steals

By Omkar Godbole (All times ET unless indicated otherwise)

Suddenly, it’s all about Ethereum rival Solana and its native token SOL as the broader market holds its breath ahead of Wednesday’s Federal Reserve rate decision.

Michael Novogratz, the founder and CEO of Galaxy Investment, says Solana could evolve to become a settlement infrastructure in global finance. Why? Because the blockchain can handle over 6 billion transactions a day, which is way higher than the 400 million-700 million trades global securities markets usually deal with, he said. Speed matters.

At BaseCamp 2025, Coinbase’s layer-2 network hinted at plans for a token launch that could accelerate decentralization and unveiled a Solana bridge to boost cross-chain connectivity. Pantera Capital’s Dan Morehead announced that Solana is their largest bet, valued at $1.1 billion, calling it the fastest and best-performing blockchain, which has outpaced even Bitcoin over the past four years.

If that’s not enough, Kyle Samani, chairman of Nasdaq-listed Solana treasury company Forward Industries, said over the weekend that the company plans to deploy funds to boost the Solana-native decentralized finance ecosystem.

All these signs suggest SOL could outperform bitcoin BTC$115,406.46, ether (ETH) and other major tokens if the Fed cuts rates by the 25 basis points this week, as expected. If it surprises with a 50-basis-point move, things could get wild. Keep your eyes on those SOL/BTC and SOL/ETH trading pairs.

Currently, SOL is trading around $235 after peaking near $250 over the weekend. Other major cryptocurrencies are stuck in neutral, trailing behind stocks, which continue to hit fresh highs.

On the stablecoin front, the Bank of England proposed limits on how the value of dollar-backed stablecoins an individual can hold, as low as 10,000 pounds ($13,600), citing systemic risks. Stani Kulechov, Aave’s CEO, called the move “absurd” and urged the crypto community to stand up against such regulations.

More countries, especially those with current account deficits, will likely consider similar measures to curb outflows that dodge traditional banks.

And as for the traditional markets, Monday’s mix of rising stocks and the VIX, Wall Street’s fear gauge, has some observers raising their eyebrows. History shows these moments often precede market corrections, so stay alert!

What to Watch

Crypto
- Sept. 16, 12 p.m.: Solana Live event on X. Guests include Pump.fun co-founder Alon Cohen and Kyle Samani, chairman of Forward Industries (FORD) and the managing partner of Multicoin Capital.
Macro
- Sept. 16, 8 a.m.: Brazil July unemployment rate Est. 5.7%.
- Sept. 16, 8:30 a.m.: Canada August headline CPI YoY Est. 2%, MoM Est. 0%; core YoY Est. N/A (Prev. 2.6%), MoM Est. N/A (Prev. 0.1%).
- Sept. 16, 8:30 a.m.: U.S. August retail sales YoY Est. N/A (Prev. 3.9%), MoM Est. 0.3%.
Earnings (Estimates based on FactSet data)

Token Events

Governance votes & calls
- Curve DAO is voting to update donation-enabled Twocrypto contracts, refining donation vesting so unlocked portions persist after burns. Voting ends Sept. 16.
- Sept. 16: Aster Network to host a community call.
- Sept. 18, 6 a.m.: Mantle to host Mantle State of Mind, a monthly downhill series.
- Sept. 16, 12 p.m.: Kava to host a community Ask Me Anything (AMA) session.
Unlocks
- Sept. 16: Arbitrum ARB$0.4921 to unlock 2.03% of its circulating supply worth $45.92 million.
Token Launches
- Sept. 16: Merlin (MRLN) to be listed on Binance Alpha, MEXC, BitMart, Gate.io, and others.

Conferences

Token Talk

By Oliver Knight

As the crypto market stays within a tight range after a brief peak and trough on Monday, one token is running its own race: IMX is up 15% in the past 24 hours with daily trading volume doubling to $144 million.
The rise lifted IMX, the native token of Web3 gaming platform Immutable, to a five-month high.
Bullish sentiment around Immutable can be attributed to an SEC probe that was dropped earlier this year and general optimism around the gaming sector. Gaming is estimated to reach $200 billion in revenue this year with further growth forecast in 2026 alongside the release of Rockstar Gaming’s Grand Theft Auto 6.
Immutable is well positioned to capitalize on that growth after teaming up with gaming giant Ubisoft on the next iteration of Might and Magic Fates in April.
Blockchain technology could have a key role to play in gaming if trends shift toward in-game ownership of items, which could see the implementation of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) within a game that could then be collected or sold on for crypto tokens.
IMX is currently trading at $0.736 having broken out of a key level of resistance. It will likely come back to test $0.70 as support before potentially moving higher, provided trading volume can sustain at these levels.

