South Korea’s Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung has reportedly become the latest presidential candidate to promise the approval of spot crypto exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and other crypto-friendly measures, should he be elected.

Lee announced his crypto promises on May 6 as part of a broader initiative to provide more investment opportunities for Korea’s youth, one of the main target demographics for the fast-approaching June 3 election.

“I will create a safe investment environment so that young people can [build] assets and plan for the future,” The Korea Economic Daily (KED) quoted Lee as saying in Korean.

He also promised the legalization of spot crypto ETFs, lower transaction fees, and more consumer protection measures.

Lee’s Democratic Party of Korea is the favorite to win the presidential election with 42% support, according to a survey conducted by Korea’s National Barometer Survey between April 24 and 30. Korea’s acting president, Han Duck-soo, came in second at 13%.

This is the first time Lee has mentioned crypto as part of his presidential campaign, KED noted. 

The Democratic Party made similar promises in its 2024 general election campaign, including passing spot crypto ETF legalization. However, progress stalled, KED said.

South Korea’s People Power Party makes similar promises

South Korea’s ruling party, the People Power Party, also reportedly made crypto policy promises in late April, which included allowing spot crypto ETFs, dismantling Korea’s controversial one-exchange-one-bank rule, and establishing a regulatory framework for stablecoins.

Source: Cointelegraph

The one-exchange-one-bank rule in South Korea is a regulation that limits each crypto exchange to working with only one local bank. It is intended to prevent money laundering and strengthen transparency by ensuring that the identities of crypto investors can be verified when trading crypto.

South Korean industry officials estimate that 16 million or 31% of the country’s 51.7 million people have access to a crypto account.

Related: North Korean spy slips up, reveals ties in fake job interviewKim Moon-soo is running as the People Power Party’s candidate — a party previously led by Yoon Suk Yeol, who was impeached after he declared martial law in December.

The controversial measure triggered a considerable fall in Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), and other cryptocurrencies. However, most coins recovered when the martial law was lifted around six hours later.

Korea’s Constitutional Court upheld the impeachment of Yoon in a unanimous 8–0 decision decision on April 4, effectively removing him from office.

Magazine: Crypto wanted to overthrow banks, now it’s becoming them in stablecoin fight

Trump family-backed crypto platform World Liberty Financial (WLFI) is proposing to airdrop a small amount of its new US dollar-pegged stablecoin to reward early WLFI holders in a test of its airdrop mechanism.

With over 99% of votes in favor of the proposal already, the airdrop will distribute a small amount of USD1 to eligible holders of the WLFI token, according to the May 6 proposal in the WLFI governance forum.

“Testing the airdrop mechanism in a live setting is a necessary step to ensure smart contract functionality and readiness. This distribution also serves as a meaningful way to thank our earliest supporters and introduce them to USD1,” the proposal states. 

“This will allow World Liberty Financial to validate the technical functionality of its airdrop system in a live environment while thanking early supporters of the project.”

Source: World Liberty Financial’

The amount of USD1 is still to be determined but will be based on the total eligible wallets and budget, according to the proposal.

The date for the airdrop is also pending, and WLFI says it reserves the “right to discontinue, suspend, modify or terminate the test airdrop” at any time.

The vote is scheduled to close on May 14, and so far, those in favor are ahead with 2.6 billion, or 99.97% of tokens, used to vote yes. Those against the measure make up about 901,000 votes, or 0.03% of the vote so far.

The airdrop vote will close on May 14, and so far, those in favor are way ahead in the poll. Source: World Liberty Financial

WLFI launched its stablecoin in early March. Since the platform’s launch in September, the crypto firm has also completed two public token sales, netting the firm a combined $550 million from the 85,000 registered holders.

Other countries challenging US dollar stablecoins

The market cap of US dollar-denominated stablecoins crossed $230 billion in April, a report from investment banking giant Citigroup found, an increase of 54% since last year, with Tether (USDT) and USDC (USDC) dominating 90% of the market.

Related: $1T stablecoin supply could drive next crypto rally — CoinFund’s Pakman

However, other countries have announced plans to launch stablecoins backed by currencies other than the US dollar.

On April 28, a trio of major Abu Dhabi institutions, including the Emirate’s sovereign wealth fund, announced a joint initiative to launch a new dirham-pegged stablecoin.

A Russian finance ministry official also floated a plan on April 16 for the country to develop its own stablecoin after a freeze on wallets linked to the sanctioned Russian exchange Garantex by US authorities and stablecoin issuer Tether. 

