Crypto Primary Funding Hit $8.658 Billion in H1 as Japan Passes Law Change to Cut Tax Rate and Open ETF Path

Compiled by ChainCatcher

The past 24 hours brought a dense run of updates across crypto policy, fundraising, ETF flows, tokenized products, and exchange activity.

U.S.-U.K. group publishes digital asset roadmap

According to The Block, the U.S. and the U.K. released a joint statement from the Transatlantic Future Markets Working Group, deepening cooperation on digital assets. The statement said regulated stablecoins could improve the efficiency and competitiveness of the financial system. The working group was established last year to strengthen coordination between the two countries and reduce market fragmentation.

The statement called on the Bank of England, the U.K. Financial Conduct Authority, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to develop approaches for the treatment of tokenized assets. It also instructed the FCA and SEC to explore options that could support cross-border capital raising.

The document backed competition and innovation for assets including stablecoins and tokenized deposits, while stressing standards around custody, reserve segregation, and consumer protection. It also said stablecoin holders should have a clear priority legal claim in insolvency.

The release came as the U.S. GENIUS Act marked one year since passage. Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh said during a House Financial Services Committee hearing that related rules were being prepared ahead of a July 18 deadline.

Japan's upper house approves revised Financial Instruments and Exchange Act

Japanese media and CoinPost reported that Japan's House of Councillors formally passed revisions to the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act and parts of the Payment Services Act. The change moves crypto assets into the category of financial products rather than treating them only as a means of payment.

The revised framework adds insider-trading restrictions for the crypto market and places the sector under the watch of the Securities and Exchange Surveillance Commission. It also renames crypto asset exchange operators as crypto asset trading operators.

Penalties for operating without registration will rise sharply. The maximum prison term increases from up to three years to up to 10 years, and the maximum fine rises from 3 million yen to 10 million yen.

The bill also requires annual periodic disclosures from certain crypto asset issuers and creates the institutional basis for crypto ETFs. Japan Exchange Group is expected to push for ETF listings around 2027, and the domestic market is widely expected to lift the ban on crypto ETFs on a similar timetable.

Tax treatment is set for a major shift. From Jan. 1, 2028, gains from crypto trading will move from the current comprehensive taxation system, which can reach as high as 55%, to a separate self-assessed tax regime of about 20%, matching stocks. The revised rules also allow losses to be carried forward for three years. The law is expected to be in force by July 2027.

With the bill now passed, attention turns to implementing rules and supervisory guidance, including reserve requirements and leverage limits for derivatives. CoinPost said compliance costs may weigh on smaller exchanges, while asset managers, banks, and insurers could see a wider opening to enter the market.

RootData: crypto primary funding reached $8.658 billion in H1

RootData said the crypto industry recorded $9.081 billion in total fundraising in the first half of 2026 across 259 financing events. Primary-market financing, excluding IPO, post-IPO, and M&A rounds, came to $8.658 billion. That was down 26.1% from a year earlier, while the number of financing events fell 28.5% year over year.

March and May were the two high points for funding amount in the first half. Deal count reached 66 in March and 68 in May. In June, financing events fell back to 43, suggesting cooler capital activity near the end of the second quarter. The data showed that large rounds can still lift monthly totals in a visible way, but routine fundraising rounds have started to lose heat.

M&A remained active. The industry saw 75 merger-and-acquisition transactions in the first half of 2026, with 16 of them disclosing value for a combined total of about $3.836 billion. Activity was concentrated in CeFi, tools and information services, DeFi, and infrastructure. Representative deals included Mastercard's $1.8 billion acquisition of BVNK and Kraken's $600 million acquisition of Reap.

On venture activity, Coinbase Ventures ranked first with participation in 25 investments in the first half. Animoca Brands took part in 20, while a16z and Tether were involved in 14 each. Over the last 12 months, Coinbase Ventures participated in 68 deals and remained first in the industry. Animoca Brands, Pantera Capital, YZi Labs, a16z, Tether, and GSR followed.