Derivatives Positioning

Most major cryptocurrencies, including BTC and ETH, continued to experience capital outflows from futures, leading to a decline in open interest.
AVAX stands out with OI rising over 14% as the token’s market cap looks to climb above $13 billion for the first time since Feb. 2.
Solana OI has reached a record high of over 70 million SOL, with positive funding rates pointing to bullish capital inflows.
On the CME, OI in solana futures pulled back to 7.63 million SOL from the record 8.12 million SOL on Sept. 12. Still, the three-month annualized premium holds well above 15%, offering an attractive yield for carry traders.
BTC CME OI continues to improve, but overall positioning remains light relative to ether and SOL futures.
On Deribit, the bias for BTC and ETH put options continues to ease across all tenors as traders anticipate Fed rate cuts. SOL and XRP options remain biased bullish.
On OTC network Paradigm, block flows featured BTC calendar spreads and shorting of call and put options.

Market Movements

BTC is unchanged from 4 p.m. ET Monday at $115,500.55 (24hrs: +0.54%)
ETH is unchanged at $4,513.45 (24hrs: -0.49%)
CoinDesk 20 is up 0.48% at 4,271.28 (24hrs: +0.71%)
Ether CESR Composite Staking Rate is up 5 bps at 2.87%
BTC funding rate is at 0.0059% (6.4616% annualized) on Binance

DXY is down 0.32% at 96.99
Gold futures are up 0.42% at $3,734.70
Silver futures are up 0.53% at $43.19
Nikkei 225 closed up 0.3% at 44,902.27
Hang Seng closed unchanged at 26,438.51
FTSE is down 0.22% at 9,256.41
Euro Stoxx 50 is unchanged at 5,437.55
DJIA closed on Monday up 0.11% at 45,883.45
S&P 500 closed up 0.47% at 6,615.28
Nasdaq Composite closed up 0.94% at 22,348.75
S&P/TSX Composite closed up 0.5% at 29,431.02
S&P 40 Latin America closed up 1.64% at 2,904.55
U.S. 10-Year Treasury rate is unchanged at 4.037%
E-mini S&P 500 futures are up 0.19% at 6,633.75
E-mini Nasdaq-100 futures are up 0.29% at 24,380.00
E-mini Dow Jones Industrial Average Index are unchanged at 45,902.00

Bitcoin Stats

BTC Dominance: 58.11% (unchanged)
Ether to bitcoin ratio: 0.03907 (-0.36%)
Hashrate (seven-day moving average): 1,025 EH/s
Hashprice (spot): $53.98
Total Fees: 4.41 BTC / $508,109
CME Futures Open Interest: 140,975 BTC
BTC priced in gold: 31.2 oz
BTC vs gold market cap: 8.82%

Technical Analysis

BTC is once again probing the 8-year bullish trendline trendline. (TradingView/CoinDesk)

The monthly chart shows that BTC is again probing the trendline connecting the previous bull market peaks.
Bulls failed to establish a foothold above that trendline in July and August.
A third straight failure could really embolden sellers, potentially yielding a deeper drop.

Crypto Equities

Coinbase Global (COIN): closed on Monday at $327.02 (+1.23%), +0.27% at $327.91
Circle (CRCL): closed at $134.05 (+6.97%), unchanged in pre-market
Galaxy Digital (GLXY): closed at $30.77 (+3.6%), +0.58% at $30.95
Bullish (BLSH): closed at $51.08 (-1.47%), +0.59% at $51.38
MARA Holdings (MARA): closed at $16.24 (-0.43%), unchanged in pre-market
Riot Platforms (RIOT): closed at $16.68 (+4.97%), +1.08% at $16.86
Core Scientific (CORZ): closed at $16.32 (+2.9%), +0.37% at $16.38
CleanSpark (CLSK): closed at $10.29 (-0.58%), +0.1% at $10.30
CoinShares Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI): closed at $38.73 (+3.78%), +1.96% at $39.49
Exodus Movement (EXOD): closed at $27.88 (-1.69%), -1.94% at $27.34

Crypto Treasury Companies

Strategy (MSTR): closed at $327.79 (-1.1%), +0.34% at $328.89
Semler Scientific (SMLR): closed at $28.39 (-2.74%)
SharpLink Gaming (SBET): closed at $16.79 (-5.14%), +0.54% at $16.88
Upexi (UPXI): closed at $6.33 (-6.29%), +0.95% at $6.39
Lite Strategy (LITS): closed at $3.07 (+10.43%)

ETF Flows

Spot BTC ETFs

Daily net flows: $259.9 million
Cumulative net flows: $57.05 billion
Total BTC holdings ~1.31 million

Spot ETH ETFs

Daily net flows: $359.7 million
Cumulative net flows: $13.74 billion
Total ETH holdings ~6.53 million

Source: Farside Investors

While You Were Sleeping

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Gamescom Opening Night Live was once again hosted by Geoff Keighley last night, and GamesIndustry.biz was there in the Confex hall in Cologne to see the whole thing unfold live.

