Good Morning,

Here's a quick preview of today’s content: Trump claims he’s ended Biden’s war against crypto, the average amount lost in $LIBRA is shocking, Microsoft announced a new quantum chip that isn’t solid, liquid, or gas (uhmm what?), leveraged Bitcoin long positions skyrocket, CoinDesk drops two more market indices, crypto from Phemex hack is on the move, and so much more.

Almost Friday. Let’s dive in.

Market Snapshot

As of 02/19/2025. Data per CoinMarketCap.

  • Demand for Bitcoin, which picked up in late 2024 amid optimism over easing regulatory headwinds on Trump's election win, looks to be possibly retreating

    • CryptoQuant data shows that demand growth slumped to 70,000 BTC recently from the 279,000 BTC peak on December 4th (see chart of the day below)

    • Inflows to spot BTC ETFs, a typical occurrence during bitcoin’s previous rallies, have disappeared, booking regular net outflows over the past two weeks after previously seeing as much as 18,000 BTC in daily purchases in November and December

Market Predictions

  • Traders on Kalshi are currently predicting whether if congestion pricing will stay in NYC after Trump’s recent tweet about it “being dead”

  • You can trade this market by checking out Kalshi

  • Get a $20 bonus when you deposit $100 or more with code “LIT” on signup

Headline Roundup
The major headlines driving crypto market

  • Trump announces that he ended Joe Biden’s war on “Bitcoin and crypto” – see full video of statement here

  • Nigeria files an $81.5B lawsuit against Binance (CT) 

  • Worth taking a look: NEOS Investments announced a 29.5% distribution yield for their Bitcoin High Income ETF, BTCI *

  • Over 13K investors in the LIBRA memecoin lost a combined $251M (CT) 

  • The SEC abandoned its court appeal over a case it lost to expand the definition of a dealer for crypto (CT)

  • Binance.US restores dollar-based services for the first time in two years (BBG) 

  • Coinbase requests Congress to grant the CFTC full authority over spot crypto markets (CT) 

  • JPMorgan Chase launching new Zelle restrictions after Chase, Bank of America and Wells Fargo Customers Lose $456M To scams in one year (DH)

  • Michael Saylor’s Strategy plans to raise $2B via convertible debt to acquire more Bitcoin (BBG) 

  • Dave Portnoy pumps and dumps another Sol meme coin 'GREED' that has swiftly gone to zero (DC)

  • Bitcoin financial services company Fold begins trading on the Nasdaq exchange (DC) 

  • Microsoft unveiled Majorana 1, a quantum chip powered by an exotic state of matter that's neither liquid, solid, nor gas (DC)

  • Leveraged Bitcoin long positions soar to $5.1B on Bitfinex (CT) 

  • Trump’s first month in office has brought sweeping changes to crypto (CT) 

  • Mark Cuban shelves plans for a memecoin launch (DC) 

  • The SEC acknowledges Canary Capital’s XRP ETF filing (TB) 

  • RWA tokenization platform Mantra Finance secures a virtual asset service provider license from Dubai (CT) 

  • Ethereum transaction fees plummet 70% to their lowest levels since 2020 (TB) 

  • The first ever Hashdex Nasdaq XRP ETF is approved to trade in Brazil (DC) 

  • ChainGPT integrates with Hedera for AI driven solutions (OCT)

  • Ethereum transaction fees plummet 70%, hitting lowest levels since 2020 (TB)

  • IRS to lay off 6,000 employees today (NYT)

M&A Announcements

  • RWA pioneer CryptoAutos acquires a $20M fleet of vehicles in Dubai (CT)

Launches

  • Secondary token markets SecondSwap launches its mainnet on Ethereum (CD) 

  • CoinDesk Indices launches two index products tracking the price gyrations of memecoins (CD) 

  • Crypto sentiment analytics platform Kaito AI prepares for token launch (BW)

  • Monad Blockchain launches public testnets with a mainnet launch slated for late 2025 (BKL)

Venture Capital

  • Cygnus Finance raises $20M in a pre-seed funding round led by OKX Ventures and Optimism (CI)

  • Universal, a crypto project building a new wrapped token standard, raises a $9M funding round led by a16z (TB) 

  • Fluent Labs raises $8M in a seed and extended funding round led by Polychain Capital (NG)

  • Rho Labs, a developer of Rho Protocol, raises $4M in a seed round led by CoinFund (P)

  • Fomo raises $2M in an angel pre-seed round (FF)

Regulation

  • Montana becomes the fourth state to advance a Bitcoin reserve bill to the House (CT) 

  • Director of Wyoming Stable Token Commission believes the state treasury should run on the blockchain (CT)

  • Hong Kong introduces a new roadmap to position the city as a global crypto hub (CT) 

  • 75 Blockchain Association members sent congress a letter in support of repealing a defi-killing broker rule from the Biden administration (X)

Cybersecurity

  • Millions worth of stolen crypto from January’s $85M Phemex exploit are moved to crypto mixer Tornado Cash (TB) 

  • Abstract’s Cardex exploit stole $400K worth of Ether across 9,000 wallets (TB) 

  • Dior Official Coin crashes 90% after it’s revealed to be a fake memecoin promoted by a hacker on Dior's official Instagram account (CN)

Extra Reads

Chart of the Day

CryptoQuant’s Inter-exchange Flow Pulse, which tracks BTC movement between exchanges, also signals weakness with BTC transfers to Coinbase – a gauge of U.S. spot demand – declining below its 90-day moving average

Meme Dump

Pls send us crypto memes to be featured in the newsletter 🤝

*NEOS Investments is a paid sponsor for this newsletter.

🐦 Follow Us: Visit our X account for constant updates on all things web3, DeFi, and crypto.

💵 Litquidity Ventures: Accredited investors & qualified purchasers within the Litquidity community can gain access to alternative investments such as venture, late-stage growth, and private equity through Litquidity Ventures. Interested? Fill out this form.

☎️ Book a call with Lit: Want to pick Litquidity’s brain on business advice, insights, or just chat to say what’s up? Buy his time here.

📧 Launch your own newsletter: Have great content ideas and looking to launch your own publication? We highly recommend Beehiiv to get started.