Bitcoin’s price has surged since the election, gaining over 29% in the last week, hitting new all-time highs and coming close to breaking the $90,000 level. Analysts and investors see Trump’s win as a potential tailwind for the crypto market. As the crypto market continues to react to the latest political development, Investing.com’s poll asks:Can Bitcoin reach $100,000 by the end of 2025? More
According to blockchain data tracker Whale Alert, “a dormant address containing 67 BTC worth $5,525,168 has just been activated after 11.0 years worth $21,050 in 2013.”The 67 BTC at the time of reactivation is now valued at nearly $5,525,168, a 26,147% increase from its worth of $21,050 back in 2013.The identity of the owner remains unknown, but the timing and magnitude of this activation have sparked speculation about the intentions behind it.Some speculate it could be an early investor cashing in on their gains, while others wonder if it signals a broader trend of long-term holders beginning to move their assets, as seen in several reactivations in recent weeks.Bitcoin, the first and largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, continues its continuous upward trend, crossing $89,000 for the first time in Tuesday’s trading. Bitcoin has increased by more than 30% since last week, establishing new highs virtually daily.Bitcoin has already more than doubled in 2024, thanks to strong demand for dedicated U.S. exchange-traded funds and a Federal Reserve interest rate reduction.According to Bloomberg, Bitcoin options traders are already targeting a milestone price of $100,000 for the original cryptocurrency. Investors are placing bets that Bitcoin will reach the milestone by the end of the year, according to statistics from crypto options exchange Deribit.As of Monday morning, there were 9,635 Bitcoin — worth around $780 million — in open interest bets on Bitcoin reaching $100,000 by Dec. 27, according to Deribit data. That is the most at stake for any trade with that expiration date. Deribit estimates that the trade has an 18.6% chance of paying off.This article was originally published on U.Today More
Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for freeYour guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the worldA frozen trade dispute over steel has become an early test of the EU’s relationship with the incoming Trump administration, with a senior US official saying Brussels should consider postponing plans for March to impose billions of dollars of extra tariffs on imports from the US.President Joe Biden had reached a truce with the EU in a conflict sparked when Donald Trump put tariffs on steel and aluminium in 2018, but each side is due to reimpose its duties on the other next year, the EU from the end of March and the US at the end of 2025. “The Commission really has to make a choice — March 2025 is not long after the inauguration,” said Rufino Hurtado, senior trade representative at the US mission to the EU. “It is entirely up to the EU to decide what happens in 2025 regarding these retaliatory tariffs — whether to again extend the suspension or allow them to snap back,” he said.The re-elected Trump has threatened tariffs of between 10 and 20 per cent on all EU imports and attacked the bloc for selling more to the US than it buys from it.Under the Biden deal, the US replaced the 2018 tariffs of 25 per cent on steel and 10 per cent on aluminium with a quota system, while the EU suspended its retaliatory duties on US goods. Hurtado told a conference in Brussels that although the EU and US “were closer than ever” on most issues Brussels had stalled progress in talks over the past three years. The two agreed to set up a “green steel club” in 2021 when pausing the dispute. The idea was to agree environmental standards so as to prevent cheap Chinese metal made with fossil fuels from flooding the US and EU markets.Hurtado said the US had put forward “ambitious” proposals but they “were not aligned with EU objectives”.EU trade commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis has said the proposed Arrangement on Sustainable Steel and Aluminium (GSA) must be in line with multilateral trade rules, and EU officials said the US plan, which favours domestic producers, would probably break WTO rules. Brussels wants to base the green steel club on its own carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM), which will levy tariffs on imports according to how much carbon they emit from 2026. That will hit US steel too, as the country has no national carbon pricing system.Meanwhile EU producers are still paying around $300mn annually for metals exports in excess of the US quotas introduced to solve the stand-off. The EU is scheduled to reimpose tariffs on €4.8bn of US imports from March 31, including 50 per cent on bourbon whiskey, Harley-Davidson motorcycles and motor boats, if there is no further postponement. Lower levies would cover a range of goods including some steel, aluminium and agricultural products and playing cards. “We are aiming to find a solution to this issue,” said an EU official, who declined to be named. “But the situation is unbalanced as our exporters are still paying some tariffs. We want to resolve it in the interests of both sides.”The Commission declined to comment.This story has been updated to correct the categories of goods to be subjected to EU tariffs at lower rates More
