Cointelegraph.com
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Cointelegraph.com - 08:01 Dec 19, 2025
Coinbase sued regulators in Connecticut, Illinois and Michigan, arguing CFTC-regulated prediction markets should fall under federal commodities law, not state gambling rules. Coinbase is taking three US states to court in a bid to lock in federal protection for its planned prediction markets, opening a new front in the battle over whether event contracts are finance or gambling. The exchange has sued regulators in Connecticut, Illinois, and Michigan, asking federal judges to declare that prediction markets listed on a US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC)-regulated platform fall under the Commodity Exchange Act (CEA) and the CFTC’s claimed exclusive jurisdiction, not 50 separate state gambling codes. In a Friday X post, chief legal officer Paul Grewal said Coinbase filed the cases “to confirm what is clear: prediction markets fall squarely under the jurisdiction of the @CFTC, not any individual state gaming regulator (let alone 50).” Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 07:50 Dec 19, 2025
Bitcoin headed higher despite the Bank of Japan's interest-rate hike while reactions saw bullish risk-asset signals and no further policy tightening. Bitcoin (BTC) aimed for $88,000 on Friday after Japan’s central bank raised interest rates to 30-year highs. Key points: Bitcoin joins US stocks futures heading higher in a curiously bullish reaction to Japan’s interest-rate hike. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 05:01 Dec 19, 2025
Mike Selig pledged to make crypto a priority when he was picked to lead the CFTC in October, while Travis Hill has spoken out against crypto debanking. The US Senate has confirmed crypto-friendly lawyer Mike Selig as the new chair of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and has elevated Travis Hill to chair the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. The two confirmations were included in a package of nearly 100 other nominees that the Trump administration had selected for various roles across the government, which passed the Senate in a 53-43 vote on Thursday. Selig, who has previous experience at the CFTC and the Securities and Exchange Commission, pledged to make crypto a priority when he was nominated in October after he was picked to take over from the previous nominee, Brian Quintenz. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 01:55 Dec 19, 2025
Cypherpunk Adam Back dismissed concerns that quantum computing poses a threat to Bitcoin, arguing the technology is still “ridiculously early.” The response from Bitcoin developers on the risk of quantum computing to the cryptocurrency is weighing down its price and affecting capital flow, crypto industry executives have argued. Adam Back, a cypherpunk the and co-founder of Bitcoin infrastructure company Blockstream argued in a series of X posts on Thursday that it is good for Bitcoin (BTC) to be “quantum ready,” but it won’t be a threat for the next few decades, as the technology is still “ridiculously early,” and has research and development issues. He predicts there will be no risks in the next ten years and even if some parts of Bitcoin’s encryption were broken, it does not rely on encryption for its core security model and “it’s not going to result in Bitcoin being stolen on the network.” Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 00:08 Dec 19, 2025
XRP has a “number of reasons” that are attracting traditional investor dollars, which has helped to push XRP ETFs over $1 billion in assets, says CF Benchmarks CEO Sui Chung. XRP exchange-traded funds have surpassed $1 billion in assets due to the long-standing recognition of the token among mainstream market participants, combined with its strong price performance over the past few years, according to a crypto executive. It comes as spot Ether (ETH) ETFs continue to post outflows, while spot Bitcoin (BTC) ETFs have recorded choppy performance over the past week. “Many investors are taking a position in XRP because of the familiarity. It has a long track record,” Sui Chung, the CEO of crypto price index provider CF Benchmarks, told CNBC on Wednesday. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 23:30 Dec 18, 2025
Synthetix founder Kain Warwick expects other perpetual decentralized exchanges to follow Synthetix back to Ethereum, which is faster than ever. Perpetuals trading platform Synthetix is returning to Ethereum’s mainnet, with its founder arguing the network is now more than capable of supporting high-frequency financial applications after years of network congestion drove derivatives activity elsewhere. “By the time perp DEXs became a thing, the mainnet was too congested, but now we can run it back,” Synthetix founder Kain Warwick told Cointelegraph during an interview on Wednesday. “It’s kind of crazy that there really hasn’t been a Perp DEX on mainnet,” he added, explaining that reduced demand after the perp DEX exodus, combined with ongoing scaling improvements, has made Ethereum layer 1 more viable again. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 22:32 Dec 18, 2025
