Bitcoin (BTC) falling more than 50% from its $126,200 all-time high was a “positioning correction,” BlackRock says.

Key points:

• A BlackRock report attributes Bitcoin’s decline below $60,000 to cascading liquidations as leverage was purged from the market.
• The long-term BTC investment thesis as a “low-correlation diversifier” remains intact, analysts confirm.
• BlackRock sees Bitcoin’s risk-asset correlation declining as time goes on.

BlackRock predicts falling correlation of BTC with risk assets

In a report published this week, the world’s largest asset manager preserved its bull thesis despite waves of outflows from its spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) in 2026.

BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) saw net outflows of $78.9 million in the week through Aug. 14. Across all ETF products, outflows totaled $267.2 million.

“We view bitcoin’s ~50% pullback from October 2025 highs as a positioning correction rather than a change in its investment case. A historically overleveraged market, enabled by perpetual futures, suffered cascading liquidations compounded by slowing ETP outflows and digital asset treasury demand,” the report states.

US spot Bitcoin ETF netflows (screenshot). Source: Farside Investors

During last year’s peak, Bitcoin experienced a surge in speculative positioning. BlackRock pointed to open interest on Bitcoin derivatives markets passing $90 billion in early October amid heavy use of leverage. The unwinding of these positions increased the correlation between BTC/USD and risk assets more broadly. 

“A macro-driven risk-off catalyst (China tariff headlines) triggered large-scale deleveraging across precious metals and crypto markets. The resulting liquidation waves drove prices down to cycle lows below $60,000 per bitcoin by June 2026,” it explained.

 

Bitcoin futures open interest data (screenshot). Source: BlackRock

Institutional Bitcoin demand has suffered this year as a combination of geopolitical uncertainty and growing inflation pressures saw capital flowing into established risk-asset classes, among them US equities, with the S&P 500 hitting record highs last week. Bitcoin has failed to follow suit, but BlackRock forecasts that this may change.

“With speculative excess now largely purged, we believe bitcoin’s recent episodes of elevated risk correlation should normalize lower, consistent with its longer-term record as a low-correlation diversifier,” it continued.

Longer-term resilience of BTC stands out

The report highlights that long-term BTC investment returns follow key political and macro events. These include the COVID-19 outbreak in March 2020, the US presidential election the same year, as well as the regional banking crisis and president Donald Trump’s multiple international trade-tariff declarations. 

Related: Bitcoin price spike to $64.5K was ‘low-volume liquidity trap’: Analysis

While it initially struggled following some of these events, Bitcoin produced solid returns on a 60-day basis. In the case of the 2020 election, these hit as high as 113%.

“Through multiple shocks in recent years, bitcoin often outperformed both the S&P 500 and gold in the weeks and months following the onset of disruptions,” BlackRock commented.

“This pattern has held true thus far in 2026 amid ongoing conflict between the U.S. and Iran, with bitcoin delivering positive returns and outperforming equities and gold following the onset of hostilities in February and the end of the ceasefire agreement in July.”

Macro asset returns comparison (screenshot). Source: BlackRock

Further data puts Bitcoin’s 12-month realized volatility at 40% compared to 26% for gold and 12% for the S&P 500. The rolling six-month correlation between Bitcoin and the S&P, presented as a 10-year average, is now 0.18 — still notably higher than gold’s 0.06 reading.

“Bitcoin’s underlying investment case aligns more closely with that of gold — as a global monetary alternative and a hedge against inflation, global disorder, and declining trust in fiat currencies. Even for gold, which tends to be viewed as a standard uncorrelated, store-of-value asset, brief periods of high equity correlation exist, including COVID in 2020-2021 and the monetary easing cycle in 2023,” the report added.

Bitcoin vs. S&P 500 correlation data (screenshot). Source: BlackRock

Since October 2025, BTC price performance has led some to question its role as a form of “digital gold.” In a Q1 report, asset manager Grayscale described short-term behavior as being more like a growth stock than gold, noting its low correlation to the latter.

Know when to adapt instead

Democratic Senator Ruben Gallego warned that rushing the CLARITY Act to a Senate vote before lawmakers resolve disputes over ethics and stablecoin yield could set United States crypto market structure legislation back.

