Schwab: Clarity Act odds had little impact on Bitcoin

Charles Schwab research found that changes in the perceived odds of the Clarity Act passing explained just 4.3% of bitcoin's (BTC) daily price movements this year, suggesting that delays to the legislation may have little immediate effect on the cryptocurrency's price.

Still, Jim Feraioli, Charles Schwab's head of crypto research, said the bill's eventual passage remains a key catalyst because it could revive the institutional adoption narrative and provide upside for bitcoin in the short term.

His comments came as Senate negotiators released updated text for the CLARITY Act, combining House and Senate proposals into a single draft and introducing language outlining what ethics provisions for public officials could look like. The legislation, however, still faces several steps before it can become law, keeping attention on how much of crypto's trading backdrop is driven by policy headlines versus broader market forces.

Citi starts Securitize at Buy despite post-listing slump

Citi initiated coverage of Securitize (SECZ) with a Buy rating and a $10 price target, arguing that the tokenization firm is well positioned to benefit from the growing market for tokenized real-world assets.

Analyst Peter Christiansen called Securitize's vertically integrated, SEC-regulated platform a competitive advantage, citing clients including BlackRock and KKR.

He described the company as "critical infrastructure" for tokenizing real-world assets, while warning that reliance on BlackRock's BUIDL fund, interest rate sensitivity and an uncertain path to higher-margin transaction revenue remain key risks.

The bullish initiation comes as SECZ continues to struggle in the public market. Since the company's listing earlier this month, shares have fallen below $7, leaving the stock down roughly 50% from its July high, a reminder that enthusiasm for tokenization stories has not translated evenly into post-listing performance.

Broadridge expands digital assets team with seven crypto-focused job openings

Financial technology firm Broadridge is expanding its digital assets business and has opened seven new roles spanning tokenization, wealth management, product development and marketing.

The positions include Head of Tokenization, APAC; VP – Product, Wealth Digital Assets; VP – Digital Assets Product, Corporate Actions; VP – Product, Digital Transfer Agency; Digital Assets Marketing Director; Digital Assets & Tokenization; and two Product Analyst roles focused on digital assets.

In a LinkedIn post, Mark Nichols, co-president of Digital Assets at Broadridge, said the company is growing its product team as tokenization and digital assets continue to mature.

Trump calls for lower interest rates ahead of Fed meeting

President Trump said the Federal Reserve should cut interest rates, arguing that the U.S. should have the world's lowest borrowing costs.

Trump said the Fed's members are political and that new Chairman Kevin Warsh has to work with them.

The U.S. central bank's two-day policy meeting begins tomorrow, with results due Wednesday afternoon. While no one is talking about the rate cuts Trump wants, many market participants are considering rate hikes.

Odds of a hike on Wednesday have surged above 35% from near zero not long ago, driven mainly by renewed hostilities in the Iran war and the resulting 25% gain in oil prices in July.

Trump called off further bombing over the weekend, sending oil down 7% on Monday. That has raised the question of whether the Fed has cover to stay on hold until its next meeting in September.

Nasdaq gives up early gains as AI favorites slide

Nasdaq 100 futures were at one point nearly 2% higher before the market open, but those gains faded.

About one hour after Monday's open, the Nasdaq was down 0.1%, led by declines of 4% to 9% in SanDisk, Micron, AMD, Applied Materials and Intel. Nvidia was lower by 3.5%.

Helping cushion the broader index were roughly 2% gains in hyperscalers Microsoft, Apple, Google and Meta.

Bitcoin, which had been attempting a rally toward $66,000, reversed alongside the Nasdaq and was trading around $64,600, roughly flat over the previous 24 hours, underscoring its recent tendency to track shifts in risk appetite even as it holds above the $65,000 area at times.

Saylor says Strategy will keep buying STRC below $100

Strategy (MSTR) Executive Chairman Michael Saylor commented on Monday morning's disclosure that the company repurchased $25 million worth of its STRC preferred stock last week.

"We intend to remain a regular, disciplined buyer of STRC below $100," Saylor said. "More at deeper discounts, less as STRC nears $100. Another $975M remains available for our prefs."

"Repurchases will be funded outside the USD Reserve, including through MSTR and BTC sales, based on market conditions," he added. "Our objective is for STRC to trade near $100 with high liquidity, low volatility, and healthy, sustainable independent demand. We will not issue below $100."

MSTR was up 6.1% early Monday, while STRC gained 2.3% to $88.90. Bitcoin was higher by 1.55% at $65,500.

Bitmine Immersion adds nearly 10,000 ETH last week

Bitmine Immersion (BMNR) added 9,946 ether (ETH) tokens last week, bringing its total holdings to 5,787,414 tokens.

The company also increased its common stock repurchases, buying back 6.1 million shares versus 5.5 million the previous week.

"We increased our equity buyback as we view the rising ETH/BTC ratio, despite the falling odds of passage of the Clarity Act in 2026, as a sign crypto prices are strengthening," said Chairman Tom Lee.

BMNR was higher by 4.9% in pre-market trading as ETH rose about 3% over the previous 24 hours.

Strive's bitcoin holdings rise to 20,000 after 79 bought last week

Bitcoin treasury company Strive (ASST) disclosed the purchase of 79 bitcoin last week, bringing total holdings to 20,000.

