Coinbase and Better Launch Token-Backed Mortgages
As bitcoin, ethereum and other cryptocurrencies see major legal, institutional, and technological developments, the financial landscape continues to adapt. Stay up on the crypto news that matters with the "Crypto Currents" weekly from The Fly. Also, join us for your essential daily recap, every day at 2 PM ET on FlyCast radio.BETTER, COINBASE LAUNCH TOKEN-BACKED MORTGAGE:Better Home & Finance Holding Companyand Coinbaseannounced Thursdayof Americans. Token-backed mortgages are originated and serviced by Better and benefit from the same backing of Fannie Maeas other conforming mortgages. Bitcoin and USDC pledges are powered by Coinbase. Americans who qualify for a mortgage with Better will now be able to pledge Bitcoin or USDC as collateral to fund their cash down payment, securing a standard conforming mortgage without liquidating tokenized assets or potentially triggering a taxable event. "The ability to transform digital wealth into housing access is an exciting milestone in our mission to increase economic freedom," said Max Branzburg, Head of Consumer and Business Products at Coinbase. "Token-backed mortgages are a major first step to unlocking homeownership for the younger generations that have struggled with barriers to saving for a traditional downpayment."On Wednesday, Chainlink announced that Coinbase has integrated Chainlink to bring its premium exchange data underpinning billions in trading activity onchain for the first time via DataLink, an institutional-grade data publishing service powered by the Chainlink data standard. By making Coinbase's exchange data securely available onchain through Chainlink's oracle platform, DeFi markets have direct access to important market information, driving more accurate pricing, stronger risk management, and entirely new onchain markets.CIRCLE DROPS ON STABLECOIN REGULATION FEARS:The crypto industry got a first look at new legislative language on stablecoin yield in the Clarity Act and early reactions suggest the text may be more restrictive than expected. According to an internal stakeholder email shared with Eleanor Terrett, journalist and host of Crypto in America, the proposal would prohibit platforms from offering yield "directly or indirectly" on stablecoin balances or in any manner resembling a bank deposit. The restriction would apply broadly to digital asset service providers and their affiliates to limit workarounds, and would bar anything "economically or functionally equivalent" to interest, she reported on X. The draft would still permit activity-based rewards tied to user activity, including loyalty, promotional, or subscription programs, provided they are not deemed economically or functionally equivalent to interest. Circle Internettradedon what appears to be worries that the "economic equivalence" test and tighter restrictions on rewards could constrain stablecoin related business lines.Following the report, Clear Street argued that Circle's roughly 20% decline on Tuesday looked like a "shoot first, ask questions later" reaction, driven by headlines about "banning stablecoin yield" in the revised CLARITY Act and Tether hiring a Big Four firm for its first full audit, sparking speculations of potential U.S. expansion. However, the move is overdone, and the firm's core thesis on stablecoin adoption including tokenization, prediction markets, agentic AI payments, 24/7 market structure, collateral mobility, and cross-border payments remains intact, added the analyst, who kept a Buy rating and $152 price target on Circle shares.Meanwhile, Morgan Stanley attributed the roughly 20% pullback in shares to reports from various sources suggesting that the current circulating version of the CLARITY Act does not allow for payment of yield nor rewards to stablecoin holders for simply holding a stablecoin after a meeting between Senate Banking and crypto industry leaders on Monday. The firm attributed the negative reaction in shares to previously-building expectations that the White House would push a compromise more favorable to the crypto industry that would permit holding-based interest/rewards payments, noted the analyst, who believes the core potential of Circle lies in future use cases which are "nascent in monetization." The firm kept an Equal Weight rating and $80 price target on Circle shares.Additionally on Tuesday, Circle announced a collaboration between one of its affiliates and Sasai Fintech, a business of Cassava Technologies, to accelerate USDC adoption and expand internet-native financial infrastructure across Africa. Stablecoin use in Africa is growing rapidly, driven by mobile-first consumers, cross-border commerce, and a rapidly expanding digital economy. Together, Circle and Sasai Fintech will explore practical applications for USDC and how Circle's full stack platform can support reducing costs, frictions and settlement time for Sasai's enterprise and consumer customers.On Wednesday, Triple-A announced that it has integrated with Circle Payments Network. As a participating Beneficiary Financial Institution on CPN, Triple-A supports