Solana price has climbed to around $78 on July 15 after a 250 million USDC mint on the network, combined with softer U.S. inflation data, injected fresh buying momentum across crypto markets.

The move gathered pace after the USDC Treasury minted 250 million USDC on Solana, adding immediate liquidity to the ecosystem as traders returned to risk assets following the latest U.S. inflation print. Capital quickly rotated into Solana-based decentralized exchanges, helping SOL recover from recent weakness while the wider crypto market also moved higher.

Earlier selling pressure had left Solana trading well below its May highs as geopolitical tensions, institutional distributions and weaker on-chain activity weighed on sentiment.

Today’s rebound, however, arrives with stronger participation. Daily trading volume has climbed above $2.1 billion, suggesting buyers, rather than short-term speculation alone, have supported the advance.

Technical structure favors another test of $80

The daily chart shows Solana (SOL) price holding above a long-standing support area between $70 and $75 after repeatedly defending that range over recent weeks. Price now trades above the 20-day and 50-day moving averages near $73.3-$74 while remaining below the declining 100-day moving average around $80.3 and well beneath the 200-day moving average near $91. 

A sustained close above the 100-day average would expose the psychologically important $80 level before opening room toward the May swing high near $82.

The 4-hour chart adds another constructive development. SOL has broken above a descending channel that had contained price action since early July, while the RSI has recovered to roughly 52 after bouncing from oversold territory. 

The Aroon Up reading near 93 also holds well above the Aroon Down line, suggesting buyers currently control short-term momentum, although resistance remains concentrated just below $80.

Derivatives positioning reinforces that technical picture. CoinGlass liquidation data shows dense short liquidation clusters stacked between $78.5 and $80, with another concentration extending toward $81.5.

A decisive push through those levels could trigger forced buying from bearish positions, while the largest long liquidation pockets remain clustered around the $76-$76.5 region, making that zone an important area for bulls to defend.

Commenting on the latest setup, analyst Ali Martinez argued that Solana has regained a bullish structure after its SuperTrend indicator flipped positive for the first time since October. He wrote:

“If buying pressure continues to build, $SOL could rally toward $96 or even $121. However, $60 remains the key level to watch.”

Outside the charts, network fundamentals have also improved. Active addresses have climbed toward seven million, while anticipation continues to build ahead of the Alpenglow upgrade, which is expected to reduce transaction finality to around 150 milliseconds later this quarter. 

Solana has also strengthened its institutional footprint through its partnership with SBI Holdings to expand on-chain financial infrastructure in Japan, while tokenized real-world assets on the network have grown to roughly $3.3 billion.

A break below key support would weaken the bullish outlook

Bullish momentum still faces several hurdles. The declining 100-day moving average around $80 represents the first major technical barrier, and failure to clear that level could keep SOL trapped inside its multi-week consolidation range.

A return below the 20-day and 50-day moving averages would shift attention back to the $75 support area, where leveraged long positions remain concentrated.

Macro risks also remain unresolved. Fresh geopolitical tensions, another rise in Treasury yields, or stronger-than-expected U.S. economic data could reduce expectations for monetary easing and pressure risk assets across the crypto market.

If selling accelerates and Solana loses the $70-$75 support zone, the bullish breakout thesis would weaken considerably, while Ali Martinez’s longer-term invalidation level near $60 would return to focus.

Strategy (MSTR), the largest public holder of bitcoin BTC$65,098.05, won’t panic unless BTC sinks to the $8,000-$10,000 range, its CEO has said.

Phong Le identified that range as when the company “would have to consider some of the risk associated with our debt,” in an interview with Bloomberg TV on Tuesday.

Such a drop would represent a drop of around 85% based on bitcoin’s current price of around $64,500 as of writing.

“Until that point in time, we feel very secure about the balance sheet,” Le said. “What we need to do is build a capital structure that can withstand bear markets and of course benefit from bull cycles.”

Strategy’s preferred stock STRC, which is designed to give it the cash flow to fund its bitcoin buying in return for a regular dividend — currently a 13% annual yield, has been under pressure in recent months. The stock is designed to maintain a $100 par, which it lost in April and falling below $75 in late June.

When STRC falls below $100, it restricts Strategy’s ability to issue new shares and then use the cash to buy bitcoin.

Japan reclassified cryptocurrencies as financial instruments, a structural shift that establishes the legal framework for separate taxation of crypto assets and for future crypto exchange-traded funds (ETFs).

