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88% of small business owners act against inflation andlabor pressures, embracing AI as a tool for growth, not replacement

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88% of small business owners act against inflation andlabor pressures, embracing AI as a tool for growth, not replacement

Retirement planning remains top concern for small businesses

While inflation and labor shortages continue to weigh heavily on U.S. small businesses, owners are pivoting away from crisis mode and actively adopting new strategies, including implementing artificial intelligence (AI), to maintain stability and fuel growth. According to a new April 2026 survey of 500 U.S. small-business owners conducted by Wakefield Research for ShareBuilder 401k, an overwhelming 88% of owners have taken decisive action over the past year to counteract inflation and labor needs. This marks a significant jump from the 78% who took similar actions in 2024.

Half of all small businesses (50%) have increased prices to protect margins, while others have turned to lower-cost vendors (23%) or increased employee wages (22%). Inflation remains the most dominant pressure point, cited by 62% as a top concern.Share

Half of all small businesses (50%) have increased prices to protect margins, while others have turned to lower-cost vendors (23%) or increased employee wages (22%). Inflation remains the most dominant pressure point, cited by 62% as a top concern for the coming year.

The Labor Crunch and the AI Solution

Staffing remains incredibly difficult among those surveyed, with 76% of owners reporting that hiring is tough right now, even when they offer competitive pay and benefits. Consequently, the cost of labor and the ability to hire and retain the right employees are top concerns for a third of businesses (33%).

Instead of replacing workers, small businesses are leaning on artificial intelligence to bridge the talent gap and increase capacity.

  • Nearly three-quarters (72%) view AI as a tool that supports staff and improves efficiency, rather than a way to reduce headcount.
  • Just 9% of owners see AI as a replacement for workers.
  • In fact, 70% anticipate that integrating AI will enable them to hire additional employees in the future.
  • The technology is already delivering real returns: 75% of owners report that AI saves them time weekly, and 63% rely on AI insights to guide their business decisions.

However, adopting this technology adds a new layer of complexity to operations, with 21% of owners citing AI integration as a top concern for the year ahead.

Retirement Planning Outpaces AI as Top Stressor

Even as owners navigate the complexities of machine learning and inflation, personal financial security weighs far more heavily on their minds. A striking 63% of small-business owners find planning for their own retirement more daunting than managing AI in their business.

While 81% of owners are currently saving for retirement, the highest rate since 2017, many remain anxious about the future. More than four in 10 (41%) lack confidence that they are saving enough. Furthermore, owners are delaying their exit strategies, pushing their average planned retirement age to 68, up from 65 in 2024 and 2022.

Despite these anxieties, businesses are increasingly stepping up to support their teams’ futures. Nearly three in 10 (29%) now offer a 401(k) plan, up from 24% in 2024. The decision is largely values-driven, with 76% stating that it is their responsibility as business owners to provide this benefit.

Cautious Optimism for the Year Ahead

The small-business sector remains resilient despite ongoing hurdles. While 63% are still concerned about the impact of market volatility, the intensity of that fear has plummeted, with only 19% “very” or “extremely concerned,” down sharply from 41% in 2020.

Overall, 68% report increased confidence in their business outlook compared to last year, driving planned, growth-facing investments into marketing and sales (58%) and AI solutions (40%).

Ronin gaming sidechain gets ready to transition to Ethereum layer 2

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Ronin gaming sidechain gets ready to transition to Ethereum layer 2

Ronin, the gaming-centric blockchain once synonymous with the industry’s infamous $625 million exploit, is officially shedding its sidechain skin on May 12 to become an Ethereum layer 2 to improve security while maintaining throughput.

Ronin, which announced the migration in April, will execute a hard fork at block 55,577,490, a process that will result in about 10 hours of downtime for users, the network said Monday on X. According to onchain data, the migration is expected to begin on Tuesday around 15:16 UTC.

“Four years ago, we launched Ronin because Axie Infinity needed a faster and more efficient network,” Ronin said when announcing the migration. “It worked. Axie Infinity onboarded millions of gamers to crypto, and Pixels proved that it was possible to do it again.” The time has come to plug “back into the mothership.”

While operating as an independent sidechain in mid-May 2022, Ronin suffered what is still today the largest DeFI bridge exploit in history. Layer 2 protocols benefit from tighter links to the underlying blockchain than sidechains, offering benefits that include greater security.

