Chainlink’s LINK token jumped 18% to $26.05 on Sunday, according to CoinDesk Data, pacing the top 50 cryptocurrencies by percentage gain as analysts and traders cited momentum and recent fundamental catalysts.

What Analysts Are Saying

Altcoin Sherpa described LINK as “one of the best coins right now,” pointing to chart strength that could carry toward $30. He explained that round-number levels like $30 often act as psychological barriers where sellers take profits, so traders should be cautious about chasing the move too late.

Zach Humphries, another analyst, argued that LINK remains “very undervalued” at current prices. He emphasized that Chainlink underpins much of decentralized finance by delivering the price feeds and cross-chain services many protocols rely on. From his perspective, the token should be treated as a bet on critical infrastructure rather than just another speculative asset.

Milk Road highlighted the strong trading backdrop. The publication noted a 66% surge in 24-hour trading volume and said LINK’s clean breakout above $24.50 added conviction for momentum traders. They tied the bullish tone back to two key August developments: the launch of Chainlink’s new onchain reserve and its data partnership with Intercontinental Exchange (ICE).

Chainlink Reserve

On Aug. 7, Chainlink introduced the Chainlink Reserve, a smart contract treasury designed to steadily accumulate LINK over time. The mechanism works by converting the project’s revenue — paid in stablecoins, gas tokens, or fiat — into LINK and then locking those tokens onchain for multiple years.

The conversion process, called Payment Abstraction, automates this workflow. It uses Chainlink’s own services — price feeds for fair conversion rates, automation to trigger transactions, and CCIP to consolidate fees from different chains — before swapping into LINK via decentralized exchanges.

Chainlink says the Reserve has already accumulated more than $1 million worth of LINK, with no withdrawals planned for several years. It also earmarks 50% of fees from staking-secured services such as Smart Value Recapture to feed the Reserve, creating a recurring stream of inflows.

The initiative serves two strategic purposes.

First, it strengthens the link between adoption and token demand by ensuring usage revenues convert directly into LINK.

Second, it provides transparency: anyone can view inflows, balances, and the timelock at reserve.chain.link.

Chainlink has framed the Reserve as one piece of a broader economic design that includes user-fee growth and cost reductions via the Chainlink Runtime Environment. For investors, the practical takeaway is that network growth can now translate into steady, programmatic accumulation of LINK on the open market.

Chainlink’s dashboard shows the reserve now holds about 109,663 LINK tokens, with a market value of roughly $2.8 million. The data also highlights that the average cost basis of these holdings is $19.65 per token, underscoring the program’s early accumulation strategy.

ICE Partnership

On Aug. 11, Chainlink announced a partnership with Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the operator of the New York Stock Exchange. The collaboration integrates ICE’s Consolidated Feed, which provides foreign-exchange and precious-metals rates from more than 300 venues, into Chainlink Data Streams.

ICE is one of several blue-chip contributors to these datasets, which are aggregated by Chainlink to create fast, tamper-resistant data feeds for use onchain. By incorporating ICE’s market coverage, Chainlink aims to make its feeds more attractive for banks, asset managers, and developers building tokenized assets or automated settlement systems.

Chainlink Labs described the integration as a watershed moment for institutional adoption. The thinking is that traditional finance players need proven, high-quality data to interact with blockchain applications, and bringing ICE’s feeds onchain helps meet that standard.

The partnership marked one of the clearest examples yet of a major Wall Street market data provider engaging with blockchain infrastructure. By giving decentralized applications direct access to ICE’s financial data, it positioned Chainlink as a bridge between traditional markets and decentralized finance.

Looking Ahead

Analysts highlight LINK’s strong trend, undervaluation and accelerating momentum, suggesting the token is in a position of strength as investors digest Chainlink’s recent strategic moves.

A pervasive calm has taken hold of asset classes as traders look forward to Federal Reserve (Fed) Chairman Jerome Powell's speech at the annual Jackson Hole Symposium, scheduled for Aug. 21-23.

Bitcoin's (BTC) 30-day implied volatility, as measured by Volmex's BVIV and Deribit's DVOL index, has declined sharply in recent months, hovering near two-year lows of around 36% last week, according to TradingView data.

