Bitcoin BTC$79,891.46 tumbled back below $80,000 late Thursday after the U.S. launched fresh airstrikes in Iran, causing brent crude oil to briefly top $100 per barrel before giving back a portion of gains during Asia and European hours.

The crypto market was already slightly jittery after Strategy chairman Michael Saylor said that the company would consider selling bitcoin to cover dividend payments from its STRC, a u-turn from its previous “never sell” strategy.

Ether (ETH) is trading at $2,280 having lost 0.2% since midnight UTC and around 2% over the past 24 hours, with other altcoins like monero (XMR) and dash (DASH) losing between 4% and 5%.

The broader crypto recovery remains intact with bitcoin having rallied from $65,000 in late March, although it’s worth noting that a drop below $75,000 would negate the recent string of higher lows and would signal a reversion to the pervious trading range.

Derivatives positioning

• The crypto futures market has cooled for the second-straight day, with cumulative industry notional open interest down over 1.5% at $131.5 billion and trading volume down over 12% at $191 billion. Investors are clearly deleveraging in the wake of bitcoin’s overnight drop below $80,000.
• Exchanges have liquidated nearly $300 million in bets in 24 hours, with longs accounting for most of the tally. It shows that traders were positioned for continued price rises into the weekend, only to take the brunt of the unexpected market weakness.
• Open interest (OI) has declined in most major tokens, including bitcoin and ether. Meme token DOGE’s OI has dropped by over 4%, the most among top 10 coins. TON is the standout, with OI rising by 6%.
• For the second straight day, OI-adjusted cumulative volume delta for most majors remains negative, a sign of traders aggressively shorting using market orders rather than passive limit orders.
• On Deribit, the most actively traded contract over the past 24 hours was a BTC $105,000 call option expiring June 26. Market positioning has also shifted, with the top five most traded contracts now including put options at $80,000, $75,000, and $60,000 strikes. This marks a clear change from the previous three sessions, when calls dominated trading activity.
• Bitcoin’s annualized 30-day implied volatility index, BVIV, remains near 40%, the lowest since late January, a sign of market calm ahead of the pivotal U.S. nonfarm payrolls report.

Token talk

• Despite relative weakness across crypto majors and privacy coins, CoinDesk’s DeFi Select Index (DFX) surged by more than 3% since midnight UTC, buoyed by an 8.2% gain in the price of ONDO.
• Ondo Finance is a real-world asset (RWA) project that on Thursday completed its first cross-border cross-bank redemption of U.S. treasuries having worked with JP Morgan, Mastercard and Ripple, driving price appreciation over the past 24 hours into Friday.
• The CoinDesk Memecoin Select Index (CDMEME) lost ground on Friday, posting a 0.1% swing to the downside to make it the only CoinDesk benchmark in the red.
• CoinMarketCap’s “altcoin season” indicator is at 42/100, significantly higher than in April when it was as low as 31/100. The total market cap of altcoins during that period has risen from below $1 trillion to $1.05 trillion.

South Korea has passed a new amendment to the Foreign Exchange Transactions Act, tightening control over companies that move crypto assets overseas. 

The revised law will require firms handling cross-border virtual asset transfers to register with the finance minister.

The rule covers businesses that move virtual assets between South Korea and foreign countries through sale, purchase, or exchange. Crypto exchanges, custody firms, and other transfer service providers fall under the new registration scope.

New bill creates transfer business category

The amendment creates a new legal category called a “virtual-asset transfer service.” This gives authorities a clearer way to track firms that support overseas crypto transfers, including stablecoin movements.

The government plans to bring these transfers into the foreign-exchange oversight system. Rep. Lim I-ja, chair of the National Assembly’s Strategy and Finance Committee, said the measure aims to build a virtual-asset monitoring system and support a sound foreign-exchange trading market.

Additionally, the new bill comes as South Korea prepares broader crypto compliance rules. Local industry groups have raised concerns about planned Travel Rule changes, including the removal of the current 1 million won threshold.

