The U.S. Department of Justice has finalized the forfeiture of more than $400 million in cryptocurrencies, cash, and real estate connected to the Helix Bitcoin Mixer, concluding litigation against its operator Larry Dean Harmon in January 2026. Helix, active from 2014 to 2017, processed over 354,468 Bitcoin allegedly tied to criminal activity, while Harmon was charged in 2020 and later sentenced in 2024 to prison time, supervised release, and asset forfeiture. The case unfolds amid broader U.S. regulatory action on crypto mixers and a policy shift on criminal enforcement for certain regulatory violations involving exchanges and developers.

The U.S. SEC and CFTC have jointly relaunched Project Crypto to better coordinate how digital assets are regulated and supervised. In a January 29 statement, the agencies outlined plans to harmonize rules, update surveillance tools, and create clearer compliance pathways for crypto businesses. The initiative aims to support innovation in on-chain trading, clearing, settlement, and custody while maintaining investor protection and U.S. financial market leadership.

On January 30, Ripple CTO Emeritus David Schwartz challenged viral projections that XRP could soon reach $50 or $100, using an expected value framework to argue they are inconsistent with current trading behavior. He explained that if many rational investors truly saw a strong chance of triple-digit prices within a few years, XRP would not be trading far below $10 as it is now. While XRP hovers near $1.75 after significant declines over the past week and year, analysts point to both extended consolidation and ongoing ETF inflows and accumulation by large holders.

Since the start of 2026, XRP has fallen about 4% to trade near $1.90, while on-chain data shows a net increase of 42 wallets holding at least one million tokens. Despite the token sitting roughly 25% below its 200-day moving average and about 40% under its price a year ago, projections for 2026 outline base, bull, and bear scenarios between $1.60 and $2.70.

Open-source AI assistant ClawdBot founder Peter Steinberger said he has never issued a token and called projects tying him to a coin scams, after his GitHub and X accounts were squatted during a forced rename. On January 25, researcher Stitchdegen said the Solana meme coin CLAWD is not official; on January 27, developer Ozmen warned similar scams often target open-source projects.

On-chain analyst Darkfost said Ethereum's ERC-20 stablecoin supply fell from $162 billion to $155 billion over the past week. For the week starting January 19, CryptoOnchain reported Binance's largest net outflows since November 2025, with about $1.97 billion BTC, $1.34 billion ETH, and $3.11 billion USDT exiting.

On January 26, 2026, Vitalik Buterin said he no longer stands by his 2017 characterization that full blockchain validation by ordinary users is unrealistic. He now argues that advances in zero-knowledge proofs, especially ZK-SNARKs, can make independent state verification feasible while aligning with his broader push for simplicity and user self-sovereignty on Ethereum.

On January 25, 2026, Bitcoin dropped under $88,000 after briefly reaching lows near $86,000, following a sharp rise in Solana network fees to about $37.5 million the day before. Around 2,000 BTC had been transferred to Binance on January 21, and roughly $170 million in long positions were liquidated within one hour as derivatives-driven selling hit a wider range of major altcoins.

Telegram-based escrow marketplaces tied to gambling operations moved a combined 414 million USDT over a 53-day span, with about 9 million USDT sent straight to major exchanges. Despite shutdowns of Huionepay and Tudou Guarantee in 2025, platforms integrated mini-app crypto payments and continued processing revenue. Wallets linked to Huione, Wangbo, and HWZF were central to settlement.