Similarly, the CME Gold Volatility Index (GVZ), which estimates the expected 30-day volatility of returns for the SPDR Gold Shares ETF (GLD), has more than halved over the past four months, dropping to 15.22%—its lowest level since January.

The MOVE index, which tracks the 30-day implied volatility of Treasury notes, has also declined in recent months, reaching a 3.5-year low of 76%.

Meanwhile, the VIX, widely regarded as Wall Street's "fear gauge," fell below 14% last week, down substantially from its early April highs near 45%. A similar vol compression is seen in FX majors such as the EUR/USD.

Rates are 'still high'

The pronounced slide in volatility across major assets comes as central banks, particularly the Fed, are expected to deliver rate cuts from restrictive territory, rather than amid a crisis.

"Most major economies are not easing from ultra-low or emergency levels like we saw after the financial crisis or during COVID. They’re cutting from restrictive territory, meaning rates are still high enough to slow growth, and in many cases, real rates, adjusted for inflation, are still positive. That’s a big shift from the last easing cycles, and it changes how the next phase plays out," pseudonymous observer Endgame Macro noted on X, explaining the bull run in all assets, including cryptocurrencies and stock markets.

According to the CME's FedWatch tool, the Fed is expected to cut rates by 25 basis points in September, resuming the easing cycle after an eight-month pause. Investment banking giant JPMorgan expects the benchmark borrowing cost to drop to 3.25%-3.5% by the end of the first quarter of 2026, a 100-basis-point decrease from the current 4.25%.

Per some observers, Powell could lay the groundwork for fresh easing during this Jackson Hole speech.

"The path to rate cuts may be uneven, as we have seen over the last two years, where markets have been eager for rate cuts and sometimes disappointed that the Fed has not delivered them. But we believe the direction of travel for rates is likely to remain lower," Angelo Kourkafas, a senior global investment strategist at Edward Jones, said in a blog post on Friday.

"With inflation treading water and labour-market strains becoming more pronounced, the balance of risks may soon tip toward action. Chair Powell’s upcoming remarks at Jackson Hole could validate the now-high expectations that, after a seven-month pause, rate cuts will resume in September," Jones added.

In other words, the decline in volatility across asset classes likely reflects expectations for easy monetary policy and economic stability.

Markets too complacent?

However, contrarians may view it as a sign that markets are too complacent, as President Donald Trump's trade tariffs threaten to weigh on economic growth, and the latest data points to sticky inflation.

Just take a look at the price levels for most assets, including BTC and gold: They are all at record highs.

Prosper Trading Academy's Scott Bauer argued last week during an interview with Schwab Network that volatility is too low following the recent round of economic data, with more uncertainty on the horizon.

The argument for market complacency gains credence when viewed against the backdrop of bond markets, where corporate bond spreads hit their lowest since 2007. That prompted analysts at Goldman Sachs to warn clients against complacency and take hedges.

“There are enough sources of downside risks to warrant keeping some hedges on in portfolios,” Goldman strategists led by Lotfi Karoui wrote in a note dated July 31, according to Bloomberg.

“Growth could surprise further to the downside,” dis-inflationary pressures could fade or renewed concerns over Fed independence may fuel a sharp selloff in long-dated yields.

In any case, volatility is mean-reverting, meaning periods of low volatility typically set the stage for a return to more turbulent conditions.

Bitcoin (BTC) mining profitability increased 2% in July as the price of the world's largest cryptocurrency rose 7% while the network hashrate jumped 5%, investment bank Jefferies said in a research report on Friday.

"We see positive BTC price momentum as most favorable for Galaxy's (GLXY) digital assets business, while miners fight a rising network hashrate," analyst Jonathan Petersen wrote.

The hashrate refers to the total combined computational power used to mine and process transactions on a proof-of-work blockchain, and is a proxy for competition in the industry and mining difficulty. It is measured in exahashes per second (EH/s).

U.S.-listed mining companies mined 3,622 bitcoin in July, versus 3,379 coins the month before, the report said, and these firms accounted for 26% of the total network compared to 25% in June.

IREN (IREN) mined the most bitcoin, with 728 tokens, followed by MARA Holdings (MARA) with 703 BTC, the bank noted.

Jefferies said MARA's energized hashrate remains the largest of the sector, at 58.9 EH/s at the end of July, with CleanSpark (CLSK) second with 50 EH/s.

