Clarity Hopes Fade, BitMEX Shuts as Lawsuit Looms: Hodler’s Digest, July 26

Clarity may get a vote, but don’t get your hopes up yet

Despite wealthy memecoin entrepreneur Donald Trump agreeing to an ethics deal, the Clarity Act is floundering as the August recess deadline looms.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune doesn’t believe the Act has the votes to pass just yet, but may bring it to a vote anyway to “get Clarity started. We’ll see where the votes are.”

The ethics deal would prohibit all US officials from issuing or sponsoring digital assets, but contains some “get out of jail free” provisions for the President that the Democrats are unhappy with, including the fact the rules expire the day he is scheduled to leave office in 2029.

The ethics provisions will also be enforced by the Attorney General that Trump appointed. The Democrats instead want state Attorney Generals to enforce it — but Trump seems unlikely to agree to empower dozens of state AGs to attempt to prosecute him.

The White House described the bill as the “most comprehensive and wide-ranging ethics provision in history,” while Democratic Senator Ruben Gallego described it as a “piece of shit” and “not a serious effort.”

Negotiations are continuing to find a deal both sides can live with, but given the lack of trust, it’s not going to be easy to find a compromise.

Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon conceded the bill is “not perfect” but has supported it anyway, along with Fidelity and Charles Schwab who represent many trillions in assets under management each.

Law enforcement organizations have also begun to signal support, with The National Fraternal Order of Police representing hundreds of thousands of members, stating the latest version of the BRCA (which protects developers of decentralized protocols) would not impede investigations into money laundering and fraud.

The odds of the bill passing this year are at 38% on Polymarket.

BitMEX to shut down after 11 years as class action launched against it

BitMEX, one of the pioneers of cryptocurrency derivatives trading, announced it will shut down operations in September after 11 years.

BitMEX launched in 2014 and became known for introducing the 100x leverage perpetual swaps. 

In recent years volumes have tanked increased competition from major exchanges like Binance and decentralized protocols like Hyperliquid.

CryptoQuant CEO Ki Young Ju said BitMEX’s share of the Bitcoin futures market has fallen to just 0.08%, with roughly $84 million in daily trading volume.

“It was a great exchange that helped shape the industry, and now it is passing the torch to the next generation of exchanges it inspired,” Ju said.

BitMEX’s utility token BMEX collapsed in value after the announcement. That same day, news emerged of a class action lawsuit accusing the crypto derivatives platform of fraudulently engineering customer liquidations to seize traders’ collateral. BitMEX denied the allegations and said it had successfully defended itself against similar claims in the past.

Restructuring adviser Roshan Dharia told Cointelegraph the exchange’s demise shows the industry is consolidating.

The top five platforms now control an estimated 80% of global spot volume, leaving mid-tier and regional exchanges with shrinking margins and no viable path to scale… The headwinds are structural, not cyclical.

As if to undescore the point, BitMart subsequently announced it would also close in the coming months.

S&P launches blockchain fundamentals index for digital assets

S&P Dow Jones Indices and Pantera Capital have launched a digital asset index that tracks the major crypto assets — but doesn’t include Bitcoin or XRP.

The S&P Pantera Digital Asset Index is designed to be the benchmark crypto index for institutions, but it screens out blockchains based on minimum thresholds for protocol revenue, market capitalization and liquidity.

The index launched with 18 constituents, with Ether (ETH), BNB (BNB), Solana (SOL), TRON (TRX) and Hyperliquid (HYPE) as its five largest holdings, while Bitcoin (BTC) and XRP (XRP) are the largest non-constituents.

The latest index follows a broader industry push to develop institutional-grade benchmarks for digital assets, with similar products including the Nasdaq Crypto Index US ETF, the Franklin Crypto Index ETF and the the Coinbase Store of Value Index among others.

Robinhood to expand prediction markets as CFTC issues new warning

Robinhood is reportedly discussing plans to expand its existing prediction markets offerings with crypto exchange Crypto.com.

According the Wall Street Journal the talks involve integrating yes-or-no event contracts supplied by Crypto.com. Robinhood launched its prediction markets in March 2025, initially facilitated by Kalshi in order to comply with regulatory requirements from the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).

Bernstein analysts last week raised its price target on Robinhood (HOOD) stock to $160 from $130 per share, based on the company’s outlook for prediction markets and tokenized equities.

Meanwhile the CFTC, which aims to become the primary regulator of prediction markets, issued a shot across the bow of providers last week, telling platforms they need to get a lot more specific about event contracts certifications.

The advisory addresses concerns about the practice of submitting broad, template-style certifications that combine many potential event contract variations into a single certification. 

Carl Kennedy, a partner at New York law firm Katten Muchin, also told a House Agriculture Committee hearing last week, that the CLARITY Act could help the CFTC’s efforts to oversee the “explosive growth of prediction markets.”

