Unchained - The U.S. Finally Has Stablecoin Legislation. Can Crypto Compete With Banks? - Ep. 871

Episode Date: July 18, 2025

After years of hostility toward crypto, the U.S. passed its first-ever federal law regarding the industry. The GENIUS Act, stablecoin legislation backed by both parties, was signed by President Trump’s desk after a last-minute showdown in Congress. Despite being seen as a sure thing, the bill’s path turned turbulent this week, with objections from Democrats over Trump’s crypto ties, and a sudden revolt from the Freedom Caucus around anti-CBDC language. Now that it’s through, what will this law actually do? And who stands to benefit—or lose? In this episode, Dante Disparte, Circle’s chief strategy officer and one of the key players behind the legislation, joins Unchained to explain: How the bill won bipartisan support despite political tensions Why banks may think twice before issuing stablecoins And why Circle is applying for a national trust bank charter Plus, the battle over interest-bearing stablecoins, how this bill fits into the broader financial regulatory landscape, and whether U.S. consumers and the dollar come out ahead. Visit our website for breaking news, analysis, op-eds, articles to learn about crypto, and much more: unchainedcrypto.com Xapo Bank FalconX Dante Disparte, Chief Strategy Officer and Head of Global Policy and Operations at Circle Unchained:  GENIUS Act Passes: Who Are the Winners, Losers, and What Comes Next? ​​House Passes Landmark Crypto Legislation: GENIUS Act and Digital Asset Bills Circle Seeks U.S. Banking License to Directly Custody Billions in USDC Reserves Fortune: JPMorgan Chase’s new fees for data could ‘cripple’ crypto and fintech startups, executives warn Reuters: Some big US banks plan to launch stablecoins, expecting crypto-friendly regulations Timestamps: 🎬0:00 Intro 🇺🇸 2:23 Why Dante says this “crypto week” went better than anyone expected 🤝 3:44 How the GENIUS Act won bipartisan support despite major political friction 📜 6:10 Why Dante believes the bill is bigger than just crypto 🏦 9:02 How Circle plans to compete with the banking giants 🪪 15:22 What Circle hopes to achieve with its national trust bank application 🔐 18:28 Why financial privacy matters so much in the U.S. system 💵 19:34 How deposit tokens differ from stablecoins 📈 22:34 What Circle might do when interest-bearing stablecoins are finally allowed 👛 27:43 How this new law could impact everyday Americans and their money Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Just yesterday, I had a major global meeting with probably 40 or 50 international regulators in central banks. And for the first time in my seven-year career in this sector at the bleeding edge of this stuff, I was finally able to say America will have a set of rules for this space and you won't have to rely just on good actors in the private sector for that U.S. representation. Hi, everyone. Welcome to Unchained. You're no hype resource for all things crypto. I'm your host, Laura Shin. Every episode we're featuring your comments. We got this comment in response to the recent Pump Fun ICO episode with Joe McCann and Haseeb Qureshi. On X, Salana's Anatolyi Akhenko Reacted to Haseeb's musings on whether Pump can really take on TikTok. He said, quote, you miss all the swings you don't take. If you want your comment featured, write a review of the

podcast overall or leave a comment on our video on YouTube, Farcaster, or X. This is the July 18th, 2025 episode of Unchained. One early Bitcoiner sold 30,000 BTC too soon, missing out on over a billion dollars. Don't want to make the same mistake. With Zopo Bank, eligible members can get instant cash without selling their Bitcoin. Check out Zappobank.com slash Unchained for more.

Imagine an AI that speaks crypto and does the work of a team of analysts. Trusted by 80-plus institutions, now open to serious traders like you. Visit Ask for, Focal.com. Today's guest is Dante Desparte, two strategy officer and head of global policy operations at Circle. Welcome, Dante. Thank you, Laura. It's great to be with you. So this is, you know, quite a big wink for the crypto industry. It's the end of the so-called crypto week in Congress. And as we speak,

the Genius Act, which is the first major piece of crypto legislation in the U.S., will soon be signed into law by President Trump. This is, of course, the Cablecoin bill. It's been pursued by multiple members of Congress for many years, just before we started recording, you said that you have been in pursuit of something like this for seven years. So, you know, coming into this administration, it was thought that this particular bill was a shoe in, but on the way to passage, it actually seemed like a less certain outcome than I think most people initially thought. So what happened to make it a nail biter in the end and how did it finally get over the finish line? Yeah, I mean, well, you know, of course, Crypto Week would not have been

I think complete without a little bit of political intrigue and political drama. I don't think too many people had in the cards that there would be an anti-CBDC insurrection. That was part of the drama this week. But nonetheless, I think what matters is the outcomes. And the outcomes, in some respects, surpassed all expectations. Number one, the Genius Act passed with more than 300 total votes. In favor of it, 102 Democrats joined ranks with their Republican colleagues and counterprivile. and also voted in favor of the Genius Act.