Magazine: Ridiculous ‘Chinese Mint’ crypto scam, Japan dives into stablecoins: Asia Express

Coinbase has introduced a new payments protocol for online payments that enables stablecoin transfers over standard internet protocols and AI agents to transact autonomously.  

On May 6, Coinbase announced that it is launching a protocol called x402 for instant stablecoin payments directly over the internet communication protocol HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol).

It allows Application Programming Interface (APIs), apps, and AI agents to transact seamlessly, “unlocking a faster, automated internet economy,” the firm stated. 

Coinbase said that x402 “is fixing the internet’s first mistake.” The protocol resurrects the experimental HTTP 402 “Payment Required” status code to create a seamless payment system native to the internet.

The firm noted that traditional payment rails, such as credit cards, bank transfers and subscriptions, “were built for a pre-internet world.” 

They’re slow, expensive, geographically limited, and “riddled with manual steps,” it added. 

However, x402 embeds stablecoin payments directly into web interactions, requiring minimal code integration, and is designed for both humans and AI agents to transact value as easily as exchanging data.

x402 payment flow. Source: Coinbase

The head of engineering at Coinbase Developer Platform and co-author of the x402 white paper, Erik Reppel, said, “We’re laying the groundwork for an economy run not just by people, but by software — autonomous, intelligent, and always on.”

Related: Coinbase sees first crypto transaction between AI agents

Gagan Mac, vice president of product management at Circle, said x402 “elegantly simplifies real-time monetization” and unlocks “exciting new use cases like micropayments for AI agents and apps.”

Coinbase is launching the new protocol in partnership with AWS (Amazon Web Services), stablecoin issuer Circle, AI company Anthropic and AI-focused proof-of-stake layer-1 blockchain Near Protocol.

Big benefits for agentic AI

AI agents can achieve economic autonomy by independently transacting without human intervention. The protocol enables AI agents to access paid resources in real-time based on their needs and eliminates dependency on pre-paid credits, API keys, or human-managed accounts. 

AI agents can also provision and pay for hardware resources in real-time, access specialized data sources through micropayments, and pay other AI systems for services. 

The x402 protocol essentially transforms AI agents from tools that require constant human interaction into autonomous economic actors that can independently discover, purchase and utilize resources to accomplish their goals.

Developers can use the protocol to monetize APIs, create software unlocks and enable metered services that dynamically charge users based on actual resource usage, while content creators can monetize their content without the need for blanket subscriptions or credit card minimums and fees.

Magazine: Crypto AI tokens surge 34%, why ChatGPT is such a kiss-ass: AI Eye

Key takeaways:

Bitcoin must maintain above $95,000 to have a chance at retesting its $109,000 all-time high; failure to hold could lead to a deeper correction, crypto analysts warn.

Several crypto analysts told Cointelegraph in March that Bitcoin may have a chance of reaching new all-time highs in June.

The upcoming Federal Reserve decision on May 7 could influence Bitcoin’s price movement over the coming days.

Bitcoin needs to continue to hold above the $95,000 level for a chance to climb back and retest its all-time high, or face an even deeper correction, crypto analysts say.

It comes after several analysts told Cointelegraph earlier this year that June could be the month Bitcoin (BTC) reaches new all-time highs.

“The $95,000 level — currently under consolidation — is a critical pivot point, acting as the lower boundary of a three-month range that defined market structure between November 2024 and February 2025,” Bitfinex said in a May 6 markets report.

Bitcoin holding above $95,000 would signal a “structural shift”

Bitfinex said that Bitcoin holding above the $95,000 level would signal a “structural shift” back into bullish territory, with a potential upward trend toward retesting its all-time highs. 

Bitcoin reached its $109,000 all-time high on Jan. 20, just hours before US President Donald Trump’s inauguration.

At the time of publication, Bitcoin is trading at $96,730, up 3.03% over the past 24 hours, according to CoinMarketCap data. 

However, Bitfinex analysts said if Bitcoin fails to hold above $95,000, it could be headed for further downfall.

“Failure to hold, however, could turn the region into resistance once more, raising the risk of a short-term rejection and another leg of corrective price action.”

They said the next several days will determine whether Bitcoin will be heading “into a sustained breakout or resolves into a retest of lower support zones.”

Bitcoin is up 2% over the past seven days. Source: CoinMarketCap

However, if Bitcoin continues the rally, it may catch many traders offside. Crypto analyst Thomas Fahrer said in a May 7 X post that $400 million of Bitcoin short positions are at risk of liquidation at the $98,000 price level. “Send it,” Fahrer said.

Bitcoin is approaching the timeframe many analysts predicted for new highs earlier this year. On March 28, Real Vision chief crypto analyst Jamie Coutts projected a best-case target of $123,000 by June.