The network’s native token, RON, is currently trading at around 11 cents with a market capitalization of about $89.5 million, according to CoinDesk data. While the token remains significantly below its 2024 peak, the migration sparked a rally, with prices climbing 30% over the last 30 days as investors eye a shift in the network’s supply dynamics.

“During this downtime window, all network transactions [including transfers, swaps, and smart contract interactions] will be paused,” Ronin said, adding that all games using its network will also be affected. “To avoid any inconvenience, please complete all necessary transactions/onchain game actions on the Ronin Network before the downtime begins.”

During the downtime, a “Proof of Distribution” model will be introduced to reward builders based on active network contribution rather than passive staking, Ronin said. The team noted that “this is fundamentally bullish for RON as it dramatically cuts token inflation from over 20% to below 1%.”

The company also said that transitioning to the OP Stack will allow it to inherit Ethereum’s robust security while maintaining high throughput. The move redirects 90 million RON tokens previously earmarked for staking rewards into the Ronin Treasury, while more than doubling marketplace fees to 1.25% from 0.5%.

Ronin said its narrative is dominated by its pivotal return to Ethereum, a strategic move to reset its economics, secure its bridge infrastructure, and secure its future in an upgrade intended to improve scalability and reduce costs through the use of EigenDA for data availability.

Bitmine buys 26K ether (ETH) after Tom Lee said to slow down accumulation

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Bitmine buys 26K ether (ETH) after Tom Lee said to slow down accumulation

Bitmine Immersion Technologies (BMNR) has sharply slowed its ether (ETH) purchase pace as Chairman Tom Lee signaled, following months of aggressive buying that made it the world’s largest Ethereum treasury company.

The firm bought 26,659 ether last week, worth about $63 million based on ether’s current price. That’s roughly a quarter of the average weekly haul it purchased over the past weeks.

The purchase lifted Bitmine’s holdings to over 5.2 million ETH, or around 4.31% of ether’s circulating supply, according to a Monday company update.

The update follows comments Lee made last week at Consensus 2026 in Miami, where he said BitMine may begin moderating its buying pace after one of the fastest accumulation runs in the crypto market.

The slowdown follows comments Tom Lee made last week at Consensus 2026 in Miami, where he said Bitmine was considering easing purchases as it approached its long-term goal of acquiring 5% of Ethereum’s supply.

“We have decided to slow down our pace of weekly accumulation from over 100,000 [ETH] per week,” Lee said in Monday’s statement. “Our previous pace of buys would have us reach 5% by mid-July.”

Bitmine remains one of the few major digital asset treasury firms still consistently buying crypto during the recent market downturn. Since the start of 2026, the company has acquired more than 1 million ETH, according to Lee.

The company’s total crypto and cash holdings stood at $13.4 billion. In addition to ETH, BitMine holds 201 bitcoin, $775 million in cash and equity stakes including investments in Beast Industries and Eightco Holdings.

Lee reiterated his view that “crypto spring” has begun, pointing to ether’s recent recovery and improving sentiment in software and growth stocks.

“If ETH closes above $2,100 at the end of May, this would be the third consecutive monthly gain — this has never been seen in a crypto bear market,” Lee said.

BitMine has also expanded its staking operations. The firm now has over 4.7 million ETH staked — more than 90% of its holdings — representing about $11.1 billion worth of assets generating staking rewards. Its MAVAN staking platform, launched earlier this year, is aimed at institutional clients as well as Bitmine’s own treasury operations.

CoinDesk 20 performance update: SUI surges 25% over weekend

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CoinDesk 20 performance update: SUI surges 25% over weekend

Cronos (CRO), up 9.7% from Friday, joined Sui (SUI) as a top performer.

Blueprint for European Digital Sovereignty Revealed in New GITEX AI EUROPE Study

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Blueprint for European Digital Sovereignty Revealed in New GITEX AI EUROPE Study

Europe’s ICT market is currently valued at €1.02trillion. However, a released whitepaper emphasizes that the continent’s long-term tech competitiveness relies heavily on scaling AI computing power, establishing cloud infrastructure, embedding open-source standards, and mobilising deeper pools of startup capital.

Authored by GITEX AI EUROPE in partnership with research firm LUE, the whitepaper argues these priorities form a “new industrial compact”. Together, these pillars aim to align Europe’s innovation capacity with its broader economic and energy growth.