And so in an otherwise politically hyper-partisan environment in our country, passage of the Genius Act is a clearly bipartisan win for the country's interests, the national interests, the role of the dollar, and so much more. So it is a big exclamation mark. Obviously, I would be remiss, Laura, to not also mention two other bills that advanced as well. Clarity, which is the House's answer to crypto market structure legislation, has also received quite a lot of bipartisan votes and is expected to be taken up in earnest on the Senate side. And, of course, an anti-CBDC provision as well, just to kind of drive home to the point that the United States will compete in the digital currency space race through regulating dollar stable coins.

So, you know, as you mentioned, like in the end, the bill did get quite a lot of support. And, you know, of course, along the way we saw earlier, not even just this week, but, The Democrats had a lot of objections to President Trump's crypto business deals, you know, particularly the fact that World Liberty Financial has its own stable coin. So, you know, I was curious to know, like, how did the Democrats get persuaded to vote for it, kind of, I guess, in greater numbers than it looked like might happen earlier. Well, I mean, for one, it's a crypto legislation, frankly, has been a bipartisan development in this country for years. And you could almost joke, Laura, that twice in my career, I'd,

United Washington. The first time was in their collective dislike of the then Libra project, which provoked quite a lot of backlash and hearings, but nonetheless unified both Republicans and Democrats and not wanting that type of project to make it to the finish line. And then, of course, fast forward to today, it took many, many hearings, many meetings, public consultations across the interagency process. The Biden administration had an executive order for digital assets. Obviously, the Trump administration has shown up with a sincere pro-growth, whole-of-government approach to this technology alongside AI. But there is no world in which the Genius Act would have made it out of the Senate with 18 senators, Democratic senators voting in favor with it,

and let alone had had such success in the House if it hadn't addressed all of those key equities, including questions that may be arising around, you know, political interests and beyond. And so it's a resounding success. And, you know, the key for us, and the key for, I think, the industry is crypto is now finally getting what it had wanted for so long, legitimization, a path for legal and regulatory clarity in the United States, and an opportunity to compete. So at this point, you probably know people largely see Circle as one of the big winners from this bill. What does the bill say in terms of which types of companies will be regulated under this law, which types of companies, you know, are not included?

And of course, so therefore it means someone's, of course, that are included, will be able to engage in stable coin business activity here in the U.S. And there are some entities that could potentially engage in such activity, but they would have to meet a higher bar in order to do so. So can you outline kind of the various players that it impacts and how? Sure. Well, first, I would argue the Genius Act is bigger than crypto. It is probably the very first piece of financial regulation in American history

that is pro-growth, pro-competition, pro-consumer, and effectively tries to unlock a rules-based competitive landscape. And so I'm happy to delineate, I think, the ways in which it's a very unique bill. The first is that allows for the protection and preservation of state oversight of banking and payments. This was a critical feature that had stalled past attempts at legislating stablecoins in the U.S., which is that we live in a world of fintech federalism. The states, today oversee banking and payments, and the Genius Act preserves that. Under the Genius Act, a bank, a non-bank, and a credit union could all launch dollar-denominated payment stablecoins.

At $10 billion and up, you have to graduate effectively to a federal framework, which would point to the OCC largely as the U.S. regulator of record. That does a lot vis-a-vis also promoting international competition. So the Genius Act has a lot of nuanced provisions in there that are about international reciprocity and looking at comparable jurisdictions. for passporting products from the U.S. abroad and from abroad into the U.S. from comparable regulatory structures. A couple of interesting points, though. The Genius Act has what I'd like to call, just for my own legacy's sake, a Libra clause in it, which is that if a non-bank company or a commercial company wants to launch a stablecoin

