Crypto
What Is the Status of the U.S.-Iran Peace Talks? Here's What Both Sides Are Saying
President Donald Trump at the start of the Iran war predicted it would last four-to-five weeks, but the conflict is now in its seventh month, with no clear timeline for when the fighting will end.
Active hostilities between Washington and Tehran resumed earlier this month, with oil tankers in and around the Strait of Hormuz coming under fire. Iran is vying to maintain a chokehold over the vital trade route amid the U.S. blockade against its ports. The Strait effectively remains in a military stalemate, bringing renewed regional instability and gravely impacting transit via the waterway, through which around a fifth of global oil production flowed before the war began on Feb. 28. Oil prices last week soared to over $100 a barrel for the first time since July, as the disruption sends energy markets spiraling once more.
The balance of power in the Gulf has come under further strain as Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels have made significant advances following weeks of fighting with the Saudi-backed government of Yemen, shattering a four-year informal cease-fire in the country’s civil war. The Houthis last week captured the strategic Perim Island, which sits in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, another vital trade route situated between Yemen and Djibouti and Eritrea in the Horn of Africa, that links Asia and Europe via the Red Sea and Suez Canal. This came as they traveled along the Red Sea coastline, aiming to tighten their grip on the critical maritime chokepoint. The disruption has placed further pressure on the global oil market.
The Houthis’ expanding presence in the Red Sea and the potential it has to severely disrupt trade via the Bab el-Mandeb arguably gives Iran leverage in its war with the U.S., experts say.
“This has the effect of turning up the pressure on the U.S. and its allies who have been relying on alternate routes,” Daniel Benaim, a former U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for the Arabian Peninsula, tells TIME. “In a contest of economic wills, the alternate Red Sea has been a very important release valve for the blockage of the Strait of Hormuz.”
Diplomatic efforts in the Middle East have faltered. The Gulf states, many of which house U.S. bases that have been targeted by Iranian strikes, on Monday postponed a critical meeting with Tehran on the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.
Despite pressure mounting for a clear way out of the war, meaningful negotiations between the U.S. and Iran also remain stalled. Here’s what each side has said regarding the status of peace talks, and how experts predict Iranian officials could use the Houthis’ disruption in the Red Sea to their benefit.
Trump says U.S. is ‘open’ to restarting negotiations
Trump on Monday said the U.S. is “open” to the concept of restarting negotiations between Washington and Tehran. High-level officials from both sides last convened for official peace talks in Switzerland in June.
“The failing nation of Iran wants to make a deal, quickly and badly,” he claimed. “I will determine whether or not the U.S.A. will choose to engage—the concept of which we are open to.”
Trump’s remarks stood in stark contrast to the position he laid out on Sept. 2, when he said he was “not trying to force” Iran to the bargaining table. “I couldn’t care less if they sign a worthless, to them, agreement. I like our position now much better, with almost total control of the Hormuz Strait, and their economy totally collapsing. They are just playing out the inevitable,” he insisted.
On Sept. 9, Trump assured the American public that the war will likely end “immediately after” the November midterms and said Iran’s government is holding out in hopes of hurting Republican political prospects.
Trump has expressed full confidence in the U.S.’ two-pronged military and economic campaign against Iran, with the latter aiming to choke Tehran off from the global economy through various sanctions.
Read More: How the U.S. Treasury’s New Aviation Sanctions on Iran Extend Beyond Tehran
Ali Vaez, deputy program director for the Middle East and North Africa at the International Crisis Group, tells TIME that Trump’s diplomatic approach will dictate how successful future negotiations may be.
“President Trump might be interested in getting a deal with Iran, but that’s not necessarily a guarantee that he will get a deal. It all depends on what approach he would adopt to diplomacy. If it’s maximalist, then it doesn’t stand a chance of succeeding,” he says, adding that dealing with Iran requires “a multi-dimensional diplomacy” in order to achieve a “sustainable de-escalation between Iran and the United States.”
Trump has repeatedly insisted that the U.S. has near total control of the vital waterway and that “oil is flowing,” but traffic via the Strait remains disrupted.
Kpler, a commodities data and analytics firm, shared data with TIME that shows that only 10 ships crossed the Strait of Hormuz on Monday—a significantly lower count than the 138 vessels that typically passed through the waterway during a 24-hour period before the war.
