Crypto World
Bitcoin’s $70,000 Support Shatters as ‘Warsh Shock’ Triggers Massive Liquidity Exodus
Bitcoin collapsed below the psychological $70,000 support level Thursday, marking a 15-month low as markets aggressively repriced the liquidity outlook under incoming Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh.
The world’s largest cryptocurrency fell as low as $67,619. The rout erased $40 billion from open interest in under 48 hours, showing a capitulation of leveraged longs.
The catalyst? The market’s digestion of President Trump’s nomination of Kevin Warsh. While Warsh is historically pro-crypto, calling Bitcoin “new gold,” traders are fleeing his well-known stance on balance sheet reduction.
JUST IN: — ADAM (@AdameMedia) January 30, 2026
Trump nominates Kevin Warsh to be the new head of the federal reserve.
Kevin is the son-in-law of Ron Lauder the President of the World Jewish Congress which calls for the destruction of Israel’s enemies…
Israel runs every aspect of American power. pic.twitter.com/DxH6f7uFEV
The Liquidity Vacuum
Spot ETF flows exacerbated the decline, with total assets under management sinking below $100 billion for the first time in Q1.
The technical damage is severe, as the $70,000 level had served as a fortress for bulls throughout 2025. Its failure has exposed the lack of bid depth below, with order books thinning out toward the mid-$60k range.
The divergence is stark: Gold shattered records Thursday, crossing $5,100/oz. Investors are rotating from “risk-on” stores of value (BTC) to “safety” stores of value (Gold), anticipating that Warsh’s restrictive monetary policy will strengthen the dollar and drain the excess liquidity that fuels crypto rallies.
The Warsh Paradox: Pro-Bitcoin, Anti-Liquidity
This sell-off represents a sophisticated pricing of the “Warsh Paradox.” Retail sees a pro-Bitcoin nominee; institutions see a hawk who despises quantitative easing.
Warsh has explicitly argued that the Fed’s swollen balance sheet distorts asset prices. The desk view? The “Fed Put” is dead. Warsh may support Bitcoin’s legality, but he will not print the dollars required to pump it. Expect volatility to persist until the market finds a price floor based on utility rather than liquidity overflow.
The post Bitcoin’s $70,000 Support Shatters as ‘Warsh Shock’ Triggers Massive Liquidity Exodus appeared first on Cryptonews.
OP_NET said it is launching a “SlowFi” decentralized finance (DeFi) stack on Bitcoin that uses standard Bitcoin transactions and native BTC fees rather than bridges, wrapped assets or a separate gas token.
According to a Thursday release shared with Cointelegraph, the project is part of a broader push to bring trading and yield-style activity directly onto Bitcoin’s base layer instead of routing it through sidechains, bridges or adjacent networks. OP_NET is betting some users will accept slower and more expensive transactions in exchange for staying fully on Bitcoin.
According to OP_NET co-founder Frederic Fosco, who goes by Danny Plainview, applications run through standard Bitcoin (BTC) transactions using Taproot-based spends, while the platform’s NativeSwap model is designed to support token swaps without wrapped BTC or a separate gas asset. Plainview told Cointelegraph that every transaction on OP_NET is “just a Bitcoin transaction with BTC as the only gas asset.”
The launch lands in the middle of a growing fight inside Bitcoin over whether DeFi-style and data-heavy uses of block space strengthen the network’s fee market or amount to spam that crowds out monetary transactions.
Plainview said a swap would typically cost about $1 to $2 under normal fee conditions and roughly $10 to $20 when blocks are congested, because users pay only standard Bitcoin network fees rather than a separate gas token.
OP_NET describes the model as “SlowFi,” arguing that Bitcoin’s roughly 10-minute block times and congestion-driven exit friction can make liquidity stickier and produce longer-lived DeFi cycles than faster chains.
