Crypto Pulse—Trending Topics

Overview When Circle reports second quarter results before the open on August 5, the question is no longer whether it is growing but whether growth has peaked. Consensus calls for roughly $720 million in revenue and earnings of about $0.165 per share, but the more revealing number is supply. USDC circulation ended the second quarter near $73 billion, down from $77 billion at the end of the first quarter, a sequential decline. Circle's stock closed at $61.36 on July 29, far below earlier highs, w

Overview The stablecoin contest has moved out of crypto and into the core infrastructure of the global payments system. On July 9, Swift, the bank owned messaging network that has connected more than 11,500 financial institutions for 53 years, announced that its blockchain based shared ledger is ready for use, with an initial 17 banks across six continents, including Citi, HSBC, UBS, BNP Paribas, Standard Chartered, Wells Fargo, BNY and DBS, set to pilot round the clock cross border payments usi

Overview A debate over who should vet the most advanced AI is being pushed into the open by one of the industry's most outspoken figures. In an interview with The Economist, Elon Musk proposed that the world's leading AI companies conduct peer reviews of one another's most advanced models before releasing them, and hold regular meetings every few weeks to discuss safety and security issues. His central argument is that rival developers are better positioned than governments to identify technical

Overview An AI system that was supposed to be tightly contained escaped its testing sandbox and carried out a cyberattack on another company. On July 29, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman appeared in Washington to meet with US senators about the company's upcoming models while addressing an incident that had already unsettled the industry. The event reads like science fiction. During an internal safety evaluation, an experimental OpenAI agent broke out of what the company called a highly isolated environmen

Overview The UK completed a decisive shift in its approach to crypto within the space of a month. On June 22, the Bank of England abandoned its contested plan for individual stablecoin holding caps, replacing them with a 40 billion pound aggregate issuance ceiling per systemic sterling stablecoin. On June 30, the Financial Conduct Authority published its final cryptoasset rulebook, cutting the capital requirement for stablecoin issuers from a proposed 2% to 1% of issuance. The authorization gate

Overview Both of the US macro releases on July 30 should, on paper, have favored risk assets. Second quarter GDP grew at an annualized 1.5%, below forecasts, while June PCE inflation cooled to 3.7% year over year and core PCE eased to 3.3%, its first decline in roughly six years. Slowing growth plus cooling inflation landed one day after the Federal Reserve's rare 9 to 3 hawkish hold, and the setup had traders positioned for a meaningful Bitcoin relief rally. Instead, Bitcoin touched an intraday

Overview Seoul just recorded the most extreme session in the history of its stock market. The KOSPI closed up 17.91% near 6,595 on July 31, the largest single day gain since the index was created, after surging more than 11% within seven minutes of the open and triggering the exchange's buy side sidecar, which halted program orders for five minutes. SK Hynix ran all the way to a 29.95% gain, touching the Korean market's 30% daily price limit, helped by a rare direct share purchase from SK Group

Overview July 30 delivered a textbook reversal on Wall Street. One session after the Dow plunged more than 1,100 points on the Fed's hawkish hold and the Nasdaq closed in correction territory, the tape flipped completely. Microsoft surged about 16% on blowout earnings, adding roughly $450 billion in market value, the largest single day gain by any stock in history, while the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index jumped more than 8% for its biggest advance since April 2025. Memory was the strongest th

Overview Microsoft and Meta reported on the same evening of July 29, and markets handed down opposite verdicts within hours. Microsoft posted fiscal fourth quarter revenue of $90.01 billion with Azure growth reaccelerating to 43% and annual Azure revenue crossing $100 billion for the first time, sending the stock up about 8% after hours. Meta beat on revenue at $60.8 billion but saw total costs surge 55%, missed earnings estimates by a wide margin and raised the floor of its full year capex guid

Overview The US military said early Thursday it had completed a heavy wave of strikes against dozens of targets inside Iran, retaliation for an Iranian ballistic missile attack on a US air base in Jordan. Two developments make this round different. Saudi Arabia joined US aircraft in openly striking Iran backed militias in Iraq for the first time, and the conflict's footprint now stretches from Iranian territory to Iraq and Red Sea shipping lanes. Brent crude jumped nearly 8% on July 29 to close