or potentially what you can classify as a vanity stablecoin, not only would they have to set up an entity that is a standalone entity that looks more like circle and less like a bank, they would have to clear a lot of competition law issues and ultimately go before a special committee in the Treasury Department that would have the final say on whether or not that type of stable coin contract would be permissible. So there's some important guardrails there and speed bumps there. If a bank, on the other hand, wanted to launch a stable coin under the Genius Act, the Genius Act requires banks to have a separate entity from the core banking platform and have the stable coin issuance and redemption activity managed in a totally

different way than the banks would typically manage lending and credit creation. And so in some respects, it's an even more conservative regime than what you would have seen from the so-called era of deposit tokens being one of the products that banks were trying to produce. So in that sense, it begs the question, will banks want to put money in a very carefully constructed balance sheet with no risk taking, no leverage, no lending to offer stable coins or would banks rather compete in providing core banking services to this market segment? All this to say, it creates clear rules that I think in the end, the biggest winners are the

U.S. consumers and market participants and, frankly, the dollar itself. Yeah, let's talk a little bit more about the big bank. So you probably, I'm sure you're very well aware of the news this week, that Bank of America, JPMorgan, Citibank are all working on launching stable coins or at least looking into it. And, you know, so you just referenced. this is not exactly covered by this law, but of course it's like the same general area. JPMorgan is also planning to release this deposit token. You know, at this point in time, Circles, USDC is largely used in trading. It's used in defy.

Of course, it has its partnership with Coinbase, which is probably its biggest business partner. And USC through Coinbase's base will be also used by millions of Shopify merchants. that's going to be rolled out. So, you know, at this point in time, Circle is much more of a crypto-native type of play. And, of course, these banks have much more distribution amongst non-crypto people. And obviously, that's a much bigger market today. So how does Circle compete with the likes of the big banks? Well, it's interesting.

I mean, one thing that I think is important. And this has been, frankly, true of the conversation between banks, non-banks, and even central banks around this whole concept of a digital currency space race is that our operating model and our long belief is that once you create very clear rules of the road, the tokenized forms of money is less the breakthrough. The actual technological breakthrough and banking and payments breakthrough is the rails. Our long-term vision statement is all about this bigger vision of an internet-based financial system. USDC, as you know very well, Laura, is a multi-chain innovation by design that promotes interoperability. It sustains this concept of constantly upgradable infrastructure.

And frankly, it takes money and banking and financial services places where banking and payments cannot go if they just remain analog. That is not an anti-bank vision statement or strategy. It's actually a banking. It's a strategy that very much depends on those pillars of trust and safety and the real economy, which are the banks that we partner with. Our anticipation is, of course, genius will produce competition at all levels and it ought to. Competition is a net positive for our economy. It's a net positive for this market category. And it's also one of the best pathways to ensure that digital asset and crypto adoption reaches scale is it has to be totally interoperable with the financial system and totally interoperable with the banking system. The other really

key piece of the puzzle, and this is the one that matters, frankly the most. The United States up until the Genius Act was the outlier country. and not having either rules for crypto or having a national payments framework for non-bank actors in the financial system. The Libra Project as just a historical example set itself up in Switzerland because Switzerland could regulate it as financial infrastructure. With the Genius Act, we can now contemplate an America first regime, but not an America alone regime, which companies like ours and other American firms, banks included, can compete globally

and not have their business models nor digital dollars on the internet. dictated by other country's rules. That to me is the most important piece of the puzzle in the long run, because at core, a lot of stable coin competition and a lot of central bank competition in this domain with CBDCs, something that was really the lightning rod issue this past week, is about alternative payment systems and about countries and certain entities in the financial system getting away from the dollar or getting away from U.S. rule of law. Okay. And I'm sorry. I just want to make sure I understand one point there. You know, I guess I had thought that this law would apply mostly to business activity in the U.S. But I forget the phrasing you used, but it seemed like you were saying

that it could also impact how these stable coins are used in other jurisdictions or? Entirely. No, no, no. And this is actually one of the important provisions in the Genius Act that was first born in the house. You'll remember once upon a time the stable genius debate. there was a rival provisions for stable coins, one being developed in the House, known as the Stable Act, and of course the Senate package, which was known as the Genius Act, a lot of the improvements in Genius, and a lot of the reason it was such a bipartisan success with 102 Democrats that voted in favor with it, of it is because a lot of the provisions that the House had wanted to see, including this concept of international reciprocity, of empowering the Treasury Department to represent this U.S. framework globally,

were at it due to the original stable coin legislation on the House side. That's incredibly important. For my career in this sector, I've often felt like I was the de facto U.S. representative at international bodies and the Bank for International and other meetings, and notwithstanding the fact that I'm private sector representative. And for once, we have a seat at the table. The United States will take up its seat and will be able to export a framework for these rules as opposed to taking other country's rules for not just crypto, but stable coins as well.