By sector, DeFi, infrastructure, and CeFi were the three busiest categories for fundraising in the first half of 2026. DeFi logged 129 financing events, infrastructure 116, and CeFi 69. AI, payments, prediction markets, and RWA were also areas of capital focus, with 59 AI-related financings, 46 payment-related deals, and 28 RWA financings.

RootData said the crypto primary market did not fully stall in the first half, but the structure changed. Aggregate funding was still supported by a small number of large transactions, institutional deployment became more concentrated, sector preferences turned more practical, and M&A became an important route for industry consolidation. Capital shifted toward infrastructure, DeFi, CeFi, payments, AI, and RWA.

South Korea plans to push the Digital Asset Basic Act in the second half

According to Maeil Business Newspaper, the South Korean government formally set out blockchain and digital-asset ecosystem policies through its Economic Growth Strategy for the Second Half of 2026.

The plan includes a tokenized government bond pilot in 2027 linked to the Bank of Korea's wholesale central bank digital currency, along with consideration of interoperability between a CBDC and other private blockchains. The government also plans to accelerate digital-asset legislation in the second half through the Digital Asset Basic Act, covering the institutionalization of stablecoins and cross-border stablecoin transactions. It will also support revisions to capital-markets law to formalize spot crypto ETFs.

On industrial policy, South Korea intends to push large-scale demonstration projects and advanced technology research in the fourth quarter of this year. The government will also work with international organizations including the UNFCCC and GGGI to manage Paris Agreement-compliant GVCM carbon credits on blockchain.

Exchange and product updates

SEC raises IBIT options position and exercise limits

The U.S. SEC said a rule change filed by the New York Stock Exchange on July 6 took immediate effect, raising the position and exercise limits for options on BlackRock's spot Bitcoin ETF IBIT from 250,000 contracts to 1 million contracts. The move was intended to meet fast-growing trading demand in IBIT options and improve liquidity and market-making capacity.

OKX to launch spot trading for tokenized U.S. equities

According to an official announcement, OKX will open the first batch of spot trading for tokenized U.S. equities on July 16. Users will be able to hold and trade exposure to the price of underlying stocks or ETFs in share units. Instruments will be named by adding an "X" before the stock ticker, such as XNVDA and XTSLA.

The product supports deposits and withdrawals on Solana and X Layer, trades against USDT, and operates 24/7. During non-market hours, prices are calculated using the latest closing price plus market estimates. Positions will sit in the same account as spot and stock perpetual products, allowing users to trade directly with USDT without a brokerage account. Strategy bots such as recurring buys and grid trading are also supported, and dividends will be reinvested at the issuer level and returned through added share units.

Binance adds bStocks collateral and trading pairs

Binance said it will add 10 bStocks tokens as eligible collateral assets at 21:30 on July 15, 2026. The list includes Applied Optoelectronics (AAOIB), Arm (ARMB), Broadcom (AVGOB), Alibaba (BABAB), Robinhood (HOODB), IBM (IBMB), Marvell Technology (MRVLB), Nokia (NOKB), Rocket Lab (RKLBB), and TSMC (TSMB). Eligible users can use them as margin collateral.

At the same time, Binance will list 10 bStocks tokenized securities trading pairs and enable spot algorithmic trading bot services. Zero maker fees for those pairs will end at 07:59 on Sept. 1, 2026.

Upbit joins the Digital Chamber

South Korean outlet Digital Asset reported that Upbit, the country's largest crypto exchange, has officially joined the Digital Chamber of Commerce in the U.S. The group, founded in 2014, said it looks forward to deepening cooperation with Upbit across its global membership community.

Hyperliquid meets with the SEC Crypto Task Force

A memo showed that on July 14, 2026, staff from the SEC Crypto Task Force met with representatives from Hyperliquid Policy Center, Highland Labs Pte. Ltd. (Hyperliquid Labs), XYZ Ltd., and Sullivan & Cromwell LLP. The discussion covered approaches to crypto-asset regulation as well as the protocol's technical architecture and market ecosystem.

ETF and market data

Spot Bitcoin ETFs took in $181 million in one day

SoSoValue data showed that spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded net inflows of $181 million on July 14, U.S. Eastern Time. BlackRock's IBIT led with a daily net inflow of $139 million, bringing its cumulative historical net inflow to $60.239 billion. Fidelity's FBTC followed with $21.0656 million in daily inflows and a cumulative total of $9.926 billion.

