Wintermute’s US arm has registered as a broker-dealer and already signed exchange-traded fund (ETF) issuers as clients, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The registration clears Wintermute USA to register as a market maker on American stock exchanges. Chief Executive Evgeny Gaevoy said the firm wants to compete with Jump Trading, Jane Street and Citadel Securities within three to five years.

What the Wintermute Broker License Changes

One list frames the whole move. BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust held $43.2 billion at the end of June. A dozen firms are cleared to create and redeem its shares, the job that keeps an ETF trading close to the value of what it holds.

Not one of them is a crypto company. The fund’s latest prospectus names Jane Street, Citadel Securities, Virtu Americas, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan among them.

That is the gap Wintermute is stepping into. It says it quotes prices across more than 60 venues, yet it could not touch the plumbing of crypto’s own flagship product. The job needs a broker-dealer license.

Now it has one. It also has customers waiting, according to the Journal.

Registration does not make Wintermute a Wall Street firm overnight. It makes it eligible.

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Wintermute Takes Aim at Jump, Jane Street and Citadel

Gaevoy gave himself three to five years to catch those three firms, the Journal reported.

The plan runs in stages. Wintermute starts with commodities and digital asset ETFs, the markets closest to what it already trades. Tokenized equities follow, if regulators allow them. Designated market maker status on a major exchange sits at the end.

Each stage needs a separate approval. None of them is automatic.

The numbers show how steep the climb is.

Three firms hold designated market maker status on the New York Stock Exchange, according to the exchange’s own model. They are Citadel Securities, Virtu Americas and GTS Securities.

Every listed stock gets exactly one. Citadel Securities holds that role for more than 1,900 of them, about 62% of NYSE listings, and issuers picked it for more than 80% of NYSE IPOs. A designated market maker must also carry at least $75 million in capital before inventory risk.

Wintermute’s case rests on who it already serves. Institutions drove 72% of its spot over-the-counter (OTC) volume in the first half of 2026, up from 59% a year earlier, according to Wintermute’s institutional flow data.

“At three quarters of volume, institutional flow defines market structure,” Wintermute, H1 2026 OTC flow report.

Those clients already buy equities, commodities and ETFs somewhere else.

The groundwork started early. The firm opened a New York headquarters in May 2025 and hired Ron Hammond, previously of the Blockchain Association, to lead policy work.

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) has 180 days to act once a membership application is complete. It oversaw 3,184 broker-dealers at the end of 2025, down from 3,394 in 2021.

Wintermute joins a shrinking club, not a crowded one.

Tokenized Stocks Remain the Bigger Prize

The tokenized equities stage carries the most weight.

That market is already forming. The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) cleared a tokenized share trading rule from Nasdaq in March 2026. In June, NYSE owner Intercontinental Exchange backed a tokenized equities venture with OKX.

Wintermute had already made its case. In a September 2025 submission to the SEC’s Crypto Task Force, it argued broker-dealers should be free to trade tokenized securities for their own account and hold them in wallet software.

That was a lobbying position then. It is a licensed firm’s position now.

Two questions remain open. Which securities Wintermute quotes first, and whether any exchange grants it market maker status at all.

Registration buys the ticket. It does not hand over the seat.

The post Wintermute Lands US Broker License and a 5-Year Plan to Rival Citadel appeared first on BeInCrypto.

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Optimism plans to release about 343 million OP over the next 12 months. Its buyback program has bought back 9 million.

Year 5 runs from May 2026 to April 2027 on the Foundation’s budget calendar. Its outlook for that stretch landed Thursday, five days after OP hit the lowest price in its history.

What Optimism’s Year 5 Outlook Projects

Optimism is an Ethereum layer-2 network. OP is its governance token. Each year the Foundation sets out where new OP will come from. Four sources feed Year 5.

• The Ecosystem Fund supplies the biggest piece at 200 million OP.
• Early core contributors add 47.6 million.
• Investors add 15.3 million.
• The Governance Fund adds 10 million.

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Airdrops and Retro Funding are both set at zero.

Add those lines together and the total comes to 272.9 million OP. The report’s own supply target implies 343 million. The 70 million difference goes unexplained.

There is a second gap. The report puts circulating supply at 2.16 billion OP. The Foundation’s official tracker, which the same report names as the canonical record, showed 2.29 billion on Thursday. That leaves 125 million OP unaccounted for.

The Foundation describes its numbers as directional estimates. Even the low reading still points to more than 200 million new tokens. Investors already hold 92% of their allocation. Early contributors hold 78%. These large scheduled token unlocks now draw from a shrinking pool.