stablecoin-to-local currency settlement across key global corridors. With this integration, Triple-A brings its cross-border payout capabilities into CPN to support use cases including remittances, payroll, supplier payments, and global treasury management across major financial markets.GEMINI PRICE TARGETS LOWERED:Mizuho lowered the firm's price target on Geminitoon the shares. The firm said a softer outlook for trading activity offsets continued strength in Gemini's card and services businesses. The company's near-term revenue growth could be constrained by a softer outlook for asset prices and lower transaction volumes across its core exchange, the analyst said.Meanwhile, Needham lowered the firm's price target on Gemini to $8 from $10 and kept a Buy rating on the shares.Goldman Sachs lowered the firm's price target on Gemini to $6.50 from $7.50 and kept a Neutral rating on the shares. Crypto stocks have declined 46% since their October 2025 peak and have shown volatile but mostly flat performance recently, reflecting investor uncertainty about the sector's outlook, the analyst said. Despite this, select digital-asset-sensitive names present increasingly attractive entry points, Goldman added. The analyst also lowered the firm's price target on Coinbase to $235 from $270 and on RobinhoodtoThe firm kept a Buy rating on the shares. Additionally, Goldman Sachs lowered the firm's price target on eTorotoon the shares.Truist lowered the firm's price target on Gemini to $5 from $7 and kept a Hold rating on the shares. The firm is updating its Q4 estimates based on the continued pullback across crypto markets, though this is partially offset by continued growth in the card business, the analyst said.CRYPTO EARNINGS:On Thursday, BitGoreported awhich compared to analyst estimates of a loss per share of (42c) on revenue of $6.08B. "In January, BitGo became the first public, federally chartered digital asset infrastructure company," said Mike Belshe, CEO. "This milestone, in combination with our strong fourth quarter and full year 2025 results and continued market share expansion, serves to strengthen our value proposition while supporting investments in our strategy as we enhance and broaden our suite of institutional-grade infrastructure solutions…The year has started with some macro volatility, but we are confident that our ability to capture near-term opportunities and grow our client pipeline position us well to mitigate these headwinds."Following the report, Clear Street lowered the firm's price target on BitGo to $16 from $18 and kept a Buy rating on the shares. The company is shifting towards higher-quality, recurring revenue and improving operating leverage, the analyst said. The firm remains positive on the shares but cut BitGo's estimates to reflect near-term macro headwinds.Additionally, Goldman Sachs lowered the firm's price target on BitGo to $10.50 from $12 and kept a Neutral rating on the shares. BitGo reported a largely in-line Q4, highlighting continued momentum, despite a challenging crypto market backdrop, the analyst said.Cantor Fitzgerald lowered the firm's price target on BitGo to $17 from $18 and kept an Overweight rating on the shares. BitGo reported largely in-line Q4 results in its first earnings call post-IPO, capping a record year with 104% client growth, 513% trading volume growth, and $2.8B in Q4 stablecoin-as-a-service assets under management, the analyst said. Despite a weaker crypto market year-to-date, the company remains well-positioned given regulatory tailwinds, international expansion plans, profitability, and a debt-free balance sheet, with shares near post-IPO lows seen as an attractive entry point, Cantor said.Rosenblatt lowered the firm's price target on BitGo to $15 from $17 and kept a Buy rating on the shares. Although Q4 results were just inline and the core business will be under market-related pressure in Q1, BitGo's first quarterly earnings report "strongly supports our case that the stock represents a defensive way to gain exposure to crypto equities," the analyst said.On Monday, BitGo announced the launch of the BitGo Model Context Protocol Server, a new capability that integrates BitGo into AI-native development workflows by enabling AI-powered tools to search, read, and interact with BitGo's developer resources using natural language.On Tuesday, BitGo Prime and Susquehanna Crypto announced a partnership to provide eligible institutional clients with access to prediction market liquidity through BitGo's OTC desk and platform. The offering is designed to enable hedge funds, family offices, and ultra-high-net-worth individuals the ability to trade listed prediction markets on an OTC basis using cryptocurrency or stablecoin-denominated collateral already held within BitGo's platform. Liquidity for offering will be supported by Susquehanna Crypto.Meanwhile on Wednesday, BitGo announced support for CIP-56 token standard assets on the Canton Network, including USDCx and cBTC. The launch expands BitGo's Canton infrastructure from custody of the network's native token, Canton Coin, to the broader ecosystem of institutional financial