west

CoinDesk analyst James Van Straten stated that the Bitcoin funding rate has fallen to its lowest level since 2023, and historical patterns show that such signals often coincide with market bottoms. According to Glassnode data, the seven-day moving average of the funding rate has dropped to about -0.005%.The funding rate is the fee that long and short positions pay each other periodically in perpetual contracts to keep the contract price aligned with the spot market. When the rate is positive, longs pay shorts, reflecting bullish market sentiment; when the rate is negative, shorts pay longs, indicating a bearish market. Despite the funding rate being persistently negative from March to April this year, Bitcoin still oscillated upward from the $60,000 to $65,000 range to about $75,000. Historically, a deeply negative funding rate often coincides with Bitcoin's phase bottoms: during the market crash triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, Bitcoin fell to about $3,000; it dropped to $30,000 during China's mining ban announcement in 2021; it hit a low of about $15,000 during the FTX collapse in November 2022; and it briefly fell below $20,000 during the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in 2023. During the yen arbitrage trade closure in August 2024 and the "Liberation Day" sell-off in April 2025, negative funding rates also appeared alongside phase lows. The continued negative funding rate indicates that even if the price trend is positive, short positions remain at a high level. This divergence may suggest that the market is climbing within a "wall of worry," and a large number of short positions could become fuel for further price increases.

Arthur Hayes stated, "I will only believe that Iran has really been collecting tolls in BTC after seeing real transactions on the Bitcoin chain. Otherwise, this is just the Islamic Revolutionary Guard mocking the dirty fiat financial system of the West."

Western Union announced the completion of its acquisition of the digital wallet Dash, which is owned by Singapore Telecommunications. This transaction gives Western Union its first digital wallet in the Asia-Pacific region and is an important part of its Beyond strategy.Founded in 2014, Dash has over 1.4 million users in Singapore and offers services such as bill payments, overseas remittances, savings, investments, and insurance. Western Union stated that integrating Dash will allow its customers in Singapore to connect more directly to its global network, which covers over 200 countries and regions. Vince Tallent, head of Western Union's Asia-Pacific region, stated that the combination of Dash's local customer base with Western Union's global network will help provide more seamless services. The specific amount of the transaction has not been disclosed.

According to The Kobeissi Letter data, U.S. government job vacancies in February fell to 701,000, the second lowest since December 2020, a decrease of 524,000 from the peak in 2022. Federal government vacancies are down to 89,000, with the hiring rate dropping to 1.4%, matching the lows of 2016 to 2017. Private companies are also significantly laying off employees, with Oracle reportedly cutting as many as 30,000 jobs, Amazon reducing 16,000 positions, and Block laying off over 4,000 people.In terms of consumer confidence, only 27.3% believe that jobs are plentiful, far below the approximately 55% in 2022; the labor market disparity indicator has dropped to 5.8 percentage points, the lowest since the pandemic. Kobeissi points out that this indicator has historically been a reliable leading signal for rising unemployment, with the current level only appearing before and after economic recessions.

According to The Block, Kroll Bond Rating Agency (KBRA) has rated Ripple Prime's U.S. brokerage and holding company as "medium quality" with a BBB rating, which is the lowest investment grade.Ripple Prime provides integrated trading, lending, and settlement services for institutional investors. KBRA noted that this rating reflects that its business is still in the "expansion phase," with revenue primarily concentrated in exchange-traded derivatives clearing and short-term government bond financing.

The enterprise-level modular L1 public chain ENI has announced a strategic partnership with the globally leading on-chain investment ecosystem Republic Crypto. Republic Crypto is backed by top institutions such as Hamilton Lane and Hashed, with an ecosystem covering over 2,500 enterprises.The two parties will combine Republic Crypto's expertise in token economics and top Western capital markets with the advantages of ENI's enterprise-level modular L1 architecture to open up liquidity channels for real-world assets (RWA) between the East and West, facilitating seamless global settlement for institutional assets and promoting the scaling of Web3 business.

