Senate Bans Prediction Trading

Find out our latest reports, listed below:

• Tokenised Markets on Bitget UEX: How Traders Are Utilising 24/7 Real-World Assets For Real Time Macro Hedging
• Block Scholes x Panoptic: Bridging The Onchain Convexity Gap
• Volatility Report: February 2026

• 2026 – the year of RWA perps?
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Market Snapshot: Overnight Moves

Daily Updates:

• BTC is up 2% in the last 24 hours trading above $77K, while US equities hit fresh highs in yesterday’s session, after macro data showed the US economy continues to march on, in spite of geopolitical turbulence. 

• Inflation-adjusted gross domestic product (GDP) rose at an annualised 2% pace in Q1 2026, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) initial estimate. 
• Consumer spending, which makes up roughly two-thirds of economic activity, increased at a higher-than-expected 1.6% rate, while Business outlays on equipment and structures advanced 10.4%. That was the fastest pace since Q2 2023 and was bolstered by massive investment in equipment used in data centres at the heart of the artificial intelligence (AI) boom.
• A separate report from the BEA however showed that the Fed’s preferred measure of inflation, the personal consumption expenditures price index (PCE), rose 0.7% month-over-month in March, the largest monthly increase since 2022. The gauge was up 3.5% from the prior year — a big increase from February’s 2.8% reading and the highest level since May 2023. 

• Yesterday’s macro data matches the thoughts Chair Powell put forward during his final press conference as Fed Chair earlier in the week. 
• There he said “Growth is really solid across our economy. Some of that is consumer spending … And some of it is just the apparently insatiable demand for data centers all over the United States. So a lot of business investment going into building data centers. And every reason to think that that continues.”
• Powell also reiterated that “Inflation is the thing we need to work on” and that the Fed needs to see progress on tariff-related inflation before it even considers the recent spike in energy prices — “The question about looking through energy really is not in front of us right now. It hasn’t even peaked yet. And I think we’d want to see the backside of that, and progress on tariffs, before we even thought about reducing rates.”

• The S&P 500 closed 1.02% higher, bringing its month-to-date performance in April to 10.4%, the best month for the index since November 2020. 
• That rally has occurred despite oil prices holding their second weekly gain. Brent crude oil contracts for July rose above $111 a barrel, while WTI is up 12% this week. 

• Meanwhile President Trump told reporters that Iran’s “economy is crashing, the blockade is incredible … So we’ll see how long they hold out”, showing little signs of easing the US’s blockade in the Hormuz Strait. 
• Iran is showing few signs of easing up their constraints in the key waterway too — earlier on Thursday, the new supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei vowed in a statement that he would not give up the country’s nuclear or missile technologies, while also signalling Tehran would keep control of the Strait. 
• Khamenei said “new management of the strait will bring comfort and progress for the benefit of all the nations of the region and economic blessings will bring joy to the hearts of the people”. He added Iran will “guard its modern technological capacities – from nano to bio to nuclear and missile, as their national capital and will guard it like their maritime land and air borders”.

• The Japanese yen rallied as much as 3% on Thursday against the US dollar, its biggest single-day move in over three years, after reports that Japanese officials had officially intervened in the market for the first time since 2024 to lift the currency. 
• According to the Nikkei newspaper, the Japanese government and Bank of Japan intervened by buying yen and selling dollars. 
• The move pushed the currency to the 155 yen range against the dollar after it had softened to around 160 earlier in the day, its weakest level since July 2024. 
• Japanese Finance Minister Satsuki Katayama also said earlier on Thursday that the timing to take “decisive action” in the market was nearing, in one of her strongest signals yet of potential currency intervention.

• The U.S. Senate has unanimously passed a resolution barring senators from trading on prediction markets, with the measure taking effect immediately.
• The resolution, introduced by Senator Bernie Moreno, is aimed at preventing insider trading and addressing growing concerns that public officials could use non-public information to profit from event-based markets.
• Prediction markets have come under increased scrutiny in Washington after allegations that confidential information was used to place bets on politically sensitive outcomes.
• Major platforms including Kalshi and Polymarket have said they support the Senate’s move. Both firms have also introduced measures intended to prevent insiders from trading and to protect market integrity.

• Riot Platforms, a Bitcoin mining and data centre operator, has reported $167.2M in total  Q1 revenue, with $111.9M generated from its core mining business despite lower BTC production and prices.
• The company sold 3,778 BTC during the quarter and retains 15,679 BTC on its balance sheet, valued at approximately $1.2B.
• The company has generated $3.2M in debut data centre revenue (~20% of total), driven by a long-term agreement with AMD, which has expanded its contracted capacity to 50MW with potential scaling up to 200MW.

• MARA Holdings, a publicly traded Bitcoin mining company, has agreed to acquire Long Ridge Energy & Power for $1.5B, adding a 505MW gas plant and 1,600-acre site to support its expansion into energy-backed digital infrastructure.
• The deal includes assuming ~$785M in debt with the remainder financed via cash and a backed bridge loan, and is expected to generate ~$144M in annualised EBITDA based on recent performance.
• MARA plans to develop the site into a large-scale data centre and AI campus with over 1GW potential capacity, marking a strategic shift from pure BTC mining toward vertically integrated power and compute infrastructure.

• Ethereum-based digital asset treasury, Bitmine, has staked an additional 162,088 ETH (~$366M), according to on-chain data, bringing total staked holdings to 4,194,029 ETH (~$9.48B), 82.59% of its total ETH portfolio.

• The Arbitrum DAO has begun voting on a proposal to release 30,766 ETH, worth roughly $71M, that was frozen by the Arbitrum Security Council following the recent KelpDAO exploit.
• The funds had been moved by the attacker to an Arbitrum One address before the Security Council intervened under its emergency powers.
• If the vote passes, the frozen ETH will be transferred to DeFi United, the recovery initiative established in response to the attack.
• DeFi United was created to help restore collateral backing for rsETH after the exploit severely affected KelpDAO’s liquid restaking ecosystem.
• The initiative has already attracted more than $331M in ETH and stablecoin contributions or loans from major DeFi participants, including Aave-linked contributors, Consensys, Mantle, LayerZero and Kelp itself.
• The Arbitrum vote will remain open until 7 May. Approval would make the Arbitrum DAO the largest contributor to DeFi United so far.
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This Week’s Calendar:

Charts of the Day:

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