“The United States has shown over time that it has capabilities to move significant amounts of shipping through the Strait, but Iran has innovated,” says Benaim. “Iran and its allies are innovating in their ability to disrupt. So it’s a bit of a foot race between U.S. attempts to bypass Iran’s restraints and Iran’s attempts to enforce its own de facto blockade.”
The Iran war, and its economic impact, has been deeply unpopular with Americans who are facing increasingly high energy costs. Diesel prices last week reached a record $6 per gallon. The war with Iran has cost the U.S. government around $38 billion and contributed to growing inflation, according to newly-published analysis by the Congressional Budget Office. A national UMass Amherst/YouGov poll, conducted from Aug. 21 to 26, found that 68% of Americans view Trump’s handling of the war negatively.
Iran says ‘no talks until conditions met’
Iran has responded to Trump’s openness to negotiations by doubling down on its demands.
“Don’t get distracted by the U.S. President’s mixed signals—from ‘no negotiations’ to ‘we’re ready to talk,’” said Mohsen Rezaei, Iran’s recently-installed secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, on Monday. “No talks until Iran’s conditions are met. Period!”
While Rezaei did not directly name any conditions, Iran previously put forward a list of six demands for the U.S. to meet before the Strait of Hormuz would be fully reopened. Rezaei also seemingly pointed to the recent developments in the wider region, arguing that the “stakes around oil and the straits have changed” and warning that “damage control won’t stop what’s coming.”
The remarks from the hard-line national security adviser took an elevated position from that of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, who in early September said Tehran was prepared to “reciprocate,” if the U.S. returned to the cease-fire conditions both countries negotiated in June. He was referencing the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed on June 17, but the pact fell apart, with Washington and Tehran seemingly adopting different interpretations of the language used in the interim agreement.
Farea Al-Muslimi, a research fellow at Chatham House’s Middle East and North Africa program, says the Iranians are now “negotiating for the sake of negotiating,” arguing that their demands are intended to draw out talks while energy prices continue to rise.
“They can wait. They can afford it. They have no [democratic] parliaments. They don’t care about public opinion, as you imagine, and they are not allergic to pain,” he tells TIME.
Has Iran gained leverage as the Houthis close in on the Bab El-Mandeb Strait?
With the Houthis tightening its grip on the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, Iran has gained another potential source of leverage, experts say.
Amid the ongoing disruption to the Strait of Hormuz since the war started, there has been an uptick in the volume of crude oil and petroleum liquids that transit via the Bab el-Mandeb, increasing from 5.6 million barrels per day in the first quarter of 2026 to 8.1 million per day in the second quarter, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA).
Despite the Houthis having claimed that they will not disrupt maritime traffic—except for Saudi Arabian oil tankers—experts tell TIME that the group’s ability to threaten shipping is enough to give Tehran greater leverage in any future round of negotiations.
“The Houthis march to the beat of their own drummer, but these actions certainly help Iran gain leverage by complicating alternative routes out of the Strait of Hormuz,” says Benaim.
In agreement, Al-Muslimi adds “the Iranians now have a new card they can use, and they haven’t totally used [it] yet, but they will. It’s a matter of time.”
“The Houthis are primarily concerned about advancing their own position within Yemen and globally. In this case, it happens to coincide with the pressure that Iran would like to apply on the United States and the international community,” Benaim adds.
Alternatives to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait present fresh challenges
The Bab el-Mandeb, which is Arabic for “Gate of Tears,” serves as the southern gateway to the Suez Canal— ships must pass through it to access the canal from the south. If the Houthis were to close the Bab el-Mandeb, it would increase the pressure on the global flow of oil.
Experts say shipping companies, if forced to find an alternative route, could be left to transit around South Africa’s Cape of Good Hope.
The Cape of Good Hope “could be a temporary solution, but it adds to insurance and travel costs, and timelines,” says Vaez. The EIA has estimated that the Cape route adds approximately 15 days to an oil voyage from the Arabian Sea to Europe.
Disturbances in the Bab el-Mandeb are particularly significant for Asian countries, experts say.
Asia has traditionally been Saudi Arabia’s primary export market for crude oil, receiving 75% of Saudi Arabia’s total annual crude oil exports in 2023, according to data from the EIA. China, Japan, South Korea, and India were its top crude oil importers.
