The Defiant

Happy weekend Defiers!

Digital assets are mounting a comeback, with Bitcoin trading at its highest level in four weeks. However, the move follows a choppy week for price action, with the markets bracing for what turned out to be positive U.S. inflation data earlier in the week.

The crypto markets were buoyed by disclosures from more than 900 leading U.S. financial institutions revealing spot Bitcoin ETF holdings exceeding $100 million each for a combined total of $10.7 billion. Institutional exchange-traded products also posted their weekly inflow in five weeks.

Meme assets also went on a tear after RoaringKitty, the trader and influencer credited with kicking off the GameStop short squeeze in 2021, returned to Twitter after a three-year hiatus.

However, one segment of the markets that is suffering is NFTs. Many Ethereum-based collections suffering heavy drawdowns as Season 3 of Blur’s airdrop campaign comes to a close, prompting farmers to offload their inventory.

The surging growth of Pump.Fun briefly came to a halt after the protocol lost around $2 million worth of SOL in an exploit leveraging flashloans. A post-mortem attributed the attack to a rogue former employee.

The U.S. Senate passed a resolution rejecting the SEC’s anti-crypto accounting rule targeting custodians with bi-partisan support, following its passage through the House of Representatives last week. While President Biden may still veto the bill, lawmakers are urging him to take stock of the resolution receiving bi-partisan backing.

In other regulatory news, an indictment charging two brothers with money laundering relating to a $25 million heist targeting an MEV bot may have legitimized Maximal Extractable Value in the eyes of the law.

Enterprises continue to embrace tokenization, with the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation tapping Chainlink to pilot bringing financial data on-chain and Deutsche Bank joining the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s Project Guardian. S&P Global Rankings also published a report praising the efficiency benefits of tokenization.

Lido is moving to take action after steadily losing market share restaking protocols in recent months. Lido’s community is currently voting on whether to launch the Lido Alliance to promote the development of a restaking ecosystem centered around its stETH token.