Revenue per exahash/second also increased. "A hypothetical one EH/s fleet of BTC miners would have generated ~$57k/day in revenue during July, vs ~$56k/day in June and ~$50k a year ago," the analyst wrote.

Read more: Bitcoin Miner MARA Steps Into HPC With Majority Stake in EDF Subsidiary: H.C. Wainwright

Bitcoin (BTC) hovered near $118,348 on Sunday, up 0.39% in 24 hours, as two analysts outlined paths that could test traders’ nerves: a dip toward $108K–$112K or a drawn-out range with room for altcoins.

Lark Davis argues that if bitcoin continues to slide, the most likely landing zone is $108,000–$112,000. That range served as a ceiling earlier this year when bitcoin’s rally stalled, and in market psychology, levels that once blocked price often flip into support when revisited.

He emphasizes that this area also aligns with two classic pullback checkpoints known as the 50% and 61.8% Fibonacci retracements. These measures, drawn from the size of bitcoin’s last rally, are widely watched because they often mark where profit-taking slows and new buying emerges. While Fibonacci ratios sound mathematical, in practice they work as self-fulfilling markers since many traders plan entries there.

Davis also points to the 20-week exponential moving average, a trend line that updates quickly with recent price action. When this line is rising into the same $108K–$112K area, it strengthens the case for support, because technical traders see both history and momentum meeting in one zone.

When several signals cluster like this — resistance turned support, Fibonacci checkpoints and a rising average —traders call it “confluence,” and confluence zones often act like magnets for price tests.

In other words, Davis isn’t predicting collapse but a healthy reset. His framework suggests that if bitcoin dips, buyers could step in around that band and fuel the next leg higher.

Michaël van de Poppe takes a different angle, noting that bitcoin was just rejected at a key resistance level near its recent highs. A rejection means sellers absorbed demand as the price tried to break out, a common signal that momentum needs to cool off before the next push. He expects the market to consolidate rather than trend, with bitcoin moving sideways between a floor and a ceiling while leverage resets.

The TradingView chart he shared underscores this. It showed bitcoin making repeated attempts at the top of its range but failing to hold above resistance. The candles formed wicks —price spikes that quickly faded — suggesting selling pressure was active near the highs. Underneath, the chart marked a zone of potential support, where Van de Poppe believes bitcoin could find a base before another breakout attempt.

For van de Poppe, the message is not about deep retracement but time. A sideways range would give the market breathing room, clear out overextended positions, and set the stage for the next move up. It would also open the door to rotation into altcoins, which often outperform when bitcoin stops trending.

That rotation, he suggests, could already be brewing. Once bitcoin stabilizes, traders typically seek higher returns in large altcoins like ether before spreading to smaller tokens. Altcoin rallies rarely start while bitcoin is in freefall, but they often gain momentum when BTC ranges and volatility cools.

In plain terms, the two analysts are describing different but compatible playbooks. Davis favors a deeper pullback into a support cluster that could refresh the uptrend, while van de Poppe sees a range-bound pause with potential for altcoins to shine.

For everyday readers, the checklist is simple: watch whether bitcoin trades sideways or dips to the $108K–$112K zone. In either case, analysts agree the broader bull market framework remains intact, but the path forward could look very different depending on how support and resistance play out in the weeks ahead.

Technical analysis highlights

• According to CoinDesk Research's technical analysis data model, Bitcoin showed bullish strength in the 24-hour window from Aug. 16, 15:00 UTC to Aug. 17, 14:00 UTC, rising from $117,847.02 to $118,485.32, a 1% gain.
• Support formed near $117,261.72 early on Aug. 17, followed by a break above $118,000 with higher-than-average volume of 2,848.15 BTC during rallies at 04:00, 08:00, 09:00, and 13:00 UTC.
• In the final hour from Aug. 17, 13:17–14:16 UTC, bitcoin climbed from $118,165.31 to $118,397.67, including a sharp move at 13:51–13:52 UTC when price spiked from $118,417.23 to $118,604.10 on 679.81 BTC of volume.
• The move set short-term resistance around $118,600 before consolidating near $118,400, leaving potential for further upside after cooling.