Related: Fireblocks to integrate Stacks for institutional-grade Bitcoin DeFi
Critics say OP_NET brings Ethereum-style DeFi bloat
Plainview framed layer-1 DeFi as a way to support miner revenue as block subsidies decline, arguing that “miners are bleeding” due to Bitcoin’s halving schedule. “The only thing that keeps miners solvent is a fee market,” he said, insisting that OP_NET does not modify Bitcoin consensus.
Related: Animoca, RootstockLabs partner to bring Bitcoin DeFi to Japanese institutions
That view has drawn criticism from Bitcoin users who argue that pushing DeFi-style activity onto layer 1 dilutes Bitcoin’s monetary focus or clogs block space with nonessential transactions. In recent posts on X, some critics described OP_NET as an attempt to bring Ethereum-style crypto infrastructure onto Bitcoin.
Some maximalists argued that any attempt to expand Bitcoin’s use cases beyond money made its proponents “sh*tcoiners” larping as Bitcoiners.
Plainview pushed back, saying that any fee-paying Taproot transaction should be treated as a legitimate use of block space.
He warned that drawing moral lines around valid transactions handed de facto control of Bitcoin to whoever defines those categories. He said:
“The whole point is that nobody controls it.”
OP_NET keeps DeFi on Bitcoin base layer
OP_NET enters a field already populated by earlier attempts to bring programmability to Bitcoin, including through RSK and Stacks.
RSK operates as a separate Ethereum Virtual Machine-compatible sidechain with its own RBTC gas token and a federated BTC peg, meaning users move value off mainnet and trust a federation to manage the bridge.
Stacks, by contrast, is a Bitcoin-anchored layer-2 with its own STX token and sBTC mechanism, executing smart contracts on a distinct chain that settles periodically to Bitcoin rather than inside L1 transactions.
By keeping execution and fees directly on Bitcoin and avoiding wrapped BTC or new gas assets, Plainview is betting that some users will accept slower, more expensive transactions in exchange for staying entirely on Bitcoin’s base layer.
Magazine: Bitcoin may take 7 years to upgrade to post-quantum — BIP-360 co-author
Evernorth Holdings, an XRP treasury company going public through a SPAC merger, disclosed in a new S-4 filing that it and Pathfinder Digital Assets held about 473.1 million XRP as of the end of last year.
The document also gives investors a clearer look at how that position was built. Evernorth said it used $214.1 million in cash to acquire 84.4 million XRP, which works out to about $2.54 per token for that portion of the treasury. XRP is currently trading at $1.45, or down about 35% from the average purchase price.
The filing also points to a $233.7 million digital asset impairment for 2025 under U.S. accounting rules, reflecting the gap between purchase prices and lower market values at the reporting date.
The filing also shows the treasury did not come only from open-market buying. Ripple, a major player in the XRP ecosystem, contributed 126.8 million XRP to Pathfinder under a contribution agreement.
The sponsor separately contributed 211.3 million XRP through a Series C subscription tied to the broader deal, the filing shows.
Evernorth says it wants to actively manage its treasury rather than simply holding XRP and waiting for the token to rise. The S-4 says the company plans to use Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin in XRP-based decentralized finance activity, including RLUSD/XRP liquidity pools.
It also expects to lend XRP, provide automated market-maker liquidity, and run options strategies, such as covered calls and cash-secured puts, to further monetize the company’s treasury.
CoinDesk Indices presents its daily market update, highlighting the performance of leaders and laggards in the CoinDesk 20 Index.
The CoinDesk 20 is currently trading at 2029.25, down 1.6% (-33.09) since yesterday’s close.
Two of 20 assets are trading higher.
Leaders: APT (+0.4%) and BCH (+0.4%).
Laggards: NEAR (-3.3%) and HBAR (-2.9%).
The CoinDesk 20 is a broad-based index traded on multiple platforms in several regions globally.
Attendees bring their laptops to install the OpenClaw AI agent during a Baidu event in Beijing, China, on Tuesday, March 17, 2026.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
BEIJING — So many people in China are rushing to try the OpenClaw artificial intelligence tool that they’re driving up prices for secondhand Mac computers.