Speaking at the SALT Wyoming Blockchain Symposium on Wednesday, Gallego said the crypto industry should encourage Senate Democrats and Republicans to continue negotiating instead of pushing for an immediate vote. He said lawmakers still had to address the bill’s Agriculture Committee portion, assemble the broader package and determine how to send it to the House. 

The warning complicates the Trump administration’s push for swift passage by suggesting that a procedural vote could arrive before negotiators have assembled the bipartisan coalition needed to reach the Senate’s 60-vote threshold. 

“Don’t go for a fast vote,” Gallego said. “A fast vote gets you a fast result, but I’m not sure it’s the result you want.” He added that Congress still had a lot of steps to complete and that “any premature movement is going to set it back further.”

Gallego says White House has not answered ethics proposal 

Gallego said he and Republican Senator Thom Tillis submitted compromise ethics language to the White House before the congressional recess but had not received a point-by-point response. He said that sufficiently strong ethics restrictions were necessary to attract Democratic support and advance the bill. 

“We’ve been sending offers over and over again to the White House, and they’ve been coming back either blank, or they’ve come back even slightly further back, or we’ve heard nothing,” Gallego said. 

Cointelegraph reached out to the White House for comment but did not receive a response before publication. 

Related: CLARITY Act delay gives Asian financial hubs an opening: First Digital CEO

The remarks follow renewed pressure from the administration. On Wednesday, Trump urged Congress to pass a “fair version” of the CLARITY Act during a White House appearance with crypto executives. 

Senate leaders have delayed action until September. On Aug. 7, Senate Majority Leader John Thune confirmed to Cointelegraph that the chamber was “punting” the vote and said CLARITY would be queued up “first thing” after lawmakers returned from recess.

White House crypto adviser Patrick Witt previously said the administration would negotiate with Democrats until the September vote but “can’t afford to wait forever.”

Magazine: ‘Fabricated rumors’ about BitMart founder, Binance bStocks dominate: Asia Express

Cointelegraph is committed to independent, transparent journalism. This news article is produced in accordance with Cointelegraph’s Editorial Policy and aims to provide accurate and timely information. Readers are encouraged to verify information independently.

Standard Chartered and HSBC have completed what they describe as the first live cross-border transaction using Swift’s blockchain-based ledger, marking an early interoperability milestone for banks experimenting with tokenized deposits. The test took place about a month after Swift said the ledger was ready for initial use.

According to the details of the transaction, payment messages were exchanged between the two banks via Swift’s ledger, while the resulting obligations were recorded on HSBC’s Tokenised Deposit Service and StanChart’s tokenized deposit infrastructure. Swift’s ledger then acted as an orchestration layer—matching and netting obligations between the banks before final settlement through existing payment systems.

Key takeaways

• HSBC and Standard Chartered report the first live cross-border trade on Swift’s blockchain-based ledger.
• Swift’s ledger is positioned as an orchestration and netting layer, with settlement still tied to existing payment infrastructure.
• The test builds on Swift’s July announcement that 17 banks would pilot live transactions using tokenized deposits.
• The approach targets 24/7 cross-border settlement while keeping established compliance, risk, and settlement controls in place.
• Interoperable tokenized deposits are increasingly being tested across jurisdictions, with broader industry trials also underway.

What happened in the first live transaction

Swift’s blockchain-based ledger is designed to connect tokenized deposits issued on separate bank infrastructure. In the live transaction between HSBC and Standard Chartered, the mechanics were centered on messaging, obligation recording, and settlement orchestration rather than a full replacement of the banks’ existing settlement rails.

Rather than moving funds end-to-end solely on-chain, the transaction used Swift’s ledger to handle the exchange of payment messages between the banks. The obligations that resulted from those messages were captured within each bank’s own tokenized deposit setup—HSBC’s Tokenised Deposit Service for HSBC and Standard Chartered’s tokenized deposit infrastructure for StanChart.

Swift’s ledger then netted and matched the obligations between the two counterparties, after which settlement proceeded through existing payment systems. That structure is significant for banks that want faster and more continuous execution without abandoning the operational, legal, and risk frameworks already embedded in traditional payment workflows.

How Swift’s ledger fits into the broader tokenized-deposit push

The live report follows Swift’s July announcement that its blockchain-based ledger was ready for initial use. Swift said it would support a pilot involving 17 banks spanning six continents, preparing to conduct live transactions using tokenized deposits.

