Filecoin to Participate in Consensus 2025 in Toronto on May 12th

USD1, the stablecoin issued by Trump-affiliated World Liberty Financial (WLFI), has seen its supply significantly increase between late last month and early May. According to CoinGecko, the coin now has over $2.1 billion in market cap, up from less than $130 million on April 27.

Multiple data sources, including CoinGecko, CoinMarketCap, and DefiLlama, showed USD1’s supply jumped over $720 million by April 28. The stablecoin’s supply surpassed $2 billion on April 30. BscScan — the primary block explorer for the Binance Smart Chain, where most of USD1 exists — indicated several large mints within that timeframe. The mints ranged between 50 million and as high as 99 million.

On May 1, Abu Dhabi investment firm MGX announced it would use WLFI’s USD1 to settle a $2 billion investment into Binance. Brandon Kae, research analyst at The Block, explained that USD1's recent supply surge was likely due to the MGX-Binance deal. The Block contacted WLFI for comment.

The Trump-backed WLFI shared plans for its USD1 stablecoin in March, and the product officially launched in April. Like most fiat-pegged crypto offerings, the coin is reportedly fully backed by short-term U.S. Treasuries, U.S. dollar deposits, and cash equivalents. Also, World Liberty Financial intends to airdrop a small portion of USD1 to WLFI token holders as a reward and to test its onchain distribution model.

USD1 became the latest entrant in a $231 billion stablecoin market dominated by Tether (USDT) and Circle (USDC). USDT’s $149 billion and USDC’s $60 billion comprise over 90% of the current U.S. dollar stablecoin sector.

Disclaimer: The Block is an independent media outlet that delivers news, research, and data. As of November 2023, Foresight Ventures is a majority investor of The Block. Foresight Ventures invests in other companies in the crypto space. Crypto exchange Bitget is an anchor LP for Foresight Ventures. The Block continues to operate independently to deliver objective, impactful, and timely information about the crypto industry. Here are our current financial disclosures.

© 2025 The Block. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

By Elsa Ohlen

Cryptocurrency-related stocks rose Thursday as Bitcoin gained momentum on hopes of easing global trade tensions.

Crypto trading platform operators Robinhood and Coinbase rose 3.5% and 4.6%, respectively, in premarket trading. MicroStrategy, the largest corporate holder of Bitcoin, gained 5.3%.

Block, a financial-technology company that also holds Bitcoin for investment purposes, rose 1.7%.

Early Thursday, Bitcoin traded around $99,500, again nearing the psychologically important level of $100,000 for the first time since February.

The crypto rally comes as trade tensions appear to be easing. President Donald Trump has said a big trade announcement is coming Thursday, which several media outlets have reported to be a U.S.-U.K. trade framework.

The deal would be the first such agreement since Trump announced sweeping so-called reciprocal tariffs on April 2, in what he referred to as "Liberation Day." The bulk of tariffs were put on a 90-day pause shortly after being announced.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is also set to meet Chinese counterparts in Switzerland this week to discuss economic and trade matters.

Companies such as Tesla and GameStop, have also dabbled in crypto investment. In the last quarter of 2024, Tesla reported a boost to its profits due to a gain in digital assets, however some of those gains reversed in the last reported quarter as the value of the assets fell. Shares of Tesla and GameStop were up marginally early Thursday.

Write to Elsa Ohlen at elsa.ohlen@barrons.com

This content was created by Barron's, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. Barron's is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

Ethereum’s highly anticipated Pectra upgrade went live yesterday and is already beginning to impact the network’s supply dynamics. On-chain data reveals a sharp dip in the coin’s circulating supply, now at an 18-day low.

This supply crunch is driven by a surge in user activity in the Layer-1 (L1) network over the past day. If this trend continues, ETH’s price could rocket to new highs.

Ethereum Supply Hits 18-Day Low

According to Ultrasoundmoney, ETH’s circulating supply has dropped since Ethereum’s Pectra Upgrade was implemented on Wednesday. As of this writing, it stands at an 18-day low of 120.69 million ETH.

This long-awaited network overhaul, which raises validator limits to 2048 ETH, enables smart wallets and boosts network efficiency, has fueled a spike in network activity, tightening ETH’s supply as user demand climbs.

Glassnode data shows Ethereum’s active address count has climbed to a 30-day high, signaling renewed user engagement. According to the data provider, on May 7, the number of unique addresses active in the network, either as a sender or receiver, totaled 474,044.

When Ethereum’s active address count increases, more unique wallets interact with the network. The surge in user activity signals growing demand and network usage, and it often correlates with higher gas fees and increased ETH burning.

This is because with more users on the network, more transactions flow through the network, triggering higher gas fees and accelerating the ETH burn rate. According to Etherscan, ETH’s burn rate is at its highest level since May began.

As more ETH coins are burned, the circulating supply lessens, increasing the upward pressure on the altcoin’s price.

Will It Reclaim $2,000 or Retreat to $1,744?

On the daily chart, ETH trades above the horizontal channel, which kept its price within a range between April 23 and May 7. The altcoin faced resistance at $1,872 during that period and found support at $1,744.

If the breakout continues, ETH could reclaim the psychological $2,000 price zone and continue its rally toward $2,235.

However, a failed retest of this breakout could cause ETH’s price to fall to $1,744. If it fails to hold, the price could drop to $1,564.

Key points:

• Bitcoin’s realized cap is beating records and has almost reached the $900 billion mark.

• The market is laying the foundations for a “potentially significant price breakout,” new analysis says.

• Profit-taking is not hindering the overall bull market rebound.

Bitcoin is setting new all-time highs in network value as BTC price action eyes a return to six figures.

Data from onchain analytics platform CryptoQuant confirms new record highs for Bitcoin’s realized cap.

Bitcoin realized cap reflects “growing conviction”

Bitcoin is worth more than ever in US dollar terms if its market cap is measured by the value at which the extant supply last moved onchain.

Known as realized cap, this figure has seen continued all-time highs since mid-April as stages a sustained recovery, and as of May 7 stood at $891 billion.

“Bitcoin has experienced a steady flow of capital inflows in recent weeks, reflecting renewed interest from investors,” CryptoQuant contributor Carmelo Alemán summarized in one of its “Quicktake” blog posts on May 7.

Alemán argued that the realized cap uptrend reflects a long-term market shift across the Bitcoin investor spectrum.

“This new all-time high in Realized Cap not only reflects a surge in invested capital but also a growing conviction in Bitcoin's long-term potential as a financial asset,” the post concluded.