The EIA on Sept. 9 acknowledged the concessions required when using alternative routes, noting that although “Saudi Arabia has increased oil shipments through the Suez Canal at the north end of the Red Sea,” it is “a longer and costlier route for customers in Asia.”
The Suez Canal also has constraints. As detailed by the International Energy Agency (IEA), “large crude carriers (VLCC) can only transit the canal when loaded below their 250,000 tonnes capacity.” As such, tankers following the route must first unload part of their cargo into a pipeline south of the canal and then reload the crude at a port before continuing their voyage, according to Reuters.
UK Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey has compared Nigel Farage’s fiscal policies to a “BTC account” handled by one of the UK’s most financially irresponsible prime ministers.
UK Chancellor of the Exchequer! “Don’t make me laugh,” John Healey has compared Nigel Farage’s fiscal policies to a “BTC account” handled by one of the UK’s most financially irresponsible prime ministers.
This is from Healey the most useless piece of communist crap ever appointed to this position. This man is really as stupid as they come. Support the British people? NO, he supports the communist socialist failed agenda and the EU, like the rest of Labour’s traitor MPs. Certainly not you the British people, and you voted for the new Communist socialist Islamic republic of Britain.
Now he and Burnham are going to piss all over you while calling for another referendum on rejoining the dictatorship called the EU, OH, AND THEY WILL USE THE WORD DEMOCRACY, SOMETHING THEY DON’T SUPPORT AND NEVER HAVE.
Healey’s jab at the Reform leader during Labour’s 2026 party conference referred to the perceived economic failure of the UK’s shortest-serving prime minister, Liz Truss.
Truss’s financial policies were widely criticised for their negative impact on financial markets. This led to a rebellion from several Tory MPs, and she was forced to resign within 44 days of her premiership.
Healey appeared to suggest that a “BTC account” is an equally financially irresponsible form of finance, and that only by pairing it with Truss would you recreate the “fantasy funding” ideals of Nigel Farage.
Healey’s comments upset a lot of Bitcoiners, who claimed his “derogatory” description of a “BTC account” demonstrated “staggering ignorance.”
Freddie New, CEO of the BTC Lightning transaction fee firm B HODL, said Healey is “gleefully ignorant that he thinks it is possible to have a ‘BTC account.’”
UK podcaster Peter McCormack said, “Healey making a dismissive joke about Bitcoin shows that he likely has a woeful understanding of economics, particularly scarcity.”
Most criticisms were technical and took offence at the use of the word “account,” which contrasts with the phrase “crypto wallet” used by crypto holders.
Healey wants a ‘new age of industrialisation’
Healey was defence secretary under Sir Keir Starmer’s leadership before he resigned in June. He argued that the government wasn’t willing to spend enough on national defence.
During yesterday’s conference, Healey announced new measures to support a “new age of industrialisation,” which includes a £300 million investment from Rolls-Royce toward its factories, and £6 billion in government contracts to build new submarine docks.
A so-called “Union Learning Fund” was also announced, as were a National Wealth Fund to help create 130,000 jobs by 2030, and a £100 million-backed local apprenticeship scheme.
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Hut 8-owned BTC mining firm, American Bitcoin, has dramatically underperformed BTC since its reverse merger which allowed it to become publicly listed.
American Bitcoin has lost approximately 92% of its value (after accounting for its reverse stock split) since its merger.
BTC by comparison has lost a mere quarter of its value.
American Bitcoin claims that it “was formed through the strategic contribution of substantially all of Hut 8’s ASIC fleet into a new venture led by Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr.”
More specifically, Eric Trump served as chief strategy officer during this >90% decline.
Donald Trump Jr. provides advice to the firm in his role as senior adviser.
Together they’ve led this firm which is supposedly “a pure-play BTC accumulation platform that integrates scaled BTC mining operations with disciplined accumulation strategies” into a substantial decline that has far outpaced the decline of BTC.
Read more: Trump promised bitcoin ‘made in America’ then ruined it with tariffs
American Bitcoin reported a net loss of over $150 million for 2025.
For the first six months of 2026 it has added to those with an additional $138 million in net losses, largely driven by the falling price of BTC.