The legislation approved by Parliament on Wednesday amends the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act and the Payment Services Act (PSA). It shifts crypto from a framework in which it was primarily treated as a payment tool to one that treats it as an investment alongside other financial instruments. The new rules are expected to take effect in 2027.

The new framework also removes a key legal hurdle for future spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs), although lawmakers did not approve any ETF products. Financial Services Agency officials said Japan will now consider developing a regulatory framework for crypto ETFs.

The legislation raises the maximum prison term for unregistered crypto operators from three years to 10 years and increases the maximum fine from 3 million yen ($18,500) to 10 million yen. It also introduces stricter insider-trading rules and expands disclosure requirements for crypto issuers and exchanges.

Noxa, the largest token launchpad on Robinhood Chain, stopped operating after earning an estimated $12 million in fees, according to DefiLlama, in the past week, citing concerns about low-quality tokens flooding the platform.

The shutdown unfolded in a matter of days. On July 11, just as CASHCAT, the chain’s breakout memecoin, was hitting peak trading volume, Noxa said it would stop accepting new token launches.

Two days later, the platform’s website went dark. The team blamed a Cloudflare issue. On July 14, it said the domain would redirect to ENS services and creator earnings would be available for withdrawal. Late Tuesday night, Noxa posted that the platform would no longer collect fees, redirecting 100% of transaction revenue to creators instead.

The decision divided Crypto Twitter.

“Half the timeline called it based because someone finally pushed back against the spam,” wrote @zubic_eth in a widely shared post summarizing the situation. “The other half called it a generational fumble and said they killed the golden goose while making $3 million a day.”

The figures contrast with BlackRock’s broader business, which posted record assets under management (AUM) of $15.3 trillion after attracting $192 billion in net inflows during the quarter. The company also beat Wall Street expectations with adjusted earnings per share of $13.91 on $7.08 billion in revenue.

BLK shares traded 4.15% higher at £1,068 in pre-market trading Wednesday.

BlackRock’s crypto target

BlackRock is targeting $500 million in annual revenue from the business under its 2030 plan, the firm said in its earnings call.

This would represent an increase of more than tenfold, compared to the $40 million BlackRock currently generates in base fees and securities lending, accounting for less than 1% of the firm’s total fee revenue.

BlackRock has steadily expanded its crypto ETF lineup since listing its spot bitcoin ETF (IBIT) and spot ether ETF (ETHA), in 2024. More recently, the firm introduced the iShares Bitcoin Income ETF (BITY), which seeks to generate income by writing covered call options on bitcoin exposure, offering investors an alternative to simply tracking the cryptocurrency’s price.

The asset manager also manages $60 billion of Circle’s reserves, about one-quarter of the $300 billion stablecoin market, and wants to become the industry’s reserve manager of choice, it added.

BlackRock pointed to 5 billion crypto wallets as a new distribution channel for its traditional investment products during the earnings call.

Just a few short years ago, the crypto hype was strong. VCs were eager to pour money into solutions for scalability, data availability, and any number of buzzwords.

Since then, the advent of powerful AI models and prolonged bear markets have taken the wind out of crypto’s sails and many chains which promised the future are now as good as forgotten.

One keen-eyed X user, crypto marketer Stacy Muur, noted the staggering $500 million invested across six blockchain projects which, together, have produced a total of just $360 in blockchain fees in the past 24 hours.

Read more: AscendEx shutdown: Uncertainty over withdrawals as hot wallets lack funds

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The claim caught Protos’ eye, so we took a look at the six companies to see where it all went wrong.

Berachain

Berachain is a blockchain born as a spinoff of the 2021-era Bong Bears NFT collection. It claims to be the first proof-of-liquidity based chain, and aims to be a “growth engine for onchain businesses.”

The project raised a total of $142 million across two rounds in 2023 and 2024. 

However, according to its most recent EoY statement, the project has struggled amidst issues with sentiment, shrinking crypto-native TAM and “increased skepticism around the value of infrastructure as a whole.”

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Since launching in early 2025, its BERA token is down 98%.

Berachain was among the networks caught up in November’s devastating Balancer hack, leading validators to temporarily halt the network.

Later that same month, it was revealed that one of the backers, Brevan Howard’s Nova Digital, was granted a one year, risk-free refund right on its $25 million investment.

Read more: Balancer exploit drains $129M in DeFi disaster

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Celestia

Celestia was seen as a hot ticket back in 2023 when “data availability” was the buzzword du jour.

Part of the Cosmos ecosystem, it promises bespoke, high throughput, modular chains “for companies with internet-scale traffic.”

