Crypto World
The civil war inside Cardano: Hoskinson vs the foundation
Cardano launched its on-chain governance system in 2025 with the promise that ADA holders would finally control the network’s $470 million treasury. Eighteen months later, that promise is producing exactly what it was designed to: a community that is now openly rejecting funding proposals from the project’s founder. Charles Hoskinson is in a public, escalating dispute with the Cardano Foundation, Emurgo, and the DRep voter base he helped create. Three concurrent governance battles in 2026 have already shaped how Cardano’s treasury gets spent, who controls the next generation of protocol development, and whether the network can preserve its identity as crypto’s “science coin” while its own elected representatives vote against research funding. This is the story almost no major outlet is telling properly.
Summary
- Cardano’s DRep governance system has repeatedly voted against treasury proposals backed by Charles Hoskinson, Emurgo, and Input Output Global during multiple disputes in 2026.
- A proposed 32.9 million ADA research funding request tied to Leios scaling and quantum-resistant cryptography faced overwhelming opposition from DRep voters ahead of the June 8 vote deadline.
- Tensions between Hoskinson, the Cardano Foundation, and community delegates have raised questions about who now controls Cardano’s long-term direction and treasury spending priorities.
The promise and the trap
Cardano spent more than seven years building toward Voltaire, the governance era that would hand control of the network from its founding entities to its community of (ADA) holders. When the Plomin hard fork activated in early 2025, the system went live. ADA holders could now delegate their voting rights to “DReps” (Delegated Representatives), the on-chain equivalent of elected officials, who would vote on protocol changes and treasury withdrawals. The Cardano Constitution, ratified in 2024, gave DReps real authority. The treasury, which had grown to hundreds of millions of ADA from transaction fees and reserves, would be spent only with DRep approval.
This was the dream. A blockchain that did what most crypto projects only said they did: handed real power to its users.
What nobody quite anticipated is what happens when the founder of a network disagrees with the network’s elected representatives.
The first warning came in late 2025 with the Genesis ADA dispute. The first major test came in April 2026 when the Cardano Summit 2026 budget proposal hit the DRep voting system. And the third, still unfolding as of late May 2026, is the rejection of Input Output Global’s “Cardano Vision 2026” research proposal, which would fund the foundational work on Leios scaling and quantum-resistant cryptography. All three battles trace to the same underlying fault line: who decides what Cardano is for, and who gets to spend its money to get there.
The story is not, strictly, about Hoskinson. It is about what happens to a project’s founding figure when the governance system they helped design starts producing outcomes they did not expect. And it is happening, in public, with documented statements from every named participant, on a chain where every vote is permanently recorded.
The Genesis ADA dispute: who owns what
The first fight set the tone for everything that followed.
In November 2025, the major Cardano organizations (IO, Emurgo, the Cardano Foundation, Midnight Foundation, and Intersect) submitted a joint proposal to withdraw 70 million ADA from the on-chain treasury to fund what they described as critical 2026 integrations: stablecoin partnerships, custody providers, analytics services, cross-chain bridges, and price feed oracles. At the prevailing ADA price, this was roughly $18 million worth of treasury draw.
Some community members pushed back. The argument was that Genesis ADA, the initial token allocations given to IO, Emurgo, and the Cardano Foundation when the network launched, should cover these integration costs rather than the community treasury. The implication was clear: if the founding entities benefit from these integrations, the founding entities should pay for them.
Hoskinson responded on November 30 during a livestream he titled “Genesis ADA.” The remarks were direct. Genesis ADA was not a community treasury, he said. It was private earnings from the early-stage risk taken by the founding entities when the project could have failed. The allocations to IO and Emurgo were “rewards for building the original infrastructure, funding early operations, and supporting” the network during a period of regulatory uncertainty. They were not, and had never been, public funds. Calls to redirect them now were “retroactive and unfounded,” he argued, because many of today’s integrations did not even exist when Genesis ADA was defined.
The deeper point, which Hoskinson made openly in the same livestream, was that the Genesis ADA debate was a proxy for something larger. Cardano was preparing for what he called a “pentad” governance restructure in 2026, moving from the original three-entity model (IO, Emurgo, Cardano Foundation) to a five-entity executive layer, adding the Midnight Foundation and Intersect. The expanded structure, he argued, was needed to compete with “large and aggressive industry players” and coordinate negotiations for major infrastructure deals.
The community pushback held. The 70 million ADA request became one of the most-discussed treasury proposals in Cardano’s history, and the underlying tension between “private earnings” and “community treasury” did not resolve. It carried into 2026.
The Summit 2026 vote: the first time DReps said no
The second battle was procedurally smaller than the Genesis ADA dispute, but politically larger, because it produced a clean, public, on-chain outcome.
In April 2026, Emurgo submitted a treasury withdrawal proposal to fund the Cardano Summit 2026 in Berlin and presence at Token 2049 in Singapore. The original request was for 14.07 million ADA, roughly $3.66 million at the time. The 2025 edition of the Summit had been approved under the same governance framework, and the funding had passed, so Emurgo went into the 2026 vote expecting a similar outcome.
That is not what happened.
DReps pushed back immediately. The 2026 budget nearly doubled the 2025 cost. ADA’s price had fallen sharply through Q1 2026, sitting in the $0.24 to $0.30 range, and community sentiment had shifted toward what one DRep called “doing more with less.” The proposal’s gross budget was $2.26 million against a revenue target of only $450,000, an imbalance that became a focal point of criticism. The Cardano Foundation, in an unusual move for a major founding entity, abstained from the vote rather than backing Emurgo’s request, stating it wanted “to avoid directing the outcome.”
Hoskinson weighed in publicly. On April 11, 2026, he posted to X, arguing that “parties” would not save ADA’s price. Infrastructure would. He proposed the same money could fund “up to six permanent offices worldwide that would operate like a hub in Buenos Aires,” shifting Cardano’s outreach model from event-based marketing to permanent local presence. He went further: the treasury, he argued, should stop issuing “free grants” entirely, and funded projects should return up to 30 percent of capital to the treasury, which would then buy ADA from the market, creating natural buy pressure.
The original proposal failed. Emurgo submitted a revised version requesting 7.8 million ADA (approximately $1.95 million), with the Foundation contributing an additional $380,000 internally. The revised version was, by analyst accounts, materially stronger than the original. The Cardano Foundation again abstained from voting on it, formally noting it wanted the community to decide independently.
The Summit vote was, in plain terms, the first time the Cardano Foundation and Emurgo discovered they no longer set the budget themselves. DReps did. And the DReps, weighted by ADA delegations, were not in the mood to approve eight-figure event sponsorships during a price downturn.
The IO research proposal: the most consequential vote yet
The third battle is the most important one, and the one most likely to define what Cardano looks like in 2027 and beyond.
In May 2026, Input Output Global submitted a proposal titled “Cardano Vision 2026: Human Centred, Scalable, Post Quantum Secure – IO Research.” The request was for 32.9 million ADA in treasury funding (roughly $8.6 million at the prevailing price) to fund advanced research initiatives, including the Leios scaling technology and quantum-resistant cryptography. Leios is Cardano’s next-generation consensus protocol upgrade, designed to sharply raise the network’s transaction throughput, targeting the 2030 scaling strategy of 27 million monthly transactions. Quantum-resistant cryptography is the long-horizon defense against the threat that future quantum computers could break the elliptic curve cryptography that secures every major blockchain today.