According to Gate market data, U.S. stocks closed higher on Wednesday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average initially up 0.49%, the S&P 500 index up 0.7%, and the Nasdaq up 1.16%. Western Digital rose 10%, while Intel, SanDisk, and Micron Technology all rose over 9%. Nike fell sharply by 15%. The Nasdaq Golden Dragon China Index rose 0.3%, iQIYI rose 2%, JD.com fell 2%, and Alibaba fell 1%.

According to the Financial Times, foreign central banks have reduced their holdings of U.S. Treasury bonds to the lowest level since 2012 in order to support their domestic economies and currencies during the war in Iran.Since February 25, the value of Treasury bonds held in custody at the New York Federal Reserve Bank by official institutions has decreased by $82 billion. Some central banks have intervened in the foreign exchange market to support their domestic currencies. Such interventions typically involve selling dollars to respond to crises. Since February 27, the Turkish central bank alone has sold $22 billion worth of foreign government bonds.Analysis indicates that supply shocks have put immense pressure on global central banks.

Bitcoin fell to $65,720 on Friday, the lowest price since March 2, with a recent trading price of about $65,804, a daily decline of over 4%. Ethereum dropped about 4% to $1,980, Solana fell 5% to below $83, and BNB decreased 3% to $608.According to CoinGlass data, over $500 million in crypto positions were liquidated in the past 24 hours, with nearly 90% being long positions. The largest corporate Bitcoin holder, Strategy, holds about $50 billion in Bitcoin, and its stock MSTR fell over 5% during the day, dipping below $124, marking a new low in a month. BitMine Immersion Technologies (BMNR), the publicly traded company with the largest Ethereum holdings, hit a monthly low of $18.42 during the day, with a daily decline of over 4%. The crypto and stock trading platform Robinhood (HOOD) also fell to a monthly low, trading slightly above $66, with a cumulative decline of over 11% in the past month and more than 50% in the past six months. The three major U.S. stock indices fell simultaneously, with the Nasdaq down 1.5%, and the S&P 500 and Dow Jones each down about 1%. The U.S. President stated after the market closed on Thursday that plans to strike Iranian energy facilities would be paused, but Israel subsequently indicated it would "escalate" attacks on Iran after suffering missile strikes. Users on the prediction market platform Myriad currently believe there is a 64% probability that Bitcoin's next target is $55,000 rather than $84,000.

According to crypto analyst Darkfost, the open contracts for ETH on the Binance platform have significantly decreased, with the position size dropping by about 400,000 ETH since January. At the same time, the spot to futures trading volume ratio for ETH on Binance has fallen to its lowest level since 2023, which is the year the bear market ended.Despite this, the current futures trading volume for Ethereum on Binance is still more than six times that of the spot trading volume. This reflects the true weakness of the Ethereum spot market at present, and the selling actions of the Ethereum Foundation and even Vitalik Buterin may have led to cautiousness among investors.

The on-chain analysis platform Santiment posted on X platform that, according to traceable wallet data, the proportion of Bitcoin stored on exchanges has dropped to its lowest level. Over the past eight years, both the crypto market and the global macro environment have undergone significant changes, while the proportion of Bitcoin reserves on exchanges has continued to decline, which is generally seen by the market as one of the signals of increased long-term holding tendency and reduced circulating selling pressure.

According to Cointelegraph, Santiment data shows that the number of non-empty Bitcoin wallets has reached an all-time high, while the supply of Bitcoin on exchanges has dropped to its lowest level since 2017. This trend indicates that Bitcoin adoption is on the rise, with more investors choosing to store their assets in offline wallets.

International remittance service company Western Union has announced a partnership with Crossmint to launch the USD stablecoin USDPT on the Solana blockchain, aimed at providing fast and low-cost global money transfer services.Western Union will integrate its digital asset network with Crossmint, allowing users to exchange digital dollars for local currency at over 360,000 locations worldwide, covering more than 200 countries and regions. Malcolm Clarke, Vice President of Digital Assets at Western Union, stated that this collaboration helps seamlessly connect global wallets and digital platforms with Western Union's payment infrastructure.

