Crypto World
Solana Price Drops 3% but Longs Keep Piling In: 17 Million SOL Explain Why
Solana (SOL) price trades at $82.20 on April 9, down 3% in 24 hours and 34% year-to-date. Yet leveraged traders are betting heavily on a bounce.
The seven-day liquidation map on Bybit shows $309 million in cumulative long leverage against just $127 million in shorts, a 2.4x mismatch that defies the price weakness. A bullish reversal pattern on the 12-hour chart and an on-chain supply wall may explain why the crowd refuses to turn bearish on Solana price despite the sustained bleed.
Price Weakness Meets a 2.4x Long Bias as a Reversal Pattern Takes Shape
Solana price has dropped almost 5% over the past 30 days while the broader market digested ceasefire uncertainty and capital rotation into equities. The 34% year-to-date decline makes SOL one of the weaker performers among top tokens.
The leverage picture tells a completely different story. On Bybit’s SOL/USDT perpetual market, cumulative long liquidation leverage stands at $308.79 million. Short liquidation leverage sits at $127.02 million. Longs outweigh shorts by roughly 2.4 to 1.
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The mismatch becomes less puzzling when the 12-hour chart is considered. SOL is forming an inverse head and shoulders, a bullish reversal pattern. The right shoulder is currently taking shape, and the price is sitting near its base. As long as the pattern remains valid (SOL stays above $76.63), the leveraged crowd appears to be betting that the current dip is the final leg of the right shoulder before a breakout.
However, a pattern alone does not justify $309 million in directional bets. The on-chain picture reveals where that conviction is coming from.
17.5 Million SOL Accumulated at the Exact Level Where the Right Shoulder Sits
The cost basis distribution heatmap from Glassnode shows the densest supply cluster sitting between $81.16 and $81.98. Approximately 17.47 million SOL has been accumulated at this range, making it the strongest holder concentration zone on the chart.
The right shoulder’s lowest wick sits at $81.67, directly inside this cluster. The alignment is not a coincidence. Traders and holders who bought between $81.16 and $81.98 are defending their cost basis. Every dip into this zone gets absorbed because selling here would mean realizing losses for a large portion of the supply.
This on-chain wall gives the inverse head and shoulders its structural credibility. The pattern is holding because a real supply base supports it, not just speculative leverage. The longs on Bybit appear to be reading the same signal and positioning accordingly.
However, a $175 million long liquidation cluster sits around $78. If the cost basis wall fails and Solana price drops through $78, the resulting cascade could wipe out the bullish thesis rather quickly.
The SOL price levels now determine which outcome plays out.
Solana Price Levels That Decide if the Longs Are Right
SOL trades at $82.20. The first hurdle sits at $84.12 at the 0.236 Fibonacci level. A 12-hour close above $84.12 would suggest the right shoulder was completed earlier and buyers are now pushing toward the neckline.
The neckline zone sits between $86.86 at the 0.5 level and $88.09 at the 0.618 level. A daily close above $88.09 would confirm the breakout and activate the 13.2% measured move projection from the neckline. That targets $98.47-$98.80, per target projection.
On the downside, $81.67 is the right shoulder floor and almost the base of the 17.5 million SOL supply wall. A 12-hour close below $81.67 would deepen the right shoulder and raise questions about the pattern’s validity.
Below that, $78.38 offers the next technical support. However, the $78 zone is where roughly $175 million in long liquidations are clustered. If SOL reaches that level, forced selling from liquidated positions would likely accelerate the decline and damage the pattern significantly. A break below $76.63 at the head invalidates the inverse head and shoulders entirely.
For now, $88.09 separates a confirmed breakout toward $98.80 from a failed right shoulder that risks triggering $175 million in long liquidations below $78.
The post Solana Price Drops 3% but Longs Keep Piling In: 17 Million SOL Explain Why appeared first on BeInCrypto.
Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company, xAI, has filed a lawsuit against the state of Colorado, seeking to block incoming AI rules that restrict speech from AI chatbots like Grok.
The AI company is specifically challenging Colorado’s Senate Bill 24-205, which aims to protect AI users from “algorithmic discrimination” in areas like employment, housing and finance.
