The Block

Quick Take The number of DEX traders on Ethereum is down to 63,000, the lowest number of traders since February. This is an excerpt from The Block’s Data & Insights newsletter.

Quick Take CEO Keonne Rodriguez and Chief Technology Officer William Lonergan Hill were charged on Wednesday with operating the Samourai Wallet. Prosecutors say Samourai is an unlicensed money-transmitting business and was involved in over $2 billion in unlawful transactions.

Quick Take Prosecutors say William Morro was involved in a scheme to hide the source of funds connected to OneCoin by lying to banks about the origin of those funds. Morro was arrested on Tuesday.

Quick Take The bitcoin halving has historically viewed as a bullish signal. This year, predictions varied. For miners, the bulk of their earnings have been cut by 50% in one day. This is an excerpt from The Block’s Data & Insights newsletter.

Quick Take Tevaera, a web3 gaming firm building on the Ethereum Layer 2 zkSync Era, raised $5 million in seed and private financing. Tevaera intends to use the funds to grow its team and to launch a Layer 3 gaming chain on zkSync, the firm’s co-founder told The Block.

Quick Take The Lummis-Gillibrand Payment Stablecoin Act introduced last week would bring clarity to regulations that “should encourage banks into the stablecoin market,” the ratings agency said in a note on Wednesday. Tether’s dominance in the stablecoin market globally could slow since it is issued by a non-U.S. entity and is not allowed if the bill passes, the ratings agency added.

Over $6.3 billion worth of bitcoin options and over $3 billion in ether options are set to expire on this Friday on Deribit.The bitcoin option put-call ratio is more skewed towards puts compared to ether’s put-call ratio ahead of the same expiry.

Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan has made five predictions ahead of Bitcoin’s next halving, estimated for April 2028.Hougan expects lower volatility, increased portfolio allocations and ETF flows, central bank involvement and a price target of at least $250,000 during the period.

Bloomberg Senior ETF Analyst Eric Balchunas said BlackRock is “gaga” when it comes to its highly-successful spot bitcoin ETF.BlackRock’s spot bitcoin fund accounts for 24% of the firm’s total ETF flows globally, according to the analyst.

Founders Fund has made a “strategic long-term investment” in Alliance. The venture capital firm has taken a minority stake in Alliance, Alliance co-founder Imran Khan told The Block.