By Jacob Joseph (All times Eastern unless otherwise noted)
Cryptocurrency markets remain under pressure despite little change in the CoinDesk 20 Index (CD20) since midnight UTC. All but one member have quit, and the outlier is Bitcoin less than 0.1% in the green area.
The index fell 2% in 24 hours, and spot Bitcoin exchange trading capital flows were negative for the second consecutive trading day, with a net outflow of $133 million on Wednesday. The spot Ethereum (ETH) ETF also saw net outflows. The second-largest cryptocurrency is down another 0.2% since midnight.
A key development overnight was the announcement by Coinbase (COIN) that its layer 2 network Base will be abandoning OP Stack, the open source modular rollup framework developed by Optimism that currently powers it. OP Stack enables chains like Base and Unichain to run as a low-cost, Ethereum-secure layer 2, fully compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), and aligned with Optimism’s broader superchain vision.
Base intends to consolidate development into a self-managed code base, rather than relying on multiple external contributors for core upgrades and protocol changes, giving teams more control over infrastructure, roadmaps, and technology evolution.
The move had a meaningful impact on optimism. Historically, Base has accounted for the vast majority (often over 90%) of the revenue generated by the hyperchain, which is owned by Optimism Collective. The announcement poses a huge potential headwind to Optimism’s revenue prospects, with OP tokens down 24% since the news broke on Wednesday.
In a more positive development, ether.fi said it will migrate its cash product to Optimism’s OP mainnet. The move will lock in approximately 70,000 active cards, 300,000 accounts and millions of dollars in total value. The non-custodial payment card allows users to spend ETH, BTC and stablecoins at over 100 million Visa merchants, offers 3% crypto cashback and has a daily transaction volume of approximately $2 million.
In another noteworthy Layer 2 development, Robinhood’s testnet recorded 4 million transactions in its first week, according to CEO Vlad Tenev. Arbitrum-based Robinhood Chain is designed to support tokenized real-world assets and broader on-chain financial services, signaling the company’s continued push into blockchain-based infrastructure.
While developments in these ecosystems remain constructive, the broader market continues to trade within a broader downward trend. Minutes of the latest Fed meeting, released yesterday, highlighted policymakers’ growing disagreement over the path of interest rates.
Several officials said further interest rate cuts should be paused for now, with a return to easing likely later this year only if inflation continues to fall. Stay alert!
Read more: For analysis of today’s altcoin and derivatives activity, see Today’s Cryptocurrency Market
What to see
For a more comprehensive list of this week’s events, see CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
- cryptocurrency
- February 19, 8 a.m.: Zama will present its 2026 roadmap live.
- Macro
- February 19: Fed’s Raphael Bostic, Michelle Bowman and Neel Kashkari speak throughout the day.
- February 19, 8:30 am: The number of people filing for unemployment benefits in the United States on February 14 is expected to be 225,000 (previous value: 227,000)
- income (Estimate based on FactSet data)
- February 19: Riot Platforms (RIOT), post-market, -$0.32
Token event
For a more comprehensive list of this week’s events, see CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
- Governance votes and calls
- The ENS DAO is voting to register the on.eth name and establish it as an on-chain registry for blockchain metadata. Voting ends on February 19th.
- Unlock
- Token issuance
- February 19: Decision to complete rollout of updated USR/RLP yield distribution parameters
- February 19: Injective launches INJ community buyback round 226
Meeting
For a more comprehensive list of this week’s events, see CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
market trend
- BTC is up 0.87% at $66,896.68 as of 4pm ET on Wednesday (24 hours: -1.31%)
- ETH up 1.29% to $1,966.13 (24 hours: -1.49%)
- CoinDesk 20 rose 0.39% to 1,932.97 (24 hours: -2.57%)
- The comprehensive pledge rate of Ethereum CESR remains unchanged at 2.81%
- The BTC financing interest rate on Binance is 0.0056% (annualized 6.1747%)
- DXY remains unchanged at 97.67
- Gold futures unchanged at $5,009.90
- Silver futures rose 1.13% to $78.47
- The Nikkei 225 closed up 0.57% at 57,467.83
- The Hang Seng Index closed up 0.52% to 26,705.94 points
- The FTSE fell 0.63% to 10,618.95
- The Euro Stoxx 50 index fell 0.81% to 6,054.02
- The Dow closed up 0.26% on Wednesday at 49,662.66 points
- The S&P 500 closed up 0.56% at 6,881.31 points
- The Nasdaq Composite Index closed up 0.78% at 22,753.63 points
- The S&P/TSX Composite Index closed up 1.5% at 33,389.73
- The S&P 40 Latin America Index closed up 0.37% at 3,707.85 points
- The U.S. 10-year Treasury bond rate rose 1.3 basis points to 4.094%
- E-mini S&P 500 futures fell 0.3% to 6,873.25
- E-mini Nasdaq 100 futures fell 0.39% to 24,857.50
- E-mini Dow Jones Industrial Average futures fell 0.35% to 49,549.00
Bitcoin Statistics
- Bitcoin dominance: 58.74% (0.26%)
- Ethereum-Bitcoin ratio: 0.0294 (-0.09%)
- Hash rate (seven-day moving average): 1,057 EH/s
- Hash price (spot): $33.63
- Total fee: 2.31 BTC / $155,155
- CME Futures Open Interest: 118,610 BTC
- BTC in gold: 13.4 ounces.
