Weekly Recap: Bitcoin Reclaims $95,000 as Trade War Thaws

Happy weekend Defiers!

Crypto markets enjoyed a bullish week, with Bitcoin rallying 14% to a two-month high above $95,000. Bitcoin ETFs attracted the largest inflows since January as trade war concerns eased.

The Sui ecosystem led the altcoin market, as SUI surged 70% and major DEX tokens posted triple-digit percentage gains.

Ethereum leadership is attempting to reverse rock-bottom ETH sentiment with a new simplified roadmap and improved communications. Meanwhile, Charles Hoskinson predicts that Ethereum will be obsolete within a decade.

Plus, Solana stablecoin TVL hits ATH, Hyperliquid TVL soars, Wormhole launches MultiGov, and Initia and Zora drop tokens.

Also, don’t forget to check out our podcasts with Amira Valliana from the Solana Foundation and Base creator Jesse Pollak.

Enjoy!

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PODCAST & INTERVIEWS

Insights on DePIN, Web3 Policy, and More | Amira Valliana from Solana Foundation

Immerse yourself in the future of decentralized infrastructure in this exclusive interview with Amira Valliana from the Solana Foundation. Perfect for Web3 enthusiasts, this episode unpacks how onchain solutions are redefining physical networks, policy, and global collaboration.

Base Creator Jesse Pollak on How Content Coins Will Fix the Creator Economy

Jesse Pollak discusses why Coinabse Layer 2 Base decided to launch two tokens on Zora.

He highlights the challenges creators face in the web2 economic model, the differences between content coins and meme coins, and the role of crypto and tokens in enabling creators to monetize their work. Pollak emphasizes the importance of experimentation in the blockchain space and how it can lead to a more equitable creator economy.

Friday

• Sui Ecosystem Outperforms Altcoin Market Sui ecosystem tokens are surging this week, fueled by SUI’s 70% rally over the last week.
• Initia Launches Mainnet with INIT Token Airdrop The modular blockchain platform’s INIT token is trading at a $900 million fully diluted valuation.
• Crypto Markets Tick Up Amid Positive Macroeconomic Data, but Inflation Fears Linger Bitcoin breaks over $95K and crypto ETFs record strong inflows.
• PolitiFi Memecoins Soar After TRUMP Presidential Dinner News Donald Trump’s decision to host a dinner for the 220 largest Official Trump memecoin holders sent his token soaring, and took the rest of PolitiFi along for the ride.
• Blockchain Could Generate 1.5 Million Jobs by 2030: Bitget New research compares blockchain’s hiring potential to AI.
• Gitcoin to Shut Down Grants Lab The software company will reduce the scale of its operations to focus on sustainability.
• We Need Less FUD and More Freud We are in an era of strategic ambiguity — in which crypto is alternately praised, ignored, or criticized.
• Firms Are Adding Solana to Corporate Treasuries, But Bitcoin Still Leads the Way Corporations of all kinds are investing in BTC as well as SOL as the trend of holding crypto on balance sheets takes hold.

Thursday

• Charles Hoskinson Claims Ethereum Will Not Survive “More than 10 to 15 years” The Cardano founder says Ethereum’s core design flaws and centralization will lead to its downfall.
• Ethereum Leadership Seeks to Reverse Rock-bottom Sentiment with New Roadmap Growing pressure to shift strategy seems to have taken hold in the Ethereum Foundation, as ETH’s underperformance forces a change in tone.
• Hyperliquid TVL Surges as HyperEVM Activity Picks Up The Layer 1 chain is the fastest-growing blockchain in the top 20 by TVL over the last month.
• Wormhole Launches MultiGov on Solana, Ethereum, and EVM Layer 2s The new governance framework aims to simplify voting across blockchains.
• Wall Street’s Next Bet: Staking-Enabled ETH ETFs On the surface, Ethereum may appear to be lagging, but staking-enabled ETH ETFs might very well be the light at the end of the tunnel.
• Bitcoin Holds Steady at $93,000 Amid Market Volatility Despite a dip in the broader crypto market, experts believe BTC could continue to thrive amid geopolitical uncertainty.
• Top 5 DeFi Protocol EtherFi Unveils Non-Custodial 'Defibank' The decentralized banking solution will be available to some U.S. users for the first time, serving as an alternative to traditional banks.
• AT&T Partners with DePIN WiFi Provider Helium Network The decentralized physical infrastructure network is providing more than 90,000 "mini-cell towers" for AT&T.