The recent rebound in BTC prices will likely reduce some of those losses in future quarters if it doesn’t fall again.
Got a tip? Send us an email securely via Protos Leaks. For more informed news and investigations, follow us on X, Bluesky, and Google News, or subscribe to our YouTube channel.
“Onchain transactions between two individuals shouldn’t mean publishing your financial history to the world,” Joe Andrews, CEO of Aztec Labs, said in a statement.
Andrews added that Aztec Labs chose DAI because it considers it “the most decentralized of the mass-market stablecoins used today on Ethereum.” He said the wallet could support other assets later.
Ethereum already has apps that hide payments, though transfers from an ordinary wallet remain public. Its developers are weighing changes for the planned 2027 Hegotá upgrade that could let privacy apps handle transaction approvals and fees with less help from outside services. Those proposals are still under consideration, while Aztec Labs is bringing back a wallet people can use on its own network.
Read More: Ethereum’s next big upgrade has 66 proposals, including a major privacy fix
What zk.money can and cannot hide
Moving money into the system still leaves a public trace, however. Aztec’s documentation says a deposit from Ethereum reveals the sender and amount, even though the recipient on Aztec can remain private.
The relaunch comes with limits, however. Each deposit, payment and withdrawal must be below $2,500. All users share a $50,000 daily deposit allowance, which replenishes over time. The documentation describes those caps as a safeguard while the system is new and says raising them would require a new contract.
Author: Cryptoman
Cryptocurrency is edging further into the financial mainstream this year, even as the industry’s relationship with traditional banking and regulators remains fraught in key markets like the United Kingdom. From Morgan Stanley’s new laboratory for testing tokenized finance to a British parliamentary group’s pointed letter to bank chief executives, the story of crypto in late 2026 is one of institutions moving cautiously toward digital assets while grappling with unresolved questions about risk, access and regulatory readiness.
On Wall Street, the direction of travel is unmistakable. Morgan Stanley has launched a Digital Asset Lab dedicated to testing stablecoins, tokenized deposits, central bank digital currencies, money-market funds and decentralized finance vaults, according to reporting by Bloomberg. The lab, part of the bank’s existing network of innovation hubs, allows employees to experiment with blockchain-based applications without touching Morgan Stanley’s core systems — a sandbox approach that mirrors, in miniature, the kind of controlled testing environments regulators elsewhere are trying to build.
Megan Brewer, who leads market innovation and labs at the bank, told Bloomberg the team is exploring how software might execute investment strategies around the clock, a question that goes to the heart of what tokenization promises: markets and money that never sleep. The lab’s remit spans the technical distinction between a tokenized deposit, which represents a claim on money held at a bank, and a stablecoin, which is backed by a separate pool of assets — a distinction that has become increasingly important as regulators worldwide try to draw clear lines around different forms of digital money.
This research effort builds on products Morgan Stanley has already brought to market. In April, the firm launched a Stablecoin Reserves Portfolio designed to help stablecoin issuers meet reserve requirements under the U.S. GENIUS Act, holding cash, short-dated Treasurys and repurchase agreements. Its E*TRADE platform completed a rollout letting eligible clients trade Bitcoin, Ether and Solana directly, while three separate exchange-traded products tracking those same assets have drawn tens of millions of dollars in inflows since launching earlier this year. Together, these moves suggest a major Wall Street institution treating crypto not as a speculative sideline but as infrastructure worth building out across trading, custody and reserve management.
The contrast with the United Kingdom is instructive. There, momentum is real but noticeably more contested. Lord Kulveer Ranger, co-chair of Parliament’s All-Party Parliamentary Group on Digital Markets and Digital Money, recently offered a candid assessment of where the Bank of England stands on stablecoins and the prospect of a digital pound. His verdict, after 18 months of engagement: the Bank is listening, but it is cautious — and caution alone, he argues, will not be enough to keep Britain competitive.
Ranger’s core complaint is about tempo. While the Bank of England takes its time absorbing feedback on systemic stablecoin rules, other jurisdictions are moving ahead with their own frameworks, some more permissive and some more experimental. Capital and confidence, he warns, do not wait for perfect policy alignment. He points to the Bank’s Digital Securities Sandbox — a testing ground for distributed ledger technology in capital markets — as a case in point: enthusiasm within the Bank has not translated into enthusiasm among firms, many of whom see sandbox participation as costly in time and resources with an unclear payoff. Without a credible bridge from experimentation to real-world deployment, he argues, elegant regulatory frameworks risk attracting interest without retaining commitment.
