Story’s (IP) price recently bounced sharply from a key support region around $2.40, forming a potential short-term base. At the same time, Open Interest and whale holdings climbed, with large players now controlling 55% of the supply and derivatives positioning hitting about $89 million. If buying pressure from these participants persists, IP could attempt to revisit the $4 resistance area where notable liquidity is clustered.

On January 22, Saga paused its Ethereum-compatible SagaEVM chainlet after an unauthorized breach that the team said caused about $7 million in losses. The incident destabilized Saga Dollar to $0.75 and was followed by a 55% drop in TVL within 24 hours, with operations halted for an audit and address blacklisting.

Thailand’s securities regulator is preparing rules for crypto ETFs and for trading crypto futures on TFEX, with formal ETF guidelines targeted early this year. The plan classifies digital assets as another asset class with a suggested allocation of up to 5% in diversified portfolios, and also advances market-making and a tokenization sandbox.

Layer-1 protocol Saga paused its Ethereum-compatible SagaEVM chainlet on Wednesday following a $7 million exploit. Its dollar-pegged stablecoin fell to $0.75 around 10:16 pm UTC, and TVL slid roughly 55% from over $37 million to $16 million. The team says the network remains sound and has begun blacklisting the attacker's address.

Tom Lee, founder and head of research at Fundstrat, reiterated on a recent podcast that markets could face a "painful" decline in 2026, pointing to tariff tensions, Federal Reserve independence and an incoming Fed chair as key factors. Bitcoin has already swung from $84k to $126k in 2025 before a late-year wipeout, and now trades near $90k after dropping 10% from a $98k high amid renewed tariff fears. Swissblock's Bitcoin Risk Index currently signals consolidation, with support and resistance levels around $89.2k, $94.8k, $99k and $84.5k guiding near-term scenarios as U.S. spot ETF flows stagnate.

Bitcoin fell below $90,000 as macro tension between the United States and the European Union, alongside concerns linked to Greenland, weighed on risk assets. Analyst MorenoDV reports that new whales now command a larger share of Bitcoin realized cap than long-term whales, while CryptoQuant data places their realized price near $98,000 with spot seen around $88,300.

On Wednesday, FFTT founder Luke Gromen said on Coin Stories that institutional investors are unlikely to propel Bitcoin from around $89,880 to $150,000 without a major catalyst. CryptoQuant CEO Ki Young Ju countered that demand remains strong, citing 577,000 BTC (about $53 billion) purchased by institutional funds over the past year. Gromen also floated a potential drop to $60,000.

Ethereum co‑founder Vitalik Buterin proposed adding native distributed validator technology to streamline staking. In a Wednesday forum post, he outlined a design that lets a validator create up to 16 independent keys that the chain treats as one, aiming to cut downtime penalties and improve security for self-stakers.