Disclaimer: Parts of this article were generated with the assistance from AI tools and reviewed by our editorial team to ensure accuracy and adherence to our standards. For more information, see CoinDesk's full AI Policy.

Terra/Luna creator Do Kwon pleaded guilty to one charge of conspiring to commit fraud and one charge of wire fraud on Tuesday, following an earlier not guilty plea and a very lengthy extradition process.

You’re reading State of Crypto, a CoinDesk newsletter looking at the intersection of cryptocurrency and government. Click here to sign up for future editions.

The narrative

Terraform Labs founder Do Kwon, who created the TerraUSD (UST) stablecoin and its counterpart Luna (LUNA) token, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit securities, commodities or wire fraud and wire fraud

Why it matters

Terra and its related ecosystem blew up in spectacular fashion in 2022, with Luna falling from an all-time high price of nearly $120 to less than 10 cents over the course of five weeks. UST broke its peg, and the event was the first domino in the various other crypto company bankruptcies over the course of 2022.

Breaking it down

In 2021, Do Kwon repeatedly assured investors that Terra and Luna were safe investments, through tweets and appearances on programs like CoinDesk TV.

On Tuesday, he apologized as part of his guilty plea.

"Between 2018 and 2022 in the Southern District of New York and elsewhere, I knowingly agreed with others to engage in a scheme to defraud, and did in fact defraud, purchasers of the cryptocurrencies issued by my company, Terraform Labs," he said, going on to say he made "false and misleading statements" about why UST regained its peg.

As part of his plea deal, the Department of Justice agreed to recommend a prison sentence of no more than 12 years, and Kwon can apply for an international prison transfer once he's served 50% of his sentence. One of Kwon's attorneys noted that there are still outstanding charges against him in South Korea, the country Kwon tried to get himself extradited to during his extended stay in Montenegro.

Kwon's statement spoke to that: "The purchasers who I defrauded were in the Republic of Korea, the Southern District of New York and elsewhere," he said.

Read more.

Stories you may have missed

• Paxos Applies for National Bank Trust Charter, Joining Stablecoin Issuers Circle, Ripple: Paxos has filed for a national bank trust charter with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.
• Who Is Patrick Witt, President Trump's Next Senior Adviser on Crypto?: Jesse Hamilton profiled Patrick Witt, who will succeed Bo Hines as a senior adviser on crypto to the White House.
• Wall Street Joins Consumer Advocates to Call for Edit to GENIUS Act on Stablecoins: Wall Street and consumer finance interest groups — including, interestingly, groups that might normally be at odds with each other — jointly signed letters to Congress this week asking lawmakers to close certain provisions in the GENIUS Act that might allow for stablecoin issuers to engage in regulatory arbitrage.
• U.S. Blacklists Crypto Network Behind Ruble-Backed Stablecoin and Shuttered Exchange Garantex: OFAC sanctioned a number of entities and crypto addresses tied to Garantex and its successor Grinex.
• U.S. Fed Officially Scraps Specialist Group Meant to Oversee Crypto Issues: The Fed closed its Novel Activities Supervision Program which focused on banks' crypto activities (among other things) and was formed a few months after Silicon Valley Bank, Signature Bank and Silvergate Bank all collapsed.
• Trump's SEC Chair Says Agency Is 'Mobilizing' to Update Custody, Other Guidance: SEC Chair Paul Atkins discussed the agency's Project Crypto on Fox Business Friday morning.
• Hong Kong Regulator Tightens Custody Standards for Licensed Crypto Exchanges: The Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission rolled out new standards for virtual asset trading platforms.

This week

Tuesday

• 14:30 UTC (10:30 a.m. ET) Do Kwon pled guilty to two charges tied to the operation and eventual collapse of the Terra/Luna stablecoin ecosystem.