As of press time, total net assets across spot Bitcoin ETFs stood at $77.96 billion. The ETF net asset ratio reached 6.02%, and cumulative historical net inflows totaled $51.033 billion.

Spot Ether ETFs saw $58.3385 million in net inflows

SoSoValue data also showed that spot Ether ETFs posted total net inflows of $58.3385 million on July 14, U.S. Eastern Time, with none of the 10 ETFs recording a net outflow. BlackRock's ETHA accounted for the full daily total and has now accumulated $11.237 billion in historical net inflows.

As of press time, total net assets for spot Ether ETFs were $10.091 billion. The ETF net asset ratio was 4.46%, and cumulative historical net inflows reached $11.016 billion.

Coinbase Bitcoin Premium Index stays negative for 50 straight days

As of July 7 to July 8, 2026, the Coinbase Bitcoin Premium Index had remained below zero for 50 consecutive days, the longest negative stretch on record for the indicator. The latest reading was about -0.0742%, indicating that Bitcoin traded at a lower price on Coinbase than on Binance. The run began on May 19, 2026 and exceeded the previous record of 40 consecutive negative days.

By early July 2026, U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs had seen about $6 billion in net outflows for the year. In late June, U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs saw more than $2.6 billion leave over nine trading days, followed by a combined $282 million inflow into Bitcoin and Ether ETFs.

$438 million liquidated across the market in 24 hours

Coinglass data showed $438 million in total liquidations over the past 24 hours, with long liquidations at $162 million and short liquidations at $277 million. Bitcoin accounted for $28.6081 million in liquidated longs and $105 million in liquidated shorts. Ether saw $29.8956 million in liquidated longs and $113 million in liquidated shorts.

In total, 88,570 traders were liquidated over the period. The largest single liquidation order occurred on Binance's ETHUSDT pair and was worth $6.3742 million.

BarnBridge suspected governance attack caused about $776,000 in losses

BlockSec Phalcon said the BarnBridge SMART Yield (cUSDC) protocol on Ethereum was attacked, with losses estimated at about $776,000. The incident appears to have been a governance attack.

According to the monitoring report, the attacker first gained DAO governance control, then upgraded the SmartYield/controller proxy to a malicious implementation contract. That contract later called the privileged _takeUnderlying function in CompoundProvider and used pre-existing USDC approvals from 50 user accounts to move aggregated funds to the attacker through transferFees.

Macro and price moves

U.S. June CPI fell 0.4% month over month, the largest monthly drop since April 2020. The annual rate dropped from 4.2% in May to 3.5%, below the 3.8% expected reading. Core CPI fell to 2.6%, also below expectations, while the monthly core reading was flat.

Major crypto assets rose after the release. BTC climbed from about $62,000 to $64,900, ETH rose 7% to $1,884, and about $300 million in short positions were liquidated.

Warsh told Congress that the Fed has "zero tolerance" for persistent inflation and said that if policy is correct, the inflation increase of the past five years will become a thing of the past. Asked about the CPI report, he said he did not agree with the view that the job was done and gave no guidance on the next policy step.

According to Jin10, White House National Economic Council Director Hassett said the data gave the Federal Reserve no reason to raise rates.

Chinese financial research firm Golden Credit Rating said in a report that the 10-year U.S. Treasury yield is likely to keep rising, citing renewed geopolitical risk. The report referenced escalating U.S.-Iran tensions and Iran's announcement that it would close the Strait of Hormuz, saying this could lift oil prices, inflation expectations, and rate expectations. It also said Warsh's congressional testimony this week was expected to carry a hawkish tone and push up real rates.

Huobi HTX said it will host a livestream at 20:00 today under the title "Ceasefire over, oil above 75, Strategy sells BTC at a loss for the first time: can Bitcoin's macro narrative still hold?" Crypto KOLs including Huabai Blockchain, Zhencheng Xiaodaoshi, Crypto.0824, and OxPink are scheduled to join.

