hodler

5 Feb 2026, 12:55

Bitcoin Battles to Defend $69K—Bears Smell Blood

Bitcoin is dangling at the edge of a breakdown, not bouncing toward a breakout. In the last hour, its price jittered between $69,049 and $69,546, as $1.40 trillion in market cap faces mounting pressure and $99.42 billion in 24-hour volume suggests panic, not conviction, inside a volatile $69,049–$76,122 trading range. Bitcoin Chart Outlook Bitcoin‘s 1-hour

5 Feb 2026, 12:53

Vitalik Buterin Sold 3,000 ETH in 3 Days: ETH is Crashing

Vitalik Buterin sold 2.961 ETH (6.6M$) in 3 days. ETH down 8% at 2.064$, RSI 22 oversold. Supports: 2.062$-1.930$. Buterin allocated 16K ETH to privacy projects. The market is approaching the end o...

5 Feb 2026, 12:51

LINK Technical Analysis February 5, 2026: Weekly Strategy

LINK is testing the $8.80 support in the downtrend; even though oversold conditions offer rebound potential, BTC weakness is dominant. Weekly strategy: Long if support holds, short bias on break.

5 Feb 2026, 12:50

Tornado Cash receives funds tied to Aperture Finance exploit

Funds linked to the January exploit of Aperture Finance have been caught moving on-chain. The hacker allegedly moved the looted funds through the Ethereum-based mixer Tornado Cash. Addresses flagged linked to the attacker deposited about 1,243 Ether (approx. worth roughly $2.4 million) into the mixer. Aperture Finance, on January 25, disclosed that it had suffered an exploit affecting its V3 and V4 contracts. The losses are estimated at around $3.67 million. However, this move comes in when the crypto market is dealing with high selling pressure and bearish sentiments. Ethereum price has dropped by around 28% over the past 7 days. Crypto hack losses jump 13% month-on-month The hacking incident occurred during a month marked by several other crypto-related losses. PeckShield in a post reported that around 16 hacking incidents happened in January, which resulted in losses of $86.01 million. The amount is slightly lower than compared to Jan 2025 (approx. amount $87.25 million), but a notable 13.25% MoM surge from Dec 2025 (approx. $76 million). Phishing-related losses during the same period exceeded $300 million. Among the largest incidents reported in January were attacks on Step Finance, Truebit Protocol and SwapNet. Step Finance lost around $29 million. There has been a breach of security for some of its treasury wallets. Truebit protocol lost approximately 8,535 ETH, valued at around $26.4 million, in the theft. PeckShield has mentioned that the Aperture Finance exploit was unrelated to the SwapNet incident, despite it happening around the same time. Security firm BlockSec reported that Aperture Finance contracts exposed an arbitrary-call capability. This unfolded because of insufficient input validation. That weakness allowed attackers to exploit existing token approvals and drain assets using transferFrom calls. The vulnerability reportedly emerged from a helper module that executed low-level calls using user-supplied calldata. It was triggered without enforcing restrictions on call targets or function selectors. Attackers were able to craft malicious calldata to siphon ERC-20 tokens and approve transfers of Uniswap V3 position NFTs. Users who had enabled Aperture Finance’s “Instant Liquidity Management” features were affected. In one Ethereum-based transaction analyzed by security firms, an attacker deployed a contract that triggered the vulnerable function with a minimal amount of ether. It was wrapped into WETH and executed a transferFrom call on WBTC. This allowed funds to be drained while passing internal balance checks. Aperture launched forensic probe Aperture Finance said the exploit had been contained and that affected web application functions were disabled. The company said it was conducting a forensic investigation with external security firms. It is also coordinating with law enforcement to trace the stolen funds. It added that its automation strategies were not impacted because they operate on a separate system. However, they advised users who had used instant liquidity features to revoke relevant approvals. Ether is suffering from the high sell-off as Bitcoin price dipped below $70,000 before recovering. ETH price is down by almost 7% in the last 24 hours. It has nosedived by 29% since the beginning of this year. Ether is trading at an average price of $2,087 at the press time. If you're reading this, you’re already ahead. Stay there with our newsletter .

