Bitcoin Withdrawal Sentiment Continues, with a 24-hour CEX Net Outflow of 1,177.57 BTC

February 18th — Per Coinbob Popular Address Monitoring (via https://t.me/Coinbob_track_CN), the "neoyokio.eth" whale (0x152) added to its position again last night and this morning. This comes after the whale opened a 2x-leveraged ASTER spot position on January 28th. Currently, its 4x-leveraged ASTER long position has grown to $14.9 million, with an average entry price of $0.6188 and an unrealized profit of ~$1.86 million (50%). It’s now the largest on-chain ASTER long position. The whale’s associated sub-address (0xfb5...) previously held ~$2 million in ASTER long positions but has since closed all of them. It currently holds no relevant positions. This whale also built a $20 million, 1x-leveraged XPL long position at an average price of $0.69 on September 24th — right before XPL’s sharp price surge. It became the largest on-chain XPL long position during XPL’s main uptrend, with a peak unrealized gain of over $16 million. That sparked insider trading suspicions around XPL.

February 18, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong took to social media to address the question: “Why is Coinbase always misunderstood or underestimated by Wall Street?” He stated: “I do think Coinbase is a misunderstood company—this is a classic ‘innovator’s dilemma.’ On one hand, the savviest traditional financial institutions are fully embracing the crypto industry. Five Global Systemically Important Banks (GSIBs) have already partnered with Coinbase, and many large financial firms are hiring crypto talent. As regulations become clearer, roughly 50% of major financial institutions are actively leaning into this trend. On the other hand, the other half are still lagging and resisting. The world’s most disruptive innovations have followed a similar pattern—think Uber, Airbnb, self-driving tech, AI applications, or SpaceX’s impact on NASA. Since the crypto industry directly disrupts Wall Street, it’s no surprise some on Wall Street misunderstand crypto and Coinbase. The smart ones will em

On February 18, a Fortune report noted that Hyperliquid has launched the Hyperliquid Policy Center — a lobbying organization led by Jake Chervinsky — with the Hyperliquid Foundation set to provide $28 million worth of HYPE as initial funding.

February 18: White House National Economic Council Chair Hassett said, "We think the Fed still has plenty of room to cut interest rates." (Forex Live)

On February 18, Fortune reported that Novig—a sports-focused prediction market platform—has closed a $75 million Series B funding round led by Pantera Capital, valuing the company at $5 billion post-money. Founded in 2021, Novig targets modern sports bettors with a consumer-friendly platform, where its key differentiator is a peer-to-peer transaction model. The firm is currently seeking a license from the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), with approval expected within six months. Unlike Kalshi and Polymarket, Novig’s product design and brand are solely focused on sports—aligning more closely with everyday sports fans’ usage habits.

February 18 Saudi-backed AI firm Humain has invested $3 billion in Elon Musk’s AI startup xAI, taking a key minority stake in the company. The investment came shortly before Musk’s aerospace firm SpaceX acquired xAI—with Humain’s stake set to convert into SpaceX shares. Founded last year to turn Saudi Arabia into an AI powerhouse, Humain and SpaceX plan to build a 500-megawatt data center in the kingdom. Source: Jinse