Kraken Just Applied to Become America's First Federal Crypto Bank
The crypto industry's biggest players are no longer asking permission to sit at the banking table—they're applying for the deed to the building.
Continue reading ›Coinbase
posts
THE WIRE:
All
AI Agent EconomyAgents
Real World AssetsRWA
Human ImperativeHumans
The SignalSignal
Wire WeeklyWeekly
Thiel Takes Steroids to Wall Street With Performance-Drug Olympics
Peter Thiel just took the performance-enhancement debate out of the shadows and onto the NYSE. Enhanced Games, an Olympics competitor allowing performance-enhancing drugs, went public via SPAC at a $1.2B valuation with backing from Peter Thiel and former Coinbase CTO Balaji Srinivasan
Continue reading ›
Kraken Applies to Become a Federal Bank After Paying $600M to Settle Fraud Charges
Crypto exchanges are quietly becoming banks, and the federal government is letting them. Kraken's parent company Payward has applied for a national trust charter from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, seeking to establish Payward National Trust Company (PNTC).
Continue reading ›
Wall Street's Bitcoin ETF Playbook Targets Ethereum and Solana Next
The institutions that tamed Bitcoin with ETFs are now shopping for the rest of the crypto stack. Institutional capital is flooding back into crypto, but Bitcoin ETFs are just the entry point, not the destination.
Continue reading ›
Companies Fire Thousands, Blame AI Instead of Poor Management
The first wave of AI layoffs isn't about robots stealing jobs — it's about executives using "efficiency" as cover for cuts they were already planning.
Continue reading ›
Wall Street Banks Feast While Coinbase Reports Surprise Loss
While Coinbase bleeds on the bottom line, Wall Street banks are hiring crypto teams by the dozen and one Coinbase business line is quietly exploding.
Continue reading ›
Coinbase Goes Dark During AWS Crash, Exposing Crypto's Centralization Lie
The second-largest US crypto exchange just proved that decentralization is still mostly marketing. Coinbase suspended trading for hours Thursday after an AWS data center in Northern Virginia overheated, forcing markets into "cancel only" mode before resuming operations hours later.
Continue reading ›
AWS Just Built the First Payment System for AI Agents
The agent economy just got its payment rails, and they're not running through Visa. AWS launched Amazon Bedrock AgentCore payments, a stablecoin-based payment system for AI agents built with Coinbase and Stripe
Continue reading ›
Coinbase Lost $394M and Now It's Letting AI Write Its Code
The largest crypto exchange in America just lost $394 million because people stopped trading, and its answer is to let AI agents write production code.
Continue reading ›
Treasury Targets Binance's Court Monitor After Iran Sanctions Breach
When your court-appointed monitor becomes a diplomatic liability, you're not just failing compliance—you're becoming geopolitical evidence.
Continue reading ›
Bitcoin Tanks 4% While S&P Hits All-Time High
Traditional markets celebrate geopolitical calm while crypto bleeds on its own bad news, a decoupling that says more about industry fundamentals than Middle East diplomacy.
Continue reading ›
Kraken Drops $600M to Kill Your Bank's Payment Rails
Crypto exchanges used to be the on-ramp. Now they're building the roads, the tollbooths, and the gas stations. Kraken parent Payward is acquiring Hong Kong-based Reap for up to $600 million in cash and stock, adding card issuance and stablecoin payment rails to its new B2B platform.
Continue reading ›
AWS Gives AI Agents Their Own Corporate Credit Cards
The cloud giant just gave millions of enterprise AI agents the ability to spend money without asking permission. AWS integrated Coinbase's x402 protocol and Stripe into Bedrock AgentCore, enabling AI agents to execute USDC micropayments autonomously
Continue reading ›
Wall Street Bets $1 Billion on Markets You've Never Heard Of
Wall Street just wrote a billion-dollar check to bet on betting — and it's not about sports. Kalshi closed a $1 billion Series F led by Coatue at a $22 billion valuation, marking one of the largest rounds in prediction market history
Continue reading ›
Your AI Tool Just Made Your Coworker's Job Obsolete and HR Noticed
The automation paradox just got personal — your performance review now includes whether you shipped the code that replaces your cube-mate. Matt Pressberg built an AI agent called Maria for his two-person PR firm, but a larger firm now wants him to deploy it explicitly to displace employees
Continue reading ›
Grant Cardone Dumps $100M Into Bitcoin After Declaring REITs Dead Money
The real estate boys are finding religion, and it's denominated in satoshis. Grant Cardone added $100 million in Bitcoin to a real estate deal, targeting 32% returns through a hybrid investment model
Continue reading ›
Coinbase Engineer: AI Agents Will Destroy Google and Meta's $600B Cash Machine
The $600 billion advertising engine that powers Google, Meta, and half the internet assumes eyeballs belong to humans who can be persuaded — but agents don't impulse-buy.
Continue reading ›
BlackRock's Bitcoin ETF Hit $532M in One Day While Wall Street Still Can't Custody It
The Bitcoin ETF victory lap is over, and now the real infrastructure work begins. Spot Bitcoin ETFs drew $532 million in a single day, led by BlackRock and Fidelity, marking three straight days of inflows
Continue reading ›
Kraken Unlocks Spot Margin Trading for US Retail After $150M Acquisition
The first shoe drops on Kraken's $150M Bitnomial acquisition, and it's exactly what US retail traders have been locked out of for years. Kraken launched regulated spot margin trading for US retail users, letting them post crypto as collateral and trade with up to 10x leverage on Kraken Pro.
Continue reading ›
Coinbase Tells Banks: Accept Crypto Tax Deal or Lose $180B Stablecoin Market
The crypto industry just gave up a tax break to end the SEC's enforcement regime, and Coinbase's chief lawyer is telling banks to take the deal before summer.
Continue reading ›