Morgan Stanley updated its S-1 for its proposed spot Bitcoin ETF, MSBT, and set a 0.14% management fee. If approved by the SEC, the fee would undercut rivals in the roughly $85 billion to $92 billion spot BTC ETF market, including Grayscale’s 0.15% and BlackRock and Fidelity at 0.25%. The bank also outlined earlier steps such as a $1 million seed investment and proposed custodians Coinbase and BNY Mellon.

The SEC hit a decision deadline on Friday, March 27, for multiple spot XRP ETF applications, while the agency was also expected to act on 91 pending crypto ETF filings covering 24 tokens. As the deadline approached, XRP derivatives metrics turned more risk-on, with open interest up 14.8% in 24h and perpetual funding jumping 158.19% to 0.0028. XRP was trading at $1.32 at the time of writing, down 2.95%, as markets reacted to macro and geopolitical headlines and a $13.5 billion options expiry.

On Friday, March 27, XRP's perpetual futures funding rate climbed 158.19% to 0.0028, pointing to a more bullish tilt among derivatives traders. Over the same 24-hour period, open interest dipped 0.25% to $823.94 million while XRP's spot price fell 1.27% to about $1.34. The move coincided with roughly $6.69 million in liquidations, largely from long positions, as weekly losses widened to over 7%.

XRP derivatives open interest increased more than 11% from the start of the week, reaching $2.65 billion on March 27. The week also saw shifts in positioning: funding rates turned negative as OI hit $2.53 billion on Thursday, before moving back into positive territory during the past 24 hours alongside the week's peak OI.

MARA Holdings said it sold 15,133 Bitcoin (BTC) from March 4 to March 25, 2026, liquidating $1.1 billion as part of efforts to bolster its balance sheet. It used $912.8 million of the proceeds for privately negotiated repurchase agreements with certain Convertible Senior Notes holders due 2030 and 2031. The company reported holding 38,689 BTC valued at about $2.68 billion, while its shares rose over 9% to around $9.15.

A survey of 351 institutions projects that planned XRP allocations will increase from 18% in January 2026 to 25% by the end of 2026. The same dataset indicates institutional exposure to XRP could grow 39% over 2026, even as XRP ranks fifth by planned allocation. Bitcoin remains the top choice, with planned exposure easing from 94% in January 2026 to 91%.

Bitcoin has traded in a $62,000–$75,000 consolidation range during 25 days of the US-Iran military conflict, and was priced at $70,748 at press time after a 1.3% daily gain. Analysts remain split on the next move, citing $2.5 billion of Bitcoin ETF inflows over the past month, a drop in exchange balances to 2.4 million BTC, and downside scenarios that include $60K and even $48K.

XRP’s 30-day realized volatility on Binance fell back below 0.5 on March 25 as the token traded around $1.42. The metric, which tracks the average size of daily moves over the past 30 days on an annualized basis, previously hit the same low in late January. Historically, similar volatility compression has coincided with sharp rebounds, including a rally of over 20% to about $2.40 on January 6, 2026.

XRP Ledger activity is rising, with transactions per ledger nearing 200 as of March 24. The uptick follows a late-2025 low and has climbed for months, a range that has previously aligned with major XRP bull phases. Address growth has also accelerated, reaching about 8,170,693 on March 24, 2026 versus 4,866,823 on March 25, 2023.