Solana price gained 500% the last time this SOL metric turned bullish

Wall Street giant BlackRock met with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Crypto Task Force to discuss staking within crypto exchange-traded products (ETPs) and tokenization of securities. The discussion could advance institutional interest in the crypto industry.

According to a May 9 memo published by the task force, BlackRock sought to “[d]iscuss perspectives on treatment of staking, including considerations for facilitating ETPs with staking capabilities.” The company has previously said that Ether (ETH) exchange-traded funds, while successful, are less perfect without staking.

Other crypto ETF issuers share that view. On Feb. 15, the New York Stock Exchange proposed a rule change to introduce staking services for Grayscale’s spot Ether ETFs. In April, the SEC delayed a decision on whether to approve or disapprove the rule change. BlackRock and Grayscale are behind the largest Ether ETFs by market capitalization, according to Sosovalue.

Bitcoin blasted back through the psychologically charged $100,000 threshold for only the second time in its 16-year history, reclaiming a level last seen in February. As the world’s first stateless money ticked higher, SkyBridge Capital founder Anthony Scaramucci told podcast host Anthony “Pomp” Pompliano that sovereign wealth funds are already accumulating the asset and are poised to scale those purchases dramatically once Washington finishes writing the rules of the road.

Sovereigns Are Pouring Billions into Bitcoin

Scaramucci, whose new Little Book of Bitcoin chronicles his own conversion from skeptic to evangelist, said overseas officials are quietly adding the digital asset even before the United States clarifies stablecoin legislation, bank-custody guidance and broader tokenization rules.

When asked if sovereigns are buying Bitcoin secretly, Scaramucci answered: “I think they are buying it, I think they’re buying it on the margin,” he said, adding that regulatory green lights will unleash a massive wave of capital inflow. “I don’t think it’s going to be a gigantic ground swell of buying until we green light legislation in the United States,” he stated. This, in Scaramucci’s view, will make “people worth 10, 20, 30 trillion dollars buying a half-a-billion dollars of Bitcoin, buying a billion dollars of Bitcoin.”

The former White House communications director framed today’s discreet allocations as a rational response to an increasingly erratic policy environment. With tariffs ricocheting through global supply chains and the dollar’s primacy “controlling the global economy,” he argued, officials outside the United States are searching for insurance against what he called “executive-policy behavior.” “We may need to be decoupled from one sovereign currency,” Scaramucci said, predicting that gold’s record highs and Bitcoin’s resilience during this year’s stock-market slump stem from the same instinct for self-protection.

He stopped short of predicting that Bitcoin will replace the dollar, but he insisted that sovereign accumulation is the precondition for an eventual seven-figure price tag. “If you want to see a million-dollar Bitcoin, that’s when somebody at a sovereign says, ‘Okay, this is part of the infrastructure of the world’s financial-services architecture.’” In that scenario, he expects official portfolios to target 1%-3% allocations—enough, in his view, to lift Bitcoin’s market capitalization toward gold’s $20-30 trillion domain.

Digital Gold Will Win

For now, the “digital gold” thesis appears to be holding. While global equity indices have fallen 5%-8% since the latest tariff salvos, Scaramucci noted, Bitcoin is “roughly where it was at the beginning of the year.” Thursday’s breakout above $100,000 underscores that relative strength.

SkyBridge itself has ridden that wave. Scaramucci reminded listeners that he began buying Bitcoin for his flagship fund around $20,000, calling the position “quite beneficial to our performance.” Independent fund-database figures show the $1.7 billion vehicle returned 43% in 2024, outpacing its hedge-fund benchmark by more than four-to-one—results Scaramucci attributes chiefly to the Bitcoin stake. “This is the best idea I have seen in my career,” he said. “I knew the risks of not jumping in were far greater than playing it safe.”

Generational dynamics are reinforcing those flows. While older asset-managers still lean toward bullion, Scaramucci said, younger allocators already treat Bitcoin as an heirloom asset. “My grandchildren will end up having Bitcoin as a store of value,” he predicted.

Still, he cautioned that widespread institutional adoption will not occur until the United States clarifies its regulatory stance. “If we green-light legislation before the end of the congressional term … then I will tell you that there’ll be large blocks of buying,” he said. Absent that clarity, purchases will remain incremental—yet even incremental flows from trillion-dollar institutions can tally in the billions.

At press time, BTC traded at $103,077.

Ethereum is up $154.75 today or 7.08% to $2339.29

• Highest 5 p.m. level since March 2, 2025 when it traded at $2526.02
• Up three consecutive days, up 31.75% over this period
• Best three day stretch since the three days ending May 26, 2021 when it rose 34.66%
• Up 30.36% month-to-date
• Down 30.06% year-to-date
• Down 51.26% from its all-time high of $4800.00 on Nov. 9, 2021 (based on 5 p.m. levels)
• Down 19.03% from 52 weeks ago (May 10, 2024), when it traded at $2889.20
• Down 42.24% from its 52-week high of $4050.30 on Dec. 16, 2024 (based on 5 p.m. levels)
• Up 58.13% from its 52-week low of $1479.38 on April 8, 2025 (based on 5 p.m. levels)
• Traded as high as $2487.87; highest intraday level since March 3, 2025 when it hit $2544.42
• Up 13.89% at today's intraday high

Note: The Ethereum price is a 5 p.m. ET snapshot from Kraken

Data compiled by Dow Jones Market Data

One of the most popular meme cryptocurrencies, Shiba Inu , is back in the spotlight after a significant rise in derivatives activity.

