TRANSPARENCY is based on Trump’s ethics

Polymarket suggests the CLARITY Act’s chances of passing this year are just 40%, after a group of Democratic senators including Chris Murphy, Jeff Merkley and Chris Van Hollen spoke out against the bill.

A key vote in the Senate could come as early as this week, and Senate Majority Leader John Thune has said it will definitely take place before August 10.

Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren is trying to spoil the vote by highlighting how much money President Donald Trump has siphoned from the industry. She demanded that Trump voluntarily disclose his cryptocurrency earnings for this year, after his 2025 disclosure showed he made more than $1 billion from cryptocurrencies last year. The controversy means Senate Democrats are unlikely to support the bill without a provision prohibiting elected officials from promoting or issuing cryptocurrency.

Summer Mersinger, CEO of the Blockchain Association and former commissioner of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, said: “Ethics is the biggest elephant in the room.”

“For my members and what we stand for on the Hill… look, whatever decision you make on ethics, it’s really not our concern. It’s politics. It’s Congress. It’s elected officials. But please don’t let this undo all the hard work we put into the rest of the bill.”

Source: Polimarket

Forecast Markets See Record Volume in Q2, France Blocks Polymarket

Cryptocurrency markets continued to decline in the second quarter, with the notable exception of forecast markets.

According to the latest CoinGecko Crypto Industry Report, spot trading volume on the 10 largest centralized exchanges (CEX) dropped from $2.7 trillion in the first quarter to just $1.95 trillion in the second.

CEX perps volume also fell 10% to $12.7 trillion, while the stablecoin market fell 1.6% to $305.1 billion. Forecast markets, meanwhile, posted their strongest quarter ever, reaching nominal volume of $113.8 billion.

According to Polymarketscan, Polymarket’s World Cup Winners Market alone has attracted over $3.3 billion in trading volume, and contracts tied to the 2028 U.S. presidential election are among the platform’s largest markets. data.

Meanwhile, France’s National Gambling Authority has ordered ISPs to block access to Polymarket because it considers prediction markets to be illegal gambling.

Polymarket is blocked in 33 countries… unless you have a VPN, of course.

The strategy became a symbol of the Internet crash: could history repeat itself?

Senate agrees SBF should serve time while FTX distributes another $900 million

The US Senate passed a resolution opposing the pardon of former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried.

The measure cannot block presidential pardons but reflects bipartisan opposition in the Senate.

Bankman-Fried was sentenced in March 2024 to 25 years in federal prison after being convicted of fraud and conspiracy charges tied to the 2022 collapse of FTX.

Speculation about a possible presidential pardon increased after Bankman-Fried asked Trump for a pardon in June 2026.

On Friday, FTX Recovery Trust said it would distribute about $900 million to creditors in a fifth round of repayments. The trust has paid out about $10 billion since its bankruptcy filing.

Tokenized shares hit a record high of $2.3 billion

The capitalization of the global tokenized stock market rose to a record $2.3 billion on Wednesday as more investors sought exposure to blockchain-based equity products.

The Ethereum network enjoyed the largest market share of 34%, followed by the BNB network with 30% and the Solana network with 23%, data aggregator Token Terminal released on Wednesday post.

The largest increases were for Kraken’s xStocks, which had tokenized shares worth $507 million, and Binance’s bStocks, with $334 million. Ondo Finance remains the largest issuer of tokenized shares with $955 million in onchain shares, according to Token Terminal data.

The Trust & Clearing Corporation, a custodian of $114 trillion in assets, was launched last week trial of tokenized securities in cooperation with over 40 financial companies.

Robinhood Chain also aims to become a leader in tokenized stocks, but its volume to date is largely driven by memecoin.

Is Robinhood Chain’s Success Bullish or Bearish for ETH?

The US and UK will align stablecoin rules, but the Genius Act rules are TBA

The US Treasury and the UK Treasury have issued four joint recommendations regarding digital assets.

The task force recommended that authorities consider establishing a private sector-led group focused on “testing cross-border use cases for tokenized assets” and that U.S. financial agencies and the Bank of England identify a common approach to regulating tokenized assets.

