TL;DR

• Reciprocal tariff: concrete decisions will be made in April, potentially targeting key trade partners with higher duties and non-tariff measures.
• The January 2025 CPI report surprised to the upside, shading shadows on market expectations for interest rate cut paces.
• Solana fell by 10%, affected by the manipulation of interest groups and memes.
• BNB increased by 10%, mainly because CZ started to focus on the development of the public chain.
• The market value of stablecoins reached a new high while USDT and USDC weren’t issued last week.
• Kaito announced token launching, Ethereum’s upgrade Pectra finalized mainnet on 24-Feb-2025, Ronin transit into open gaming blockchain.
• This week, raised $149,85M, (+9% from the previous week), CeFi and DeFi projects were the largest share of funding

Macro Overview

Reciprocal tariff: concrete decisions will be made in April, potentially targeting key trade partners with higher duties and non-tariff measures.

On February 13, President Donald Trump signed a memorandum officially announcing the reciprocal tariff policy. The reciprocal tariff will expand the scope of targeted countries, now covering major trade partners such as Brazil, India, and the EU. As Trump put it, “Whatever countries charge the United States of America, we will charge them. No more, no less.” Non-tariff policies are also taken into account, classifying Value-Added Tax and Digital Services Tax as unfair trade practices. While the policy has been announced, tariffs will not be imposed immediately. The administration will wait for the completion of an investigative report on April 1 before making concrete decisions. According to the 2023 tariff rate data by WTO, countries like India, South Korea, Brazil, and Vietnam all have a simple average tariff rate exceeding 9% and a weighted average above 5%, while the US maintains significantly lower rates at 3.3% and 2.2%, respectively. In theory, this makes these countries primary targets under Trump’s new trade agenda.

The January 2025 Consumer Price Index (CPI) report surprised to the upside, as the headline figure (raw inflation) rose by 0.5% MoM and core CPI (excluding food and energy) rose by 0.4% MoM. These monthly gains have led to a modest firming in the YoY rates, bringing the headline CPI to 3% YoY and core CPI to 3.3% YoY. Data publication immediately led to stock falls and treasury bonds’ rose. The data could suggest that the interest rate cuts may be delayed to the latter half of the year.

Meanwhile, US retail sales dropped by the most in nearly two years in January. It is largely due to the frigid temperatures, wildfires and motor vehicle shortages, suggesting a sharp slowdown in the economic growth. While the first quarter data in general reflect on economical adjustment, the slowing down retail sales adds more complexity to further policy making.

The dollar index dropped significantly last week, retracing all gains since mid Dec 2024 and landed at $106.793. This results from the combination effects of weak retail sales, relaxed tensions between Russia and Ukraine, and postponed US tariffs on the EU.

The total asset level rose by approximately $2.5bn last week, consolidating around the $6.8tn line. While the Fed didn’t give clear guideline on QT ending at this moment, it is clear that the depository institutions’ total reserves/total assets provides a meaningful indicator: it dropped from 13.86% in Nov 2024 to 13.75% in Dec 2024, and the upcoming data will be increasingly lower.

Gold price climbed high this week, continuing its momentum going upward. The price dipped and closed at $2,882.43 last Friday, after approaching the line of $2,940 and some investors started profit-taking. The arising Europe defense concerns, together with reciprocal tariffs, fueled the asset allocation.

Crypto Markets Overview

1. Main Assets

As of this Monday, BTC is trading at around $96,000 and ETH at $2,680, down by 1.4% and increase by 1.2% respectively. Altcoins overall continue to perform weakly. The issuance of the $Libra token failed, causing Meme coin tokens to plummet significantly, and the market is expected to refocus on altcoins. Solana fell by 10% last week, mainly due to news of manipulation within the Solana ecosystem’s tokens.

2. Total Market Cap

The total market capitalization of the cryptocurrency market stands at $3.13 trillion this Monday. Excluding Bitcoin and Ethereum, the market cap amounts to $901.8 billion, both reflecting increases of almost 0%. Altcoins remain sluggish as always.

3. Net Inflows

Last week, the total market value of stablecoins reached $225.3 billion, setting a new high for this cycle, with an increase of $1.2 billion compared to the previous week. However, the issuance of USDT and USDC stalled last week, with the main growth coming from DAI.

4. Top 30 Crypto Assets Performance

Last week, the overall increase of altcoins was 0%, so the top 30 also had mixed results. Among them, BGB experienced a significant rise in speculation and saw a substantial pullback. BNB rose by 10% due to CZ starting to hype the ecosystem and Meme on BNB.

Solana fell by 10%, mainly because of the issuance of $libra tokens, leading many people to believe that projects like Jupiter formed a monopoly, speculating on token prices and insider information. At the same time, Solana is facing the unlocking of approximately $2 billion worth of Sol tokens on March 1st, which are part of FTX OTC.