That’s according to Jeremy Ji, chief strategy officer and general manager of international business at ATRenew, a used consumer electronics buyer and reseller that works with Apple and retailer JD.com in mainland China.
OpenClaw is an AI agent, a tool that can autonomously conduct personal tasks such as sending emails and shopping online. Usage in China is currently outstripping the U.S., according to American cybersecurity firm SecurityScorecard.
However, the free-to-download software also poses security risks, prompting many users to run OpenClaw on a cloud computing server or laptop separate from their primary device. If allowed direct access to a personal computer, the AI agent could autonomously alter private data such as banking information, or enable hackers to access it more easily.
As people in China jump on the OpenClaw trend, they are turning to preowned computers, Ji said in a phone interview.
He likened the demand surge to the pandemic, when many people bought more personal computing devices since they were working and spending more time at home.
As a result, from March to May this year, Ji said that ATRenew is keeping its prices for Apple products similar to those seen during the peak fall season around new iPhone releases. That contrasts with a typical price drop during the spring.
Ji said prices for a new MacBook are typically 15% higher than the used ones sold through ATRenew.
Apple’s self-developed chips, the latest of which is called the M5, are generally more power-efficient than chips for computers running Windows systems. For early OpenClaw adopters, the popular hardware of choice has been Apple’s Mac Mini.
ATRenew’s Ji said the company is seeing people trade-in their MacBooks with older M1 and M2 chips for computers with the M4 or M5 chip. “We do see the growing demand for laptops, PCs as a whole, but the Mac devices benefit from that trend [to try OpenClaw] above all.”
Consumer interest in more powerful secondhand MacBooks is “still going very strong,” Ji said, noting that ATRenew has had to increase its price for buying back devices in order to increase the supply of secondhand Macs available for purchase. He predicted the trend could continue “throughout the whole year.”
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An Austrian developer, Peter Steinberger, launched OpenClaw in November. But the latest wave of interest in China only picked up early this month as Tencent and other Chinese tech companies used OpenClaw as a way to attract more users.
ATRenew’s Ji declined to share the exact volume of MacBooks handled since late February, but noted the average number of devices the company processed last year was around 100,000 a day. He expects the share of MacBook and other laptop or personal computing devices could grow to 20% of the business, up from 15% right now.
Jensen Huang, CEO of U.S. chip giant Nvidia, told CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Tuesday that OpenClaw is “definitely the next ChatGPT.”
“It is now the largest, most popular, the most successful open-sourced project in the history of humanity,” Huang said.
Overall demand for AI computing power has also driven up prices for memory chips, a key component of smartphones and laptops.
The chip price surge has specifically encouraged more consumers in China to buy used Apple smartphones, rather than flagship Android-based devices, Ji said.
Bitcoin slid as geopolitical shocks in the Middle East reverberated through energy markets, pushing crude prices higher and prompting a fresh round of profit-taking among long-term holders. Large, one-time transfers—conducted by an ancient BTC whale and one of the earliest adopters—added to the sense that risk appetite was evaporating as investors weighed the intersection of conflict, energy supply concerns, and crypto exposure.
Blockchain trackers reported notable moves from historical bitcoin wallets on the same day that Brent crude surged past $119 per barrel before retreating, and European energy prices spiked in response to attacks on gas infrastructure in the region. The broader macro backdrop has crypto traders watching for where the next large liquidity shift might come from, as the balance between risk-off sentiment and perceived safe-haven demand remains unsettled.
Key takeaways
- A long-destined bitcoin whale moved 1,000 BTC to Binance on Wednesday, after purchasing 5,000 BTC around 13 years ago. The address reportedly still holds roughly 1,500 BTC, worth about $106 million at current prices.
- One of the earliest BTC holders, Owen Gunden, transferred 650 BTC to Kraken on the same day, marking his first substantial sale in five months. He previously liquidated a large portion of his stack, around 11,000 BTC, in a prior period.