The latest data from Coinglass shows that SHIB's futures open interest has increased to $220 million, its highest level in the last 30 days.

Source: Coinglass">

Open interest is the total value of all open futures contracts on an asset. Typically, a rise in open interest signals increased investor confidence in the asset’s short-term price direction.

Coinglass shows a gradual increase in SHIB open interest since late April and into May, including a significant breakout in the last 48 hours. This increase coincides with a modest rally in SHIB’s price, indicating renewed optimism among traders.

The sharp rise in futures activity suggests that investors are positioning themselves to benefit from SHIB’s next price move, with many expecting a breakout and the start of a rally.

Starting from April 9, 2025, open interest in SHIB grew from $93 million to over $200 million, before surpassing $220 million on May 9. This increase represents more than double the value from just a month earlier.

SHIB traders brace for volatility

Even though SHIB’s price remained relatively stable during this period, the spike in open interest shows that more capital is flowing into the market. Typically, traders interpret this trend as a sign of upcoming volatility or rising confidence in the coin.

It also suggests that speculators are anticipating a significant price move and are opening leveraged positions to capitalize on the potential swing.

With its meme-driven community and a history of sharp price changes, Shiba Inu has long been considered a high-risk, high-reward asset.

Majority of SHIB investors break even

Meanwhile, the latest on-chain data from IntoTheBlock shows that more than half of token holders are currently at breakeven. This data also offers insight into the overall profitability of SHIB holders.Source: IntoTheBlock">

According to the data, only 18.49% of SHIB addresses, holding 182.19 trillion SHIB, are currently “in the money” (or in profit), meaning the current price is higher than their average purchase price.

However, 27.93% of SHIB addresses, holding 275.19 trillion SHIB tokens, are at a loss, or “out of the money.”

US Vice President JD Vance will speak at the Bitcoin 2025 conference in Las Vegas, roughly a year after then-presidential candidate Donald Trump spoke at the same event.

According to a May 9 notice from the event’s organizers, Vance will address conference attendees in person on May 28, making him the first sitting US vice president to speak at a digital asset conference.

Trump provided a pre-recorded video of himself from the White House to the organizers of the Digital Asset Summit in March — his first appearance at a crypto event since taking office in January — and spoke in person at the Bitcoin 2024 conference in Nashville while campaigning.

Though Vance is a Bitcoin holder — he holds $250,000 to $500,001 worth of the cryptocurrency, according to a financial disclosure filed in August 2024 — it’s unclear whether the vice president intends to make a substantive policy statement at the event. Cointelegraph reached out to Vance’s office for comment but had not received a response at time of publication.

Since taking office alongside Trump in January, Vance has largely stayed out of the media spotlight in terms of crypto-related policy. The president has signed executive orders on establishing a crypto reserve and regulating stablecoins, while Vance’s involvement with overseeing the industry seemed to be limited to speaking on AI regulation.

Two of the president’s sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, who are tied to the crypto platform World Liberty Financial, were also scheduled to speak at the May event. Many lawmakers have expressed concerns that the platform, backed by the Trump family, is being used to personally enrich the president.

Trump’s ties to crypto holding up legislation?

The vice president’s appearance at the crypto conference was announced the same week Democratic lawmakers in the House of Representatives and the Senate strongly criticized Trump’s connections to the crypto industry. 

In the House, Representative Maxine Waters halted a joint hearing discussing a crypto market structure bill and led a group of lawmakers to explore “Trump’s crypto corruption.” In the Senate, nine Democrats blocked a crucial vote on a stablecoin bill, saying the legislation lacked certain safeguards, hinting at the Trump family enriching itself through the USD1 stablecoin issued by World Liberty Financial.

According to analyst Charlie Morris, Bitcoin, the leading cryptocurrency, has reached a new record high relative to the tech-heavy Nasdaq index.

The ratio of Bitcoin to Nadsaq futures (the "BitDAQ ratio") is now at its new peak, surging above 5. Morris believes that the aforementioned threshold is psychologically significant. 

This essentially means that one Bitcoin is worth five times the value of a single Nasdaq futures contract.

Bitcoin, which tends to be correlated with traditional tech, has significantly outperformed this sector by acting as a safe haven asset. This is despite the fact that the leading cryptocurrency historically has a rather high correlation with tech stocks. 

As reported by U.Today, the cryptocurrency has reached $103,000, hitting its highest level in four months.

The Nasdaq-100 index is down 4.3% on a year-to-date basis, recovering from the tariff-induced crash that occurred in early April. 

This week, major U.S. stock indices rallied due to renewed trade optimism stemming from rumors about potential negotiations between the U.S. and China. The US also announced its very first major deal with the UK, further boosting risk assets.

Bitcoin managed to return to six-digit territory earlier this week for the first time since February. The rally has coincided with the massive inflow streak logged by BlackRock's record-shattering Bitcoin ETF.

The cryptocurrency is now on the cusp of reaching a new record peak.

"If at any point in the last 15 years, you were debating whether to buy and hold Bitcoin or the Nasdaq, you would have been better off in Bitcoin," Matt Weller, global head of market research at StoneX, said on X.