However, in a post on X, Scaramucci wrote that he believes that Bitcoin will still record future gains beyond the current cycle. Hence, he reassured those who do not hold Bitcoin that it is “early.” He said, “It may feel like you missed it, but you didn’t.”Scaramucci believes that Bitcoin, as an asset with long-term value, still has better days ahead. Therefore, those willing to jump on the adoption train can still do so as future events will shape up to have a bullish impact on Bitcoin.Notably, he references the possibility of the U.S. government establishing a “Strategic Bitcoin Reserve.” This could have broad implications for the asset; as such, a move might trigger broader acceptance by other countries across the globe in Bitcoin acquisition. Such a development will trigger bullish sentiment for the asset.The founder of SkyBridge Capital has always been positive about Bitcoin. As reported by U.Today, Scaramucci predicted that by 2026, Bitcoin could become a store of value when it gains wider usage, say, one billion users.As of this writing, Bitcoin has maintained its bullish trajectory and is trading for $87,268.45, a 6.39% climb in the last 24 hours. According to data, the coin had earlier tested the 90K level – when it hit $89,729.This article was originally published on U.Today More
Known for his vocal criticism of digital assets, Schiff has said that Bitcoin and the broader blockchain ecosystem may ultimately be remembered as one of the greatest misallocations of resources in modern financial history. However, if he had known how big Bitcoin would become, he might have “loaded up on it,” the crypto-skeptic admitted.Well, that did not happen in 2011, when Bitcoin was last seen at $1, and the cryptocurrency made its way to nearly $90,000 without Peter Schiff onboard. For now, the banker remains convinced that BTC is a bubble, and when it bursts, it will not just affect individual speculators; it will also affect those who have financed infrastructure and companies in the crypto sector.He noted that silver’s decline was relatively small, especially on a day when gold saw a significant drop. In addition, Schiff noted that Bitcoin’s market value has once again surpassed that of silver, but the balance could shift in favor of precious metals if dynamics of cryptocurrency prove to be nothing more than “pump and dump.”This article was originally published on U.Today More
With its 2023 update, this chart, which has historically helped Bitcoin holders navigate through different market cycles, still suggests potential for expansion. Increased demand and buyer enthusiasm are indicated as Bitcoin moves closer to the upper spectrum, suggesting that the market may be preparing for a longer bubble phase. There are more details in the two-Year MA Multiplier chart. This graph, which compares the historical price trajectory of Bitcoin to the two-year moving average (MA), currently indicates that if Bitcoin crosses the red line, it could reach a maximum potential of about $200,000. Reaching this level would likely be the current cycle’s peak, as this red line has historically represented the upper bounds of Bitcoin’s price range during previous bull runs.It is conceivable that Bitcoin may test these higher boundaries in the upcoming months given its current volume and momentum. This potential is further supported by the daily chart’s technical analysis. Bitcoin has shown strong bullish sentiment by breaking above earlier resistance levels, which were around $80,000. Its long-term descending channel breakout and high trading volume suggest a strong trend reversal. With this increasing trend, Bitcoin looks poised to delve into uncharted territory and get closer to the anticipated $200,000 mark. These indicators taken together give Bitcoin a good chance of reaching $200,000, even though reaching this milestone is not assured, particularly if macroeconomic conditions continue to be favorable for cryptocurrency’s growth. As Bitcoin moves toward new all-time highs, holders and prospective buyers should keep an eye on these technical indicators.This article was originally published on U.Today More
Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.To think that two and two are four / And neither five nor three / The heart of man has long been sore / And long ‘tis like to be. A.E. Housman.In 1810, 81 per cent of the US labour force worked in agriculture, 3 per cent worked in manufacturing and 16 per cent worked in services. By 1950, the share of agriculture had fallen to 12 per cent, the share of manufacturing had peaked, at 24 per cent, and the share of services had reached 64 per cent. By 2020, the employment shares of these three sectors reached under 2 per cent, 8 per cent and 91 per cent, respectively. The evolution of these shares describes the employment pattern of modern economic growth. It is broadly what happens as countries become richer, whether they are big or small or run trade surpluses or deficits. It is an iron economic law. Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.What drives this evolution? In Behind the Curve — Can Manufacturing Still Provide Inclusive Growth?, Robert Lawrence of Harvard’s Kennedy School and the Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE) explains it in terms of a few numbers — the initial shares of employment in each of the three sectors, “income elasticities of demand” for their products, their “elasticities of substitution” and relative rates of growth of productivity. Income elasticities measure the proportional increase in demand for a category of goods or services relative to income. Elasticities of substitution measure the impact of changes in price on demand. A crucial consequence of the simple model that emerges is “spillovers”: what happens to a sector also depends hugely on what happens in the other sectors.