Related: Bitcoin price rallied 1,550% the last time the ‘BTC risk-off’ metric fell this low

Around the same time, Swan Bitcoin CEO Cory Klippsten said that Bitcoin has a “50% chance” of reaching new all-time highs before the end of June.

Since 2013, Bitcoin’s average performance in June has been slightly negative at -0.35%.

The upcoming Federal Reserve interest rate decision on May 7 could also have an impact on Bitcoin’s price.

The announcement often sees crypto market volatility both before and after the results are published. However, the latest data from CME Group’s FedWatch Tool indicates that the futures market sees minimal odds of a rate cut.

Meanwhile, overall market sentiment is becoming more positive as Bitcoin’s price approaches the psychological $100,000 price level.

The Crypto Fear & Greed Index, which measures overall market sentiment, has spiked again over the past 24 hours, further into “Greed” territory, jumping 8 points to a score of 67.

Magazine: 12 minutes of nail-biting tension when Ethereum’s Pectra fork goes live

This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.

Members of the crypto community are circulating apparent “proof” that Zerebro developer Jeffy Yu faked his suicide as he promoted his new memecoin during a Pump.fun livestream on May 4.

The belief appears to come from an unverified private letter supposedly sent by Yu to a Zerebro investor, trading activity linked to crypto wallets owned by Yu, and the removal of his obituary from Legacy.com.

Others speculate that Yu used a tool to pass off a pre-edited video as if it were filmed in real-time during the Pump.fun live stream.The unverified letter from Yu to an early investor states that he deliberately created a livestream pretending to shoot himself as it was the only “viable exit” from persistent harassment, blackmail, threats and hate crimes.

“Being fully doxxed has placed me under constant fear of robbery and physical harm. There have been numerous notable figures in the crypto community which have undergone armed robberies in their homes recently.”

“With my address publicly known, I have not been able to comfortably reside in any of my family’s homes for months now.”

The letter claimed he would “exit public life and fame” and shift his focus to music, conducted in anonymity.

In addition to the unverified letter, Legacy.com removed Yu’s obituary, which initially described him as a Stanford “tech prodigy” who scaled the AI content-powered Zerebro protocol into an $800 million ecosystem at its peak.

Source: Vee

X user and crypto enthusiast “Vee” also claimed that after Yu’s supposed death, one of his wallets offloaded the Zerebro (ZEREBRO) token for USDC (USDC), which was then moved to the same address that created the Legacoin (LLJEFFY) token.

Vee’s claims were later supported by blockchain analytics firm Bubblemaps, which estimated that $100,000 of ZEREBRO was sold and moved to LLJEFFY.

Onchain transfers conducted by wallets confirmed or believed to be in Yu’s control. Source: Bubblemaps

Meanwhile, one viewer of Yu’s livestream believes the gunshots were edited with brightness and sound effects, while another observer claimed that the flash didn’t come from the gun.

Related: Strange, but true: 5 outlandish and weird crypto stories of 2024

The LLJEFFY token has fallen over 80% to a market cap of $5 million since the incident, DEX Screener data shows.

Yu’s alleged suicide came a few hours after he published a manifesto explaining the concept of Legacoins — or legacy memecoin as he called it — which requires the creator to never sell the coin.

Magazine: Memecoin degeneracy is funding groundbreaking anti-aging research

Members of the crypto community are circulating apparent “proof” that Zerebro developer Jeffy Yu faked his suicide as he promoted his new memecoin during a Pump.fun livestream on May 4.

The belief appears to come from an unverified private letter supposedly sent by Yu to a Zerebro investor, trading activity linked to crypto wallets owned by Yu, and the removal of his obituary from Legacy.com.

Others speculate that Yu used a tool to pass off a pre-edited video as if it were filmed in real-time during the Pump.fun livestream.

Source: Hash

The unverified letter from Yu to an early investor states that he deliberately created a livestream pretending to shoot himself as it was the only “viable exit” from persistent harassment, blackmail, threats and hate crimes.

“Being fully doxxed has placed me under constant fear of robbery and physical harm. There have been numerous notable figures in the crypto community which have undergone armed robberies in their homes recently.”

“With my address publicly known, I have not been able to comfortably reside in any of my family’s homes for months now.”

The letter claimed he would “exit public life and fame” and shift his focus to music, conducted in anonymity.

In addition to the unverified letter, Legacy.com removed Yu’s obituary, which initially described him as a Stanford “tech prodigy” who scaled the AI content-powered Zerebro protocol into an $800 million ecosystem at its peak.