This was, in IO’s framing, the foundational research that would keep Cardano relevant for the next decade.
DReps started voting against it almost immediately.
As of the week of May 19, 2026, with the vote scheduled to close on June 8, 86.72 percent of votes are “No,” with only 13.28 percent supporting the proposal. Among the most influential opposing voices was a DRep operating under the name YUTA, who announced an abstention vote and argued the proposal “mixes valuable research with what he considers unnecessary treasury spending.” YUTA’s stated preference was for the proposal to be split into separate submissions, so DReps could approve the Leios scaling work without simultaneously approving everything else IO had bundled with it.
A separate cluster of Japanese DReps voted against the proposal on different grounds, raising structural concerns about how IO was using the treasury to fund what they saw as work that should be covered by Genesis ADA allocations. The argument echoed the November 2025 Genesis dispute almost verbatim, but with sharper teeth: this time, the DRep system was actually voting, and the votes were going against IO.
Hoskinson’s response was extraordinary by any measure of crypto founder discourse. He warned, publicly, that if the proposal failed, IO would not resubmit it. He warned that “layoffs could follow if proposals fail.” He warned that ADA’s “downturn could become permanent if Cardano loses its research-driven edge.” He criticized opposing DReps as undermining “years of technological progress” for the sake of “ADA’s temporary price downturn.” And he warned that Cardano risked losing its identity as the “science coin,” the reputation it had built over “more than a decade of development and hundreds of millions of dollars invested in peer-reviewed research and academic rigor.”
The framing was that DReps voting against the proposal were not just rejecting a budget request. They were rejecting the foundational identity of Cardano itself.
DReps kept voting no.
What the three fights have in common
Step back from the specifics of each battle, and a pattern emerges that explains all three.
The Cardano governance system was designed to give ADA holders real authority over treasury spending. The system is now exercising that authority. The DReps who hold delegated voting rights are not, on net, voting the way the founding entities want them to vote.
This is not a failure of the governance system. It is the system working exactly as designed. The unstated assumption among many of the project’s founding entities had been that Voltaire would produce a decentralized rubber stamp for proposals the founding entities themselves brought forward. The reality has been the opposite: DReps are rejecting proposals, including high-profile ones, from the project’s most senior figures.
There is a price dimension to all of this that cannot be ignored. ADA has been trapped in the $0.24 to $0.30 range since January 2026, down sharply from earlier highs. Treasury proposals that fund event marketing, large research initiatives, or anything that does not produce immediate measurable value have become much harder to pass in this environment. The community has, in effect, become a fiscal hawk. DReps are protecting the treasury because the treasury’s purchasing power has shrunk, and they want to see clear returns on what little spending does occur.
There is also a structural dimension. The Cardano Foundation expanded its DRep delegation program in January 2026, adding 220 million ADA across 11 DReps. The move was designed, by the Foundation’s framing, to distribute voting power more broadly and maintain coordinated governance participation. The unintended effect has been to create a class of DReps who are accountable to no single entity, and who can vote against any of the founding organizations, including the Foundation itself. The Foundation’s abstention on the Summit 2026 votes is, in part, an acknowledgment that the Foundation itself can no longer count on the community to follow its lead.
And there is a personal dimension. Hoskinson’s public communication style has, by his own admission, contributed to the friction. In a Thanksgiving 2025 livestream, he openly accepted “responsibility for some of the tension” and urged the ecosystem “not to polarize.” The months that followed did not produce a less polarized ecosystem. The April 2026 “no more parties” post, the criticisms of DReps as undermining Cardano’s research mission, and the recurring framing of disputes as existential threats to the project have not lowered the temperature.
The deeper question is whether Cardano’s founder still has the political capital to push proposals through a governance system designed to operate without him.
The Foundation’s careful position
The Cardano Foundation deserves separate attention because its conduct during these three battles has been notably different from Emurgo’s, and notably different from IO’s.
The Foundation has not, in any of the three disputes, openly opposed Hoskinson. It has also not, in any of the three disputes, openly backed him. On the Summit 2026 vote, the Foundation abstained both times, formally stating its reasons. On the Genesis ADA dispute, the Foundation did not weigh in publicly. On the IO research proposal, the Foundation has stayed largely silent.
What the Foundation has done is build governance infrastructure. The January 2026 DRep delegation expansion put 220 million ADA into circulation across 11 DReps. The Foundation has introduced new standards (CIP-0113, the Programmable Tokens standard) and backed tokenization initiatives. It has, in effect, focused on the structural work of making governance function rather than on the political work of taking sides in any particular vote.
The Hoskinson-Foundation tension has surfaced periodically. In November 2025, Hoskinson posted criticism of the Foundation’s spending discipline, framing it as resistance to “accountability, oversight, or real KPIs.” The Foundation’s community and governance lead, Nicolas Cerny, responded by pushing back against what he called “CF derangement syndrome” and advising community members to practice “critical thinking rather than simply parroting the talking points of certain individuals.” The exchange, conducted publicly on X, was unusually sharp for an organization-to-founder communication in crypto.
The Foundation’s quieter posture in 2026 may reflect an institutional judgment that the public fights are not worth having. Or it may reflect a strategic patience: if Hoskinson’s relationship with the DRep community keeps deteriorating, the Foundation’s careful neutrality becomes more valuable, not less.
Either way, the asymmetry between the Foundation’s silence and Hoskinson’s public statements is one of the most telling features of the current dynamic.
What this means for ADA holders
For an ADA holder, the civil war has direct, material consequences that extend beyond founder drama.
Treasury spending is now harder to approve. This is, on balance, neutral or positive for ADA’s price in the short term, because every rejected proposal is a smaller draw against the treasury, which means less sell pressure from funded projects converting ADA to fiat. The Summit 2026 rejection alone kept approximately $3.66 million of ADA out of the market. The IO research proposal, if it fails as currently projected, would keep an additional $8.6 million from being sold.
Treasury spending is also slower. The lag between proposal submission and DRep vote, combined with the now-common pattern of revisions and resubmissions, means projects requesting funding face longer timelines and more uncertainty. This is good for fiscal discipline. It is bad for execution speed, particularly for time-sensitive infrastructure work.
The most consequential outcome for ADA holders is what happens to the founder. If Hoskinson follows through on the warning that IO will not resubmit the research proposal if it fails, the Cardano Vision 2026 research initiative would not proceed in its current form. IO’s research division has been one of the project’s strongest differentiators, the source of the peer-reviewed papers, academic partnerships, and “science coin” reputation that has carried Cardano through multiple downturns. If that engine slows, Cardano’s competitive position against Ethereum, Solana, and the broader Layer-1 field changes materially.
For now, the situation is unresolved. The IO research proposal vote closes June 8, 2026. The pentad governance restructure is still under discussion. The Summit 2026 revised vote is still active. Each of these has the potential to either de-escalate the tension or sharpen it further, and there is no clear signal yet which direction the next round will move.