Compute capacity and energy integration

While Europe’s data centre capacity is projected to grow by 70 per cent by 2030, demand stemming from AI applications is expected to rise even faster. To keep pace, the region must expand its compute and energy infrastructure in tandem to ensure resilience and sustainability.

Key infrastructure insights from the study include:

  • Germany alone may need to triple its data centre capacity by the end of the decade.

  • This expansion in Germany will require up to €60billion in new investment to meet projected industrial and AI workloads.

  • The EU’s €200billion InvestAI programme is already anchoring this effort by funding five AI gigafactories across Europe.

  • These facilities will be equipped with 100,000 or more specialised GPUs, with access open to large industrial companies, startups, and research institutes.

Sovereign cloud and open-source foundations

The second frontier identified by the report is cloud autonomy. Currently, about 40 per cent of European enterprises have at least 40 per cent of their applications hosted in the cloud, a figure that is expected to soar to 91 per cent by 2028. Despite this rapid adoption, non-European hyperscalers currently control roughly 70 per cent of the continent’s cloud market.

The paper calls for a shift toward “sovereign-first” cloud architectures that guarantee legal, operational, and data control strictly within European jurisdictions.

Open-source technology is highlighted as a pivotal force in reinforcing this sovereignty. Open standards, such as the Sovereign Cloud Stack (SCS) funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action, enable companies to migrate freely across platforms and foster a culture of shared innovation without relying on proprietary vendors.

Backing deep-tech builders

According to the Bertelsmann Foundation, despite Europe’s rich engineering talent, only around 5 per cent of global venture capital flows into the EU tech ecosystem.

To close this critical funding gap, the whitepaper calls for a new ecosystem of growth-stage financing powered by public-private co-investment and strategic industrial funds. Current initiatives building this financial scaffolding include:

  • Germany’s €1billion KfW DeepTech Future Fund, which backs high-growth innovators.

  • The Important Project of Common European Interest (IPCEI) on Next-Generation Cloud and Services, which channels €3billion into EU-based data and semiconductor projects.

Rallying global tech partnerships

The findings set the stage for GITEX AI EUROPE 2026, which is scheduled to run from 30 June to 1 July 2026 at Messe Berlin.

The event serves as a massive nexus connecting AI, deep tech, quantum, cyber, and cloud innovators. Following a successful inaugural edition that united 1,400 enterprises and startups from over 100 countries, the 2026 event will reinforce its role as a defining platform for the continent’s intelligent economy and collaborative technological leadership.

Ripple raises $200 million from Neuberger Berman to expand its Ripple Prime platform

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Ripple raises $200 million from Neuberger Berman to expand its Ripple Prime platform

Ripple’s prime-brokerage unit announced Monday it closed a $200 million funding agreement with global investment firm Neuberger Berman to expand the margin it offers investors to trade in traditional and digital asset markets.

In its announcement, Ripple also said the funding will help support the ongoing growth of its multi-asset prime brokerage platform, Ripple Prime, citing increasing client demand for its institutional-grade services and margin financing solutions.

The crypto firm said that since it acquired Hidden Road and rebranded it as Ripple Prime in 2025, this platform’s revenue has tripled year over year. Neuberger Berman has approximately $570 billion in total assets under management (AUM).

Ripple acquired prime-brokerage Hidden Road for $1.25 billion, one of the largest deals in the history of the cryptocurrency industry. The company later agreed to buy treasury-management software provider GTreasury for $1 billion.

“Dependable access to financing and balance sheet strength are critical to institutional participants in today’s dynamic markets,” said Noel Kimmel, President of Ripple Prime. “This facility enables us to grow alongside our clients by delivering increased margin capacity, greater responsiveness, and improved capital efficiency.”

Kimmel said that apart from the funding, Neuberger Specialty Finance brings deep expertise in asset-based finance and a strong understanding of Ripple Prime’s services and business model.

“Ripple Prime has built an innovative brokerage platform combining fintech-grade technology and agility with bank-level compliance and operational rigor,” said Peter Sterling, Head of Neuberger Specialty Finance.

Institutional investors are getting increasingly more involved in crypto assets, in part due to the U.S. President Donald Trump’s Administration’s drive for more crypto-friendly rules and regulations.

