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BitGo offers MiCA compliance lifeline to EU crypto firms as license deadline looms

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BitGo offers MiCA compliance lifeline to EU crypto firms as license deadline looms

Eligible businesses may also continue to evaluate or pursue their own MiCA-focused crypto asset service provider (CASP) licenses in parallel while integrating BitGo Europe’s infrastructure, BitGo said.

The final deadline for crypto firms to have transitioned to the MiCA regime is the end of this month, a regulatory reckoning that will force some firms to close down their businesses.

Industry estimates suggest that Europe had more than 3,000 registered crypto firms as of 2024, with Poland alone accounting for over 1,400 registrations. As of May 2026, there are 194 authorised CASPs (including credit institutions) and it is expected that around 75% of the pre-MiCA population will lose registration status as transitional periods expire, according to law firm Hogan Lovells.

Belshe said firms don’t need to go bust because of MiCA’s regulatory requirements, adding that regulators are aware of BitGo’s compliance-enhancing infrastructure offering. In terms of fees for the crypto compliance service, Belshe said it’s relatively cheap and varies product by product.

“There’s some amount of monthly minimum that you pay similar to what’s always been there. That’s a couple of $1,000 a month type of thing that can scale with volume,” he said. “Then clients can either go to variable-based plans, where they’re paying per transaction more, or they can use static-based plans, where they have kind of a fixed fee, and they pay less.”

Crypto PAC’s $12 million Senate candidate, Barry Moore, wins Alabama GOP primary

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Crypto PAC’s $12 million Senate candidate, Barry Moore, wins Alabama GOP primary

At the time of their most recent filings with the Federal Election Commission, the collection of related PACs had about $164 million on hand at the end of April, though they were spending at a rapid clip.

Tuesday’s result — with Moore taking almost 56% of the vote — will likely counter the industry’s setback in Illinois, where Fairshake spent more than $10 million trying to defeat Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton, who went on to claim victory in the Democratic primary, all but guaranteeing that the next Senate would have a member who crypto interests spent heavily against. Most of Fairshake’s outcomes have been successful, though, and the latest win joins what’s shaping up as a full roster of successful primary candidates backed by the super PAC.

Moore, who was also backed by the crypto-tied Fellowship PAC, hopes to trade his seat in the U.S. House of Representatives with the Senate position held by Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville, who made a bid for governor.

Fairshake also devoted $735,000 to U.S. Representative Kevin Hern in this week’s Oklahoma Republican primary, where he won his party’s Senate nomination. Like Moore, Hern was also endorsed by President Trump.

Fairshake is mostly backed by three crypto-world contributors: Coinbase, a16z Crypto and Ripple. The PAC made a name for itself in the previous congressional campaign cycle, when it supported more than 50 pro-crypto candidates (from both major parties) who’ve participated in this session of Congress, outpacing a number of leading industry PACs and even some of the largest party organizations.

Illinois Governor Signs Illinois Budget Including Crypto Tax

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Illinois Governor Signs Illinois Budget Including Crypto Tax

Illinois is going ahead with a 0.2% “privilege tax” on crypto transactions involving its residents under a new $55.9 billion state budget bill signed Tuesday.

Governor JB Pritzker signed the measure despite opposition from crypto industry groups over the provision, a transaction tax that applies to all digital asset transactions on any registered platform under broadly termed “digital asset business activity.”

“This will create an unprecedented tax regime that disproportionately burdens Illinois residents for simply using digital assets and will drive innovation and builders out of the state,” the Crypto Council for Innovation said, as it urged a “line-item veto” of Article 3 of Senate Bill 3019 on Tuesday.

Illinois is home to several well-known crypto companies, including Zero Hash, Jump Crypto, Bitnomial, and Apex Crypto. The wide-reaching digital asset tax could also impact out-of-state companies if they have sufficient customer activity in the state, according to US tax firm BDO USA.

The measure, which takes effect on Jan. 1, 2027, will also make Illinois the only state to tax digital asset users regardless of income, gains or profits, unlike traditional tax structures. Digital asset brokers operating in the state are also required to register and comply with new reporting obligations. 

Letter from the CCI to Governor JB Pritzker. Source: CCI

Akin to taxing email rather than post

The CCI argued the tax would single out digital assets simply based on the technology used to process them. 