In the build up to the entrance of the big man at 8pm, the 5,000-strong audience was treated to a pre-recorded ‘pre-show’, featuring various game trailers that didn’t quite get past the velvet rope into the main event.

Notably, the only one of these trailers to get an actual cheer from the steadily warming up audience was He-Man and the Masters of the Universe: Dragon Pearls of Destruction, a retro 2D brawler from Bitmap Bureau and Limited Run Games.

Coming after the rapturous reception for Bitmap Bureau’s retro-styled Terminator 2D: No Fate, it just goes to show the nostalgia drug remains as potent as ever.

Although nothing like the whooping for He-Man, a few other pre-show trailers gained some smatterings of applause, including Long Gone (funded by Outersloth), Valor Mortis, PVKK, the Chinese single-player action RPG Swords of Legends, and Saber Interactive’s new truck simulator Road Kings, which will no doubt go down well with the Euro Truck Simulator crowd.

Then it was time for Keighley to glide onto the stage in his trademark comfortable brown shoes. “It turns out that E3 didn’t die,” he pronounced, “it just moved right here to Germany.”

Setting aside Keighley’s own role in the murder, it’s difficult to compare the atmosphere of this vast German hall to the fan fervour you might see in days gone by in LA. The German audience seems far more muted and less prone to spontaneous outbursts.

Then again, it does feel like Gamescom has been building some serious momentum over the past few years in the absence of its US rival.

Image credit: Team Cherry

Right off the bat, Keighley revealed new gameplay footage of Hollow Knight: Silksong and proclaimed a demo would be playable at Gamescom, to the elation of the crowd.

The long-awaited game now has nearly five million wish lists on Steam, and the anticipation for it is reaching fever pitch.

Then it was on to a new trailer for Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, which focused on some freaky-deaky, hallucinatory levels, reminiscent of the Scarecrow sequences in Batman: Arkham Asylum. The big headline feature for CoD this year is a two-to-four-player co-op – and it all culminates in a new PvE end game that could be a big draw.

Lord of the Fallen 2 got a surprise unveiling, along with a new anime based on From Software’s Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice called Sekiro: No Defeat.

But one of the biggest reveals at the show was Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight, which focuses on Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy.

TT Games’ head of development Jonathan Smith was wheeled out on stage to enthuse about the new title. “We are so thrilled to be revealing this game,” he said. “This is the definitive, essential Batman story.”

And it certainly seemed to be thrilling the assembled crowd, receiving one of the warmest receptions of the entire night.

Smith explained that it would be the first of the studio’s Lego titles to have different difficulty levels (‘Caped Crusader’ and ‘Dark Knight’ mode), and it appears to be a lot more involved than Lego Batman games of the past, featuring combat styled similarly to the Arkham titles.

Image credit: TT Games

More announcements followed. Warhammer Dawn of War IV is on the way in 2026, although developed by King Art Games rather than Relic Entertainment.

Monster Hunter Wilds is getting a crossover with Final Fantasy XIV, Chocobos included. Perhaps it will help to buoy the slump in sales for Wilds over the past few months.

The Fallout cast were ushered on stage to talk about season 2 of the show, which is headed to New Vegas this time around. But perhaps the bigger news is that Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is heading to Switch 2 next year, eliciting gasps from the crowd.

Later, in another example of Microsoft’s IP crossing boundaries, it was revealed that Age of Empires IV is coming to PS5. As Rob Fahey recently commented, it’s a confusing time to be a console warrior.

We received new trailers for a whole swathe of previously announced titles, including Cronos: The New Dawn, The Outer Worlds 2, and Ghost of Yotei, which it was revealed will be receiving a Legends multiplayer mode in 2026, just like Ghost of Tsushima before it.

But the crowd was most roused by new footage from Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2, which after years in development by various different studios is finally being released on October 21st this year.

Keighley took some time to enthuse about Death By Scrolling, the new game from Monkey Island creator Ron Gilbert, which offers a departure from Gilbert’s point and click adventure roots by tasking the player with avoiding Death by fleeing upwards through a forced-scrolling playfield.

Image credit: Capcom

Eventually, nearly two hours in, and long after the show had begun to lose momentum, it was the turn of Resident Evil Requiem, a game that is clearly hotly anticipated by the audience. There were actual German whoops.

The new footage focused on terrified protagonist Grace Ashcroft fleeing violent monk-ish intruders alongside her handgun-wielding mother, but otherwise offered frustratingly few details about the new title, which is due on February 27th, 2026.

As Keighley entered into his thank yous following the trailer, it was notable that many audience members chose to get up and leave while he was speaking. But there was one more thing, he said, prompting the biggest reveal of the night.

A short CGI trailer for Black Myth: Zhong Kui ended the show, a sequel to Game Science’s multi-million selling Black Myth: Wukong.

Few details were provided apart from the name, but the fact that this one was saved until last just goes to show how Chinese studios are currently in the soaring ascendent.