Under the current system, the Travel Rule applies to crypto transfers above 1 million won. Industry groups warned that wider checks could add delays, create return issues, and expose users to losses when prices move during verification.

Crypto tax deadline adds pressure

Related coverage also reported that South Korea plans to tax virtual asset gains from Jan. 1, 2027. Gains above 2.5 million won will face a combined 22% tax, made up of 20% income tax and 2% local income tax.

The National Tax Service is preparing guidance with major local exchanges, including Upbit, Bithumb, Coinone, Korbit, and Gopax. The first full filing period for affected investors is expected in May 2028, covering income earned in 2027.

South Korea has been moving toward cross-border crypto controls for more than a year. Reuters reported in 2024 that the finance ministry planned registration and monthly reporting rules for businesses handling overseas virtual asset trade.

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For more details:

The U.S. stock market is heating up in a way that suggests speculative mania. It matters to bitcoin as analysts have linked the cryptocurrency’s recent rally to increased risk-taking on Wall Street.

The overheating signals come from options tied to the S&P 500. These are derivative contracts that let traders bet on or hedge against moves in the index. A call option is a bet that the index will rise above a certain price within a set time. A put option does the opposite, offering protection from declines in the index.

On Wednesday, U.S. equity derivative exchanges registered a notional volume of $2.6 trillion in S&P 500 call options, according to data tracked by Zero Hedge. That amounted to 60% of total S&P 500 options activity. To put it into context, the notional amount nearly matched the total crypto market valuation of $2.73 trillion, which represents the combined capitalization of thousands of cryptocurrencies, with bitcoin leading the way.

In essence, the majority of market participants were positioned for upside through calls or bullish exposure.

On the surface, the implication for bitcoin is straightforward: it is bullish. A speculative surge in the S&P 500 could spill over into crypto, driving valuations higher. After all, double-digit gains in the S&P 500 and Nasdaq since early April played a big role in lifting bitcoin to $80,000 from under $70,000 a few weeks ago.

QCP Capital put it best early this week when BTC broke above $80,000: “After a solid April, BTC has begun May on firm footing, breaking above $80k for the first time since January 31. The move appears aligned with equities, reinforcing a broader trend as BTC’s correlation with U.S. stocks climbing back toward 2023 levels, signaling a renewed linkage with risk assets broadly.”

That said, the outsized investor bias for bullish exposure in the S&P 500 has raised alarm on social media, with several handles calling it a sign of an overcrowded trade. When too many investors lean in the same direction, in this case, heavily bullish, it leaves the market more vulnerable to sharp reversals in sentiment and positioning if price momentum stalls.

It’s not just social chatter either. Media reports have also cited Goldman Sachs analysts describing the market as being in a “semi-irrational chasing mode,” a phrase widely read as a play on the semiconductor-driven surge in equities.

If that’s not enough, the bullish momentum in the Nasdaq-listed PHLX Semiconductor Sector index (SOX), as measured by the 14-week relative strength index, is strongest since 1999, according to data source TradingView.

All of that is hinting at speculative frenzy. If it unwinds just as quickly, downside volatility could spill over into bitcoin and the broader crypto market, given their positive correlation. Let’s see how things unfold…

Some Revolut users saw bitcoin briefly display far below market prices on Friday, with app charts showing a sudden plunge before snapping back near prevailing levels, in what appeared to be either a pricing display issue or a liquidity-related dislocation.

Revolut’s official bitcoin page shows BTC briefly marked around £29,414 on Revolut’s one-day chart before returning near £58,600. Other social media posts claimed the app showed even lower prints, including near-zero prices as low as 2-cents, though CoinDesk could not independently verify those levels or confirm whether any trades were actually executed there.

The issue seemed isolated as no exchange on lists tracked by CoinGecko and CoinMarketCap showed any bitcoin price anomaly. It trades just over $79,000 as of Asian afternoon hours Friday.

Revolut had not responded to a CoinDesk request for comment by publication time.

