Hedge funds built a $1.2 trillion Treasury trade on money they have to keep borrowing
Companies can own a mountain of US government debt without betting that bond prices will rise. Hedge funds buy Treasury securities and sell futures against them to collect a small pricing gap, borrowing most of the purchase money to make the return…
Leveraged funds’ Bitcoin futures shorts fall by 5,300 BTC-equivalent as longs shrink
Leveraged funds’ reported Bitcoin futures shorts fell by about 5,300 BTC-equivalent in the week to Sept. 29, narrowing their net short even as their aggregate long exposure shrank. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s latest futures-only figures,…
Wall Street arrived in NEAR just as a $4 billion-a-month app got hacked
NEAR’s new US ETF is facing its first stress test days after launch as a $3.8 million ecosystem exploit hit the token. NEAR fell about 10% to $4.86 after NEAR Intents disclosed a security incident involving its Omni deposit-and-withdrawal infrastructure.…
Standard Chartered says Ethena’s ENA could crush Bitcoin and Ethereum returns by 2028
Standard Chartered expects Ethena’s ENA token to rise about sevenfold by 2028, provided the protocol can rebuild its shrinking synthetic-dollar business. The bank initiated coverage of ENA with a $2 year-end 2028 target, up from about $0.28 currently. It…
Kalshi’s $40 billion growth story hits tough questions about its trading volume
Kalshi is ending a trader-volume incentive program nearly a year early as scrutiny of activity in its crypto markets intensifies. The prediction-market operator told the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) that its Volume Incentive Program will…
Robinhood Chain’s $1.5 billion boom is attracting memecoin rug factories
A second suspected memecoin rug factory has surfaced on Robinhood Chain as the fast-growing network attracts increasingly coordinated scam activity. On Sept. 28, blockchain security firm GoPlus said it identified a high-risk operation behind hundreds of…
Strategy makes first back-to-back Bitcoin buys since June as accumulation picks up
Michael Saylor-led Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) has made back-to-back weekly Bitcoin purchases for the first time since June, rebuilding its holdings after selling some of the cryptocurrency earlier this quarter. On Sept. 28, the company said…
Bitcoin survives a 5.2% Treasury shock as traders slash $1.7 billion in leverage
Bitcoin is holding near $84,000 even as a historic US bond selloff pushes Treasury yields to decades-high levels. The benchmark 10-year Treasury yield climbed to 5.22%, extending a move that has taken borrowing costs to their highest level since 2007.…
XRP volume explodes to $7.4B, and a massive CME short squeeze is blamed
XRP registered an intraday high of $1.60 on Sept. 22, with roughly $7.4 billion in reported volume. The move was strong, but the latest public data on regulated futures showed different positioning shifts across venues. The Commodity Futures Trading…
Offshore Bitcoin futures crash 97% as traders abandon traditional risk
A strange thing has happened to Bitcoin’s derivatives market over the past five years. The market is larger, institutions play a much bigger role, exchanges offer more sophisticated products, and traders have become far better at moving risk…