CryptoPunk #3609 sold for 440 ETH, approximately $1.087 million

On May 18th, NVIDIA (NVDA.O) is aiming to decrease its dependence on large tech companies. It is seeking to form new partnerships in order to sell its AI chips to national states, corporate groups, and those challenging groups like Microsoft, Amazon, and Google. This week, NVIDIA announced a multi-billion-dollar US chip deal with Humain in Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile, the UAE disclosed plans to cooperate with the US government to build one of the world's largest data centers. These "sovereign AI" transactions play a crucial role in NVIDIA's strategy to attract customers outside of Silicon Valley. NVIDIA executives, industry insiders, and analysts stated that the $3.2 trillion chipmaker intends to expand its business beyond mega-scale enterprises. NVIDIA mentioned that large cloud computing groups account for more than half of its data center revenue and are actively providing support to potential competitors of Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud. This includes promotin

May 18th: The current mainstream CEX and DEX funding rates have witnessed a slight rebound, and the market has become cautiously bullish. The specific funding rates for mainstream currencies are presented in the attached image. BlockBeats Note: The funding rate is a rate set by cryptocurrency trading platforms to maintain the balance between the contract price and the underlying asset price. It is usually applicable to perpetual contracts and serves as a funding exchange mechanism between long and short traders. The trading platform does not charge this fee. Its purpose is to adjust the cost or profit of traders holding contracts to keep the contract price close to the underlying asset price. When the funding rate is 0.01%, it represents the baseline rate. When the funding rate is greater than 0.01%, it indicates a generally bullish market. When the funding rate is less than 0.005%, it indicates a generally bearish market.

On May 18th, Coinbase made an announcement. Webull Pay has chosen Coinbase to be its cryptocurrency partner and will make use of Coinbase's Cryptocurrency as a Service (CaaS) platform. Webull Pay will employ Coinbase's institutional-level custody services, advanced trading capabilities, USDC, and staking services.

On May 18th, according to HTX market data, Bitcoin has exceeded $104,000, and the 24-hour growth rate is 0.57%.

May 18th. As per Dennis Porter, a co-founder of SAF, the Texas Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Bill (SB 21) is set to undergo its second reading in the House on May 20th. This is a crucial step preceding the final vote. In case the bill secures the full House vote before the Texas legislature adjourns on June 2nd, it will be forwarded to the Governor for signing. On March 6, 2025, the Texas Senate passed the SB 21 bill with 25 votes in favor and 5 against, thereby setting the stage for its consideration in the House. On May 8, 2025, the SB 21 bill passed the House Committee without any amendments and moved on to the full House vote stage. The SB 21 bill aims to establish the Texas Strategic Bitcoin Reserve by investing in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. The reserve fund will be composed of appropriations through legislation, dedicated revenues, purchased cryptocurrencies, investment returns, and donations. It will also implement security measures like cold storage. The bill mentions th

On May 18th, as per Reuters, venture capital firm A100x declared the launch of its second fund aimed at supporting AI, digital assets, and blockchain startups. The size of this fund is $50 million. The first phase of the fund started its operations in mid-2024 and has already completed 15 investment rounds. A100x's current portfolio within the blockchain and artificial intelligence domains consists of: Web3 solution Blockdaemon, mining cloud service Coreweave, on-chain analytics platform Nansen, blockchain game developer Mythical Games, tokenization company Securitize, and so on.