Elsewhere:

• (D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals) Two judges on a three-judge appeals court panel ruled that a district court did not have appropriate jurisdiction in blocking the Trump administration's efforts to reduce the size of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, writing in part that, "The plaintiffs point to no regulation, order, document, email, or other statement, written or oral, purporting to shut down the CFPB" and that "the government does not claim the power to 'shut down' the CFPB." Attorney General Pamela Bondi said in a tweet afterward that the circuit court had "sided with my [Department of Justice] attorneys in our effort to dismantle the CFPB." The circuit court panel did open the door for a potential en banc hearing with the full D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.
• (The Washington Post) The White House removed IRS Commissioner Billy Long after he clashed with the White House over sharing confidential taxpayer information, the Post reported. CNN also reported that the IRS did start "sharing sensitive taxpayer data [last] week with immigration authorities."
• (The Associated Press) States are starting to take action against the possibility that Big Tech firms' datacenters are driving up residents' electricity prices.
• (Bloomberg) Bloomberg published an analysis of Tron creator Justin Sun on its Billionaires Index, saying he owns over 60 billion TRX (~$4.9 billion) — "the majority of its supply" — as well as $3.55 billion in other crypto holdings and $3.73 billion in HTX holdings. Sun filed for a temporary restraining order to block publication (although the page was already published), with exhibits confirming that his team shared wallet addresses and other information with Bloomberg to help the news organization verify his holdings.
• (Politico) The fallout from the hack of the federal court database system PACER continues.
• (Reuters) Reuters has a detailed report out about Meta's artificial intelligence policies, from large language model chatbots inviting people to real addresses to enabling these technical models to engage with minors using language that seems to be more suitable for people who aren't minors. Some of these provisions were changed after Reuters asked about them, the news organization reported.
• (New York Magazine) This is a lengthy and bonkers deep dive into two individuals accused of kidnapping an Italian crypto investor in New York. It is well worth your time to read.

If you’ve got thoughts or questions on what I should discuss next week or any other feedback you’d like to share, feel free to email me at nik@coindesk.com or find me on Bluesky @nikhileshde.bsky.social.

You can also join the group conversation on Telegram.

See ya’ll next week!

Every day, there seems to be a new blockchain for stablecoins.

Or at least that’s how it felt this week, when USDC (USDC) issuer Circle announced Arc, its own settlement network, shortly after payments giant Stripe accidentally revealed Tempo, built in collaboration with Paradigm.

They were the latest in a growing list. Startups Plasma and Stable both raised funds recently to develop dedicated chains for USDT (USDT), the $160 billion and largest stablecoin on the market.

Tokenization players are piling in, too.

Securitize is building Converge with Ethena, Ondo Finance announced its upcoming in-house chain earlier this year, and, just days ago, Dinari said it will soon launch an Avalanche-powered layer-1 network for clearing and settling tokenized stocks.

Stablecoins and tokenized real-world assets are rapidly growing segments of the crypto economy, and analysts project them to swell into trillion-dollar asset classes in the not too distant future. Stablecoins are poised to disrupt cross-border payments, while tokenization allows traditional instruments like bonds, funds and stocks trade around-the clock with faster settlements on blockchain rails, proponents say.

Read more: Stablecoin Payments Projected to Top $1T Annually by 2030, Market Maker Keyrock Says

Why build L1s?

Today, the vast majority of these tokens live and settle on public blockchains like Ethereum, Solana or Tron. These neutral networks give issuers global reach and liquidity, but they also come with certain constraints for asset issuers.

"Building their own L1 is about control and strategic positioning, not just technology," said Martin Burgherr, chief clients officer at crypto bank Sygnum.

Stablecoin economics are shaped by settlement speed, interoperability, and regulatory alignment, so "owning the base layer" lets firms directly embed compliance, integrate foreign exchange engine and ensure predictable fees, he said.

There’s also a defensive motive. "Today, stablecoin issuers depend on Ethereum, Tron or others for settlement," Burgherr said. "That reliance means exposure to external fee markets, protocol governance decisions, and technical bottlenecks."

Custom chains allow companies to issue their own gas tokens, control transaction costs and keep network performance isolated from unrelated activity that may clog the network, said Morgan Krupetsky, VP of ecosystem growth at Ava Labs.

Increasingly, she said, blockchains are becoming the "middle and back office" of a company’s operations, powering transactions behind the scenes while user-facing apps may live across multiple chains.

“The idea of a company owning and customizing their end-to-end blockchain infrastructure is increasingly appealing,” she said.

The economics can be even more compelling than the tech. "The revenue opportunity from owning the settlement layer will dwarf traditional payment processing margins, said Guillaume Poncin, chief technology officer at web3 development platform Alchemy.