- Bitcoin traded around $70,400, down about 5% over 24 hours, as traders weighed the conflict-driven energy shock against ongoing macro uncertainty. Gold also softened, dipping roughly 4% to around $4,686 per ounce.
- Geopolitical events linked to Iran, Israel, and Qatar pushed energy benchmarks higher, with Brent briefly tipping above $119 before retreating, and WTI testing the $100 level in intraday moves.
- Analysts characterized the move as part of a broader risk-off shift rather than a straightforward move into safe-haven assets, underscoring ongoing questions about how crypto assets react to geopolitical stress.
Whale activity amid macro turmoil
Data from Arkham indicates that the so-called “bc1ql” whale—one of the most famous address labels in the bitcoin ecosystem—sent 1,000 BTC to Binance on Wednesday. The address originally acquired 5,000 BTC about 13 years ago and remains a significant UTXO holder, with roughly 1,500 BTC still in reserve, according to Onchain Lens analysis of the wallet’s balance history.
Meanwhile, Owen Gunden—one of the earliest BTC holders—moved 650 BTC to Kraken on the same day. Lookonchain reported this as his first sizeable sale in five months, part of a pattern of selective liquidity operations during a period of heightened macro noise.
Aurelie Barthere, principal research analyst at crypto intelligence platform Nansen, noted that the BTC sell-off appeared to be connected to a broader risk-off phase driven by the energy shock in the Middle East. “BTC began to sell off yesterday around noon CET, following the escalation of the war between Iran and Israel and the attack on gas infrastructure in Qatar,” she told Cointelegraph, adding: “If we fail to hold the $70K–$71K level, we could return to the previous range of approximately $60K–$71K.”
Energy markets in flux deepen crypto uncertainty
The same day, energy markets reacted decisively to the regional tensions. Brent crude surged past $119 per barrel before easing to about $114.77, while West Texas Intermediate moved in a similar range, briefly touching $100 before trading near $96.50, according to Trading Economics. The price action underscores how geopolitical catalysts can quickly translate into risk-off dynamics across traditional and digital asset markets.
New developments in the region further intensified market attention. Reports emerged that Israel conducted strikes on Iran’s South Pars gas field—a component of the world’s most prolific natural gas reserve, which Iran shares with Qatar. The South Pars field has long been a focal point for debates about regional energy security and its potential spillover effects on energy prices globally. In the wake of the strikes, energy headlines dominated market screens, with Western wholesale gas prices in Europe and the UK spiking as European buyers weighed potential supply disruptions.
These energy-market ripples helped propel a narrative that the crypto market’s recent risk-off move is not a pure flight-to-safety among crypto bulls, but rather a broader shift away from risk assets in a period of heightened geopolitical risk. As Barthere put it, the interplay between energy prices, macro risk, and crypto exposure is still ambiguous—investors will be watching whether bitcoin can defend the key psychological level around $70,000.
Bitcoin’s price path amid a mixed risk environment
Bitcoin’s price action reflected a cautious stance among traders. As of early European trading hours, BTC traded around $70,440, down roughly 5% on the day, according to CoinMarketCap data. The pullback mirrors a concurrent decline in gold, which shed about 4.2% to roughly $4,686 per ounce, signaling that even traditional haven assets were not immune to the risk-off tone at the time.
Analysts stressed that this is not a straightforward “buy-the-dip” moment for all investors. Rather, it is a climate in which macro shocks, energy-market volatility, and geopolitical risk converge to shape liquidity flows. The key question for participants is whether BTC can hold the $70,000–$71,000 zone, which may prove pivotal in determining whether the market stabilizes in the near term or if the next leg down tests lower ranges.
“If we fail to hold the $70K–$71K level, we could return to the previous range of approximately $60K–$71K,” Barthere summarized, highlighting how quickly support levels can become contested when macro drivers shift abruptly. In this environment, traders and investors may need to consider both on-chain signals, such as whale balance movements, and off-chain indicators, including energy pricing and geopolitical risk proxies, to calibrate risk and potential hedges.