According to CryptoQuant data, over 31,000,000 ETH has flowed out of centralized exchanges, marking the largest monthly outflow since last year. Among them, Binance saw an outflow of about 14,450,000 ETH, accounting for nearly half of the total outflow; OKX had an outflow of about 3,830,000 ETH; and Kraken saw an outflow of about 1,040,000 ETH.The continuous outflow has reduced the liquidity available for spot trading. After tokens are transferred to private wallets or staking platforms, short-term liquidity decreases. When market activity picks up, the shrinking exchange balances may exacerbate price volatility.Crypto analyst Arab Chain stated that although the ETH price is still hovering around $2,000, derivatives data shows a divergence between small buyers and large sellers. The market is focused on how the price will react once retail investors and whales align in their buying and selling directions.CryptoQuant data also shows that Ethereum reserves on the Binance platform have dropped to about 3,460,000 ETH, the lowest level since 2020. In the previous cycle, reserves peaked above 5,000,000 ETH before entering a gradual decline.Hyblock data indicates a divergence between different trading scales. The cumulative trading volume Delta for small orders ($0--10,000) is close to $95,000,000, showing sustained buying by retail investors; while the CVD for the $10,000--100,000 range is about -$162,000,000, and for orders above $100,000, it is close to -$357,000,000, indicating that larger participants tend to net sell during the same period.The buy-sell ratio recently turned slightly positive, rising to 0.2 before falling back to 0.03, indicating a slight increase in buying pressure but an overall lack of broad consensus.Open interest has decreased from nearly $10,000,000,000 at the end of February to about $9,410,000,000, with leverage being reduced. Analysts believe that if retail investors continue to accumulate while large sellers slow down, the forces of bulls and bears may tend to align.At that time, against the backdrop of a contraction in supply on trading platforms, if ETH stabilizes above $2,000--$2,150, it may amplify upward price momentum.

According to CertiK statistics, the total losses due to vulnerabilities in all security incidents in the cryptocurrency sector in February have been confirmed to be approximately $35.7 million, of which about $8.5 million is attributed to phishing attacks. This figure is the lowest monthly loss amount since March 2025.

A Bank of America (BofA) survey in February showed that investors' bearish positions on the dollar have fallen to the lowest level since 2012, with dollar allocations at a historically low level.Traditionally, a weaker dollar is usually favorable for risk assets like Bitcoin, but the report noted that since the beginning of 2025, Bitcoin has shown an unusual positive correlation with the dollar index, with a 90-day correlation coefficient rising to 0.6 at one point. Analysts believe that if this correlation continues, further declines in the dollar may not be beneficial for Bitcoin and could instead put pressure on it; conversely, if the dollar rebounds due to short covering, Bitcoin may rise accordingly, and market volatility could significantly increase.

According to Jinshi News, U.S. President Trump stated on social media, "The employment data is excellent, far exceeding expectations! The U.S. should pay much less interest on borrowing costs (bonds!). We are once again the world's number one superpower, and therefore we should enjoy the lowest interest rates to date. This will bring at least a trillion dollars in savings on interest expenses each year------the budget can not only be balanced but also have a significant surplus. Wow! The golden age of America has arrived!!!"

According to Gate's market data, U.S. stocks closed on Tuesday with the Dow Jones Industrial Average initially rising by 0.1%, the S&P 500 index falling by 0.3%, and the Nasdaq down by 0.59%. Nvidia (NVDA.O) fell nearly 1%, S&P Global (SPGI.N) dropped nearly 10%, Intel (INTC.O) decreased by 6%, and Western Digital (WDC.O) fell by 8.1%. The Nasdaq Golden Dragon China Index rose by 0.87%, Alibaba (BABA.N) increased by 2%, and Dingdong Maicai (DDL.N) rose by 7%.

Google's global "crypto" search volume is currently hovering near an annual low of 30/100 (with 100 representing the highest search interest), reflecting weak investor sentiment. The total market capitalization of the crypto market has fallen from a historical high of over $4.2 trillion to about $2.4 trillion, and market trading volume has plummeted from $153 billion on January 14 to $87.5 billion on Sunday.The Crypto Fear and Greed Index hit a historical low of 5 last Thursday, and slightly rebounded to 8 on Sunday, still in the extreme fear range. This is the lowest level since the collapse of the Terra ecosystem and its dollar-pegged stablecoin in 2022. At that time, the Terra collapse triggered a wave of liquidations, accelerating the bear market of 2022.