All right. So in a moment, we'll talk more about Circle's plans. But first, we're going to take a quick word from the sponsors who make this show possible. Selling your Bitcoin just to get cash? One early Bitcoiner did and missed out on over a billion dollars. With Zapo Bank, you can access up to $1 million instantly without selling a single set. Eligible Zappo Bank members can borrow up to 40% of their Bitcoin's value. No stress, no selling, no buying back in. it for what matters most, your dream home, your child's education, a getaway or that can't miss investment. With Bitcoin-backed loans, you're in control. Set your installments and repay in Bitcoin or U.S. dollars, your choice. Enjoy competitive rates, zero fees, flexible terms, and no penalties for early repayment. And your Bitcoin stays safe, never re-hypothecated, relent, or pooled.

It's securely held until your loan is repaid. Check them out at ZopoBank.com slash Unchained. Here's another comment responding to the Pump Fun ICO episode. On YouTube, Sherezi 1,2, 3, 4, 5, 6 wrote, I like Haseeb's description. Pump Fund is like the arms dealers. The crypto arms dealers, I guess. Again, if you want your comment featured on the show, please write a review or leave a comment on an episode on YouTube, Procaster, or X. Back to my conversation with Dante. So in late June, Circle applied to create a national trust Bank in the U.S., and that would enable Circle to act as a custodian for its own reserves, and also hold crypto on behalf of institutions.

Tell us more about Circle's plans with this National Trust Bank. Yeah, I mean, well, first, it is exactly, as you said, I think the ability to provide additional custodian and safeguarding services is just one thing that you can anticipate. The other is, of course, now with the passage of the Genius Act yesterday, is that one of the requirements of the Genius Act is that non-bank stable coin issuers in the U.S. have to have an OCC charter and a trust charter. And so I think part of the move, of course, was an anticipation of this very moment. And just to kind of maybe relate it, there's no surprises here in some respects, because this is exactly what we did in Europe with the markets and crypto assets framework.

Our business over time has always been defined by a race to the top. And when the Europeans spent years developing the markets in crypto assets framework. It also was clear that we would have to have a European affiliate. We chose France. We got an e-money license across Europe. And of course, Circle USC and our Euro-denominated stable coins were the first to comply with MECA. It would stand to reason that we would follow the same model here in the U.S. once the rules allowed that pathway to be clear. So I did want to ask one other aspect about this competition with the big banks, which is You probably saw that Fortune reported that JP Morgan plans to start charging for data from JP Morgan used by the fintechs. So, you know, just this is one hypothetical example.

You could have a fintech provider like Plaid, which is at the center of connections that an exchange like, say, Coinbase, which is your biggest partner, could make to a customer's bank. So if that bank would happen to be JPMorgan, then what is currently a free connection could certainly have a charge on it, you know, just kind of playing this. out, it would seem like Lee Plaid might charge that fee to Coinbase who could then charge it to the consumers. So I wondered what you thought about this type of move? Like, you know, could it hamper Circle's ability to grow? How would Circle plan to deal with, you know, if this goes through something like this or any other similar charges from banks? Yeah, I mean, look, first, it's hard to say. I think one thing is clear, though, and one of the things that was such a vigorous debate over the years. And one of the things that first motivated me to get involved in this industry is,

you know, first, to the right of lawful, the use of money should be as free as possible. Second, we have massive gaps in our economy domestically and globally in terms of very basic financial access. And we're totally wanting in the U.S. and around the world for alternatives in the payment systems. Better, faster, cheaper payments in the traditional banking system analogizes to what phone calls look like back in the old wide. days where you paid more money, the longer your call traveled over the fixed infrastructure. And so, you know, of course, many companies are going to compete on the basis that the data is the asset. This is the era of data being the new oil. And if that's the case, is blockchain a new barrel, TBD.