What remains uncertain is how durable the current risk-off mood will prove, and whether fresh catalysts—such as diplomatic developments or escalations in regional tensions—will reorient flows toward or away from digital assets. Market participants will be watching for any signs that key support holds and whether larger players—whether legacy funds or new entrants—adjust their allocations in response to evolving macro conditions.
As the situation in the Middle East continues to unfold, investors should keep a close eye on on-chain movements from long-held wallets, shifts in correlated markets like oil and gold, and the evolving narrative around bitcoin’s role in a high-uncertainty environment. The coming days could reveal whether this is a temporary liquidity squeeze or the first stage of a longer adjustment in crypto demand amid a broader macro pivot.
Readers should watch forthcoming updates on energy-market developments and on-chain whale activity, which together may illuminate the next leg for bitcoin’s price and its evolving relationship with traditional financial markets.
Pi Network price managed to brush off the bearish sentiment prevailing in the broader crypto market amid a major mainnet upgrade that introduced smart contract functionality to the Pi ecosystem.
Summary
- Pi Network price held steady near $0.177 after a brief drop, defying a broader crypto market downturn despite remaining nearly 40% below its post-listing high.
- The resilience followed the rollout of mainnet version 20, which introduced smart contract capabilities and boosted expectations for ecosystem growth.
- Technical indicators remain bearish, with PI trading below key moving averages and facing downside risk if support near $0.176 fails.
According to data from crypto.news, Pi Network (PI) price initially fell 5% to an intraday low of $0.171 on March 19 before recouping from its losses and edging higher to $0.177 at press time. The token, however, remains nearly 40% lower than its high, which it attained following its highly anticipated listing on crypto exchange Kraken.
Pi Network’s resilience amidst the sectorwide downturn can be attributed to hype surrounding its mainnet upgrade to version 20. The latest upgrade brings the ability to support smart contracts to the network. This means developers can now build decentralized applications and other services on the platform, which could ultimately drive development and adoption of the Pi ecosystem.
In a March 19 X post, Pi developers also revealed that version 21 of the protocol would soon be rolled out. They instructed node operators to ensure their systems are up to date and to wait for more detailed instructions.
Major announcements such as these tend to boost investor demand for the token and thus add upward pressure on its price.
The latest upgrade follows a series of protocol updates that began on Feb. 20, when the team rolled out its first upgrade of the year to version 19.6.
Despite the bullish development for the Pi ecosystem, charts seem to present a bearish outlook for the Pi token for the upcoming sessions.
On the daily chart, Pi Network price has fallen below the 50, 100, and 200-day moving averages, a sign that the long-term trend has shifted decisively in favor of sellers. The only exception was the 20-day SMA at $0.176, which stands as the final line of support preventing a deeper slide into bearish territory.
As PI price fell, it flipped the Supertrend indicator red, which means the market bias has turned negative and volatility is now working against the bulls. Furthermore, the MACD lines have pointed downwards, which indicates that bears have seized dominance over the price action, and momentum is currently favoring further downside.
For now, $0.176 is the most important support level to keep an eye on. A drop below this could instill confidence in bears to push prices down to the Feb 23 low of $0.156. However, a break above the $0.200 psychological resistance would invalidate the bearish forecast and potentially signal a trend reversal.
Disclosure: This article does not represent investment advice. The content and materials featured on this page are for educational purposes only.
Some South Korean lawmakers are pushing back against the ruling party’s plan to levy a 22% tax on cryptocurrencies.
Summary
- People Power Party has introduced a bill to amend the Income Tax Act and scrap the planned crypto gains tax ahead of its 2027 rollout.
- The proposed 22% tax on crypto profits above 2.5 million won has already been delayed three times amid continued political disagreement and industry pushback.
A bill introduced by the right-wing People Power Party on Thursday seeks to amend the Income Tax Act and fully abolish the planned taxation on cryptocurrency gains, according to local media reports.
