The White House has cleared a Department of Labor proposal that could change how 401(k) fiduciaries assess alternative assets, including digital-asset exposure. 

The move brings the rule closer to publication and opens the next stage of the federal process.

The White House’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs completed its review of the Labor Department proposal on March 24. The action appeared on the OIRA website as “consistent with change” and carried an “economically significant” label.

That completed review removes an interagency step for the proposal. The Labor Department is now expected to publish the rule for a 60-day public comment period before it considers revisions and a final version.

The proposal follows President Donald Trump’s Aug. 7, 2025, executive order on alternative assets in 401(k) plans. The order told federal agencies to expand access to alternative investments, including digital assets through certain investment vehicles.

It also told the Labor Department to revisit limits on alternative assets in defined-contribution plans. The order named digital assets, private equity, and real estate, and it called for coordination with the Treasury Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission.

In addition, the new step follows an earlier federal policy shift. On May 28, 2025, the Labor Department withdrew its 2022 compliance release that had urged fiduciaries to be “extremely cautious” when considering crypto in 401(k) plans.

That change marked a different federal approach to retirement-plan exposure to digital assets. If the proposal advances, fiduciaries may get a wider path to review crypto-linked options alongside other alternative investments.

States also push crypto retirement access

State-level efforts are also moving forward. On Feb. 25, Indiana lawmakers passed a bill that would require certain state retirement and savings plans to offer a self-directed brokerage option with at least one crypto investment option by July 1, 2027.

The broader retirement market remains large as these policy changes develop. According to the Investment Company Institute, US retirement market assets reached a record $48.1 trillion on Sept. 30, 2025.

MemeCore spikes 40% to $2.31 as leverage and sector-wide memecoin rebound push its value above $3 billion.

MemeCore (M), a high‑beta memecoin project focused on on‑chain speculation and community‑driven rewards, is trading at approximately $2.31 today, with a live market cap of about $3.01 billion and 24‑hour trading volume of $33.03 million. According to CoinMarketCap, M’s price has climbed 39.78% over the past 24 hours, with intraday lows and highs at $1.69 and $2.47 respectively as of March 26, 2026. Derivatives data from CoinGlass shows a further $2.21 million in spot volume and roughly $85.7 million in futures volume over the same period, underscoring a heavy speculative footprint in MemeCore’s order books.

CoinMarketCap lists M with a circulating supply near 1.3 billion tokens, a fully diluted valuation around $24.1 billion, and total supply capped at 10 billion M. Those tokenomics position MemeCore firmly within the memecoin vertical rather than as a DeFi, L1, or AI protocol, aligning it with other high‑risk assets like PEPE and BONK that have seen similar liquidity‑driven surges covered by outlets such as crypto.news. Earlier this month, MEXC reported MemeCore’s market cap crossing $3 billion on a 16.6% daily move from $1.47 to $1.72, with 24‑hour volume at just $12.9 million, highlighting thin liquidity relative to its valuation.

CoinGlass data indicate that MemeCore’s futures volume now outpaces spot by more than 38:1, with $85.7 million in futures changing hands versus roughly $2.21 million on spot markets in the last 24 hours. That skew suggests leveraged traders are driving much of the latest leg higher, rather than long‑only spot accumulation. At the same time, CoinGecko reports daily trading volume around $11.4 million and a 12.80% increase from one day ago, signalling a sharp pick‑up in activity alongside the price spike.

The MemeCore move sits inside a broader shift back into the memecoin trade at the start of 2026. MEXC notes that the CoinGecko GMCI Meme Index value recently climbed to about $33.8 billion in total sector market cap, with $5.9 billion traded in 24 hours, marking a 23% rise in memecoin capitalization as speculative appetite returned following a holiday lull. Gate.io’s March overview of “notable memecoins” highlights how names like SIREN and other BNB‑aligned memes have delivered triple‑digit monthly growth, reinforcing a rotation into high‑volatility tokens.

For readers tracking live prices, MemeCore’s latest quote and market cap can be followed on the crypto.news price page for MemeCore, while related profiles of other meme tokens such as PEPE and BONK are available on the same crypto.news market‑cap dashboard for cross‑comparison within the sector. In addition, recent crypto.news coverage of memecoin rallies, BNB Chain ecosystem flows, and speculative leverage in altcoins provides background on how MemeCore’s surge fits into this year’s risk‑on narrative across the meme segment.

Mochi founder Azeem Ahmed sold 550K CVX from a Curve-linked stash as on-chain probes allege over $8M in diverted rewards and $54M in DeFi losses.

Azeem Ahmed, founder of Mochi Finance and GaiaDAO, has sold approximately 550,285 Convex Finance (CVX) tokens from wallets linked to a 2021 Curve Finance drain, netting around $946,000 and triggering a double‑digit intraday slide in CVX’s price. On March 19, the tokens were liquidated at an average price of about $1.72, sending CVX from roughly $1.88 to $1.68, a drop of more than 10% according to on-chain data reviewed by Crypto Daily. The proceeds were routed to a multisig associated with the Mochi protocol, which held about $864,858 in assets after the sale, while another 500,000 CVX remain locked on Convex Finance.

