This week witnessed a notable shift in the cryptocurrency market, with market capitalisation experiencing a significant decline of 17.96%. In contrast, trading volume surged by 14.98%, alongside a rise in volatility indices of 33.33%. An important metric in this context is stablecoin velocity, which measures the frequency of stablecoin transactions within a specific timeframe. This metric is determined by taking the total stablecoin transfer volume and dividing it by the stablecoin’s total supply for that period.
Recent data from the Cambridge Digital Money Dashboard highlights a remarkable performance by Circle’s USDC stablecoin on Ethereum, showing an accelerated velocity significantly greater than that of Tether’s USDT. The latest figures show USDC achieving a monthly velocity of 46.8, which is approximately 3.5 times that of USDT’s velocity of 13.3. Moreover, USDC’s market capitalisation has skyrocketed by 72% since January, while USDT’s market capitalisation increased by only 32%. Analysts suggest that USDC’s growth trajectory can be attributed to its strong regulatory compliance, including adherence to frameworks such as Europe’s Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) and its expanding presence across various payment and blockchain networks.
In other developments, Crypto.com has joined forces with Hollywood.com to launch a new prediction market tailored for entertainment. Users will have the opportunity to trade contracts related to movies, television shows, and awards. The contracts will be offered by Crypto.com | Derivatives North America (CDNA), which operates as a CFTC-registered exchange, ensuring compliance and security for entertainment enthusiasts looking to express and trade their opinions.
Moreover, MyPrize, a rapidly evolving social gaming platform, has also partnered with Crypto.com to create MyPrize Markets. This new platform will integrate social gaming, prediction markets, and livestreaming into a unified user experience.
In a noteworthy advancement for Ethereum, developers have confirmed that the Fusaka upgrade is set to go live on December 3. This upgrade will introduce PeerDAS, a feature that enables validators to verify only segments of data. This innovation is expected to reduce bandwidth usage and cut costs, benefiting validators and Layer-2 networks. The upgrade is anticipated to activate when the blockchain reaches a specific slot number, projected for 21:49 UTC on that date.
FTSE Russell has partnered with Chainlink to bring key stock and digital asset indices on-chain. This initiative includes notable indices such as the Russell 1000, Russell 2000, Russell 3000, and FTSE 100, utilizing Chainlink’s DataLink service to enhance accessibility and transparency.
Further expanding its presence, decentralized derivatives exchange dYdX is planning to enter the U.S. market by late 2025 while also introducing spot crypto trading. Eddie Zhang, President of dYdX, emphasized improved regulatory conditions under the current administration as a contributing factor to this decision. The exchange has also initiated a user vote to provide compensation to those affected by a recent service outage, which would be sourced from its insurance fund.
In tokenomic developments, ZKsync, a Layer-2 scaling solution for Ethereum, has put forth a proposal to shift its native token, ZK, from a governance-centric model to one that emphasizes utility. This shift aims to create value via on-chain interoperability fees and off-chain enterprise licensing revenues, which will support staking rewards, ecosystem development, and token buyback initiatives.
Meanwhile, Maple Finance, a decentralized finance lending protocol operating on Solana and Ethereum, has announced its decision to discontinue SYRUP token staking rewards. Instead, a portion of the platform revenue will be allocated to a new DAO treasury named the Syrup Strategic Fund (SSF), designed to hold various assets such as SYRUP, bitcoin, and stablecoins to ensure long-term sustainability.
On a regulatory front in Indonesia, Bank Indonesia (BI), the nation’s central bank, is planning to issue a ‘national stablecoin’ that will be backed by government bonds and integrated into its digital rupiah central bank digital currency (CBDC). This initiative aims to meld blockchain technology with Indonesia’s monetary framework and support broader digital finance strategies.
In Brazil, Banco Inter has successfully executed a pilot for a blockchain-based cross-border trade finance system in collaboration with the Central Bank of Brazil, Hong Kong’s Monetary Authority, and Chainlink. This pilot project leveraged Brazil’s Drex and Hong Kong’s Ensemble blockchain networks to simulate international trade settlements, showcasing the potential of distributed ledger technology to enhance cross-border transaction efficiency.
However, not all news has been positive. The decentralised exchange AMM Balancer was recently exploited, resulting in an estimated loss of $128 million in crypto across multiple blockchains, including Ethereum, Arbitrum, and Base. As a precautionary measure, the emerging blockchain network Berachain has halted operations and is planning an emergency hard fork to address this significant security breach, which was linked to a precision or rounding error in the Balancer V2 code.
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