On Wednesday, the Federal Open Market Committee held the federal funds rate at 3.5–3.75% while assessing the economic fallout from the war in the Middle East and its effect on energy prices. Chair Jerome Powell said growth and consumer spending remain solid but highlighted soft housing, a cooling labor market and inflation still above the 2% goal, creating tension in the Fed's dual mandate. Derivatives data show most traders expect no change at the April 2026 meeting, while market commentators debate how prolonged liquidity support could influence broader risk assets such as cryptocurrencies.

The FTX Recovery Trust plans to distribute $2.2 billion to eligible creditors and former customers on March 31, 2026, marking its fourth reimbursement round since February 2025. The plan includes specific payout percentages for different claim types and will lift the cumulative amount returned to about $10 billion, while some creditors continue to argue the recoveries are insufficient. The payments are based on 2022 petition-date crypto valuations and come as former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried pursues an appeal and potential prison transfer.

Over the last 24 hours, Bhutan’s state investment arm Druk Holding and Investments transferred more than 973 BTC, exceeding $72.3 million, and also moved over 175 BTC on March 10. After its Bitcoin stash peaked at around 13,295 BTC in October 2024, the country now holds just over 4,400 BTC as it continues to liquidate part of its reserve through periodic sales.

Gnosis co-founder Dr. Friederike Ernst argues that the US Digital Asset Market Structure Clarity Act risks pushing crypto activity back through large, licensed financial intermediaries. She acknowledges the bill's attempt to divide oversight between the SEC and CFTC and to safeguard peer-to-peer transactions and self-custody, but warns it may undermine open, permissionless blockchain infrastructure and DeFi while debate in Congress continues.

Venus Protocol, a decentralized lending and borrowing platform, reported suspicious activity in its Thena (THE) and Cake (CAKE) pools tied to a suspected supply cap exploit exceeding $3.7 million. The attacker allegedly accumulated about 84% of THE’s market cap and then used the tokens as collateral to borrow multiple assets, prompting Venus to pause borrows and withdrawals for THE and some low-liquidity tokens.

On a Saturday, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin submitted a proposal to merge the consensus-layer and execution-layer client software into a single backend codebase, aiming to make running Ethereum nodes simpler for users. He argued that operating personal infrastructure should be easy and accessible, and linked this effort to his May 2025 concept of partially stateless nodes that reduce storage demands by keeping only necessary blockchain data.

Andrei Grachev of DWF Labs argues that classic altseasons have ended, with excess tokens, constrained liquidity and ETF flows concentrating capital in Bitcoin, Ether and RWAs. Altcoin valuations have dropped sharply since the October 2025 crash, with $209 billion leaving the sector over 13 months and 38% of tokens trading near record lows, while analysts foresee shorter narratives and more aggressive capital rotations across select sectors.

Basel III bank capital rules are scheduled for revision in 2026, and analyst Nic Puckrin argues that a lower risk weight for Bitcoin could release substantial liquidity into the asset. Under the current framework, BTC carries a 1,250% risk weight, forcing banks to fully back their holdings with reserves and making crypto services uneconomical. Other industry figures say this regime misprices risk compared with assets like corporate bonds, gold and government bonds, and acts as an indirect constraint on banks' participation in the crypto sector.

Former United Kingdom Prime Minister Boris Johnson described Bitcoin as a Ponzi scheme with less value than Pokémon cards in an opinion piece. He cited a case of a friend who lost 20,000 British pounds over three and a half years to a BTC investment scheme, arguing collectibles are more tradable. Bitcoin advocates and industry figures pushed back, highlighting Bitcoin's decentralized design and criticizing debt-based fiat systems instead.