He said that the new chains can offer additional control and the ability to implement know-your-customer (KYC) checks and other innovations at the protocol level. While L1s can offer full customization, rollups are faster to deploy and secure.

In either case, Poncin noted, compatibility with Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) makes it far easier to integrate with other blockchains and speed adoption.

How could this impact existing L1s?

It's way too early to tell how the new chains will impact the incumbents, but some networks may feel the competition sooner than others, analysts said.

Coinbase analysts led by David Duong argued in a Friday report that Circle's Arc and Stripe's Tempo are targeting high-throughput, low-fee payments, which is Solana's (SOL) sweet spot. Meanwhile, Ethereum with its institution-heavy user base is less likely to be disrupted in the near term, they wrote.

The process for the entrants to win over users could take years, Sygnum's Burgherr said.

"New entrants will need not just technology, but also years of trust-building to shift the deepest liquidity and highest-value payments away from incumbent rails," he said. "Financial institutions prize proven security, custody integration, and resilience under real-world stress."

"That's why Ethereum remains the institutional ‘Fort Knox,’" he said.

Jason Zhao, co-founder of intellectual property blockchain project Story Protocol, is stepping away from his full-time role after more than three years of building the platform.

Zhao announced via a social media post that he will remain as a strategic adviser while turning his focus to a new AI initiative, Poseidon, which applies artificial intelligence to frontier industries such as science, biopharma, robotics, and space.

“Language generation is just the initial wave of a cascade of abundant intelligence across fields… that, if successful, will constitute a new Industrial Revolution,” Zhao said in a post on X.

Zhao launched Story Protocol in 2021 as a way to make intellectual property “programmable,” enabling rights holders to register and monetize content directly on-chain.

The project has since secured more than $130 million in venture funding from backers, including a16z.

Leadership will now pass fully to co-founder SY Lee as CEO, alongside Andrea as chief product officer and Sandeep as chief AI officer.

Zhao said he will remain close to Story through partnerships and investment, calling the project “the most meaningful experience of my life.”

Story Protocol's token, IP, is trading above $5.80, up 2% on-day.

The crypto market grew 13% in value in July, fueled by a rotation from bitcoin (BTC) into altcoins, according to Binance Research’s "Monthly Market Insights" report for August.

Ether (ETH) was the standout, rallying 48% as another 24 companies added the asset to their balance sheets, lifting corporate holdings by 128% to 2.7 million ETH. That's nearly half the number held by ETFs. Binance attributed the trend to staking yield, ETH’s deflationary supply and growing comfort among companies to hold cryptocurrencies directly .

Bitcoin (BTC) dominance fell 5.2 percentage points to 60.6%, driven by expectations of Federal Reserve interest-rate cuts and U.S. regulatory clarity from the passage of three major crypto bills, including the GENIUS Act on fully reserved stablecoins .

Stablecoin transfer volumes held near $2.1 trillion, outpacing Visa again, as they have done since late 2024. JPMorgan expanded its deposit-token pilot, Citi explored tokenized deposits for cross-border settlements and Visa reaffirmed stablecoins as complementary to its network .

The report also highlights a 220% month-on-month jump in the market cap of widely traded tokenized stocks such as Tesla (TSLA). The company excluded Exodus Movement (EXOD) shares issued via Securitize from its calculations, saying they skewed the calculation.

Tokenization is the process of representing real-world assets (RWAs) such as stocks as digital equivalents that can be traded on blockchains. As of June this year, the RWA tokenization market reached $24 billion in value.

Active on-chain addresses for tokenized stocks soared to 90,000 from 1,600, while centralized exchanges facilitated over 70 times more volume than on-chain venues. Binance likened the growth of the sector to DeFi’s 2020-2021 boom and estimated that tokenizing just 1% of global equities could create a $1.3 trillion market.

NFT sales rebounded nearly 50% in July, led by a 393% jump in CryptoPunks transactions, while Bitcoin NFTs saw a 28% rise. Still, volumes remain below prior-cycle peaks.

The report suggests that if macroeconomic tailwinds hold, the capital rotation into altcoins, coupled with the regulatory green light for stablecoins and tokenized assets, could accelerate crypto’s integration into mainstream finance.

Crypto exchange Gemini filed an updated registration statement for its initial public offering effort, sharing a few more details in its push to become a publicly traded firm.

