Argentina President suspects launching Meme Coin SEC crypto team solicits opinions from industry

Golden Weekly is a weekly blockchain industry summary column launched by Golden Finance, covering weekly key news, mining information, project trends, technological progress and other industry trends. This article is one of the news weekly news magazines, which will take you to take a look at the major events in the blockchain industry this week.

Headlines

▌Argentine President is suspected of launching Meme currency LIBRA, and it is not yet certain whether his account has been stolen

Argentine President Javier Milei announced the launch of Meme Coin LIBRA and announced the contract address through his official X account about half an hour ago. It is not clear whether his account has been compromised. According to GMGN data, LIBRA broke through US$7.8 in a short period of time and temporarily reported US$3.51, with a current market value of US$3.5 billion. Note: The price of Meme coin fluctuates greatly, and the authenticity of the coin has not been clarified yet. Investors are advised to participate with caution.

▌The US SEC crypto team is soliciting opinions from the industry to understand the issues the industry wants the SEC to pay attention to

According to Fox Business reporter Eleanor Terrett, some staff in the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) trading and marketing department held a webinar on pledge this week with some leading crypto industry participants. Meanwhile, the SEC's crypto task force is seeking comments from the industry to understand the issues they want the SEC to focus on. The level of participation of the new SEC leadership is eye-catching.

▌ CZ: BTC is more like a reserve asset than a trading currency

Cryptocurrency analyst Immortal posted on X: "BTC chain trading volume is far from reaching the level of 2021... But we expect a big bull market? Even if the transaction fees are at high levels, it may not necessarily indicate a bull market. Just look at the past cycle You know." In response to this, CZ responded: "My intuition is that due to the high fees and long block time, BTC is now more like a reserve asset than a transaction currency. A lot of new funds are being purchased ETFs, and these ETFs are not reflected in on-chain trading. To state, I may be wrong.”

▌Trump chooses crypto-friendly person and former Bitfury executive Jonathan Gould to lead the Currency Supervision Agency

U.S. President Donald Trump has appointed former blockchain executive Jonathan Gould to lead the Office of the Supervisor of Currency (OCC). Gould served as Chief Legal Officer for Bitfury, and prior to that, he served as senior deputy auditor-general and chief legal counsel for the OCC, which oversees and oversees the National Bank and the Federal Savings Association. Ron Hammond, senior director of government relations at the Blockchain Association, said Jonathan Gould will be in "the best position to start working immediately". Jonathan Gould may also follow the leadership of former Director of the Currency Supervision Agency Brian Brooks, who briefly served as CEO of Binance.US. “In addition, his expertise in cryptocurrencies ensures that the U.S. Currency Complaint is able to engage with Congress as Congress begins legislation around stablecoins and market structures,” Hammond said.

▌CFTC 's new chairman: CFTC will ensure that the United States will lead the world in blockchain

CFTC’s new chairman Brian Quintenz released his first update after his nomination today on Personal X. Brian said: “I am honored to be nominated by President Trump as the next chairman of the CFTC, who I served as a member of the committee in his previous administration. The CFTC plays a key role in maintaining the strong hedging and price discovery markets of global envy. . The agency is also ready to ensure that the United States leads the world in blockchain technology and innovation. I look forward to working with President Trump’s excellent financial regulatory team. ” Previous news, Trump has nominated Brian Quintenz, director of policy at a16z crypto to serve as permanent member of the CFTC President.

policy

▌The central bank releases China 's monetary policy implementation report for the fourth quarter of 2024

On February 13, in the next stage, the People's Bank of China will further deepen financial reform and high-level opening up to the outside world, continue to promote high-quality financial development and the construction of a financial power, accelerate the improvement of the central bank system, and further improve the monetary policy framework. Focus on balancing the relationship between short-term and long-term, stabilizing growth and preventing risks, internal balance and external balance, improving the forward-looking, targeted and effective nature of macro-control, enhancing macro-policy coordination and cooperation, supporting expansion of domestic demand, stabilizing expectations, and stimulating vitality. Promote stable economic growth. (Jin Shi)

▌SEC accepts 21Shares Bitcoin and Ethereum spot ETF physical redemption application

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has accepted an application to allow 21Shares Bitcoin and Ethereum spot ETFs to be redeemed in kind.

▌US SEC crypto team has discussed new regulatory solutions with multiple industry participants

Fox Business News reporter Eleanor Terrett posted on the X platform that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Crypto Task Force is recording all its meetings with industry participants. To date, the task force has held meetings with Colin Lloyd, partner of the Commodity, Futures and Derivatives and Capital Markets team at Blockchain Association, Jito Labs and Multicoin Capital, Nasdaq, and Colin Lloyd, a partner of the law firm Sullivan & Cromwell Commodity, Futures and Derivatives and Capital Markets team. The topics of the conference focused on regulation and how the agency’s new approach would affect certain markets and products. Previously, the US SEC Cryptocurrency Working Group met with representatives from Jito Labs and Multicoin Capital Management to discuss the addition of staking function to ETP.

