Why institutions are hesitant about decentralized finance — Shibtoshi

Shibtoshi, the founder of the SilentSwap privacy-preserving trading platform, outlined several concerns that make institutions hesitant to adopt decentralized finance (DeFi) solutions, including privacy, a lack of standardized compliance regulations, and legal accountability.

The DeFi founder told Cointelegraph that the high transparency of onchain transactions presents a problem for companies that must conceal sensitive information, including trading strategies, payroll information, and business-to-business agreements. Shibtoshi said:

“The main concerns — regulatory uncertainty, privacy limitations, and complex user experience — are real, but solvable. Innovations in privacy-preserving protocols are making DeFi increasingly compatible with enterprise needs. Platforms like SilentSwap are a step in that direction.”

Regulatory uncertainty continues to be one of the biggest problems for DeFi and is compounded by a fragmented approach across legal jurisdictions, which prevents institutional adoption, Shibtoshi added.

“Are DeFi tokens securities? What happens if a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) messes

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US recession 40% likely in 2025, what it means for crypto — Analyst

The United States has a 40% chance of a recession in 2025 amid the potential for a protracted trade war and macroeconomic uncertainty, according to market analyst and Coin Bureau founder Nic Puckrin.

In an interview with Cointelegraph, the analyst said that while a recession is not probable, a recession and the current macroeconomic uncertainty will create an environment where risk-on assets like cryptocurrencies suffer. Puckrin said:

“Trump and his advisors have said they have not completely dismissed the recession, which means it is definitely possible, but right now, I would not say it is probable, but the odds have climbed a lot.”

The analyst added that US President Donald Trump is not actively attempting to engineer a recession, but that the things the Trump administration is doing, including cutting federal jobs and spending to balance the budget can lead to recessions as a side effect.

Macroeconomic uncertainty is

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Potential Bitcoin price fall to $65K ‘irrelevant’ since central bank liquidity is coming — Analyst

Bitcoin’s (BTC) 7% decline saw the price drop from $88,060 on March 26 to $82,036 on March 29 and led to $158 million in long liquidations. This drop was particularly concerning for bulls, as gold surged to a record high at the same time, undermining Bitcoin’s “digital gold” narrative. However, many experts argue that a Bitcoin rally is imminent as multiple governments take steps to avert an economic crisis.

The ongoing global trade war and spending cuts by the US government are considered temporary setbacks. An apparent silver lining is the expectation that additional liquidity is expected to flow into the markets, which could boost risk-on assets. Analysts believe Bitcoin is well-positioned to benefit from this broader macroeconomic shift.

Source: Mihaimihale

Take, for example, Mihaimihale, an X social platform user who argued that tax cuts and lower interest

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Kalshi sues Nevada and New Jersey gaming regulators

Prediction market Kalshi filed a lawsuit against the Nevada Gaming Control Board and the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement after both state regulators sent cease and desist orders for the firm to pause all sports-related contracts in the states.

Kalshi’s legal team argued that the contracts fall under the jurisdiction of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and, therefore, cannot be regulated by state-level authorities.

The team also contends that the cease and desist orders fail to recognize that Kalshi’s event contracts are two-sided markets that trade as swaps as opposed to the sports-betting book model where the house controls the market. Kalshi co-founder Tarek Mansour said:

“Prediction markets are a critical innovation of the 21st century, and like all innovations, they are initially misunderstood. We are proud to be the company that has pioneered this technology and stand ready to defend it once again in a court of law.”

Additionally, the Nevada

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The future of finance is built on Bitcoin — Ethereum was just the testnet

Opinion by: Alisia Painter, chief operating officer of Botanix Labs

Without Ethereum, the industry wouldn’t be where it is today in terms of bringing decentralized finance (DeFi) to life, making programmability a key feature of blockchains and proving the value of smart contracts at scale. The Ethereum Virtual Machine has become the go-to platform for developers, with the largest ecosystem and tooling.

As DeFi matures, however, it’s worth asking: Is Ethereum the best foundation for the future of financial innovation? Well, the answer might just be Bitcoin.

With nearly $6 billion in total value locked as of March 2025, Bitcoin’s decentralization, liquidity and resilience position it as the natural home for the next era of onchain finance, and while Ethereum’s flexibility has enabled an explosion of experimentation, that same flexibility has come with trade-offs.

From vulnerabilities in smart contracts we’ve seen in big-name hacks to ongoing debates around scalability, Ethereum’s experimental ethos

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Bitcoin adoption in EU limited by ‘fragmented’ regulations — Analysts

Institutional adoption of Bitcoin in the European Union remains sluggish, even as the United States moves forward with landmark cryptocurrency regulations that seek to establish BTC as a national reserve asset.