Some users on X claimed buy orders executed during the disruption, but those reports remain unconfirmed. If trades were filled, Revolut would likely have to determine whether the prints reflected legitimate liquidity, stale quotes, a routing issue or a platform-side pricing error.

Flash moves in crypto apps can happen for several reasons. A display glitch can show an incorrect price without actual market execution. Thin liquidity on a specific venue or internal pricing rail can also produce sharp wicks if an order sweeps through a shallow book.

“Revolut operates with limited liquidity depth compared to a full exchange, and if a large enough sell order hit a thin book at the wrong moment, it could exhaust all available bids down to that level before the price recovered,” Ranveer Arora, co-founder and CEO of Altura, told CoinDesk in message as a possible explanation.

In other cases, market makers briefly pull quotes, spreads widen, and apps relying on aggregated feeds may display prices that do not match deeper global markets.

Crypto has seen similar isolated dislocations before. Bitcoin briefly printed far below market on Binance’s USD1 pair in December in a move tied to a thinly traded pair rather than broader selling. South Korean exchanges also saw sharp local wicks during the country’s martial-law shock in 2024 as activity surged and local order books briefly broke from global prices.

Nearly half of US voters are willing to cross party lines to get clear crypto regulation off the ground, while public support for the CLARITY Act could bring an electoral benefit for politicians, according to a new survey from HarrisX.

The poll included responses from 2,008 registered voters from May 1-4. It found that 52% of respondents support the CLARITY Act, with just 11% opposed. 

About half, or 47%, said they would consider voting for a candidate outside their preferred party if that candidate backed the bill and their own party did not. Among crypto users, that number jumped to 72%.

“Passing the CLARITY Act is a bipartisan, winning issue,” Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong said on X on Thursday. Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev added: “There’s real momentum now to finally get CLARITY across the finish line. One more small push and we establish the legislative foundation to ensure American dominance in digital finance.”

Source: HarrisX

The crypto industry has been waiting for the CLARITY Act to move through the US legislative process. It is expected to provide long-awaited regulatory clarity for crypto and could help the country become a major hub for crypto and digital finance.

The HarrisX poll also highlighted strong bipartisan support for the bill, with 55% of Democrats, 58% of Republicans and 42% of independents supporting it. Public support for the bill could also give senators a 20-point electoral advantage, it said

Related: Bitmine’s Tom Lee says ‘crypto spring’ has already begun

Some predict the CLARITY Act will receive additional markups as soon as next week.

Speaking at the Consensus 2026 crypto industry conference in Miami on Wednesday, Coinbase’s vice president of US policy, Kara Calvert, said her “prediction is that we have a markup next week” from the Senate Banking Committee.

Calvert stressed that bipartisan support will get the bill across the line, saying it needs at least 60 votes to pass the Senate, but she is unsure how things will unfold in the coming days.

“That means you need Democrats. You need a bipartisan bill, and we have all been working really hard to make sure that bipartisanship holds. I think the big question is, how do these votes shape up over the next few days?”

The timeline for a vote may still be months away, however. US Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand recently suggested additional markups are required before the bill can progress, predicting a Senate vote in August.

Magazine: Guide to the top and emerging global crypto hubs — Mid-2026 

Arbitrum delegates approved the release of $71 million in ether frozen after last month’s Lazarus-linked rsETH exploit, setting up a direct clash between decentralized governance and an active U.S. court fight over who owns the funds.

The on-chain vote, which closed Friday afternoon Hong Kong time with more than 90% support, authorizes the release of 30,765 ETH frozen by Arbitrum’s Security Council after the April 18 exploit, when attackers used unbacked rsETH tokens as collateral on Aave to borrow roughly $230 million in ETH from the protocol.

The funds are earmarked for a coordinated industry recovery effort led by Aave, KelpDAO, LayerZero, EtherFi and Compound, aimed at making affected users whole.

But the frozen ether is also at the center of an escalating legal dispute in Manhattan federal court.