However, in a filing to a US district court in Colorado on Thursday, xAI argued that “Colorado cannot alter xAI’s message simply because it wants to amplify its own views on the highly politicized subjects of fairness and equity.”
The company further argued that the law, set to take effect on June 30, is contradictory as it promotes “differential treatment” in an effort to “increase diversity or redress historical discrimination.”
Forcing xAI to change Grok would also interfere with its goal of being “maximally truth seeking,” it said.
Colorado isn’t the first state that xAI has sued over AI regulations. In December, it sued California over its Generative AI Training Data Transparency Act, arguing that disclosure requirements compel speech and reveal trade secrets in violation of the First and Fifth Amendments.
Related: AI agents overwhelmingly prefer Bitcoin over fiat in new study
The Colorado and California AI laws come after accusations of Grok making racist, sexist and antisemitic comments in the past.
AI rules should be left to federal regulators: David Sacks
White House AI czar David Sacks has led a push for state regulators to steer clear of crafting AI rules, arguing for a single federal standard for AI instead of a “patchwork” of state laws.
“The problem that we’re seeing right now is that you’ve got 50 different states regulating this in 50 different ways, and it’s creating a patchwork of regulation that’s difficult for innovators to comply with,” Sacks said in late March.
Sacks was appointed as co-chair of the newly established President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology to address that issue.
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A solo Bitcoin (BTC) miner has beaten extraordinary odds to successfully mine a solo block. The miner earned roughly 3.128 BTC, worth about $222,000, including subsidy and transaction fees.
Wu Blockchain reported that the Bitcoin miner was operating at an estimated hashrate of just 70 terahashes per second (TH/s). That hash power represented approximately 0.0000074% of Bitcoin’s total network hashrate, which sat at over 940 EH/s on April 9.
At that scale, the probability of mining a block on any given day is estimated at around 1 in 100,000, translating to a statistical expectation of roughly one successful block every 300 years.
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For context, major publicly listed miners operate at tens of exahashes per second, dwarfing the 70 TH/s rig. Thus, that scale gap illustrates how improbable the outcome was.
Meanwhile, the rare win comes amid shifting mining conditions. Global Bitcoin hashrate declined to around 1,004 EH/s in the second quarter of 2026, down from approximately 1,066 EH/s in the previous quarter.
The drop has been largely attributed to weaker mining profitability, which has forced less efficient machines offline.
At the same time, the mining industry is undergoing a structural shift. Many operators are increasingly diversifying into artificial intelligence and high-performance computing workloads.
“Based on recent company announcements, listed miners could derive as much as 70% of their revenues from AI by the end of this year, up from roughly 30% today. What began as a marginal diversification strategy is increasingly becoming the core business,” CoinShares noted.
While such solo mining successes remain exceedingly rare, they serve as a reminder that Bitcoin’s decentralized design still allows for unexpected wins, even in an increasingly competitive space.
The post Solo Bitcoin Miner With 70 TH/s Wins Full Block Against 1-in-100,000 Odds appeared first on BeInCrypto.
Coinbase has rolled out a notable upgrade to the x402 protocol, introducing usage-based pricing for agentic AI compute tasks and moving away from the longstanding flat-fee model. The new “Upto” scheme is live, according to Coinbase’s Developer Platform, and is designed to unlock variable-cost services such as large language model inference, data queries, and other AI-backed compute operations.
According to Coinbase, the change addresses a key limitation of the earlier model: fixed prices for all requests, which worked well for deterministic APIs but capped the economics of services where cost scales with usage, token counts, or query complexity. The Upto framework is built as an Ethereum-compatible layer, with ERC-20 support on the tokens side and the CDP Facilitator enabling fully gasless payments on the client side.
Key takeaways
- Upto introduces usage-based pricing on x402, replacing the prior fixed-fee approach for agentic AI tasks.
- Sellers can set maximum prices for tasks; buyers authorize these caps, while actual charges reflect the real resources consumed, potentially reducing overpayment.
- The scheme operates on an EVM-compatible layer and supports ERC20 tokens; the underlying CDP Facilitator enables gasless payments.