The deeper question
Strip away the specifics, and Cardano is testing a question every other major crypto project will eventually have to answer.
What happens when a network’s governance system, designed to give power to its community, starts producing outcomes the founding figures of the network disagree with?
The honest answer is that this is what decentralization actually looks like. Bitcoin’s founder is gone. Ethereum’s founder has explicitly stepped back from operational influence. Cardano’s founder is still active, still vocal, and still convinced his vision for the project is the correct one, but the governance system he helped design no longer requires the community to agree with him.
That is not a failure mode. That is a feature. But it is a feature that produces visible discomfort when it operates against the founder’s preferences, and the discomfort is now public, ongoing, and documented on-chain.
Cardano’s civil war is therefore not a crisis. It is a test. The project that emerges from 2026 will be either one where DReps and the founding entities have learned to coordinate productively, or one where the founding entities accept reduced political influence over a system that has, by design, outgrown them.
Both outcomes are plausible. Neither is settled.
The Pi Network community has spent years asking when tier-1 listings would arrive. The Cardano community is asking a harder question: when the founder of the network and the community of the network disagree, who actually decides?
The answer, on chain, is increasingly clear. The DReps decide. Whether Hoskinson can rebuild political capital with that community, or whether Cardano will keep shipping through a governance system that no longer defers to him, is the story to watch through the rest of 2026 and into 2027.
For now, the votes are running. The proposals are being rejected. And the man who built the system that produced this outcome is, by his own framing, watching his project lose the identity he spent over a decade building.
That is the civil war. It is happening in public, in real time, and it is shaping Cardano in ways the project’s founder did not anticipate when the system that produced it was first designed.
This article is for informational purposes and does not constitute financial or investment advice. Governance votes and ecosystem disputes evolve quickly; the figures and statements described reflect reporting available as of late May 2026. Always do your own research.
The May read on inflation cooled expectations for rapid monetary easing, as the U.S. consumer price index rose 4.2% year over year. The print reinforced a data-dependent stance from the Federal Reserve and tempered hopes for near-term rate cuts, even as some analysts still anticipate further rate hikes later in the year. The result added headwinds for risk assets, including Bitcoin and gold, while crude oil extended a rebound that has persisted through the year.
Bitcoin has endured a rough start to the year, sliding about 36% since January. Gold has fared no better, retreating roughly 23% from its January peak. In contrast, crude benchmarks have surged, with oil up more than 50% over the same span. The broad inflation backdrop thus remains a litmus test for capital allocation across risk assets and hedges alike.
“Today’s in-line CPI print keeps the Fed cautious, data-dependent, and in no rush to cut,” said Iggy Ioppe, chief investment officer at Theo, reflecting a common view among market participants that policymakers will await clearer signs of easing before altering the policy path. “For Bitcoin, an in-line print is unlikely to be a clean catalyst either way. It keeps liquidity expectations capped and risk assets trading more on positioning than on a fresh dovish impulse.”
Regarding gold, Ioppe noted that real yields remain a central driver. “Without imminent rate cuts, the opportunity cost of holding a non-yielding asset stays elevated,” he said, underscoring why the precious metal has struggled as inflation data points oscillate between hot and not-so-hot readings.
Key takeaways
- The May CPI rose 4.2% year over year, reinforcing a data-dependent Fed stance and delaying expectations for near-term rate reductions.
- Bitcoin has fallen about 36% since January, while gold has declined roughly 23% from its January peak; oil has gained more than 50% in the same period, highlighting divergent macro reactions across assets.
- Institutional appetite for Bitcoin remains cautious. Markus Thielen of 10x Research says the macro setup isn’t yet supportive enough to trigger meaningful reallocations into Bitcoin by Wall Street players.
- Geopolitical and supply concerns—particularly around oil—add an extra layer of uncertainty that could influence inflation expectations and asset mix in the months ahead.
- Market odds on near-term rate moves reflect a wait-and-see approach: CME’s FedWatch tool pointed to a high likelihood—about 98%—of no change at the Fed’s upcoming meeting, underscoring how the inflation path governs risk appetite.
Policy backdrop and the road ahead
On the policy front, inflation dynamics continue to dictate the Federal Reserve’s posture. The latest CPI data align with a narrative of persistent price pressures that require careful monitoring before policymakers consider easing financial conditions. The debate among investors centers on whether inflation will meaningfully slow soon enough to justify rate cuts this year, or whether the data remains too fractious to permit a shift toward looser policy.
As traders parse these signals, the market environment remains fragile. The lack of a decisive shift in policy expectations suggests liquidity conditions may stay constrained for now, especially for assets that do not deliver yields. Tim Sun, a senior researcher at HashKey Group, captured the sentiment: “Only when inflation drops, rate cuts become viable, and liquidity improves alongside lower capital costs, will the overall risk appetite truly reverse.”
In practical terms, this macro tension translates into ongoing caution for digital-asset portfolios. Bitcoin, often viewed as a risk-on proxy in liquidity cycles, is susceptible to declines when macro catalysts loom large or when institutional demand remains tepid. The same backdrop has weighed on gold, despite its traditional role as a hedge, as real yields and the relative attractiveness of yield-bearing assets compete for capital.
Institutional stance and geopolitical risk
In the corporate and financial services sphere, the appetite for Bitcoin appears muted for the moment. Markus Thielen of 10x Research argued that the data released so far do not present a compelling case for a broad reallocation into Bitcoin by big investors. “We do not believe this data is sufficiently encouraging to prompt Wall Street investors to meaningfully reallocate into Bitcoin,” Thielen told Cointelegraph. He highlighted two key frictions: inflation’s persistence as a drag on risk sentiment, and geopolitical tensions—specifically Iran-related developments—that could compound supply-side volatility in oil markets and feed inflation expectations.
Thielen also warned that oil-supply disruptions could become more pronounced during the summer, potentially uplifting inflation expectations and complicating any near-term shift toward higher risk-taking in crypto and other speculative assets. In such an environment, the case for Bitcoin as a hedge or asymmetric bet remains nuanced, with outcomes highly dependent on the trajectory of inflation and the pace of liquidity normalization.
On the rate-front, the market is already looking past the immediate horizon. HashKey’s Sun emphasized that while rate hike expectations were heating up, the probability of a policy move this year remains relatively low unless inflation convincingly converges toward the Fed’s target. The market’s current pricing—reflected in Fed futures—suggests traders see little chance of an immediate policy shift, reinforcing a wait-and-see stance for both traditional and crypto markets.
What to watch next
Looking ahead, two threads are particularly consequential for markets and crypto builders alike. First, the inflation path remains the arbiter of policy and liquidity: sustained deceleration would tilt the balance toward rate cuts and a broader risk-on rally. Second, geopolitical tensions and commodity-market dynamics could reintroduce volatility by injecting uncertainty into inflation expectations and the pace of capital cost reductions.
Investors and developers should monitor upcoming inflation releases and any shifts in the Fed’s communications. Attention will also turn to global oil supply news and potential geopolitical flare-ups, which can ripple across equities, bonds, and crypto markets alike. As the data flush continues, the balance between inflation normalization and policy accommodation will likely shape how Bitcoin, gold, and other risk assets perform in the near term.