Buybacks Cover Only a Fraction of New Supply

Governance approved the buyback in January 2026. It routes up to half of Superchain revenue into monthly OP purchases for one year.

The first purchase cleared on March 5. It spent 95.8 ETH and picked up 1.57 million OP, according to the Foundation’s public thread.

Purchases now top 9 million OP, worth roughly $781,000. Set against 343 million in projected unlocks, that is one token bought for every 38 released.

The revenue behind those buybacks is shrinking too. Coinbase’s Base network left the OP Stack in February. OP fell 23% on the news, and Optimism cut more than 20% of its staff weeks later.

OP traded near its record low at $0.0867 on Thursday, down 2.5% on the day. It bottomed at $0.082043 on August 1. The token now sits 98% below its March 2024 peak of $4.84.

Enterprise Bet Now Carries the Token

Optimism has stopped handing tokens to users. No airdrops ran in Year 4. Retro Funding paused after Season 7. The Grants Council budget shrank.

Both programs sit mostly unspent. Retro Funding has used 81.4 million OP of an 859 million pool.

OP Enterprise replaced them in January 2026, selling production-grade infrastructure to exchanges, fintechs and banks. Bitpanda’s Vision Chain, Ink and a Dunamu agreement for GIWA Chain lead the customer list. Base signed on as a paying client in the same post that announced its exit.

The Foundation tied all future spending to that shift.

“token deployment is tied to the OP Enterprise strategy and measured against OP Mainnet growth and enterprise customer acquisition,” the Optimism Foundation said in a report.

OP Mainnet grew monthly transactions by more than 60% in Year 4. The projected unlocks are worth about $29.8 million at current prices, or 15% of the token’s entire market value. For holders, the question is simple. Can enterprise revenue grow faster than the supply still to come?

Optimism did not immediately respond to BeInCrypto’s request for comment.

The post Optimism Year 5 Outlook Raises 5 Red Flags for OP Holders appeared first on BeInCrypto.

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Uniswap Labs' launchpad passed Pons on daily token launches within a day of opening on Robinhood Chain, according to onchain data, taking the lead from a product that settles every trade on Uniswap's own automated market maker. Uniswap now runs a product in the same category as applications built… Read the full story at The Defiant

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July was the month the market caught its breath. After a June defined by a hawkish Fed surprise, a broken ETF cycle, and one of Bitcoin’s worst monthly candles in years, July delivered the opposite script: a steady grind higher, a World Cup campaign that closed out on schedule, a tennis debut at Wimbledon, and a security backdrop across the industry that made Zoomex’s transparency stack more relevant than ever. The month proved that recovery, like the drawdown before it, tests infrastructure just as hard as a crash does. 

Zoomex by the Numbers

Against that backdrop, Zoomex’s value proposition stayed exactly where it was in June: sub-10ms execution, a dual liquidity pool architecture blending internal depth with aggregated external liquidity, and a minimalist interface built to hold up when volatility spikes in either direction. The platform continues to serve over 3 million registered users across 35-plus regions, with a catalogue spanning 700-plus trading pairs across Perpetual USDT, Inverse Perpetuals, Spot, tokenized equities, and now Predict Market contracts.

July’s test looked different from June’s. Rather than a single violent liquidation event, the month asked Zoomex’s infrastructure to hold up through a slower, choppier grind higher punctuated by a contentious Fed decision and an industry-wide spike in security incidents elsewhere. Zoomex’s regulatory stack, Canada MSB, US MSB, US NFA, and Australia AUSTRAC, stayed unchanged and fully active through it, and the platform’s Hacken security audits and Proof of Reserves framework remained the answer to a month where trust, not just speed, was the thing being tested across the sector.

What Zoomex Shipped in July

World Cup Predict Market Series Reaches Its Finale

Zoomex closed out its five-part World Cup Edition X Space series, part of the Zoomex World Cup Impact Pledge, with back-to-back episodes featuring some of football’s biggest names. England goalkeeper David James joined the third episode on July 9.

It was followed by Argentina legend and two-time Olympic gold medalist Javier Mascherano for the #ZOOMEXFootballAMA episode on July 14 hosted from Boston hours before the quarterfinals kicked off. 

The series wrapped with a World Cup Final Panel featuring Fernando Llorente in late July. Each episode carried a charity component: Zoomex committed 1,000 USDT per episode to a cause chosen by that episode’s football guest, rising by an additional 5,000 USDT whenever the guest’s match prediction landed.

