PLUS: Solana's Anti-Woke Disaster

March 18, 2025

The biggest crypto news and ideas of the day 

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Welcome to The Node! This is Ben Schiller to take you through the latest crypto news. 

 

In today's news from CoinDesk reporters:
Bitcoin Pulls Back With Markets Nervous Ahead of Fed Meeting Results
Coinbase Stock a Buy With Over 60% Upside Amid Trump's New Crypto Regime: Bernstein
Michael Saylor's Strategy Funding More Bitcoin Purchases With New Preferred Stock
Bitcoin's Bull Market Cycle Is Over, CryptoQuant's Ki Young Ju Says

 

Opinion: Weeks before Trump won again, and Solana released an ad widely criticized for being anti-queer, it held an event that protected "gender identity." CoinDesk's Danny Nelson reports.👇

 

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Bitcoin Pulls Back With Markets Nervous

  • Crypto traded lower alongside U.S. stocks on Tuesday.
  • The Fed began its policy meeting today, with results due tomorrow afternoon U.S. hours.
  • No one is expecting the Fed to cut rates tomorrow, but investors will be on the lookout the central bank is turning a bit more dovish given the recent economic and market uncertainties.
 

Bernstein Recommends Coinbase

  • Bernstein initiated coverage of Coinbase with an outperform rating and a $310 price target.
  • The crypto exchange is the best positioned platform to benefit from regulatory tailwinds under the new Trump administration, the report said.
  • The broker said rising U.S. onshore dominance of the crypto market is expected to offset competitive pressures that Coinbase may face.
 

Strategy Buys More BTC

  • Strategy is set to issue 5 million shares of Strife (STRF), a Series A perpetual preferred stock.
  • This new series will have a fixed 10% annual cash dividend versus the 8% initially offered on Strategy's original preferred issuance.
  • If the dividend is unpaid, the interest will compound at an additional 1% per year.
 

CryptoQuant: Bitcoin's Bull Is Over

  • The Bitcoin bull market is over, according to CryptoQuant CEO Ki Young Ju, who predicts 6-12 months of bearish or sideways price action due to declining market liquidity.
  • CryptoQuant's report suggests a possible return of BTC to the $63K mark, with key valuation metrics indicating bearish signals and the risk of a deeper price correction.
  • Economic uncertainty and global tensions could exacerbate bearish pressure on crypto markets, with a 51% chance that BTC ends the week between the $81K-$87K range, according to Polymarket bettors.
 

Opinion: Solana's Gender About-Face

By Danny Nelson, CoinDesk

The Solana Foundation nixed an ad widely criticized for being anti-queer late Monday, nearly nine hours after seemingly invoking the culture wars as a mechanism to boost conference attendance.

 

The now-deleted spot imagines "America" in therapy. A human embodiment of the nation desperately wants to think big – about tech, crypto, space travel. But he can't: his therapist wants him to "focus on pronouns" and on "coming up with new genders."

 

"America, numbers are non-binary," the therapist insists after chiding his "rational thinking syndrome." America eventually snaps and yells out, "I want to invent technologies, not genders.

 

That the Solana Foundation – a Swiss nonprofit whose mission is to evangelize the Solana blockchain – would call upon right-wing talking points to promote its first U.S. conference sparked immediate controversy. Some influential voices within Solanaland called it pandering; others, offensive.

 

It's also a reversal for an organization that previously called diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) part of its "core values" and insisted attendees of its flagship event show respect to others regardless of gender.

 

 

Just weeks before President Donald Trump retook the White House in part on an anti-trans campaign, the foundation held a conference in Singapore. The event's code of conduct prohibited "deliberate verbal or physical intimidation" based on "gender," "gender identity and expression," or other traits often lumped in with DEI. It threatened infractors with ejection and a ban from attending future events.

"The Solana Foundation is committed to the principles of diversity, equity, inclusion, and respect," the Code of conduct read.

 

It's not clear whether the Solana Foundation's ad strategy also portends a shift in its "core values." CoinDesk could not immediately locate the code of conduct for the upcoming event. A representative for the Solana Foundation did not return a request for comment.

 

Regardless, the ad threatened to thrust crypto deeper into partisan politics than many in the industry are comfortable with.

 

The crypto industry's embrace of President Trump had previously been an exercise of single-issue alignment: Trump promised to embrace crypto, and the industry's high-rollers hugged him back. The arrangement has left room for proponents to work alongside Democrats too, and many have.

 

That bargain may begin to fall apart if crypto loses its ostensibly bipartisan sheen.

 

Links, Links, Links

 

The Company Testing Wall Street’s Appetite for A.I. Computing Power – NY Times

Fintechs and crypto companies seek bank charters for growth – Reuters

Xapo Bank Debuts Bitcoin Loans, Calls Out ‘Predatory’ Crypto Lenders – Decrypt

 

Solana's PR Fire

 

 

 
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