That tension between innovation and caution is playing out concretely in the banking sector itself. In August, the UK’s Crypto and Digital Assets APPG wrote directly to the chief executives of every major British bank, demanding explanations for why crypto and digital asset firms continue to struggle to open basic bank accounts. The letter, signed by co-chairs Gurinder Singh Josan and Lord Vaizey of Didcot, cited persistent reports of firms being shut out of banking services or having crypto-related payments restricted outright — even as the UK moves toward a comprehensive regulatory regime for the sector.
The APPG’s language was blunt: banking access, the letter said, “could be one of the single biggest barriers to growth” for UK crypto businesses, with the potential to undermine the very regulatory regime the government is trying to build and to influence whether firms choose to invest in Britain at all. Notably, the group acknowledged that banks have legitimate obligations to guard against financial crime, but argued that decisions should be based on individual firms’ risk profiles rather than blanket sector-wide exclusion. That view echoes an assurance given in Parliament back in March by Economic Secretary to the Treasury Lucy Rigby, who told MPs that firms authorized by the Financial Conduct Authority should not face banking restrictions simply for operating in crypto.
The letter is now feeding into a formal Parliamentary Inquiry into banking access for the sector, which gathered written evidence from banks, crypto businesses and regulators through the end of August before a report and recommendations to government.
Taken together, these developments capture an industry at an awkward but consequential midpoint. In the United States, a heavyweight institution like Morgan Stanley is quietly normalizing crypto exposure across trading platforms, exchange-traded products and now dedicated research infrastructure, treating stablecoins and tokenization as inevitable features of modern finance rather than fringe experiments. In Britain, meanwhile, the debate remains more elemental: not just how sophisticated the regulatory framework should be, but whether crypto businesses can even get a bank account in the first place.
Both stories point to the same underlying reality. Cryptocurrency’s next phase of growth will be determined less by technological breakthroughs than by the willingness of banks, regulators and central banks to treat digital assets as a normal, if carefully managed, part of the financial system. Wall Street appears to be answering that question with capital and infrastructure. Westminster and Threadneedle Street, for now, are still working out the terms.
Iran War Polymarket odds price a US announcement ending the naval blockade of Iran no earlier than March 31, 2027, with the contract trading at 74.5% Yes to 25.5% No as of mid-morning on Tuesday, 29 September, according to live pricing on the platform.
The event has logged over $33M in cumulative volume since launch, and the highest-priced outcome sitting nine months out raises an obvious question: if US-Iran talks are genuinely progressing, why is the smart money betting on delay rather than a near-term resolution?
Got a Gut Feeling? It Could Pay Out Big on Polymarket
Iran War Polymarket Odds: What is the Diplomatic Backdrop Traders Are Watching?
Pricing is influenced by ongoing negotiations, as Reuters reported on September 24. U.S. and Iranian negotiators are considering a phased deal where Tehran would reopen the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for lifting the U.S. economic blockade. Both sides are hesitant to yield leverage; the U.S. maintains economic pressure, while Iran controls a key shipping artery for global oil.
However, current conditions do not trigger resolution under market rules. Polymarket specifies that only official announcements from the U.S. government can count for contract resolution, excluding speculation or conditional statements.
This discrepancy between market sentiment and strict legal requirements is causing outcome expectations to shift later in the timeline. Observers can also see how the Iran-U.S. ceasefire proposal is affecting Bitcoin price expectations, reflecting broader risk sentiment.
Iran says it struck 19 ships in the Strait of Hormuz over the past two nights, Fars News Agency reported Sunday, after Kpler reported over 20 million barrels of crude and products exiting the US blockade line as 7-day average.
Iranian forces hit 12 vessels Friday night and 7… https://t.co/UnVeYf99k0 pic.twitter.com/LP8tZknZqo— Drop Site (@DropSiteNews) September 27, 2026
What the Full Ladder of Contracts Actually Shows
Polymarket’s blockade market features multiple deadline contracts that gauge the odds of a qualifying announcement on specific dates. These contracts can’t be combined into a single event probability, as each one represents a distinct bet.