“Taxing a transaction based on the medium through which it happens to occur on a blockchain is akin to taxing correspondence because it is delivered by email rather than by post.”

Related: Crypto tax proposals weighed ahead of Tuesday House hearing

They also said the timing is poor, since the industry is already adjusting to the federal Digital Assets and Consumer Protection Act (DACPA) and Congress is separately working on a national tax framework for crypto assets.

The Digital Chamber sent a similar letter opposing the Digital Asset Privilege Tax Act on June 3 with similar arguments.  

“The tax will discourage the use of digital assets at the very time when financial services are moving to the blockchain, freezing Illinois residents out of progress and innovation and pushing the existing IL blockchain and crypto companies out of the state,” it read. 

Crypto is being singled out

Miles Jennings, head of policy and general counsel for a16z Crypto, said on X on Wednesday that it was one of the most anti-crypto laws in the US.

“There is effectively no comparable state financial transaction tax on stocks, bonds or derivatives anywhere in the country,” he said. “That means crypto is being singled out in violation of several federal laws.”

“Rather than embracing innovation and the cost efficiencies blockchains can deliver for ordinary people in Illinois, the state is poised to punish its entrepreneurs and citizens that want to use crypto.”

The crypto tax, which was bundled with registration and compliance requirements, is one piece of a much larger package built to close a budget gap. The bill is expected to raise more than $800 million in new tax revenue to support Pritzker’s $55.9 billion budget for fiscal 2027. 

Magazine: China’s 107 Bitcoin memory thief, Bithumb CEO booked: Asia Express

Binance Could Face EU Exit as Reports Say Greek Regulator is Set to Reject MiCA License

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Binance Could Face EU Exit as Reports Say Greek Regulator is Set to Reject MiCA License

Greece’s Hellenic Capital Market Commission appears set to reject Binance’s MiCA license application, putting the world’s largest crypto exchange on course to lose EU client access on July 1. Binance disputes the account and says its application was considered compliant, promising an update before June 30.

Greece’s financial watchdog is preparing to reject Binance’s application for a pan-European crypto license, according to Reuters, putting the world’s largest exchange on course to lose access to European Union clients as soon as July 1. Binance disputes the characterization and says its application meets the regulator’s requirements.

The Hellenic Capital Market Commission (HCMC) has reviewed Binance’s Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA) license application and is set to deny it, Reuters reported Tuesday, citing two people familiar with the situation. Bloomberg separately reported the exchange is internally preparing contingency plans for an EU exit. Under MiCA’s transitional schedule, crypto firms without a valid license are barred from serving EU residents starting July 1.

Binance pushed back in a blog post and on its official X account, saying the HCMC “completed its review of the application and considered it compliant with MiCA requirements” and that the application “was also reviewed at ESMA level.” The exchange added that HCMC “informed ESMA that it was their view that the application was compliant and that they intended to progress the licence and move to authorise at an upcoming Board meeting.”

“Binance serves more users in Europe than any other crypto exchange, and any delay or distortion in our MiCA path has consequences beyond Binance,” the exchange wrote. “It risks weakening liquidity, reducing competition and user choice, and pushing activity, jobs, investment, and tax revenue outside the EU.”

The exchange said it would provide a further update before June 30, 2026.

MiCA License

Binance said in its Tuesday blog post that it has been pursuing a MiCA license “over the past 18 months,” including through an application process with the HCMC. The company chose Greece as its primary jurisdiction after speculation it might seek approval in Malta, where it had offices. Binance also set up a Greek holding company in conjunction with the application, per local reports from late 2025.

MiCA, the EU’s unified crypto regulatory framework, came into full force this year. It requires exchanges to obtain authorization from a national regulator in one EU member state. That authorization then grants access to the entire bloc through a passporting mechanism overseen by the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA).

The HCMC had issued no public statement on the Binance application as of publication.

Consequences of Rejection

If the HCMC formally denies the license and no alternative path materializes before July 1, Binance would be prohibited from offering services to EU residents under MiCA rules. The exchange has not publicly disclosed the number of EU users on its platform, but has described itself as serving more European users than any other crypto exchange.

