Solana Staking Spot ETFs are Live, Trump and Xi Meeting & The End of QT

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This Week’s Top Stories

“Bitwise’s Solana Staking Spot ETF started trading this week.” – Tuesday, 28 October 

• On Tuesday, Bitwise’s Solana Staking spot ETF started trading under the ticker BSOL. The fund is the first U.S. spot ETF to hold and stake 100 percent of its assets in spot Solana (SOL). BSOL is designed to allocate all assets to on-chain staking, with Solana’s current average annual staking yield estimated at approximately 7 percent.
• The Solana spot ETF recorded $69.5 million in inflows on its first trading day and is currently sitting on $152 million in net inflows so far this week. Not bad, especially when compared to the first week of the Ethereum spot ETFs, which recorded $340 million in net outflows. However, these outflows were largely driven by Grayscale’s ETHE product. Bitwise’s Ether spot ETF attracted roughly $250 million in its first week. Solana is on track for this, depending on today’s inflows.

“U.S. – China tariff saga continues this week as Trump and Xi meet in person in South Korea.” – Thursday, 30 October 2025 

• We all remember 10 October, when Trump announced new 130 percent tariffs on China and the global trade war came roaring back, sending our beloved crypto assets down the abyss. Well, this week, Trump and Xi met in person in South Korea to find a solution to the problem. Mr. Trump rated the meeting “12 out of 10 points,” praising it as an “amazing” meeting. While there is no ink on the table yet, this development has certainly calmed the markets a little.
• China has allegedly pledged to purchase large quantities of U.S. farm products and energy, while continuing to supply the U.S. with critical minerals. The two countries will also collaborate to stop the fentanyl flow into the U.S., a very important topic for President Trump.

“The Federal Reserve cuts interest rates by 25 bps and QT will stop in December.” – Wednesday, 29 October 2025 

• On Wednesday, the Fed announced its interest rate decision, lowering its overnight lending rate by a quarter percentage point, bringing its benchmark rate to a target range of 3.75 to 4 percent.
• Powell mentioned that there were strongly differing views about how to proceed in December, and that a cut in December is not a foregone conclusion. At the same time, the Fed is closely monitoring the labour market, watching the emergence of recent layoffs very carefully. The Fed also announced that the balance sheet runoff will cease in December, officially ending QT.

A Quick Crypto Overview: Crypto Markets are Down This Week

Bitcoin was trading around $116’000 at the start of this week, and market participants were feeling optimistic about a potential relief rally led by Bitcoin and spilling over into altcoins. The week turned out differently; however, Bitcoin reached a temporary bottom around $106’000, down almost 9 percent from Monday’s high. 

Bitcoin dominance is up almost 1 percent this week, while Ethereum dominance has lost more than 5 percent from Monday’s high. 

Gold lost over 11 percent over the past two weeks but seems to have found a bottom on Tuesday, briefly dipping below the $4’000 mark before climbing back above it. 

The US stock indices are flat this week after volatile price action and new all-time highs on Wednesday, with the S&P 500 trading above 6’900 for the first time in history. 

Chart of the Week: CEX to DEX Shift is Accelerating

The DEX-to-CEX futures trade volume (%) has risen from 6 percent at the beginning of this year to over 15 percent today. This shift has accelerated over the past few months, and the crash on 10 October has very likely reinforced this trend, as centralized exchanges such as Binance showed some fragility, while DEXs such as Hyperliquid performed well without any downtimes. 

Interestingly, Lighter has taken over a lot of market share from Hyperliquid, as many traders seem to be switching to the newer competitor to farm points for a potential upcoming airdrop once the project TGEs. 
The monthly perpetual trade volume on DEXs is reaching new highs almost every month, with October on track for another all-time high, with total perp volumes just below $1 trillion. Last year in October, for comparison, the overall monthly perp trade volume was around $100 billion, showing a 10x increase over the past 12 months. This is a trend we expect to continue over the coming months and years, especially as many of the perp DEXs are starting to integrate stock futures, commodities, and FX trading pairs.

What’s Happening Onchain? ICOs, TGEs & Airdrops – A lot is Happening in Q4 This Year 

Over the past few weeks, a lot of attention has shifted toward new projects conducting public sales in anticipation of potential TGEs in Q4 this year, and many market participants have been farming projects for potential airdrops in the coming months. 

Just this week, the airdrop claiming period elapsed, and eligible investors were able to check their airdrop allocations. At the same time, the public sale for MegaETH opened on Monday, ending in a 28x oversubscription, with the total committed amount at the max price almost crossing $1.4 billion. The appetite for shiny new projects is immense, all money that could have ended up flowing into Bitcoin or other existing projects. 