The banks named as part of that pilot include Citi, BNP Paribas, BNY, Wells Fargo, UBS, MUFG, DBS, and ANZ, alongside HSBC and Standard Chartered. Swift has framed the ledger as a way to enable interoperability between tokenized deposits across different institutions, while still respecting the settlement, compliance, and risk controls that financial institutions require.

For investors and market participants watching the “tokenization” trend, the key signal is not only that banks are testing digital assets, but that they’re working toward connectivity between separate tokenized systems. Interoperability is often the hardest problem: tokenized value can exist inside a silo, but cross-border payment usefulness rises substantially when institutions can transact across siloed infrastructures.

Why orchestration and netting matter for adoption

Swift describes its ledger as an orchestration layer that matches and nets obligations before final settlement. That design choice can reduce the operational complexity of cross-border payments between different tokenized deposit environments—each bank can maintain its own infrastructure while relying on Swift’s ledger to coordinate the interaction.

The emphasis on netting also reflects a practical reality: cross-border payment systems must handle large numbers of transactions without turning every transfer into a fully independent settlement event. By pairing messaging with netting, banks can potentially reduce friction and execution overhead—while still settling obligations via established payment rails.

Swift’s positioning is also relevant to a wider debate in crypto-adjacent payments about how far blockchain should be used in the payment stack. This pilot suggests a hybrid direction: blockchain-based infrastructure for coordination and continuity, alongside conventional settlement processes where required.

Industry momentum beyond Swift’s pilot

The Swift-anchored cross-border transaction is occurring as other major institutions pursue tokenized deposit and “real-value” settlement trials.

HSBC previously indicated plans to expand its Tokenised Deposit Service to corporate clients in the US and UAE in the first half of 2026, building on deployments in Hong Kong, Singapore, the UK, and Luxembourg. The service was also launched in the US in April, with coverage for eligible corporate and institutional clients seeking 24/7 domestic and cross-border transfers using tokenized deposits.

Standard Chartered has participated in broader efforts to test tokenized bank money across institutions. In July, it was among 28 financial institutions and central banks involved in the Bank for International Settlements’ Project Agorá, which conducted real-value settlement trials using tokenized commercial bank deposits and central bank reserves across six currencies.

Meanwhile, the US payments landscape is also moving toward connectivity between legacy systems and tokenized rails. The Clearing House has reportedly discussed plans to launch a tokenized deposit network in the first half of 2027, connecting traditional payment networks with digital asset infrastructure for around-the-clock settlement.

Taken together, these efforts point to a broader pattern: rather than treating tokenized deposits as isolated experiments, major players are working toward networks and coordination layers that can make tokenized money function across boundaries—geographic, institutional, and regulatory.

Next, market participants will want to track how quickly the Swift ledger pilot expands beyond initial counterparties, and whether additional banks can complete similar end-to-end workflows with the same level of operational readiness—particularly around reliability, compliance processes, and how netting and orchestration behave as transaction volumes increase.

BitGo Korea has secured VASP registration from South Korea’s Financial Intelligence Unit, becoming the first local entity owned by an overseas crypto company to complete the process directly.

Yonhap News Agency reported on Aug. 20 that the Financial Intelligence Unit, an agency under South Korea’s Financial Services Commission, had accepted BitGo Korea’s virtual asset service provider registration two days earlier.

BitGo Korea plans institutional custody services

Established in 2024, BitGo Korea chose to meet the country’s regulatory requirements through its own entity rather than acquire a company that already held VASP registration, according to the Yonhap report.

The company plans to use the registration to establish cryptocurrency custody and transfer services in South Korea. BitGo said its local business will focus on financial institutions and corporate customers, although the company did not provide a launch date.

Details about the assets supported by the service, custody charges, and insurance coverage were also absent from the announcement. BitGo did not identify any customers or disclose how much it expects to hold in custody through the Korean entity.

BitGo CEO Mike Belshe described the registration as an important step in the company’s plan to establish regulated infrastructure in major markets.

“We will focus on connecting global virtual asset infrastructure with the Korean market,” Belshe said, according to a translation of his statement carried by Yonhap.