An earlier post from Binance’s official X account Tuesday morning said the exchange was “still working to secure the right path forward under MiCA” and would “continue to update our users as progress is made.”

Binance has faced sustained regulatory pressure in multiple jurisdictions. In 2023, the exchange reached a $4.3 billion settlement with the US Department of Justice and Treasury Department. Former CEO Changpeng Zhao pleaded guilty to a felony charge and stepped down as part of the deal. Richard Teng took over as CEO. The exchange has since operated under a US monitoring program while pursuing expansion in regulated markets, including Europe.

The MiCA deadline creates a structural pressure point for the sector. Several other crypto firms have secured licenses in EU member states under the framework; regulators in Germany and the Netherlands have already authorized crypto companies seeking compliance. Binance’s application in Greece was one of the higher-profile outstanding cases ahead of the July 1 cutoff.

Not Confirmed

Binance’s blog post described the HCMC review as complete but stopped short of confirming the Reuters account that a rejection was imminent. The HCMC has made no public statement on the matter. ESMA has also not commented publicly.

Binance’s statement says the HCMC viewed the application as compliant and “intended to progress the licence and move to authorise at an upcoming Board meeting.” Reuters’ report, citing two people familiar with the situation, says the regulator is set to reject it. The two accounts have not been reconciled in any public filing or regulator statement.

Binance said it will update users by June 30, one day before the MiCA transitional deadline expires.

Bitcoin bottom signal flashes as holders absorbed 125,000 BTC in June

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Bitcoin bottom signal flashes as holders absorbed 125,000 BTC in June

Bitcoin’s risk-adjusted return has fallen to a level that has marked every bear-market bottom of the past decade, the latest on-chain reading to point toward accumulation rather than more downside.

The Sharpe ratio, which measures return against volatility, dropped to -20 on June 11, according to CryptoQuant data reviewed by CoinDesk. It hit that mark at the 2015, 2018-19 and 2022-23 cycle lows.

The catch is what came next. In all three cases, -20 marked the start of a long base rather than a launch. The metric stayed below the line for about five months in 2015 and roughly three months each in 2018-19 and 2022-23 before bitcoin began a durable recovery. So the signal can be interpreted as the floor is forming, not that the rebound has arrived.

Meanwhile, Accumulator wallets, the addresses with a history of holding rather than selling, took in about 125,000 BTC in the first half of June.

Exchange reserves have fallen roughly 80,000 BTC since February to about 2.71 million, and whales pulled more than 11,000 off exchanges in the past day.

This is the latest in a run of on-chain bottom signals over two weeks, after similar calls from valuation and sentiment gauges. They measure accumulation and exhaustion, not flows, and the driver of bitcoin’s recovery from its $59,130 low to about $65,800 was the US-Iran deal, not the metrics, per CoinDesk data.

Today’s FOMC decision, Kevin Warsh’s first as chair, is the next test. A hold is nearly fully priced, so the dot plot and Warsh’s tone on inflation will decide whether the recovery extends.

HYPE Bulls Target $80 As TradFi Piles Into Hyperliquid DEX

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HYPE Bulls Target $80 As TradFi Piles Into Hyperliquid DEX

Key takeaways:

  • Hyperliquid defies the crypto bear market with $3 billion HYPE open interest, a 32% growth in a week.
  • Hyperliquid’s TradFi innovation, like SpaceX pre-IPO trading, signals that the path to $80 HYPE price looks well-supported.

Hyperliquid’s native token HYPE rallied 44% over five days, hitting a $76.90 all-time high on Tuesday. Despite the pullback to $73, open interest on HYPE futures reached the $3 billion mark, signaling growing institutional demand. 

With Hyperliquid decentralized exchange (DEX) volumes showing no signs of weakness amid the cryptocurrency bear market, traders question the odds of further HYPE gains above $80.

HYPE futures aggregate open interest, USD. Source: CoinGlass

The aggregate open interest on HYPE futures rose 32% from one week earlier. Hyperliquid DEX held a 53% market share in perpetual trading volumes, followed by Binance at 14%, Bybit at 9% and Bitget at 8% according to DefiLlama data. While demand for HYPE futures has undoubtedly picked up, it’s worth exploring whether the recent price rally was fueled by excess leverage.