But one thing is clear, though, and one of the things that was the biggest arguments against central bank digital currencies in the United States is our deep, deep, deep entrenched need in our society for financial privacy. And financial privacy, frankly, will be a hard thing to guard against unless you create rules-based competition. And unless you also have this world in which the full suite of financial services can be safely and privately rendered down to end users on cryptographic wallets, stable coins are doing that with dollars, mobile digital wallets and open source wallets and blockchain infrastructure are empowering that entire suite of competition down to the last mile. In a world post-genious, people will have choice.

consumers will have choice. And I think if large institutions want to compete on the basis of monetizing data without end users signing up for that and participating that, the good news is post the Genius Act, I think they'll have a lot of options that they can choose from without having to sacrifice their privacy. I did want to circle back to the deposit token issue because, you know, this is something that actually I had not heard very much about until that announcement. And, you know, each of these tokens would represent a portion of the deposits held at the bank. How would you differentiate the use of a stable coin from a deposit token? What do you think the potential is for deposit tokens to be widely used?

And how might they be widely used? And how would they compete with stable coins or simply just be used differently? Like, how do you think about them or how should consumers think about them? Yeah. Well, it's a little bit, you know, as the protagonist of the anti-CBDC movement. with a lot of careful thought and occasional academic papers to back it up. I think the same holds true with deposit tokens, right? That the Genius Act doesn't preclude banks from offering bank-issued payment stablecoins,

but the only product that becomes legally permissible under the Genius Act is just that bank-issued payment stablecoins. And there's some interesting things in the payment stablecoin legislation that I think would raise questions if I were on the board of a big bank. Number one, you can't pay yield directly from the issuer. And so this is not meant to be a product that competes with the deposit base. It's meant to be a fully reserved form of digital money. And therefore, the question I would ask anybody listening is,

would you want a deposit token issued from Credit Suisse, for example, a failed bank? Because a deposit token, unless it were structured under the regime that is proposed by the Genius Act, would potentially be the digital twin of the asset liability. mismatch on the bank's balance sheet, which means that your right to redeem at par for a single dollar could potentially be at risk given the fact that a bank's core balance sheet is creating lending, taking credit, has duration risk and maturity risk. And that's why the Genius Act requires banks to offer stable coins from a completely separate entity in a completely different balance sheet. The other really incredibly important thing, Laura, is gone are the days of stable and name only

coins under the Genius Act. So the whole Terra Luna world. where you can make yourself available in the United States, get listed on exchanges in the U.S. are gone. And there would be even criminal penalties if a stable coin issuer failed to pass the Jerry McGuire test of Show Me the Money. And so trust, transparency, auditability, including criminal penalties for officers are now imposed under the Genius Act. So we would never see this case of people creating cryptographic counterfeits of the dollar, calling them stablecoins, and then watching them blow up. Yeah.

I don't think it will stop people from trying, but they're calling them other things now. But, you know, I will say one of them is so far, at least very successful, which is Athena. So we'll see what happens with that. I know there are some centralized aspects, and it's not at all like Tara Luna, but anyway, I did want to ask about the interest-bearing stable coins because, of course, you know, these are not going to be allowed,

which is not necessarily a consistent. consumer-friendly provision and is in some ways maybe a bit unusual because that was actually something that Democrats wanted. However, it is a boon to circle and companies like circle. So I understand that like a change in this part of the law may not be on the table now, but I could kind of foresee a future when consumers begin to understand that this is something that's not necessarily friendly to them. So if it were to come to pass that there might be a movement to change that or something, like I don't know, you know, what Circle is thinking about its overall kind of like business activity or what it would do in that kind of situation where, let's say, you know, suddenly that provision were changed

and Circle had to compete, you know, to get more customers. And one of the ways to compete would be to offer some of that yield to consumers. And this may not be something that you've thought about, but, you know, I could see a day when that might happen. Oh, I assured you, we've thought about it. Well, at first, and here's how we've thought about it, right? Number one, you know, the fully reserved stablecoin model that ensures that we solve the crypto, the crypto's original challenge was buyers and spenders remorse. Bitcoin stopped serving immediately as a great medium of exchange on the internet because of

volatility and appreciation. And then the narrative of it becoming digital gold and not an asset you would want to have buyers and spenders remorse with like Bitcoin Pizza Day created the necessity for a fully reserved stable asset that is that is, you know, the pricing mechanism for not just crypto trading, but also this medium of exchange on the internet itself, you cannot necessarily pay yield. Now, Mika and Genius Act both preclude the issuer from paying yield directly to the coinholder. But we think it's a really critical feature of crypto and of course all of DFI and all of the other credit and lending features that you could have with programmable money, that yield is a

