After a 9.8% drop in Bitcoin’s value over the past week, investors are showing signs of caution, worried about the potential for further declines. Despite this, Japan-based Metaplanet has reaffirmed its confidence by buying nearly 620 BTC.

Interestingly, the latest acquisition marks its largest Bitcoin purchase to date.

Metaplanet’s Largest Single BTC Acquisition

According to the company’s official press release, the acquisition, executed as part of its Bitcoin Treasury Operations, involved t

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump has appointed former college football player Bo Hines to the new crypto council.

Announced Sunday, Hines will be onboard as the executive director of the Presidential Council of Advisers for Digital Assets.

Trump’s Crypto Council

The 29-year-old acknowledged the appointment in a December 23 post on X, writing:

“Thank you, Mr. President! It will be the honor of a lifetime to serve in your next administration. Thank you for everything you have done and continu

Days after Binance introduced its pre-listing token selection pool, Binance Alpha, it launched 29 tokens with mixed performances.

Data shared by crypto analysts Sankin shows that out of the listed cryptocurrencies, 17 have seen their values increase while 12 experienced declines.

Small-Cap Tokens Lead the Pack

In a December 23 post on X, Sankin noted a trend where smaller market-cap assets generally performed better than their larger counterparts.

Those with fully diluted valuations (FDVs) b

The growing speculation surrounding a potential presidential pardon for Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) has been fueled by high-profile figures and shifting political tides.

A major Trump ally, Elon Musk, for one, will be “shocked” if US President Joe Biden does not grant an early pardon to the disgraced former CEO of FTX.

Crypto, Politics, and Pardons

Bankman-Fried, who was convicted in November 2023 on seven charges, including fraud and embezzlement, is currently serving a 25-year sentence for his

Key metrics on Ethereum are painting a bullish outlook for the network’s native cryptocurrency, ether (ETH), despite its sluggish momentum over the past weeks. The asset has struggled to match bitcoin’s (BTC) momentum following the conclusion of the United States presidential election, but on-chain metrics indicate a bullish trend in the near term.

According to an analysis by the pseudonymous CryptoQuant official EgyHash, factors like Ethereum’s funding rates and Estimated Leverage Ratio sugges

MicroStrategy has extended its Monday bitcoin acquisition streak with another purchase announced by co-founder Michael Saylor minutes ago.

This time, the company was slightly more modest by allocating less than a billion to acquire 5,262 BTC.

MicroStrategy has acquired 5,262 BTC for ~$561 million at ~$106,662 per bitcoin and has achieved BTC Yield of 47.4% QTD and 73.7% YTD. As of 12/22/2024, we hodl 444,262 $BTC acquired for ~$27.7 billion at ~$62,257 per bitcoin. $MSTR https://t.co/asDGerBV7

Chainlink (LINK) briefly dropped to $20.1 during the weekend before staging a quick recovery to a little over $23.  The latest dip, however, extended its weekly losses to almost 22%.

This prompted many whales to accumulate the token.

LINK Whales’ Conviction

There has been a noticeable uptick in the holdings of wallets containing between 10 million and 100 million LINK coins, rising from approximately 475.79 million to 479.78 million within a short period.

According to popular crypto analyst

Ripple is navigating a pivotal range between $1.8 and $3, with recent price action highlighting the likelihood of a consolidation phase.

A breakout from this range will likely determine its next significant trend.

XRP Price Analysis

By Shayan

The Daily Chart

XRP recently faced rejection at the critical $3 resistance, triggering increased volatility and initiating a sideways consolidation phase. After that, the price found support at the $1.8 level, a key zone filled with demand and buying p

Cardano encountered significant selling pressure following a notable rejection at the $1.3 resistance region, resulting in a sharp decline.

However, the price has now reached a critical support level, suggesting the potential for a bullish consolidation phase in the mid-term.

Technical Analysis

By Shayan

The Daily Chart

Cardano recently failed to breach the substantial $1.3 resistance zone due to heightened selling pressure, driven mainly by participants capitalizing on the distribution pha

Bitcoin has been navigating an ascending consolidation phase near its critical $108K resistance level, recently encountering a sharp decline.

However, strong support zones suggest a potential for a short-term bullish rebound.

Technical Analysis

By Shayan

The Daily Chart

Bitcoin has undergone an ascending consolidation phase near the $108K resistance region, only to face increased selling pressure and distribution activity from large market participants.

