Crypto rebound driven by ETF flows and product launches, but Washington uncertainty clouds outlook

Cryptocurrency markets staged a notable upswing over the week with large-cap tokens leading gains even as lawmakers in Washington and regulators abroad remained a focal point for investors. Bitcoin traded back above the mid-five-figure mark after roughly a single-digit weekly rise while Ether posted a slightly stronger percentage advance amid activity around prominent Ethereum treasuries. US spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds continued to supply liquidity, recording several days of net inflows that supported price momentum and underpinned renewed institutional interest. New product launches and capital deployment were also visible: a mining firm committed a sizable equity investment into a major creator-run entertainment company, and a dollar-backed stablecoin-backed lending marketplace launched with a multibillion-dollar market cap that enabled onchain borrowing and lending against mainstream tokens. At the same time, domestic legislative progress appears muddled — a high-profile Senate markup of market-structure legislation is likely to be postponed after the withdrawal of a major industry backer, elevating near-term policy uncertainty in the US. That domestic uncertainty sits alongside an array of international developments that together amplify execution risk: reports of a Justice Department inquiry touching senior central-bank staff, a major US exchange suspending peso-denominated services in Argentina citing operational reassessment, cancellations of Europe-facing NFT events because of weak trading conditions, and state-level experiments with publicly issued stablecoins listed on major venues. Regulators in jurisdictions including Italy and Moldova are moving toward clearer — and in some cases stricter — compliance expectations for marketing and market access, a shift that is already prompting platform-level changes in service maps and outreach. Operationally, several DeFi teams are tightening public support channels after repeated scam activity, and derivatives traders continue to migrate activity to perpetual decentralized exchanges that promise lower costs and integrated services. Taken together, the week combined healthy spot and product-driven demand with a more complex risk landscape: near-term price action benefits from ETF-driven liquidity, but the persistence of gains depends on how policy clarity evolves and whether projects and platforms can harden user protections and cross-border operating models. For market participants, the coming weeks will test whether fresh flows translate into sustained institutional adoption or a repricing around regulatory and enforcement headlines.