Ripple Swell 2026 is scheduled for October 27–29 at The Shed in Hudson Yards, New York City, combining Ripple’s Swell conference with the XRPL Apex developer summit into one three-day event. The program is described as the largest Swell to date, citing 1,500+ attendees, 75+ speakers, 50+ sessions, and three parallel stages for institutions, ecosystem builders, and emerging technology.

CME Group CEO Terrence Duffy said the exchange operator will file a federal lawsuit against the CFTC over the regulator’s late-May approval of bitcoin perpetual futures for prediction-market platform Kalshi. He argues the contracts approved as futures should be treated as swaps under the Dodd-Frank Act and says the agency exceeded its authority by fast-tracking the approval without adequate review. Duffy also said CME holds exclusive licensing agreements with major benchmark providers whose indexes underpin crypto-derivatives pricing.

A strategic investment in Flutterwave’s Series E round places RLUSD at the core of Africa’s payments infrastructure, reinforcing the XRPL settlement narrative. The development is framed as supportive for an XRP bull case, though price action has yet to respond.

Forward Industries’ all-stock acquisition proposals for three rival Solana treasury firms were rejected or went unanswered. The company is left holding more than 7 million SOL bought at an average price well above current market levels, with no completed deal to show for the M&A push. The targets—Solana Company, Brera Holdings and SkyAI—each declined to accept FWDI equity as consideration.

XRP is back in motion, with price action supported by rising volume and fresh forecasts. The token has gained 10% over the past 24 hours. Traders are watching for follow-through after the latest move.

Charles Hoskinson is defending a 1,096 BTC allocation from Cardano’s early foundation structure, which he says funded a legitimate audit of the original ADA crowdsale. The amount was worth roughly $454,000 when moved in March 2016 and about $70 million at current prices. Critics argue the issue is the lack of a public paper trail for the payment and want supporting records.

Europe’s MiCA transitional period ends July 1, 2026, and most crypto firms are not yet fully authorized. Of 1,200+ firms that previously held national VASP registrations across the bloc, about 210 have converted to full CASP licensing, a conversion rate of roughly 17%. That leaves 83% either outside the window, still mid-process without legal standing to operate, or having exited.

Earlier this week, Tether's USDT briefly moved ahead of Ethereum by market capitalization, with trackers placing both assets in the $183–188B band during the crossover. One snapshot showed USDT at $187B versus ETH at $186B, a gap of under $1B, before Ethereum returned to second place as prices stabilized. The episode reflected continued USDT issuance alongside ongoing ETH price weakness rather than a sudden supply change on Ethereum.

MUFG Bank, Mizuho Bank and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation have set up a joint council to develop and co-issue a yen-pegged crypto stablecoin by the end of Japan’s fiscal year 2026, which runs through March 2027. The token is planned to be issued via a trust structure with the banks as joint settlors and a trust bank (or similar institution) acting as trustee. The effort sits within the FSA’s Payment Innovation Project and follows a late-2025 pilot on whether multi-bank co-issuance could be done legally.