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- XRP bulls get headlines, not momentum
XRP bulls get headlines, not momentum
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ZachXBT’s iPhone wallet pitch exposes crypto custody’s missing layer
Key points:
ZachXBT said a dedicated iPhone could outperform hardware wallets for experienced users, while Roman Storm flagged the lack of mobile BIP39 passphrase support.
Trezor defended dedicated devices, as Ledger extended hardware-based transaction approval to AI agents.
News - Onchain investigator ZachXBT reignited the self-custody debate after calling hardware wallets “complete garbage,” naming Ledger as the worst, and recommending a separate iPhone used only for crypto.
His criticism focused on Ledger Live’s frequent software and interface updates, which he said can disrupt basic actions. Ledger’s 2020 customer data breach, backlash over Ledger Recover, and the 2023 Connect Kit compromise added context to his attack.
Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm broadly agreed with the iPhone idea but identified a missing safeguard: BIP39 passphrases.
The hidden wallet problem - A BIP39 passphrase adds another secret to a 12- or 24-word recovery phrase. The same seed words can then open a different wallet, allowing the visible account to remain empty if the phrase is exposed.
Storm said Trezor, Ledger, Coldcard, Keystone, and BitBox support passphrases, while MetaMask and Trust Wallet do not, and Rabby limits the feature to desktop. He also advocated air-gapped mobile signing.
The concern is growing. Chainalysis recorded 158,000 personal wallet compromises in 2025, affecting 80,000 victims and causing $713 million in losses.
Ledger doubles down on human approval - Ledger, meanwhile, launched Ledger Agent Stack, an open-source toolkit that lets AI agents analyze portfolios and prepare transactions but requires every sensitive action to be approved on a Ledger hardware device.
Trezor executive Danny Sanders also rejected the phone comparison, citing zero-click exploits, cloud backups, clipboard leaks, and the absence of an independent confirmation screen. The dispute ultimately exposes competing risks rather than a universally safer device.
XRP’s bullish headlines collide with a market that will not follow
Key points:
XRP barely participated in the post-CPI crypto rally as its Clarity Act catalyst was delayed and exchange outflows faded.
Whale-retail behavior remains split across venues, while a formed head-and-shoulders pattern awaits breakdown confirmation at key levels.
News - Softer June inflation helped Bitcoin clear $65,000 and pushed Ethereum close to $1,900, but XRP remained near $1.10 and slipped about 0.5%. Its indicator score stood at -42%, while the daily chart retained a confirmed death cross.
The expected Senate floor vote on the Clarity Act also moved beyond July 4, with late July or August now the earliest likely window. That left XRP relying largely on broader market momentum, where Bitcoin and Ethereum absorbed capital first.
Bullish news meets resistant positioning - Ripple joined the Linux Foundation’s x402 Foundation on July 14 to support AI-agent payments on the XRP Ledger using XRP and RLUSD. Top traders still leaned bearishly. One proprietary gauge showed them positioned 136% more short than retail, while daily net outflows fell from about 205 million XRP on July 3 to 87 million by July 14.
CryptoQuant data added a venue split. Binance’s whale-to-retail gap dropped to 35.1%, near its early-May level, while the reading across other exchanges remained higher at 38.4%.
A warning pattern, not a confirmed break - XRP’s 8-hour chart formed a bearish head-and-shoulders setup with a projected downside near $0.92, but weakening sell volume means the breakdown is not confirmed.
Holding $1.10 preserves room for $1.13. Losing $1.08 would expose the $1.06 neckline, while an 8-hour close above $1.13 would weaken the bearish setup.
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Senate closes ranks against SBF, but cannot close Trump’s pardon door
Key points:
The Senate unanimously adopted a nonbinding resolution saying SBF should never receive a pardon or sentence commutation.
His clemency petition remains pending, but the vote cannot restrict President Donald Trump’s constitutional authority to grant it.
News - The U.S. Senate approved S. Res. 772 by unanimous consent, declaring that former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) should “under no circumstances” receive executive clemency.
The bipartisan measure was led by Senators Cynthia Lummis and Ruben Gallego, the top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee’s digital assets subcommittee, and introduced on June 17. It also affirmed the Senate’s commitment to the rule of law and the integrity of the U.S. financial system.
SBF is serving a 25-year sentence after his 2023 conviction on seven fraud and conspiracy counts tied to FTX’s collapse.
A unanimous vote without legal force - The resolution creates political pressure, not a legal barrier. As a simple Senate resolution, it does not require approval from the House or president and carries no force of law.
Article II, Section 2, Clause 1 gives the president broad authority to grant pardons and commutations for federal offenses, except in impeachment cases. Congress cannot use a resolution to narrow that power.
The clemency path remains open, but narrow - SBF filed a formal pardon petition with the Justice Department’s Office of the Pardon Attorney in 2026, and the request remains pending.
Trump said in January that he had no plans to pardon him, although he has granted clemency to other crypto figures, including Changpeng Zhao and Ross Ulbricht. Polymarket traders placed the chance of a pardon by July 31 below 1%, while SBF’s release eligibility remains around 2044.
Dormant Bitcoin whale moves $383M without sending it to an exchange
Key points:
A wallet inactive since December 2017 transferred its entire 5,907.56 BTC balance, now worth about $383.6 million, to a new address.
The destination was not linked to an exchange, leaving the move consistent with custody migration rather than a confirmed sale.