The CVX position itself originates from Mochi’s controversial November 2021 move to mint its USDM stablecoin against MOCHI and drain roughly $46 million in DAI-equivalent liquidity from the USDM/3CRV pool on Curve. At the time, Mochi used 10 billion MOCHI tokens—assigned a hard‑coded oracle price despite near‑zero market value—to mint 46 million USDM, convert the proceeds into 9,876 ETH, and purchase about 1,050,285 CVX, which were then locked on Convex Finance, according to certified crypto‑trace reports by forensics firm IFW Global. Curve’s Emergency DAO responded by killing Mochi’s gauge and blocking further emissions after characterizing the maneuver as a “clear governance attack,” a clash that became part of the broader “Curve Wars” over CVX and CRV voting power and emissions.

In the aftermath, Ahmed re-emerged through GaiaDAO with a Peg Rebalancing Module (PBM) pitched as a mechanism to distribute CVX staking rewards from the locked position to USDM holders and gradually restore the stablecoin’s peg. The PBM charged a 2% management fee and 20% performance fee payable to Ahmed, but according to Curve governance forum records, he unilaterally hiked the performance fee to 50% before community backlash forced him to reverse the change. By November 2025, reward distributions from the 1,050,285 vlCVX position had stopped entirely, and on-chain data indicates those rewards were rerouted to a wallet that also acts as a signer on the CVX multisig, with the value of diverted staking rewards alone estimated at more than $1.6 million.

Beyond staking flows, investigators allege that about 2,198 ETH—worth roughly $6.67 million at the time—and $471,429 in USDC were drained from Mochi/ETH liquidity pools and never returned to depositors, while airdrops from protocols including Prisma, CNC, VELO, LFT, and YB reportedly remained unclaimed or undistributed. Aggregate investor losses tied to the Mochi ecosystem and its associated pools are now estimated at over $54 million, according to IFW Global’s certified reports.

Ahmed’s track record stretches back to at least 2020 and spans Yieldfarming.insure (SAFE), Armor.fi, Mochi Finance, and GaiaDAO, with repeated accusations of misappropriating community funds. During the original Mochi‑Curve confrontation, Curve alleged that Mochi’s strategy amounted to a governance attack, while Ahmed insisted in an interview with Crypto Briefing that the team had simply taken a “bold approach to gaining voting power in the DAO” and argued that the “DeFi Cartel … feels threatened that a small player on the outskirts” could challenge incumbents. Robert Forster, Ahmed’s former co‑founder at Armor.fi, later accused him publicly of stealing “millions in LP tokens,” a charge Ahmed denied by claiming the funds were “returned in full” and counter‑alleging that Forster had taken money for personal use.

Legal pressure has also followed the on‑chain drama into courts. A prior lawsuit by an Armor.fi user in San Francisco Superior Court (Chen v. Ahmed, Case No. CGC‑21‑589609) ended in an out‑of‑court settlement after a temporary restraining order application, according to filings referenced in IFW Global’s reports. Attorneys now point to potential U.S. claims spanning securities fraud under Section 10(b), racketeering (RICO), common‑law fraud, conversion, and unjust enrichment, and affected investors have been directed to file complaints with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and the FBI’s IC3 portal.

Ahmed’s March 19 liquidation is the most aggressive on-chain move from Mochi‑linked wallets since the 2021 Curve incident and is being read by many affected investors as confirmation that the locked CVX will be used for exit liquidity rather than restitution. With roughly 500,000 CVX still locked on Convex Finance and controlled via the same governance structure, any further sales could become major liquidity events for CVX and reignite questions over how DeFi protocols respond when governance power is acquired through exploits rather than open‑market buying. Ahmed, described in IFW documentation as a UK citizen, has not publicly responded to the latest allegations, and his social media profiles have been inactive for months.

US President Donald Trump is set to become the first sitting president in history to have his signature put on US paper currency.

In an announcement on Thursday, the US Department of the Treasury said the move would mark the 250th anniversary of the US. It will put both Trump and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s signatures on future US notes.

“There is no more powerful way to recognize the historic achievements of our great country and President Donald J. Trump than U.S. dollar bills bearing his name, and it is only appropriate that this historic currency be issued at the Semiquincentennial,” Bessent said.

Until now, the tradition has been to put the signatures of the treasurer and the Treasury secretary on US paper currency. This move would mark the first time in history that a sitting president is placing his signature on US currency.

According to a report from Reuters on Thursday, the first $100 bills with Trump and Bessent’s signatures will be printed in June, with other bills following in later months.

Trump’s name and likeness have also made their way to cryptocurrencies, famous landmarks and commemorative coins.

Alongside the Treasury’s plans to put Trump’s signature on US notes, there are also potentially $1 coins with the president’s face on them that could enter circulation as part of the US’s 250th anniversary.

In late 2025, the US Mint released three proposed designs bearing Trump’s face and the caption “In God We Trust.”

Trump has also helped oversee the renaming of major US landmarks such as the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. 

The board of the Kennedy Center, reportedly filled with Trump appointees, voted in late December to change the name to the “Donald J. Trump and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.”

Related: SEC is no longer a ‘cop on the beat’ on crypto, says US lawmaker

This has prompted pushback, however, with lawmakers arguing that the move is illegal when done without authorization from Congress.