AI-driven growth highlights the critical role of technology in economic expansion, potentially reshaping investment strategies and policy focus.
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The White House's block on Mythos expansion underscores the U.S.'s strategic focus on regulating AI for national security amid global tech rivalry.
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Bitcoin was trading at $75,900 on Wednesday after the Federal Reserve’s latest rate decision sent a chill through crypto markets, capping three straight days of withdrawals from US spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds that together erased more than $490 million. Related Reading: Trump’s Bitcoin Reserve Could Be Near As White House Signals Major Update Fidelity And BlackRock Lead The Exodus Fidelity’s FBTC took the heaviest hit, shedding $191 million over the period. BlackRock’s IBIT — the largest spot Bitcoin ETF by assets under management — wasn’t far behind, with close to $167 million flowing out. Ark Invest’s ARKB recorded another $73.3 million in withdrawals. The selling was spread across the week: Monday saw the worst single-day figure at $263 million, followed by $89.7 million on Tuesday, and $137.6 million on Wednesday — the day the Fed announced its decision. The outflows came right on the heels of a strong stretch. According to reports, Bitcoin ETFs had pulled in steady money for nine consecutive days before the streak snapped, with total inflows during that run reaching a little over $2 billion. Last week alone brought in almost $824 million. The reversal was sharp. Fed Holds Firm, Markets Respond The Federal Reserve kept its benchmark rate unchanged at 3.50%–3.75% for the third meeting in a row. Fed Chair Jerome Powell gave no hint of cuts ahead. No softer tone on inflation. No signal of easier financial conditions on the horizon. That message landed hard on risk assets, and Bitcoin felt it quickly. At the same time, rising tensions between the US and Iran added to the unease. Reports indicate that US President Donald Trump warned the Strait of Hormuz could be blocked if Iran does not stand down. Global markets were already on edge, and that kind of geopolitical pressure tends to push investors toward the exits. Meanwhile, fear has returned to the crypto market, with the Crypto Fear and Greed Index falling back into the “Fear” zone as investors grow cautious amid macro uncertainty and continued Bitcoin ETF outflows. What Comes Next For Bitcoin Bitcoin had bounced back from a low near $74,000 earlier in the month, briefly pushing toward $80,000 before this week’s pullback. With ETF outflows continuing, that $75,000 level is again in focus as a potential support test. Related Reading: Bitcoin Bull Run Brewing: ATH In Sight By Late 2026: Analyst Data shows Bitcoin dropped about 3% following the Fed’s announcement. Some traders still expect a recovery toward the $85,000–$88,000 range in May, though that outlook depends heavily on whether macro conditions hold steady. For now, the momentum that built over nine days of inflows has stalled. The question is whether it restarts — or fades further. Featured image from Pexels, chart from TradingView
The closure exacerbates global supply chain vulnerabilities, highlighting the geopolitical risks to critical energy and pharmaceutical routes.
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The deployment signifies a deepening military alliance in the Middle East, potentially escalating regional tensions and impacting global diplomacy.
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Economic resilience may delay rate cuts as the Fed prioritizes inflation control, impacting future monetary policy and market expectations.
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Apple's revenue surge amid chip shortages may shift competitive dynamics, challenging NVIDIA's market cap dominance and affecting tech leadership.
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Trump's nomination highlights shifting global diplomatic dynamics, potentially influencing future international peace efforts and Nobel considerations.
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Nvidia's potential market cap lead over Apple highlights shifting tech dynamics and investor sentiment amid evolving global trade tensions.
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Diminished trust and heightened tensions could hinder diplomatic progress and potentially drive up oil prices amid geopolitical instability.
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Alphabet's valuation boost highlights its competitive edge in tech, potentially reshaping market leadership dynamics by 2026.
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Hezbollah's drone threat complicates IDF's strategic decisions, potentially prolonging Israeli military presence and affecting regional stability.
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The shutdown's end may prompt future legislative battles over immigration funding, impacting political dynamics and market stability.
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The endorsement of Bitcoin as a strategic tool may enhance its geopolitical significance, potentially influencing global economic power dynamics.