For a clearer read on the inflation trajectory, traders often turn to data trackers such as Trading Economics, which notes the CPI’s movement as part of a broader inflation picture, and to policy trackers like the Fed Funds futures market. CME’s FedWatch tool remains a widely cited barometer of policy expectations, currently signaling a minimal near-term likelihood of rate changes absent a sharper shift in inflation trends.
An artificial intelligence and cybersecurity researcher claims to have jailbroken Anthropic’s latest AI model, Claude Fable 5, within just 48 hours of it being launched.
“Pliny the Liberator,” a well-known figure in the AI community, said on Wednesday he “liberated” Fable 5, launched on Tuesday as a safety-tuned version of the more powerful Mythos model that Anthropic said was too dangerous to release widely.
He used various techniques, including a jailbroken version of Opus 4.8, to bypass the built-in safeguards that Anthropic installed on the model to prevent users from asking it for potentially harmful information, such as drug-making formulas or hacking instructions.
“Despite this overly sensitive, authoritarian ‘safety’ layer on top of Mythos, my lil liberators have been hard at work […] cleverly finding the holes in the fence that the thought police missed,” said Pliny.
Some crypto users had already expressed concern during the launches of Claude Fable 5 and Mythos earlier this year that it could be used to attack crypto protocols and software. A jailbroken version of Claude Fable 5 would mean the threat is even closer than expected.
Getting around Claude Fable 5’s guardrails
“Pliny” rose to prominence around 2024 by developing and openly sharing jailbreak prompts for models like ChatGPT, Claude, Grok, and others, often posting “jailbreak alerts” with techniques that bypass guardrails shortly after new AI models launch.
To get around Anthropic’s security fence, Pliny said he used Unicode and homoglyphs, long-context framing, narrative and fiction framing, academic-style decomposition-recomposition, and a jailbroken Claude Opus 4.8 to get Fable to respond to his otherwise restricted prompts.
“Perhaps the most effective is decomposition + recomposition in the backend,” he said.
This involves breaking requests into small, innocent pieces and asking for harmless-sounding facts one by one. Each prompt alone looked fine to the AI’s safety filters, but when pieced back together, they produce something more useful or dangerous.
Pliny demonstrates a path to meth synthesis by asking about the Birch reduction method. Source: Pliny
Backlash over Fable 5 mounts
Anthropic’s Fable 5 has prompted backlash from critics since its launch due to its heavy restrictions.
When a user prompts the model for sensitive topics such as bioweapons or cybersecurity, Fable 5 is designed to return a notification and then redirect the conversation to an earlier, less capable model.
Related: AI agents with crypto could escape and become ‘unstoppable,’ experts warn
“This is one of the first times that an AI company has rolled out a guardrail, and there has been uniform disdain. It has led to a lot of justified anger,” said Sayash Kapoor, an AI researcher at Princeton University, according to the Wall Street Journal.
“The consensus seems to be that this has been one of the most disappointing model drops of all time, effectively preventing legitimate researchers from contributing their talents to our collective advancement,” said Pliny.
Anthropic had found no universal jailbreaks
During the Fable 5 launch, Anthropic said it ran an external bug bounty program to look for ways to jailbreak the AI model.
“As well as internal testing, we ran an external bug bounty that produced no universal jailbreaks in over 1,000 hours of testing.”
Cointelegraph reached out to Anthropic for comments but did not receive an immediate response.
Magazine: AI-driven hacks could kill DeFi — unless projects act now
The European Central Bank is expected to raise its benchmark rate to 2.25% on Thursday, June 11, the first increase since 2023, as Middle East-driven energy costs push eurozone inflation above its 2% target. The move lands six days before Kevin Warsh chairs his first Federal Reserve meeting.
The ECB’s Governing Council cited energy prices as the primary driver of eurozone CPI, which is running at 3.2%, above the 2% target. Observers expect at least one further hike this year, with September the most likely date.
How a Stronger Euro Pressures the Fed
When European rates rise relative to US rates, capital tends to shift toward euro-denominated assets, strengthening the euro and weakening the dollar.
A weaker dollar makes imports more expensive for American consumers, adding to the inflation pressure the Fed is already struggling to contain.
The ECB’s decision comes as US headline CPI sits at 4.2%, well above the Fed’s 2% target.
The central bank has held its benchmark rate at 3.50–3.75% across three consecutive FOMC meetings this year, and Wall Street prices a 97% probability of no change at the June 17–18 meeting.
But Kevin Warsh, who chairs his first FOMC this month after promising “regime change” on inflation discipline, now faces a global environment that reinforces the case for staying restrictive.
‘Higher for Longer’ Goes Global
The ECB’s decision confirms something bigger than a single rate move. Energy-driven inflation is proving sticky, and no major central bank can yet claim a clear path to easing.
Goldman Sachs has pushed its Fed rate-cut forecast to late 2026 or early 2027, citing energy cost pass-through keeping US core inflation near 3% for the rest of the year.
Cleveland Fed President Beth Hammack has warned that waiting for “definitive evidence” of embedded inflation risks requires “larger policy adjustments, at greater cost.”
The Fed’s own higher-for-longer signals now carry European confirmation. Bitcoin has tracked the collapse in rate-cut expectations almost exactly, falling from $82,000 in mid-May to the low $60,000s.
June 17–18 is the next data point. What Warsh signals from his first press conference will tell markets whether this rate cycle still has further to go.
The post The ECB’s Rate Hike Could Force the Fed’s Hand appeared first on BeInCrypto.
Crypto-friendly DBS Bank said it will start offering tokenized gold trading to its retail customers in the second half of 2026.
DBS said it will list the product, called DBS Physical Gold Tokens, on its digibank platform and is also considering making it available on the DBS Digital Exchange (DDEx), which is tailored for accredited investors and institutions.
The bank will tokenize, issue, distribute and manage the physical gold tokens entirely in-house, backed by trusted bank-grade infrastructure. Each token is backed by 1 gram of physical gold held by DBS in a dedicated vault in Singapore, the bank said in a statement.
The move builds on a growing trend towards blockchain-based versions of real world assets (RWAs). The size of physical gold holdings in the portfolios of wealthy clients of DBS has more than doubled over the past three years.
In 2025, DBS tokenized structured notes on Ethereum and listed sgBENJI, the token of Franklin Templeton’s tokenized money market fund, alongside the Ripple’s RLUSD dollar-pegged stablecoin.
“While our retail investors have been able to buy gold funds, access to physical gold has been largely available to only institutional and accredited investors,” said James Tan, the head of DBS’ investment product and advisory unit. “DBS has offered physical gold investments to wealth clients since 2013, and we are now leveraging tokenisation to broaden access, enabling more retail customers to invest in gold in a safe and meaningful way.”
The Solana Foundation has shipped a native onchain subscriptions and allowances primitive on Solana mainnet, giving any team building on the network a shared program for recurring billing, capped delegated spending, and merchant-published billing tiers without standing up its own custody, billing,… Read the full story at The Defiant
Advisers to some of the world’s largest financial institutions are showing renewed interest in stablecoins and the tokenization of assets, rather than a continued zeal for Bitcoin itself. Matt Hougan, chief investment officer of Bitwise, summarized the sentiment in a memo after speaking with more than 40 advisers who remain broadly interested in crypto but are increasingly focused on real-world crypto applications.
