Stablecoin transaction volume on solana climbed to a record $650 billion last month, more than double the network’s previous record. It also saw the highest volume of any blockchain last month, according to a Wednesday note published by Grayscale Head of Research Zach Pandl.

“Stablecoins are one of the megatrends driving adoption of blockchain technology, and Solana is well positioned to compete in this category,” Pandl wrote.

The research note comes as the supply of stablecoins on solana has jumped to $15.4 billion, a substantial leap since the start of 2025, when the figure sat at $5.1 billion, data from open-source analytics platform DefiLlama shows. 

The price of solana has increased 7.3% in the last 24 hours to return above the $90 level, outpacing bitcoin, ethereum, and dogecoin, per CoinGecko.

International banking group Standard Chartered has predicted solana will grow to $250 by the end of 2026, pointing to a shift in activity from meme coins to solana-stablecoin pairs, aided by AI-driven micropayments.

The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City approved a limited purpose account for Kraken Financial, making the exchange the first cryptocurrency company to gain access to the Fed’s payment infrastructure, according to a Wednesday report from The Wall Street Journal. 

The approval “marks the convergence of crypto infrastructure and sovereign financial rails,” according to Kraken co-CEO Arjun Sethi. With a Federal Reserve master account, Kraken can directly connect to core US payment systems used by traditional banks and credit unions, enabling faster and more efficient fiat movement for Kraken’s institutional clients.

Sethi continued, “This creates a uniquely resilient foundation. It gives us the ability to settle directly on Fedwire, reduce dependency on correspondent banks, and integrate regulated fiat liquidity directly into digital asset markets.”

The approval of a Fed master account comes as Kraken, which was founded in 2011, is preparing for an initial public offering.

Kansas City Fed President Jeff Schmid in a press release said the payments landscape is actively evolving. “Throughout this transformation, the integrity and stability of the U.S. payments system remain our priority,” Schmid said.

Investors appear to be rotating where they are placing their crypto bets, but not necessarily fleeing the asset class entirely. 

Last month, spot bitcoin ETFs registered $206.5 million in outflows, marking their fourth straight month of redemptions. Ethereum spot ETFs saw even heavier withdrawal as $369.9 million left the investment vehicles, also marking a fourth consecutive monthly outflow. 

Since November, spot bitcoin and ethereum ETFs have posted more than $9.1 billion in cumulative outflows.

Bitcoin and ethereum are the market’s virtual ATMs, according to Chris Soriano, cofounder and chief commercial officer at BridgePort. “It’s no surprise when institutions start laying off risk or meet redemptions, they naturally sell what’s most liquid first,” Soriano told Sherwood News. “This is no different than when a traditional fund manager trims S&P 500 exposure before touching their small-cap growth positions.” 

On the other hand, newer funds based on altcoins haven’t stopped recording monthly green candles. 

Spot XRP ETFs pulled in $58 million last month and have yet to post a single negative month since their launch in November. Spot solana ETFs attracted $63 million and, likewise, remain in the black since their debut in October. 

The outflows of the two largest cryptocurrencies combined with the modest inflows of the two smaller tokens suggest a rotation regime, Soriano argued. “Institutions trimming their core liquid holdings while selectively adding to high-conviction, higher-beta positions where they think there’s more juice in the squeeze. It’s not a contradiction; it’s portfolio mechanics behaving exactly as you’d expect,” Soriano continued.

He added that XRP and solana’s markets are also thinner, which means the same dollar of buying pressure registers as a louder, more persistent inflow signal than it ever would in BTC or ETH.

Nic Roberts-Huntley, CEO and cofounder of Blueprint Finance, told Sherwood that bitcoin and etheruem’s outflows combined with XRP and solana’s inflows “may signal a broader market transition, one where capital increasingly chases specific use cases rather than the entire asset class moving in lockstep.”

After rallying from $1,830 to above $2,100 on Wednesday, ethereum struggled to hold on to its gains and dipped under $2,000, a round psychological price level, on Thursday. 

The seesaw price action helped liquidate $146 million worth of leveraged long and short positions on ethereum in the last 24 hours, data from CoinGlass shows.  