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Trump's criticism of media coverage may further polarize public opinion, complicating diplomatic efforts and impacting geopolitical stability.
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The FCC's focus on DEI over individual remarks may shift media scrutiny towards corporate policies, impacting industry compliance standards.
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Iran's control over the Strait of Hormuz could reshape geopolitical alliances, affecting global energy markets and regional power dynamics.
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The Senate agreed unanimously to revise its rules to ban members and their staffs from wagers on prediction markets platforms.
The US's hypersonic missile deployment could escalate regional tensions, impacting geopolitical stability and military strategies globally.
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Market confidence in oil price resilience suggests temporary geopolitical and SPR impacts, highlighting ongoing uncertainty in global dynamics.
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Legal experts' skepticism may lead to case dismissal, impacting market confidence and highlighting potential flaws in legal proceedings.
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Apple's strategic shift to high-margin services may bolster its long-term valuation, potentially reducing Nvidia's market cap dominance chances.
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Morgan Stanley’s Amy Oldenburg said a future move by major banks to put Bitcoin on their balance sheets is “not totally out of the question,” pointing to regulatory progress while warning that capital rules and global supervisory alignment still matter. Speaking during a Bitcoin 2026 conference panel, Oldenburg was asked what it would take for a bank like Morgan Stanley, or another regulated financial institution, to make the leap from offering Bitcoin exposure to actually holding Bitcoin as a treasury asset. “Bitcoin on the balance sheet,” she said, pausing on the premise. “You know, I think if we continue to see the progress that we’ve made over the last 16 months or so in regulatory, that that’s something that you may see going forward. It’s not totally out of the question.” Morgan Stanley And Bitcoin? That answer is notable less because it signals an imminent move and more because it frames the idea as procedurally possible. For years, the bank balance sheet question has sat on the far end of institutional Bitcoin adoption: beyond ETFs, beyond custody, beyond client access, and into the realm of prudential capital, examiner expectations, accounting, liquidity planning and board-level risk appetite. Oldenburg’s caveat was that the constraint is not a single rule. She pointed first to SAB 121, the SEC accounting guidance that had made it more difficult for banks to custody crypto assets at scale before its rollback changed part of the equation. But she immediately widened the lens. Related Reading: Bitcoin To $125,000: Arthur Hayes Says The Setup Is Turning Bullish “I think the other thing too is we were talking about SAB 121 rolling back on the capital treatment, but it’s not just that that holds us back,” she said. “It’s Fed guidance, it’s Basel guidance. When you’re a large G-sub bank, it’s not just one agency that you report to.” That is the core of the issue for a firm like Morgan Stanley. A global systemically important bank does not evaluate Bitcoin only through a market-risk lens. It has to satisfy multiple regulators, capital frameworks and jurisdictional expectations at once. Oldenburg said large banks have “many oversight groups” to attend to and need “a little bit more alignment across the board with some of those agencies.” The Backdrop The Basel point is especially important. The Basel Committee’s cryptoasset standard places the most conservative treatment on unbacked crypto assets such as Bitcoin, and industry advocates have argued that the 1,250% risk-weight treatment effectively makes direct bank balance-sheet exposure uneconomic. The Basel Committee said in February 2026 that it had expedited a targeted review of its prudential standard for banks’ cryptoasset exposures, with an update expected later in the year. The Bitcoin Policy Institute has been trying to push that debate into the US implementation process. In March, the group said it planned to review and comment on the Federal Reserve’s coming Basel proposal, arguing that the current treatment discourages banks from holding or servicing Bitcoin because of the punitive risk weight. Related Reading: Analyst Reveals Bitcoin Big Picture, Predicts 50% Crash By EOY The US side has also been moving, though not in a straight line toward bank-owned Bitcoin. In April 2025, the Federal Reserve withdrew earlier guidance tied to banks’ crypto-asset and dollar-token activities, saying the move would keep expectations aligned with evolving risks and support innovation in the banking system. The FDIC and OCC also moved away from prior-approval style frameworks for permissible crypto activity, while maintaining that banks still need sound risk management. More recently, US banking agencies clarified that eligible tokenized securities should generally receive the same capital treatment as their non-tokenized equivalents, describing the capital rule as technology neutral. That clarification does not solve Bitcoin’s balance-sheet treatment, because Bitcoin is not a tokenized version of a traditional security. But it does show regulators separating blockchain rails from asset risk, rather than treating every digital-asset exposure as the same category. That distinction helps explain Oldenburg’s answer. The path for a bank to hold Bitcoin is not simply “regulators become more pro-crypto.” The first point is Basel: if Bitcoin remains subject to the most punitive capital treatment, a G-SIB has little economic incentive to warehouse it as a treasury asset, even if client demand is clear. The second point is Federal Reserve supervision: even after recent rollbacks, large banks still need a coherent examiner framework that tells them how Bitcoin exposure will be judged across safety and soundness, liquidity, operational risk and capital planning. At press time, BTC traded at $1.3716. Featured image created with DALL.E, chart from TradingView.com
Strong earnings boost market confidence, potentially stabilizing risk assets despite geopolitical tensions and uncertain monetary policies.