Together, they suggest traders expect the diplomatic process to extend beyond the current news cycle. Once a qualifying announcement is made, it resolves as “Yes,” even if the blockade later continues or if a partial concession is made; such concessions do not qualify.
This distinction is important, as past U.S.-Iran ceasefire agreements have quickly unraveled, reflecting a tendency for narrower resolutions, similar to market bets on the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait, which require specific triggers for resolution.
Got a Gut Feeling? It Could Pay Out Big on Polymarket
Total volume across the event stands at $33,486,973, with liquidity of $519,322 as of the last update at 09:07:57 UTC Tuesday. The March 31, 2027 contract – the current price leader – carries relatively thin volume of just $24,290, meaning its 74.5% Yes print reflects a smaller pool of capital than the headline number suggests.
The heaviest trading has run through nearer-dated contracts already priced for near-certain No outcomes: the September 30 deadline alone has drawn $5,238,179 in volume against a mere 3.3% Yes price, and October 31 has seen $2,604,557 change hands at 24.5% Yes.
December 31 sits between the two extremes at $2,596,836 in volume and 57.9%. Yes. That distribution suggests most capital has already been deployed betting against a quick resolution, leaving the March contract as a comparatively low-conviction, low-liquidity outlier at the top of the ladder, a dynamic worth weighing against how Polymarket’s NATO-related contracts have similarly shown thin markets producing headline-grabbing but fragile probability prints.
The post Iran War Polymarket Odds: $33.5M Placed on a 2027 Blockade End appeared first on Cryptonews.
BlockTower Capital founder Ari Paul has accused Coinbase of losing $25 million of his company’s funds while covering up over $1 billion worth of “massive and repeated hacks.”
Paul claims that at least a dozen firms are affected by the alleged cover-up, and that Coinbase “still wouldn’t return our money.”
He also claims that these major allegations are all he can say at the moment as there are “multiple legal processes still ongoing.”
Read more: Coinbase and Brian Armstrong are threatening to leave California… again
BlockTower Capital is a crypto and traditional asset investment firm founded in 2017 by Paul and Goldman Sachs executive, Matthew Goetz.
Two executives left the company in 2022 and 2023 for mysterious reasons, while the company also shuttered its $100 million Market-Neutral Fund in 2023.
Coinbase claims it isn’t covering up hacks
When asked for comment, Coinbase directed Protos to a support post that claimed the exchange “is not hiding a series of hacks and we certainly didn’t lose $1 bilion.”
It said that it advises customers on security practices like maintaining their API keys, and that like most other firms that offer access via API keys, “we do not retain the information necessary to transact on customer accounts.”
Coinbase refused to comment on specific clients.
Coinbase allegations made against Cobie
Paul was responding to a series of posts shared by Cobie, a prominent crypto investor who became a glorified customer support representative for Coinbase.
Cobie was pointing out to X user “Kuno” that they’d been ignoring the crypto exchange’s attempts to reach out to them.
Kuno, on the other hand, claimed they repeatedly approached Coinbase over $1.2 million it had allegedly stolen.
Cobie noted that Kuno was promoting a “shitcoin” and that the whole affair looks like “an entirely fake/scam report/engagement farm.”
Cobie hasn’t responded to Paul’s allegations at the time of writing.
Coinbase sued over $55M draining hack
Coinbase was sued back in May for allegedly withholding a portion of $55 million in crypto that was stolen in a draining hack in August 2024.
The victim claims he lost his crypto after clicking on a malicious link that spoofed Ethereum DeFi management tool “DefiSaver.”
Read more: Coinbase CEO admits content coins were a mistake
From here, he unknowingly authorized a smart contract permission that supposedly gave the thieves control of his crypto wallets.
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Key takeaways
- LINK rose about 6% while much of the crypto market retreated, extending its reported 30-day gain to 30.3%.
- Chainlink’s CCIP 2.0 launch gives institutions the option to add their own cross-chain transaction verifiers.
- LINK met resistance near $15, while the supplied chart analysis identifies $12-$13 as a potential support zone.
Chainlink’s LINK token outperformed a weaker crypto market following the launch of Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP) 2.0.
