Vitalik Buterin sold over 6,100 ETH as prices slid below $2,000, adding to heavy whale-led selling pressure.

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin sold thousands of ETH over the past few days as the token fell below $2,000, according to on-chain data shared by Lookonchain.

The sales came during a broader wave of large-holder deleveraging that pushed ETH to multi-month lows and added to already heavy selling pressure across the market.

ETH Sales Coincide With Heavy On-Chain Distribution

On February 5, Lookonchain reported that wallets linked to the blockchain developer had sold 2,961 ETH worth about $6.6 million over three days at an average price near $2,228. Less than 24 hours later, the analytics account said total sales over the same three-day window had risen to 6,183 ETH, or roughly $13.2 million, with the average exit price closer to $2,140 as ETH continued to slide.

Some of the proceeds were quickly redirected, with Buterin transferring about $500,000 he earned from the sale of 212 ETH on February 2 to Kanro, a philanthropic initiative tied to open-source biomedical research.

Kanro Fund confirmed the transfer the same day and said the funds will be used to support anti–airborne-disease and pandemic-related projects. The group also pointed out that the Ethereum stalwart has been funding similar efforts for nearly three years, including a $20 million personal contribution made in October 2025.

Buterin has publicly addressed his broader plans, saying in a recent post on X that he withdrew 16,384 ETH to support work spanning biotech, secure hardware, privacy-focused software, and other areas outside Ethereum’s core protocol. He framed the move as part of a period of tighter spending at the Ethereum Foundation.

Institutions and Whales Repositioning

The price of ETH has faced some severe action in the last few days, falling well below the $2,100 level that many traders viewed as a key support area and underperforming Bitcoin as risk appetite faded across altcoins.

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At the time of writing, the world’s second-largest cryptocurrency was trading around $1,900 after losing about 7% in the last 24 hours and more than 30% over the past week. On-chain data suggests the pressure is not limited to retail traders, with a February 5 CryptoQuant report showing U.S. investors have been selling ETH at a discount, pushing the Coinbase Premium Index to its lowest level since July 2022. That pattern points to institutional de-risking during the current correction.

According to Lookonchain, other large holders have also been active. The firm reported on February 6 that Trend Research sold more than 170,000 ETH in under 10 hours to repay loans, while Aave founder Stani Kulechov sold about 4,500 ETH near $1,900.

At the same time, some entities moved the other way, with serial crypto investors, 7 Siblings, buying 9,000 ETH for just under $2,000 each as prices dipped.

• Bitcoin price plunged to $60,000, its biggest single-day fall since the FTX crash.
• Prices rose to above $66,000 as analysts forecast a potential dead cat bounce.
• Market sentiment remains in extreme fear.

Bitcoin fell sharply on Friday, crashing to lows of $60,000, which ignited widespread selling before swiftly staging a dramatic recovery to around $67,100.

The volatile swing has sent the cryptocurrency market sentiment into extreme fear, with top altcoins, including Ethereum, XRP, and Solana, hitting critical support levels below $1,900, $1.40, and $80, respectively.

But after experiencing one of its most severe single-day plunges in history, can bulls sustain the flip?

Bitcoin sees biggest 24-hour dip since FTX crash

As noted, Bitcoin plummeted more than $10,000 in a matter of hours on Thursday, briefly dipping to lows near $60,000.

While Bitcoin has since recovered some ground and stabilised near $67,000 at the time of writing, the broader market remains under pressure following the cryptocurrency’s sharpest one-day decline since the collapse of FTX in November 2022.

Unlike previous sell-offs triggered by clear catalysts such as regulatory actions or exchange failures, the latest downturn appears to have been driven largely by technical factors.

Analysts have pointed to a wave of liquidations and forced unwinding of highly leveraged positions, as traders who had positioned for continued gains were caught off guard by the sudden reversal in momentum.

Crypto analyst and investor Lark Davis shared the following on X:

There’s discussion that Bitcoin’s dump is part of a bigger domino effect.

People borrowed money to buy Bitcoin, gold, and silver. When prices dropped, lenders said “give us more money NOW or we’ll sell your stuff.”

