Author: John Smith

Circle launched CPN Managed Payments on April 8, a fully managed stablecoin settlement solution that makes the Circle Payments Network accessible to banks, payment service providers, and fintechs without requiring them to manage digital assets, custody infrastructure, or blockchain operations directly. Summary Partners interact entirely in fiat while Circle manages the complete digital asset lifecycle including USDC minting and burning, payment orchestration, compliance controls, and blockchain infrastructure, reducing the adoption barrier for institutions that lack crypto licenses or technical capacity. USDC has supported more than $70 trillion in total on-chain settlement since inception, with on-chain transaction volume approaching $12 trillion…

BitGo announced that AndX USA LLC has launched its US crypto exchange 2026 entry on top of BitGo’s Crypto-as-a-Service infrastructure, giving the global digital asset platform nationwide operations across all 50 states under an OCC-regulated custody framework backed by $250 million in insurance coverage. Summary AndX, a New York-headquartered AI-native Web3 financial platform that already operates in Turkey, the UAE, India, Brazil, the Philippines, and South Africa. The platform runs on BitGo Bank and Trust, National Association, the first federally chartered digital asset trust bank owned by a publicly traded company. AndX CEO Viru Raparthi said the partnership enables the…

In Trump news today, President Trump criticized Pope Leo XIV as “WEAK on Crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy” in a social media post that escalated a days-long public feud with the first American pope, who has repeatedly condemned the US-Israel war on Iran and called Trump’s pre-strike threat to wipe out Iranian civilization “truly unacceptable.” Summary Trump also claimed Pope Leo supports Iran having nuclear weapons, a claim the pope did not make, and said he did not want “a Pope who criticizes the President of the United States,” adding that Leo had not been on anyone’s list to…

In the latest generative AI news, CBS MoneyWatch reported that US households are actively making room in their budgets for AI subscriptions, backed by Bank of America Institute data showing the number of paying AI subscribers has surged 38% from the 2024 average. Summary Approximately 3% of Bank of America households paid for AI services in early 2026, with median monthly spend at $20, up 10.4% year over year, driven by growing use of tools like ChatGPT Plus, Claude Pro, and Gemini. The share of subscribers paying $21 to $40 per month jumped 50% year to date versus 2024, suggesting…

Summary Coinglass data show about $1.044 billion of Ethereum longs would be exposed to forced liquidations on major centralized exchanges if ETH drops below $2,323. On the upside, a clean move above $2,563 would flip pressure onto bears, with roughly $531 million of short positions at risk of liquidation across the same venues. The new band extends an April pattern in which more than $1.8 billion of leverage has repeatedly clustered in tight ranges, turning 5–7% moves into outsized liquidations for over‑levered traders. Fresh Coinglass heatmap data suggest Ethereum is again sitting between two sizeable liquidation walls, with leverage stacked…

Payward, the parent company of Kraken, agreed to acquire Bitnomial, the first US crypto derivatives platform to hold all three CFTC licenses simultaneously, for up to $550 million in cash and stock, in a deal that values Payward at $20 billion and is expected to close in the first half of 2026. Summary Bitnomial is the first crypto-native US firm to hold all three CFTC licenses required for a full-stack derivatives business — a designated contract market, a derivatives clearing organization, and a futures commission merchant — giving Payward the infrastructure to run an exchange, clear trades, and offer brokerage…

HBAR price prediction improved Friday as Hedera gained 1.4% and Stellar’s XLM added 1.5% to top the CoinDesk 20 performance update, placing the index at 2,125.52, up 0.3% from Thursday’s close, with just 9 of 20 assets trading higher as Bitcoin approached the $76,000 resistance level that has capped every major rally attempt in 2026. Summary Laggards included Near Protocol at -2.3% and Polkadot at -1.6%, reflecting the selective nature of Friday’s session as capital rotated toward payment-layer and enterprise-backed tokens rather than broad altcoin names. HBAR’s 24-hour trading volume surged 57.6% to over $103 million, a signal of directional…

Liquid Capital’s Li Hua Yi says there’s “no reason to take profits” after the Strait of Hormuz reopens, citing S&P highs, MicroStrategy’s BTC buys and altcoin rotation. Summary Liquid Capital founder Yi Lihua told followers there is “currently no reason to take profits” after the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, arguing peace is now the “only best choice” for both sides. Yi pointed to the S&P 500’s push to fresh highs, MicroStrategy’s renewed Bitcoin purchases and a rotation into so‑called “Hawthorn Coin” as signs this rebound still has room to run. His comments underscore how traders are framing the…

Bitcoin price prediction turned aggressively bullish early Friday as CoinDesk reported that perpetual funding rates dropped to their most negative level since 2023 on a seven-day moving average, with ZeroStack CEO Daniel Reis-Faria targeting $125,000 within 30 to 60 days if the market’s heavily short positioning is forced to unwind. Summary BTC was trading near $74,700 in Asian morning hours Friday, up 3.5% on the week but down 0.4% on the day, with the 10-day global equity rally pausing ahead of the April 22 Iran ceasefire expiry. The 7-day moving average funding rate dropped to approximately -0.005% per Glassnode data,…

In Solana news today, DoubleZero Foundation launched Edge, a public beta platform that delivers raw Solana block data through a private global fiber network using multicast, bypassing the public internet to cut average delivery times by 6 milliseconds — the same data distribution standard that traditional exchanges have used for decades. Summary Edge launched with 379 validators publishing shreds, covering approximately 43% of Solana’s total stake, with Jito, Triton, Staking Facilities, and Harmonic participating as initial launch partners. Traders subscribe in USDC per device per epoch, with prices from $30 to $100 depending on city, while revenue splits 50% to…