- Adoption of x402 has cooled since its November peak, with data from Dune Analytics showing a sharp decline in weekly transactions through Q1 2026.
- Governance has shifted toward broader industry participation, as the Linux Foundation now hosts the protocol, with major tech players like Google, Microsoft, and AWS holding stakes through the x402 Foundation.
From flat fees to flexible usage: what Upto changes for AI compute payments
Under the Upto scheme, sellers can cap the price they’re willing to accept for a given task, while buyers pre-authorize a ceiling. If costs are lower than the maximum, the system charges only what the task actually requires. This marks a shift from the previous regime, where simple and complex requests were priced the same, leaving users exposed to overpayment or underpayment depending on task complexity.
The practical effect for developers and AI operators is twofold. First, it introduces price discovery at the task level, aligning payments with real resource usage rather than a blanket rate. Second, it can reduce friction for experiments with agentic AI workflows, where costs can be highly variable based on token streams, compute duration, and the intricacy of the queries being processed.
In addition, the architecture remains compatible with existing crypto rails: Upto is described as an EVM-compatible layer, while the CDP Facilitator supports gasless transactions, which can streamline experiences for end users who expect near-instant, fee-free onboarding and execution from their wallets. These elements are crucial as developers explore widespread AI agent deployment, where the cost of inference and data access can swing dramatically over time.
Market backdrop: adoption trends and what this means for agentic AI payments
Even as Coinbase markets Upto as a practical remedy to pricing frictions, the broader x402 ecosystem has faced a notable retrenchment in 2026. Dune Analytics data shows that after peaking during a standout week in early November, the network’s activity faded considerably. During the week of November 4–10, x402 processed about 13.7 million transactions — its all-time high for weekly volume — but weekly transaction counts have since fallen below the 1 million mark in early January and continued to slide into the first quarter. By the last week of March, total activity stood at roughly 112,708 transactions, underscoring a sharp deceleration in adoption.
The shift matters for any assessment of agentic AI’s economics. A pricing regime that ties costs more tightly to actual usage could help rebuild demand if buyers and sellers can reliably predict costs for complex AI tasks. It also heightens the importance of on-chain efficiency, instant settlement, and cost transparency as usage grows. While Upto directly targets cost alignment for AI workloads, the broader question remains: will pricing flexibility alone reverse the recent downtrend, or will buyers demand additional incentives—faster settlement, more interoperable primitives, or deeper tooling support for AI agents?
Governance and industry backing: Linux Foundation and big-tech stake
In a significant governance development, the x402 protocol’s ownership was moved to the nonprofit Linux Foundation earlier this month. The shift signals an emphasis on open governance and standardization as AI agentic services expand. The ecosystem is already backed by a coalition of large technology companies that hold stakes in the protocol through the x402 Foundation, including Google, Microsoft, and Amazon Web Services. This collective involvement reflects industry-wide interest in creating interoperable payment rails that can scale with AI agent usage.
Beyond pure technical advantages, the move toward neutral stewardship and broad platform participation could influence how future deployments are designed and audited. For developers and enterprise users, such governance structures may offer greater assurances around compatibility, security standards, and long-term maintenance, which are critical as agentic AI services move from experiments to production workloads.
What to watch next
Several development vectors will shape x402’s trajectory in the near term. First, the uptake of Upto will be measured by real-world pilots and early adopters testing AI agent workloads with variable costs. Observers will be watching whether usage-based pricing can rekindle activity on a network that saw a steep decline through Q1 2026. Second, ecosystem momentum around the x402 Foundation will matter: any new collaborations, standardized interfaces, or tooling improvements could accelerate diffusion among developers and enterprises who want frictionless payment primitives for AI services.
Finally, the industry’s ongoing conversation about agentic AI economics—how to monetize autonomous compute, data access, and inference at scale—will intersect with pricing innovations like Upto. If the model proves durable, it could influence other protocols seeking to support dynamic workloads and near-instantaneous settlements in AI-driven ecosystems.
Readers should monitor updates from Coinbase and the x402 Foundation for pilots and performance metrics as usage-based pricing becomes more widely tested in practical AI workflows. As the market weighs these changes, the central questions remain: will usage-based pricing unlock renewed demand, and can governance-backed protocols deliver the reliability that builders and users require for agentic AI at scale?