The problem: People didn’t have cash, so they sold their OTHER…

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— Lark Davis (@LarkDavis) February 6, 2026

Data from Coinglass showed that more than $2.6 billion worth of cryptocurrency positions were liquidated over the past 24 hours, with Bitcoin derivatives accounting for the largest share.

The sell-off spread across major altcoins. Ethereum fell below $1,800 for the first time in more than a year, while Solana slid to around $67, its lowest level since December 2023.

XRP also came under heavy pressure, touching lows near $1.13 and raising the risk of a move back below the $1 mark for the token linked to Ripple.

Market participants noted that open interest in Bitcoin futures had climbed to record levels before the downturn, leaving heavily leveraged long positions exposed when prices reversed sharply.

Bitcoin price outlook: dead cat bounce or sustained rally?

As Bitcoin trades near $66,000, traders are weighing whether the rebound marks the start of a sustained recovery or represents a short-lived “dead cat bounce” that could give way to renewed losses.

Bearish sentiment remains dominant, with market confidence sliding to extreme lows.

The CoinMarketCap Fear and Greed Index is currently at 5 out of 100, signalling severe investor anxiety.

Despite this, some analysts argue that supportive factors are still present.

The scale of the recent sell-off, driven in part by heavy long liquidations, has raised the possibility of a short squeeze.

If short sellers continue to cover positions, prices could extend their recovery.

For bulls, a sustained move above $70,000 and a retest of $73,000 would be key technical milestones.

However, if momentum weakens amid ongoing macroeconomic and geopolitical pressures, Bitcoin could slip toward $60,000, undermining the rebound.

In that scenario, some market participants see $50,000 as the next potential downside target.

XRP staged a sharp rebound on Friday, rising about 18% over 24 hours to trade near $1.49 after a deep selloff a day earlier made it the worst performer among major tokens.

The move came as bitcoin briefly rose over $70,000 in U.S. morning hours, reversing Thursday’s sharp declines ahead of the weekend.

The bounce came after XRP collapsed to roughly $1.14 in the prior session, a move that triggered heavy liquidations and flushed out traders who had been leaning too hard on leverage.

Data shows short liquidations of roughly $26 million in the past 24 hours, compared with around $30 million in longs from earlier Thursday.

That imbalance matters. It suggests the market wasn’t reacting to fresh bad news as much as it was mechanically clearing out bullish bets as prices slid. Once those positions were forced shut, selling pressure eased and XRP was able to rebound quickly.

The recovery also comes at an awkward time for XRP’s broader narrative. Ripple and its ecosystem have spent the past week pitching a more institutional future for the XRP Ledger, including plans for permissioned markets, lending and privacy tools.

Flare, a closely watched project trying to bring DeFi-style utility to XRP through FXRP, also expanded institutional access through custody firm Hex Trust.

But none of that helped XRP sentiment when the market cracked.

Friday’s rally, then, looks less like investors suddenly buying into the “institutional DeFi” pitch and more like a classic crypto snapback: a steep fall, a leverage wipeout, then a fast rebound once forced sellers are gone.

Meanwhile, a ratio of bullish versus bearish bets on futures tracking XRP shows retail longs got rinsed, but big traders were leaning the other way.

On Binance, the overall account-based long/short ratio is 2.13 as of Friday, meaning there were about 2x more accounts positioned long than short. That’s usually a sign of crowded bullish positioning — lots of smaller traders expecting a bounce.

But at the same time, Binance’s top trader long/short (positions) is ~0.73, which means the biggest traders on Binance were net short.

That split suggests XRP’s dump wasn’t random: it likely ran into a market where smaller traders were stubbornly long, while larger players were positioned to profit from a flush.

And once those longs were cleared, XRP did what it usually does after a wipeout: it snapped back violently, because there wasn’t much selling left.

Russia’s largest bank, Sberbank, is moving toward offering loans secured by cryptocurrency and said Friday it is prepared to coordinate with the country’s central bank on shaping the necessary regulatory framework, according to Reuters.

The lender has already tested the model in January. The bank issued the country’s first bitcoin-backed loan to one of its largest bitcoin miners, IntelionData, calling the transaction a pilot and suggesting it was keen to issue more in the future.

