Good Morning,

Here's a quick preview of today’s content: Kraken offers TradFi products putting Robinhood and Coinbase on alert, OM token crashes over night but the drama doesn’t end there, Mechanism Capital founder doubles his insane long Bitcoin bet, Metaplanet and Strategy continue to do what they do best, Canada to have new crypto ETFs launch this week, a second roundtable for industry execs was recently had, and so much more below.

Feeling Bullish 🐂 Let’s dive in.

Market Snapshot

• BTC options show near-term caution with risk reversals favoring puts until June, but mid-term sentiment is turning bullish as $100K call options now lead with $1.2B in open interest

  • Traders are optimistic the worst of tariff-related sell-offs is over, especially with the Fed ready to stabilize markets if needed

  • Prominent financial figures warn of a potential U.S. recession by 2025, with betting markets placing 40%-60% odds

• Crypto majors tracked by the broad-based CoinDesk 20 slid nearly -2%, data shows, with DOGE leading losses. Solana’s SOL, tron (TRX) and Cardano’s ADA lost as much as -2.5%, BNB Chain’s BNB and xrp (XRP) were little changed as bitcoin clung to the $85,000 level

• Mantra's OM token surged +20% after a dramatic sell-off (more on that later), while VeThor's VTHO rose +37% with UFC CEO Dana White joining as a strategic advisor

Headline Roundup
^{_{The major headlines driving crypto markets}}

• Mantra's OM token plunged over -90% in a matter of hours from around $6 to $0.45 - the full breakdown of the "reckless liquidations" controversy here

• Drama cont. - Mantra CEO denies insider OM token dump, says Arkham ‘mislabeled’ wallets (CT)

• Kraken adds commission-free trading for 11,000+ stocks and ETFs (DT)

• Binance and KuCoin go down due to AWS data center outage (CT)

• Andrew Kang doubles down on Bitcoin long position with another $100M bet, a second to one just days prior (CT)

• The US Department of Homeland Security is probing crypto bank Anchorage Digital for financial crimes (TB)

• JPMorgan rolls out GBP blockchain payments, extending EUR and USD offerings (TB)

• US Director of Digital Assets says U.S. could buy bitcoin via tariff revenue (CT)

• SEC decision on staking for Grayscale Ethereum ETF delayed until June 1 (DT)

• Tether, issuer of stablecoin USDT, will provide direct resources to support bitcoin mining pool Ocean (DT)

• Michael Saylor’s Strategy buys another $286M worth of Bitcoin according to public filing (CS)

• Metaplanet becomes 10th largest public holder with latest 319 BTC purchase (CD)

• Solana stablecoins are still near all-time highs around $12.1B market cap (BW)

• CoinShares’ latest fund flow report reveals third consecutive week of outflows for crypto investment products, totaling $795M (BS)

• Phantom wallet hit with $3.1M lawsuit for alleged security vulnerability tied to $500k memecoin loss (DT)

• European crypto firms must meet MiCA licensing rules to advertise on Google (CD)

• South Korea pushes Apple to remove 14 unregistered crypto apps amid compliance drive (TB)

Venture Capital

• ZenMEV announces $140M strategic investment received from VentureX (X)

• Cypress Hill gives crypto-backed loan provider APX Lending access to $20M accordion facility (CD)

• Layer-2 startup OpenZK announces $6M seed funding from institutional investors like Animoca Brands, Coinstore, and others (AI)

• Variant discloses lead investment in pre-seed round for AI startup Plastic Labs (VF)

• 1kx makes strategic investment into blockchain game developer Gunzilla Games (CC)

• Web3 video content startup Toji gets backing from A16Z CSX (BG)

Launches

• Spot Solana ETFs to launch in Canada this week (CT)

Regulation

• Industry executives share ‘wish list’ for SEC crypto regulations at second roundtable (BW)

• South Korea blocks 14 crypto exchange apps in the Apple app store including KuCoin and MEXC (CD)

• Binance reportedly met with government officials to discuss relaxed regulation against the exchange (PY)

Cybersecurity

• New perpetual trading platform backed by Binance KiloEx hit by $7M exploit across 3 chains (BiC)

• Ethereum L2 chain Abstract has endorsed Bigcoin game which has been accused of a Ponzi scheme (BW)

• Fake applications on cheap Android’s exposed to pre-installed crypto stealing malware (HR)

Extra Reads

• Lucas Matheson, CEO of Coinbase Canada, is advocating for increased blockchain adoption

  Here’s why Canada needs a blockchain strategy ahead of the April 28, 2025 election

Chart of the Day

Mantra, $OM, under fire as price suddenly drops 93% 

Meme Dump

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