Zoomex Debuts at Wimbledon 2026

Zoomex extended its sports footprint beyond football and Formula 1, marking its first entry into elite tennis through partnerships with three professional players, Felix Gill, James Duckworth, and Roman Safiullin, timed to Wimbledon 2026.

Alongside the sponsorship, Zoomex launched a dedicated tennis Predict Market and a Grand Slam Trading Challenge, letting users trade to earn Lottery Tickets toward Wimbledon prizing while forecasting match outcomes and key moments as the tournament played out, extending the same Elite Access Platform positioning that has anchored its football and racing partnerships all year.

Home Race Week With Ollie Bearman

Zoomex’s Formula 1 partnership stayed active through the sport’s own headline week, as Silverstone hosted the British Grand Prix with Haas driver, Zoomex partner, and local favorite Ollie Bearman racing in front of a home crowd. 

The platform marked the occasion with dedicated content around Bearman’s Silverstone weekend, keeping the F1 partnership visible alongside the month’s football and tennis campaigns rather than treating it as a one-off from earlier in the year.

Regulatory Watch: July’s Countdown Redefines Crypto’s Rulebook

Zoomex closed out July’s regulatory coverage by tracking the CLARITY Act’s stalled momentum, updated text was out and a floor vote was targeted before the August recess, but an ethics dispute kept blocking the final step, dropping the odds of 2026 passage sharply. Against that backdrop, MiCA continued cementing its position in Europe as the only fully operational framework. 

Macro Meets Crypto: When the Regime Flips

Zoomex broke down how July inverted the macro playbook that had defined crypto trading through 2025 and early 2026. Instead of tariffs weakening the dollar and the Fed inching rates lower, July brought a strengthening dollar and a new Fed chair talking hikes instead of cuts, forcing traders to rewrite the script mid-cycle.

Grid Trading on Zoomex: How to Profit From Sideways Markets

With July’s price action defined by a choppier, range-bound grind rather than a clean trend, Zoomex published a breakdown of its Contract Grid tool, designed specifically for markets that drift sideways for days or weeks without a decisive move.

Zoomex Predict World: Turning Crypto Markets, Sports, and Global Events Into Live, Tradable Charts

Alongside the World Cup campaign, Zoomex’s Predict Market kept broadening its scope through July, letting users trade not just match outcomes but geopolitical and macro questions from the same interface, from Venezuela-related political scenarios to speculation around a potential Russian nuclear test by a set 2026 deadline. The mix reinforced the product’s core pitch: one prediction venue spanning sports, crypto price action, and world events, rather than a football-only campaign tool.

Zoomex Monthly On-Chain Report: June 2026

Rounding out coverage carried over from June, Zoomex published its monthly on-chain report highlighting a pivotal month for the platform’s on-chain footprint, marked by a dramatic surge in exchange trade volume, sustained multi-chain asset growth, and a diversified pattern of capital flows.

CEX Security Architecture: How Your Funds Are Protected on Zoomex

Zoomex closed the month’s editorial output with a deep dive into its 7-layer security architecture, framed against the industry’s track record of exchange failures, from the FTX collapse to the Bybit exploit that resulted in $1.5 billion in losses in early 2025, positioning Zoomex’s safeguards as the counterpoint to that history.

World Cup Prediction Market Campaign Wraps Up

The World Cup Prediction Market Campaign that opened in mid-June ran through July 18, giving users a full month of task-based Lucky Spin draws for World Cup tickets, gift boxes, airdrop rewards, and trading vouchers before closing out alongside the tournament itself, with Zoomex flagging heating competition on the leaderboard as the window narrowed.

Discord Rewards Campaign

From July 15 to July 25, Zoomex ran a Discord-based promotion offering USDT bonuses, limited community roles, and priority access, with a $500 prize pool for top participants, extending the platform’s community engagement beyond X and into Discord for the first time this cycle.

July Airdrop Carnival

Running from June 30 through July 31, the July Airdrop Carnival targeted new users with tiered onboarding rewards, including up to $770 in combined bonuses and airdrops and a fixed-term product offering competitive fixed-term yield options, structured around KYC completion, deposit tiers, and trading activity, before rolling directly into the August Summer Airdrop at month’s end.

Conclusion

July was the month the macro backdrop finally caught up with crypto, and Zoomex’s response was to keep building rather than retreat. A live Prediction Market timed to the World Cup, a full tokenized equities suite answering the AI rotation directly, two World Cup campaigns running in parallel, and a five part charity series pairing football culture with real donations. Not a pause. Continued output through the sharpest drawdown of the year.