Goldman Sachs (GS), Citigroup (C), Morgan Stanley (MS) and Cantor acting as lead bookrunners on the IPO, Gemini said in a press release Friday.

Evercore ISI, Mizuho, Truist Securities, Cohen & Company Capital Markets, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, Needham & Company and Rosenblatt are also acting as bookrunners, the company said. Academy Securities and AmeriVet Securities are acting as co-managers.

The S-1 published on Friday follows a confidential filing submitted to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission back in June, and confirms "Gemini Space Station," co-founded by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, intends to sell an undisclosed number of Class A shares.

Gemini's filing indicated that it had generated total revenue of $142.2 million in 2024, up from $98.1 million the prior year. For the six months ending on June 30, 2025, the total revenue was $68.6 million, down from $74.3 million in the first six months of 2024.

Its net loss in 2024 stood at $158.6 million, compared to $319.7 million in 2023. That figure stood at $282.5 million for the first six months of 2025.

Its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization for 2024 stood at a loss of $13.2 million, and a loss of $113.5 million for the first half of 2025.

Like other crypto firms, Gemini pointed to standard risks in the risk portion of the filing, including the general nature of blockchain networks and how banks and regulators view the industry.

"Key factors influencing the further development of blockchain networks and digital assets include the global adoption of digital assets and blockchain technology; regulatory and quasi-government restrictions on access to and operation of blockchain networks; and the maintenance of open source protocols that support blockchain networks," the filing said.

Gemini is only the latest crypto company to try and go public this year, following Circle (CRCL), eToro (ETOR) and CoinDesk parent company Bullish (BLSH). BitGo has filed for paperwork to go public as well.

Gemini plans to list its Class A common stock on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker symbol GEMI.

Read more: Billionaire Winklevoss Twins-Backed Exchange Gemini Files With SEC For Planned IPO

Rick Rieder, BlackRock’s chief investment officer of global fixed income, said earlier this week the current backdrop represents the “best investment environment ever,” citing unusually favorable dynamics in both equity and bond markets.

Speaking on CNBC, Rieder described “extraordinary” technical conditions in equities, with trillions of dollars still parked in money market funds and robust corporate buybacks shrinking available supply. While valuations for the market’s largest technology names remain elevated, he noted that earnings growth outside Tesla helped justify the multiples. “MAG-7 year-on-year growth is like 54%,” he said, adding that the pace makes the sector difficult to ignore.

On the bond side, Rieder highlighted the appeal of income.

Investors can still build portfolios yielding between 6.5% and 7%, a level he described as highly attractive in a world where inflation has drifted below 3% on a core basis. He argued that while the Federal Reserve has room to cut rates — potentially starting as soon as September — current yields already offer investors solid returns.

'Crazy low' volatility

Rieder also emphasized today’s unusually subdued volatility. He described trading equity volatility, or “vol,” at levels near 9.5 to 10, which he called “crazy low.” Low volatility, he said, makes hedging against downside risk relatively cheap, giving investors what he called an “escape hatch” if conditions sour. “You don’t actually have to take the downside risk,” Rieder said.

Still, Rieder cautioned that complacency is his biggest concern. With insurance in markets so inexpensive, he sees signs investors may be underestimating risks, particularly in credit spreads and other corners of fixed income.

Fed's interest rate

On monetary policy, Rieder argued the Fed’s rate hikes have done little to suppress inflation, given that large corporations rely less on borrowing to finance investment.

The real drag, he said, has been on housing activity and lower-income households that depend more heavily on credit. Keeping rates too high, he warned, risks imposing excessive costs on the government and households without meaningful disinflation gains.

He believes the central bank could lower the funds rate by as much as 100 basis points over the coming year, a move he sees as unlikely to rekindle inflation given low structural volatility and rising productivity from advances in data, hyperscale computing and even space-related technologies.

“There’s something spectacular happening around productivity,” he said, calling it a once-in-a-generation dynamic.

For crypto investors, Rieder’s comments reinforce a broader narrative: an environment with falling rates, ample liquidity, and low volatility could support renewed appetite for risk assets beyond equities. If his call proves correct, the same technical tailwinds driving stocks higher could spill into digital assets that thrive on excess cash and investor risk-taking.