The token gained about 6% in the session described in the supplied analysis, taking its 30-day advance to 30.3% and its year-to-date return into positive territory.
The upgrade gives financial institutions more control over transactions that move data or assets between blockchains.
Traders appeared to welcome the announcement, though LINK’s approach to $15 brought a technical test after its recent rally.
CCIP 2.0 adds institution-operated verifiers
Cross-chain transfers require a way to confirm that an action occurred on one blockchain before a corresponding action is completed on another. CCIP provides that communication layer.
With version 2.0, institutions and asset issuers can add Cross-Chain Verifiers to apply their own checks alongside Chainlink’s default verification network. Chainlink says starter kits will let users run those verifiers on infrastructure including Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud.
The added checks could matter to firms with internal security or compliance requirements. An issuer, for example, may want a transfer to proceed only after its own verifier has approved it.
CCIP 2.0 also offers configurable compliance controls, fees, and execution options, allowing users to choose how a transaction is checked and completed. These features are optional; Chainlink says its existing verification network remains the default.
Speed is another part of the upgrade. CCIP 2.0 supports faster-than-finality transfers where a user’s chosen risk settings permit them.
Chainlink also says it is working to support Ethereum’s Fast Confirmation Rule when that feature launches. Its future integration should not be treated as a speed improvement already available for every Ethereum transfer.
The supplied market analysis reported an 89% jump in LINK trading volume following the CCIP 2.0 announcement.
Higher volume shows that more tokens changed hands during the move, but it does not, by itself, show whether buyers will remain in control.
The same analysis cited a recovery in Chainlink’s total value secured from about $43 billion in June to $57 billion in August. That metric describes value associated with assets using Chainlink services; it is distinct from revenue earned by Chainlink or the market value of the LINK token.
The product announcement gives traders a reason to reassess Chainlink’s role in institutional blockchain infrastructure. Even so, a network upgrade does not automatically create immediate demand for LINK. Adoption, usage, and the broader market’s direction will matter to whether the price move lasts.
Can LINK break above $15?
LINK’s advance encountered selling pressure near $15, a level the supplied daily-chart analysis identifies as immediate resistance.
It also noted a bearish divergence in the relative strength index: price strengthened while the momentum reading weakened. Such a signal can precede a pause or pullback, although it does not establish that one must occur.
If LINK retreats, the analysis places a possible support zone at 12–13. Holding that area could leave the broader recovery intact, while a decisive break below it would weaken the bullish setup.
A sustained move above $15 would shift attention toward higher levels, including the article’s $20 upside scenario. From $12, a rise to $20 would be roughly 67%, but that percentage describes a hypothetical entry and exit, not an expected return.
For now, the clearest test is whether LINK can absorb selling around $15 while maintaining support if the wider crypto market remains under pressure.
BTC’s move above $80,000 has triggered a “double-bottom breakout,” a technical analysis pattern confirming a bullish trend and opening the door for a rally to $100,000, according to Jurrien Timmer, director of global macro at Fidelity Investments.
“Bitcoin is looking particularly interesting here as it challenges key resistance at $80k. If it breaks it will confirm a double bottom targeting $100K,” Timmer wrote on X on Friday.
A double bottom looks like the letter W on a price chart. The price drops to a low, bounces, falls back to roughly the same level, then rises again. The two dips show buyers stepping in at the same price twice. The peak in the middle of the W acts as resistance. A break above it suggests sellers have run out of steam and a new uptrend may be starting.
Timmer’s chart shows bitcoin’s two lows this year at $60,033 and $57,742, with the middle peak near $82,800.
Chart patterns are not guarantees. Breakouts often fail, reversing quickly and trapping buyers who chased the move.
Still, the bullish setup is consistent with options traders positioning for more gains. The $90,000 call is the most popular bitcoin options bet on crypto exchange Deribit, with $2.45 billion in open interest. The $95,000 call follows with $2.33 billion, and the $100,000 call holds $1.79 billion. A call gives the buyer the right to buy at a set price and profits when the market rises above it.
XRP price hovers under $1.49 after three consecutive daily declines left the token losing the $1.50 support, even as a modest bounce pulled it off session lows. CoinGlass data showed the long-to-short ratio at 0.975, meaning short positions marginally outnumbered longs, while the funding rate sat at a positive 0.008%, the reading that determines whether long or short traders pay a periodic fee to hold perpetual futures.