HYPE perpetual futures annualized funding rate. Source: Laevitas

The funding rate on HYPE perpetual futures has remained below the neutral 6% threshold for the past week, signaling weak demand for bullish leverage. Given that HYPE futures open interest increased during the period, short sellers appear to be doubling down despite the losses. It is possible that core contributors with tokens currently locked have partially hedged their positions.

HYPE excitement faces valuation concerns and dilution risk 

HYPE circulating supply stood at 253.41 million on Tuesday, while the maximum supply reached 953.92 million according to CoinMarketCap data. Thus, regardless of how quickly current holders face dilution, the project’s fully diluted value (FDV) stands at $71.3 billion. For comparison, the market capitalization of the highly profitable financial company Aon Plc (AON US) stood at $70 billion.

Hyperliquid perpetuals ranking by open interest, USD. Source: Hyperliquid

Hyperliquid has successfully dodged the cryptocurrency bear market thanks to the launch of traditional finance (TradFi) perpetuals, including those on S&P 500 (S&P500), Nasdaq 100 (XYZ100), crude oil (WTIOIL), SpaceX (SPCX), Micron (MU), gold (GOLD), silver (SILVER) and Google (GOOGL). Open interest in TradFi contracts has exceeded $2.9 billion, vastly surpassing Bitcoin’s $2 billion.

Hyperliquid weekly DEX and perpetual volumes, USD. Source: DefiLlama

Considering that aggregate decentralized exchange (DEX) volumes have fallen 57% over the past six months, Hyperliquid stands out as a positive outlier with $9.6 billion in activity. In perpetual contracts trading, no other protocol comes close to Hyperliquid’s 38% market share. Pre-IPO trading of SpaceX shares further highlights the exchange’s constant innovation and broader appeal.

Related: NYSE parent ICE pushes ‘level playing field’ for 24/7 onchain perps

Source: X/EricSRosengren

Hyperliquid’s successful run was highlighted by former Boston Federal Reserve Chair Eric Rosengren, along with an extremely bullish report from Citrini Research, a financial analysis firm. Moreover, HYPE exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have gathered $208 million since launch, signaling strong institutional interest. 

Overall, a surge to $80 for HYPE doesn’t seem out of reach considering Hyperliquid’s revenue generation and growth potential in Real World Assets (RWA) trading.

Hyperliquid, Uniswap and Worldcoin buck crypto slump as traders chase AI, DeFi trends

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Hyperliquid, Uniswap and Worldcoin buck crypto slump as traders chase AI, DeFi trends

A handful of tokens continued their run while bitcoin and the rest of the crypto market stalled after the early week bounce.

Senators Urge Treasury Ensure State Authority in GENIUS Rules

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Senators Urge Treasury Ensure State Authority in GENIUS Rules

A bipartisan group of US senators led by Republican Senator Cynthia Lummis has urged the Treasury to ensure that state authorities are given the ability to regulate stablecoin issuers as the department considers how to implement the GENIUS Act.

In a letter to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Tuesday, the lawmakers said it was critical that the Treasury implement a section of the law giving a pathway for certain issuers to be regulated by the states “in a manner that preserves and promotes State participation.”

The GENIUS Act allows issuers that have a stablecoin with a market value of $10 billion or less to be regulated by a state authority if that state has laws largely similar to the bill.

Currently, that would mean all stablecoins but three, Tether (USDt), USDC (USDC) and USDS (USDS), formerly Dai (DAI), could be regulated by the states, as all have a market value above $10 billion, according to CoinGecko.

In April, the Treasury sought public input for how it plans to implement the GENIUS Act at the state level, rules that President Donald Trump signed into law in July that regulate stablecoins and their issuers.

President Donald Trump signing the GENIUS Act in July 2025. Source: The White House

“Congress clearly sought to preserve the dual banking system and the crucial role of State banking agencies in supervising this market,” the senators said in their letter.

They added that the Treasury’s proposal “did not address the timeline and procedural requirements related to State certification.” They argued this created “uncertainty for States” and could be interpreted as the process being “a one-time window that effectively bars future certifications.”

The lawmakers said that state legislatures vary, and a flexible certification framework was needed to ensure that states can participate when they have rules implementing the GENIUS Act.

