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Plus: Paul Atkins was confirmed and ETH ETF options were approved.
Apr 11, 2025, 8:13 p.m.
Tariffs, tariffs, tariffs.
Trump’s on-again, off-again import levies dominated the week. At the beginning, tariffs sent stocks and crypto appreciably lower. By the end, with all new non-China tariffs paused for 90 days, markets were up again.
Bitcoin returned to a level ($82,000) that it was at this time last week. And analysts debated whether, in the panic of the previous days, it showed “safe haven” qualities (like gold) or whether it was a risk-asset like many others. The consensus was that bitcoin performed resiliently rather than completely reassuringly.
Our Asia reporting team led the way on our markets coverage. Omkar Godbole started the week strong by revealing how the unwinding of the "basis trade" could impact bitcoin price. Sam Reynolds wrote on how Kalshi was set to win its legal battle in Nevada, hours before the prediction market got its first victory in the state. Shaurya Malwa reported on the first XRP ETF listing in the U.S. and how Teucrium's leveraged fund received $5m during its first day of trading.
From our European team, there was some timely analysis from James Van Straten, and the All-Important U.S. 10-Year Yield Moving in the Wrong Direction for Trump, and a story showing the resilience of the decentralized economy from Oliver Knight, How DeFi 'Defied' Market Carnage as Traders Poured Millions Amid Panic. Our coverage expanded beyond just tariffs and market reactions, with Jamie Crawley's scoop, Rootstock Prepares to Release SDKs for Bitcoin Layer 2s Using BitVMX after he took the opportunity offered by an embargoed press release to phone the company and interview the founder. And there was a nice DeFi follow-up on the repercussions of HyperLiquid's price manipulation exploit from March by Oliver, How the Hype for HyperLiquid's Vault Evaporated on Concerns Over Centralization.
Meanwhile, there was lots of news that wasn’t tariff-related.
Paul Atkins was confirmed as the new SEC chair. The Department of Justice closed down its crypto enforcement unit, prompting criticism, from Democrats and others, that it’s not serious about combating malfeasance. The SEC approved ETH ETF options, following a long delay. And President Trump put an end to a controversial DeFi accounting rule.
It was a week that showed how crypto was increasingly central to finance and even macro-economics. Fun times are ahead.
Benjamin Schiller
Benjamin Schiller is CoinDesk's managing editor for features and opinion. Previously, he was editor-in-chief at BREAKER Magazine and a staff writer at Fast Company. He holds some ETH, BTC and LINK.
Sheldon Reback
Sheldon Reback is CoinDesk editorial's Regional Head of Europe. Before joining the company, he spent 26 years as an editor at Bloomberg News, where he worked on beats as diverse as stock markets and the retail industry as well as covering the dot-com bubble of 2000-2002. He managed the Bloomberg Terminal's main news page and also worked on a global project to produce short, chart-based stories across the newsroom. He previously worked as a journalist for a number of technology magazines in Hong Kong. Sheldon has a degree in industrial chemistry and an MBA. He owns ether and bitcoin below CoinDesk's notifiable limit.
Parikshit Mishra
Parikshit Mishra is CoinDesk's Regional Head of Asia, managing the editorial team in the region. Before joining CoinDesk, he was the EMEA Editor at Acuris (Mergermarket), where he dealt with copies related to private equity and the startup ecosystem. He has also worked as an Senior Analyst for CRISIL, covering the European markets and global economies. His most notable tenure was with Reuters, where he worked as a correspondent and an editor for various teams. He does not have any crypto holdings.
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