XRP Long Short Ratio, Coinglass
That combination is the crux of the problem. Traders are still paying to stay long, yet the spot price has not moved in a way that rewards the bet, and the disconnect between heavy spot selling and futures demand is the setup that tends to unwind fast once a key level gives way.
A 0.975 long-to-short ratio is not a bearish signal in any decisive sense. It sits close enough to 1.0 that it reads as near-balanced positioning rather than a market leaning hard in either direction.
XRP Funding Rate, Coinglass
Funding tells a more interesting story on its own. A positive rate means demand for long exposure in crypto derivatives is real enough that longs are compensating shorts to hold the position, which typically signals conviction that price moves higher.
However, it cuts both ways: if price falls further, those same leveraged longs become forced sellers, and a positive funding regime built on thin spot demand can flip into a liquidation cascade faster than one built on genuine accumulation.
CryptoQuant’s summary data flagged overheating conditions across both XRP’s spot and futures markets, alongside sell-side dominance in futures, meaning sellers have retained the upper hand in derivatives even as funding stays positive. That is the missing piece: positive funding shows traders are willing to hold bullish exposure, but it has not yet translated into enough buying pressure to absorb the futures selling and push through resistance. Earn $50 and Enter $300K Prize Draw on EdgeX
XRP Price and the $1.37 Support
The daily chart still leans bullish on a longer timeframe. XRP held above its 50-day price exponential moving average near $1.365 and its 200-day EMA near $1.369 through the three-day slide, with the 100-day EMA sitting lower at $1.307 as a secondary reference.
Momentum has cooled rather than reversed. The RSI sat near 55, close to neutral, and the MACD flattened around zero, a pattern consistent with consolidation after an earlier advance rather than an active breakdown.
The level that matters most sits at $1.37, where the 50-day and 200-day EMAs converge into a single support band. A clean break below that zone opens the $1.30 area, and a deeper slide would eventually put the $1.00 psychological level in play, though XRP would need to fall substantially before that becomes the immediate focus. On the upside, reclaiming the $1.574 resistance level is the trigger that would strengthen the case for a move toward $1.90.Trade XRP on Bybit and Get a Chance to Win Our $1,000 USDT Airdrop
What Happens Next for XRP?
Two scenarios frame the near-term path. If XRP holds the $1.37 zone, the market stays in a consolidation phase where positive funding continues to reflect trader appetite for long exposure, but that alone won’t confirm a breakout without a corresponding rise in open interest and spot volume.
If XRP price instead reclaims $1.574, the technical case for a run toward $1.90 gets meaningfully stronger, and that move would likely force shorts to cover into strength. The alternative is a sustained break below $1.37, which shifts focus to $1.30 as the next line of defense, with $1.00 as the deeper level only if that support also fails.
Either way, the current setup leaves no room for complacency on either side of the trade. Near-balanced positioning combined with positive funding and futures sell-side dominance is a fragile mix, and the next move in spot price will do more to settle the argument than another shift in the long-short ratio.
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The post XRP Price in Danger: Positive Funding Masks a Fragile Setup appeared first on Cryptonews.
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Bitcoin recovered Monday’s losses to trade at $84,170 on Tuesday, up 0.82% since midnight UTC and 1.4% over 24 hours, with 72 of the 100 CoinDesk 100 constituents higher and the index adding 0.89% to 1,904.49.
The bid is arriving despite conditions that have been suppressing risk assets for a week, the 10-year Treasury yield sitting at 5.234% after ending Monday above 5.2%, near levels last seen in 2007, and the 30-year at 5.549% having topped 5.56% on Monday, around a 2004 high.
U.S. stocks fell for a second session on Monday, the Dow dropping more than 300 points and the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite shedding 0.8% and 0.9%, with futures mixed on Tuesday morning.
Decentralized finance (DeFi) is driving the move for the second time in a week, with the DeFi Select Index (DFX) gaining 5.0% since midnight, led by lending protocol token aave at 11% and curve dao token at 5.2%. The CoinDesk 80 rose 2.0% against the CoinDesk 5’s 1.3%, though the ranking inverts over 24 hours, where the CD5’s 1.7% beats the CD80’s 0.44%.
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