White House AI and crypto czar David Sacks said the CLARITY Act will reach the Senate next month for debate and amendment before a full vote. The long-awaited Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, or CLARITY Act, is moving closer to law, with a Senate markup expected in January, says White House artificial intelligence and crypto czar David Sacks. Sacks posted to X on Thursday that Senate Banking Committee Chair Tim Scott and Agriculture Committee Chair John Boozman had confirmed that the bipartisan crypto bill will be shaped up by the Senate next month. The CLARITY Act would define crypto securities and commodities and clarify the roles of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and other financial regulators. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 21:59 Dec 18, 2025
Osborne began advising Coinbase in 2024 and has been critical of the UK government's lack of robust digital asset regulations. Coinbase, the largest US-based crypto exchange, has appointed George Osborne, a former United Kingdom chancellor of the exchequer, to run the company’s internal advisory council. The decision to appoint Osborne, who began working as a Coinbase advisor in 2024 during its battle with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), is part of Coinbase’s strategy of expanding its influence with foreign governments, according to Reuters. Osborne announced the new lead position on Thursday, framing it as a learning opportunity. He said: Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 21:46 Dec 18, 2025
A representative from Brazil's stock exchange, B3, said the stablecoin would be “a tool to enable trading in tokens," which it planned to offer in 2026. Brazilian stock exchange B3 announced a move deepening its ties to digital assets through the launch of a tokenization platform and stablecoin for settlements, starting in 2026. In a Tuesday notice to investors, B3’s vice president of products and clients, Luiz Masagão, said the exchange plans to launch a tokenization platform for traditional assets, starting with stock market offerings. He added that B3 would also issue its own stablecoin as “a tool to enable trading in tokens." “The great value of having this tokenization platform connected to the traditional ecosystem is that assets are fungible,” said Masagão. “The token buyer won’t know they’re buying from a traditional stock seller. This allows for a smooth transition, with both benefiting from the same liquidity.” Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 21:35 Dec 18, 2025
A recent study by the US Federal Reserve argues that despite periodic challenges, a lack of credible alternatives has kept the dollar at the center of global bond markets. A new Federal Reserve discussion paper finds that the US dollar’s role in global bond markets has risen and fallen in cycles over the past six decades, with no clear long-term trend toward either greater dollar dominance or de-dollarization. Using the Bank for International Settlements’ (BIS) international debt securities database, the authors identify three distinct “dollarization waves” since the 1960s, showing that shifts in currency use have followed cyclical patterns rather than a steady structural change in global financing. “We find no monotonic dollarization or de-dollarization trend; instead, the dollar’s share exhibits a wavelike pattern,” the paper says. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 21:33 Dec 18, 2025
SOL falls behind multiple altcoin competitors as its onchain activity, fee and DApp revenues slump. Cointelegraph explains why. Key takeaways: SOL lagged the altcoin market as falling fees and DApp revenues signaled weaker Solana network demand. Growth shifted to Base, Arbitrum, Polygon and BNB Chain, reducing the odds of a near-term SOL rebound. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 21:30 Dec 18, 2025
The values that are baked into the foundations of crypto — privacy, self-sovereignty, decentralization — are eroding, and we’re running out of time to address the problem. Not long before he died, Grandad said something that I thought was a little silly, a little old-fashioned. He declared that he didn’t trust the banks, and he didn’t want them to know what he did with his money. I scoffed at the time, paranoid old fella! But of course, it turns out I owe him an apology. As we were walking around his house, he motioned toward an off-white wall with an off-comfortable sofa in front of it. This piece of singularly ugly furniture hadn’t left its spot in more than a decade. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 21:21 Dec 18, 2025
The discussions follow Intercontinental Exchange's $2 billion investment in prediction platform Polymarket in October. Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), is in talks to invest in crypto payments company MoonPay as part of the company’s latest funding round. MoonPay is seeking to raise funds at a $5 billion valuation, according to Bloomberg, which cited sources familiar with the deal and did not disclose the dollar amount of the potential investment. In October, ICE invested $2 billion in prediction platform Polymarket, in a funding round that brought the company’s valuation to $9 billion. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 19:57 Dec 18, 2025
Bitcoin briefly clinched $90,000 after the November Consumer Price Index report showed a drop in US inflation, but the essential components for an extended rally remain elusive. Bitcoin (BTC) moved closer to reclaiming $90,000 after US inflation cooled more than expected, with the November CPI coming in at 2.7% year-over-year versus forecasts of 3.1%. The softer print narrows the gap to the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, easing near-term inflation pressure and reviving risk appetite across markets. Key takeaways: The lower-than-expected CPI print generated a positive response from Bitcoin as new positions opened versus the usual short covering. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 19:25 Dec 18, 2025
