(14/52) Weekly Market Insights: Tariff risks reduce currency liquidity

Hot News

• Cryptocurrency markets remain heavily influenced by macroeconomic conditions and impending tariffs, with investors remaining cautious due to ongoing uncertainty. Trading volumes and open interest for major crypto assets have fallen to their lowest levels since November 2024.

• Last week, Bitcoin prices fell by about 4.33%. Meanwhile, the market capitalization of stablecoins grew for the fourth consecutive week, increasing by $1.1 billion last week.

Macro Outlook

• President Trump reconfirmed that reciprocal tariffs will take effect on April 2, including a new 25% tariff on all imported cars. He also warned that the EU and Canada will face higher tariffs if they cooperate to harm the US economy. In addition, Trump threatened to impose new tariffs on pharmaceutical products and copper, as well as "second-level tariffs" on Russian oil. However, he expressed his willingness to negotiate with the relevant countries after April 2 to avoid these tariffs. At the same time, he said that the United States may consider reducing tariffs on China if Beijing supports the sale of TikTok to American companies.

• U.S. durable goods orders rose 0.9% in February, far exceeding the 1% decline expected by the market. The final GDP data for the fourth quarter of the United States was 2.4%, higher than the initial estimate of 2.3%.

• The core PCE price index in the United States rose by 0.4% in February, higher than the market expectation of 0.3%. Personal income increased by 0.8% during the same period, significantly higher than the market expectation of 0.4%. At the same time, personal expenditure increased by 0.4%, slightly lower than the market expectation of 0.5%.

Upcoming economic calendars include:

• April 1 (Tuesday) 10:00 pm: US March ISM Manufacturing PMI and February JOLTs job vacancies data released

• April 3 (Thursday) 10:00 p.m.: U.S. March ISM service industry PMI data released

• April 4 (Friday) 8:30 p.m.: U.S. March non-farm payrolls and unemployment rate released

• April 4 (Friday) 11:25 p.m.: Fed Chairman Powell to speak at SABEW annual conference

Cryptocurrency Market Overview

• Japan announced plans to revise crypto assets into financial products and introduce insider trading regulations for cryptocurrency transactions.

• Wyoming launches WYST token, the first publicly-issued, fiat-backed, 1:1 asset-collateralized stablecoin in the U.S. LayerZero is selected as the standard for cross-chain interoperability.

• The U.S. FDIC issued the 2025 Financial Institution Letter FIL-7-2025 , which clearly stated that banks regulated by the FDIC can engage in compliant crypto-related businesses without prior approval.

• The United States introduced the 2025 STABLE Act , which stipulates that payment-type stablecoins must be backed by 1:1 cash and U.S. Treasury bonds with a maturity of less than 93 days, that stablecoins may not generate income, and that a two-year ban on algorithmic stablecoins is imposed.

• The U.S. SEC has officially terminated its lawsuits against Kraken, Consensys, and Cumberland, and ended its investigations into Crypto.com and Immutable .

• Crypto.com also announced a partnership with Trump Media and Technology Group to support a basket of cryptocurrency ETFs including CRO.

• Ripple agreed to withdraw its appeal against the SEC and settle by paying a $50 million fine, less than the $125 million originally awarded. In addition, the SEC announced plans to ask Judge Torres to lift the "compliance with the law" injunction against Ripple. Once the SEC completes its internal vote and files the necessary court documents, the years-long SEC vs. Ripple lawsuit will officially end.

Layer 1 and Layer 2 Public Chains

• Cross-chain support between HyperCore and HyperEVM is now live. Powered by Unit Protocol, Hyperliquid has started Ethereum spot trading .

• Gelato announced support for the Avalanche layer 1 network , providing seamless public chain issuance services including custom execution, KYC compliance, and native interoperability.

• Celo’s Ethereum Layer 2 network is officially launched , with features such as 1-second block time and fee abstraction.

• Movement announced that it has terminated its relationship with an undisclosed market maker that sold large amounts of MOVE tokens without providing appropriate buy orders. Movement has pledged to launch a 38 million USDT buyback program , funded by cash proceeds recovered from the market maker.

• Peaq launches Universal Machine Time (UMT), the first on-chain accurate clock designed to improve machine collaboration and consistent timestamping of data.

• The Sei Foundation has announced plans to acquire 23andMe , a genetic data company, as it bets on the development of the decentralized science (DeSci) field.

• Sophon releasesSophon OS , an operating system designed for an encryption-driven consumer experience.

Dapps

• World Liberty Finance has launched USD1 , a stablecoin that is 100% backed by short-term government bonds.

• Dydx announced the launch of the DYDX repurchase plan , which will use 25% of the net proceeds of the agreement for repurchase. The community is currently actively discussing increasing the allocation ratio of the net proceeds of the agreement for repurchase to 100% in the future.

• Chainlink partners with Abu Dhabi Global Market to advance compliant tokenization framework in the UAE.

• Particle Network, a chain-abstract DEX protocol, has released the PARTI token. PARTI tokens can be used to pay for gas fees, staking, cross-chain liquidity, and provide trading discounts. The FDV of the token is currently less than $300 million, and its trading platform UniversalX has generated $4.5 million in fee income.

• Bio Protocol announced that the first three BioDAOs have entered the curation phase of Bio v1. BIO holders can lock BIO to support BioDAOs, and BioDAOs with enough locked BIO will be eligible for funding support, while curators will receive discounted subscription opportunities for BioDAO tokens.

• Ostium, a self-custodial exchange that provides foreign exchange, commodities and indices trading, has launched V2 , adding a new fee structure, more asset selection, more flexible trading functions, and optimized user deposit and registration processes.

• Rysk Finance has launched Rysk V12 , a covered call strategy platform focused on liquid crypto assets such as ETH and BTC.

• Term Labs launched the TERM token as a governance token that can be used to veto protocol changes under its optimistic governance framework. TERM stakers can also share part of the protocol's revenue.

• DigiFT announced the launch of the world’s first on-chain index fund consisting of tokenized stock assets.

• CARV launched Infinite Play , which aims to allow players to own their own game data and help developers gain analytical information from players' real-time game data.

Governance/Project Updates

• The Ethereum Pectra mainnet upgrade is expected to be launched at the end of April or May .

• The Solana community proposed in the SIMD-0256 proposal to increase the block limit from 48 million to 60 million to improve the network's transaction processing capabilities.

• Sonic announced that SonicCS2.0 will be launched on the mainnet soon. The new consensus mechanism will bring a 2x performance improvement and reduce memory consumption by 68%.

• Wayfinder, a DeFAI protocol, announced that it will postpone the PROMPT token TGE by approximately one to two weeks, which is expected to take place in mid-April.

Token Unlock

• OP tokens will be unlocked on April 1st, accounting for 1.98% of the total token supply.

• GRASS tokens will be unlocked on April 1st, accounting for 1.34% of the total token supply.

• SUI tokens will be unlocked on April 2, accounting for 2.53% of the total token supply.

• ENA tokens will be unlocked on April 3rd, accounting for 1.78% of the total token supply.

• JTO tokens will be unlocked on April 8th, accounting for 2.04% of the total token supply.

• IO tokens will be unlocked on April 12th, accounting for 2.09% of the total token supply.

• APT tokens will be unlocked on April 13th, accounting for 1.88% of the total token supply.

• STRK tokens will be unlocked on April 16th, accounting for 4.65% of the total token supply.

• ARB tokens will be unlocked on April 17th, accounting for 2.01% of the total token supply.

• VANA tokens will be unlocked on April 17th, accounting for 1.47% of the total token supply.

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