Source: Vee

X user and crypto enthusiast “Vee” also claimed that after Yu’s supposed death, one of his wallets offloaded the Zerebro (ZEREBRO) token for USDC (USDC), which was then moved to the same address that created the Legacoin (LLJEFFY) token.

Vee’s claims were later supported by blockchain analytics firm Bubblemaps, which estimated that $100,000 of ZEREBRO was sold and moved to LLJEFFY.

Onchain transfers conducted by wallets confirmed or believed to be in Yu’s control. Source: Bubblemaps

Meanwhile, one viewer of Yu’s livestream believes the gunshots were edited with brightness and sound effects, while another observer claimed that the flash didn’t come from the gun.

Related: Strange, but true: 5 outlandish and weird crypto stories of 2024

The LLJEFFY token has fallen over 80% to a market cap of $5 million since the incident, DEX Screener data shows.

Yu’s alleged suicide came a few hours after he published a manifesto explaining the concept of Legacoins — or legacy memecoin as he called it — which requires the creator to never sell the coin.

Magazine: Memecoin degeneracy is funding groundbreaking anti-aging research

Digital asset manager Bitwise has filed to list a spot Near exchange-traded fund with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, adding to a growing list of altcoins currently vying to win regulatory approval.

The Bitwise Near (NEAR) ETF will track the price movements of the NEAR token, minus expenses, through a traditional brokerage, Bitwise’s May 6 registration statement shows.

Bitwise named Coinbase Custody as the proposed custodian of the Bitwise NEAR ETF. The management fee, ticker and stock exchange it seeks to list on weren’t named yet. 

Source: Cointelegraph

Bitwise must also file a 19b-4 filing with the SEC to kickstart the regulator’s approval process for the fund. The crypto native asset manager indicated it would make such a filing when it registered a trust linked to the NEAR ETF in Delaware on April 28.

NEAR joins a pile of spot crypto ETFs on the SEC’s desk

The SEC now has at least a dozen spot crypto ETFs to review in 2025, including applications for Litecoin (LTC), Dogecoin (DOGE), Solana (SOL), XRP (XRP), Cardano (ADA), Hedera (HBAR), Polkadot (DOT), Chainlink (LINK), Avalanche (AVAX), Aptos (APT) and Sui (SUI).

Bitwise already has applications out for a spot DOGE, SOL, and XRP ETFs, and also has an approved spot Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) ETF, which are listed on the NYSE Arca and have attracted a combined $2.35 billion in net inflows since launching last year.

NEAR — the token powering the layer-1 Near blockchain — is the 44th largest cryptocurrency by market cap at $2.73 billion, CoinGecko data shows.

The Near blockchain was once touted as an Ethereum killer and is considered by its proponents as a solution to the “blockchain trilemma” — the challenge of achieving all three critical aspects of blockchain performance: security, scalability and decentralization.

Related: Ethereum’s era of crypto dominance is over — LONGITUDE panel

Through Nightshade sharding, Near can process up to 100,000 transactions per second and is secured by 265 active validators, Nearblocks.io data shows.

Source: Justin Bons

The Near ecosystem shifted from decentralized finance to AI infrastructure in 2024, unveiling plans to build the world’s largest open-source large language model.

Magazine: 12 minutes of nail-biting tension when Ethereum’s Pectra fork goes live

Digital asset manager Bitwise has filed to list a spot Near exchange-traded fund with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, adding to a growing list of altcoins currently vying to win regulatory approval.

The Bitwise Near (NEAR) ETF will track the price movements of the NEAR token, minus expenses, through a traditional brokerage, Bitwise’s May 6 registration statement shows.

Bitwise named Coinbase Custody as the proposed custodian of the Bitwise NEAR ETF. The management fee, ticker and stock exchange it seeks to list on weren’t named yet. 

Source: Cointelegraph

Bitwise must also file a 19b-4 filing with the SEC to kickstart the regulator’s approval process for the fund. The crypto native asset manager indicated it would make such a filing when it registered a trust linked to the NEAR ETF in Delaware on April 28.

NEAR joins a pile of spot crypto ETFs on the SEC’s desk

The SEC now has at least a dozen spot crypto ETFs to review in 2025, including applications for Litecoin (LTC), Dogecoin (DOGE), Solana (SOL), XRP (XRP), Cardano (ADA), Hedera (HBAR), Polkadot (DOT), Chainlink (LINK), Avalanche (AVAX), Aptos (APT) and Sui (SUI).

Bitwise already has applications out for a spot DOGE, SOL, and XRP ETFs, and also has an approved spot Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) ETF, which are listed on the NYSE Arca and have attracted a combined $2.35 billion in net inflows since launching last year.

