Weekly Crypto Recap | Market, Stablecoin & Infrastructure Highlights

This week’s developments span from global monetary easing and political shifts to rapid innovation across stablecoin payments, tokenization pilots, and AI-integrated finance.

📊 Macro & Market Overview

Monetary conditions turned looser this week as the Federal Reserve cut rates by 25bps and officially ended quantitative tightening — lowering the Fed Funds Rate to 3.75–4.00%, the lowest level in three years.
However, Powell’s hawkish tone on the December outlook sent the probability of another rate cut tumbling from 95% to 65%.

Global trade tensions continued to ease, and markets await potential progress in a U.S.–China leadership meeting.
The dollar strengthened, U.S. equities hit new highs, gold’s rally cooled, and crypto markets underperformed.

Key upcoming events:

• Oct 30: U.S. FOMC & Bank of Japan policy decisions
  

• Oct 31–Nov 1: APEC Summit in Gyeongju, Korea
  

• Nov 7: U.S. October Nonfarm Payrolls
  

💹 Market Trends

BTC continued to fall alongside broad weakness in altcoins, as China reaffirmed its crackdown on domestic crypto speculation. The spotlight this week was on AI x PayFi narratives.

Top Gainers:

• VIRTUAL (+90%) — An AI token launchpad on Base; the Base network token is expected soon.
  

• PAYAI (+40%) — The 2nd-largest facilitator for Coinbase’s x402 protocol, allowing AI agents to make online payments autonomously without traditional bank accounts.
  

• HYPE (+40%) — On-chain derivatives platform, amid rumors of team buybacks and extended lockups.
  

On-chain Data:

• BTC’s support zone sits around $111K, with strong sell pressure near $117K — the next breakout from this range may define the next market leg.
  

• Institutional inflows resumed on optimism around easing.
  

• MVRV-Z Score: 1.9 — mid-range, suggesting neutral sentiment.
  

Derivatives:
Funding rate at 0.00% (bearish tilt), open interest flat, long/short ratio at 1.5 (neutral).

Spot Market:
BTC lagged equities and gold. Since the Oct 10 correction, BTC has traded with high volatility and sensitivity to Trump’s comments on U.S.–China relations.
Polymarket currently prices a 91.5% probability of a Biden–Xi meeting taking place.

💵 Stablecoin Landscape

Global Stablecoin Market Cap: $308.5B (–0.1% WoW).
Composition: USDT 60%, USDC 25%.

Key Developments:

• Coinbase’s x402 Protocol — Daily transactions surged 500% to 150K, marking a milestone for the HTTP-402 payment standard. Partners include Visa, Google, and Cloudflare, paving the way for AI agents to autonomously purchase data, compute, and services.
  

• Tether released an open-source cross-chain wallet toolkit for both humans and AI agents, part of its expansion into the AI economy. CEO Paolo Ardoino predicted that “every AI agent will have its own wallet within 15 years,” enabling machine-to-machine transactions using stablecoins instead of bank accounts.
  

• Coinbase announced new privacy features for Base L2, building on the integration of the Iron Fish team into Base’s “Privacy Lab.”
  

Chain Trends (30D):

• USDT supply up on Arbitrum (+26%) and Avalanche (+42%), driven by DeFi demand.
  

• USDC supply up on BNB Chain and Polygon (+9%), led by on-chain meme speculation.

Geography: Stablecoin activity remains steady — North America 37%, Europe 36%, Asia 16%.

⚙️ Stablecoin & Payment Projects

• Tether to exit Fairshake PAC and explore independent U.S. political donations, signaling growing crypto lobbying independence. Ardoino criticized Fairshake as being “aligned with one corporate interest” (widely assumed to reference Coinbase).
  

• Openmarkets Group (Australia) plans to raise $50M to expand into DeFi and tokenization, launching a regulated digital asset treasury for cross-border crypto and stablecoin management.
  

🏛️ Policy & Regulation

🇭🇰 Hong Kong

• The first Solana Spot ETF (“ChinaAMC Solana ETF”) will list on HKEX on Oct 27, marking Asia’s first Solana ETF and the third approved crypto spot ETF after BTC and ETH.
  

• The HKMA published its Phase II report on the e-HKD pilot, highlighting successful trials in tokenized asset settlement, programmability, and offline payments.
  Seven banks are preparing to launch tokenized deposits this year.
  

• The HKMA reiterated that stablecoins, tokenized deposits, and e-HKD share similar technology, differing mainly by issuer type — “public money vs. private money.”
  

🇺🇸 United States

• Trump pardoned CZ, who pledged to help make the U.S. “the global hub of crypto innovation.”
  

• Tether to establish a U.S. entity and seek new political donation channels.
  

• OpenAI completed a major restructuring (valuation ~$130B) under the new OpenAI Group PBC, positioning for a potential IPO.
  

• Securitize, the RWA tokenization platform backed by BlackRock, to go public via SPAC (valuation ~$1.25B; $469M raise).
  

• Crypto.com applied for a U.S. national trust bank charter with the OCC to expand custody and staking services.
  

🇯🇵 Japan

• JPYC launched its yen-backed stablecoin and redemption platform JPYC EX, backed by bank deposits and JGBs. Users can issue or redeem JPYC 1:1 for JPY; transaction fees are temporarily waived to encourage adoption.
  

💰 Funding Highlights

🧱 Infrastructure & Ecosystem Updates

• Ripple Prime: Ripple completed its acquisition of Hidden Road, rebranding it as Ripple Prime — expanding into multi-asset prime brokerage across FX, digital assets, and derivatives. Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin is now accepted as collateral across several PB products.
  

• OSL: Appointed as custody and VATP partner for Hong Kong’s first Solana ETF, providing digital asset custody.
  

• Aptos Labs x BCG Report: Found 61% of HK & Mainland investors plan to double tokenized fund allocations, citing higher liquidity and transparency.
  Aptos, the only public blockchain in HKMA’s e-HKD+ Phase II pilot, validated atomic settlement, built-in compliance, and cross-border efficiency.
  

• Perle Labs: Launched its public beta on Solana, rewarding contributors who advance AI development with on-chain incentives.
  

🧭 Featured Research

• Hyperliquid: Stablecoin Wars — Patryk (Oct 17)
  

• Apps and Chains, Not Issuers: The Next Wave of Stablecoin Economics Belongs to DeFi — Simon (Oct 27)
  

• Understanding Concordium: A Comprehensive Overview — Dillon (Oct 27)
  

💡 Key Takeaway

The week highlighted a growing convergence of AI, payments, and on-chain infrastructure — from Coinbase’s agent payment rails and Tether’s AI wallet vision to Ripple’s prime brokerage expansion and Aptos’ role in digital currency settlement.

As traditional and Web3 systems merge, stablecoins are fast evolving from speculative tools to the settlement backbone of the next global financial layer.