The macro numbers explain why that mattered: Bitcoin down roughly 18% for the month, $2 trillion wiped out across risk assets in minutes on June 17, and the Fear & Greed Index sitting in Extreme Fear for most of the back half of the month. Zoomex’s sub-10ms execution infrastructure and dual liquidity pool architecture were built for exactly this kind of stress, and the platform’s regulatory stack, FINTRAC, FinCEN, NFA, AUSTRAC, FATF Travel Rule, stayed unchanged and fully active through it.

No platform token. No VC entanglements. No user funds at risk.

June confirmed what May suggested: reliability compounds precisely when markets don’t cooperate, and the platforms still shipping through a hawkish Fed surprise and an $18 billion monthly drawdown are the ones building for the World Cup final and beyond, not just for the next bull run.

About Zoomex

Founded in 2021, Zoomex is a global cryptocurrency trading platform focused on derivatives trading. The platform serves over 3 million users across 35+ countries and regions, offering access to 700+ trading pairs. Built around easy to use, transparency, fairness, and speed, Zoomex provides a clear and efficient trading experience for users worldwide.

Through its high-performance matching engine, clear asset and order displays, and transparent fee and rule mechanisms, Zoomex helps users better understand their account status, order execution, trading costs, and results. Zoomex maintains registrations, licenses, and regulatory statuses across multiple jurisdictions, including the U.S. MSB, Canada MSB, U.S. NFA, and Australia AUSTRAC, and has completed security audits conducted by blockchain security firm Hacken. The platform also continues to strengthen its trust framework through Proof of Reserves, Security & Transparency, Compliance Information, and Fees / Rules Transparency initiatives.

Beyond trading, Zoomex builds a refined brand experience through elite sports partnerships, including the TGR Haas F1 Team, World Cup-winning goalkeeper Emiliano Martínez, and world-class tennis events such as Wimbledon. The values of speed, precision, discipline, fair play, and rule-based execution are closely aligned with Zoomex’s approach to derivatives trading.

At Zoomex: Easy to Use. Transparent balance. Fair access to your earnings.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Zoomex? Zoomex is a global crypto derivatives platform founded in 2021, serving over 3 million users across more than 35 countries and regions with 700+ trading pairs.

How does Zoomex work? Zoomex operates through a high-performance matching engine with transparent asset and order displays, allowing users to execute trades and track outcomes with full visibility into their balances and results.

What can you trade on Zoomex? Zoomex offers 700+ trading pairs spanning cryptocurrencies such as BTC, ETH, and SOL, as well as stock-linked contracts like NVDA and AAPL and gold exposure through XAUT.

How does Zoomex compare to other exchanges? Zoomex differentiates itself by not issuing a platform token, avoiding venture capital or incubation deals, and holding security certifications from Hacken alongside regulatory licenses in multiple jurisdictions, positioning the platform around transparency and fund safety rather than token incentives.

Where is Zoomex headquartered? Zoomex operates as a global cryptocurrency exchange with regulatory registrations including Canada MSB, U.S. MSB, U.S. NFA, and Australia AUSTRAC, reflecting its multi-jurisdictional compliance approach.

Is Zoomex available in my country? Zoomex serves users across more than 35 countries and regions. Availability can vary by local regulation, so traders should check the official Zoomex website for country-specific access and requirements.

The post Zoomex Monthly Transparency Report: July 2026 appeared first on BeInCrypto.

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Ripple’s cross-border token has fallen by 65% over the past year, while Pi Network’s PI and Cardano’s native cryptocurrency have crashed by around 73% over the same period. This has happened amid a prolonged bear market that has caused the entire market to bleed heavily.

Yet, many analysts believe that a new bull run may begin in the coming months, while the four-year cycle supports their theories. On that note, we asked three of the most popular AI-powered chatbots whether XRP, PI, or ADA will perform best when everything starts booming again.

XRP’s Chances

According to Perplexity, Ripple’s cryptocurrency has the cleanest risk-adjusted setup to outperform during the next bull run. The chatbot claimed the asset is quite trending among institutional investors and noted that it is perhaps the most popular among the trio.

“XRP is favored to deliver the most consistent, risk-adjusted gains among the three, with a realistic path to new cycle highs if ETF and payments narratives stay hot,” it added.

Perplexity also reminded that Ripple’s legal battle with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has long been resolved, and that the absence of regulatory uncertainty can only benefit XRP during a potential market uptrend.