NEAR — the token powering the layer-1 Near blockchain — is the 44th largest cryptocurrency by market cap at $2.73 billion, CoinGecko data shows.

The Near blockchain was once touted as an Ethereum killer and is considered by its proponents as a solution to the “blockchain trilemma” — the challenge of achieving all three critical aspects of blockchain performance: security, scalability and decentralization.

Related: Ethereum’s era of crypto dominance is over — LONGITUDE panel

Through Nightshade sharding, Near can process up to 100,000 transactions per second and is secured by 265 active validators, Nearblocks.io data shows.

Source: Justin Bons

The Near ecosystem shifted from decentralized finance to AI infrastructure in 2024, unveiling plans to build the world’s largest open-source large language model.

Magazine: 12 minutes of nail-biting tension when Ethereum’s Pectra fork goes live

The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) is seeking permission from the court to drop an appeal against prediction market Kalshi. The move could allow the platform to offer political event contracts to users without contest.

In a May 5 filing in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, lawyers for the CFTC filed an unopposed motion for voluntary dismissal, suggesting an agreement with Kalshi.

The motion, subject to approval by the court, could end the CFTC’s appeal against a federal court ruling that the financial regulator could not bar Kalshi from listing political event contracts, i.e., bets on elections.

Motion to dismiss appeal filed by the CFTC on May 5. Source: Courtlistener

Kalshi stipulated in a joint filing that the company would “bear its own costs, court fees and attorney fees incurred” if the court granted the CFTC’s motion to dismiss. The platform said that “election markets are here to stay” in a May 6 X post following the filing.

The betting platform initially filed a lawsuit against the CFTC in 2023 in response to the regulator ordering Kalshi to stop offering political event contracts. The company won in the lower court, prompting the appeal by the CFTC in September 2024.

Motion to drop the appeal after the change in administration?

The case was handled mainly before the US election and the appointment of acting CFTC chair Caroline Pham under President Donald Trump. CFTC Commissioner Summer Mersinger, nominated by former President Joe Biden, reportedly echoed Kalshi’s sentiment in February, claiming that election prediction markets were “here to stay.”

Related: Kalshi accepts Bitcoin deposits in bid to woo crypto-native users

Launched in 2021, Kalshi became popular among many crypto users in part due to bets related to the 2024 US election. Though the CFTC argued in its appeal that betting on the elections could result in “spectacular manipulation” of markets and harm to the public interest, the regulator under Pham and Trump appeared to have reversed its position with the motion to dismiss. 

Magazine: Pokémon on Sui rumors, Polymarket bets on Filipino Pope: Asia Express

A group of crypto traders reportedly purchased millions of dollars worth of Melania Trump’s memecoins minutes before she announced the launch on social media.

According to a May 6 Financial Times report, the crypto traders earned roughly $100 million from buying $2.6 million worth of MELANIA tokens before the public launch on Jan. 19. Shortly after Trump announced the memecoin launch on social media, the price surged from roughly $2.00 to $12.95 — a 550% increase. The traders reportedly sold their holdings within 12 hours.

“In total, the 24 accounts bought up 16.7mn of the 200mn total $MELANIA tokens scheduled for sale during the launch period,” the Financial Times reported. “[…] the run of sales that started pre-launch continued. About $900,000 worth of tokens [were] bought by an additional 22 accounts in the 42 seconds after the launch.”

Price of MELANIA token from Jan. 19 to Jan. 28. Source: CoinMarketCap

The memecoin started trading roughly two days after then-president-elect Donald Trump announced the launch of his own TRUMP coin. Both tokens have come under scrutiny from lawmakers, alleging conflicts of interest and corruption due to the potential for bribery and foreign influence.

Memecoin dinner prompts call for impeachment

Much of the scrutiny and criticism from US lawmakers over the memecoins seems to be directed at the president rather than the first lady. After Trump announced that top TRUMP tokenholders would have a chance to meet him at a private dinner and tour, one senator even called for his impeachment.

Related: Dem lawmakers object to hearing, citing ‘Trump’s crypto corruption’

Both the prices of the MELANIA and TRUMP tokens have dropped significantly since shortly after their launch in January, with the First Lady’s memecoin falling to $0.31 at the time of publication. The TRUMP token price briefly surged after the memecoin dinner announcement in April, but had dropped to $10.90 as of May 6.

Two companies connected to the president control roughly 80% of the TRUMP supply, though many of the tokens were locked and will be released over the next three years. Critics have suggested that the project’s insiders could still rug-pull investors.

Magazine: Trump’s crypto ventures raise conflict of interest, insider trading questions