Market and regulation news for Indian investors.
The BCI News Desk covers market moves, regulation and industry news, and explains what each story means for someone investing from India. Every news story links to the report it is based on, and we correct errors when we find them.
Articles from this desk are reviewed by Gaurav Vyas, the site's founder.
How we research, source and correct stories is set out in our editorial policy. Spotted a mistake? Tell us and we will fix it.
India
India, first in last year's Chainalysis crypto adoption index, is sixth in the redesigned 2026 edition. Brazil leads. Here is how India scored and why it moved.
Exchanges
Bitget reopens withdrawals in stages after its $387.5 million hack: BTC from 28 September, ETH on 29 September, USDT on 30 September, the rest on 2 October.
Bitcoin
Bitcoin fell about 2% to near $83,000 on Monday as Iran tensions and a 5.17% US 10-year yield hit risk assets, despite $2.4 billion of ETF inflows last week.
ETFs
US spot Ether ETFs took in $689.9 million in the week to 25 September, led by BlackRock ETHA, a sharp turnaround from $140 million of outflows the week before.
Stablecoins
Binance bought $100 million of Circle shares at a 5% discount and renewed its USDC deal for five years. Here is what it means for USDC and Tether's lead.
Stablecoins
Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino says USDT is returning to Bitcoin, using the RGB protocol and Lightning. UniSat joins as a wallet partner. No launch date yet.
Ethereum
Ethereum's Glamsterdam upgrade will hit the Sepolia testnet on 6 October, not 28 September. Mainnet is aimed at December. Here are the dates and what changes.
ETFs
US spot XRP ETFs saw zero flows on 21 September, then took in $75.6 million over four days. Seven funds now hold about 1.2 billion XRP worth $2 billion.
Altcoins
Miners create about 13.5 million DOGE, worth $1.3 million, every day. Dogecoin ETFs rarely take in that much. Here is why it matters for the DOGE price.
Stablecoins
SoFi Bank now settles its whole Mastercard debit and credit card program in its own stablecoin, SoFiUSD. It is the first US national bank to go live.
ETFs
US Solana ETFs took in $188.21 million from 21 to 25 September, their biggest week since launch. Bitwise BSOL alone drew $128 million. Here is what it means.
Markets
Key crypto dates for 28 September to 4 October 2026: Bitget withdrawals, a new NEAR ETF, the Q3 close, Brazil wallet rules and US jobs data, in IST.
Stablecoins
BlackRock's 'Machine-Native Economy' paper argues AI agents will pay each other in stablecoins, and that most AI models it tested favour Bitcoin for saving.
Altcoins
The Clearing House, owned by major US banks, chose Quant to link tokenized deposits between banks. QNT rose 62% in a week. Here's what the deal means.
Regulation
From 1 October, crypto firms in Brazil must report transfers of $10,000 or more to or from self-custody wallets. Holding your own keys stays legal.
Ethereum
In a new post, Vitalik Buterin says Ethereum will be almost unrecognisable by 2030: proof-based checks, faster finality, built-in privacy and quantum safety.
Bitcoin
Bitcoin treasury firm Strategy wants to pay dividends on four preferred stocks every day. Shareholders vote on 28 October; STRC would switch first, in November.
Trading
Hyperliquid's next network upgrade will cut the maximum hourly funding rate from 4% to 0.5% and double the limits on its HIP-4 outcome contracts.
ETFs
NYSE Arca has approved the Bitwise NEAR ETF (ticker NRR). The fund will stake 100% of its NEAR, charge 0.75% a year and could start trading around 29 September.
Security
The attacker behind the $387.5 million Bitget breach is moving stolen XRP out of its holding wallets. Here is why nobody can freeze it, and what happens on Sunday.
Exchanges
CoinEx stops all trading on Tuesday and sells leftover tokens other than USDT. Here is the checklist before the exchange shuts for good on 22 December.
Bitcoin
Researchers propose Zcash-style private transfers on Bitcoin without changing its rules. The catch: there is no way to move real BTC in or out yet.
Stablecoins
Circle Foundation grants will help the UNDP and the World Food Programme test regulated stablecoins for sending aid faster and more cheaply.
Bitcoin
Bitcoin gave back part of its early-week jump above $87,000 and is holding near $84,000. Rising US bond yields and Fed hike bets are now in focus.
Altcoins
Batch, which lets users bundle up to eight XRP Ledger transactions into one, will now go live no earlier than 9 October after a validator vote reset.
India
India's FIU has named 15 offshore crypto platforms for breaking anti-money laundering rules and asked for their apps and websites to be blocked.