Data suggests that fears about Xinjiang-related Bitcoin mining have overstated the impact, with hashrate losses proving brief and driven partly by US power curtailments. Recent claims of a major Bitcoin mining crackdown in China’s Xinjiang region rippled through the digital asset industry this week, but data by TheMinerMag suggests the actual impact was far smaller than early narratives implied. According to the latest Miner Weekly report, the Bitcoin network initially experienced a short-term hashrate decline, which was linked to developments in Xinjiang. However, the drop also coincided with power curtailments in the United States. Most major mining pools recovered to near pre-dip levels within days, resulting in a net decline of roughly 20 exahashes per second, which is significantly lower than the approximately 100 EH/s loss cited in early reports. “That points to a largely temporary disruption rather than a sustained, region-specific shutdown,” the report said. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 19:05 Dec 18, 2025
US lawmakers are only considering de minimis tax exemptions for dollar-pegged stablecoins, according to Bitcoin Policy advocate Conner Brown. Representatives of the Bitcoin Policy Institute (BPI), a nonprofit Bitcoin advocacy organization, warned that US lawmakers have not included a de minimis tax exemption for Bitcoin transactions below a certain threshold. “De Minimis tax legislation may be limited to only stablecoins, leaving everyday Bitcoin transactions without an exemption,” Conner Brown, BPI’s head of strategy, said on X, adding that the decision to exclude Bitcoin (BTC) is a “severe mistake.” In July, Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis introduced a bill proposing a de minimis tax exemption for crypto transactions of $300 or less, with a $5,000 annual limit on tax-free transactions and sales. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 18:25 Dec 18, 2025
In a recent Cointelegraph interview, James Check uses onchain data to challenge popular Bitcoin narratives and outline his thinking for 2026. Bitcoin’s price may look deceptively familiar, but according to onchain analyst James Check, the market beneath the surface has changed far more than most investors realize. In a new interview with Cointelegraph, Check revisits a question he was asked earlier this year: Are we in a bull market or a bear market? While Bitcoin (BTC) is trading near similar price levels, Check says that leverage, investor cost base, and sell-side behavior are now very different, and all those shifts matter. In fact, a majority of the capital currently invested in Bitcoin was acquired at higher prices, leaving many holders underwater and shaping a cautious sentiment. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 18:22 Dec 18, 2025
The company’s stablecoin infrastructure and USDC coin will be part of the deal, potentially to be embedded in Intuit’s financial platforms. Intuit, the company behind TurboTax, Credit Karma, QuickBooks and Mailchimp, announced a “multi-year, strategic partnership” with stablecoin issuer Circle involving its stablecoin infrastructure and USDC (USDC). In a Thursday notice, Intuit said the agreement with Circle would allow “faster, lower-cost” payments through their platforms, which focus on business transactions, tax refunds and marketing. According to Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire, the deal will “extend the speed, power and efficiency of USDC for everyday financial transactions.” USDC is the second-largest stablecoin by market capitalization, trailing Tether’s USDt (USDT) by more than $186 billion. According to data from Nansen, USDC’s market cap was more than $77 billion at the time of publication. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 18:07 Dec 18, 2025
Issued by SoFi Bank, the dollar-backed token is designed for payments and settlement across banks, fintechs and enterprise platforms. SoFi Technologies has launched SoFiUSD, a fully reserved US dollar stablecoin issued by its banking subsidiary, SoFi Bank. According to Thursday’s announcement, SoFiUSD is backed one-to-one by cash held by SoFi Bank, a nationally chartered and insured depository institution, and is redeemable on demand. It is designed to support low-cost settlement for banks, fintechs and enterprise platforms. A SoFi spokesperson told Cointelegraph that SoFiUSD will initially be issued on the Ethereum network, with plans to add support to other blockchains over time. Read more -
Cointelegraph.com - 17:28 Dec 18, 2025
The lawsuit against the memecoin launch platform Pump.fun, Solana Labs, the Solana Foundation and Jito was amended to include new evidence over MEV trading practices. A US court is once again being asked to weigh in on maximal extractable value practices after a judge allowed new evidence to be added to a class-action lawsuit tied to a memecoin platform. The judge granted a motion to amend and refile to include new evidence a class-action lawsuit against memecoin launch platform Pump.fun, the maximal extractable value (MEV) infrastructure company Jito Labs, the Solana Foundation, which is the nonprofit organization behind the Solana ecosystem, and others. The motion said over 5,000 pieces of evidence in the form of internal chat logs were submitted by a “confidential informant” in September that were previously unavailable. The filing said: Read more
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