In the memo, Hougan quoted advisers who were “still interested in crypto” but “more interested today in stablecoins and tokenization than they are in Bitcoin.” He noted that several calls this week highlighted curiosity about how crypto technologies are being applied in areas ranging from capital markets to cross-border payments, beyond price momentum or BTC narratives alone.
Bitcoin has faced a softer run of momentum, trading down roughly 30% year-to-date and hovering around the $62,500 level, a backdrop that may be amplifying the search for practical crypto use cases among institutional clients. Against this backdrop, stablecoins and tokenization have emerged as focal points for Wall Street, signaling a potential reorientation of crypto capital toward infrastructure, compliance-friendly products, and traditional investment channels.
The scene outside the traditional spot market is shifting as well. Circle, the issuer of the USD Coin (USDC), staged a high-profile initial public offering in June 2025, with its stock climbing to a peak near $240 from an initial debut around $31. Since then, the shares have cooled, closing just under $79 on the most recent session observed. The move underscored investor appetite for crypto-related equities, even as broader crypto equities have encountered a broader rout.
Beyond equity markets, regulatory signals appear to be aligning with broader adoption of tokenized assets. Reports indicate that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is considering allowing tokenized stock trading, a development that could give traditional investors greater access to select equity exposure via blockchain-backed instruments. The prospect of a formal framework for tokenized securities may bolster confidence among institutional buyers contemplating crypto-enabled strategies.
Hougan underscored that the narrative around crypto—from CNBC headlines to speeches by senior policymakers and executives at large asset managers—now frequently centers on stablecoins and tokenization rather than Bitcoin’s live price moves. “It’s hard to turn on CNBC and not hear someone like SEC Chair Paul Atkins or Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon or BlackRock CEO Larry Fink talking about stablecoins and tokenization,” he said. “Investors want to be a part of that.”
The interview and memo capture a broader shift in the ecosystem, where the most consequential developments may lie in infrastructure and regulatory clarity rather than in the daily ups-and-downs of the largest digital asset. Hougan argued that the technologies underpinning stablecoins and tokenized assets could provide the catalyst needed to pull crypto into a sustained bull market, framing new product breakthroughs and a broader class of investors as the drivers of the next cycle.
During discussions with advisers, several crypto rails and projects repeatedly surfaced as potential beneficiaries of this shift. Notable mentions included Ethereum, Solana, Canton (a network associated with cross-chain capabilities), Chainlink, and Avalanche. Participants also pointed to trading platforms such as Hyperliquid and crypto-native firms like Figure, Circle, and Coinbase as players positioned to capitalize on the evolving demand for tokenized and structured crypto exposures. The broader implication is a growing conviction that traditional wealth-management channels will increasingly allocate to crypto-enabled solutions rather than to naked BTC exposure alone.
In parallel, exchanges have been broadening their offerings beyond pure trading. Some have rolled out tokenized stock products—often outside the United States—to provide investors with access to popular equities and highly anticipated public offerings. The market’s interest in high-profile tokens and tokenized assets continues to grow even as the regulatory framework for such instruments remains a work in progress.
Against this backdrop, investors are watching how regulatory developments unfold, how Circle’s public-market performance evolves, and whether the shift toward stablecoins and tokenization translates into tangible inflows into crypto infrastructure and tokenized products. The combination of institutional curiosity, regulatory movement, and new product lines could shape the next phase of crypto adoption if these use cases prove durable and scalable.
Related coverage notes the evolving role of Bitcoin as a market canary in the face of broader risk-off dynamics, and how tokenization could influence correlations across asset classes in the months ahead.
Key takeaways
- Institutional advisers are increasingly prioritizing stablecoins and tokenization over direct Bitcoin exposure, signaling a potential shift in crypto investment emphasis.
- The performance and perception of Circle’s stock post-IPO illustrate the market’s appetite for crypto-related equities, even as broader crypto valuations move in a wider market cycle.
- Regulatory signals pointing toward tokenized stock trading could bolster institutional confidence and unlock new channels for capital inflows into tokenized assets.
- Advisers mentioned Ethereum, Solana, Canton, Chainlink, and Avalanche as prominent technologies likely to benefit from a broader adoption of tokenized and crypto-backed financial products.
- Exchanges expanding into tokenized stocks and services reflect a broader trend of crypto firms diversifying beyond trading into infrastructure, custody, and regulated investment products.
Shifting dynamics in advisory outreach and product focus
Bitwise’s memo crystallizes a notable shift in the conversations advisers are having about crypto. Rather than focusing on price trajectories or BTC as a solo investment thesis, many are asking how blockchain-based finance can synchronize with mainstream markets and regulatory expectations. The emphasis on stablecoins—designed to preserve value and enable seamless settlement—and on tokenization—the digitization of real-world assets like stocks and bonds—highlights a path toward integrated crypto-native solutions that can operate within traditional portfolios and risk controls.
Still, the path forward depends on how quickly the market can translate these technologies into scalable, compliant products. The regulatory environment, particularly around tokenized securities, will play a central role in determining the pace of adoption. If tokenized trading becomes more widely available within the framework of U.S. securities law, it could lower barriers for institutional investors to gain exposure to a broader set of assets via blockchain-enabled channels.
Regulatory signals, adoption, and the tokenization thesis
The SEC’s reported consideration of a tokenized-stock trading exemption signals a potential regulatory foothold for new investment vehicles. Such a framework could offer a clearer path for tokenized versions of well-known equities, making it easier for asset managers to include crypto-linked products in client portfolios. The potential impact on liquidity, price discovery, and cross-border trading is significant, though it will hinge on how the exemption is crafted and how disclosures and custodial controls are implemented.
On the corporate side, Circle’s IPO experience underscores the market’s appetite for crypto-native listings and related instruments. A peak near $240 for Circle’s stock, from an IPO price of $31, demonstrates strong initial demand, while the subsequent pullback to around $79 reflects broader crypto stock volatility and sector-wide pressures. The episode illustrates how crypto-linked equities can act as a barometer for investor sentiment toward the broader crypto ecosystem, even as fundamental adoption in payments and settlement accelerates.
Investors are also watching the ecosystem’s players—Ethereum, Solana, Chainlink, and Avalanche—as potential beneficiaries of increased demand for tokenized assets and stablecoins. Platforms and firms such as Hyperliquid, Figure, and Coinbase are cited as example incumbents that could scale these capabilities. The convergence of exchange platforms, custody and settlement providers, and fintech-style trading tools signals a maturation of the crypto space where tokenized products become core offerings rather than niche experiments.
In the near term, the trajectory will depend on regulatory clarity, the speed with which institutional users can onboard to compliant platforms, and the ability of market participants to demonstrate real-world use cases that translate into measurable yield and risk-management benefits. If the new wave of institutional investment materializes around stablecoins and tokenization, it could provide a counterpoint to Bitcoin’s price cycles and augment the sector’s resilience in the face of macro shifts.