While ethereum was due for a relief rally after entering into oversold conditions as measured by its relative strength index, some are still maintaining a bearish sentiment, according to Delphi Digital analyst Simon Shockey.

With ethereum now trading under $2,000, Shockey called the rally “unconvincing.” He told Sherwood News that he doesn’t “think most crypto natives are compelled to really believe the lows are in,” adding that he could see ethereum fall further from here and make new lows in the second half of the year. 

The price action comes as cofounder Vitalik Buterin has sold $35 million worth of ethereum tokens since the start of February and the paper loss for the largest ethereum treasury firm, BitMine Immersion Technologies, has climbed to nearly $7.9 billion. 

On the positive side, ethereum developers introduced a new road map that involves seven hard fork upgrades by 2029 and several north stars, one of which aims to make ethereum a “post quantum” layer 1 network.

Crypto assets and crypto-adjacent companies are catching a bid and rebounding off recent lows, with stablecoin issuer Circle soaring after reporting strong earnings before the bell. The company beat on revenue and reported that USDC in circulation has grown to $75.3 billion, up 72% year over year.

The total market capitalization of all cryptocurrencies has increased 4.5% in the last 24 hours, and both tokens and companies close to crypto are enjoying a boost:

• Altcoins ethereum, XRP, solana, dogecoin, hype, chainlink, and avalanche are all in the green.

• Bitcoin treasury firms Strategy and Strive Inc. are rising along with bitcoin.

• Bitcoin miner Hut 8, which reported Q4 earnings that beat on earnings per share while missing on revenue, is up in early trading, as are miners MARA Holdings and Riot Platforms.

• Ethereum treasury firms BitMine Immersion Technologies, SharpLink Gaming, and Bit Digital are up.

• Solana treasury firms Upexi and DeFi Development Corp. are also both rising.

• Crypto trading platform Coinbase and Robinhood are both enjoying a boost from the rise in crypto sentiment.

(Robinhood Markets Inc. is the parent company of Sherwood Media, an independently operated media company subject to certain legal and regulatory restrictions.)

Despite the relief bounce, some are still uneasy. “The whole market still seems very heavy to me,” Glenn Rosenberg, managing partner at Persistent Trading, told Sherwood News. “Jokingly, BTC feels like it’s now 100% correlated to any asset or news that’s negative! I think we test 60,000 — that’s a big long-term channel and could push lower from there,” he said. “The whole [space] looks risky right now.”

The price of ethereum remains under pressure as ethereum cofounder Vitalik Buterin selling a tranche of his holdings and sustained spot ETF outflows act as headwinds for the second-largest cryptocurrency. 

Buterin sold $5.9 million worth of ethereum over the past several days after withdrawing 3,500 tokens from lending protocol Aave, on-chain data from blockchain analytics firm Arkham Intelligence shows. Since the beginning of the month, Buterin has reportedly sold 8,000 tokens.

“Historically, his sales have funded ecosystem development or philanthropy rather than signaling reduced conviction,” per Kelly Ye, deputy chief investment officer of Avenir Group. “It may create short-term sentiment pressure, but it’s not necessarily a structural negative — especially given his continued active role in building ethereum,” Ye told Sherwood News.

Meanwhile, spot ethereum ETFs recorded $123.4 million in outflows last week, marking the fifth consecutive week of outflows. In total, nearly $1.4 billion has exited from the funds during the stretch, data from SoSoValue shows. “ETF outflows reflect positioning and liquidity conditions more than protocol fundamentals. ETH is still being treated tactically by many allocators rather than as a core allocation,” Ye added.

The longest outflow streak for the investment vehicles is eight weeks, occurring between February and April 2025, when the cryptocurrency dropped from $2,200 to under $1,600. 

Still, pockets of demand persist. BitMine Immersion Technologies, the leading ethereum treasury firm, acquired roughly $100 million worth of tokens last week, according to a press release. 

“In the midst of this ‘mini crypto winter,’ our focus continues to be on methodically executing our treasury strategy and steadily acquiring ETH and in turn, optimizing the yield on our ETH holdings,” BitMine Chairman Tom Lee said in a statement.