Cryptoccino — Friday 25 September 2026

Bitcoin retreats from eight-month highs as bond yields breach 2007 levels. BTC slid to around $83,300 after touching a high near $87,400 last week, with the 10-year Treasury yield hitting its highest point since 2007 and traders now pricing in four Fed rate hikes by June 2027. Risk appetite compressed across crypto broadly, with altcoins underperforming. The macro backdrop is shifting the near-term narrative back toward tightening, regardless of crypto-specific tailwinds. coindesk decrypt bloomberg_crypto

JPMorgan flags $85,000 as a key production-cost threshold for Bitcoin miners. Analysts at JPMorgan said a sustained move above their estimated $85,000 all-in production cost could meaningfully reduce miner selling pressure. With BTC currently below that level, the bank implies sell-side supply from miners remains elevated. The note adds a structural dimension to the current pullback beyond just macro. theblock

ONDO surges over 18% on launch of BlackRock-backed onchain portfolio tokens. Ondo Finance released three tokenised portfolio products built on model strategies developed by BlackRock, sending ONDO sharply higher. The launch is notable partly because it arrives amid a cloud over the project after founder Nathan Allman’s death and reports of an attempted sale of the firm. Market reaction suggests investors are reading the product momentum as continuity rather than distress. theblock cryptobriefing

Glassnode confirms the first Bitcoin bear market cycle that never touched realised price. The analytics firm identified that the recent bear phase was unique in that BTC held above its realised price throughout, a first in the asset’s history. The data aligns with a broader thesis that successive cycles are seeing shallower drawdowns as the holder base matures and institutional floors deepen. Whether that structural support survives a sustained rate-hike cycle remains untested. cryptobriefing coindesk

ARK Invest tokenises its $1.3 billion venture fund via Securitize on Ethereum. The ARK Venture Fund, which holds positions in OpenAI, Anthropic and Stripe, will now be accessible onchain through Securitize’s infrastructure. It is one of the larger venture-fund tokenisations attempted to date and gives qualified investors secondary-market optionality they did not previously have. The move is a significant data point for the feasibility of bringing illiquid private-market exposure onchain at scale. theblock coindesk

UK’s largest banks settle the first interbank tokenised-deposit transactions. Major British lenders completed real interbank transfers using tokenised deposits, a milestone in live wholesale settlement rather than a pilot or proof of concept. IBM separately confirmed it has connected its Digital Asset Haven clients to Swift’s shared ledger for the same class of transactions, signalling convergence on infrastructure standards. The two announcements together point to tokenised deposits moving from experiment to operational plumbing. coindesk theblock

Bullish, Alpaca and Apex Fintech form a coalition to advance issuer-backed tokenised equities. The three firms are aligning to push a model where equity tokens are backed directly by the issuing company rather than via a third-party custodian, a structural distinction they argue closes the trust gap that has kept tokenised stocks marginal. The move comes as the broader industry debates whether broker-backed or issuer-backed structures will win regulatory acceptance first. Timing is deliberate, with both the SEC and CFTC actively shaping frameworks. coindesk

Solana Foundation recruits Binance’s global CMO and a Polygon Labs payments lead. Rachel Conlan joins as chief strategy officer, tasked with institutional adoption, while Jamal Raees takes the newly created GM of payments role. Both hires arrive as Solana Foundation escalates its push into tokenised finance and real-world payment rails. The moves follow recent RWA-focused protocol wins on Solana and suggest the Foundation is building out an enterprise-facing layer beneath the consumer ecosystem. theblock decrypt coindesk

Bitget breach full summary. See lead. $352 million drained from hot and cold wallets across multiple chains, withdrawals suspended, receiving address actively swapping. coindesk

Duelbits crypto casino drained for $7 million via hot wallet compromise. The platform went offline after attackers emptied its hot wallet, with the incident following a pattern of casino-sector hot wallet exploits. Exact method has not been disclosed. The site remains down as of this morning. coindesk

Brooklyn man sentenced to up to 12 years for a $16 million Coinbase social-engineering scheme. Ronald Spektor, 23, posed as Coinbase support staff to drain around 100 accounts, then lost roughly $6 million of the proceeds gambling, according to his own messages used in evidence. The sentence underscores prosecutors’ willingness to push for significant prison time on crypto phishing at scale. The case is one of the heavier custodial sentences handed down for this class of offence in the US. theblock decrypt coindesk

UK couple attacked in targeted crypto home invasion, £10,000 reward offered. Police described the robbery as planned and co-ordinated, with a fourth individual directing three on-site attackers via video call. The incident fits a rising pattern of physical attacks on known or suspected crypto holders, particularly in the UK. A reward is being offered for information leading to arrests. decrypt

New York sues Polymarket, seeking a court order to block the platform from operating in the state. Attorney General Letitia James and Governor Kathy Hochul allege Polymarket runs an unlicensed gambling operation, following a structurally similar lawsuit filed against Kalshi in July. The action is the most aggressive state-level move against prediction markets to date and sets up a potential constitutional fight over whether event contracts are speech-protected activity or regulated wagering. Polymarket has not commented publicly. coindesk theblock decrypt cointelegraph_regulation

Federal Reserve opens two proposals to implement the GENIUS Act for stablecoin issuers. The proposals would require supervised stablecoin issuers to hold full backing in safe assets, meet standardised capital requirements, and operate a two-day redemption window with public reserve disclosures. Issuers not supervised by the Fed would fall under separate frameworks still being drafted. The comment period opens what is likely to be an intense lobbying window for both bank and non-bank stablecoin operators. coindesk theblock cointelegraph_regulation decrypt

CFTC updates guidance allowing commodities firms to invest in tokenised assets and use blockchain records. The guidance arrives in the wake of the CLARITY Act’s failed committee vote and is framed by the CFTC chair as a unilateral push for regulatory clarity while Congress remains stalled. Authorised entities can now hold tokenised assets and treat distributed ledger entries as valid records for regulatory purposes. The move narrows the practical gap between on-chain operations and CFTC-regulated activity without requiring new legislation. coindesk cointelegraph_regulation

Trump administration weighs funding private-sector dollar stablecoin expansion overseas. The reported plan would involve multiple US agencies co-ordinating with private issuers to extend dollar-backed stablecoin reach internationally, targeting markets where dollar demand is structurally high. The initiative is framed internally as a tool to entrench the dollar’s reserve status and maintain Treasury demand as debt levels rise. No formal proposal has been published, but the policy signals are consistent with recent GENIUS Act momentum. coindesk decrypt cointelegraph_regulation

What else is grinding?

• EU financial watchdogs warned that quantum computing could break blockchain encryption before it becomes commercially mainstream, giving member states until end of 2026 to produce migration plans. coindesk decrypt
• EBA outlined potential MiCA-adjacent rules for crypto lending and DeFi access services as part of the European Commission’s ongoing MiCA review. cointelegraph_regulation
• HIFI raised $37 million in a Series A led by Left Lane Capital to scale tokenised settlement infrastructure for capital markets. theblock
• Morpho CEO Paul Frambot’s proposal to split onchain vaults into non-custodial and discretionary categories drew immediate pushback from Aave contributors, with the classification boundaries still contested. cryptobriefing
• SkyAI, a Solana-treasury listed firm, survived a shareholder board-removal vote but had its proposed equity compensation plan defeated by a wide margin. theblock
• Outgoing SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce used one of her final speeches to argue that mandatory KYC data collection creates the very attack surface it is meant to prevent, citing recent phishing campaigns targeting crypto holders via leaked identity databases. decrypt

Last sip. Bitget says the funds are safe, but the receiving address is still swapping.