TL;DR

• BTC surges above $98,000, while ETH continues to oscillate around $1,800.
• Fed Chairman Powell states inflation has significantly decreased.
• Solana DEX trading volume surpasses $800 billion in 2025.
• Polygon Labs launches CDK OP Stack configuration.
• Revolut to introduce Bitcoin Lightning Network payments in the European market.
• Tether mints 1 billion USDT on Tron, bringing the total minted USDT for 2025 to 14 billion.

Market Analysis

• BTC — This week, BTC maintained its upward momentum, currently priced at $97,998. It has broken through the $98,000 resistance, with the next key resistance level at $100,000. In terms of chart patterns, BTC displayed a healthy 24-hour trend, breaking through $97,000 on May 7, retesting $95,800, and then showing five consecutive hourly bullish candles on May 8, pushing towards the critical $100,000 mark. On the weekly level, this BTC rally is expected to have sustainable momentum. [1]

• ETH — ETH’s performance this week has been weak, currently priced at $1,829. Compared to BTC, ETH has not reached the upper boundary of its range at $1,870, making a breakout unlikely in the short term. The moving averages (5-day, 10-day, and 30-day) are converging, indicating that most investors have an average cost of around $1,815, and ETH may continue to consolidate in the near term. [2]

• Altcoins — Over the past 7 days, altcoins have shown mixed results. The top performers include Cat-Themed, Bitcoin Fork, and Bittensor Ecosystem sectors, with market caps increasing by approximately 9.7%, 8.3%, and 8.0%, respectively. [3]
• Futures Market — As of May 8, 2025, 00:00 AM (UTC), the open interest in BTC options has increased to $33.3 billion from $32.7 billion. With BTC prices briefly breaking 98,000 USDT and signs of a softening in the U.S. tariff policies, the market has been gradually warming, leading to a rise in BTC options open interest. [4]
• Macroeconomic Data — On May 8, U.S. tariff policy showed signs of easing, with major U.S. stock indexes rising: Dow Jones up 0.70%, S&P 500 up 0.43%, and Nasdaq up 0.27%. [5] Market risk sentiment eased, with gold retreating from its peak to $3,393 per ounce as of 00:00 AM (UTC) on May 8. [6]
• Stablecoins — Stablecoins’ total market cap increased by 0.08% this week, reaching $242.2 billion, with slight inflows from over-the-counter funds. [7]
• Gas Fees — Ethereum’s average gas fee over the past 7 days has risen to 0.75 Gwei, indicating a significant increase in network activity. [8]

Trending Sectors

According to Coingecko, the top-performing sectors over the past 7 days include Cat-Themed, Bitcoin Fork, and Bittensor Ecosystem, with market caps rising by 9.7%, 8.3%, and 8.0%, respectively. [9]

Cat-Themed — This section refers to the Memecoin category themed around cats, with representative projects including Popcat, Mog Coin, and Cat in a Dogs World. POPCAT is currently the highest market cap project in this category. It originated from the widely circulated mischievous cat meme online, a symbol that not only embodies a light-hearted and humorous community atmosphere but also cleverly combines the viral nature of internet culture with the rapidly growing crypto world. Mog Coin initially started as a fun meme but gradually evolved into a cultural project on the Ethereum network. Its name is derived from the internet slang “AMOG,” which refers to someone who is a “leader” among their peers. Over the past week, the price of MOG tokens has increased by more than 50%.

Bitcoin Fork — The Bitcoin Fork segment, as an important derivative branch of the Bitcoin ecosystem, has unique market positioning and technical features. This segment mainly includes various forked coins based on modifications to the Bitcoin codebase (such as BCH, BSV, etc.). These fork projects typically attempt to address Bitcoin’s limitations in scalability, transaction efficiency, or smart contract support by adjusting core parameters like block size, consensus mechanisms, or script functionalities. From a market performance perspective, mainstream forked coins show a high correlation with Bitcoin’s price, but with more significant volatility, reflecting the segment’s dual nature of serving as both a store of value and a high-risk speculative asset.

Bittensor Ecosystem — This segment refers to the decentralized machine learning ecosystem built around the Bittensor network. Bittensor leverages blockchain incentive mechanisms to encourage global developers to collaboratively train, deploy, and share high-quality AI models. Its core mechanism rewards nodes contributing to the network (such as model trainers and evaluators) with TAO tokens, facilitating continuous model optimization and network autonomy. Projects within the Bittensor ecosystem primarily focus on decentralized AI services, knowledge economies, data provision, and model collaboration, forming an open AI market that operates without centralised control.