- Bitcoin and gold market capitalization: 4.47%
technical analysis
- The ratio of altcoins (excluding the top 10) to Bitcoin price continues to rise from key weekly support levels and is currently testing the 50-week exponential moving average.
- A break above this level would signify continued resilience of altcoins relative to Bitcoin, which is likely a result of their extreme oversoldness.
crypto stocks
- Coinbase Global (COIN): Closed at $164.05 (-1.19%) Monday pre-market, up 0.24% to $164.45
- Circle Internet (CRCL): Closed at $63.15 (+2.48%), +0.19% at $63.27
- Galaxy Digital (GLXY): Closed at $21.73 (+2.02%), +0.74% at $21.89
- Bullish (BLSH): Closed at $31.85 (-0.47%), unchanged pre-market
- MARA Holdings (MARA): Closed at $7.50 (-0.13%), +0.40% at $7.53
- Riot Platforms (RIOT): Closed at $15.49 (+5.73%), +0.19% at $15.52
- Core Scientific (CORZ): Closed at $17.27 (+0.23%)
- CleanSpark (CLSK): Closed at $9.27 (-0.11%), unchanged pre-market
- CoinShares Valkyrie Bitcoin Miner ETF (WGMI): Closed at $40.04 (+0.10%)
- Exodus Movement (EXOD): Closed at $9.88 (-2.08%)
Cryptocurrency Treasury Corporation
- Strategy (MSTR): Closed at $125.20 (-2.70%), unchanged pre-market
- Strive (ASST): Closed at $8.05 (-1.59%)
- SharpLink Gaming (SBET): Closed at $6.60 (-0.90%)
- Upexi (UPXI): Closed at $0.69 (-4.17%)
- Lite Strategy (LITS): Closed at $1.10 (+0.00%)
ETF flows
Spot BTC ETF
- Net daily traffic: -$133.3 million
- Cumulative net flow: $54.07 billion
- Total BTC holdings are approximately 1.26 million
Spot ETH ETF
- Daily Net Traffic: -$41.8M
- Cumulative net flow: $11.68 billion
- The total holdings of ETH are approximately 5.74 million
Source: Farside Investors
when you are asleep
- Bitcoin shakes off U.S. session losses as Trump says trade deficit cut by 78% (CoinDesk): Bitcoin trading remained volatile on Thursday, rising to around $67,000 after briefly falling near $65,900, as traders digested President Trump’s claims that the U.S. trade deficit had been cut by 78%.
- Bitcoin, ether, xrp ETFs plunge, while Solana bucks the trend (CoinDesk): U.S.-listed spot crypto ETFs are in the red across the board, with one exception. The SOL ETF recorded net inflows of $2.4 million, bringing cumulative inflows to nearly $880 million.
- Gold returns to $5,000, with focus on Fed interest rate trends (Bloomberg): Gold prices rose 2% on Wednesday before recovering to around $5,000 an ounce, with traders focusing on the Fed’s next move in interest rates. Gold prices rose 0.9% on Thursday, while silver gained 3%.
- European stocks fall as Airbus, Rio Tinto plummet; Nestlé rises (Reuters): European stocks fell on Thursday as investors sifted through mixed earnings from the likes of Airbus, Rio Tinto and Nestlé.