The volume of digital financial asset issuances on the platform hit 408 billion rubles (about $5.3 billion) in 2025 — an increase of 5.6 times versus 2024 (73 billion rubles, or $948 million) and 204 times greater than 2023 (2 billion rubles or $26 million).

Sberbank’s regulated digital financial asset (DFA) business expanded rapidly in 2025, with total issuance reaching RUB 408 billion ($4.9 billion), more than 5.6 times the 2024 level, while the bank’s own DFA holdings grew sevenfold in six months to RUB 185 billion ($2.2 billion).

The growth comes alongside a still-dominant traditional balance sheet: in December, Sber’s corporate loan portfolio stood at RUB 30.4 trillion ($365 billion), its retail loan book at RUB 18.8 trillion ($226 billion), and client deposits at RUB 33.1 trillion ($398 billion), highlighting the relatively small but fast-scaling role of tokenized assets within Russia’s largest lender.

When announcing the trial loan, Anatoly Popov, Sberbank’s deputy chairman, said the bank already offers clients structured bonds and digital financial assets with investments in bitcoin and ether. Popov also said the bank was currently testing decentralized finance (DeFi) instruments and supports the gradual legalization of cryptocurrencies within the Russian legal framework.

Another major lender, Sovcombank, became the first Russian bank to roll out crypto-backed lending on Feb. 5 to individuals and businesses legally holding bitcoin.

In December 2025, it reopened the cryptocurrency market to the public with new rules laid out by the country’s central bank. Officials expect to complete legislation governing crypto assets by July 1, 2026.

Sberbank said the planned lending program would target not only mining companies but also businesses that hold cryptocurrency on their balance sheets.

TLDR

• Blockratize Inc., the parent company of Polymarket, has filed trademark applications for the terms “POLY” and “$POLY.”
• The trademark filings cover various services, including digital token and cryptocurrency trading, as well as platform-as-a-service offerings.
• Both trademark applications were filed on February 4 and are currently listed as “live” and “pending” by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
• The filings were submitted on an “intent to use” basis, meaning the marks are not yet in active commercial use.
• Polymarket executives have previously confirmed plans to launch a native POLY token alongside an airdrop, but no official launch timeline has been provided.

Blockratize Inc., the parent company of the crypto-powered prediction platform Polymarket, has filed trademark applications in the U.S. for “POLY”. These filings, made on February 4, signal the company’s ongoing plans to launch a native token. The applications are currently listed as “live” and “pending,” suggesting the project is moving forward.

The trademark filings span multiple classes, covering digital token services, cryptocurrency trading, and platform-as-a-service offerings. This move aligns with previous statements from Polymarket executives about the potential launch of a native token, adding a formal legal step to their plans. While the filings don’t specify a timeline, they confirm ongoing preparations for the launch of the POLY token.

Trademark Filings Confirm Polymarket’s Token Plans

Polymarket’s trademark applications cover a range of services, including downloadable software for cryptocurrency trading and financial services. These filings have been submitted on an “intent to use” basis, meaning they are not yet in active commercial use. The company has also applied for digital token and cryptocurrency services as part of its broader market strategy.

While the trademark filings do not mention specific dates or mechanics, they do reinforce earlier statements from Polymarket executives. In October, Polymarket’s Chief Marketing Officer, Matthew Modabber, confirmed the company’s plans for the POLY token launch. Founder Shayne Coplan also teased the token’s release, with both executives noting that the U.S. app’s relaunch would take precedence over the token rollout.

Polymarket’s Expansion and Token Speculation

Polymarket has become one of the largest global venues for prediction markets, with $7.7 billion in trading volume last month. This growth has spurred anticipation for the POLY token, particularly as speculation around the launch continues to build. With the increasing popularity of prediction markets in politics, sports, and macro events, the token launch has captured the attention of the broader cryptocurrency community.

The company has secured significant investments, including a $2 billion deal with the Intercontinental Exchange, parent of the New York Stock Exchange. Polymarket has also formed strategic partnerships with major names like Google Finance, Yahoo Finance, DraftKings, and the National Hockey League.

XRP outperformed the broader cryptocurrency market on Friday, Feb. 6, rising nearly 20% over the past 24 hours.