In Kaito’s Pre-TGE Arena, Monad holds the top spot in terms of “mindshare,” meaning it received the most attention from investors over the past seven days. MegaETH is in second place, followed by Polymarket, Base, and MetaMask.

When it comes to Base, JPMorgan recently published a report stating that the token could be worth up to $34 billion, creating a new monetization path for Coinbase alongside USDC yields and onchain trading. The bank estimates Base’s market cap between $12 billion and $34 billion, with Coinbase likely holding about 40 percent of the supply, worth $4 billion to $12 billion in equity value. 

Digital Asset Fund Flows: Almost $1B in Inflows Last Week & DAT News 

Last week, digital asset investment products saw $921 million in net inflows, with Bitcoin bringing in all the money, while Ethereum recorded net outflows for the first time in over a month. 

This week started on a positive note for the Bitcoin spot ETFs, with two inflow days attracting more than $250 million. However, Wednesday and Thursday both saw net outflows just shy of $500 million. Ethereum, in comparison, is still sitting on net inflows of roughly $100 million so far. 

K33 Research published interesting insights this week, highlighting that even though the Bitcoin spot ETFs recorded almost $27 billion in net inflows this year, BlackRock’s IBIT accounted for more than $28 billion of those inflows, meaning that without BlackRock, the Bitcoin spot ETFs would be negative year-to-date. This is particularly interesting with regard to the altcoin spot ETFs, as BlackRock is staying out of the altcoin spot ETF race, at least for now. 

In the world of DATs, BitMine purchased 77’055 ETH last week. After this purchase, the company now holds a total of 3’313’069 ETH. BitMine Chairman Tom Lee stated that the company’s total ETH holdings now account for approximately 2.8 percent of the total ETH supply. 

OceanPal announced this week that it closed its $120 million offering to launch a NEAR-based digital asset treasury and AI cloud initiative in collaboration with the NEAR Foundation. The investors included crypto household names such as Kraken, Proximity, and G20 Group. The proceeds will be used to implement a digital asset treasury strategy centered on the NEAR Protocol and to develop a confidential AI cloud platform powered by NEAR and Nvidia technologies. 

Market Sentiment: Fearful Markets but AAII Members Feeling Bullish 

While both the crypto and CNN stock market Fear & Greed Indices are showing fear levels, AAII members indicated this week that 44 percent are feeling bullish. The number of bearish members dropped significantly from 43 percent last week to 37 percent this week, an interesting development toward the bullish side. When looking at the historical averages, we can see that the market is truly divided right now. While historically around 31.5 percent of members feel neutral, today only 19 percent indicate a neutral stance. It seems there are only two sides: bulls and bears.

Other Relevant News 

• According to Mt. Gox’s latest announcement, the creditor repayment deadline has been extended from October 31, 2025, to October 31, 2026. – Link 
• Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) plans to launch a prediction market platform, Truth Predict. – Link 
• According to Fortune, Mastercard is in talks to acquire crypto infrastructure startup Zerohash for between $1.5 billion and $2 billion. – Link 
• Consensys, the parent company of MetaMask, has selected JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs as lead underwriters for its IPO. – Link 

Looking Ahead: Gold Seems to Be Slowing Down; Will Bitcoin Finally Catch Up? 

Gold has been trading to the downside and is now consolidating below its highs. When looking back at the relationship between gold and Bitcoin since the beginning of 2024, when the spot ETFs launched, we observed that Bitcoin often starts accelerating to the upside once gold begins consolidating. The question is, will it be the same this time? Eyes on gold. 

The market crash on the 10th of October still seems to be weighing heavily on the market, as some participants are still wondering whether some dead bodies will come to the surface anytime soon. Rumors have it that some smaller market-making firms blew up during the crash. With Bitcoin dominance increasing this week, it seems like most altcoins are in a difficult spot, with the bid not really accelerating and most of them having traded significantly lower over the past few days. The new altcoin spot ETFs might be able to ignite some buying interest, but will it be enough to stop the downtrend? 

Below, you can find some of the key data releases and events to watch out for next week. 

Monday, 3 November 2025 

Switzerland – CPI 

Tuesday, 4 November 205 

USA – JOLTs Job Openings 

Wednesday, 5 November 2025 

Japan – BoJ Monetary Policy Meeting Minutes 

Eurozone – PPI 

Thursday, 6 November 2025 

Great Britain – BoE Interest Rate Decision 

Switzerland – Unemployment Rate 

Friday, 17 October 2025 

Eurozone – CPI, Core CPI 

USA – Nonfarm Payrolls (might be delayed due to Government Shutdown) 

USA – Unemployment Rate (might be delayed due to Government Shutdown)