CryptoQuant CEO Ki Young Ju says he was wrong about the Bitcoin bull cycle being &#8220;over&#8221; after BTC recently surpassed the $100k mark. He believes that the market is currently in a transitional phase. In a recent post, CryptoQuant founder…

CryptoQuant CEO admits he was wrong about Bitcoin bull cycle

U.S. stocks ended the week mixed, with investor sentiment cautious ahead of 
scheduled trade talks between U.S. and Chinese officials in Switzerland this 
weekend. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.3%, while the Nasdaq 
Composite edged up 0.0043% while the…

Dow drops 119 points, Nasdaq inches higher, Bitcoin settles at $103k amid China talk rumors

Ethereum&#8217;s Pectra upgrade doesn&#8217;t pose a threat to decentralization, according 
to Mallesh Pai, senior research director at blockchain software firm 
Consensys, describing the update as a cleanup of the behind-the-scenes &#8220;busy 
work&#8221; currently handled by validators.
During a May 9 Cointelegraph X Space, Pai said a validator&#8217;s chances of 
proposing a block or earning rewards remain tied to how much ETH they hold, 
adding that larger validators don&#8217;t gain any new advantages under the upgrade:
&gt; &#8220;Rewards continue to be proportional to the amount of ETH you have. […] it&#8217;s 
&gt; not the case that if you&#8217;re a big validator, you somehow have any more 
&gt; advantages than you did before.&#8221;
Pectra is Ethereum&#8217;s most extensive network upgrade since the Merge took place 
in September 2022. Pectra allows validators to stake as much as 2,048 ETH, up 
from the previous limit of 32 ETH. The new standard has raised community 
concerns about the risks of centralization on the network.
According to Pai, the Pectra upgrade has taken &#8220;a bunch of busy work that the 
network was doing behind the scenes and removed it.&#8221;
Pai noted that while there are about a million technical validators on 
Ethereum, many aren&#8217;t truly distinct &#8212; large validators often operate 
numerous virtual keys from a single physical machine. With the Pectra upgrade, 
those keys can now be consolidated &#8212; something he says they are already 
seeing.
&#8220;In the best case, we&#8217;ll get to about 30,000 validators,&#8221; he said, adding that 
this consolidation reduces auxiliary work and enables network stakeholders to 
focus on what matters, such as lowering gas limits.
_**Related:**__**Ethereum Pectra upgrade adds new features &#8212; How long before 
ETH price reacts?**_
## New Pectra staking limit paves the way for institutions
The new limit could pave the way for institutions to stake ETH, according to 
Artemiy Parshakov, vice president of institutions at Ethereum staking service 
P2P.org. &#8220;EIP-7002 makes institutional staking much easier to integrate 
without taking too much risk.&#8221;
Ether staking within exchange-traded funds has been a hot topic in 2025. 
BlackRock has said that the successful Ether ETFs are less perfect without 
staking, and multiple financial institutions have filed for amendments to 
their Ether ETFs to allow for staking.
If approved, investors might be more inclined to buy into the ETFs, as they 
could receive yield. The SEC has yet to rule on staking amendments.
Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas recently forecast in a podcast interview 
that if staking were to be approved for Ether ETFs, it would have &#8220;a little 
impact&#8221; on inflows. &#8220;The bigger problem with Ethereum is performance; it just 
doesn&#8217;t ever go on a nice long rally.&#8221;
_**Magazine: Pectra hard fork explained &#8212; Will it get Ethereum back on 
track?**_

Ethereum's new staking limit is not a risk to decentralization, says Consensys researcher

XRP analyst Egrag Crypto, who is well-known for offering bullish predictions 
about the altcoin, has now drawn the crypto community’s attention to another 
altcoin, XDC. The analyst predicts this crypto token could also witness a 
remarkable surge and enjoy up to a 3,350% gain as bullish metrics emerge. XDC 
To Rally To $2 As Indicators Turn Bullish In an X post, Egrag Crypto stated 
that XDC will rally to $1 and then easily surge to $2. This came as he 
remarked that the altcoin’s chart looks “amazing.” First, the XRP analyst 
noted that the RGB (Red-Green-Blue) indicators perfectly align with the XDC 
token. Based on this, he asserted that the next move for the altcoin could be 
a 10x pump. Related Reading: Fartcoin Reaches Critical Make-Or-Break Level: 
Analyst Reveals What Could Happen From $0.77 This XDC price surge is expected 
to target the Fibonacci levels between 1.414 and 1.618, rallying to between 
$0.50 and $0.80. The XRP analyst remarked that this is still below the 
previous cycle’s blow-off top, when the token soared by 3,350%. He expects XDC 
to replicate this explosive move, potentially surging to the $2 target. The 
XRP analyst alluded to the Stochastic Relative Strength Index (SRSI) as 
another bullish indicator. He revealed that the SRSI is waving bullish 
signals. The analyst admitted that there is still a long road for XDC to reach 
and sustain RSI levels above 80, but claimed that the momentum is definitely 
on the bulls’ side. In line with this, Egrag Crypto asserted that big moves 
could just be around for the altcoin. The Bearish Angle For The Altcoin The 
XRP analyst also provided a bearish angle for the XDC price. He revealed that 
the 21 Exponential Moving Average (EMA) is on the verge of crossing below the 
33 Moving Average. If that happens, the analyst warned that it could turn 
super bearish. Related Reading: Altcoin Season In Danger If Bitcoin Dominance 
Closes April Above This Level However, he added that this crossover will most 
likely be avoided and that there could be a blow-off top before the inevitable 
retracement. The analyst also urged market participants to be attentive as the 
sharp move higher would come unexpectedly before a big crash to the downside. 
From a fundamental perspective, XDC’s outlook also looks bullish. The XDC 
network just officially joined the MiCA alliance, which is a major step 
forward in aligning blockchain innovation with regulatory clarity in Europe. 
The team stated that the network is deeply committed to compliance, 
transparency, and building long-term trust. Like Ripple’s offering using XRP 
for cross-border payments, XDC is a layer-1 that offers real-world 
applications like trade finance, cross-border payments, and RWA tokenization. 
At the time of writing, the XDC price is trading at around $0.07, up over 1% 
in the last 24 hours, according to data from CoinMarketCap. Featured image 
from Getty Images, chart from Tradingview.com

XRP Analyst Marks XDC For 3,350% Take-Off As Bullish Metrics Emerge

Hester Pierce has long been an advocate of regulatory sandboxes for crypto. 
However, Wormhole legal chief believes there are risks.

SEC’s Hester Peirce wants crypto sandbox: Wormhole legal chief has concerns

Blockchain analytics firm Arkham Intelligence is partnering with Haruko, a 
portfolio and execution management platform to bolster institutional-grade 
digital assets trading. Arkham Intelligence (ARKM) and Haruko will tap into 
this collaboration to bring digital asset liquidity venues and order types…