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.Now make the following simple and empirically-based assumptions. First, productivity grows fastest in agriculture, followed by manufacturing and then services. Second, income elasticities of demand are below one for agriculture, but above one for manufactures and still higher for services. Third, elasticities of substitution are all below one. This means that the proportion of income spent on a given broad category declines as it becomes relatively cheaper. Assume, too, that economies have all started with similar proportions of workers in the three sectors to those of the US in the early 19th century.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.What happens is the pattern seen in the US and other contemporary high-income countries (except city-states, where food was partly imported from outside). Initially, two positive forces — cheaper food and higher incomes — shift spending towards manufactures and drive up the share of manufacturing in employment. But two negative forces — the decline in prices of manufactures relative to services and the higher income elasticity of demand for the latter — do the reverse. Initially, the positive effects on manufacturing dominate, because the agricultural revolution is so huge. Yet there comes a time when agriculture is too small to provide a positive impulse to manufacturing. Then forces operating within manufacturing and the service sector dominate. Employment shares in manufacturing start to fall. In the US, these have been falling for seven decades. The idea that this process is reversible is ridiculous. Water flows downhill for a good reason.In manufacturing, tasks are repetitive and must be done precisely in a controlled environment. This is perfect for robots. The overwhelming probability then is that in a few decades nobody will work on a production line. In some ways, that is a pity. But the work was also dehumanising. Surely, we can do better than hanker nostalgically for this inescapably vanishing past.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.Humans seek to blame someone for events beyond anybody’s control. It is so much easier to blame the disappearance of US manufacturing jobs on China than on domestic consumers and automation. The bilateral US trade deficit in goods with China is only 1 per cent of GDP. The overall US deficit in goods has been around 4 per cent of GDP since just after the 2008 financial crisis. If that were eliminated (probably impossible, given US competitiveness in services and the macroeconomic forces causing US trade deficits), it would indeed increase domestic output of goods (presumably at the expense of services). But the very most it is likely to do is to bring employment shares to the levels of a decade or two ago.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.In fact, as Lawrence shows in another paper for the PIIE, “Is the United States undergoing a manufacturing renaissance that will boost the middle class?”, even Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act merely delivered a further “steady decline in the manufacturing employment share of non-farm employment”. Trump’s tariffs will probably deliver no more than this. After all, rich Asian countries with trade surpluses in manufactures also have falling shares of jobs in that sector.This is not to argue that there are no important issues in production and trade in manufactures. Some manufactures are indeed vital to national security. The ability to produce some manufactures may also generate important externalities for the economy. Even so, the idea that these are manifestly more important than in other sectors — software, for example — is nonsense. Equally, as the structure of the economy shifts, people need help in developing new skills. The absence of a market in the creation of human capital is a market failure that justifies intervention.Fetishising manufacturing cannot restore the old labour force. Worse, the Trump tariffs will not only fail to achieve that goal, but will cause further malign side-effects. Not least, they will create a clash between the effects of the tariffs, the intended expulsion of millions of illegal immigrants and the planned tax cuts. The consequences for political and economic stability will be the subject of next week’s column.martin.wolf@ft.comFollow Martin Wolf with myFT and on Twitter More
Expanding the Warped Universe with Mysten Labs and SuiWarped Games, an indie game studio consisting of web3 and veteran game developers who have a legacy in creating player-focused games like LEGO Universe, Jumpgate, and Dragons and Titans, is on a mission to onboard millions of players to expand the Warped Universe, an immersive blockchain-powered game where players’ actions and decisions shape the environment and influence each season’s direction. After extensive exploration, Warped Games selected Sui as the blockchain to support this ambitious vision, thanks to its player-friendly approach and innovations in the Move language.The announcement of Warped Games becoming an official partner with Mysten Labs arrives at a pivotal moment for blockchain gaming. With games like “Off The Grid” making strides toward mainstream adoption, this new collaboration marks another significant step in expanding blockchain gaming’s reach to a wider audience. Breaking Barriers to Blockchain AccessibilityOne of the largest obstacles facing blockchain adoption today is its intimidating complexity for newcomers. Traditional blockchain experiences involve managing seed phrases, navigating wallets, high fees, slow speed, and unfriendly, often intimidating transactions—barriers that can