Brent crude rose 25% to $115 in a single trading session. The sharp move marked one of the largest daily gains for the benchmark oil contract.

Circle and Stripe are expanding into overlapping roles in USDC issuance, payments, and infrastructure. Circle, which minted USDC backed by U.S. dollar reserves and pushed its market cap above $55 billion, launched the Arc L1 blockchain, cross-chain transfer protocol CCTP, and Circle Payments Network in May 2025, where 55 financial institutions have registered and 74 are under review. Stripe, which processed $1.9 trillion in payment volume in 2025, launched the x402 USDC payment feature on Base for AI agents, acquired Bridge for $1.1 billion (supporting its conditional OCC trust bank approval on Feb. 12), co-developed the Tempo L1 settlement chain with Paradigm, and bought wallet provider Privy. Artemis data show USDC handled more than $8.4 trillion in onchain transactions in January out of $10 trillion across all stablecoins, with the broader stablecoin market exceeding $300 billion as both firms seek to control key payment, settlement, and application pathways.

Strategy intends to raise $300 million in the coming weeks by selling its STRC preferred shares to fund additional Bitcoin purchases, Cointelegraph reports as cited by ChainThink. STRC, introduced in July 2025 as an income-generating financing instrument with a variable monthly yield currently annualized at 11.50%, has enabled the company to build a Bitcoin position valued at about $50 billion while keeping the security's market price close to its $100 par value.

Bitcoin spot ETFs recorded net inflows of $568 million between March 2 and March 6 (ET), while Ethereum spot ETFs saw net inflows of $23.56 million. SOL spot ETFs posted net inflows of $24.05 million over the same period, whereas XRP spot ETFs registered net outflows of $4.0855 million.

WTI crude oil climbed to an intraday high of $119.5 on March 9 and last traded near $114.5, up more than 25% from last Friday's close and over 40% in a week amid an almost weeklong near-closure of the Strait of Hormuz in Iran that handles about 20% of global oil flows, Foresight News reports. The spike in oil prices coincided with sharp declines in traditional and crypto markets, including a 5.4% drop in Japan's Nikkei 225, a 7% slide in South Korea's KOSPI, a fall of over 3% in Germany's DAX, Bitcoin dipping below $66,000, around $120 million in crypto liquidations in one hour, and the Crypto Fear & Greed Index sinking to 12. On Hyperliquid, Lookonchain reported that trader CBB shorted 127,175 xyz:CL at an average $78.37 (about $13.78 million notional) and now faces roughly $3.81 million in unrealized losses with a liquidation level at $120.76, while address "2 frères 2 fauves" holds 12,717 CL worth about $13.37 million, is down about $3.4 million on paper, and shares the same liquidation price. Another whale, address 0x8Af7, reportedly saw a full liquidation on a 72,179-CL short (about $7.8 million) with losses exceeding $1.55 million before re-entering with 60,166 new short contracts totaling roughly $6.48 million, whereas Sky cofounder Rune Christensen's onchain address RuneKek was disclosed by EmberCN to be long around $7.82 million in crude oil near $93, with unrealized gains above $1.36 million while also shorting part of ETH and XYZ100 as a hedge via onchain perpetuals on Hyperliquid.

Ethereum spot ETFs posted a combined net inflow of $23.56 million for the week of March 2–6, SoSoValue data show. BlackRock's ETHA led with $133 million in weekly net inflows, bringing its cumulative total to $11.97 billion, while Grayscale's Ethereum Mini Trust (ETH) recorded $84.18 million in weekly inflows and $1.82 billion cumulatively. Fidelity's FETH saw the largest weekly outflow of $218 million but retains $2.29 billion in cumulative inflows. Total net assets across all Ethereum spot ETFs stand at $11.28 billion, representing 4.72% of Ethereum's market cap, with cumulative historical inflows of $11.63 billion.

SOL spot exchange-traded funds recorded a combined net inflow of $24.05 million for the trading week ending March 6, while XRP spot ETFs saw a net outflow of $4.0855 million in the same period, SoSoValue data show. Bitwise's BSOL led SOL products with a weekly net inflow of $33.9499 million, bringing its cumulative historical net inflow to $767 million, followed by Invesco & Galaxy Digital's QSOL with $2.1473 million in weekly net inflows and $3.45 million in total historical net inflows, while Fidelity's FSOL posted the largest net outflow of $10.2586 million despite holding $1.53 billion in cumulative historical net inflows. The aggregate net asset value of all SOL spot ETFs has reached $807 million, representing 1.66% of SOL's total market capitalization, with cumulative historical net inflows across SOL spot ETFs totaling $958 million, according to SoSoValue.

Bitcoin spot ETFs posted a combined net inflow of $568 million for the week ending March 6, with BlackRock's IBIT leading at $660 million in weekly inflows and cumulative net inflows of $62.47 billion, SoSoValue data cited by Odaily Planet Daily show. Grayscale's Bitcoin Mini Trust (BTC) recorded $45.89 million in net inflows for the week and $2.17 billion cumulatively, while Fidelity's FBTC saw the largest weekly outflow at $153 million but maintains $10.84 billion in total net inflows. As of publication, spot Bitcoin ETFs collectively hold $87.07 billion in total net assets, with an ETF net asset ratio of 6.39% and aggregate net inflows since inception of $55.37 billion.

Trader pensionusdt.eth opened a 3x leveraged long position purchasing 1,000 BTC valued at $67.26 million approximately two hours ago, on-chain data show. The position currently shows $9.7 million in unrealized profit. Since March 1, the trader has closed 10 consecutive winning trades with a cumulative profit of $27.22 million and a reported win rate of 85%.