The U.S. Treasury has launched a cybersecurity information-sharing program to give U.S. digital asset firms timely, actionable intel on threats targeting their customers and networks.
Summary
- The U.S. Treasury’s OCCIP has unveiled a new initiative to strengthen cybersecurity across the digital asset industry.
- The program will share timely, actionable cyber threat information with eligible U.S. crypto companies and industry groups.
- The move implements a key recommendation from the President’s Working Group report on enhancing U.S. leadership in digital financial technology.
The U.S. Treasury Department has launched a new cybersecurity information‑sharing program aimed at hardening the digital asset industry against increasingly sophisticated attacks. The initiative, run through the Office of Cybersecurity and Critical Infrastructure Protection (OCCIP), will distribute timely, actionable threat intelligence to eligible U.S. digital asset companies and industry groups so they can better detect, prevent, and respond to cyber threats targeting their customers and networks.
Treasury’s move implements a key recommendation from the President’s Working Group on Financial Markets, set out in its report “Enhancing the U.S. Leadership in Digital Financial Technology.” By formalizing a dedicated channel between federal cyber teams and crypto‑adjacent firms, the program effectively treats major digital asset players as part of critical financial infrastructure, rather than as a separate, loosely connected sector.
In practice, participating firms can expect early warnings on active campaigns, indicators of compromise, and best‑practice guidance tailored to exchanges, wallet providers, custodians, and other digital asset intermediaries. The goal is to move from reactive disclosure after a breach to proactive defense before attacks spread across multiple platforms and service providers.
For an industry that has historically relied on informal back‑channels and ad hoc coordination during incidents, Treasury’s framework marks a shift toward more structured public‑private cooperation. The success of the effort, however, will depend on how many firms choose to participate, how quickly information flows in both directions, and whether smaller providers — often the weakest links — are able to plug into the new system as effectively as the largest U.S. players.
Bhutan moved more Bitcoin from its sovereign-linked wallet on Thursday, further reducing its once sizeable BTC stash and extending its months-long selling.
Arkham data showed a wallet attributed to the Royal Government of Bhutan and its investment arm Druk Holding & Investment, transferred about 319 Bitcoin (BTC), worth roughly $22.68 million, bringing total outflows since late October 2024 to more than 9,000 BTC.
The transfer follows a series of recent wallet movements by the country flagged by Arkham. In March alone, the Bhutan-tagged wallet moved more than 1,667 BTC (roughly $120 million), taking Bhutan’s Bitcoin holdings from about 13,000 BTC in late 2024 to 3,654 BTC in April, according to Arkham Intelligence’s tracking dashboard.
While that constitutes a roughly 70% drop in the country’s BTC holdings, Bhutan is still the fifth-largest publicly tracked nation-state holder, behind the United States (328,000 BTC), the United Kingdom (61,000 BTC), El Salvador (7,600 BTC) and the United Arab Emirates (7,000 BTC).
Bhutan has not publicly commented on the recent disposals, and the activity is inferred from wallet labels and transaction patterns tied to the government and Druk Holding & Investment.
Bhutan’s green Bitcoin strategy
The kingdom built much of its position through state-backed mining that uses hydropower to support data centers, a strategy officials have framed as part of a “green Bitcoin economy” and a way to diversify export revenues beyond electricity sales.
Bhutan uses surplus, carbon-free hydropower to run energy-intensive supercomputers that mine Bitcoin, turning excess electricity into a liquid digital export and exploring whether large corporations could buy its “green” coins to meet environmental, social and governance targets.
Related: Bhutan to deploy Sei validator in Q1, eyes tokenization collab
In December 2025, Bhutan unveiled a national Bitcoin Development Pledge committing up to 10,000 BTC (roughly $1 billion at the time) to support the long-term development of its Gelephu Mindfulness City special administrative region.
Authorities said the allocation would be managed through options such as using Bitcoin as collateral, low-risk yield-generating instruments or long-term holding as part of a broader strategy to anchor the new economic hub in digital assets and sustainable finance.
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CME Bitcoin futures open interest has fallen to a 14‑month low as the once‑crowded basis trade collapses, compressing yields and pushing leveraged institutions out.