More than three weeks after President Donald Trump’s March 7 executive order outlined plans to use cryptocurrency seized in criminal cases to create a federal Bitcoin (BTC) reserve, European companies have largely remained silent on the issue.

The stagnation may stem from Europe’s complex regulatory regime, according to Elisenda Fabrega, general counsel at Brickken, a European real-world asset (RWA) tokenization platform.

“European corporate adoption remains limited,” Fabrega told Cointelegraph, adding:

“This hesitation reflects a deeper structural divide, rooted in regulation, institutional signaling and market maturity. Europe has yet to take a definitive stance on Bitcoin as a reserve asset.”

Bitcoin’s economic model favors early adopters, which may pressure more

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Sonic Labs ditch algorithmic USD stablecoin for UAE dirham alternative

Sonic Labs has canceled plans to launch a US dollar-pegged algorithmic stablecoin, opting instead to develop a United Arab Emirates dirham-denominated alternative.

On March 22, Sonic Labs co-founder Andre Cronje said the company was working on a US dollar-pegged algorithmic stablecoin with an annual percentage rate (APR) of up to 23%, Cointelegraph reported.

However, one week later, the firm reversed course.

“We will no longer be releasing a USD based algorithmic stable coin,” Cronje said in a March 28 X post. “Completely unrelated, we will be releasing a mathematically bound numerical Dirham which is settled and denominated in USD, which is definitely not a USD based algorithmic stable coin.”

The shift in strategy comes shortly after the UAE announced it would launch its digital dirham central bank digital currency (CBDC) in the fourth quarter of 2025.

Source: Andre Cronje

Khaled

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$1T stablecoin supply could drive next crypto rally — CoinFund’s Pakman

The global stablecoin supply could surge to $1 trillion by the end of 2025, potentially becoming a key catalyst for broader cryptocurrency market growth, according to CoinFund managing partner David Pakman.

“We’re in a stablecoin adoption upswell that’s likely to increase dramatically this year,” Pakman said during Cointelegraph’s Chainreaction live show on X on March 27. “We could go from $225 billion stablecoins to $1 trillion just this calendar year.”

He noted that such growth, while modest compared to global financial markets, would represent a “meaningfully significant” shift for blockchain-based finance.

Pakman also suggested that the rise in capital flowing onchain, combined with growing interest in exchange-traded funds (ETFs), could further support decentralized finance (DeFi) activity:

“If we have a moment this year where ETFs are permitted to provide staking rewards or yield to holders, that unlocks really meaningful uplift in DeFi activity, broadly defined.”

https://t.co/v9lOnk00QY

— Cointelegraph (@Cointelegraph) March

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NAYG lawsuit against Galaxy was ‘lawfare, pure and simple' — Scaramucci

The New York State Attorney General’s (NAYG) recent legal action against Galaxy Digital over its promotional ties to the now-collapsed cryptocurrency Terra (LUNA) was unfair and an abuse of the legal system, says SkyBridge Capital and founder Anthony Scaramucci.

“It’s LAWFARE, pure and simple due to an obscure but dangerously powerful New York law known as the Martin Act,” Scaramucci said in a March 28 X post.

Martin Law can “open the door for abuse”

“The law has no need to prove intent, creating a low standard of proof that can open the door for abuse like this. It shouldn’t exist,” he said.

New York’s Martin Act is one of the US’s strictest anti-fraud and securities laws, allowing prosecutors the power to pursue financial fraud cases without needing to prove intent. The NAYG alleged that Galaxy Digital violated the Martin Act over its alleged promotion of Terra, with <a

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Greedy L2s are the reason ETH is a 'completely dead' investment: VC

Ether’s (ETH) declining appeal as an investment comes from layer-2’s draining value from the main network and a lack of community pushback on excessive token creation, a crypto venture capitalist says.

“The #1 cause of this is greedy Eth L2s siphoning value from the L1 and the social consensus that excess token creation was A-OK,” Castle Island Ventures partner Nic Carter said in a March 28 X post.

Ether “died by its own hand”

“ETH was buried in an avalanche of its own tokens. Died by its own hand,” Carter said. He said this in response to Lekker Capital founder Quinn Thompson’s claim that Ether is “completely dead” as an investment.

Source: Quinn Thompson

“A $225 billion market cap network that is seeing declines in transaction activity, user growth and fees/revenues. There is no investment case here. As a

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