OVERVIEW

A Crypto Love Story: Cardano & LayerZero 🫂

Before we dive in, here’s today’s crypto market heatmap:

And here’s a look at crypto’s total market and altcoin market cap charts:

CRYPTOTWITS
Cryptotwits Podcast: A Sit Down With Strike Finance, Cardano’s Biggest Perp Dex 👍️

I got to sit down with the founder/CEO of Strike Finance for today’s Cryptotwits podcast! What we talked about:

• Origin story: How Charles Hoskinson's whiteboard videos drew Shan into Cardano during COVID

• Strike V1 vs V2

• V2 asset expansion: Runs on stablecoins instead of requiring underlying asset pools, enabling support for blue chip cryptos, stocks, equities, and real assets on Cardano

• Cardano DeFi context: Strike handles 50–80% of Cardano's trading volume at times

• Key topics covered: How DEXs let users become market makers, liquidation mechanics, and Strike's plan to open-source its core matching/liquidation engines

• Shan's trading tip: Set a stop loss one cent above liquidation to avoid liquidation fees

• V2 launch date

NEWS
A Crypto Love Story: Cardano & LayerZero Make It Official Just in Time for Valentine's Day 👩‍❤️‍💋‍👨

Holy Satoshi love is in the air - and on chain. 💘 

Two days before Valentine's Day, Charles Hoskinson walked on stage at Consensus Hong Kong wearing a McDonald's uniform (I shit you not, he did) and announced that Cardano and LayerZero are officially together.

Nobody had this couple holding hands on their Polymarket. Not because they weren't both catches - but because they ran in completely different circles. Now they're finishing each other's transactions.

The Meet-Cute

• $ADA ( ▲ 5.78% ) - the strong, silent type. A Layer 1 blockchain built on extended UTXO architecture (same DNA as Bitcoin), committed to formal verification and security-first values. Loyal to a fault. Doesn't chase trends. TAKES FOREVER TO MAKE A DECISION.

• $ZRO ( ▼ 1.56% ) - the one who knows everybody. An omnichain messaging protocol connected to 160+ blockchains, with $200B+ in cross-chain volume and a fresh investment from Citadel Securities. Already in relationships with Ethena, PayPal, BitGo, and Stargate. Like the neighborhood bicycle, but in a way that means everybody knows it but not necessarily ridden it if you know what I mean.

The Love Languages

LayerZero doesn't ask Cardano to change. It connects through messaging endpoints, letting Cardano stay exactly who it is while opening the door to Ethereum, Solana, Base, Arbitrum, BNB Chain, Sui, and 140+ other networks.

The gifts they're exchanging:

• OFT Standard - 400+ tokens ($80B+ market cap) moving natively across chains. No wrapping. No baggage

• Stargate - the biggest cross-chain bridge by volume, now part of the family

• USDCx - a privacy-focused stablecoin launching with Midnight's mainnet, powered by zero-knowledge tech

• OApp Standard - Cardano devs can now build for the entire LayerZero-connected universe

Early days. But sometimes the best relationships are the ones nobody saw coming. 🧠 

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HEDERA
It’s Fun To Swap In One Place 🎲

Something for all you $HBAR ( ▲ 7.29% ) fans out there. 👇️ 

HashPack just dropped cross-chain swaps directly inside the wallet. That means users can now move assets into and out of Hedera without ever leaving the HashPack interface.

No extra apps. No janky bridges in a separate tab. One wallet, multiple networks.

Users see one clean interface (like above) while multiple execution routes fire behind the scenes. It's the kind of integration that lowers the barrier for anyone looking to enter the Hedera ecosystem without assembling a five-tool tech stack just to move value around.

HashPack already handled Hedera-native token swaps, but this update pushes it from "Hedera wallet" into "cross-chain access point" territory. Fewer steps. Fewer excuses not to explore what Hedera's building.

And if you want to hear directly from the HashPack team, they show up every Thursday on the Cryptotwits Live Community Space on X. HashPack is like that one guy who showed up to your party once and just ended up staying because he's awesome, chill, and somehow always has something useful to say. We're not complaining.