Wednesday

• Zora’s Token Airdrop Sparks Confusion The Coinbase-backed platform distributed 1 billion ZORA tokens to early users.
• Ethereum Layer 2 Scroll Claims to Achieve ‘Stage 1’ Decentralization With its Euclid upgrade, the ZK rollup has reached a degree of decentralization laid out by Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin.
• With a Pro-Crypto SEC and 72 Crypto ETF Filings, Bloomberg Analyst Predicts ‘a Wild Year’ Bloomberg’s senior ETF analyst forecasts that “a TON of alt/meme coin ETFs are likely going to hit the market.
• Meebits NFT Project Integrates with AI Agent Platform The NFT collection created by Larva Labs and sold to Yuga Labs was acquired in February and is expanding into the AI and IP spaces.
• Crypto Market Tops $3 Trillion for First Time in Six Weeks as ETF Inflows Pick Up Bitcoin climbs past $93,500, while the Official Trump memecoin shot up nearly 60%.
• TRUMP Memecoin Surges 60% After Unveiling Presidential Dinner for Top Holders The “$TRUMP Dinner” page was added to the official TRUMP memecoin website.
• Zora Hit Record Daily Revenue Amid Base-Driven Buzz Last Week, But Other Metrics Were Down One industry insider told The Defiant “It’s a reminder that in crypto, moments of attention can generate real economic spikes, even if the fundamentals haven’t caught up yet."

Tuesday

• Ripple’s RLUSD Stablecoin Launches on Aave A day after its debut, almost $19 million RLUSD has been supplied to Aave’s V3 Ethereum Core market.
• Fartcoin Reclaims $1 Billion Market Capitalization The irreverent Truth Terminal AI-inspired memecoin is in a tight race with BONK for fifth place.
• Ethereum's Based Rollups Are Gaining Momentum, Aiming to Unify Fragmented L2 Space Several based rollup players have emerged in the Ethereum ecosystem, including Taiko Alethia, Puffer's UniFi and RISE.
• Solana Stablecoin Market Hits Record $12.8 Billion The surge signals rising demand for stablecoins as the Solana DeFi ecosystem expands.
• Bitcoin Soars Above $91,000 as Global Markets Rebound BTC, ETH and SOL rallied 4%, 5.5% and 6.2%, respectively.
• Top AI Blockchain Bittensor's Subnets Surge Past $500M Market Cap Subnets are up more than 100x since the dTAO launch in February and TAO is a top performing altcoin this week.

Monday

• Unichain TVL Surges 2500% to $318 Million After Liquidity Incentives Go Live The spike has propelled Uniswap’s Layer 2 blockchain to become the fifth-largest L2 by total value locked.
• Vitalik Proposes Replacing EVM With RISC-V to Scale Ethereum Ethereum’s co-founder argues that switching virtual machine languages is “perhaps the only way” to scale the base layer.
• Bitcoin Rallies Above $88,000 Boosted by Microstrategy’s Latest $555 Million Purchase BTC surged to a three-week high, while ETH and XRP gained 2%.
• Coinbase and Zora Accused of Shady Marketing Ahead of ZORA Token Launch The blockchain-based social network Zora will airdrop its official token on Wednesday.

TRENDING

• Charles Hoskinson Claims Ethereum Will Not Survive “More than 10 to 15 years”
• Hyperliquid TVL Surges as HyperEVM Activity Picks Up
• Wall Street’s Next Bet: Staking-Enabled ETH ETFs
• Ethereum Leadership Seeks to Reverse Rock-bottom Sentiment with New Roadmap
• Top 5 DeFi Protocol EtherFi Unveils Non-Custodial 'Defibank'
• AT&T Partners with DePIN WiFi Provider Helium Network