The statement said stablecoins “should be fully backed, at least on a one-to-one basis, by high-quality liquid assets” under U.S. law.

Ironically, a few days later it was revealed that all US regulatory agencies had missed the Saturday deadline to pass the GENIUS Stable Coin Act. Exceeding the statutory deadline does not invalidate the GENIUS Act, but it means that issuers will have less time to adapt to the regulations that will enter into force in January.

Source: ZachXBT (but DYOR)

Winners and losers

At the end of the week, Bitcoin (BTC) will cost $64,620, Ether (ETH) – $1,868, and XRP (XRP) – $1.09. According to CoinMarketCap, the total market capitalization is $2.21 trillion.

Among the top 100 cryptocurrencies, the top three altcoins of the week were Pump.fun (PUMP) up 36%, Venice Token (VVV) up 10% and Litecoin (LTC) up 7%.

The three biggest altcoin losers this week are DeXe (DEXE), which is down 27%, Lighter (LIT), which is down 17%, and Worldcoin (WRLD), which is down 14%.

Weekly forecast

Bitcoin hits fresh August target of 80k. dollars

A fresh forecast says Bitcoin (BTC) could reach as high as $80,000 in August if it breaks through nearby resistance. A macro surge can be the spark that ignites another move higher.

Crypto trader and analyst Michaël van de Poppe said earlier this week that BTC/USD has successfully defended “key” support.

“It holds the key level at $61,000 and reverses an important MA in search of support, indicating more momentum is on the horizon,” he wrote, referring to the moving average trendline.

“I expect an increase to $68,000 in the next 1-2 weeks, followed by a continuation towards $75,000-80,000 in August.”

Not everyone agreed with the analysis, including nichoxbt, who believes the price is returning below $60,000.

Source: Nichoxbt

The best FUD of the week

Consensys unknowingly outsourced software development work to North Korea

Blockchain company Consensys accidentally used a programmer with ties to North Korea who had access to some of its systems for a month.

First reported on Friday by Drop Site, Consensys earlier this year he took it to the software developer through a “reputable third-party service provider” that was later discovered to have ties to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

The move caused maker Metamask to temporarily suspend product releases, but an investigation “confirmed that there was no misappropriation of resources or data, no malicious code was deployed, and there was no impact on user security.”

Kaspersky identifies malware platform targeting cryptocurrency investors

Cybersecurity firm Kaspersky said a newly identified malware platform is targeting cryptocurrency investors.

The malware, dubbed “OkoBot,” initiates a chain of infections that begins with social engineering tactics such as ClickFix, which tricks users into running malicious commands, or trojanized GitHub applications that provide backdoors to infected devices, the cybersecurity firm wrote on Wednesday. report.

According to SlowMist, a separate malware campaign aims to infiltrate Web3 developers’ devices through bogus LinkedIn recruiting opportunities.

Attackers contact blockchain developers via LinkedIn, posing as recruiters. They then send victims bogus GitHub repositories, claiming to contain code that must be evaluated before interrogation, the security firm said Saturday. report.

Base social bet left him behind in prediction markets and culprits: Pollak

Base creator Jesse Pollak says he’s stepping back from running the Base app after admitting he made a “bad bet” on social media, causing the network to lag in forecast and futures markets.

In a post to X on Wednesday, Pollak he said he bet that creator apps, content and messaging would drive adoption, but instead the market “completely fell apart.”

Pollak said he now realizes that financial apps are the future of the web, with a focus on commerce, payments and AI agents.

The core app will now return to Coinbase and will be overseen by cryptocurrency influencer and trader Jordan Fish, better known on X as “Cobie.”

The most popular magazine articles of the week

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Growing volumes on Robinhood Chain could be very good for Ethereum, but only if the “ETH is money” crowd turns out to be right.

Gambling on random Pokémon cards: Onchain gagcha reaches record high as cryptocurrencies fade away

In June, users spent a record $324 million on onchain gacha, even as Bitcoin hit a 21-month low. The thrill of getting the highest Pokemon card from a random pack becomes large business.