State Street Corp. announced a digital-asset platform earlier this year, while Standard Chartered Plc has plans to set up a prime brokerage for crypto trading.

Ripple also raised $500 million, giving the firm a $40 billion valuation, with backing from Fortress Investment Group and Citadel Securities. That capital was used to boost Ripple’s expansion into custody, stablecoins and prime-brokerage services.

Bitget Launches QR-Based Payments for Daily Needs, Targets 2.2 billion Users Globally

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Bitget Launches QR-Based Payments for Daily Needs, Targets 2.2 billion Users Globally

WHY THIS MATTERS

The launch of Bitget’s “Scan to Pay” feature on May 6, 2026, marks a major milestone in the evolution of stablecoins from speculative assets to practical “everyday money.” By enabling users to scan merchant QR codes and pay directly with USDT, Bitget is plugging decentralized value into the world’s most successful retail payment infrastructure. This is particularly transformative in Southeast Asia and Latin America, where over 2.2 billion people already use QR codes, but high percentages of the population remain “underbanked.” For these users, Bitget Pay provides a way to hold digital dollars and spend them instantly at local merchants, bypassing the “correspondent bank tax” and the delays of traditional fiat conversion.

For Bitget, this move solidifies its transition into a Universal Exchange (UEX)—a model where trading, assets, and daily financial services are unified. By allowing USDT to function as a seamless payment rail that settles in the background, Bitget is removing the “friction of off-ramping” that has historically limited crypto adoption. Merchants receive settlement without exposure to volatility, and users gain a consistent payment experience that works across borders. In a 2026 landscape where digital assets are becoming structural parts of the financial system, Bitget is betting that the exchange of the future is not just a place to trade, but a wallet that powers a morning coffee purchase.

Bitget, the world’s largest Universal Exchange (UEX), has introduced its Scan to Pay feature on Bitget Pay, enabling users to spend USDT directly at offline merchants by scanning QR codes through the Bitget App.

The feature is now live across selected markets across Southeast Asia and Latin America at launch, where QR-based payments are widely adopted but access to traditional banking infrastructure remains uneven. By integrating with existing local payment networks, Scan to Pay allows users to complete transactions without changing merchant systems or relying on bank intermediaries.

The launch comes as crypto adoption continues to expand beyond trading into real-world use cases. Emerging markets across Southeast Asia and Latin America have seen some of the fastest growth in digital asset usage over the past year, driven in part by demand for stable, accessible financial tools. At the same time, billions of adults globally remain underbanked despite widespread access to mobile payment systems, creating a gap between financial access and financial usability that new payment models are beginning to address.

Scan to Pay is designed around this intersection. Users can set a payment PIN, scan a merchant QR code, and complete transactions instantly, with USDT converted and settled in the background. The experience mirrors familiar local payment flows, while removing the need for manual off-ramping, bank transfers, or currency conversion steps.

“QR code payments have a strong real life usage with over 2.2 billion people using it globally. There’s no reason why crypto shouldn’t be a part of it. It naturally fits into how people live, and spend.” said Gracy Chen, CEO of Bitget.

For users in supported markets, the feature enables stablecoins to function as practical spending tools rather than passive holdings. For travelers and cross-border users, it offers a consistent payment experience across regions without reliance on local banking systems. For merchants, integration requires no change in infrastructure, while transactions are settled without exposure to crypto volatility.

The rollout reflects a broader shift in how digital assets are being positioned within financial systems. As stablecoins gain traction as a medium of exchange, their role is expanding from trading pairs to payment rails that can operate alongside existing networks.

Within Bitget’s UEX model, where trading, assets, and financial services are brought into a single environment, Scan to Pay extends crypto from portfolio management into daily life. As financial services converge, the distinction between holding assets and using them continues to narrow, moving digital assets closer to everyday money.

FF NEWS TAKE

Bitget is effectively “leapfrogging” the credit card era in emerging markets. While Western fintechs are still trying to integrate crypto with legacy card networks, Bitget is targeting the mobile-first economies of APAC and LATAM where QR codes are already the dominant currency. The brilliance of the “Scan to Pay” rollout lies in its invisibility; it integrates with existing local payment networks so that merchants don’t have to upgrade their hardware. By positioning itself at the intersection of “financial access” and “financial usability,” Bitget is capturing a high-velocity transaction layer that traditional banks have failed to serve.