Summary
- CME Bitcoin futures average daily open interest fell below $8B in March and to about $7.2B in early April, the lowest since February 2024.
- March volume slid to $163B, nearly half January 2025’s peak, as the spot‑ETF plus short‑futures basis trade unwound and leveraged funds exited.
- With annualized basis near 5% versus ~4.5% risk‑free rates, funding costs and counterparty risk have erased arbitrage appeal at CME.
CME Bitcoin futures activity has fallen to its weakest level in more than a year as the once‑crowded basis trade unwinds and leveraged institutions pull back. Average daily open interest dropped below $8 billion in March 2026 and slid to about $7.2 billion in early April, marking a new low since February 2024 and extending a five‑month decline. Monthly trading volume on CME fell to $163 billion in March, almost half the peak seen in January 2025, underscoring how quickly institutional demand has cooled.
At the center of the shift is the cash‑and‑carry structure that dominated Wall Street’s crypto exposure after U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs launched. For much of 2024 and 2025, funds bought spot ETFs while shorting CME futures to capture a relatively low‑risk yield from the spread between futures and spot. “The CME Bitcoin futures basis is primarily driven by price momentum and market sentiment,” CF Benchmarks wrote in a 2025 analysis, noting that aggressive rallies tended to push futures into rich contango and make basis trades highly attractive.
That regime has broken down as Bitcoin has retreated from highs near $120,000 to below $70,000, compressing the annualized basis to around 5% — barely above a roughly 4.5% U.S. risk‑free rate. With funding costs and counterparty risk taken into account, “a near‑flat basis reduces the incentive for basis trades that rely on futures premia to generate low‑risk carry,” derivatives commentary from MEXC noted in February, describing CME’s structure as close to neutral. In some stress episodes, the CME‑to‑spot basis has even turned negative, a sign of “aggressive hedging or the unwind of cash‑and‑carry structures when risk appetite fades,” according to Padalan Capital’s observations cited in the same report.
The result is a sharp drop in the very type of activity CME was built to attract. Total Bitcoin futures open interest across venues remains sizable — over $43 billion as of early March, according to derivatives trackers — but liquidity is increasingly concentrated offshore or in perpetual swaps, while regulated CME contracts lose share. A Binance research note in January captured the turning point bluntly: “The era of arbitrage is over; Wall Street withdraws from Bitcoin basis,” after CME open interest fell below major offshore exchanges for the first time.
For Bitcoin (BTC), the implications are mixed. A lower, flatter CME basis suggests less leveraged carry and more spot‑driven price action, which can make the market structurally healthier but also more sensitive to directional flows. For CME, the open question is whether new use cases — such as more nuanced hedging by spot ETF issuers — can replace the vanished basis trade, or whether regulated futures will remain a shrinking island in a derivatives complex increasingly dominated by 24/7 offshore products.
Bitcoin pulled back to $71,843 on Friday after a third attempt to breach $73,000 was met with selling on Thursday, a level that has now rejected the price on every rally since the Iran conflict began in late February.
The retreat is modest. Bitcoin is up 7.9% on the week, its strongest weekly performance of the war so far, holding above the 50-day moving average which has turned upward for the first time since the conflict started. Ether held at $2,189, up 6.6% on the week. Solana’s SOL gained 5.1% to $83.09. XRP added 2.8% to $1.34. Dogecoin climbed 2.4% to $0.092. The entire top 10 is green on the weekly chart for the first time in over a month.
But $73,000 is seemingly a wall. The level has capped bitcoin three times since the ceasefire was announced on Tuesday — each attempt producing a rally that faded within hours. The pattern is identical to the pre-ceasefire range, just shifted higher. Instead of grinding between $65,000 and $73,000, bitcoin is now grinding between $70,000 and $73,000.
“We will need to wait for the price to rise above $75,000 before we can speak of the market entering an active bullish phase,” said Alex Kuptsikevich, FxPro’s chief market analyst, in a note to CoinDesk. He added that bitcoin remains above the 50-day moving average, reinforcing short-term bullish sentiment, but flagged the repeated rejection at $73,000 as the barrier that needs to break.