The tax plan was originally introduced in 2020 by the Ministry of Economy and Finance and proposed a 20% national income tax and 2% local tax on crypto profits that exceed 2.5 million Korean won. Since its inception, the proposal has been at the center of a heated political debate and has been postponed three times.
It was originally set to be implemented in 2022, but the effective date is now slated for Jan. 1, 2027.
However, the opposition contends that the proposal raises concerns around fairness and equity in taxation across investment classes, especially as South Korea has previously repealed income tax on other financial investments such as stocks. Critics of the framework argue that taxing only crypto investors is unfair.
Several major exchanges in the country have also argued that the tax structure would hamper trading activity and reduce market participation.
Interestingly, the bill cites the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s recent guidance on how most cryptocurrencies may not qualify as securities. The People Power Party’s bill highlights this position to argue that crypto should not be treated the same as traditional securities.
Kim Han-gyu, the senior deputy floor leader for policy of the Ruling Democratic Party, has reportedly said that the left-wing party will discuss the bill, but noted that such a proposal has not been seriously considered so far.
As one of the largest crypto markets in the world, South Korea has been reevaluating its approach to taxation on digital assets.
Last year, the country’s Ministry of Small and Medium Enterprises and Startups proposed an amendment to the framework which would allow crypto firms to register as venture companies and become eligible for tax cuts and other benefits.
Browser marker Opera (OPRA) wants to replace its cash-based deal with Celo with a 160 million CELO token allocation, a move that would make the browser company a major stakeholder in the payments network if token holders approve it.
The proposal, submitted to Celo’s governance forum, would swap a quarterly U.S. dollar grant for a three-year token award. Using the roughly 600 million CELO now in circulation according to CoinMarketCap data, the proposed allocation equals about 27% of circulating supply.
It also represents 16% of the token’s 1 billion maximum supply. CELO is at the time of writing trading at $0.07, down significantly from a peak above $6 seen in late 2021.
The transaction would involve a “one-time transfer of 160 million CELO from the unreleased treasury to an Opera-controlled Safe.” To maintain governance, the proposal reads, the voting power of these tokens will be “capped at 10% of total staked CELO,” with protocol emergencies being the exception.
Opera and Celo said the change reflects the role of self-custodial crypto wallet MiniPay, which the browser maker operates, on the network. MiniPay runs on Celo, an Ethereum layer-2 network built for low-cost payments, and lets users hold their own funds, send stablecoins with phone numbers instead of wallet strings and pay using local methods in various countries including Argentina and Brazil.
“Since MiniPay is already Celo’s most-used app, we have a clear, long-term incentive to see the entire ecosystem thrive,” Jorgen Arnesen, EVP at Opera, told CoinDesk. “The terms of this agreement reflect the scale and maturity of the partnership and Opera’s genuine belief in and commitment to the long-term value of the Celo ecosystem and its native governance token, CELO, and our goal to be a supportive, key stakeholder.”
According to the companies, MiniPay has reached more than 14 million registrations and over 420 million transactions across more than 66 countries since launching in 2023.
They also said more than 50 million Opera browser users who earned rewards in recent months will be able to redeem them as USDT inside MiniPay.
If approved, the proposal would turn Opera into a long-term stakeholder in the Celo ecosystem. Opera’s shares are trading at $14.6 after losing 1.2% of their value in yesterday’s trading session.
XRP crypto just got its own treasury company heading to Wall Street.
Evernorth filed its Form S-4 with the SEC on Wednesday, formalizing a merger with SPAC Armada Acquisition Corp. II. The deal is expected to generate over $1 billion in gross proceeds.
The merged entity, Evernorth Holdings Inc., projects holding at least 473 million XRP at launch. Funded through Ripple contributions and open-market purchases using merger proceeds.
- Deal Structure: Merger with Armada Acquisition Corp. II targeting a Nasdaq listing under tickers XRPN and XRPNW.