▌U.S. judge approves Binance and SEC litigation suspension for 60 days, requiring the filing of joint status report by April 14

According to a public legal filing, U.S. federal judge Amy Berman Jackson has approved a joint motion for Binance and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to suspend the lawsuit by 60 days. At the same time, the judge also asked the two sides to submit a joint status report by April 14. This means that the lawsuit against Binance will be temporarily suspended and the parties have time to negotiate or seek other solutions.

▌If the new bill is passed, New Mexico may buy up to $2 billion in Bitcoin

If a new bill passes, New Mexico could buy up to $2 billion in bitcoin.

Blockchain application

▌Circle: USDC has now received native support on 18 blockchains including Unichain

Circle announced that USDC and Circle development tools are available online on Unchain, and developers built on Unichain can now access USDC, CCTP and programmable wallets to build secure and scalable on-chain applications, and developers can also use them to build secure and scalable on-chain applications from Circle Faucet gets a free testnet USDC to test the flow of funds in its Unichain applications. With the addition of Unichain, USDC is now natively supported on 18 blockchains.

▌Vitalik: Short-term L1 expansion that can be achieved in the next 1-2 years is valuable

On February 14, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin released the latest article "Reasons for increasing the L1 Gas restrictions even in L2-dominated Ethereum." The article said that an important recent discussion in the Ethereum roadmap is about how to increase the L1 gas cap. Recently, the L1 gas cap has increased from 30 million to 36 million, with a 20% increase in capacity. Many support further significant increases in the near future. These increases are secure due to recent and upcoming technological improvements: increased efficiency of Ethereum clients, reduced demand for storing old history due to EIP-4444 (see roadmap), and stateless clients in the future. The article concludes that even in the L2-dominated world, the approximately 10-fold expansion of L1 gas is of significant value. This in turn means that the short-term L1 expansion that can be achieved in the next 1-2 years is valuable regardless of the long term.

▌Story Public Main Network Homer is online

Layer1 Intellectual Property Blockchain Story Protocol announced that its public mainnet Homer has been launched.

▌Galaxy Report: ETH leads enterprise blockchain adoption with use cases such as NFT and RWA tokenization

More than 50 traditional companies, including financial institutions such as Deutsche Bank and Paypal, as well as brands such as Louis Vuitton and Adidas, are developing cryptocurrencies specific to Ethereum and its L2 network, according to a report by Christine Kim, vice president of research at Galaxy Digital. The application focuses on non-speculative use cases such as RWA tokenization, NFT, Web3 gaming, and scalable infrastructure. Ethereum is leading in RWA tokenization, with the value of its custodial assets almost 10 times that of Stellar, the report said. Of the 20 financial institutions that build crypto infrastructure, 13 issue RWAs, including BlackRock BUIDL. Stablecoins are also booming on Ethereum, with Paypal's PYUSD and Robinhood's USDG driving a 70% surge in supply in 2024, while Ethereum accounts for more than 50% of the $400 billion stablecoin market. Scalable infrastructure investment emphasizes enterprise adoption. Deutsche Bank is developing a compliant financial solution for Ethereum L2 and ZKSync, while Sony L2 project Soneium is targeted at gaming and entertainment. These projects highlight Ethereum’s role as the foundation of enterprise-level blockchain customization. In addition, the Ethereum L2 centralized roadmap balances scalability and security, attracting institutions seeking effective on-chain solutions. Regulatory downwinds, including SEC's focus on tokenization, and collaborations like Stripe's $1 billion acquisition of stablecoin platform Bridge, show an increasing amount of mainstream adoption.

Fireblocks executive: X Money is expected to support crypto payments by the end of the year

Ran Goldi, senior vice president of payments and networks at Fireblocks, revealed that he heard that X Money may support crypto payments by the end of 2025. Goldi notes that more and more large payment companies are developing digital asset strategies, which also makes the market look forward to X Money's future cryptocurrency integration. X Money announced in January this year that it would launch digital wallet recharge, bank account transfer and P2P payment functions, but did not mention the crypto payment plan at the time. However, due to Musk's long-term ties with the cryptocurrency industry, expectations for X Money's future entry into crypto payments are heating up.

Cryptocurrency

▌Bitwise CIO: In the long run, altcoins may bring considerable returns

Matt Hougan, chief investment officer of Bitwise, said in a report to clients that there is an interesting dichotomy for institutional investors and retail investors in the cryptocurrency field: On the one hand, institutional investors’ sentiment towards cryptocurrencies is the most in history. Optimistic, and retail investors are in despair. Investment professionals now see cryptocurrencies as a field where institutional capital allocates at record amounts through ETFs; however, for retail investors, it's almost like living in another reality, Bitwise's own on-chain sentiment scores show It is currently one of the lowest readings ever. Matt Hougan said he firmly believes institutions are right, and so far this year, ETFs and businesses have purchased more than 100,000 BTC, compared with 18,000 BTC mined. And in the long run, the allocation of altcoins is stronger than ever in history, but the situation of altcoins is more complicated. With the clarification of the regulatory agenda, the United States regards stablecoins as a "national priority" and the growing confidence in institutions The crypto industry is bound to push DeFi applications to the public, and its impact will be self- evident and unstoppable.

