(17/52) Weekly Market Insight | May Week 2 | Backed to Neutral

Headline News: Backed to Neutral

• Bitcoin closed April up 11.86%, marking its strongest monthly performance in a year. Despite the macroeconomic overhang from the continued closure of the Strait of Hormuz, markets have largely looked past geopolitical conflict, with upside momentum instead being driven by the broader AI infrastructure narrative. However, perpetual futures funding rates remain broadly negative, indicating a lack of structural momentum behind the recent rally. Broader market sentiment is stabilizing, with the Crypto Fear & Greed Index recovering to ‘Neutral’, its highest level since January.

Macro-Outlook: War and Interest Rate Are Staying

• Iran submitted a new 14-point counter-proposal to the US via a Pakistani intermediary, while President Trump publicly doubted the viability of the new proposal. The Trump administration formally informed Congress that hostilities had “terminated”, sidestepping the immediate need for congressional authorisation to extend the conflict. Meanwhile, the US plans to start guiding ships through the Strait of Hormuz.
• President Trump announced a 25% tariff increase on cars and trucks imported from the EU, citing non-compliance with the agreed trade deal.
• The US Fed kept interest rates unchanged at the April FOMC meeting, with three hawkish members dissenting against the inclusion of an easing bias and one dovish member dissenting in favor of a rate cut. Kevin Warsh is expected to serve as the next Fed Chair in May, while Powell will remain as governor until his legal matters are fully resolved.
• The market prices in a 92% probability that the rate will remain unchanged for the first Warsh-led FOMC meeting in June, and a 13% probability of a rate cut in 2026.
• The US PCE Price Index rose to 3.5% in March, matching market expectations. US personal income and spending increased by 0.6% and 0.9% respectively, higher than the market expectation of 0.3% for personal income and in line with market expectations for personal spending.
• The US ISM manufacturing PMI stayed at 52.7 in April, slightly lower than the market expectation of 53.

The Upcoming Economic Calendar includes,

• Tuesday, May 5, 10:00pm: US ISM Services PMI in April and JOLTs Job Openings in March
• Friday, May 8, 8:30pm: US Job Reports in April
• Friday, May 8, 10:00pm: Michigan Consumer Sentiment in May

Weekly-Cryptos-Overview: Institutions Are Taking Actions

• CLARITY Act moved closer to law after bipartisan compromise finalised on stablecoin yield, banning passive yield but allowed activity-based rewards. The Senate Banking Committee is expected to formally mark up the bill and push for a formal debate in May.
• US Congressman Nick Begich announced he will introduce revised Strategic Bitcoin Reserve legislation to codify Trump’s executive order (which can be easily reverse by future administration) into permanent law.
• Colombia’s largest pension fund Porvenir moved into Bitcoin exposure via BlackRock’s IBIT ETF, offering indirect BTC allocation to voluntary pension accounts with a minimum investment of $25 after risk profiling.
• Meta partnered with Stripe to roll out USDC payouts to creators in Colombia and the Philippines on Solana and Polygon networks, marking its return to blockchain-based payments after shutting down the Libra/Diem project in 2022.
• Western Union announced that its Solana-based US dollar stablecoin USDPT is in final-stage preparation and expected to launch next month as an alternate to SWIFT for cross-border settlements.
• Visa expanded its stablecoin settlement pilot to nine blockchains with onchain settlement volume now running at an annualized pace of $7 billion and support for over 130 stablecoin-linked card programs across more than 50 countries.
• Stripe launched its new Treasury product, allowing businesses to hold funds in multiple currencies and stablecoins, instantly transfer money to US businesses for free, pay anyone in 160 countries via email, earn credits on balances toward Stripe fees, spend with a Stripe card for 2% cash back, and more.
• Shinhan Card, South Korea’s leading card issuer, signed a strategic MOU with the Solana Foundation to bring stablecoin payments to its 28 million cardholders and expand Solana-based payment infrastructure.
• SBI Holdings entered formal talks to acquire Bitbank as a consolidated subsidiary via capital and business alliance, following its recent acquisition of Bitpoint Japan.
• KBank partnered with Upbit and Ripple to test onchain cross-border remittances.
• Toku, a stablecoin payroll provider, integrated Paxos Labs’ Amplify to offer yield directly on creators’ and employees’ USDC paychecks.
• OKX published the Agent Payments Protocol (APP), an open standard enabling AI agents to handle the full commerce lifecycle including dispute resolution across any chain.
• Gemini rolled out Agentic Trading, allowing AI bots to directly manage crypto exchange trading accounts.
• NYSE filed a proposed rule change with the SEC to allow tokenized equities and ETFs to trade alongside traditional shares under DTC, using the same CUSIP, ticker, rights and T+1 settlement.
• Securitize partnered with Computershare to let US listed companies issue real equity as Issuer-Sponsored Tokens (ISTs) alongside traditional shares and DRS without changing their capital structure.
• Prediction market ETFs are set to launch as early as next week according to ETF analyst James Seyffart, after Roundhill filed a post-effective amendment with the SEC, setting May 5 as the effective date for six funds targeting the 2028 presidential election and 2026 midterms.