5 Feb 2026, 12:41

Dogecoin Price Prediction: DOGE Holds Critical $0.10 Support as Bears Dominate Market

Dogecoin traded near the critical $0.10 support level on Wednesday as selling pressure mounted across cryptocurrency markets. The leading meme coin faced continued downward momentum driven by deteriorating market conditions and weakening investor confidence. The digital asset's price action reflected broader market uncertainty. Risk-off sentiment dominated trading activity, while retail participation declined sharply. Technical indicators painted a concerning picture for short-term price prospects. Derivatives Market Shows Signs of Weakness Futures Open Interest for Dogecoin dropped to $1.16 billion on Wednesday, down from $1.27 billion recorded the previous day. This represented a significant decline from the $6 billion peak reached on September 14. The falling Open Interest suggested traders were closing positions rather than establishing new ones. This trend typically adds to selling pressure as market participants reduce exposure. Rising Open Interest would signal renewed confidence and potential bullish momentum. Market sentiment reached extreme levels on Wednesday. The Alternative Fear and Greed Index fell to 14, down from 17 on Tuesday. This reading indicated extreme fear had taken hold of the cryptocurrency market. Investor caution increased as the sell-off persisted. Fewer traders opened fresh positions amid the uncertain environment. However, historical patterns show that extreme fear often precedes rebounds. Contrarian investors may view current conditions as a potential entry opportunity. Technical Outlook Points to Further Downside Risk Multiple moving averages confirmed the bearish trend. The 50-day Exponential Moving Average stood at $0.1295, well above current price levels. The 100-day EMA reached $0.1457, while the 200-day EMA traded at $0.1677. All three key moving averages remained above the spot price. This configuration typically indicates sustained bearish momentum. Bulls would need to reclaim these levels to shift the technical outlook. The Relative Strength Index reentered oversold territory, suggesting intensifying downward pressure. Prolonged time in this zone could keep control firmly in the hands of sellers. The indicator reflected building bearish momentum. The Moving Average Convergence Divergence remained positioned below its signal line. Red histogram bars on the MACD reinforced the sell signal. These technical factors suggested caution for potential buyers. A contraction in MACD histogram bars could signal a potential reversal. This would indicate returning bullish momentum. Traders would watch for this development as an early warning of trend change.

5 Feb 2026, 12:40

USDT market cap climbs to record $187.3B as crypto weakens post-October liquidations

Tether’s dollar-pegged stablecoin USDT closed the fourth quarter of 2025 with a record-breaking market cap of $187.3 billion. The expansion followed the cascade of liquidations in October, which triggered heavy losses across the digital asset space and sent competing stablecoins running for cover. According to Tether’s latest quarterly report, USDT has added $12.4 billion to its net market capitalization in Q4. As a result, its dominance grew, while rivals scrambled to regain momentum. Circle’s USDC, the second-largest stablecoin, experienced volatility after the October 10 liquidation event but largely closed at the quarter’s level. Meanwhile, Ethena’s synthetic dollar USDe lost more than 57% of its market cap. USDT expands supply while rivals lose ground USDT’s growth was remarkable despite the falling crypto prices and liquidity. While the total crypto market cap lost more than a third between October 10, 2025, and early February 2026, USDT still attracted inflows. Tether reported that USDT grew by 3.5% in the same period, and outperformed both USDC and USDe, which declined by 2.6% and 57%, respectively. Furthermore, the data show that the demand for USDT went beyond speculative trading. About two-thirds of the total supply was in savings wallets and centralized exchanges. The remaining third were in favor of payments, remittances, and decentralized finance activity. Beyond supply growth, on-chain USDT activity reached record levels. Average monthly active wallets jumped to 24.8 million during the quarter, representing nearly 70% of all stablecoin-holding wallets. At the same time, the transfer volume in quarters skyrocketed to $4.4 trillion, with a total of 2.2 billion on-chain transfers. User adoption also picked up. Tether estimated that it added 35.2 million new users in Q4, bringing the global total to 534.5 million. Notably, the quarter was the eighth consecutive quarter in which the stablecoin added more than 30 million users. On-chain holders grew 14.7 million to 139.1 million, with USDT wallets holding over 70% of all stablecoin wallets. In addition, Tether estimated that more than 100 million users hold USDT on centralized platforms, reinforcing its role as a core settlement infrastructure. Reserves grow as Tether boosts treasury exposure Tether’s balance sheet has also become more robust during the quarter. Total reserves increased by $11.7 billion to $192.9 billion, with net equity of $6.3 billion. Exposure to U.S. Treasuries rose to $141.6 billion, making Tether one of the largest holders worldwide and ahead of many sovereign nations. Reserves also consisted of 96,184 BTC and 127.5 metric tons of gold, giving more diversification. However, the report recognized the remaining challenges. USDT was the most used among stablecoins in illicit transfers. According to Bitrace, $649 billion in stablecoins flowed to high-risk addresses in 2024, of which Tron-based USDT accounted for well over 70%. Tether has had a few shifts in its capital strategy, with Tether’s advisers discussing a potential $5 billion fundraising round, down sharply from earlier numbers. In January, Tether introduced USAt, a US-focused stablecoin by Anchorage Digital Bank within the framework of the GENIUS Act. As Cryptopolitan previously reported, Tether partnered with Opera to bring USDT and Tether Gold into Opera’s MiniPay, targeting digital payments adoption in emerging markets. Get seen where it counts. Advertise in Cryptopolitan Research and reach crypto’s sharpest investors and builders.