The token was trading around $1.50, after briefly touching a high near $1.53, per The Defiant’s price page. XRP’s market capitalization now stands at about $91.3 billion. XRP also strengthened against Bitcoin (BTC), gaining more than 13% on the BTC pair, according to CoinGecko. Meanwhile, 24-hour trading volume climbed to roughly $16.5 billion.

The rally came as investor sentiment improved following a series of Ripple announcements this week, with the latest being the company teasing major upgrades to the XRP Ledger (XRPL) on Feb. 5.

In a blog post, Ripple outlined how new and upcoming features on the XRP Ledger would expand XRP’s real-world utility beyond payments. The company also said that XRP is increasingly being used across stablecoin settlement, FX, tokenized assets, and lending.

“With each use case, XRP’s role becomes more intertwined in institutional finance, either as the asset being moved, the bridge facilitating exchange, or the reserve currency backing network security,” the post reads.

Earlier this week, the team also announced that Ripple Prime added support for Hyperliquid – the largest decentralized perpetual futures platform by trading volume and open interest (OI), according to DeFiLlama. The move aims to provide institutional clients with on-chain derivatives liquidity through Ripple’s prime brokerage platform.

“At Ripple Prime, we are excited to continue leading the way in merging decentralized finance with traditional prime brokerage services, offering direct support to trading, yield generation and a wider range of digital assets,” said Michael Higgins, International CEO, Ripple Prime. “This strategic extension of our prime brokerage platform into DeFi will enhance our clients’ access to liquidity, providing the greater efficiency and innovation that our institutional clients demand.”

XRP’s rebound comes amid a broader market downturn that has stretched for weeks. Bitcoin (BTC) is currently trading under $70,000 – a price point not seen since Nov. 2024. Meanwhile, Ethereum (ETH) is currently changing hands at $2,000, down 25% on the week.

Cryptocurrency markets experienced a brutal sell-off this week as investor concerns grew over stagnating US liquidity following US President Donald Trump’s nomination of Kevin Warsh to lead the Federal Reserve.

Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) recorded three consecutive days of outflows, with $431 million exiting on Thursday, according to data from Farside Investors. Bitcoin’s (BTC) price briefly dipped to $60,074 on Friday before recovering above $64,930 as of 7:49 a.m. UTC.

Warsh — who previously served as a Fed governor from 2006 to 2011 — is expected to continue the interest rate cut trajectory. His nomination may also signal that broader market liquidity is expected to “stabilize rather than meaningfully expand,” Thomas Perfumo, economist at crypto exchange Kraken, told Cointelegraph.

The industry recorded its 10th-largest liquidation event on Jan. 31, as more than $2.56 billion in leveraged positions were wiped out, according to derivatives data platform CoinGlass.

TRM Labs completes $70M investment round at $1B, becomes crypto unicorn

Blockchain intelligence platform TRM Labs completed a $70 million Series C funding round, valuing it at $1 billion, becoming the latest crypto company to reach unicorn status.

The investment round was led by seed investor Blockchain Capital, with participation from Goldman Sachs, Bessemer Venture Partners, Brevan Howard Digital, Thoma Bravo, Citi Ventures and Galaxy Ventures, according to a Wednesday news release.

TRM Labs seeks to equip public and private institutions with AI solutions that combat cybercrime. The company defends against illicit activities that increasingly rely on automation.

“At TRM, we’re building AI for problems that have real consequences for public safety, financial integrity, and national security,” wrote Esteban Castaño, co-founder and CEO of TRM Labs.

“This funding allows our world-class team — and the people who will join us next — to innovate alongside institutions on the front lines of the most consequential threats, and expand the potential of AI to meaningfully improve how our critical systems are protected.”

The $70 million round shows that capital is flowing into blockchain analytics platforms seeking to stop the spread of AI-fueled scams and cyberattacks, including from large traditional institutions.

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Avalanche tokenization hits Q4 high as BlackRock’s BUIDL expands onchain

Blockchain network Avalanche saw increasing institutional adoption across tokenized money market funds, loans and indexes in the fourth quarter, driving the value of real-world assets (RWAs) on the layer 1 to a new high.

The total value locked of tokenized RWAs on Avalanche rose 68.6% over the fourth quarter of 2025 and nearly 950% over the year to more than $1.3 billion, boosted by the $500 million BlackRock USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL) that launched in November, Messari research analyst Youssef Haidar said in a Jan. 29 report.