Stablecoins, institutions, and corporate developments

Circle-Heka arbitration documents become public

The Financial Times reported that newly public court documents show Circle blocked accounts linked to Heka Funds, a crypto fund backed by Tether, in late 2023. Circle suspected the fund of using large-scale arbitrage to manipulate the market and help Tether gain share.

During the 2023 Silicon Valley Bank crisis, USDC briefly broke below its $1 peg. Heka bought discounted USDC in size and redeemed it with Circle for dollars. Circle argued that the scale of those redemptions far exceeded that of other market participants and suspected the money ultimately flowed to Tether to help expand USDT's market share.

The arbitration documents also said Tether invested about $800 million in Heka, representing roughly 75% of the fund's assets, and waived stablecoin minting fees. The arbitrator found that Heka failed to properly disclose Tether's backing and knew that information would raise concerns at Circle. In 2024, Heka brought arbitration seeking about $49 million in lost profits after the account freeze. In February this year, the arbitrator rejected all of Heka's claims and ordered it to pay Circle about $166,000 in legal and expert fees. Heka denied market manipulation and said it has never been subject to regulatory investigation for such conduct. Circle declined to comment, and Tether did not respond to a request for comment.

Open USD targets a 2026 second-half launch

CoinShares said Open USD aims to challenge Circle directly by distributing stablecoin reserve income to partners, putting pressure on the USDC distribution model. Open USD is backed by more than 140 companies, including BlackRock, Coinbase, Mastercard, Stripe, and Visa, and is expected to launch in the second half of 2026.

CoinShares said USDC still benefits from liquidity and integration advantages that may be difficult for a new entrant to replicate.

Coinbase and Robinhood both offer around 7% on USDC, but structures differ

Days after Robinhood Earn launched a 7% yield campaign, Coinbase introduced a high-yield USDC lending tier with an annualized rate of about 7.02%, roughly double its standard tier at 3.63%. Both products route through Morpho, a decentralized lending protocol with $7.11 billion in total value locked, and both use Steakhouse Financial as curator.

Analysis account Pink Brains said the yield structures are materially different. Robinhood's 7% is made up of borrower interest, reserve income from USDG Treasury assets, and subsidies distributed through Merkl. The organic yield is only in the mid-3% range, meaning about half is subsidy. Coinbase, by contrast, cycles borrowed funds into Ethena's USDe and then into perpetual funding-rate opportunities, with MORPHO token rewards layered on top. That structure has no fixed cap and no floor. Pink Brains said Coinbase's blended rate including rewards has already fallen to 4.44%. Robinhood's subsidy commitment lasts one year, while Coinbase's campaign is unofficially estimated to run until mid-September.

Stripe and Advent bid for PayPal

Reuters reported that payments company Stripe and private equity firm Advent International submitted a joint acquisition proposal for PayPal Holdings at $60.5 per share, valuing the company at more than $53 billion. The offer represented about a 28% premium to PayPal's Tuesday close.

The bid has support from about $50 billion in committed bank financing. Stripe and Advent plan to own 50% each and do not intend to break up the company. The proposal was submitted earlier this month after preliminary contact in early April. PayPal has not responded, and the two bidders hope to reach a deal by the end of the month, though the outcome remains uncertain.

Tokenization and onchain real-world assets

U.K. plans first G7 digital sovereign bond by early 2027

The U.K. plans to issue its first digital sovereign bond by early 2027, which would make it the first G7 country to issue government debt on distributed ledger infrastructure. The bond will be listed on HSBC's Orion platform and included in the Bank of England and FCA digital securities sandbox to test shorter settlement times and lower costs.

Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey said the central bank plans to make the bond eligible as collateral in market operations so banks can use it in central bank funding transactions.

Tradable plans to move up to $1 billion in private credit assets to Stellar

The Block reported that Tradable, a tokenization platform backed by ParaFi Capital, plans to migrate as much as about $1 billion in private credit assets from Ethereum layer-2 network ZKsync to Stellar.