Here’s today’s Community Space if you missed it 👇️ 

NEWS
Stonkmarket News 📰

NEWS
BlockFills Halts Withdrawals as Crypto Market Stress Spreads 🤦

Yesterday, institutional crypto trading firm BlockFills has suspended client deposits and withdrawals, citing "recent market and financial conditions." 😨

The Chicago-based company, which facilitated over $60 billion in trading volume in 2025 and serves more than 2,000 institutional clients including hedge funds and asset managers, confirmed the halt began last week.

Clients can still open and close positions in spot and derivatives trading, suggesting the firm's matching engine and core infrastructure remain operational. But the inability to withdraw funds is the part that makes people nervous - for obvious reasons.

The comparison to 2022's crypto winter is unavoidable. When FTX, BlockFi, Celsius, and Genesis Capital halted withdrawals during the last bear market, every single one of them eventually entered restructuring or bankruptcy. BlockFills insists it is working to "restore liquidity to the platform" and has hosted information sessions where clients could question senior management directly.

Let’s hope the shenanigans don’t go any further. 🙏 

NEWS
Banks: "Stablecoins Will Destroy Lending." Credit Unions: "Where Do We Sign Up?" 🫢

Two industries. Same law. Completely opposite reactions. 🔃

Since July 2025, the ABA (American Banking Association), the BPI (Bank Policy Institute), and roughly 100 community bank CEOs have been carpet-bombing Treasury with letters demanding regulators expand the GENIUS Act's yield prohibition to cover exchanges, affiliates, rewards programs - basically anything that lets a stablecoin holder earn a nickel.

Their math is simple: stablecoins at 4%, savings accounts at 0.5%, money walks. Their solution is simpler: make sure no one's allowed to offer that 4%… or higher.

Then, yesterday (February 11), the National Credit Union Administration (NCAU) - the regulator overseeing 4,000+ credit unions and $2.38 trillion in assets - dropped a 22-page proposed rule. 

Not a comment letter. Not a lobbying campaign. A licensing framework. The whole thing lays out how credit union subsidiaries apply to become Permitted Payment Stablecoin Issuers under the GENIUS Act. 120-day approval window. Background checks on officers. Business plan requirements. Anti-money laundering certifications within 180 days.

Oh, and NCUA Chairman Kyle Hauptman comments are the financial/banking/government/regulatory version of, ‘we ain’t scured’. He said credit unions "won't be at a disadvantage versus other entities, whether in timing or standards."

What Makes The Credit Union Different Than The Banks Here

• Credit unions are cooperatives - no shareholders screaming about margin compression.

• They return value to members. And the NCUA is building for that model specifically.

• The rule anticipates widely held subsidiaries - dozens of credit unions pooling capital into a single stablecoin issuer - because the costs are too steep for any one shop to absorb alone.

• It's a cooperative chassis for a digital product. Banks can't replicate that structure. They don't want to.

• There's a 1% capital investment cap per credit union. But spread that across 50 or 100 credit unions funding one issuer and you've got a meaningful operation competing directly with JPMorgan's stablecoin subsidiary.

This rule hit the Federal Register the same day the bankers walked into the White House pushing "prohibition principles" against stablecoin benefits.

This has got to be the biggest middle finger Credit Union’s have given big banks in, literally (maybe), over 100 years. 🤯

LINKS
Links That Don’t Suck 🔗

📺️ The Howard Lindzon Show - Robinhood: The Mob Turns, Crypto Noise, and What Matters

🛑 New crypto ban targets Russia rails but one chokepoint decides whether flows die or just relocate offshore

⛓️ Aster Chain Confirms Mainnet Launch in March, Emphasizes Privacy Focus

😨 Crypto panic erupts as Ripple executive slams Bitcoin as a technological dead end

🇮🇱 Israelis Arrested Over Alleged Insider Polymarket Trades on IDF Military Secrets

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Author Disclosure: The author of this newsletter holds positions in AVAX, ADA, PUDGY, WLC, IMX, XTZ, NEAR, HBAR, ALGO, INJ, LTC, LINK, ZEC, XLM, and FET. 📋