Galaxy Digital CEO Mike Novogratz set the bar higher, saying the key conditions for bitcoin to resume its uptrend are consolidation above $74,000 followed by a break above $80,000. “Breaking through these levels could trigger a new wave of optimism and restore the uptrend,” he said.
The ceasefire that triggered Tuesday’s rally is already fraying. Iran accused the U.S. of breaching three clauses of the agreement.
The Strait of Hormuz remains only partially reopened with “technical limitations.” Oil rebounded from its 15% single-day crash to trade back above $97.
Ether’s setup is similarly range-bound. The token pulled back 4% from its Wednesday peak to $2,189, which Kuptsikevich described as market noise within a $2,000 to $2,400 consolidation zone.
“A breakout beyond this calm consolidation zone would signal the start of a directional move,” he said.
Outside of majors, Algorand dropped 11.4%, Aptos fell 6.1%, and Polkadot lost 6.1%, marking an altcoin divergence that typically appears when traders are rotating rather than entering fresh capital.
The Fear and Greed Index climbed out of single digits for the first time in over a month, meanwhile.
If the ceasefire survives through the weekend and the Strait opens further, $73,000 gets its fourth test with momentum behind it. However, Tehran’s grievances escalate or Trump’s rhetoric shifts, the pullback toward $68,000 to $70,000 is the path of least resistance.
XRP is trying to stabilize after a sharp move higher, but the bigger question is whether this is real strength or just a short-term bounce. The breakout came on solid volume, yet the lack of follow-through and weak broader structure suggest buyers are still cautious.
News Background
- XRP ETFs saw $3.32M in inflows, but the scale remains too small to meaningfully shift price direction given the token’s size.
- The move continues to be driven more by technical positioning than fundamentals, with no clear catalyst behind the recovery.
Price Action Summary
- XRP moved from $1.33 to $1.35, breaking above the $1.34 level on strong volume.
- The initial push was sharp, but price quickly settled into a tight range just below $1.36 without extending higher.
- Short-term volatility remains elevated, with quick dips being bought but rallies still struggling to hold.
Technical Analysis
- The key signal is the quality of the breakout. Volume confirms participation, but the lack of continuation suggests this is not yet a strong trend shift.
- XRP remains within a broader downtrend, and rallies are still capped below the $1.40 level.
- Some indicators point to exhaustion rather than strength, with analysts flagging potential downside if momentum fades.
- At the same time, tight consolidation near current levels shows buyers are at least attempting to build a base.
What traders should watch
- $1.34 is now the immediate pivot. Holding above it keeps the short-term recovery intact.
- $1.36-$1.40 remains the key resistance zone. A clean break is needed to shift momentum meaningfully.
- On the downside, a move back below $1.32-$1.31 would signal the breakout has failed and reopen pressure toward $1.28.
Coinbase has announced an upgrade for the x402 protocol, enabling usage-based pricing for agentic AI compute requests, which replaces the former flat fee model.
In a post on X on Thursday, Coinbase Developer Platform announced the “Upto” scheme has gone live, adding it will help open up “variable-cost services” for agentic AI such as large language model inference, compute and data queries.
“Until now, x402 only supported exact, fixed-price payments. That works great for deterministic APIs. But it blocked an entire category of services where the cost depends on usage, such as token count, compute time, or query complexity,” Coinbase Developer Platform said.
“Upto is an EVM implementation, supporting all ERC20s, and CDP Facilitator supports fully gasless payments,” it added.
The move comes amid growing support for the x402 protocol as a wide range of firms prepare for future agentic commerce adoption, which is expected to bring extreme levels of network demand and require frictionless payments and near-instant transactions to support agentic AI.
Flat-fee problem gets a fix
The Upto scheme allows sellers to configure maximum prices, while buyers will be able to authorize prices up to a specific amount.
On the server end, where costs fluctuate, the server will charge only for how much it actually takes to complete the task, meaning users won’t be overcharged and may even pay less than the specified maximum price.
Previously, simple and complex requests cost the same amount, resulting in some users either overpaying or underpaying for tasks done by AI agents. This upgrade will help users set prices they are willing to pay before a task instead of guessing how much they think the task will cost for an agent to complete.