However, the “UEX” strategy carries significant regulatory weight. As Bitget integrates direct banking rails in Nigeria and Mexico and expands its tokenized stock offerings, it must navigate the strict compliance standards of the GENIUS Act and the EU’s MiCA framework. The recent $1 billion milestone in tokenized stock volume proves there is a massive appetite for 24/7 financial access. If Gracy Chen and her team can maintain Bitget’s 163% reserve ratio while scaling these real-world payment tools, they will set the standard for how a global exchange can operate like a next-gen digital bank for the world’s 125 million digital asset users.

Ethereum Leverage Ratio Sees Sharp Drop: What It Means

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Ethereum Leverage Ratio Sees Sharp Drop: What It Means

Trusted Editorial content, reviewed by leading industry experts and seasoned editors. Ad Disclosure

Data shows the Estimated Leverage Ratio has seen a sharp decline for Ethereum on Binance, a sign that traders have been pulling back on risk.

Ethereum Leverage Ratio Has Dropped To A Value Of 0.57

As pointed out by an analyst in a CryptoQuant Quicktake post, speculative activity in the Binance Ethereum derivatives market has observed a cooldown recently. The indicator of relevance here is the “Estimated Leverage Ratio” (ELR), which tracks the ratio between the ETH Open Interest and Derivatives Exchange Reserve.

The former metric, the Open Interest, measures the total amount of positions related to the cryptocurrency that are currently open on a given centralized derivatives exchange. Meanwhile, the latter is the amount of the asset sitting in wallets connected to that platform. Since the ELR takes the ratio of the two, it essentially tells us about how much leverage investors are opting for against the average position.

When the value of the indicator is high, it means the Open Interest is significant compared to the Exchange Reserve. Such a trend suggests the average trader on the exchange is opting for a high amount of risk. On the other hand, the metric being low implies investors aren’t taking on much leverage on their positions, a potential sign that market interest in speculative activity is low.

Now, here is a chart that shows the trend in the Ethereum ELR for Binance over the last few months:

Ethereum ELR

The value of the metric seems to have plunged over the last few weeks | Source: CryptoQuant

As displayed in the above graph, the Ethereum ELR for Binance surged to a high level back in March. This uptick in leverage usage coincided with a recovery run in the cryptocurrency. The rally failed to sustain, and with it, speculation also noted a cooldown. In April, the market again made a recovery, and while investors took some risks initially, the ELR interestingly ended up following an overall downtrend. This means that this new surge hasn’t been able to attract the more speculative traders to the cryptocurrency.

Today, the ELR is sitting at a value of 0.57, implying that the Open Interest is 57% of the Binance derivatives reserve. For comparison, the metric peaked at 0.76 back in March. While the decline in the indicator does signal that investors have become more risk-averse, it may not entirely be a bad sign for Ethereum. In the past, periods with extreme leverage usage in the derivatives market have often unwound with volatility.

Given that the ELR has calmed down recently, it’s possible that the market could show some stability in the near future. That said, it only remains to be seen how the metric will develop in the coming days.

ETH Price

At the time of writing, Ethereum is trading around $2,330, unchanged from one week ago.

Ethereum Price Chart

Looks like the price of the coin has been consolidating recently | Source: ETHUSDT on TradingView

Featured image from Dall-E, chart from TradingView.com

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Biggest consensus overhaul in blockchain’s history is live for testing

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Biggest consensus overhaul in blockchain’s history is live for testing

Solana developer Anza said Monday that Alpenglow, the network’s biggest proposed consensus overhaul to date, is live on a community test cluster, marking a major step toward a potential mainnet rollout.

The update means validator operators can now test software designed to move Solana from its current consensus system, which combines Proof-of-Stake with TowerBFT and Proof-of-History, toward a new architecture intended to dramatically reduce finality times and improve network responsiveness.

“Alpenglow is live on the community test cluster,” Anza wrote on X. “The biggest consensus change in Solana’s history, now running on validator infrastructure ahead of mainnet.”

Today, Solana relies on Proof-of-History, a cryptographic clock that timestamps transactions, alongside TowerBFT, a voting mechanism validators use to agree on the state of the blockchain. While the design has helped Solana achieve high throughput and low fees, some have pointed to outages and network instability during periods of heavy demand.

