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- US Banks Cleared to Support Bitcoin | Crypto Alpha Week 17 of 2025
US Banks Cleared to Support Bitcoin | Crypto Alpha Week 17 of 2025
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TL;DR
Bitcoin Surpasses Google Market Cap
US Banks Cleared to Support Bitcoin
Ethereum’s L2 Scaling Supports High-Throughput Chains
Ethereum Gas Limit Test for Fusaka Fork
RockawayX Raises $125M Fund for Solana Startups
Astra Fintech Commits $100M for Solana Growth in Asia
Securitize and Mantle Launch MI4 Crypto Fund
Stargaze Introduces Gas Fees for NFTs
Ash Wallet Integrates Safe Accounts on Avalanche
Kalichain Goes Mainnet on Avalanche
Paul Atkins Sworn in as SEC Chairman
SEC Charges Exec Over $198M Crypto Fraud
And much more!
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Bitcoin Highlights of the Week
Bitcoin has officially surpassed Google’s market capitalization, reaching $1.86 trillion as its price surged past $94,000. This move cements Bitcoin’s place as the world’s fifth-largest asset, behind only Gold, Apple, Microsoft, and Nvidia. The rally was fueled by a broader tech sector upswing and improving U.S.–China trade relations.
Bitcoin’s strong momentum also allowed it to outperform major benchmarks like the Nasdaq, breaking through critical technical levels. This milestone further validates Bitcoin’s expanding role in global markets and highlights accelerating crypto adoption as traditional financial and tech sectors experience shifting capital flows.
Cantor Fitzgerald, Tether, Bitfinex, and SoftBank are launching 21 Capital, a $3 billion Bitcoin investment firm set to list on Nasdaq under the ticker “XXI.” The venture will convert over 42,000 BTC into shares priced at $10 each, fixed at an $85,000 Bitcoin rate.
Strike CEO Jack Mallers will lead 21 Capital, positioning it as a diversified, structured alternative to MicroStrategy’s strategy. The firm plans to raise an additional $550 million through bonds and private equity, offering transparent Bitcoin Per Share and Bitcoin Return Rate metrics to create a regulated, tradable proxy for institutional Bitcoin exposure.
Michael Saylor’s Strategy acquired 6,556 BTC for $555.8 million last week at an average price of $84,785, boosting total holdings to 538,200 BTC. The purchase was funded through $547.7 million in common stock sales and $7.8 million from Series A preferred stock.
Strategy has now bought 91,800 BTC in 2025, accounting for 17% of its total reserves. This move follows a brief buying pause and signals renewed momentum in its aggressive acquisition strategy. Institutional interest in MSTR continues to grow, with 13 institutional holders and over 814,000 retail accounts now exposed to the firm.
Bitcoin ETFs in the U.S. attracted $912.7 million on April 22, the largest single-day inflow since January 17. Top performers included ARKB with $267.1 million and FBTC with $253.8 million. The surge follows political tensions as Donald Trump criticized Fed Chair Jerome Powell, causing market uncertainty.
Bitcoin’s price rose above $90,000 as investors sought safe-haven assets amid declining confidence in the U.S. dollar. Experts note that Bitcoin is increasingly behaving like a macro asset, responding to broader economic and political shifts rather than moving independently from traditional financial markets.
The U.S. Federal Reserve has withdrawn its 2022 guidance discouraging banks from engaging in crypto, signaling a shift that could accelerate institutional Bitcoin adoption. Michael Saylor declared that U.S. banks are now “free to begin supporting Bitcoin,” following the Fed’s policy reversal.
Industry leaders view this as a pivotal moment for broader financial participation. The change paves the way for regulated banking involvement, a domain previously dominated by crypto-native firms like Coinbase. Further institutional momentum hinges on pending legislation, including the GENIUS and STABLE Acts, which aim to standardize crypto oversight.