secondary market innovation. And so the Genius Act precludes the direct regulated issuers from paying yield to the customer, to the ultimate coin holder. But as a secondary market innovation, that's one of the core features, obviously, these markets. In the same way that a physical dollar being used on a bank's balance sheet to create lending and credit and all the rest, is the base layer of sound money and the traditional banking system. We think fully reserved stable coins are the same base layer of innovation for this internet economy. The distinction, of course, is that the customer and the user gets all of the other benefits of money that doesn't take bank holidays, programmability, composability, extensibility,

defy, and all the rest. And you couldn't do any of that if the money itself was fractionalized and the money itself was risky. And so that's why it's hard not to agree with the two proposals. genius and Mika that are now effectively the legal basis for stable coins on both sides of the Atlantic. Now, the other thing is we obviously need crypto market structure regulation in the United States to address the rest of the market. What is a commodity? What is a security? What is a digital collectible? How do you address this novel category of combined economic activity that goes beyond

banking and payments oversight and straddles capital markets, commodities and securities? And that's where I think the secondary market innovation and the defensive yield really has its next day in court. Okay. So last couple of questions, I did want to turn to Circle's recent IPO. The stock is treating it as of an hour ago, about $234. That's well above the IPO price of 31. I was curious what the mood in the office has been like since the IPO, because as I'm sure you're well aware, beforehand, I think the expectations, at least this is my perception, maybe it's just a crypto perception, but the expectations didn't match the reality of what happened. So I was curious, what, you know, was that also the case for you? Was that a shock? Well, unfortunately,

or for all of circle, I should say. The good news is I can't say much about the stock price, nor the IPO, except to say that one, becoming a public firm was a very longstanding objective for the company. And two, as a public firm, the way we operate is still very much focus on the same principles that got us there in the first place, which is the long term. And so that's probably the most I can say about that. But, you know, look, I think back to the real news cycle right now is the Genius Act. I actually have to gradually work my way over to the White House for a signing ceremony of a law that I feel personally I have a lot of sweat equity in the moment that we're at today. And so that's kind of where my mind is at is getting a law behind us as a country.

It's in not only in the interest of the company, but of course the whole country in this entire market to finally have legal clarity on our side in the U.S. So last question then. You know, how would you like if you were to project five years from now, how would you imagine that this law will impact the lives of everyday Americans? consumers, you know, the standing of the U.S. globally. Yeah. Well, you know, I owe what was once upon a time my Forbes pen to you, Laura Shin, when you were the editor there and you gave me the ability to write occasional articles in Forbes,

and I took that up pretty seriously for a while. But some years ago, I wrote a piece that says when we stopped talking about blockchain, we could change the world with it. And I think what the Genius Act does and what a soon-to-be past market structure regulation the United States will do is make the cruise. crypto and the blockchain part of this fade to the background and effectively make the results be the outcome. And my sincere hope is that in five years time, not only have we defended the role of the U.S. dollar on the internet as the American competitive strategy for this big

competitive race around the world, but that more and more people will enjoy the benefits of device-centric, safe, sound financial services, from something so basic as a payment to something so complex as, you know, savings, lending, credit, and all these other features. And so the U.S. is now in the room. Just yesterday, I had a major global meeting with probably 40 or 50 international regulators in central banks. And for the first time in my seven-year career in this sector at the bleeding edge of this stuff, I was finally able to say America will have a set of rules for this space and you won't have to rely just on good actors in the private sector for that U.S. representation. Yeah. And as somebody who has watched this also unfold over the last decade, I'm so grateful just as an American. This is my personal opinion that you can say that. It feels good to me as well. So Dante, congratulations on everything. You know, Circle Success, the signing of this bill. Go enjoy the signing. You deserve it. And thank you so much for coming on Unchained.

Thank you so much, Laura. Don't forget. Next step is the weekly news recap. Stick around for this week. crypto after this short break. Looking for your next big trade? Want to track every move in your portfolio, news, unlocks, price action, and open interest in one place? Meet Focal, your personalized AI assistant for crypto. Built for institutions now open to serious traders like you. Focal surfaces high signal insights, automates your workflows, and helps you move faster in 24-7 markets. Find out why the smartest desks use Focal to stay ahead. Sign up at askfocal.com. Welcome to this week's Crypto Roundup.

