Crypto Regulation Hits a Detour as Washington Juggles Priorities

Hi! In today’s edition:

• 🏛️ Senate delays crypto market structure bill

• 📉 Bitcoin rebounds after Trump eases tariff fears

• 📊 Why gold rose while bitcoin fell during Japan bond turmoil

• 🎙️ How Nansen’s new AI trading agent could change crypto investing

Today’s newsletter is brought to you by YO (Yield Optimizer)!

Remember when DeFi meant 15 browser tabs, three stressful bridges, and checking Discord every hour to make sure you weren't getting rugged?

YO (Yield Optimizer) just retired that struggle.

Think of it as the "Easy Mode" button for DeFi. Whether you hold BTC, ETH, USD, EUR, or even GOLD, YO automatically routes your assets into the best risk-adjusted strategies across all chains.

It’s not just an aggregator; it’s an engine that continuously rebalances your portfolio using Exponential’s Risk Ratings (so you don't have to do the due diligence math).

• 100+ Integrations: Unmatched diversification.

• Zero Bridging Stress: Cross-chain yield in one click.

• Total Transparency: See exactly where the yield comes from.

Stop farming. Start optimizing. 

Crypto Regulation Slows as Senate Shifts Focus, but Momentum Isn’t Gone

U.S. crypto legislation has hit another pause, highlighting how uneven the path to regulatory clarity remains in Washington.

Work on a sweeping crypto market structure bill has been delayed after lawmakers on the United States Senate Banking Committee shifted their focus to housing affordability, a top priority for the Trump administration ahead of elections, according to Bloomberg. 

The bill, already postponed once, is now unlikely to resurface until late February or March. The delay follows Coinbase pulling its support, which weakened momentum behind the draft.

That pause does not mean crypto policy is stalled everywhere. The Senate Agriculture Committee has stepped in, releasing its own updated version of a crypto market structure bill and scheduling it for markup. The proposal would expand the authority of the CFTC and is expected to become a key building block in any final Senate package.

Meanwhile, President Donald Trump struck an optimistic tone, saying this week that he expects to sign a comprehensive crypto bill soon. His comments suggest the administration still views digital asset regulation as strategically important, even as legislative priorities compete for attention.

For crypto, the signal is mixed but constructive. Progress is slower than hoped, but the framework for federal oversight is still taking shape, just across multiple tracks instead of one.

Bitcoin Rebounds After Trump’s Truth Social Post Eases Tariff Fears

Markets stabilized after President Donald Trump softened his stance on tariffs on Wednesday.

Earlier in the day at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Trump ruled out the use of force in his push for U.S. control of Greenland. That helped calm nerves, but it did not spark an immediate rally. The real shift came later.

Bitcoin rebounded after Trump posted on Truth Social, saying the U.S. had reached a “framework of a future deal” with NATO and that tariffs on eight European countries would not move forward. That message directly reduced near-term trade risk, and markets reacted fast.

Bitcoin jumped roughly 3% to around $90,000, recovering from lows near $87,600 hit during the tariff-driven selloff. U.S. stocks followed, with the S&P 500, Dow, and Nasdaq each rising about 1.2%, their strongest daily gain in months.

The rebound fits a familiar pattern. Many investors continue to lean into the so-called “TACO” trade, betting that Trump’s aggressive threats are often walked back. Still, caution remains visible elsewhere.

Gold and silver sold off following the news, but are holding near record highs, with gold around $4,825 an ounce, signaling that investors are relieved, but not fully convinced the turbulence is over.

Why Gold Rose and Bitcoin Tumbled on Japan Bond Turmoil

Stocks, bonds, and crypto fell together this week, but gold didn’t.

That split matters more than the selloff itself. Japan’s bond market triggered a global repricing of risk, and it exposed where bitcoin still trades in moments of stress. 

We unpack the signal, the history, and the portfolio implications.

Read the full analysis and subscribe to Bits + Bips Premium:

How Nansen’s New Trading Agent Makes It Easier to Follow the Smart Money Onchain

Is trading as we know about to change forever? Alex Svanevik discusses Nansen’s AI trading agent and the possibilities it could unlock.

Crypto intelligence platform Nansen has rolled out an AI trading agent, aiming to let users complete the full trading lifecycle—from discovery to execution—within a single platform. But the move also heralds a new horizon for trading and investment, one potentially filled with interesting possibilities.

In this episode of Unchained Nansen CEO Alex Svanevik unpacks what the AI agent does, the end game, the opportunities and the hurdles.

Can Nansen AI do for trading what Anthropic’s Claude is doing for coding? And will humans soon be able to work without being glued to a screen?

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pods, Fountain, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform.

• 📱 Farcaster’s founders stepped back after selling the struggling decentralized social protocol to Neynar, an infrastructure company already embedded in its ecosystem, marking a leadership reset for a project that raised $150 million but failed to sustain user growth.

• 🗣️ Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin signaled a renewed push toward decentralized social media in 2026, backing open, user-owned platforms like Lens as it changes hands to Mask Network and warning that token-driven social apps risk recreating the same engagement problems as centralized networks.

• 🇮🇷 Blockchain data suggests Iran’s central bank accumulated more than $500 million in USDT, likely using the dollar-pegged stablecoin to stabilize its weakening currency and settle trade outside the global banking system due to sanctions.

• 🎮 Axie Infinity’s AXS token surged more than 120% after developers overhauled in-game rewards by making newly earned tokens non-tradable by default, a shift designed to cut down on bots, slow new token supply, and refocus the blockchain game on real players rather than automated farming.

• 📈 Crypto custody firm BitGo priced its IPO at $18 per share above expectations as it prepares to its Thursday debut on the NYSE, positioning itself as one of the first pure-play digital asset safekeeping companies to go public with over $90 billion in assets under custody and a valuation above $2 billion.

• 📊 Galaxy plans to launch a $100 million hedge fund in early 2026 that mixes crypto tokens with financial-services stocks, positioning the vehicle as a defensive strategy amid falling bitcoin prices, rising volatility, and growing links between traditional finance and digital assets.

• 💰 Tron founder Justin Sun invested $8 million into River, a lesser-known DeFi project building cross-chain stablecoin infrastructure, just as analysts flagged that a sharp rally in its token appeared driven more by leveraged trading than organic demand.

• 🧱 Crypto accelerator a16z CSX and Road Capital led a $5.5 million seed round into Cork, a startup creating tools to make hidden risks in tokenized real-world assets measurable and tradable, aiming to help investors hedge against stablecoin failures and sudden liquidity shocks.

• 💼 Strive, the bitcoin-focused asset manager founded by Vivek Ramaswamy, is seeking to raise $150 million in a follow-on stock offering to buy more bitcoin and pay down debt, building on strong demand for its high-dividend preferred shares after its stock climbed to $100.

1. DL News: Venezuelan stablecoin fever cools as ‘economic path forward becomes clearer,’ says economist 

2. The Defiant: Prediction Markets Hit New TVL High as Polymarket Tops $330 Million

3. A16z crypto: 11 AI x crypto crossovers