India
Under a rule in force since 1 April 2026, crypto platforms must send user-level trade data to the Income Tax Department. Here is what it means for you.
Regulation
SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce, who led the agency's Crypto Task Force, confirmed her last day is 2 October, leaving the commission with just two members.
Regulation
New SEC staff FAQs say buybacks and upgrades on a working blockchain do not, on their own, make a token a security. Here is what changed and why it matters.
Altcoins
Altcoins beat Bitcoin as Solana crossed $120 for the first time in eight months, XRP neared $1.57 and the Altcoin Season Index hit a three-month high.
ETFs
US spot Bitcoin ETFs took in $134 million on Friday, a seventh straight day of inflows, and about $2.4 billion this week. Net flows for 2026 are now positive.
Bitcoin
The $16 billion quarterly Bitcoin options expiry passed quietly. BTC dipped to $83,700 and trades near $84,000, and analysts say the price pin is now gone.
Security
Bitget raised its hack loss to about $387.5 million after finding more affected assets on Zcash and TRON, and will restart withdrawals in stages from 28 Sep.
Regulation
The EU now bans dealings with Russian crypto providers, the digital ruble and 14 offshore platforms. Here is how the 20th and 21st packages change the rules.
Regulation
Russia's crypto law is now in force. Retail buyers can spend up to 300,000 rubles a year per intermediary on BTC, ETH or USDT, but crypto payments are banned.
Regulation
Russia's digital ruble began its mass rollout on 1 September 2026. Who must accept it, what it costs, why many Russians are wary and why the EU banned it early.
Explainer
Ukraine has received well over $200 million in crypto donations since 2022. Here are the key figures, where the money went and how crypto giving has changed.
Bitcoin
After about 280 days below it, Bitcoin has climbed back above its roughly $85,000 production cost, JPMorgan says, which could ease forced selling by miners.
Investing
ARK Invest is putting its $1.3B ARK Venture Fund (ARKVX), which holds OpenAI, Anthropic and Stripe, on Ethereum through Securitize for qualified investors.
Altcoins
Ondo Finance has rolled out three tokenized portfolios based on BlackRock model strategies for non-US investors, and the ONDO token rose about 27% on the news.
Security
Crypto casino Duelbits is offline after attackers drained about $7M from its hot wallets on Ethereum, BNB Chain, Tron and Bitcoin. It says user funds are safe.
Investing
Bullish, Alpaca, Apex Fintech, Equiniti and DriveWealth have teamed up to set standards for issuer-backed tokenized stocks that carry real shareholder rights.
Markets
Bitcoin holds near $84,000 as bond yields and oil ease. XRP and SOL rise, Quant jumps 39% and $14B of BTC options expire on 25 September.
Security
Attackers drained $351.6M from Bitget's hot and warm wallets using spoofed transfers. The CEO says keys are safe and a $464M fund covers the loss.
Regulation
New York says Polymarket's crypto prediction market is unlicensed gambling that lets 18-20 year olds bet, and it wants triple penalties.
Regulation
The Fed has proposed GENIUS Act rules on stablecoin reserves, capital, rewards and bank issuers. Here is what they mean for USDT and USDC users in India.
Regulation
US futures brokers can now put customer funds into tokenised versions of permitted assets and keep required records on a blockchain, per new CFTC guidance.
Altcoins
Seven UK lenders including Barclays, HSBC and Lloyds made the first live interbank tokenised deposit payments on Quant's ledger. QNT rose about 39% on the news.
Regulation
The EU's securities watchdog ESMA will prioritise AI and tokenization in its supervision from 2027, as firms bring both into customer-facing financial products.
Markets
IBM has connected Digital Asset Haven to Swift's blockchain ledger, letting banks handle tokenized deposit transactions with standard ISO 20022 messages.
Guides
Bitcoin's dip to about $83,150 is driven by US bond yields, not a crypto crisis. Here is how to read it, and the tax and risk rules Indian investors must know.
Bitcoin
StarkWare says a week-long contest using AI coding tools cut the estimated GPU cost of a quantum-resistant bitcoin transaction from about $320 to $66.
Altcoins
Polygon has burned 100 million POL, roughly 1% of supply, using collected base fees. Yet POL fell over 6% on the day. We look at how the burn works and why.
India
Infosys will offer Chainlink's CCIP, Proof of Reserve and data feeds to its banking clients. Here is what the deal covers, what it omits and why India cares.
India
Jetking Infotrain, India's best-known bitcoin treasury company, meets shareholders on Sept 29, its first AGM since SAT backed BSE's refusal to list its shares.
Regulation
A week after the US crypto market-structure bill failed in the Senate, Trump's crypto adviser Patrick Witt says the push now shifts to regulators like the SEC.