In today's recap, Pump. Dot Fun smashes ICO records, Coinbase launches its all-in-one base app, and Trump-I's crypto access for 401K plans. We also cover Polymarkets cleared investigations, Citigroup's stablecoin plans, gray scales quiet IPO move, and a bold, hype token strategy from Sonit. Plus, fair shake ramps up election spending and fantasy top shifts to base.

Let's begin. Pump. Pump. Fun raises $600 million in minutes. Solana-based meme coin platform, Pump. Dot Fun has completed one of the largest initial coin offerings in crypto history, raising $600 million in just 12 minutes during the public sale of its pump token. Combined with a prior private sale of $720 million, the total raise reached 1.

$0.32 billion. According to co-founder Alon Cohen, 150 billion tokens were sold at 0.4 cents each. Despite extensive demand, only 42.3% of the nearly 24,000 KYC verified wallets secured allocations. Exchange issues on Bybit and Cracken left thousands of users without tokens. The token began trading on Monday at a fully diluted valuation of $5.6 billion, with spot volume topping $100 million, and perpetual trading volume exceeding $728 million. As of early trading, Pump delivered around 25% returns for public sale participants. On-chain data shows a wide distribution of buyers, with both large investors and small retail traders participating in the offering. Coinbase rebrands-based ecosystem with speed upgrade and Everything app launch.

Coinbase has rebranded its layer-to network base as base. chain and unveiled the base app, a comprehensive platform that merges wallet services, trading, payments, and social media features. Announced at the company's A New Day One event, the launch marks a strategic shift toward positioning Coinbase as a crypto-native super app provider. Base chain's upgrade includes flashblocks, which reduces block times to 200 milliseconds, promising near instant confirmations and up to 10 times faster performance. Alongside this release, the new base app combines crypto wallet functions with real-time token trading, NFC-enabled USDC payments, content sharing, and messaging.

Users receive a smart base account to enable cross-app sign-ins, while the base pay service allows near instant checkout with USDC. Social features leverage the Farcaster and Zora protocols, enabling tokenized posts and creator earnings. Trump plans executive order to open 401k market to crypto. President Donald Trump is preparing to sign an executive order that would permit investments in cryptocurrency, gold, and private equity within the U.S. 401K retirement system, according to multiple sources cited by the Financial Times. The order could be issued as early as this week. The directive would reverse a Biden-era policy, discouraging crypto allocations in retirement accounts, and instruct federal agencies to identify regulatory barriers limiting access to alternative investments. A White House spokesperson emphasized that no decisions should be deemed official until directly confirmed by the president. If enacted, the measure would impact the 9 trillion 401k market, giving savers broader exposure beyond traditional stocks and bonds.

Large firms like Blackstone, Apollo, and BlackRock are expected to benefit, with several already forming partnerships to offer private market options to retirement plan sponsors. The move aligns with Trump's ongoing efforts to integrate crypto into mainstream financial systems and promote broader asset class diversification for American savers. DOJ and CFTC close polymarket investigations. U.S. regulators have officially closed their civil and criminal investigations into polymarket, the blockchain-based prediction market platform, bringing an end to years of legal uncertainty. The Department of Justice and the Commodity Futures' Transcuites, Rating Commission recently issued formal declination notices, confirming that no charges would be filed

against the company. The probes centered on whether Polly Market had continued allowing U.S. users to place bets after a 2022 settlement with a CFTC, which included a $1.4 million fine and a commitment to restrict American participation. Activity on the platform surged during the 2004 U.S. presidential election drawing increased scrutiny and culminating in an FBI raid of CEO Shane Copland's apartment last November. Coplin was not charged. Polymarket has provided value to tens of millions of people this election cycle while causing harm to nobody, Coplin said at the time. The company has not commented on the closure of the investigations. Cantor Fitzgerald advances four billion Bitcoin acquisition. Canter Fitzgerald is nearing a major

crypto deal involving over 30,000 Bitcoin, as its special purpose acquisition company, Cantor Equity Partners 1, finalizes terms with Block Stream CEO, an early Bitcoin advocate, Adam Back. The transaction, valued at more than $4 billion, would be one of the largest institutional Bitcoin purchases to date. Back in his company would contribute approximately $3 billion in Bitcoin in exchange for shares in the newly renamed BSTR Holdings. The SPAC also plans to raise up to $800 million in additional capital to expand its Bitcoin holdings even further. This marks another step in Cantor's growing presence in digital assets. In April, it partnered with SoftBank and Tether on a $3.6 billion crypto investment initiative. Brandon Lutnik, who chairs