Related: Anchorage backs Treasury’s GENIUS AML rules, seeks secondary-market sanctions clarity

“States must be able to develop and seek certification of stablecoin regulatory regimes as demand for these charters materializes and as legislative schedules permit,” the letter said. 

Republican Senators Bill Hagerty, Kevin Cramer and Pete Ricketts, along with Democratic Senators Kirsten Gillibrand, Angela Alsobrooks, and Catherine Cortez Masto, also signed the letter.

Public comments on the Treasury’s proposal closed on June 2, and it will now draft a final rule for publication in the Federal Register.

Magazine: Guide to the top and emerging global crypto hubs: Mid-2026

UNI Gains 22% in 24 Hours With $621M Volume, Extending Standard Chartered Bull Thesis

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UNI Gains 22% in 24 Hours With $621M Volume, Extending Standard Chartered Bull Thesis

UNI climbed 22% in 24 hours to $3.28 on $621 million in trading volume Tuesday, the highest-percentile move in recent CoinGecko tracking, one day after Standard Chartered published a $100 long-term price target for the token.

Uniswap’s UNI token climbed 22% in 24 hours to $3.28 on $621 million in trading volume Tuesday, one day after Standard Chartered published a $100 long-term price target for the asset.

The move hit the 100th percentile of CoinGecko’s recent price-change distribution for UNI, meaning no comparable 24-hour window in the tracked dataset registered a larger gain. The volume-to-market-cap ratio came in at 0.30 against a $2.04 billion market cap, a level that distinguishes the session from thin-book price manipulation. UNI has gained 31% over the trailing seven days and is trading roughly 93% below its 2021 all-time high of $44.92.

The Standard Chartered Frame

Standard Chartered Global Research published its $100 UNI target for end-2030 on June 15, framing Uniswap as the likely trading infrastructure for tokenized real-world assets. At Tuesday’s $3.28 price, that target is roughly 30x away. To reach $100 from the current level by December 2030, UNI would need to compound at approximately 135% annually over four years. One strong 24-hour session does not close that gap, but it aligns with the directional thesis the bank outlined.

Protocol Fundamentals Supporting the Move

The rally arrives alongside genuine protocol activity. DefiLlama lists Uniswap’s combined V3 and V4 deployment at $1.47 billion in 24-hour DEX volume, the top DEX entry on its rankings. Fees on Uniswap V4 over the trailing 24 hours came in at $734,000, per DefiLlama, with V4 TVL at $895 million. Combined V3 and V4 TVL exceeds $2.3 billion.

The protocol’s UNIfication fee switch, passed by governance in December 2025 with 99.9% support, is also an active supply-side factor. The mechanism redirects a portion of protocol fees toward buying and burning UNI on an ongoing basis, reducing circulating supply.

Standard Chartered’s June 15 initiation placed fresh institutional framing on a token that had spent most of 2026 below $3. That coverage, combined with the active UNIfication fee-burn mechanism, appears to have attracted renewed buying interest in Tuesday’s session. No public statement was issued by Uniswap Labs or the Uniswap Foundation regarding the price move.

U.S. senators urge Treasury not to leave states out of GENIUS Act stablecoin process

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U.S. senators urge Treasury not to leave states out of GENIUS Act stablecoin process

State regulators got sidelined in the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s effort to implement the new U.S. stablecoin law, according to several senators from both parties who insist that the states need to be given an explicit process for proving their supervision and standards are on par with federal regulators’.

The Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act to regulate stablecoin issuers is being translated into regulations across several federal financial agencies, including the Treasury. But the opening effort may not have satisfied state regulators who are trying to push their own GENIUS-related regulations, according to a Tuesday letter from the lawmakers, led by Republican Senator Cynthia Lummis, chair of the Senate Banking Committee’s crypto subcommittee.

“Treasury’s finalized principles for assessing whether state regimes are substantially similar to the federal regulatory framework are critical in this process,” according to the letter, also signed by fellow Republicans and a few Democrats, including Angela Alsobrooks, Catherine Cortez Masto and Kirsten Gillibrand. “The proposed principles were published by Treasury but did not address the timeline and procedural requirements related to state certification.”

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