Alpenglow proposes replacing major portions of that system with a redesigned framework centered around new components. In simple terms, the new model aims to let validators communicate and confirm blocks faster and more efficiently, potentially cutting transaction finality from several seconds to near real-time speeds.

The start of the community test cluster also suggests that validator software can successfully perform what developers are informally calling “Alpenswitch,” transitioning validator nodes from Solana’s existing process to Alpenglow in a live network environment.

The test milestone comes just days after Solana co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko said at Consensus Miami 2026 that Alpenglow could reach mainnet as soon as next quarter if testing continues smoothly.

Read more: Solana’s ‘Alpenglow’ upgrade could arrive next quarter, co-founder Yakovenko says

Wall Street giants are triggering a massive fee war that could crush crypto exchange margins

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Wall Street giants are triggering a massive fee war that could crush crypto exchange margins

Immediately after Morgan Stanley announced it was rolling out E*Trade, charging a mere 50 basis points undercutting established rivals Coinbase, Robinhood and Schwab, Bloomberg analyst Eric Balchunas said “crypto exchanges should be scared.”

Others were less blunt, saying the Wall Street giant’s “isn’t entering crypto to complement Coinbase—it’s entering to replace it…”

The battle for cheap crypto trading resembles the trading fee race when spot ETFs launched in 2024, which saw providers begin high, offering 50 basis points before Morgan Stanley undercut them all with a 14 basis point offering.

In the long run, this means that trading crypto will be cheaper, where the clear winners will be retail traders, while crypto exchanges see their margins significantly trimmed, potentially affecting the likes of Coinbase, who recently cited financial issues as a reason for to reduce its workforce by 14%.

When announcing E*Trade, Jed Finn, Morgan Stanley’s head of wealth management, suggested the move was more about dominance than control. “This is much bigger than trading crypto at a cheaper rate.

“In a way, the strategy is disintermediating the disintermediators.” He added: “It’s going to be very competitive in the next couple of years,” explaining the move is aimed at ensuring its 8.6 million clients remain within its banking system instead of resorting to other platforms as the demand for crypto increases.

In his X post last week, Balchunas echoed Finn’s sentiment, framing the Wall Street giant’s move as a “SHOTS FIRED” moment. “Morgan Stanley is rolling out crypto trading on its E*Trade platform for 50bps per trade, undercutting Schwab’s 75bps (who undercut Coinbase).”

He said that based on his knowledge of how Schwab works, it will “likely won’t let this stand. Others will probably undercut too.” He also said that “by the time the dust settles it’ll be pretty dirt cheap to trade crypto everywhere.” Before concluding by saying “this is why (traditional financial) TradFi is no joke and crypto exchanges should be scared.”

However, crypto-native leaders rebuffed the “doom and gloom” narrative as U.S.-centric.

“While we respect Eric Balchunas’s insights on TradFi’s push into crypto, the perspective feels somewhat localized to the U.S. market and oversimplified for quick engagements on X,” said Kevin Lee, chief business officer at Gate, which ranks seventh on Coingecko with a 24 hour volume of nearly $2 billion.

Lee also told CoinDesk that Balchunas’ comments do not “fully capture the mature, global evolution of the crypto industry.”

The Gate CBO explained that the recent moves by the Wall Street giants to cut spot trading fees reflects the ongoing reduction of commissions that is normal to see when competition intensifies.

“This mirrors long-established patterns in equities markets, where fierce competition naturally compresses fees,” Lee said. “Smart platforms moved on long ago from fee-only models to diversified revenue streams including staking, structured products, institutional services, and ecosystem growth.”

Georgii Verbitskii, derivatives trader and founder of TYMIO, a non-custodial decentralized finance (DeFI) protocol, told CoinDesk he believes Morgan Stanley’s move into crypto trading is a good sign.

“This is clearly positive for crypto adoption overall,” Verbitskii said. “Morgan Stanley bringing crypto trading to millions of brokerage users is another sign that digital assets are becoming part of mainstream investment infrastructure, although the 50 bps fee itself is not especially competitive.”

Keneabasi Umoren, a crypto market analyst and Web3 researcher, recently told CoinDesk, he does not believe Wall Street will “kill exchanges, but it will squeeze U.S. spot-trading and custody revenue and push exchanges further into derivatives, DeFi and global markets.”

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