Tether reserves, USDT blockages in Russia, and Bitcoin's identity crisis: the main events of the week
This week, I focused on several key events shaping the market's trajectory: pressure from Russian banks on crypto companies, Tether's first full audit, the risk of a Solana halt, rising costs of AI computing, and the fundamental question of Bitcoin's role in the global economy.
Russian banks tighten compliance for crypto businesses
Russian financial institutions have begun asking companies working with USDT to provide confirmation of inclusion in the Central Bank's registry, which does not actually exist yet. This is classic de-risking ahead of September 1, when cryptocurrency settlements for foreign economic activity will transition from an experimental phase to permanent practice. Businesses will face stricter checks, rising operational costs, and the risk of legal liability for illegal exchanges.
My assessment: the transition period has started ahead of schedule, and the key challenge for the industry will be transforming chaotic manual checks into a clear, transparent procedure that allows settlements to be legalized without administrative pressure.
Tether: first independent audit and excess reserves
Tether has completed its first full audit, conducted by KPMG US, receiving an unqualified opinion that its 2025 financial statements comply with U.S. standards. Auditors not only verified the balance sheet but also physically counted the gold reserves, which, along with other assets, exceeded the issuer's liabilities by $6.81 billion.
This is an important signal for the stablecoin market: while the opinion does not guarantee perpetual transparency, it sets a new standard for all major issuers. Amid growing regulatory pressure, this could become a benchmark for the industry as a whole.
Solana: close to disaster due to infrastructure failure
The Solana network came dangerously close to a complete halt after a routing failure at provider TeraSwitch. Validators controlling 28.83% of staked SOL went offline simultaneously, nearly reaching the critical threshold of 33.34%, beyond which transactions cease to finalize. The issue was resolved within 33 minutes, but the incident vividly demonstrated vulnerability due to infrastructure centralization.
For institutional investors, this is a wake-up call: network reliability should not depend on a single provider, otherwise trust in Solana as a high-throughput platform will be undermined.
AI industry: paradigm shift from algorithms to infrastructure
The potential acquisition of startup Decart by Anthropic for $6 billion and personnel changes at Google have exposed the sector's main problem—the astronomical cost of model maintenance. Competition is shifting from algorithm development to the battle for GPUs, energy resources, and inference optimization.
In the long term, this sharply raises the barrier to entry: only players who can effectively manage product economics at scale, rather than merely generating new models, will prevail.
Bitcoin: identity crisis and the search for a macroeconomic role
Bitcoin is undergoing a fundamental crisis of self-definition. Miners' revenue from fees has fallen to an all-time low of 0.69%, and the hash rate is declining due to competition with AI for energy capacity. The paradox is that major funds, including BlackRock, are actively buying the asset, but it has stopped correlating with stocks and gold, failing to serve as a "safe haven" during periods of market shocks.
My expert opinion: Bitcoin has already outgrown its status as a speculative instrument, but its real macroeconomic role has yet to be defined. Until the asset finds a stable correlation with global risks or inflation, its volatility will deter conservative investors, despite institutional interest.
This is a shortened version of my weekly analysis. The full edition is available on major podcast platforms.