What remains to be seen is whether this shift will translate into a durable bull-case narrative for crypto, or if it will simply reflect a phase of exploration among institutions as they test regulatory boundaries and product suitability. Market observers will want to monitor regulator guidance on tokenized securities, the performance of Circle’s public listing, and the pace at which institutions begin allocating toward tokenized products at scale. As Hougan summarized, the conversation has moved beyond BTC price action toward the infrastructure and real-world use cases that could redefine crypto’s role in a diversified, institutionally accessible market.
Looking ahead, readers should keep an eye on regulatory developments surrounding tokenized assets, the continued expansion of stablecoins into mainstream financial infrastructure, and the performance of key platforms and issuers that could drive the next phase of institutional crypto adoption.
On 11 June, the ECB is holding the second day of its Governing Council meeting. The interest rate decision will be announced at 14:15 CET, followed by a press conference by Christine Lagarde at 14:45 CET. Markets are focused on the possibility of a 25-basis-point rate increase to 2.25%.
The case for further tightening is supported by accelerating inflation in the euro area, driven in part by higher energy prices resulting from geopolitical tensions in the Middle East. At its 30 April meeting, the ECB paused its policy cycle but indicated that June would be an important point for reassessing the outlook. Labour market resilience and signs of second-round inflation effects have strengthened the arguments in favour of tighter policy. The tone of the press conference could shape market expectations for interest rates through the remainder of the year.
Technical Picture
Following a peak near 1.2000 in January, EUR/USD formed a downward move towards the March lows around 1.1400 on the daily chart. An ascending trendline drawn from the March lows is currently being tested from above, with price attempting to break below it.
At the same time, the pair is trading beneath the lower boundary of the current volume profile at 1.1620, which may indicate increasing selling pressure in this area. Should the price remain below the trendline, the next downside reference point could be the green support level around 1.1450.
The red resistance zone is located near 1.1850. If the market reverses higher and manages to overcome both the point of control (POC) at 1.1720 and the upper boundary of the profile at 1.1790, this area could become the next target for buyers.
RSI + MAs currently shows readings of 35, 41 and 44. All three lines remain below the neutral 50 level, while the moving averages continue to point lower.
Key Takeaways
The outcome of the ECB press conference on 11 June may determine whether the current attempt to break the corrective trend develops into a sustained move or ends with a return to the point of control (POC) area. For now, RSI + MAs remains firmly in bearish territory.
Trade over 50 forex markets 24 hours a day with FXOpen. Take advantage of low commissions, deep liquidity, and spreads from 0.0 pips (additional fees may apply). Open your FXOpen account now or learn more about trading forex with FXOpen.
This article represents the opinion of the Companies operating under the FXOpen brand only. It is not to be construed as an offer, solicitation, or recommendation with respect to products and services provided by the Companies operating under the FXOpen brand, nor is it to be considered financial advice.
Bitcoin has lost buyers on two fronts.
The exodus from spot ETFs as a catalyst for the recent bitcoin price swoon is well documented. Less discussed is the equally steep drop in buying by digital asset treasuries, or firms whose core business is accumulating bitcoin as a treasury asset.
“As BTC broke down from the mid-$70Ks toward $60K, net inflows from corporate treasury firms fell sharply, with daily purchases slowing to a fraction of their recent pace,” analysts at Glassnode said in the latest market update.
“While companies remain net buyers overall, the decline in accumulation suggests this cohort is becoming more cautious, removing another source of marginal demand at a time when broader market sentiment remains weak,” they said.
The green and red bars show the dollar value of daily net purchases by digital asset firms since June 2025, smoothed using a seven-day moving average.
The DAT demand has pretty much evaporated this month, down significantly from multiple instances of over $500 million in daily accumulation observed through April and May.
That partly explains BTC’s quick slide from $74,000 to under $60,000 last week.
Some analysts believe the sell-off was mainly catalyzed by Strategy, the world’s largest publicly listed BTC holder, disclosing that it sold 32 BTC in the final week of May. The firm, however, returned to the market during last week’s sell-off, snapping up BTC worth around $100 million. But that failed to keep prices from falling below $60,000.
As of writing, bitcoin changed hands at around $62,500.
The U.S.-listed spot ETFs remain another major headwind, continuing to bleed capital and reducing the odds of a sustained price rebound. On Wednesday, the 11 funds posted an outflow of $213.85 million, according to SoSoValue. Total redemptions have exceeded $5.72 billion since the second week of May.
Advisers to some of the largest financial institutions are taking more of an interest in stablecoins and tokenization than in Bitcoin, which could help pull crypto out of its current slump, said Bitwise investment chief Matt Hougan.
Hougan said in a note on Wednesday that he recently spoke with more than 40 advisers who were “still interested in crypto” but are “more interested today in stablecoins and tokenization than they are in Bitcoin.”
“It was pretty hard to engage with advisors on Bitcoin this week,” he said. “In call after call, they expressed much more curiosity over the real-world applications of crypto that are quickly reshaping everything from capital markets to global payments.”
Stablecoins and tokenization have recently captured the interest of Wall Street, as Bitcoin (BTC) has struggled to maintain momentum, trading down almost 30% so far this year to $62,500.
Stablecoin issuer Circle saw a buzzy initial public offering in June 2025, with its stock quickly rallying to a peak of $240 from its debut price of $31. It has since struggled amid a wider rout in crypto stocks, closing at just under $79 on Wednesday.
Tokenization is also set for a boost as the US Securities and Exchange Commission is reportedly planning to allow tokenized stock trading, which could give traditional investors confidence and spur investment.
“It’s hard to turn on CNBC and not hear someone like SEC Chair Paul Atkins or Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon or BlackRock CEO Larry Fink talking about stablecoins and tokenization,” Hougan said. “Investors want to be a part of that.”
Matt Hougan, pictured appearing on a podcast in January, says advisers are becoming less interested in Bitcoin. Source: YouTube
He said interest in the technologies could be what pulls crypto into a bull market, which has historically been triggered by “new product breakthroughs and new types of investors.”
Related: Bitcoin may act as a ‘canary in the coal mine’ as risk-off pressure spreads
The “best hope,” according to Hougan, is that financial advisors and institutional investors make up the new crypto investment class, and their money is likely to flow into stablecoin and tokenization investments.
He said Ethereum, Solana, Canton, Chainlink and Avalanche were mentioned during his conversations, along with trading platform Hyperliquid and crypto companies Figure, Circle and Coinbase.
Coinbase and other crypto exchanges have been expanding into business lines beyond crypto trading in a bid to capitalize on investor interest in blockchain-linked services.
Many exchanges have begun to offer tokenized stocks, albeit outside of the US, which have grown in popularity as investors seek to gain exposure to popular stocks and intensely-hyped public offerings, such as SpaceX’s planned debut on Friday.
Magazine: Does ‘Paper Bitcoin’ mean there’s an unlimited supply of BTC?
In 2026, on-chain transparency has become a non-negotiable standard across the entire digital asset industry. Following years of exchange collapses such as FTX Crypto Exchange Collapse, opaque reserve reporting, and sudden withdrawal freezes that eroded trader confidence globally, the benchmark for evaluating a platform has shifted decisively. Price feeds and marketing copy no longer suffice, what matters now is what the blockchain itself says, in real time and without ambiguity.