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Ethereum Highlights of the Week
Ethereum developers are exploring a fourfold increase in the network's gas limit for the Fusaka hard fork. The proposal, outlined in Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) 9678, suggests raising the gas limit to 150 million. The change aims to scale Ethereum’s layer 1 execution, requiring extensive testing for potential bugs.
With validators supporting a raise to 36 million gas, the Fusaka update is expected by late 2025. This proposal comes as part of the ongoing efforts to improve scalability without adding new features, and client developers are crucial for testing the changes.
Gitcoin, the Ethereum-based public goods funding protocol, is winding down its software development unit, Gitcoin Labs, due to profitability challenges. The project will also discontinue its Grants Stack and Allo Protocol. Gitcoin's focus will shift to its Grants program and asset management, continuing to support open-source projects.
Despite this restructuring, Gitcoin remains committed to its mission, maintaining its community-driven ethos, and ensuring a smooth transition for its partners and users. The decision follows a strategic overhaul aimed at streamlining operations and embracing more capitalistic ventures.
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has proposed replacing Ethereum’s current EVM bytecode with the open-source RISC-V architecture to enhance scalability. Buterin suggests that this ambitious change could dramatically reduce on-chain execution costs by up to 100x.
The proposal would maintain interoperability between old and new contracts, ensuring a smooth transition. Other blockchain projects, like Polkadot, have also explored similar approaches. This idea aims to make Ethereum’s execution layer more efficient, marking a significant shift in the network’s scalability strategy.
Ethereum Layer 2 solution Scroll has launched the Euclid upgrade, marking a major protocol transformation aimed at improving network throughput and security. The update reduces fees by 90% and introduces key improvements such as a new L2 prover, optimized rollup processing, and support for EIP-7702 and RIP-7212.
The upgrade makes Scroll "Stage-1 ready," aligning with Vitalik Buterin's decentralization framework for Layer 2s. Euclid also deprecates the existing "halo2 circuits" in favor of the OpenVM, boosting speed and scalability. The upgrade positions Scroll for faster, more efficient operations within the Ethereum ecosystem.
Ethereum’s focus on Layer 2 scaling could create a diverse ecosystem of high-throughput chains, according to Avail co-founder Anurag Arjun. By using various L2 solutions with different transaction speeds and parameters, Ethereum offers a unique advantage over monolithic blockchain competitors.
While this architecture promotes innovation and experimentation, Arjun highlights a challenge: the lack of interoperability between L2s could complicate asset transfers. Critics argue that Ethereum's L2-centric approach limits liquidity and undermines the base layer. Meanwhile, Ethereum’s decreasing fees in 2025 indicate waning demand and reduced market interest.
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Solana Highlights of the Week
New filings from the Federal Election Commission reveal crypto giants like Solana Labs, Yuga Labs, and Uniswap’s founder made significant donations to Trump’s 2025 inauguration fund. Solana Labs contributed $1 million, Uniswap’s CEO Hayden Adams gave $245K, and Yuga Labs provided $100K.
The donations have sparked concerns over potential regulatory influence, as the SEC closed investigations into firms like Uniswap and Consensys shortly after these contributions. The situation raises questions about the intersection of political donations and business interests in the crypto industry.
A Solana whale who staked nearly 1 million SOL tokens in 2021 for about $27 million is now sitting on over $153 million in profit after the tokens appreciated in value. The whale’s staked holdings grew to 1.29 million SOL, worth around $180 million as Solana’s price surged to approximately $140.
On April 22, the whale began offloading some of the tokens, transferring 100,000 SOL (worth $14 million) to Binance, indicating a potential sell-off. Despite the offload, the whale still holds 1.19 million SOL, equating to roughly $166 million in value.
Nous Research has raised $50 million in a Series A round, led by Paradigm, to develop decentralized, open-source AI models on the Solana blockchain. This funding values the company at $1 billion and emphasizes the rising interest in AI and blockchain.
By utilizing global idle computing power for AI training, Nous challenges centralized AI giants like OpenAI. The new capital will be used to scale resources and further research, with Paradigm's backing highlighting the growing intersection of blockchain and artificial intelligence in venture capital.
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