It raised first $1.5 million in 2021, a further $50 million in 2022 and finally $100 million in 2024.

Its much-hyped token launch was one of the first rays of light following a deep bear market sparked by the catastrophic crypto collapses of 2022.

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Despite initially surging around 10x in its first months to an all-time high of over $20, TIA eventually bled approximately 98%, sitting today at $0.40.

Scroll raised a total of $83 million over three funding rounds, the latest of which brought the Ethereum L2 to a $1.8 billion valuation in March 2023.

It made just $24 in fees yesterday.

The zkEVM layer two hit a peak TVL of $585 million as users enthusiastically farmed an ultimately disappointing airdrop. In the aftermath, the network lost around 75% of its TVL within a couple of months.

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There’s currently just under $12 million on the chain.

Eclipse

Eclipse billed itself as “Solana on Ethereum,” an SVM layer two network which would pair Solana’s performance with Ethereum’s liquidity.

Developer Eclipse Labs raised a total of $65 million, most of which came in a $50 million Series A, led by Placeholder and Hack VC, in March 2024.

DeFiLlama data shows the chain’s TVL peaking at almost $50 million in late February last year. It’s currently down to just $1.15 million, a drop of approximately 98%.

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The project’s most recent blog post is from a year ago, announcing the launch of its token ES, and an airdrop. Eclipse Labs has since pivoted to development of The Human API, a marketplace for AI agents to hire humans.

Sonic

Launched as Fantom by controversial developer Andre Cronje, founder of DeFi stalwart Yearn Finance, the fast, low-cost network migrated to Sonic in 2024. It raised a total of $61 million across six rounds between 2018 and 2024, according to ICODrops.

As Fantom, it took a hit in the Multichain debacle, with many bridged assets depegged from their native versions.

Fantom’s peak TVL reached a staggering $7.9 billion in 2022 and now sits at just under $5 million. Sonic’s hit $1.2 billion last spring, but has since dropped to $16 million.

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Cronje’s involvement with Sonic terminated last month and he’s spent much of the last 18 months building Flying Tulip.

Read more: Andre Cronje says someone stole his code to build a $1B DeFi project

Manta

ZK-focused Manta raised a total of $60 million across four rounds between 2021 and 2023. 

Its TVL chart is dramatic, highlighting an intense, heavily gamified airdrop campaign, which saw over $650 million poured into the chain.

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Just a few weeks before its peak, TVL sat at under $20 million. Likewise, within four months, it was back below $50 million once again. Today, just $4 million is held on the chain.

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Japan is set to reshape its cryptocurrency market with stricter trading rules, stronger user protections and a framework closer to traditional finance.

The country’s parliament on Wednesday passed revisions that classify crypto assets as financial assets under Japan’s Financial Instruments and Exchange Act (FIEA), according to a report by local news agency Nikkei.

The changes move Japan’s crypto regulation away from the Payment Services Act (PSA), which treated digital assets primarily as payment instruments, and introduce insider trading rules and stronger oversight for crypto businesses.

The overhaul marks one of Japan’s biggest shifts in digital asset policy as regulators worldwide continue debating how crypto should fit within existing financial systems.

Crypto exchanges face tougher oversight

Under the revised framework, crypto businesses operating in Japan will face additional compliance obligations designed to improve market integrity and protect users.

The updated rules prohibit issuers, exchanges and other market participants from trading while aware of undisclosed material information, creating insider trading restrictions similar to those applied in traditional finance (TradFi).

Source: Reuters Legal

The revised rules increase penalties for companies operating without registration, reportedly raising the maximum prison sentence from three years to 10 years and increasing fines from around 3 million Japanese yen ($19,000) to around 10 million yen.

Related: Japan stablecoin payments advance with Lawson trial, Netstars launch

Insider trading violations could result in penalties of up to five years in prison, fines of up to 5 million yen, or both, the report notes.

Global regulators align crypto with financial rules

In line with Japan’s move to bring crypto closer to TradFi, the revised law also reportedly changes the terminology for registered businesses from “cryptocurrency exchange” to “cryptocurrency trading company.” The change reflects the broader financial role regulators now assign to the sector.

Japan’s crypto regulation developments reflect a broader global trend of regulators applying existing financial frameworks to crypto rather than treating the sector as entirely separate.

South Africa’s tax authority published draft guidance in early July outlining how existing tax rules apply to crypto assets, while US regulators continue clarifying how existing securities and commodities laws apply to digital assets.

Magazine: Thai scammer’s $122M wallet, Japan embraces crypto credit: Asia Express