Zoomex has embraced this new standard fully. Rather than relying on self reported figures or quarterly disclosures, Zoomex publicly attributes and maintains wallet addresses across 14 blockchain networks, all independently verifiable through DefiLlama’s CEX Transparency module. This report examines Zoomex’s on-chain footprint for May 2026, cross referenced against CoinGecko, CoinMarketCap, LiquidityFinder, and Hacken, to give traders, researchers, and institutional participants a verified, source linked picture of where Zoomex stands, not where it claims to stand.
$24MTotal On-Chain Assets (DefiLlama)
~$6.1B24h Total Volume (Spot + Derivatives)
7/10CoinGecko Trust Score
14Blockchain Networks
ZOOMEX PLATFORM OVERVIEW
Founded in 2021, Zoomex has grown into a global cryptocurrency trading platform serving over 3 million registered users across more than 35 countries and regions. The platform operates on its core philosophy of “Simple – User-Friendly – Fast,” a guiding principle that informs everything from its matching engine architecture to its user interface design.
Zoomex’s product scope in May 2026 covers spot trading, perpetual contracts (USDT-margined and inverse), copy trading, and as of this reporting period, ZoomexStocks, a new instrument category giving traders access to U.S. stock-linked perpetuals including TSLA, NVDA, AAPL, META, MSTR, and COIN, all from a single crypto account without fiat conversion. This multi-product approach positions Zoomex not merely as a crypto exchange but as a unified trading ecosystem bridging digital assets and traditional equity markets.
The platform’s technical backbone is engineered for performance. Zoomex maintains sub-10ms order matching latency, and execution tests confirm that a 1 BTC market order on Zoomex results in approximately 0.03% slippage – a figure that competes directly with much larger Tier 1 platforms. This infrastructure maturity, combined with Zoomex’s regulatory registrations and third-party security audits, forms the foundation for everything documented in this report.
ON-CHAIN RESERVES: CEX TRANSPARENCY TRACKER
Zoomex’s on-chain reserve position as of May 2026 stands at approximately $23,997,962 in verified exchange assets, independently calculated from publicly attributed wallet addresses and cross-referenced against DefiLlama’s CEX Transparency module. These funds are distributed across 14 separate blockchain networks, a multi-chain distribution strategy that reflects Zoomex’s commitment to supporting diverse user bases and asset types – rather than concentrating risk on a single chain.
Source: https://defillama.com/cex/zoomex
DefiLlama’s CEX Transparency module tracks cold and hot wallet addresses that have been publicly attributed to centralized exchanges and verified on-chain. For Zoomex, this means any interested party – trader, researcher, or institutional risk manager can independently confirm reserve figures in real time without relying on Zoomex’s own statements. This is the gold standard for reserve verification in 2026, and Zoomex meets it.
It is important to contextualize these reserve figures correctly. Zoomex’s on-chain reserve balance reflects verifiable cold and hot wallet holdings; it does not represent the full scope of Zoomex’s $50 million insurance fund, which is maintained separately as a dedicated reserve to protect users in extreme market events or operational failures. The combination of publicly verifiable on-chain reserves and a separately maintained insurance fund gives Zoomex a layered capital protection structure that distinguishes it from platforms offering only one or neither.
Source: defillama.com/cex/zoomex
EXCHANGE VOLUME: READING THE FLOW
Volume is the most scrutinized and most frequently manipulated metric in the exchange industry. For Zoomex, figures across all tracked platforms tell a consistent story of genuine, growing activity. May 2026 delivered a volatile but high-volume environment. Bitcoin reached a local high near $111,000 before correcting approximately 20%, creating exactly the kind of two-sided market that drives both spot and perpetual derivatives volume to elevated levels.
Source: https://www.coingecko.com/en/exchanges/zoomex
Zoomex’s 24-hour spot trading volume at the time of this report stands at $1.226 billion, a 13.62% single-day increase across 71 active trading pairs spanning 69 listed coins, according to data from CoinGecko.
Source. https://www.coingecko.com/en/exchanges/zoomex
On the derivatives side, Zoomex Futures recorded $5.26 billion in 24-hour trading volume across 518 active pairs, with open interest of $893 million, a figure that speaks to sustained trader positioning rather than short-term spike activity.
Across the full month of May 2026, Zoomex processed approximately $168 billion in total combined volume according to LiquidityFinder. The platform’s month-over-month volume growth of 74% is particularly significant when set against a challenging macro backdrop: in early June 2026, institutional crypto ETP vehicles reported one of the largest weekly outflow streaks of the year, with over $4.4 billion in cumulative BTC ETF redemptions during a 13-day streak. Zoomex’s volume expansion against this institutional headwind strongly suggests the platform is successfully capturing retail and active-trader flows rotating out of passive investment vehicles and into direct spot and derivatives markets.
Live figures: https://liquidityfinder.com/crypto-data/exchanges/zoomex
SPOT MARKET STRUCTURE: DOMINANT PAIRS AND FLOW PATTERNS
Zoomex’s spot market in May 2026 exhibits a healthy and structurally coherent distribution of activity. The dominant pair is BTC/USDT at $547.5 million (44.66% of total spot volume), followed by ETH/USDT at $361.2 million (29.46%) and USDC/USDT at $93.7 million (7.66%). Together, these three pairs account for over 81% of all spot activity on Zoomex, a concentration pattern that mirrors the distribution seen at larger, more established mid-tier exchanges and reflects genuine organic trading behavior rather than synthetic volume inflation.
The most structurally notable feature of Zoomex’s spot market is the USDC/USDT stablecoin corridor. With $28.8 million in +2% bid depth and $18.6 million in ask depth, USDC/USDT on Zoomex carries order book depth orders of magnitude larger than any equity-traded pair. This is not an anomaly, as it reflects a deliberate strategic positioning by Zoomex to serve users in regions where direct USD fiat rails are constrained or inaccessible, and where USDC serves as the primary USD proxy. For traders executing large stablecoin entries or exits on Zoomex, this depth means minimal slippage even at scale.
Average bid-ask spread across Zoomex’s spot markets is 0.105%, which is competitive for a platform of Zoomex’s tier and consistent with genuine market-maker participation.
Source: https://www.coingecko.com/en/exchanges/zoomex
BTC/USDT specifically maintains an extremely tight 0.01% spread, a strong indicator of active professional market-making on Zoomex’s books. CoinGecko assigns Zoomex a Trust Score of 7/10 based on volume consistency, order book depth, and cybersecurity metrics, a score that accurately reflects Zoomex’s mid-tier positioning with clear institutional-grade infrastructure components.
Spot market data: https://www.coingecko.com/en/exchanges/zoomex
ORDER BOOK DEPTH & FINANCIALS RESERVES
Order book depth is where wash-traded volume typically falls apart, fabricated fills leave no real resting orders. Zoomex’s depth figures, as tracked by CoinGecko and CoinMarketCap, reflect genuine market-maker participation across Zoomex’s primary pairs throughout May 2026.