Tradable was founded in 2024 and provides onchain infrastructure for the full private-credit lifecycle, including compliance controls and investor onboarding. Last year, it tokenized about $1.7 billion and nearly 30 institutional private-credit positions on ZKsync. The migration is intended to tap Stellar's user base in institutional tokenization and its compliance and privacy features to offer traditional asset managers access to onchain private-credit opportunities. Stellar has already hosted RWA products and stablecoin pilots from Franklin Templeton, WisdomTree, Ondo Finance, and Figure.

Regulation and enforcement

Czech Republic blocks Polymarket

Bitcoin News reported that the Czech Ministry of Finance added decentralized prediction market platform Polymarket to its list of unauthorized online betting services on July 13. The country's gambling regulator told internet service providers to block access within 15 days.

Regulators said Polymarket lacks necessary supervision and operates in substance as a betting product. They also said its decentralized structure and unlicensed operation bypass local gambling rules and create risks related to insider-information abuse and weak risk controls. Italy has recently put the platform back on its blacklist, and the Netherlands has rejected its appeal. That makes the Czech Republic the third European country to take regulatory action against Polymarket.

U.K. fraud review calls for judicial training on crypto laundering and AI scams

A fraud review commissioned by the U.K. government recommended that the Judicial College provide training for all judges and magistrates in England and Wales to address a rise in cases involving AI scams and money laundering through crypto.

The report said the Fraud Act 2006 is broadly capable of handling AI fraud, but courts are not adequately prepared to hear such cases. It recommended assessing whether existing courses for long and complex trials should be updated or replaced with dedicated modules on fraud and related crimes, and whether judges likely to handle complex fraud should face mandatory training.

The review said fraud may soon account for half of all crime in England and Wales. In the year to June 2025, it estimated 4.1 million cases, affecting one in 14 adults and one in four businesses. The Financial Ombudsman Service estimated that more than half of investment scams now involve crypto assets.

The report also cited the case of Qian Zhimin, who was said to have run a Ponzi scheme in China that defrauded more than 128,000 victims of about 5 billion pounds and laundered the proceeds into Bitcoin. The case led to the largest confirmed Bitcoin seizure in U.K. history, involving more than 61,000 BTC. Qian Zhimin was sentenced in November at Southwark Crown Court to 11 years and 8 months in prison.

Mining and infrastructure

The Block reported that listed Bitcoin miners CleanSpark, BitFuFu, and Canaan all posted lower BTC production in June than in May, even though Bitcoin mining difficulty fell by more than 10% in mid-June to its lowest point of 2026.

CleanSpark mined 614 BTC in June, down from 671 in May. BitFuFu mined 125 BTC, down from 177. Canaan mined 64 BTC, down from 90.

The reasons differed by company. CleanSpark's average operating hashrate fell from 46 EH/s to about 43 EH/s in June. BitFuFu's total hashrate dropped from 19.5 EH/s to 15 EH/s, mainly because hosted hashrate declined, though its self-owned hashrate rose to 3.5 EH/s. Canaan attributed part of the decline to power-grid maintenance at some mining sites.

Rankings and meme token activity

RootData ranking of stock-derivatives exchanges

RootData's latest stock-derivatives exchange ranking put Binance, Bitget, and Bybit in the top three, with OKX falling to fourth.

Binance scored 91.7, supported 130 contracts, had about $4.733 billion in open interest, around $20.863 billion in 24-hour trading volume, and a funding rate of +0.0002%.
Bitget scored 90.7, supported 233 contracts, had about $1.128 billion in open interest, around $2.507 billion in 24-hour trading volume, and a 0% funding rate.
Bybit scored 90.2, supported 98 contracts, had about $80.4994 million in open interest, around $767 million in 24-hour trading volume, and a funding rate of +0.0001%.

Over the past week, OKX dropped two places from second to fourth. Bitget rose from third to second and held there, while Bybit climbed from fourth to third.

GMGN meme heat list

According to GMGN data as of 09:30 on July 16, the top meme names over the past 24 hours were:

Ethereum: LINK, GROKKYBARA, ASTEROID, Grokkybara, ADI
Solana: SOLdiers, ANSEM, TrumpCoin, Grokkybara, BARRON
Base: $COBIE, MYRAD, SOSO, ELSA, FLOCK