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A new crypto crime report by TRM Labs paints a stark picture of how North Korean hacking groups have been operating in 2026 so far. Through April, they were responsible for 76% of all losses tied to crypto hacks, but the report emphasizes that this outcome wasn’t driven by a steady stream of attacks. Instead, the massive share of stolen value comes down to just two incidents whose combined haul—about $577 million—far outweighed everything else that year. Two Crypto Hacks, Nearly $600M Stolen The first breach highlighted by TRM Labs took place on April 1: the Drift Protocol hack. The report puts the value stolen at $285 million. The second incident followed on April 18, when the KelpDAO bridge exploit reportedly resulted in $292 million in losses. Related Reading: Hyperliquid Jumps Into The Betting Boom With New ‘Outcome Tokens’ For Real-World Events What’s striking is that these two events account for only about 3% of the total number of crypto incidents in 2026 during that period. Yet together, they represent 76% of the stolen value, underlining a pattern the report says has defined North Korea’s approach across most years since 2017—relatively few attacks, but extremely outsized payouts. The report also charts how North Korea’s share of crypto hack losses has grown over time. It notes that the figure was under 10% in 2020 and 2021, then rose to 22% in 2022, 37% in 2023, 39% in 2024, and 64% in 2025. The 76% figure through April 2026 is described as the highest sustained share on record, suggesting that the pattern seen in recent years is not just continuing, but accelerating. April Sets New Record Of Incidents TRM Labs details how the Drift Protocol hack was carried out, focusing on the time and preparation that preceded the actual drain. The crypto hack involved about three weeks of pre-attack staging. It also included months of social engineering intended to compromise protocol signers. Once the attackers were in position, the full drain reportedly took place in roughly 12 minutes, showing how planning can turn into rapid theft at the moment of execution. Related Reading: A Stealth Force In Derivatives—Why Bitcoin Can’t Punch Past $80,000 Yet The KelpDAO hack, dated April 18, followed a very different technical path. According to TRM Labs’ crypto crime report, the exploit centered on a flaw in a single-verifier design used in a LayerZero bridge. After the breach, the attackers moved quickly into laundering: they routed proceeds through THORChain after more than $75 million was frozen on the Arbitrum blockchain (ARB). The findings align with another data point from the broader crypto ecosystem. DeFiLlama, which tracks activity and incidents in decentralized finance (DeFi), flagged April as the most-hacked month in crypto history by number of incidents. Featured image created with OpenArt, chart from TradingView.com
Reform UK's potential gains could intensify political pressure on Starmer, possibly affecting Labour's stability and future leadership dynamics.
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The US's hardening stance on Iran could escalate geopolitical tensions, impacting global oil markets and straining international relations.
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Nvidia's stock surge highlights the transformative impact of AI on global markets, with potential volatility from geopolitical and economic factors.
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Rubio's stance exacerbates US-Iran tensions, hindering diplomatic progress and impacting global oil markets amid geopolitical uncertainty.
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The blockade exacerbates global trade disruptions, heightens geopolitical tensions, and impacts oil markets, with no resolution in sight.
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