[News Brief] Apr 22, morning | Bhutan-linked wallet deposits 700 BTC to Binance

According to Whale Alert, 2,315 BTC was transferred from an anonymous wallet to OKX.

The transfer was worth approximately $144.74 million. Inflows to exchanges are generally interpreted as potential selling activity, although no actual sale has been confirmed.

Odaily, citing Onchain Lens, reported that a wallet linked to the Kingdom of Bhutan deposited 700 BTC into Binance.

The deposit was worth about $43.75 million. Large BTC transfers to exchanges are often interpreted by the market as a potential sign of selling pressure.

Odaily reported on the 4th that CME’s average daily trading volume for June crypto contracts rose 76% year over year, with notional value exceeding $10 billion.

The IMF stated that the future of tokenized financial systems will depend on policy choices, adding that three types of payment assets, including stablecoins, may end up being used together.

Separately, Spotify requested Kalshi and Polymarket to remove its branding, while Korean companies raised concerns that they had not participated in discussions related to the OUSD Alliance member list and were unaware of any assigned roles.

According to Odaily, data from BitcoinTreasuries shows that listed companies have been net buyers of 166,984 BTC so far this year.

This is about twice the 81,153 BTC mined during the same period. The average daily BTC purchase volume by listed companies was calculated at 912 BTC.

Local banks in Germany are expanding the rollout of cryptocurrency trading services, Odaily reported, citing Bloomberg.

According to the report, various financial institutions, including cooperative banks and savings banks, are preparing services that will allow retail customers to directly buy and sell digital assets through existing banking platforms. These services are expected to be launched in phases over the coming months.

This move is seen as part of a broader trend of Germany’s traditional financial sector accelerating its entry into the digital asset market under regulatory frameworks, which could further expand cryptocurrency usage within Europe’s mainstream financial system.

Visa, M-Pesa, and Onafriq have launched a pilot program in the Democratic Republic of the Congo for cross-border mobile payment settlement using a dollar-pegged stablecoin, Odaily reported.

The pilot will cover international mobile wallet top-ups, cross-border commercial payments, and remittances. The World Bank estimates that the average cost of cross-border remittances in Sub-Saharan Africa is about 8% of the amount sent.

Visa previously partnered with African crypto exchange Yellow Card to explore stablecoin treasury management and international payment use cases.

According to PANews, a security incident occurred at decentralized privacy protocol Hinkal, where an attacker stole approximately 797,000 USDC from an Ethereum smart contract.

All stolen funds were swapped into 454 ETH, of which 410 ETH was transferred to Tornado Cash. The remaining approximately 44.67 ETH was cross-chained to the Bitcoin network via THORChain.

Hinkal stated that the attack only affected the Ethereum-based liquidity pool and that no asset theft has been confirmed on smart contracts deployed on other blockchains. The project has temporarily paused all contracts and is tracking fund flows with external security firms.

Hinkal also said affected users will be fully compensated on a 1:1 basis, with details on the reimbursement process and timeline to be announced later.

According to Whale Alert, 100 million USDC, worth approximately $100.33 million, was transferred from an anonymous wallet to Ethena.

The transaction occurred on the Ethereum network, and the specific purpose of the transfer has not yet been disclosed. Ethena is a DeFi protocol that issues the synthetic dollar USDe.

A newly created address has accumulated $41.5 million worth of ETH and WBTC since June 30.

The source is PANews. According to on-chain analyst Ai Yi, the address (0x268…47643) withdrew an additional 61.35 WBTC 30 minutes ago, bringing its cumulative purchases to 19,725.38 ETH and 161.35 WBTC.

The address is currently showing an unrealized profit of $3.59 million.

According to Odaily, a Fox Business crypto reporter said on X that President Trump’s financial disclosure documents listed more than $600 million in 2025 income from a Solana-based memecoin.

Following that, Senator Gillibrand renewed calls for ethics reform to prohibit the president, members of Congress, and their spouses from issuing or endorsing digital assets.

Senator Gillibrand has long advocated for stronger digital asset ethics rules. However, her position is also facing further scrutiny after recent reports said her son had raised funds to establish a crypto derivatives exchange.