The Crypto Retirement Plan
In another milestone for crypto, President Trump has signed a new executive order to allow cryptocurrencies to be included in 401K retirement plans.
As part of the order, the US Labor Department will be directed to re-analyze restrictions around alternative assets such as crypto, private equity and property in specific contribution plans.
Besides that, the SEC will be working with the Treasury Secretary to provide greater access to these alternative investments in retirement savings plans.
The implementation of the order will open the door for up to $12.5T worth of retirement savings to be used to gain exposure to digital assets.
With that said, the announcement has proven to be a positive catalyst for the crypto market, causing the price of Bitcoin to rise by 2.2% from $115K to a daily peak of $117.6K.
Similarly, ETH inched ever closer to the $4K mark, reaching a new yearly high of $3,950.
Pump Keeps the Glass Full
Memecoin launchpad Pump.fun has announced the launch of a new entity called the ‘Glass Full Foundation’.
The aim of this new initiative is to support projects in its ecosystem by providing additional liquidity to its most popular tokens.
The team also stated that the Foundation had already begun providing support to several tokens, with plans to deploy more capital soon.
However, further elaboration on where the liquidity comes from and how projects can qualify have yet to be revealed.
Shortly after the announcement, the price of PUMP spiked to $0.0036, but has since retraced to $0.0033 as of the time of writing.
No More Free Swaps for Whales
Not so great news for institutional off-rampers.
Crypto exchange Coinbase will begin charging a 0.1% fee on net USDC conversions over $5M.
The fees will be implemented in a week’s time, and calculated based on USDC sales and purchases within a 30-day rolling period,
The announcement came after the exchange missed earnings expectations for the second consecutive quarter, causing its shares to plunge from $378 to $303 as of time of writing.
While some are not happy with the fee schedule, Coinbase’s senior stablecoin product manager, Will McComb, clarified that this move is merely an experiment to analyze the impact of fees on USDC redemptions.
Crypto influencer Cobie also commented that the recent update may be intended to stem the decrease in supply of USDC, as Circle’s free 1:1 conversions are causing users to exit via USDC instead of USDT.
The market cap of USDC has risen by 81.2% in the past year from $34.5B to $64.6B, which is still lower than USDT’s $49.1B increase.
Etherex Enters
Linea-based DEX Etherex has announced the launch of its native REX token.
Using similar token mechanisms as the Ramses DEX, all exchange fees will go to REX token holders.
Beyond the original version of the REX token, the platform also features additional staked and locked versions such as REX and REX33.
Unlike traditional token locks, users will be able to simply trade voting positions using REX33.
Since its launch, REX briefly reached a peak of $0.66, but has since fallen to $0.51, with a market cap of $181M.
In Other News…
SBET Raises Additional $200M. Sharplink Gaming (SBET), has raised an additional $200M to purchase additional ETH. SBET is an ETH treasury firm and now holds over $1.9B in ETH.
Sky Protocol Gets B- Credit Rating. S&P Global has given Sky Protocol (formerly MakerDAO), the issuer of USDS, a B- credit rating. The B rating is due to centralization issues and “weak risk-adjusted capitalization”.
USD1 Announces Points Program. Trump-linked World Liberty Financial announced a loyalty points program for its USD1 stablecoin. It is unclear what these points would be used for and there is no mention of any potential airdrop.
JPMorgan’s First Blockchain Client. Financial services firm Marex is now the first clearing firm to use JPMorgan’s Kinexys blockchain platform for client settlements. This partnership enables 24/7 payments using blockchain-based deposit accounts.
Trollface Creator Disassociates from Crypto. Carlos Ramirez, the creator of the original Trollface meme said that he has been approached “constantly” with offerings of token supply for Trollface related memecoins. Ramirez says that he has no interest in being involved, even as TROLL becomes the 32nd largest memecoin.
ETH Is Back on the Menu! Ethereum daily transactions reached 1.87M, just shy of the previous ATHs of 1.96M achieved in 2024. Market analysts attributed the surge to rising stablecoin adoption aided by the passing of the GENIUS Act.
Tornado Cash Developer Found Guilty. The Jury finds developer Roman Storm guilty of operating an unlicensed money transmitter. He was not found guilty of a separate money laundering charge. The market has since reacted negatively, with TORN being down 15% since this jury verdict.