The Solana price is juggling around a narrow range after triggering a rebound from the dynamic support close to $142. The price is jammed around the narrow range, but the volume has been rising, which has recently surged above $3 billion. This could lead towards a potential upswing, but considering the SOL price rally, the bears seem to remain dominant. On the other hand, the fundamentals are strengthening, due to which Solana marked an eventful week.
The developers fixed a crucial bug and patched a zero-day vulnerability that could have allowed hackers to mint unlimited tokens. This swift response prevented potential damage to the network. Coming to the on-chain figures, the SOL TVL took a dip by close to 2.8% and maintains second position after Ethereum. The DEX volume also drops by 10% below $20 billion, while the daily active addresses remain steady at 3.8 million.
The main development in the ecosystem includes DeFi Development Corp. acquiring a Solana validator for $3.5 million to self-stake SOL & earn rewards. While the impact on the SOL price remains negligible. Does this suggest the investors do not see the token with the potential of going long, or have they lost confidence in the token’s growth trajectory? Here’s what you need to know!
The long-term price actions display no major deviation, but the short-term price action has been flashing bearish signals. After failing to sustain above $150, the SOL price seems to have been following a trend. As StochRSI rises to the overbought zone, the price marks the local highs, followed by a rejection. This has occurred a couple of times, and the current trade setup suggests yet another similar pattern is in the making. On the other hand, the Gaussian channel remains bearish in the short term.
Considering the chart pattern, it appears to be feasible that the Solana (SOL) price could incur more losses in the next few hours. It may drop below the dynamic support at $141.19 and test the levels close to $140 or range slightly below around $138. However, a rebound could follow, but until Solana remains stuck within this pattern, no major price action can be expected. On the other hand, the bearish scenario could be squashed if the SOL price transforms the resistance at $155 into a strong support.
Bitrace’s 2024 Crypto Crime Report shows that criminals moved $649 billion in stablecoins to high-risk addresses. Stablecoins’ total use in fraud and money laundering grew, but the legitimate sector grew even faster.
The report also tracked a few other components, like gambling and darknet markets. It highlighted the growing enforcement actions against stablecoin money laundering, as Tether and Circle froze over $1 billion in assets last year.
Stablecoins and Crypto Crime – A Concerning Trend?
Stablecoins are a vital component of the international crypto ecosystem, but they fulfill a similar role in crime. For example, crypto sleuth ZachXBT alleged last month that North Korean hackers have “epidemic” participation in this space.
Bitrace’s 2024 Crime Report details illicit activities all across the industry, but it focuses specifically on stablecoins.
Its data claimed that $649 billion in stablecoins went to high-risk addresses last year, a definite increase from 2023. However, these transactions only amounted to 5.14% of global stablecoin volume, a decrease from 5.94% the previous year.
In other words, the stablecoin sector is growing faster than its usage in crypto crime.
Naturally, Tether makes up the overwhelming majority of these transactions since it’s the most popular stablecoin. Tron and Ethereum were the most popular blockchains for USDT stablecoins, making up around 90% of the crime-related volume.
Ethereum’s presence grew relative to Tron, but the latter blockchain still represents more than 75% of transactions.
Stablecoins in Crypto Crime.
1/ Since 2022, stablecoins replaced Bitcoin as the preferred currency for illicit transactions. pic.twitter.com/FxExZHQky5
Bitrace’s Crypto Crime Report mostly focused on the stablecoin industry but also covered several other sectors.
For example, illicit trade on the darknet grew by more than $30 billion as vendors switched to DeFi to avoid law enforcement. Crypto gambling is also on the rise, increasing 17.5% to $217.84 billion.
However, the industry is also taking several initiatives of its own. Scams and frauds have ballooned last year, jumping from $12 billion in 2023 to $52 billion in 2024.
The quantity of total frozen assets grew by nearly $1 billion in 2024, double the amount of the past three years combined. This is far below the necessary amount, but hopefully these operations can scale up.
To summarize, stablecoins are a thriving component of crypto’s criminal underworld, but enforcement is becoming more determined and sophisticated.
If the industry continues to focus on fighting fraud and money laundering, it could make a real difference. Stablecoin’s legitimate uses dwarf this sector, and criminals’ total market share is decreasing.
The XRP price has reached a new all-time high, exceeding its previous record from eight years ago. This increase in value comes as the GENIUS Act is sent to President Trump for approval, indicating a possible change in how cryptocurrency is regulated in the U.S. XRP Breaks 8-Year Slump With New ATH XRP price reached
Welcome to the US Morning Crypto News Briefing—your essential rundown of the most important developments in crypto for the day ahead.
Grab a coffee to see how Bitcoin (BTC) is faring against public companies, precious metals, and ETFs (exchange-traded funds) on metrics of total assets by market capitalization. The pioneer crypto is proving formidable, taking the stage as a tech stock proxy to ‘dynamic hedge’ against equities and US Treasury risk.
Bitcoin Surpassed Google in Market Cap
Amidst renewed optimism, Bitcoin has surpassed Google, effectively joining the top five assets on market cap metrics.
According to data on companiesmarketcap.com, which tracks over 10,436 firms, Bitcoin is now the fifth most valuable asset after GOLD, Apple (AAPL), Microsoft (MSFT), and Nvidia (NVDA). As of this writing, it boasts a market cap of $1.86 trillion.
This growth comes as Bitcoin progressively gains attention as a hedge against traditional finance (TradFi) and US Treasury risk, which aligns with the most recent US Crypto News publication. As BeInCrypto reported, experts say Bitcoin’s number one purpose in a portfolio is to hedge against risks to the existing financial system.
In contrast, Gold is losing appeal after recently establishing a new all-time high (ATH). While President Trump’s tariffs catapulted Gold to new heights, there appears to be a capital rotation as investors’ appetite for risk grows.
“Bitcoin has surged past the prior $88,800 technical ceiling, clearing the psychological $90,000 mark to trade at an eye-watering $93,500. Meanwhile, Gold has slid 6 percent, reflecting a renewed appetite for risk and a clear rotation into digital assets,” QCP Capital analysts said.
According to analysts, institutions are no longer testing the waters of crypto. Instead, they are diving in headfirst. Based on this outlook, BeInCrypto contacted Standard Chartered Head of Digital Assets Research Geoff Kendrick, who forecasted a new ATH for Bitcoin price.
Standard Chartered Reiterates Next Bitcoin ATH
According to Kendrick, the increasing 10-year US Treasury term premium, now at a 12-year high, correlates with an increase in Bitcoin price. The term premium is the additional yield investors demand to hold a long-term bond instead of a series of shorter-term bonds.
“While correlations vary over time, the relationship between Bitcoin and the term premium is pretty solid, especially since the start of 2024. This relationship shows that Bitcoin has lagged the term premium increase in recent weeks,” Kendrick told BeInCrypto.
According to the analyst, this lag likely reflects the previous narrative that tariffs are hurting tech stocks and Bitcoin trading, such as Mag7 stocks.
“This could be what is needed for the next all-time high, and on that, I reiterate my current forecasts for Bitcoin, of 200k end-2025 and 500k end-2028,” he added.
As Bitcoin acts as a dynamic hedge, it remains to be seen whether it can flip Nvidia this quarter. Nevertheless, Kendrick does not rule it out, acknowledging that dominant narratives change and Bitcoin serves several purposes in portfolios.
Stablecoins in Crypto Crime. 
