclusivity and ethics rather than cyclical, speculative gains. The industry should take inspiration from emerging regions and how ethical financial investing can help to repair some of the ways our industry has often fallen short. 

The rise of layer 2

When Vitalik wrote a blog post on layer 2s as a cultural extension of Ethereum, he brought up a critical point not only in business and technology but humanity — what we build in this life should be more significant than ourselves. Citing blockchains, he described how layer 2s, which he framed as subcultures of Ethereum, don’t merely differ in their technical benefits but how their positioning and intricacies trickle down into the culture of their communities. 

In a space where new layer 2s are emerging rapidly, Vitalik’s insights are accurate and inspiring. When we build in a vacuum of echo chambers and monocultures, we miss out on the actual value of community in Web3. 

Key points:

Bitcoin is witnessing a tussle between buy and sell volume as BTC/USD hits its highest levels since the start of March.

BTC price action is making traders increasingly wary due to the pace of recent gains.

$100,000 is likely to remain out of reach for the short term, multiple commentators say.

Bitcoin (BTC) headed into key resistance after the April 25 Wall Street open as doubts over the BTC price breakout persisted.

An official of the Swiss National Bank dismissed calls for the institution to add Bitcoin to its reserves as a hedge against the ongoing macroeconomic turmoil.

According to an April 25 Reuters report, Swiss National Bank Chairman Martin Schlegel said that “cryptocurrency cannot currently fulfil the requirements for our currency reserves” during a shareholder meeting in Bern earlier today. The comments come amid mounting pressure from the local crypto industry to add Bitcoin (BTC) to the central bank’s reserves.

Campaigner Luzius Meisser, a board member of cryptocurrency broker Bitcoin Suisse, told Reuters that “holding bitcoin makes more sense as the world shifts towards a multipolar order.” He claimed that the need is even more dire now that “the dollar and the euro are weakening.”

This is not the first time Schlegel has pushed back against the idea. Reports from early March quoted Schlegel saying that he doesn’t want to make Bitcoin a reserve asset in Switzerland, citing a lack of stability, liquidity concerns and security risks.

Related: Swiss canton of Bern votes to study Bitcoin mining feasibility

Decentralized AI startup Nous Research has raised $50 million in a Series A round led by crypto venture giant Paradigm, marking one of the largest investments at the intersection of blockchain and artificial intelligence to date.

According to an April 25 report from Fortune, the funding round values Nous at a $1 billion token valuation. Previous investors include Distributed Global, North Island Ventures, and Delphi Digital, who contributed to Nous’s earlier $20 million seed rounds.

Operating since 2022, Nous Research is stepping into the spotlight with the latest fundraising to develop open-source AI models powered by decentralized infrastructure.

The company leverages the Solana blockchain to coordinate and incentivize global participation in training its AI models, aiming to challenge centralized giants like OpenAI and DeepSeek.

Nous Research announcing Nous Psyche on Solana. Source: Nous Research

Related: Angels from Citadel, Jane Street, JPMorgan back $20M raise for Theo network

The crypto industry is bracing for a significant shift in regulatory tone following Paul Atkins’ swearing-in as chair of the US Securities and Exchange Commission on April 21. A former SEC commissioner with deep roots in deregulatory philosophy, Atkins replaces Gary Gensler, whose combative stance toward crypto defined much of the agency’s recent legacy.

In the latest episode of Byte-Sized Insight with Cointelegraph, key industry figures weigh in on the implications of this leadership change and what it might unlock for innovation, investment and clarity for digital assets.

Crypto’s “golden age” continues

Chris Perkins, president of CoinFund, spoke with host Savannah Fortis and described his excitement regarding the new SEC chair, predicting a reduction in regulatory uncertainty under the new administration. 

“We were under this regulatory reign of terror, you know, under the Biden administration,” said Perkins. “Investors in assets, they’re very comfortable taking market risk... but they’re not comfortable taking reputational risk, and along with that is regulatory risk.”

He pointed out how it was not only investors and companies who were nervous under the last administration, but also developers in the crypto space who had been targeted for their work.

As the Russian government is considering a ban on cash-to-cryptocurrency transactions, some major local crypto exchange platforms have experienced police raids.

Mosca, a crypto-to-cash exchange located in the Moscow International Business Center, was raided on April 23 in connection with fraud by one of its customers, Mosca’s development head Dmitry Titarenko confirmed to Cointelegraph.

“Law enforcement agencies have carried out a standard procedure of checking our customer data,” Titarenko told Cointelegraph at the local crypto event Blockchain Forum 2025.

The Mosca office raid followed online reports linking several arrests of some Mosca customers to a crypto robbery involving a victim reportedly giving fraudsters a massive cash deposit worth millions of dollars.

Cash-to-crypto ban to protect investors?

The police raid on Mosca came the next day after Evgeny Masharov, a member of the Russian Civic Chamber, proposed banning crypto exchangers from accepting cash from their customers to buy cryptocurrencies like Tether USDt (USDT).

Bitcoin adoption among United States financial institutions could see a major boost after the US Federal Reserve withdrew its guidance discouraging banks from engaging with cryptocurrency.

On April 24, the Fed withdrew its 2022 supervisory letter that served as guidance to deter banks from engaging in crypto and stablecoin activities. The withdrawal spurred a notable uplift in Bitcoin (BTC) investor sentiment.

The Federal Reserve Board’s withdrawal giving banks guidance on crypto activities. Source: Federal Reserve

The 2022 guidance initially warned that crypto may pose risks to investors and the stability of the US financial system.

The Fed’s move means that “banks are now free to begin supporting Bitcoin,” said Michael Saylor, co-founder of the world’s largest corporate Bitcoin holding firm, Strategy, in an April 25 X post.

Source: Michael Saylor

The Fed’s decision “is a significant development, as it will simplify the path to institutional adoption,” according to Anastasija Plotnikova, co-founder and CEO of blockchain regulatory firm Fideum.