Cantor and leads this back, is spearheading the effort. The firm's combined crypto acquisitions through BSTR and other vehicles may exceed $10 billion by year end. Crypto Super PAC Fairshake builds $141 million fund to sway 2026 elections. Fairshake, a crypto-backed political action committee, has reported amassing $141 million in funds ahead of the 2026 U.S. midterm elections. The PACs disclosed raising $52 million in the first half of 2025, adding to the $109 million collected since November 2024, Major contributors include Coinbase, which donated $25 million, along with Ripple Labs and a 16Z crypto. Formed in 2023, Fershake has rapidly become a significant political force.

It spent over $130 million during the 2024 elections to support candidates aligned with crypto policy reforms. The group in its affiliates, defend American jobs and protect progress, have already invested over $2 million in 2025 specials. elections, including races in Virginia and Florida. Fair Shake spokesperson Josh Vlasto said the pack is building an aggressive, targeted strategy for next year. City Group considers launching proprietary stable coin. City Group is exploring the issuance of its own stable coin as part of a broader push into digital finance, CEO Jane Fraser confirmed during the bank's latest earnings call. We are looking at the issuance of a city stable coin, but probably most important, Finally, is the tokenized deposit space, where we're very active, Fraser told analysts.

The initiative aims to support faster and more secure digital payments. Citigroup, the third largest bank in the U.S., is also evaluating custody services and reserve management for stable coins. However, not everyone is convinced. Noel Atchison, author of The Crypto is Macro Now, newsletter and co-host of Bits and Bips, wrote, I'll go on the record as saying they won't issue a stable coin. This development aligns with broader moves by major U.S. banks, including Bank of America and J.P. Morgan, who are also assessing stable coin opportunities amid expectations for favorable federal legislation.

As regulatory clarity progresses in Washington, institutions are preparing to integrate digital assets more deeply into the traditional banking system. Grayscale moves toward IPO with confidential SEC filing. Grayscale Investments has submitted a confidential draft registration statement to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, signaling its intent to pursue an initial public offering. The filing made under Form S-1 enables the crypto asset manager to engage with regulators privately as it prepares for a potential market debut by the end of 2025. The firm, which oversees approximately $50 billion in digital assets, did not disclose specific details such as share count or pricing. Confidential filings allow companies to finalize offering terms without revealing competitive information prematurely. Grayscale, known for its flagship Bitcoin and Ethereum trusts, joins a growing list of crypto firms eyeing public listings amid surging digital asset valuations. The move comes as Bitcoin trades near record highs and follows the successful IPOs of Circle and ETO earlier this year.

Sonnet Biotherapeutics merges to launch 888 million hype token strategy. Sonnet. Biotherapeutics has announced an $888 million crypto treasury initiative centered on Hyperliquid's native token, hype, through a merger with Roershack-Oin LLC. The combined entity will operate as Hyperliquid Strategies Incorporated and become the largest U.S. listed public company to hold Hype on its balance sheet. Upon closing, Hyperliquid Strategies is expected to control approximately 12.6 million hype tokens, valued at around $560 million, along with $305 million in cash reserved for further token purchases and operations. Backing comes from prominent investors including Paradigm, Galaxy Digital, and Pantera Capital.

Hyperliquid has broken out as a crypto project with real fundamentals, said Paradigm co-founder Matt Huang in a statement. Fantasy Top migrates to base after user and revenue decline. SocialFi Project Fantasy Top is moving its platform from the Ether. Ethereum layer, two network blast to Coinbase's base, following a sharp decline in activity. Monthly fee revenue dropped 93% to approximately $200,000, while active users fell by 80% to just 2000, according to data from Defalama and Dune. In a statement on X, Fantasy Top said it was teaming up with the most active layer two to become the leading social experience in the ecosystem.

The migration began on Tuesday. once buoyed by a $2.5 billion deposit surge in May 2024, has since seen deposits collapse 95% to $140 million. Thanks so much for joining us today. To learn more about the Genius Act, Circle and Dante, check of the showness for this episode. Unchained is produced by me, Laura Shin, with help from Matt Pilchard, Wanda Manovich, Pamma Jumdar, and Margaret Curia.

Thanks for listening.