The company also added 808 shares of Strategy's STRC, bringing its holdings of that preferred stock to 43,879 shares.

According to an SEC filing Monday morning, the funds for the purchases appeared to come from a combination of cash on hand and sales of common stock.

Strategy boosts cash reserve, buys back small amount of STRC

Strategy (MSTR) last week increased its so-called USD Reserve by $525 million to $3.75 billion. Michael Saylor said that amount covers 2.1 years of preferred stock dividend payments.

The company raised $544.5 million through sales of more than 5.4 million shares of common stock, according to an SEC filing Monday morning.

A small portion of that fresh capital — $25 million — was used to repurchase 288,930 shares of its high-yielding STRC preferred stock.

The company made no changes to its bitcoin holdings, which remain at 843,755 coins.

MSTR was up 2.8% in pre-market trading alongside a slight rise in bitcoin over the weekend. STRC gained 2.45%.

Chinese chipmaker CXMT surges to nearly $500 billion market cap

Memory chip maker CXMT, which is described as China's answer to U.S. company Micron Technology and South Korea's SK Hynix and Samsung, has become the most valuable publicly listed company in China after rising about 466% following its IPO.

At a market capitalization of $484 billion, the company surpassed the valuation of the previous leader, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China.

Among CXMT's customers could be Apple, which is lobbying the Trump administration to allow the use of CXMT chips in Apple devices sold outside the U.S.

Oil plunges as Iran war cools over the weekend

President Trump is giving diplomacy "some space," said Mike Waltz, Washington's ambassador to the United Nations, on Sunday.

WTI crude oil was down nearly 7% at $83.14 per barrel, while Brent crude was also lower by a similar amount.

U.S. stock index futures moved higher in response, led by the Nasdaq 100's 1.35% gain. Interest rates ticked down by a couple of basis points.

Bitcoin was up 1.1% at $65,150, while ether (ETH) and solana (SOL) outperformed with gains closer to 2% to 3%.

More than $1 million in stablecoins drained in WEMIX and Garden Finance incidents

Layer-1 blockchain WEMIX and decentralized finance protocol Garden Finance paused services after separate security incidents on Sunday moved at least $1.17 million in stablecoins, though Garden said its protocol and user funds were not affected.

An attacker compromised ownership of a WEMIX$-related contract and issued about 5.23 million tokens without authorization, WEMIX said. The tokens were converted into 30,736 WEMIX and roughly 724,200 USDC.e, which was bridged to Ethereum and BNB Chain.

Separately, Blockaid said about $450,000 in USDT was drained from Garden Finance's hash time-locked contracts across Ethereum, Base, Arbitrum and BNB Chain.

Garden said its contracts were not compromised and attributed the incident to a breach of an independent solver's off-chain database, adding that no user funds were lost or placed at risk.

SpaceX falls far enough for the market to price its AI business at zero

SpaceX has now more than round-tripped its entire post-IPO run.

The stock priced at $135 in mid-June, jumped to $225 in its first week, and now trades near $115 after touching $110.85 on Friday, about 18% below the offering price.

Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas said that if the stock falls to $100, as some expect when an insider lockup expires next month, investors would effectively be assigning zero or negative value to the company's AI business.

Jonas said he is telling clients to buy. He kept a $300 target, more than half of it tied to the AI segment built around the xAI merger, and framed the selloff as a gap between bearish sentiment and largely unchanged fundamentals.

Nearly 80% of analysts covering SpaceX rate it a buy, with an average target of $232.

The company holds $1.2 billion worth of bitcoin at Monday's prices, according to Arkham data.

Ether-bitcoin ratio hits three-month high

The ether-bitcoin ratio has risen to 0.03, the highest since late April, according to TradingView data.

The pair is hovering above its 200-day simple moving average for the first time since January and has gained more than 20% since the sell-off lost momentum on June 6.

The sustained outperformance in ether could be a sign of an approaching altcoin boom. Even so, BTC remains the dominant token, accounting for 59% of the total crypto market.

China's gold imports continue to rise

China, the world's second-largest economy, continues to accumulate gold even as the U.S. and other advanced economies move to integrate crypto and blockchain into finance.

China's gold purchases increased for a third straight month in June, totaling about 173 tonnes, according to the latest customs data. June imports were the highest since March 2024.

Demand is not only institutional. Retail investors are also steadily accumulating gold through small, incremental purchases via bank-led savings plans.

China has a strict ban on trading and mining cryptocurrencies and stablecoins in order to prevent capital flight and financial fraud.

Ether leads crypto higher as bitcoin holds as a defensive anchor

Bitcoin is likely to remain range-bound, said Jeff Ko, chief analyst at CoinEx, who pointed to three reasons the backdrop has eased.

Oil has retreated from last week's highs after another pause in U.S.-Iran hostilities. The 10-year Treasury yield, nearing 4.7%, is doing part of the Fed's tightening work on its own. The Fed may also want to preserve flexibility ahead of this week's PCE inflation and second-quarter GDP data.

The larger swing factor is corporate. Apple, Microsoft, Meta and Amazon are all set to report this week, and Ko said their free cash flow and AI-spending guidance could move Treasury yields and the Nasdaq, indirectly affecting the liquidity that flows into crypto.

Ko added that the composition of ETF flows will matter as much as the headline numbers.