The reported first applies specifically to a Korean subsidiary of an overseas virtual asset company obtaining VASP registration directly. BitGo’s announcement does not establish that it is the first foreign-linked crypto business of any type to operate legally in the country.

South Korea treats VASP approval as a registration rather than a general financial services license. The approval lets BitGo Korea build its stated custody and transfer operations, but the announcement did not say that the company can operate a won-based retail cryptocurrency exchange.

Hana and SK Telecom hold stakes in BitGo Korea

BitGo’s entry has been supported by two large Korean companies. Hana Financial Group acquired a 25% interest in BitGo Korea in 2024, while SK Telecom purchased a 10% stake and joined the venture as a strategic partner.

In May, crypto.news reported Hana Bank’s planned 930 billion won, or roughly $670 million, investment in Dunamu, the operator of Upbit. The report also noted that Hana and SK Telecom had helped establish BitGo Korea as part of the bank’s activity in digital assets.

Hana Bank began working with BitGo on cryptocurrency custody services in 2023. Under the later ownership arrangement, Hana was expected to contribute its financial-sector experience, while SK Telecom would provide knowledge related to authentication, identity checks, and security.

Alongside its BitGo investment, Hana has pursued other crypto-related projects. A March 2026 report detailed cooperation between Hana Financial and Standard Chartered on tokenized deposits, stablecoins, custody, and payment infrastructure.

BitGo said in 2024 that its Korean partners would help develop an institutional market for digital assets. The latest announcement did not state whether Hana, SK Telecom, or their subsidiaries will become paying customers of the newly registered business.

BitGo follows regulated custody paths in Korea and the US

Founded in the United States in 2013, BitGo provides custody, wallets, trading, settlement, staking, and other digital-asset services through entities operating in several jurisdictions.

In Europe, BitGo holds authorization from Germany’s Federal Financial Supervisory Authority under the Markets in Crypto-Assets framework. Its other regulated operations include entities in Singapore, Dubai, Denmark, and Switzerland, according to the company’s licensing information.

For US institutions, BitGo’s Korean registration follows a separate federal banking process. A July 2026 report said BitGo had received full approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to convert its state-chartered trust company into a national trust bank.

A national trust bank may provide custody, fiduciary, and approved asset-servicing functions under federal supervision. It does not operate like a commercial bank that accepts ordinary insured deposits and issues conventional consumer loans.

BitGo states on its website that BitGo Bank & Trust, National Association, is regulated by the OCC. The company also warns that digital assets held in custody are not protected by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation or Securities Investor Protection Corporation insurance.

The Korean approval therefore does not extend the protections or permissions attached to BitGo’s US-regulated entity. Services offered in South Korea will remain subject to local rules, customer eligibility requirements, and the authority of Korean regulators.

South Korea has tightened VASP registration checks

BitGo Korea received its approval shortly before stricter entry checks took effect on Aug. 20. The Financial Services Commission said the revised rules expand regulatory reviews to the chief executive or controlling shareholder of a VASP.

When a company is the largest shareholder, the FIU may also examine that company’s largest shareholder and representative. BitGo Korea’s shareholder structure includes Hana Financial and SK Telecom, although neither the FSC nor BitGo said whether the new tests applied to the application accepted on Aug. 18.

Under the updated framework, applicants must maintain a debt ratio of no more than 200% and must not have defaulted during the previous three years. A company may also be rejected if it was previously declared an insolvent financial institution or lost a registration or operating license for violating financial laws.

Executives must satisfy the qualifications established under South Korea’s rules for the governance of financial companies. The FSC said applicants also need suitable staff, cybersecurity systems, physical infrastructure, and internal controls covering anti-money-laundering duties and customer protection.

South Korea has previously acted against overseas platforms that served local customers without registration. In January, Google Play restrictions required crypto exchanges and wallet providers targeting South Korean users to show proof of an accepted VASP filing to remain available through the local app store.

Transfer controls will become stricter under another part of the revised framework. The FSC said South Korea will remove the existing 1 million won threshold for Travel Rule checks between registered domestic VASPs, requiring sender information to accompany transfers of every value.

Transfers involving foreign exchanges or personal wallet providers will be permitted under risk-based conditions. Six months after the revised rules are promulgated, registered providers must also report transfers of at least 10 million won to overseas VASPs or wallet services to the FIU, regardless of the assessed transaction risk.