alienate potential users. Sui’s design eliminates these hurdles by offering a seamless, user-friendly blockchain experience required by games like Warped Universe, aiming to appeal to a mainstream gaming audience. With Sui’s zkLogin feature, players can access the blockchain and create wallets using familiar credentials, like passkeys or existing logins, removing the need for seed phrases and technical know-how. For those who prefer greater control, Warped Universe will also allow players to connect their own self-custodied wallets, giving them the option to manage their assets independently. This accessibility empowers users to focus on what matters most—the game experience itself.Enhanced NFT Utility with MoveSui’s Move language and object model empower Warped Universe to create NFTs that go beyond static assets, offering dynamic, context-rich tokens that evolve with each player’s journey. Sui treats each asset as an individual, on-chain object with unique IDs and customizable fields, allowing NFTs to reflect player progression and deepen in-game immersion.Innovations extend to the use of closed-loop tokens for in-game purchases and season pass NFTs, which act as “time capsules”, allowing players to revisit exclusive content from past seasons. With each season in Warped Universe serving as a self-contained story arc, these season passes aren’t just NFTs—they’re gateways to the game’s evolving history, creating lasting value and enhancing player ownership.Kiosk: Marketplace Re-ImaginedKiosk is a decentralized system designed for commerce applications on the Sui network, similar to traditional markets where vendors sell goods or services from small, standalone booths. Just like in those markets, where individual sellers operate their own kiosks, owning the products on display and managing their own sales, with Kiosk, shared objects are owned by individual parties who store assets and may list them for sale as well as utilizing custom trading functionality, such as royalties and the ability to rent assets.Walrus: Re-Defining Digital Ownership In Warped UniverseAs Warped Universe expands, decentralized storage will play a crucial role in ensuring the authenticity and accessibility of in-game assets. Mysten Labs’ Walrus protocol is set to support this need, providing a secure and efficient way to store raw data and media files—such as images, audio, video, and other game assets—at low cost without compromising performance. Unlike traditional NFTs, which often store metadata off-chain on platforms like IPFS or AWS, Walrus enables both the NFT and its metadata to be stored in a decentralized manner. This integration introduces new ways for players in Warped Universe to experience genuine ownership of their digital assets, giving them the ability to store in-game captures or statistics, and creating a more immersive and reliable player-driven experience.High Performance, Scalability, and Environmental ResponsibilityIn Warped Universe, players aren’t just playing a game; they’re building and defending entire solar systems each season, with their achievements and digital assets minted and transacted on-chain in the background. This model requires a blockchain capable of handling high transaction volumes both efficiently and affordably. Sui’s high throughput and low transaction costs make this possible, providing fast, cost-effective, and seamless on-chain transactions that support a robust gaming economy.Sui also prioritizes environmental sustainability by using a delegated proof-of-stake (DPoS) consensus model rather than energy-intensive proof-of-work. With its efficient Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) architecture, Sui can process large transaction volumes with minimal environmental impact—aligning perfectly with Warped Games’ vision of a sustainable, responsible gaming ecosystem.Looking Ahead with Warped Universe and SuiCurrently, the blockchain element in Warped Universe is the $WARPED token, an ERC-20 token designed to give holders a voice in game design, seasonal voting, discounts, potential rewards, and exclusives. While specific plans for the token’s future are yet to be announced, the Warped Universe team is committed to keeping current holders top of mind as they explore expanding to the Sui blockchain. Plans for the WARPED token, on-chain assets, skins, seasonal passes, and other elements will be shared in due time—stay tuned for updates.As Warped Universe continues to develop, the teams at Warped Games and Mysten Labs are dedicated to working closely together to explore practical blockchain integration in games, enhancing player ownership, scalability, and immersive gameplay. Together, through Warped Universe and the Sui blockchain, they’re building a unique, player-driven experience that showcases the future of blockchain gaming.Warped Games is an indie game studio dedicated to creating immersive, player-driven gaming experiences with a focus on blockchain integration. Known for pushing the boundaries of web3 technology, the team behind Warped Games combines industry veterans from both gaming and tech to bring innovative worlds like Warped Universe to life.About Mysten LabsMysten Labs is a technology company focused on advancing blockchain infrastructure to support next-generation applications. Founded by experts in distributed systems, Mysten Labs developed the Sui blockchain, a high-performance, user-friendly platform designed to make blockchain technology accessible and scalable for mainstream audiences.ContactBusiness DevelopmentReece HubbardWarped Games Incmarketing@warped.gamesThis article was originally published on Chainwire More