Fortune 500 fintech FIS partnered with Avalanche-based marketplace Intain to launch tokenized loans in November, further boosting Avalanche’s TVL, Haidar said. Intain enables 2,000 US banks to securitize over $6 billion worth of loans on Avalanche.

The S&P Dow Jones also partnered with Dinari, an Avalanche-powered blockchain, to launch the S&P Digital Markets 50 Index, which tracks 35 crypto-linked stocks and 15 crypto tokens on Avalanche.

Traditional finance firms are increasingly confident about experimenting with tokenization, as the Securities and Exchange Commission has become more open to crypto products over the past year.

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ParaFi Capital makes $35M investment in Solana-based Jupiter

Jupiter said it has secured a $35 million strategic investment from ParaFi Capital, marking the first time the Solana-based onchain trading and liquidity aggregation protocol has taken outside capital after years of bootstrapped growth.

The transaction involved token purchases at market prices with no discount and an extended lockup period and was settled entirely in Jupiter’s JupUSD stablecoin, the companies said. Financial terms beyond the $35 million investment were not disclosed.

The investment comes as Jupiter has processed more than $1 trillion in trading volume over the past year and expanded beyond swap routing into perpetuals, lending and stablecoins, according to the company.

The deal also included warrants allowing ParaFi Capital to acquire additional tokens at higher prices, a structure the companies said was intended to reflect long-term alignment. 

The investment follows a recent expansion of Jupiter’s product offerings. In October, Jupiter rolled out a beta version of its onchain prediction market developed with Kalshi, followed in January by the launch of JupUSD, a Solana-native, dollar-pegged stablecoin built in partnership with Ethena Labs.

Jupiter’s native token (JUP) was up around 9% over the past 24 hours, according to CoinGecko data.

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Aave winds down Avara, phases out Family wallet in DeFi refocus

Aave Labs said it is sunsetting its “umbrella brand” Avara in the company’s latest move to refocus on decentralized finance and simplify its branding.

Aave founder and CEO Stani Kulechov posted Tuesday on X that Avara, a company encompassing projects including the Family crypto wallet and previously the social media platform Lens, “is no longer required as we go all in on bringing Aave to the masses.”

Kulechov said the Apple iOS-based Family crypto wallet was also being wound down as the team has “learned that onboarding millions of users requires purpose-built experiences, such as savings, rather than generic, open-ended wallet experiences.”

The move marks Aave’s latest effort to refocus on products such as its flagship lending protocol as the project handed stewardship of Lens to the Mask Network last month, with Kulechov saying Aave’s participation in the protocol would be reduced to an advisory role so it can focus on DeFi.

Kulechov said in his latest post that Aave was “now united as one team of world-class designers, engineers, and smart contract experts, aligned around a single mission: bringing DeFi to everyone.”

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Step Finance treasury wallets breached, $27M in SOL drained as STEP crashes 90%

Step Finance, a decentralized finance portfolio tracker on Solana, disclosed a security breach that led to the compromise of several treasury wallets, triggering a sharp sell-off in its native token.

“Earlier today, several of our treasury wallets were compromised by a sophisticated actor during APAC hours. This was an attack facilitated through a well-known attack vector,” the platform wrote in a post on X, adding that they have taken “remediation” steps.

Onchain data reviewed by blockchain security firm CertiK shows that roughly 261,854 Solana (SOL) (worth around $27.2 million) was unstaked and transferred from Step Finance-controlled wallets.

Step Finance has not yet confirmed the total scale of the losses. The team also did not disclose how the attacker gained access, nor whether the incident stemmed from a smart contract flaw, compromised keys or an internal access issue. It also remains unclear whether any user funds were affected, beyond protocol-owned assets.

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DeFi market overview

According to data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView, most of the 100 largest cryptocurrencies by market capitalization ended the week in the red.

The privacy-preserving Zcash (ZEC) token fell 35% to record the week’s biggest decline in the top 100, followed by the Story (IP) token, down 34% during the past week.

Thanks for reading our summary of this week’s most impactful DeFi developments. Join us next Friday for more stories, insights and education regarding this dynamically advancing space.