This wave of selling led to a signif

TL:DR;

Dogecoin was once the top-performing cryptocurrency after Donald Trump’s victory, going from under $0.15 to almost $0.5.

Although it has lost its momentum, especially in the past week or so, history shows that its most spectacular price surge during this cycle could still be around the corner.

DOGEUSD. Source: TradingView Can DOGE Pull a 2021-Like Rally?

Perhaps due to its affiliation with Elon Musk and his upcoming role in Donald Trump’s administration, Dogecoin skyrocketed after th

Bitcoin’s struggles continue as the asset fails to initiate a notable recovery, and its price is still below or around $96,000.

The altcoins are not in great shape either, with many, such as XRP, ADA, and AVAX, still 3-4% down on a daily scale.

BTC Keeps Struggling

A lot can change in the cryptocurrency markets within a week, and this has been the case for the past seven days or so. Just last Monday and Tuesday, BTC posted fresh gains and shot up above $108,000 to mark its latest all-time hig

Crypto markets are in correction mode, dropping around 13% from their peak last week.

There are a few economic reports due out this week despite it being a holiday period. However, they are unlikely to impact crypto markets.

“We expect volatility from last week to carry over into early this week,” commented the Kobeissi Letter.

Economic Events Dec. 23 to 27

Most of last week’s losses were due to the reaction to the news from the Federal Reserve’s meeting on Wednesday, in which it made the de

TL:DR;

After several consecutive weeks of charting impressive gains, BTC’s price tumbled by 15% from top to bottom last week and has failed to produce a notable recovery.

The crowd has gone into a full Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt (FUD) state, which could actually be beneficial for bitcoin’s upcoming price movements.

Bitcoin/Price/Chart 23.12.2024. Source: TradingView Crowd Hints at Recovery?

Just six days ago, the primary cryptocurrency was flying high above $100,000 and ever skyrocketed t

BTC prices are currently down 12% from their all-time high of just above $108,000 on Dec. 17, and the correction appears to be deepening.

The asset hit an intraday low of $93,810 during trading in Asia on Monday morning but recovered quickly to tap $96,000 before another slip.

Those losses have resulted in a “bearish engulfing” weekly candle, as reported by crypto analyst “Rekt Capital.” All of the gains over the past month have now been wiped out in the correction.

“Bitcoin is showing increa

In 2024, euro-backed stablecoins emerged as a critical driver of growth in the European cryptocurrency market, bolstered by the implementation of the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA).

In fact, these tokens have notched a new record in terms of monthly volumes after attracting liquidity and institutional players across the region.

MiCA Spurs Euro-Backed Stablecoin Adoption

Monthly volumes for euro-backed stablecoins reached a multi-year high, surging to nearly €800 million in Novembe

Mohammed Azharuddin Chhipa, 35, from Springfield, Virginia, was convicted on December 13, 2024, for providing material support to the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), which has been designated a terrorist organization by the United Nations and others.

The charges stemmed from his actions between October 2019 and October 2022, during which he raised funds to assist female ISIS members in Syria.

Guilty of Financing ISIS Operations

In an official press release, the United States Departm

Kim Nam-guk, a former South Korean lawmaker from the Democratic Party, is under legal scrutiny for allegedly concealing substantial cryptocurrency holdings in his 2021 and 2022 asset declarations.

He is accused of omitting millions in crypto profits and transferring assets to bank accounts.

Hidden Crypto Profits

A local news outlet, Donga, prosecutors have requested a six-month prison sentence for Kim, claiming he concealed 9.9 billion won, worth approximately $6.8 million, in crypto assets.

The US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has sanctioned two individuals and one entity involved in a network laundering millions of dollars in illicit funds for North Korea.

Lu Huaying and Zhang Jian, based in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), used a UAE-based front company to facilitate money laundering and cryptocurrency conversion, funneling the proceeds back to Pyongyang.

OFAC Imposes Sanctions

In its official press release on December 17th, the OFAC state

As 2024 gradually wraps up, the web3 security firm Cyvers has released a Security, Fraud, and Compliance Report for the year, detailing how much impact cybercriminals and their operations had on the crypto industry.

According to an executive summary shared with CryptoPotato, in 2024, the crypto industry lost over $2.361 billion to cyber threats across 165 incidents. This figure represents a 40% increase from 2023, when losses totaled $1.69 billion.

Access Control Incidents Lead to More Losses