Related: CIA to integrate AI ‘co-workers’ to process intelligence, catch spies
Developed by Coinbase, the protocol’s ownership was handed over to the nonprofit Linux Foundation earlier this month, with big tech firms such as Google, Microsoft and Amazon Web Services having a stake in the protocol via the x402 Foundation.
Despite the hype surrounding x402, the network has seen declining adoption rates in 2026 after hitting peak levels in November, according to Dune Analytics data. Between Nov. 4 and Nov. 10, the protocol saw 13.7 million transactions, its biggest week on record.
However, it has been on a steep decline since then, with weekly transaction volume dropping below 1 million in early January and continuing to plunge further over the first quarter. As of the last week in March, x402 saw just 112,708 transactions.
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BeInCrypto, the world’s leading multilingual crypto news platform, and Proof of Talk, the “Davos of Web3,” are joining forces to co-host the Institutional 100 Awards. An awards program with a simple rule: if you made the list, you deserved to be there. Winners will be announced during Proof of Talk, June 2-3, 2026, at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs within the Louvre Palace in Paris.
The BeInCrypto x Proof of Talk Institutional 100 is an independent media awards program across six segments and 25 categories, from capital markets and tokenization to regulation, enterprise blockchain, and retail access to digital assets. It identifies and benchmarks the companies and individuals driving the convergence of TradFi and digital assets. Proof of Talk brings the right room: 2,500 CEOs, founders, and policymakers representing more than $18 trillion in AUM, 85% of whom hold decision-making authority. Getting into that room and getting onto this list work the same way.
Alena Afanaseva, CEO & Founder of BeInCrypto, comments:
“The Institutional 100 was built on a simple principle: no one buys their way onto this list, and no single opinion puts them there. Our two-stage evaluation combines hard data with independent expert judgment, so whoever makes the final list got there on merit. Proof of Talk is built the same way. You get in because of your track record, full stop. Having them come on as co-host is the most natural partnership we could have made.”
DEHNADI Zohair, Co-Founder & CEO, Proof of Talk, comments:
“Davos defined global finance for a generation. Proof of Talk is where Web3 defines the next one. We chose the Louvre deliberately, because history doesn’t happen in convention centres. It happens in rooms that convene CEOs who already know what it means to change the world. That’s the intention we bring to every conversation here.”
The Institutional 100 Methodology
The ranking evaluates over 500 candidates using a proprietary scoring system. Data is sourced from verifiable outlets including DefiLlama, Dune Analytics, SEC EDGAR, and Kaiko. Every nominee goes through two sequential assessment stages conducted by separate teams: Stage 1 applies quantitative screening using publicly verifiable data, followed by Stage 2, where a senior Expert Council of 10 to 13 practitioners spanning traditional finance, digital asset management, and regulatory advisory score the shortlisted candidates.
Council members include Rayhaneh Sharif-Askary, Managing Director and Head of Product and Research at Grayscale Investments; Sunday Domingo, Global Head of Digital Channel Solutions at Standard Chartered; Fabian Dori, Chief Investment Officer at Sygnum Bank; and Gregory Johnson, Board Member of the Bretton Woods Committee, among others.
Learn more about the awards: https://awards.beincrypto.com/
For PR and media requests, contact Iva Belamaric at iva.belamaric@beincrypto.com
About BeInCrypto
Founded in 2018, BeInCrypto is one of the world’s top three crypto news media platforms, known for accurate, unbiased, and multilingual reporting on blockchain, Web3, and market trends in 26
different languages; recognised by the Trust Project, a global standard for journalism
transparency.
For more information, visit: beincrypto.com | awards.beincrypto.com
About Proof of Talk
Proof of Talk unites Web3’s 2,500 most influential decision-makers under one roof to deliver the world’s highest value-per-square-meter experience in the Louvre Palace. Attendance is highly curated: 85% of participants hold C-level or equivalent roles, collectively responsible for $18+ trillion in assets under management.
For more information, visit: proofoftalk.io
The post BeInCrypto Teams Up with Proof of Talk to Launch the Institutional 100 Awards appeared first on BeInCrypto.
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