Markets
Blockchain.com plans to give users round-the-clock access to tokenized US-listed stocks and ETFs via NYSE's planned digital venue, once regulators approve.
Security
Europe's three financial supervisors flagged quantum risk in their autumn report. By some estimates, about 6.9 million BTC sit in addresses with exposed keys.
Altcoins
LTC rose about 8% to near $66 while Bitcoin fell, taking its September gain to 37%. More than $1 billion of value moved on the Litecoin network in a single day.
Security
A 23-year-old from Brooklyn posed as Coinbase support and tricked about 100 users into moving nearly $16M. The same trick is used against Indian investors.
With about $18 billion of Bitcoin and Ether options expiring on Friday, here is what max pain, put-call ratio and open interest mean, and what they don't.
Regulation
US agencies are exploring joint ventures with private firms to spread dollar-backed stablecoins abroad, aiming to reinforce the dollar and Treasury demand.
Altcoins
Money rotated into older 'Bitcoin family' coins as an altseason gauge hit 90%. Within hours, XRP, Dogecoin, NEAR and Zcash were among the biggest losers.
Markets
A weak US five-year note auction sent the 10-year yield to its highest since 2007, pulling Bitcoin off an eight-month peak and XRP down about 8%.
Bitcoin
About $15.9 billion of Bitcoin options and $2.1 billion of Ether options expire on Deribit on 25 September. Calls dominate, while max pain sits at $75,000.
ETFs
Nearly $1B flowed into US spot Bitcoin ETFs as BTC broke $80,000, and altcoin funds had their best week of 2026. Analysts see resistance at $87,000 to $88,000.
India
After three years at No. 1, India ranks sixth under a new method that weights activity by income. Brazil tops the list, and India is still 2nd for inflows.
Exchanges
The exchange that pioneered perpetual futures stopped trading and deposits on 22 September. Users can still withdraw, but idle balances face a monthly fee.
Bitcoin
BTC gained about 6% in a day and over 10% in a week as shorts were squeezed and the Fear & Greed index returned to 'Greed'. Analysts still see pullback risk.
Ethereum
Ether rose for six straight sessions to about $2,732, its highest since January, while Bitcoin sat in a month-long range. Altcoin rotation is unconfirmed.
Markets
Strategy and Strive bought about $184 million of Bitcoin on Monday, and US spot ETFs drew $433 million on 18 September, steady demand linked to the rally.
Exchanges
CoinEx says compliance risk and shrinking volumes no longer justify staying open. Spot trading ends on 29 September and all funds must be out by 22 December.
India
REC, L&T and IIFL raised about $107 million via corporate bonds issued as blockchain tokens, paid in the RBI's wholesale digital rupee and settled same day.
Security
Stolen keys and admin credentials, not smart-contract bugs, now cause the most DeFi losses, with North Korea's Lazarus Group linked to about $575 million.
Regulation
A Standing Committee study, a Finance Ministry hearing and an interim self-regulation idea put India's crypto law back on the table. Here is where it stands.
Exchanges
No paid rankings here. Use this checklist to judge any Indian crypto exchange on FIU registration, KYC, fees, INR withdrawals, safety and TDS reports.
Bitcoin
Bitcoin has left gold, the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq far behind this quarter. An FxPro analyst calls it a bull market but warns sharp pullbacks remain possible.
Bitcoin
Galaxy Research found 13 such crossovers since 2011, and 11 were never followed by a lower low. The two failures in 2021 and 2022 show the limits of the signal.
Markets
Bitcoin rose about 6% despite a Fed rate rise to 4.00%. Coming up: the SEC's tokenised-securities pilot, US jobs and durable-goods data and $89M of unlocks.
Altcoins
Proposal 68 passed on 58% turnout. ZETA will convert 1:1 into an SPL token on Solana as the team shifts its focus to Anuma, a privacy-focused AI app.
Security
An attacker drained a few dozen of Blink's custodial accounts, while non-custodial Spark wallets were safe. Blink has patched the flaw and will repay users.
Regulation
Goldman Sachs and Citizens analysts say firms already tokenising stocks lead under the SEC's five-year exemption, which requires dividends and votes.
CBDC
SAMA says it finished its mBridge proof of concept in May 2025 and then left. China, Hong Kong, Thailand and the UAE are taking the platform commercial.
Regulation
Draft rules add two new ratios, a 1,250% risk weight on direct holdings and action after six breaches in 30 days, with reporting from January 2027.
India
After a year of hearings, Parliament's finance panel has finished questioning the DEA on VDAs. Chair Mahtab says not regulating leaves scope for 'indulgences'.