The Key Crypto Highlights

1.Kaito.ai announced $KAITO, with use-case across InforFi Ecosystem

$KAITO serves as the primary currency and governance tool within the InfoFi ecosystem. While details about its tokenomics and distribution schedule remain undisclosed, its utility spans three key areas: (1) Market influence; (2) Network currency; (3) Governance,

The whitepaper also highlights three core products aimed at revolutionizing crypto data management: [First], Kaito Pro: an AI-powered market intelligence platform, aggregates data from fragmented crypto sources and provides real-time insights. Its features include MetaSearch, Sentiment Analytics, AI Copilot to. [Second], Kaito Yaps: This enables creators and brands to assess influence, identify high-quality content, and optimize promotional channels by using AI algorithms like Proof-of-Work, Proof-of-Exchange, and Proof-of-Insight.. Yaps Points is an example. [Finally], Kaito Connect serves as the InfoFi network hub, powered by AI, to optimize information and capital flow. Its pillars include Yaps as Proof-of-Attention, public leaderboards for creators, and a Yapper Launchpad for market-driven attention distribution.

2. EF confirms Pectra upgrade timeline and key features of each phases

Following the successful Dencun upgrade in Q1 2024, which reduced gas fees significantly via EIP-4844, Pectra — Ethereum’s next update aimed to improve speed, scalability, and user experience. The launching event was delayed due to the expanded scope of the upgrade. Ethereum Foundation have now finalized its mainnet deployment for March this year. Pectra is split into two phases: [Phase 1] in 2025 includes EIP-7251 (higher staking limits) and EIP-7702 (better wallet experience). [Phase 2] Fusaka in 2026, introduces EVM Object Format (EOF) and PeerDAS for enhanced performance and security. Pectra aligns with Ethereum’s vision of Account Abstraction and aims to boost ETH’s value. Specifically, Pectra will go live on the Holesky testnet at epoch 115968 on 24-Feb, followed by the Sepolia testnet at epoch 222464 on 5-Mar.

3. Ronin transition to open-gaming blockchain, fueling eco-expansion with new toolkits

Ronin — a gaming-focused blockchain, has reached a new milestone by officially opening its network to developers. It welcomes developers from various fields to build applications on its network.To support this transition, Sky Mavis introduced the Ronin Developer Console, a toolkit designed to simplify deployment and enhance accessibility. With this tool, developers can efficiently launch projects without worrying about complex technical issues The Ronin ecosystem continues to expand, now hosting 17 active games, including notable successes like: Pixels, which has surpassed 1 million daily active users (DAU); Lumiterra’s NFT collection, with a trading volume exceeding $1.65 million. Additionally, other prominent games, such as Pirate Nation, are preparing to join the Ronin network.

Key Ventures Deals

1.Legend Secures $15M in first raising

Legend has successfully raised $15 million in its first funding round, led by a16z and Coinbase Ventures. The project is a “mobile-first” platform that integrates an embedded smart wallet, designed to streamline user experience by eliminating common pain points such as complex wallet connections and risky third-party websites. At launch, Legend will focus on supporting Layer 2 blockchains, with a strong emphasis on EVM-compatible chains (particularly Base), ensuring fast and low-cost transactions for its users. Since its announcement, the project has gained significant traction, with 1.6 million users already registered on its waitlist. Key features of the Legend platform are set to be released this week.

2. Plasma Raises $13M in Series A

Plasma, a blockchain specifically designed to optimize transactions for Tether’s USD-pegged stablecoin, has raised $13 million in a Series A funding round led by Framework Ventures. Other participants include Bitfinex, 6th Man Ventures, Bybit, and notable angel investors. This funding brings Plasma’s total capital raised to $24 million, which includes a prior $3.5 million round led by Bitfinex in October 2024. The project plans to use the funds to continue developing its EVM-compatible Bitcoin sidechain, aimed at facilitating USDT transfers with zero fees.

3. BitRobot raised $8M in Pre-Seed and & Seed

BitRobot has secured $8 million in total funding, including $6 million from a recent seed round led by Protocol VC. Other participants include Big Brain Holdings, Fabric Ventures, Zee Prime Capital, Tioga Capital, Sfermion, Solana Ventures, and prominent angel investors such as Solana Labs co-founders Anatoly Yakovenko and Raj Gokal, as well as eight founders from DePIN projects like Aethir and Gensyn.

BitRobot is a crypto-incentivized platform built on Solana, utilizing a subnet-based architecture to enable global collaboration and open-source innovation in robotics and AI. The platform employs a network of subnets to advance embodied AI research, contributing outputs such as compute resources, real-world robot fleets, datasets (both real-world and synthetic), and embodied AI models. These advancements span a wide range of robotic tasks and embodiments, from sidewalk robots to humanoids.

The number of deals closed in the previous week was 41, with DeFi leading the way with 18 deals, representing 44% of the total number of deals. Meanwhile, Infra sector had 8 (20%), Data sector had 7 (17%), Social sector had 5 (12%), Gamefi sector had 3 (7%) deals

The total amount of disclosed funding raised in the previous week was $149.85 million, 53% deals (22/41) in previous week didn’t public the raised amount. The top funding came from Infra sector with $62,5 million. Most funded deals: Hashkey with $30M and Plasma $13M

Total weekly fundraising rose to $149.85 million for the 3rd week of February, an increase of +9% compared to the week prior. Weekly fundraising in the previous week was up 10% year over year for the same period.