- Treasury Assets: Combined entity expects to hold a minimum of 473 million XRP plus additional open-market acquisitions.
- Strategic Backing: Capital commitments involve major industry players including Ripple, SBI, and Pantera Capital.
Evernorth Deal Mechanics: Beyond Passive Holding
Evernorth is not just buying and hoarding XRP like MicroStrategy does with Bitcoin. The plan involves active yield generation through lending markets, liquidity provisioning, and validator operations on the XRP Ledger. They are also integrating Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin directly into the strategy.
— Diana (@InvestWithD) March 18, 2026
BREAKING: Evernorth OFFICIALLY FILES S-4 to Go PUBLIC on NASDAQ Under Ticker “XRPN” 
@Evernorthxrp has now OFFICIALLY FILED its S-4 with the @SECGov, moving one step closer to becoming a PUBLICLY TRADED NASDAQ COMPANY built around $XRP exposure. 
Evernorth is NOT doing… pic.twitter.com/EZc2SNtW2g
The SPAC conversion is straightforward. Armada Acquisition Corp. II becomes Evernorth Holdings and lists on Nasdaq under the ticker XRPN. SBI and Kraken are among the institutional investors already lined up. Davis Polk is handling legal, making sure the structure survives regulatory scrutiny.
The mandate is clear. Build a balance sheet that acts as a direct proxy for the XRP ecosystem. Use the $1.1 billion financing to dominate the asset’s float.
The timing fits a broader pattern. RedotPay is targeting a $150 million pre-IPO raise for a US listing. Crypto firms are racing to access public capital markets while the window is open.
What It Means for XRP Crypto: The Institutional Premium
XRPN opens a door that did not exist before. Equity-only funds that cannot hold crypto directly can now get XRP exposure through a Nasdaq-listed stock. That is a significant new liquidity valve for institutional capital sitting on the sidelines.
XRP’S FIRST PUBLIC TREASURY GIANT RISES — CryptosRus (@CryptosR_Us) March 19, 2026
Evernorth is poised to make history as the first public company with a core XRP treasury strategy, sealing a $1B+ merger with Armada Acquisition Corp. II for a Nasdaq listing as $XRPN. Holding ~473M $XRP at launch, backed by… pic.twitter.com/FJ3Hyyg1pH
Goldman Sachs already has a reported $154 million position in related crypto instruments. Evernorth locking hundreds of millions of XRP into a corporate balance sheet alongside that kind of institutional interest could meaningfully reduce volatility in the spot market.
The bull case is reflexive. XRPN trades at a premium to NAV, the firm issues more shares, buys more XRP, drives spot prices higher, repeat. CEO Asheesh Birla has been explicit about the goal. Grow XRP per share. That signals aggressive accumulation is the core strategy.
The bear case is regulatory timing. SPACs face intense disclosure requirements and the SEC review process can drag. If the merger close gets delayed, the entire $1.1 billion capital deployment sits frozen. The environment has improved significantly under Paul Atkins but the risk is real.
The infrastructure is built. The vehicle exists. Now the market decides whether it wants to pay a premium for access.
Discover: The best new crypto in the world
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The execution layer’s launch comes alongside a DeFi stack, including a Bitcoin L1 DEX, permissionless smart contract deployment, and OP-20 token launches.
OP_NET, a smart contract protocol that embeds execution directly into standard Bitcoin transactions, activates on Bitcoin Layer 1 (L1) today, March 19. The execution layer brings with it a live DeFi stack that includes a decentralized exchange (DEX), token issuance, permissionless smart contract deployment, and yield farming, without leaving Bitcoin mainnet via bridges or wrapped assets, per a press release shared with The Defiant.
The co-founder of OP_NET, Chad Master, told The Defiant that, unlike Bitcoin Layer 2 (L2) chains or “metaprotocols,” OP_Net operates as a “deterministic execution layer that runs directly on Bitcoin as it exists today – no soft fork, no hard fork, no new opcodes, no separate chain, no separate token. Every OPNet transaction is a real Bitcoin transaction.”