Last week, attorney Charles Gerstein, representing families holding roughly $877 million in unpaid terrorism judgments against North Korea, served a restraining notice on Arbitrum DAO claiming the frozen ETH constitutes North Korean property because the exploit has been widely attributed to Pyongyang’s Lazarus Group.

That triggered an emergency legal fight.

Aave moved earlier this week to vacate the restraining notice, arguing the assets belong to innocent users, not North Korea, and warning that continued delays risk “cascading liquidations” and broader instability across decentralized finance markets.

Gerstein fired back Tuesday, arguing the exploit was not theft but fraud, meaning the attackers obtained legal title to the ETH by deceiving Aave’s lending markets with worthless collateral.

Friday’s governance vote does not mean the funds move immediately.

Because the measure was structured as a Constitutional AIP under Arbitrum’s governance framework, the transfer cannot be executed for at least eight days, giving the Manhattan court time to intervene before any ETH moves.

Arbitrum delegates were also not voting blindly to the legal risk. The proposal included indemnification protections for the Arbitrum Foundation, Offchain Labs, Security Council members, and governance delegates against certain claims arising from either freezing or releasing the ETH, underscoring how unusual the stakes around the vote had already become.

Speaking at Consensus Miami this week, Aave Labs Chief Legal and Policy Officer Linda Jeng said the exploit had already forced the protocol to rethink its risk framework, expanding collateral standards beyond financial metrics to include cybersecurity, interoperability, and technical architecture reviews.

Jeng, who worked as a regulator during the 2008 financial crisis, drew a contrast with traditional finance’s taxpayer-backed rescues.

“In the financial crisis, we had to bail out the banks,” she said. “Here, we came together as an ecosystem to bail ourselves out.”

Zcash will roll out quantum-recoverable wallets within a month and reach full post-quantum status within 12 to 18 months, Zcash Open Development Lab founder and CEO Josh Swihart told a Consensus Miami audience on Thursday in a session moderated by Solana infra firm Helius’s founder Mert Mumtaz.

A separate scaling track is targeting MasterCard- and Visa-scale throughput on a similar horizon.

The roadmap arrived during a ZEC rally that has lifted the token more than 110% over the past 30 days as prominent crypto fund Multicoin Capital disclosed a sizable ZEC investment and the privacy narrative caught on among investors, sentiment daata shows.

Swihart’s pitch was that Bitcoin no longer holds up as the cypherpunk-grade money it was meant to be. The asset works as an ETF wrapper and a store of value, he said, but as a peer-to-peer private payment system “it’s just fundamentally broken.”

Visible balances on a transparent ledger let governments seize what they can see, he argued, the same wealth-visibility critique Multicoin’s Tushar Jain leaned on this week when disclosing the fund’s purchases.

The user-side traction is running through the Electric Coin Company’s mobile wallet after an October integration with Near Intents opened cross-chain swaps from assets like BTC, SOL and USDC directly into shielded ZEC.

Near Intents lets a user state what they want, like turning USDC into ZEC, while specialized routers handle the multi-step trade across different blockchains in the background.

Roughly $600 million to $700 million has flowed through that route since launch, mostly to and from USD and USDC, Swihart said. Near’s broader intent-based system has processed close to $800 million in volume over the past 30 days alone, per Near Protocol data, with Ethereum, Solana and Zcash dominating the chain side.

A separate proposal to cut Zcash’s target block time from 75 seconds to 25 seconds is in active discussion on the project’s community forum, with bridges to Solana and Hyperliquid already live, Mumtaz noted.

Token-holder voting through Zashi is also slated, Swihart said, less as formal governance and more as an opinion layer feeding the project’s existing rough-consensus model.

For traders, the cleanest near-term test is whether quantum recoverability actually ships within Swihart’s stated month. The fail-safe is the shielded pool, which now sits at roughly 30% of circulating ZEC, an all-time high. If it keeps growing alongside price, the rally is being underwritten by adoption rather than speculation