News - A Bitcoin wallet dormant for more than 8.5 years moved 5,907.56 BTC in block 958217 early Thursday, reviving a position accumulated near the peak of the 2017 cycle.
Galaxy Research estimated that the holdings were acquired at an average price near $17,000 per Bitcoin and had appreciated by roughly $285.5 million, or 291%. Another calculation, using an entry closer to $16,000, placed the gain near 284%.
The wallet had remained untouched through Bitcoin’s 2018 crash, its 2021 rally, the 2022 downturn, and the record highs reached in 2025.
The destination matters more than the transfer - The full balance moved to a new, unidentified wallet rather than a Coinbase, Binance, or other known exchange deposit address. That means the transaction provides no direct evidence of liquidation.
The coins also shifted from a legacy address beginning with “1” to a newer bc1q format, which supports lower transaction fees and more modern wallet standards. Such a move can reflect upgraded custody or key management, although the holder’s intent remains unknown.
An old wallet enters a newer dispute - Galaxy Research labeled the sending address “Noah Doe #27 – Salomon Client Dusted,” linking it to addresses examined in its reporting on litigation seeking ownership of millions of allegedly abandoned Bitcoin.
For traders, the next transfer matters most. A later move into an exchange-linked wallet would offer clearer evidence of an exit. For now, the whale has moved its Bitcoin, but has not demonstrably sold it.
Wall Street’s New Shopping List
Big money is rotating into a select group of stocks for the second half of 2026.
MarketBeat’s analysts tracked the move and identified 10 companies attracting fresh capital right now.
The updated 10 Best Stocks to Own in 2026 report lays out the tickers, trends, and catalysts.
More stories from the crypto ecosystem
Interesting facts
A 12-word wallet backup is not just twelve random words: In a standard BIP-39 phrase, four of the 132 encoded bits form a checksum. This means only one out of every 16 randomly assembled 12-word combinations will pass checksum validation.
Cosmos let one blockchain operate an account on another: Interchain Accounts allow a controller chain to register and control an account on a separate host chain through IBC messages. Instead of signing transactions with its own private key, the account executes instructions received from the controller chain.
Algorand can make 16 transactions share one fate: Its protocol can group up to 16 transactions of any supported type into one atomic unit. Every transaction in the group succeeds together, or the entire batch fails.
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Top 3 coins of the day
Ethena (ENA)
Key points:
ENA reclaimed the entire MA Ribbon and rose 4.51% to $0.0858, turning the $0.086 to $0.087 area into the next confirmation test.
Awesome Oscillator remained positive at 0.0015 but showed fading momentum, while $0.0818 to $0.0824 is the key breakout defense.
What you should know:
Ethena’s ecosystem expansion arrived as its chart shifted into a stronger moving-average regime. Galaxy Digital launched an institutional Vault Curator that identified Ethena products among the targeted assets for enhanced-yield Morpho vaults, while Ethena deployed $50 million into a Morpho USDG vault following the Robinhood Chain launch. ENA then climbed to $0.0858 and moved above the 20, 50, 100, and 200 SMAs, with volume rising to 47.43M. The Awesome Oscillator stayed positive at 0.0015, although its contracting red bars showed that bullish momentum had cooled despite the latest price advance. The $0.086 to $0.087 area is the confirmation test, while $0.0818 to $0.0824 is the first support zone.
Ondo (ONDO)
Key points:
ONDO’s wave-three surge carried price to $0.38 on 27.91M volume, but RSI at 85.16 showed the advance had entered heavily stretched territory.
The $0.39 to $0.40 area is the continuation test, while $0.36 and $0.35 are the projected wave-four retracement levels.
What you should know:
Ondo’s latest product launches turned its rally into a near-vertical wave-three expansion. The project introduced CRCLon and SPYon through a framework linked to DTC Tokenized Entitlements, while its SBI Group partnership targeted tokenized Japanese equities and RWA products using JPYSC for collateral and settlement. ONDO then surged from roughly $0.31 to $0.38, cleared the wave-one peak near $0.35, and drew 27.91M in volume. RSI climbed to 85.16, confirming exceptional momentum but also showing that the move had become overextended. The $0.39 to $0.40 area is the immediate continuation test. If momentum cools, the Elliott Wave indicator projects wave-four retracement levels at $0.36 and $0.35.
DeXe (DEXE)
Key points:
DEXE’s drop below the 20 and 50 SMAs turned its post-rally pullback into a deeper unwind, although the rising 100 and 200 SMAs preserved the broader trend.
Squeeze Momentum fell to -7.097 as volume reached 328.21K; $32.50 to $33 is the immediate floor, while $37.35 to $38.95 is the recovery threshold.
What you should know:
DEXE’s pullback stopped looking orderly once price lost both short-term averages on heavy selling volume. The token fell 7.15% to $33.04 after its parabolic run toward $49, while large transfers from DeXe treasury and team-linked wallets into unlabeled addresses added supply-overhang fears and intensified profit-taking. DEXE traded below the 20 SMA at $38.95 and 50 SMA at $37.35, while Squeeze Momentum sank to -7.097 and volume climbed to 328.21K. The broader ribbon remained intact because price still held above the 100 SMA at $30.90 and 200 SMA at $24.99. The $32.50 to $33 area is the immediate floor, while reclaiming $37.35 to $38.95 is needed to repair the correction.
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