Rain Joins Mastercard as Principal Member for Stablecoin Cards
Rain joined Mastercard as a Principal Member, allowing it to issue stablecoin-powered credit and prepaid cards on a network accepted in over 210 countries and regions. Rain already had a relationship with Visa. Rain and Mastercard will also explore settling select program flows onchain using regulated stablecoins. In January, Rain disclosed a $250 million Series C round at a $1.95 billion valuation.
Amazon generated $70 billion from ad space, and ad revenue grew 24% last quarter. Amazon's Q1 earnings call also showed AWS revenue rose 28% year over year to $37.6 billion, while AMZN stock traded near $268 after gaining nearly 19% year to date.
World Liberty Sues Justin Sun Over Alleged WLFI Short Campaign
World Liberty Financial sued Justin Sun in Florida state court, accusing him of a deliberate short-selling campaign against WLFI. The Trump family crypto firm said it froze Sun's token position under his token unlock agreement to prevent further harm. The filing follows Sun's own lawsuit last month, which claims World Liberty improperly froze his tokens.
Bitcoin rose to a 13-week high of $80,610 on Monday as traders focused on a CME gap at $84,000. Short liquidations across crypto totaled $452 million over the last 24 hours.
SEC Reportedly Delays First Prediction Market ETFs
The SEC has reportedly delayed the expected launch of more than two dozen prediction market ETFs after asking for more detail on product structure and disclosures. The proposals from Roundhill Investments, GraniteShares and Bitwise had been expected this week after a 75-day review period.
Charles Edwards said Bitcoin may reach $96,000 by June after institutions absorbed more than 500% of daily mined BTC supply. Glassnode data shows Bitcoin sharks accumulated more than 61,000 BTC in the past 30 days.
Haun Ventures closed a $1 billion fund, split about evenly between an early-stage fund and a late-stage fund. The firm said it will invest over the next two to three years in crypto and blockchain startups, while also expanding into AI agents, fintech, and alternative assets.
Polymarket launched its Deposit Wallets feature, and newly registered users now automatically receive a dedicated deposit address. Polymarket said the rollout to all users is expected to gradually reduce the existing ghost fills issue while the team monitors system performance.
Strategy Halts Preferred-Share Sales Used for April Bitcoin Buying
Strategy halted sales across its four preferred-share classes between April 27 and May 3, while selling $82 million of MSTR stock and buying no Bitcoin. The pause left MSTR common stock as the only active funding source, even though available capacity still exceeded $27 billion across the preferred-share programs. The freeze contrasts with April 13–19, when Strategy funded a $2.54 billion Bitcoin purchase mostly through STRF preferred shares.
Seven crypto-linked companies report between May 5 and May 8 as public miners face an average production cost near $79,995 per Bitcoin. The week will test whether more than $70 billion in cumulative AI agreements can offset thinner post-halving mining margins.
CLARITY Act Moves Toward Senate Markup After Stablecoin Rewards Compromise
Senate negotiators released compromise language on stablecoin rewards last week, raising expectations that the CLARITY Act could reach a Senate Banking Committee markup in the week of May 11. The draft would bar rewards that are economically or functionally equivalent to interest on a bank deposit and would direct regulators to define disclosures and permitted reward activities. Coinbase backed the compromise, but the American Bankers Association and 52 state bankers' associations are still pressing the OCC for a stricter yield ban.
Strategy paused its Bitcoin buying streak before earnings, while MSTR rose over 10% in the last two days. Chairman Michael Saylor said the company would skip purchases this week and resume next week. Strategy holds about 818,334 BTC, or close to 3.9% of total supply.
GameStop Offers $55.5B to Buy eBay in Cash-and-Stock Deal
GameStop submitted a non-binding proposal to acquire eBay for $125 per share in a cash-and-stock deal valued at $55.5 billion. GameStop said the offer implies a 46% premium to eBay's February 4 closing price, and Ryan Cohen said he could take the bid to shareholders in a proxy fight if needed. eBay said it has not held discussions with GameStop and that shareholders do not need to take action.
msx.com data shows U.S. stocks opened mixed, with the Dow down 0.3%, the S&P 500 down 0.1%, and the Nasdaq flat. Crypto concept stocks were also mixed, with Circle up 9.15%, Coinbase up 5.03%, Hut 8 up 1.83%, and ABTC down 2.89%.
Strategy Shows $2.6B BTC Gain as Bitmine Holds $6.3B ETH Loss
Strategy held a $2.598 billion unrealized gain on its 818,334 BTC position, while Bitmine held a $6.289 billion unrealized loss on its ETH treasury. Yu Jin said Strategy did not buy BTC last week, while Bitmine bought 101,745 ETH for about $235 million. Strategy's average BTC cost was $75,537, and Bitmine's average ETH cost was $3,546.
DeFi Development launched a $200 million at-the-market equity financing program to expand its Solana treasury. The Nasdaq-listed company said the proceeds may support additional SOL purchases, working capital, and strategic development.
DTCC Sets July Pilot for Tokenized Securities Trading
DTCC said it will begin limited trading of tokenized securities through DTC in July 2026 with more than 50 firms in the initiative. DTCC said a full launch is planned for October. Participants include BlackRock, JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, Nasdaq, Ondo Finance and Payward, and the program covers tokenized equities, ETFs and Treasuries.
Tom Lee Says "Crypto Spring" Has Started as CLARITY Act Odds Top 60%
Bitmine Chairman Tom Lee said a new "crypto spring" has begun as Polymarket put the probability of the CLARITY Act passing in 2026 above 60%. Tom Lee said ETH is benefiting from Wall Street tokenization and blockchains tied to agentic AI, and he said ETH has outperformed the S&P 500 by more than 1,380 basis points since the start of the Iran war.