Layer 1 and Layer 2s

• Ripple Treasury was implemented by Subway, consolidating the fast-food giant’s bank accounts from 450 to 350 and bank relationships from 70 to 30 while automating 90% of payments and delivering 98% cash visibility across its global franchise operations.
• Base onboarded Chiliz and Fan Tokens onto the network, bringing official fan tokens for Manchester City, FC Barcelona, Juventus and other major sports clubs just in time for the 2026 World Cup.
• Kite AI, the agentic payments-focus L1, launched its mainnet, featuring a high-frequency low-value stablecoin settlement layer, Kite Agent Passport for identity and programmable governance, and native support for payment standards including x402, Google AP2 and Stripe MPP.

Dapps

• Pump.fun burned $370M worth of PUMP tokens or 36% of circulating supply and launched a programmatic buyback-and-burn scheme using 50% of all net revenue for the next year. The token is expected to have a major unlock, 16% of circulating supply in July.
• Chainlink completed its SOC 2 Type 2 examination by Deloitte & Touche for CCIP and Data Feeds, becoming the only data and interop oracle platform to hold SOC 2 Type 2, SOC 2 Type 1 and ISO/IEC 27001:2022 certifications.
• Obol, Ethereum distributed validator infrastructure, released ObolClaw v0.8.0, enabling one-command deployment of AI agents on personal hardware that autonomously discover, price and pay for services from other agents on Ethereum/Base via USDC x402 payments)with full agent-friendly CLI and one-agent full-permissions model.

Governance and Upcoming Alpha

• Aave DAO passed a governance vote to pause buybacks and redirect emissions until the rsETH post-incident is resolved.
• Solana released its post-quantum readiness report from Anza and Jump Firedancer researchers, confirming a ready-to-deploy Falcon post-quantum digital signature scheme (compact, high-throughput design).
• Sui began testing post-quantum stateless signatures on its testnet, confirming seamless performance for future quantum-resistant cryptography without added validator burden.
• ZKsync proposed its v31 protocol upgrade (ZIP-16), introducing ZKsync Connect for native interop between ZKsync Chains, Stage 1 support for L1-settling chains, and expanded ZKsync OS compatibility to enable seamless cross-chain activity within the network.
• The Ethereum community is having debate on staking reward reduction. Fundstrat’s Tom Lee stated that Ethereum staking issuance should reflect actual security costs and could be lower than current levels, adding he is not opposed to a market-based adjustment that would also create new yield opportunities outside native staking. While, Lido staking lead warned that cutting Ethereum staking issuance would likely kill liquid staking tokens (LSTs), shrink DeFi, and ultimately threaten Ethereum’s core value proposition.

Token Unlock

• ADI token unlocks on May 9, representing 7.18% of the token supply.
• LINEA token unlocks on May 10, representing 4.08% of the token supply.
• FHE token unlocks on May 10, representing 7.09% of the token supply.
• RAIN token unlocks on May 10, representing 10.5% of the token supply.
• BB token unlocks on May 13, representing 10.9% of the token supply.
• KERNEL token unlocks on May 14, representing 4.88% of the token supply.
• CYBER token unlocks on May 15, representing 6.26% of the token supply.
• ZKC token unlocks on May 15, representing 5.16% of the token supply.
• VANA token unlocks on May 16, representing 4.47% of the token supply.
• STBL token unlocks on May 16, representing 83.3% of the token supply.
• SOLV token unlocks on May 17, representing 40.9% of the token supply.
• ERA token unlocks on May 17, representing 4.13% of the token supply.
• BANK token unlocks on May 17, representing 9.58% of the token supply.