assets built on the CIP-56 token standard.On Thursday, Hyperion DeFireported awhich compared to EPS of 5c on revenue of $302,506 in Q3. Gross HYPE Tokens increased from 1.72M as of Q3 to 1.88M as of Q4."Against a backdrop of significant market volatility, we are pleased to report rapid growth in our DeFi operating businesses which exceeded our guidance in the fourth quarter," said Hyunsu Jung, CEO. "Today, we are reporting detail on each business we have built in our first six months under our new DeFi strategy. We continue to make progress on our Company's corporate transformation as a premier institutional gateway to DeFi innovation, and we expect each business to continue to scale through 2026 and beyond. Hyperion DeFi is building for the future of on-chain finance. This is more than just HYPE."Hyperion DeFi also announced Tuesday that it has entered a HYPE Asset Use Service agreement with Silhouette, a newly launched shielded trading platform built for Hyperliquid. The company will provide the use of staked HYPE to Silhouette, enabling the exchange's global users to access substantially reduced transaction fees when submitting trades to Hyperliquid via its platform. Silhouette is expected to initiate a growth campaign shortly, which will further incentivize trading activity on its platform.On Wednesday, CIMG Inc.reportedwhich compared to revenue of $22,853 last year. As of December 31, the company held 730 Bitcoins with a carrying value of $63,978,821. Alice Wang, CEO of CIMG, stated, "The company will continue to focus on the Asia market and deepen the dual-track layout of health consumer goods and computing power technology products. On the one hand, we will seek to expand the online and offline sales channels for maca series and homology of medicine and food series products, optimize product pricing and cost control, and improve the gross profit margin of core categories over time, although there can be no assurance that these efforts will be successful. On the other hand, we will increase R&D investment in computing power products, improve the industry-specific customized development of artificial intelligence data processing modules, further expand the enterprise customer base, and raise the revenue share of the computing power business."CIMG Inc. also announced Tuesday that it entered into a non-binding memorandum of understanding with Bedrock to explore a strategic collaboration aimed at advancing compliant institutional decentralized finance solutions. The primary objective of the proposed collaboration is to bridge the gap between traditional finance and the decentralized ecosystem by offering a secure and scalable pathway designed to align with regulatory requirements for institutional engagement with on-chain finance, with an immediate focus on Bitcoin liquid staking.NYSE, SECURITIZE PARTNER FOR TOKENIZED SECURITIES SUPPORT:The New York Stock Exchange, part of Intercontinental Exchange, and Securitize announced Tuesday, with Securitize named as the first digital transfer agent eligible to mint blockchain-native securities for corporate or ETF issuers on the upcoming NYSE-affiliated tokenized securities platform. As part of the collaboration formalized in their Memorandum of Understanding, NYSE plans to partner with Securitize as a premier design partner in the development of a digital transfer agent program intended to support on-chain settlement of tokenized security transactions. The companies plan to collaborate on the development of standards for digital transfer agents and tokenization agents participating in the digital ecosystem, with a focus on establishing regulatory, operational, and technology requirements for institutional-grade tokenized securities infrastructure."The NYSE continues to lead the industry in responsible innovation," said Lynn Martin, President, NYSE Group. "As we explore how tokenization can enhance capital markets, it is critical that new infrastructure is developed in a way that preserves the trust, transparency, and protections investors expect. Securitize brings deep experience in digital asset infrastructure and transfer agency, making them a strong partner in helping design this next generation of market structure."OTHER CRYPTO NEWS:BitFuFuprice targetat H.C. WainwrightBitcoin DepotCEOAlex Holmes succeeds, H.C. Wainwright raises price target to $4 from $3.50Hyperscale DatareportsStrategyacquiresBitmine Immersionreportslaunches MAVAN Ethereum staking platform, B. Riley raises price target to $33 from $30SRx Healthhedges DeFi portfolio withMara HoldingssellsTeraWulfinitiatedat AreteHut 8initiatedat AreteStriveprice target loweredat MaximEmpery Digitalsellsrejects nomination notices from ATG Capital, Tice BrownNovaBayto change nameBMOintroduceswith CME, Google CloudQ2 HoldingsentersCleanSparkpreferredsays NorthlandCRYPTO STOCK PLAYS:Publicly traded companies in the space include Bit Digital, Coinbase, Core Scientific, Greenidge Generation, Mara Holdings, Strategy, Riot Platformsand TeraWulf.PRICE ACTION:As of time of writing, bitcoin dropped roughly 5% this week to $66,269 in U.S. dollars, according to CoinDesk.