Additionally, it highlighted the company’s global expansion, major investments, and strategic partnerships inked over the past several months that have solidified its presence in the financial and crypto sectors. One of the biggest acquisitions came in April 2025 when Ripple purchased the prime broker Hidden Road for $1.25 billion.

Examples of its broader international growth include the collaboration with the South Korean KBank, which plans to use Ripple’s network and infrastructure, as well as the entity’s ability to secure a MiCA license and continue its operations in the European Union.

ADA’s Potential

ChatGPT agreed with Perplexity that XRP has the strongest institutional foundation. It noted that it is the largest cryptocurrency of the three with deeper liquidity but at the same time argued that it might find it difficult to achieve larger returns than ADA in a future bull run.

OpenAI’s platform claimed that Cardano’s token could be the best overall bet after noting that a huge chunk of the total supply is already in circulation, which makes the risk of dilution less than with XRP and PI.

It predicted that in an “extreme euphoria” case, ADA could skyrocket to as high as $5. It is important to mention that the asset has enjoyed a solid revival over the past week, with its price rising by roughly 17%. Its positive performance comes on the back of whale accumulation and renewed interest from traders, while many analysts think a much more substantial upswing could be on the way.

PI: The Moonshot Bet

Google’s Gemini claimed that XRP and ADA both have chances to rally hard during the next bull run, yet it set its attention on Pi Network’s cryptocurrency.

It said the controversial project has one of the largest community bases in the crypto world, adding that it has the potential to experience a whopping 100x explosion should it solve its ecosystem issues and get listed by the leading exchanges.

Recall that Binance hinted at such a move last year but has not yet done so. Coinbase, Bybit, and many other well-known names also prefer to stay away from PI at the moment.

The post XRP vs PI vs ADA: 3 AIs Speculate Which Will Perform Best in the Next Bull Market appeared first on CryptoPotato.

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Crypto analyst Ali Martinez said on August 6 that Ethereum’s recent move above a major MVRV pricing level could open the way toward a $3,000 target.

The market watcher’s view is based on historical on-chain patterns that have previously appeared before major ETH recoveries, though resistance levels remain ahead.

Ethereum Reclaims MVRV Level as Analysts Watch $3K Target

“ETHEREUM IS HEADING TO $3,000,” Martinez announced in a post on X.

He said the asset turned bullish after breaking above its 0.8 MVRV Pricing Band near $1,800 and explained that this level has historically acted as a point where ETH goes from weakness into recovery phases.

The move followed an earlier July 6 post from the analyst, where he had identified $1,800 as the level Ethereum needed to clear. At the time, ETH was testing that area as resistance, with a successful daily close above it expected to increase the chances of a move toward its Realized Price.

In his August 6 post, Martinez confirmed that the world’s second-largest cryptocurrency had since reclaimed the MVRV as support. According to him, similar recoveries over the last six years have often led Ethereum toward, or above, its Realized Price, which currently sits near $2,300.

He also pointed to an MVRV Momentum golden cross that formed after ETH’s recovery, with previous signals of this type being followed by rallies of 50%, 166%, 74%, and 113%. The metric compares Ethereum holder profitability with its 160-day moving average and is used by analysts to track shifts between selling periods and recovery phases.

The asset was trading around $1,900 at the time of writing after rising 1.6% in the last 24 hours. It has gained almost 7% over the last 30 days but remains down more than 47% over the last year. ETH reached an all-time high near $4,950 in August 2025 and is still around 62% below that level.

According to Martinez, the $3,000 area is the next major target if buying pressure continues. The analyst pointed to on-chain transaction data showing more than 10 million ETH previously changed hands around that price, making it a major resistance zone.

Market Watches Ethereum’s Breakout Attempt

Other traders have also focused on Ethereum’s recovery, with trader Ted Pillows saying it could move toward $2,000 if it holds the $1,800 region following an 18.5% jump in July, adding that the fact that there was spot buying activity was a positive sign.

Michaël van de Poppe also said holding $1,800 could lead to a move above $2,000 and then toward $2,300.

Some traders believe a stronger ETH move could improve sentiment across the wider market, possibly affecting the next phase for altcoins, although that depends on whether Ethereum can continue breaking through resistance levels.

For now, Martinez’s $3,000 forecast relies on ETH maintaining its MVRV breakout and continuing the pattern seen in previous cycles. According to him, the next areas traders should be watching are around $1,980 to $2,080, followed by the $2,773 region he had mentioned in a previous update.

The post Analyst Forecasts Ethereum Rally to $3K After Key On-Chain Breakout appeared first on CryptoPotato.

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