The results, as Master explained, is decentralized applications whose state is anchored to Bitcoin’s settlement layer, with BTC as the only gas asset.
In a statement, Master noted that the design intent is unambiguous:
“Every OpNet transaction is just a Bitcoin transaction. Users are never doing anything but making Bitcoin transactions. Connect your BTC wallet, make a trustless swap, and your Bitcoin stays Bitcoin. This is what native DeFi on Bitcoin actually looks like.”
At launch, the live DeFi ecosystem centers on MotoSwap, a Bitcoin L1 DEX for swapping BTC and OP-20 tokens (the protocol’s new token standard, the equivalent of ERC-20 tokens on Ethereum), alongside a two-phase swap execution model called NativeSwap that locks a quoted price for five blocks to reduce slippage risk — a necessary design given that Bitcoin transactions can’t be reverted once confirmed.
Permissionless smart contract deployment is live from day one, per the release, and a staking contract, similar to SushiSwap’s MasterChef, allows liquidity providers to create yield farms for new assets. The roadmap includes $PILL liquidity farming going live after the first week, with major stablecoins on Bitcoin via the OP-20S extension standard targeted for early Q2 2026, per the release.
The launch is the latest entry in the fast-growing Bitcoin DeFi (BTCfi) space, and lands amid a broader, sometimes fractious conversation about what Bitcoin’s base layer is actually for. When Bitcoin Core v30 shipped last October, expanding the OP_RETURN data limit from 80 bytes to 100,000 bytes, it triggered a debate, with critics warning of blockchain bloat and legal risk, and supporters arguing it was neutral infrastructure.
The debate was first flagged by The Defiant in May 2025, when the OP_RETURN limit removal was still a proposal. Meanwhile, the race to bring yield to BTC holders has been accelerating across the stack: Babylon Genesis launched its native BTC staking L1 last April, and Botanix rolled out yield-bearing stBTC last September — all pointing to the same demand to put idle BTC to work, without leaving Bitcoin.
‘SlowFi’: Making Fees a Feature
The team behind OP_NET is framing the opportunity around what they call “SlowFi” — the idea that Bitcoin’s 10-minute block times and L1 fee dynamics create structural exit friction that keeps capital in protocols longer than fast-chain DeFi allows.
On faster chains, sentiment shifts can drain liquidity in seconds; on Bitcoin, settlement delays and congestion fees make panic exits genuinely costly.
Master told The Defiant that the the team sees the SlowFi framing as an a unqiue and intentional feature Bitcoin has to offer:
“Our motto is ‘functionality over scale.’ We’re not trying to compete with Solana or Ethereum on speed. Bitcoin DeFi settles in blocks, not milliseconds, and that’s a feature for a certain class of capital – the kind that values security and finality over execution speed.” Referencing the potential scale of native BTCfi, he added:
“That capital is enormous and currently has nowhere to go on-chain. OPNet gives it a destination without asking it to leave Bitcoin.”
Master also sees fee generation as a feature, not a side effect — and one with implications for Bitcoin’s long-term security model, which depends increasingly on transaction fees as block subsidies continue to halve, “Every single Bitcoin block will be full. Miners will earn on L1 fee subsidies,” he said in the release, adding in commentary to The Defiant:
“OPNet doesn’t create a problem for Bitcoin – it contributes to solving one. More economic activity on L1 means more fees, which means a stronger security budget for the network.”
The OP_NET founders’ longer-term vision extends well beyond DeFi primitives — into tokenized equities, invoicing, encrypted messaging, and institutional debt instruments issued natively on Bitcoin.
“If Bitcoiners had access to MSTR or STRC natively issued as tokenized assets on Bitcoin — with the ability to trustlessly swap their Bitcoin for those assets,” Master told The Defiant, “I think there is a wide ocean of unexplored possibilities.”
This article was written with the assistance of AI workflows. All our stories are curated, edited and fact-checked by a human.
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