▌National Bank of Canada reduces its holdings of Bitcoin ETF

National Bank of Canada has recently shown a bearish attitude towards Bitcoin. On February 12, the bank filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that it has applied to exercise put options to sell positions on the BlackRock iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF worth more than $1.3 million.

▌CZ reiterates that it will not issue Meme coins, and only publishes photos and names of pet dogs

Binance Lianchuang CZ posted on X platform: "For those who ask me for CA (contract address), no, I will not issue Meme coins. I just posted a photo of my dog ​​and its name, just like What some of you asked for. Yesterday I was also given advice to make the best Meme coins in the community a winner.”

▌Addresses related to the LIBRA token issuance currently hold more than US$100 million in USDC and SOL

According to Arkham monitoring data, 70% of LIBRA's supply is stored in 2 addresses, while 15% of the supply is stored directly in Meteora LP by the developer's address. The developer address has charged more than $20 million in transaction fees from these deposits. In addition, 7 different addresses received a total of 60 million LIBRA tokens from the deployer - each address depositing LIBRA into the liquidity pool and later withdrawing SOL/USDC. Addresses related to the LIBRA token issuance currently hold more than $100 million in USDC and SOL, which have been withdrawn from liquidity in the past 18 hours and most have been transferred to separate holding addresses. LIBRA- related accounts currently hold US$57.6 million USD and US$48.6 million SOL.

Robinhood 's revenue increased by 115% year-on-year to US$1.01 billion in Q4 last year, of which crypto revenue increased by 700%.

Trading platform Robinhood (HOOD) exceeded analyst expectations for the fourth quarter. Robinhood said its fourth-quarter revenue rose 115% from a year ago to $1.01 billion, surpassing Wall Street analysts’ expectations of $945.8 million, according to FactSet. The company said in a statement that its transaction revenue increased by 200% from a year ago, mainly due to a 700% increase in cryptocurrency-related revenue. Robinhood also reported earnings per share of $1.01, higher than the average estimate of $0.42. HOOD shares rose more than 5% in after-hours trading on Wednesday.

Important economic trends

▌Federal Waller: Stablecoins must have clear use cases and business cases to be economically feasible

The Fed's official website released a speech by Director Waller, "Thinking on the increasingly mature stablecoin market", saying that he defined a stablecoin as a digital asset that aims to maintain a stable value relative to the national currency. Like any payment method, stablecoins must have: clear use cases and clear business cases to be economically feasible. The US dollar is the preferred fiat currency for most stablecoins, and in this sense, a stablecoin is a synthetic dollar. The second use case of stablecoins is to provide means to acquire and hold US dollars, the third use case is cross- border payment, the industry is increasingly concerned about the "stablecoin sandwich" model of cross-border payments, and the last use case is retail payment. So far, most stablecoin issuers seem to generate revenue primarily by deriveing ​​income from their reserve assets that are higher than their spending.

▌Trump: Interest rates should be lowered, and interest rate cuts should complement tariffs

U.S. President Trump said he believes interest rates should be lowered and that the rate cut will complement the upcoming tariff policies. (Jin Shi)

▌Feder Logan: If the labor market remains strong, better inflation data does not necessarily mean the Fed can cut interest rates

Fed Logan said that if the labor market remains strong, better inflation data does not necessarily mean the Fed can cut interest rates. Even if better inflation data are obtained, interest rate movements should be treated with caution; inflation data in the next few months will be very important; geopolitical and policy changes should also be paid attention to; the impact of these factors on the economy is being carefully observed.

▌Economist: The Federal Reserve will suspend interest rate cuts for a long time, and in theory it should raise interest rates

Mohamed El-Erian, former CEO of Pacific Investment Management Corporation (Pimco) and dean of Queen's College of Cambridge, said that the Fed may not cut interest rates "for quite a long time" under the impact of exceeding expectations of inflation data. It may even tolerate higher inflation to protect economic growth. Erian pointed out on Wednesday that if the Fed is truly committed to achieving its 2% inflation target, in theory, interest rates should be raised now. But the reality is that the Fed is more likely to keep interest rates unchanged and preserve economic growth and the "exceptionalism" in the United States by tolerating higher inflation. Bond traders postponed the Fed's next bet on interest rate cuts until December as U.S. inflation exceeded expectations. Swap contracts related to Fed's future decisions were repriced after CPI exceeded expectations in January. Previously, the market expected the Fed to cut interest rates by September. The new interest rate level means the market bets that the Fed has only cut interest rates by 0.25 percentage points this year. Regarding January CPI data, Erian admitted: "On the surface this is not good news for the Fed. They will continue to appease the market and say everything will be fine, but I think the interest rate pause button will be pressed longer than the market expected."

▌Director of the U.S. National Economic Commission: Micro and macro policies are needed to deal with inflation

Hassett, director of the National Economic Commission: Micro and macro policies are needed to deal with inflation.