Balaji’s Network School turns to Kazakhstan amid Malaysia setback

Balaji Srinivasan’s Network School, a community of “digital nomads,” is eyeing a new campus in Kazakhstan after its Forest City campus had its business license in Malaysia revoked over alleged premises-use violations. 

A memorandum of understanding was signed between Kazakhstan’s relevant Minister Zhaslan Madiyev and Srinivasan to establish the first Network School campus in the country, which aims to become a digital hub. 

The School was forced out of Johor in Malaysia, following a controversy in Malaysia over allowing Israeli dual citizens to attend. The Muslim majority country has no diplomatic relations with Israel. Despite an investigation finding no visa violations, the Network School was ordered to shut down on another pretext.

Dragonfly Capital managing partner Haseeb Qureshi said the drama has validated Balaji’s Network State thesis.

“The whole idea of a network state is taking a dense group of talent and capital, and collectively negotiating with states. The Malaysia drama set up Balaji to negotiate better terms with another state to copy and paste the network there.“

Winners and losers

At the end of the week, Bitcoin (BTC) is at $65,395, Ether (ETH) is at $1,958, and XRP (XRP) is at $1.11. The total market cap is at $2.24 trillion according to CoinMarketCap.

Among the biggest 100 cryptocurrencies, the top three altcoin winners of the week are Audiera (BEAT), which gained 53%, Shinba Inu (SHIB) with a 29% gain, and Venice Token (VVV), which increased 19%.

The top three altcoin losers of the week are DeXe (DEXE), which lost 89%, Midnight (NIGHT), which fell 26%, and Pyth Network (PYTH), which dropped 10%.

Prediction of the Week

Bitcoin will get ‘lift’ from Hyperliquid, Robinhood in next crypto bull market

Bitcoin (BTC) is “finally showing signs of a bottom,” according to Matt Hougan, chief investment officer at Bitwise.

Houghan predicts that TradFi integrations, particularly Hyperliquid and Robinhood, will drive the next crypto bull market, and the resulting tide should “lift” the largest cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin and Ether.

Houghan believes crypto is bringing major benefits like 24/7 trading to traditional markets, and noted that today “nearly half the volume on Hyperliquid is in conventional assets like oil, silver, and the S&P 500 [and] it’s expanding into spot commodities, prediction markets, and options,”

Bitwise data also suggests apparent demand for BTC is showing signs of reversal. The metric measures the difference between newly-mined BTC and the supply inactive for at least one year. 

Source: Matt Hougan

Top FUD of the Week

Home invasions became most common crypto wrench attack in H1 2026: CertiK

Home invasions became the most common form of crypto wrench attacks during the first half of 2026, rising to 20 publicly reported incidents from just one a year earlier, according to blockchain security firm CertiK. 

On Thursday, CertiK said it verified 52 wrench attacks worldwide in the first half of 2026, up 33.3% from 39 incidents during the same period in 2025. Kidnappings rose to 16 from 12, while robberies declined from five incidents to one. 

CertiK said the recorded financial exposure linked to the attacks reached about $124.1 million, up from $10.5 million a year earlier.

The increase in home invasions suggests criminals are increasingly bypassing digital safeguards by physically coercing crypto holders and their families.

Hackers steal $31.6M in 2 crypto bridge attacks within 7 hours

Hackers stole more than $31.6 million across two unrelated crypto bridge exploits spaced just hours apart, targeting bridges operated by decentralized perpetual exchange AFX and Verus Protocol. 

According to Blockaid, AFX, a decentralized perpetual exchange operating on Arbitrum, reportedly lost $24.15 million on Wednesday through a hack targeting one of its cross-chain bridges. Hours later, Blockaid said it detected an exploit targeting the Verus Ethereum Bridge that resulted in about $7.5 million in crypto being stolen. 

“Another bridge, another exploit. Bridges will always be a weak link, until security is upgraded,” onchain investigator TheCrypticWolf said in a post on X. 

Ethereum ETFs close week in red, end 5-day inflow streak

US-listed spot Ethereum exchange-traded funds (ETFs) logged $70.62 million in net outflows on Friday, ending a five-day inflow streak.

Ethereum funds saw $211.25 million in net inflows over the previous five sessions from July 17, according to SoSoValue data. They still posted $103.9 million in net inflows for the week ended Friday.

Despite the outflows, Ethereum ETFs extended their weekly inflow streak to three straight and have attracted $337.74 million in net inflows so far in July.

The Bitcoin ETFs reversed gains made earlier in the week to end up with $33.9 million of inflows.

Top Magazine Stories of the Week

Both parties say they want US crypto market structure legislation, but a dispute over ethics rules and who enforces them is becoming the bill’s biggest obstacle.

A Bitcoin development roadmap that addresses quantum computing risks could see the price surge by “double digits” very quickly, according to Charles Edwards.

Are the fears of an AI driven hacking epidemic totally overblown, or is this just the lull before the storm?