The SOL/USDT pair on Zoomex is a notable addition to this picture: with $830,501 on the bid side and $744,007 on the ask, it demonstrates symmetric and substantial depth consistent with active professional market-maker participation rather than synthetic fills. This is exactly the kind of order book profile that institutional and algorithmic traders look for when evaluating execution venues.
The USDC/USDT corridor remains the single most structurally significant entry in Zoomex’s order book. At $28.8M bid depth and $18.6M ask depth, it functions as one of the deepest stablecoin execution venues in the mid-tier CEX segment. This depth is directly tied to Zoomex’s growing user base in Southeast Asia, Latin America, and other regions where USDC is the primary dollar-denominated settlement asset.
A closer look at Zoomex’s real-time reserve breakdown reinforces the structural integrity of its order book. As of the latest update, Zoomex’s publicly reported financial reserves total $21,097,959.53, distributed across a diversified multi-asset allocation. USDC leads at 30.49% (~$6.42M across two attributed wallet addresses), followed by USDT at 24.51% (~$3.22M), ETH at 19.10% (1,385.66 ETH valued at ~$2.33M), XRP at 13.35% (1,996,794.22 XRP at ~$2.33M), and BTC at 12.55% (25.66 BTC at ~$1.64M). This reserve composition directly correlates with the order book depth profile observed across Zoomex’s primary trading pairs — the dominant stablecoin reserves (USDC + USDT representing over 55% of total holdings) underpin the platform’s capacity to maintain deep, liquid execution on its highest-volume corridors, while meaningful ETH, XRP, and BTC on-chain balances support reliable settlement across its most actively traded spot markets.
Source: https://coinmarketcap.com/exchanges/zoomex/
MAY 2026 SPOTLIGHT: ON-CHAIN GOLD AND THE ZOOMEX STOCKS
One of the most distinctive data points in Zoomex’s May 2026 activity profile is the continued relevance of its XAUT/USDT (Tether Gold) pair as a macroeconomic hedging instrument.
Source: https://www.zoomex.com/trade/usdt/XAUTUSDT
In late February 2026, a geopolitical risk event triggered rapid capital movement toward safe-haven assets during a period when traditional gold futures markets were closed. On-chain gold assets, specifically XAUT and PAXG, were the first markets globally to reflect price changes as capital moved, and Zoomex’s XAUT/USDT pair maintained stable liquidity throughout the event, functioning as a 24/7 gold exposure mechanism when traditional markets were unavailable.
Zoomex’s structurally persistent advantage in this context is straightforward. Unlike traditional gold futures that operate within fixed trading hours and are subject to exchange closures, Tether Gold on Zoomex trades continuously, around the clock, seven days a week. Given that May 2026 saw continued macroeconomic uncertainty, including Bitcoin’s sharp correction from its $111,000 local high, the XAUT/USDT pair remained actively relevant as a hedging instrument for Zoomex traders seeking gold exposure without traditional market friction or settlement delays.
Zoomex published a dedicated analysis of this dynamic in March 2026, establishing its position as an informed commentator on the convergence of on-chain and traditional commodity markets. This kind of transparent, research-backed product development is consistent with Zoomex’s broader commitment to building a trading environment that is not only liquid but genuinely useful for active risk management.
Launched April 16, 2026 and gaining traction through May, ZoomexStocks enables users to access 12 major U.S. equity-linked assets, including Apple, Tesla, and NVIDIA, directly through their Zoomex account using USDT. No separate brokerage account required.
Unlike traditional stock trading platforms that demand lengthy onboarding, identity verification with brokers, and currency conversions, ZoomexStocks lets crypto-native users get exposure to top-performing U.S. equities in a familiar environment they already trust. Trading is available 24/7, removing the constraints of standard market hours, and to celebrate the launch, Zoomex introduced a limited-time fee rebate campaign offering up to 100 USDT in rebates. Whether you’re a seasoned crypto trader looking to diversify into equities or a newcomer wanting a simpler entry point to U.S. markets, ZoomexStocks lowers the barrier significantly by keeping everything within one unified platform.
PLATFORM COMMUNITY AND USER METRICS
Zoomex ended May 2026 with over 3 million registered users across more than 35 countries and regions. The platform’s Telegram community has grown to 69,663 members, reflecting active engagement among Zoomex’s core retail trading base.Zoomex’s daily active trader count consistently exceeds 1 million users according to independent review data, TradersUnion, making it one of the most actively used mid-tier exchanges globally by session volume. The platform regularly adds new assets based on market demand combined with rigorous vetting, as of this report, Zoomex lists 486–495 cryptocurrencies and operates across 518–575 trading pairs depending on the market segment (spot or derivatives), a figure that has grown steadily through 2026.
The post Zoomex Monthly On-Chain Report: May 2026 appeared first on BeInCrypto.
US inflation tops 4%; Bitcoin and gold face pressure, analysts say
Brexit ten years on: devolution
NBA Finals Takeaways: Anunoby delivers defining moment as Knicks near title
-
Fashion6 days agoWeekend Open Thread: Evereve – Corporette.com
-
Crypto World6 days agoJensen Huang Approves Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron for NVIDIA (NVDA) HBM4 Memory Supply
-
Entertainment4 days agoThe Best Mystery Series of All Time Is Surging on Streaming 30 Years After It Ended
-
Crypto World3 days agoAnatomy of the June crypto crash: Fed, Iran, Saylor
-
NewsBeat3 days agoAlexander Zverev wins the French Open to finally earn a 1st Grand Slam title
-
Tech5 days agoSuspicious Polyfill login prompts pop up on Toshiba, Muji websites
-
Crypto World5 days agoSenator Cynthia Lummis Calls CLARITY Act the Most Consequential Financial Legislation of This Generation
-
Tech4 days agoMicrosoft unveils seven homegrown AI models in new bid for ‘long term self-sufficiency’
-
Tech6 days agoMicrosoft launches MXC, an OS-level sandbox for AI agents, with OpenAI and Nvidia already on board
-
Business6 days ago(VIDEO) Justin Bieber Delivers Surprise Happy Birthday Serenade to Diners at Los Angeles Mexican Restaurant
-
Business4 days agoThe Pain Points Taking a Fragile Tech Rally Down a Notch
-
Crypto World3 days agoEli Lilly (LLY) Stock Surges 4% Following Breakthrough Sleep Apnea Trial Results
-
Business3 days agoHigh Stakes for Wembanyama as New York Pushes for 3-0 Lead
-
Tech5 days agoVon der Leyen’s AI envoy pick draws conflict-of-interest fire
-
Crypto World6 days ago
LBank Surpasses 25 Million Users Worldwide as AFA Partnership Continues to Drive Global Growth
-
Tech5 days agoHackers now exploit SolarWinds Serv-U flaw to crash servers
-
Tech6 days agoMeta steals a tactic from Tesla and builds data centers in tents
-
Crypto World4 days agoTrump’s AI Ownership Plan Could Benefit Anthropic at OpenAI’s Expense
-
Sports2 days agoBangladesh beat Australia after 20 years in ODIs, register only their second win over six-time world champions | Cricket News
-
Tech3 days agoNotion restores access to Anthropic after service disruption
You must be logged in to post a comment Login