Bitcoin Touches $86,000 as Fed Holds Interest Rates Steady

Bitcoin Touches $86,000 as Fed Holds Interest Rates Steady

The Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged at 4.25%-4.50% while cutting economic growth projections and raising inflation expectations. Chairman Jerome Powell warned that Trump’s tariffs could prolong inflation, stating, "It is going to be very difficult to have a precise assessment of how much of inflation is coming from tariffs."

Bitcoin surged to $86,000, shaking off hawkish Fed sentiment, with Ethereum and Solana also climbing. Traders remain divided, with Fed futures showing a 51% chance of a June rate cut (according to CME FedWatch), while the Fed’s dot plot suggests only two cuts in 2025, down from prior forecasts.

The Hyperliquid whale, infamous for massive BTC shorts that earned him $9.4 million, flipped long with 40x leverage, pushing a position above $44 million. Other traders, watching Fed uncertainty and rising inflation fears, have piled into risk assets, driving crypto’s latest rally.

Despite short-term gains, Powell emphasized inflation remains a concern, citing a higher-than-expected PCE forecast of 2.8%. Stocks, gold, and crypto all posted gains, suggesting investors see rate cuts coming despite the Fed’s cautious stance.

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Ripple CEO: SEC Lawsuit Is Over, XRP Surges 11%

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse announced on Wednesday that the company’s legal battle with the SEC has ended, bringing an end to four years of litigation. In 2020, the SEC sued Ripple, alleging it raised $1.3 billion through unregistered XRP sales, but a 2023 ruling determined programmatic sales were not securities violations. Following the announcement, XRP’s price jumped over 11%, reaching $2.50.

The SEC’s decision to drop its appeal follows recent cases dismissed against Coinbase and Kraken under the new Trump administration. In August 2023, Ripple was fined $125 million, and in October, the SEC argued that the court ruling contradicted Supreme Court precedent. While the SEC must still officially vote to dismiss the appeal, the agency controls the timeline for finalization.

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Raydium to Launch Memecoin Platform Competing With Pump

Raydium, one of Solana's leading decentralized exchange, is reportedly developing a memecoin launchpad to compete with PumpFun, a platform that has driven 35% of Raydium’s revenue since early 2024. The decision follows Pump’s recent testing of a custom-built automated market maker (AMM), potentially removing Raydium from its trading process.

PumpFun currently transfers tokens to Raydium once they hit a $69,000 market cap, ensuring liquidity for secondary market trading. In response, Raydium’s new “LaunchLab” will use a similar bonding curve while offering third-party UI fee customization and direct access to its liquidity pools. The project has reportedly been in development for months and aims to protect Raydium’s market position.

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Ethereum Devs to Shut Down Holesky Testnet in September

Ethereum core developers will end support for the Holesky testnet in September 2025, citing validator congestion and inefficiencies. Launched in September 2023, Holesky was intended as a staking and infrastructure testnet, but recent Pectra upgrade testing exposed critical issues that led to disruptions and delayed validator exits.

To replace Holesky, Ethereum devs have introduced Hoodi, a new testnet that will activate the Pectra upgrade on March 26 ahead of an expected mainnet upgrade in Q2 2025. Holesky will remain temporarily operational for core developer testing, including gas limit increases and stress tests. From now on, staking operators and infrastructure providers should use Hoodi for validator testing, the foundation added.

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Data of the Day

Solana’s new CME futures launched Monday, generating $12.3 million in daily volume and $7.8 million in open interest, significantly lower than Bitcoin ($102.7M) and Ethereum ($31M) on their first days. K33 Research notes, however, that when adjusted for market cap, Solana’s debut aligns more closely with BTC and ETH launches.

Market conditions played a role in SOL’s underwhelming futures launch, as BTC and ETH futures debuted during bull markets, while SOL launched amid bearish sentiment and waning memecoin activity. Despite this, FalconX’s Joshua Lim sees institutional demand growing, with the CME product providing new risk management tools for hedge funds and ETF issuers exploring Solana exposure.

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More Breaking News

• EOS Network will rebrand to Vaulta as part of a strategic move toward Web3 banking, with a new token swap scheduled for May-end.
• Justin Sun staked $100 million in Ethereum, signaling institutional confidence as analysts say ETH has broken its downtrend for a bullish cycle.
• Cosmos' Interchain Foundation has open-sourced Evmos, making it the native EVM framework for its ecosystem and enhancing Ethereum compatibility.
• Bitcoin ETFs rebounded with $500M in inflows over three days, led by BlackRock, ARK, and Fidelity as BTC price stabilized above $84,000.
• Ethereum’s stablecoin dominance surged, with USDC and USDT driving $850B in volume, reinforcing Ethereum as the leading digital dollar settlement layer.
• Coinbase launched KYC-verified liquidity pools for DeFi swaps, aiming to reduce counterparty risk for both institutional and retail traders.
• Chainlink’s Sergey Nazarov urged the US to establish a competitive moat around tokenized real-world assets to maintain financial dominance.
• AiXBT's token dropped 20% after its AI influencer bot was hacked, losing $100K in Ethereum to an exploit via its Simulacrum wallet.

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