Trending Tokens

According to CoinGecko, the top trending tokens over the past 7 days are:

KAITO (Kaito AI) — With a 7-day increase of approximately 65.5%, the circulating market cap stands at $350 million.

KAITO is the native token of the Kaito AI platform. Kaito AI leverages artificial intelligence and blockchain technology, aiming to reshape the landscape of decentralized digital interactions. Founded by YuHu in 2022, the platform quickly gained traction in the crypto market, raising a total of $10.8 million in two rounds of funding. The core mission of Kaito AI is to build an AI-driven InfoFi network to allocate attention and funds more transparently and efficiently. The platform has laid out an innovative development roadmap, launching more advanced AI analysis tools and expanding decentralized social media features.

The primary reason behind KAITO’s recent increase of over 60% is its ecosystem airdrop, such as the highly anticipated BOOP airdrop. Several key opinion leaders (KOLs) have voiced their support for KAITO on the X social media platform. In addition to the KAITO airdrop, its ecosystem projects have distributed over $71 million in rewards to yappers, stakers, and hodlers. The founder of Kaito AI, Yu Hu, stated on X that the second-quarter revenue of Kaito AI will show growth compared to the first quarter, and the team is in talks with multiple teams for various collaborations. [10] [11]

MOG (MOG COIN) — With a 7-day increase of approximately 51.7%, the circulating market cap is $356 million.

MOG is an ERC-20 token that was initially created as a fun meme but later evolved into a cultural project on the Ethereum network. Its name derives from the internet slang “AMOG,” referring to someone who is a “leader figure” among peers, typically standing out in terms of attractiveness, dominance in a particular field, or overall advantage. The AMOG trend started in 2021, initially as a joke among a group of friends who created the MOG community. While the founders remain unknown, they officially launched the project in 2023 and conducted a fair token issuance on the Uniswap V2 liquidity pool in July of that year. Since then, the project has also released merchandise.

The recent surge in MOG’s price was sparked by a cultural trend led by figures from the tech elite circle, including Y Combinator founder Garry Tan and influencers like Elon Musk, who adopted the iconic Pit Vipers sunglasses profile picture. This has led to increased shares and imitations from more users on the X platform. [12] [13]

SYRUP (Maple Finance) — With a 7-day increase of approximately 42.1%, the circulating market cap stands at $234 million. \
Maple Finance is a crypto lending protocol established in May 2021. With Maple Finance, institutional investors can borrow funds without the need for full collateral, while users can invest in fixed-rate products for yield. According to data from DefiLlama, Maple’s total value locked (TVL) is $759 million. Recently, asset management company Bitwise announced a partnership with Maple Finance.

An important factor driving the recent increase in SYRUP’s price is the launch of a $500,000 USDC incentive program by Maple Finance to celebrate its TVL surpassing $1 billion. The program, running from May 1 to May 31, requires users to deposit at least $1,000 into its flagship yield product, SyrupUSDC, and hold it for 6 months. The higher the deposit amount, the greater the chances of winning. The program will set 14 awards, with the highest prize being $300,000 USDC. This initiative has increased the excitement around the Maple Finance project, driving up the token price. [14] [15]

Weekly Spotlights

Hot Topic Review

Fed Holds Rates Steady Again, Powell Signals Rate Cuts Could Be Appropriate Later This Year

On May 7 (ET), the Federal Reserve announced after its FOMC meeting that it would keep the federal funds rate target range unchanged at 4.25% to 4.5%. This marks the third consecutive policy meeting where the Fed has opted to pause. Fed Chair Jerome Powell stated that the economy remains robust and inflation has fallen significantly. While inflation is still slightly above the 2% target, the labour market has reached or is near maximum employment. Powell noted that, under certain conditions, rate cuts this year could be appropriate, but in other scenarios, they might not be, emphasising uncertainty over the appropriate path for interest rates. His remarks were generally dovish, keeping the door open for potential cuts while easing concerns about the Fed’s independence. This is expected to intensify market speculation over future rate policy. [16]

Polygon Labs Launches CDK OP Stack Integration

Polygon Labs has announced that its chain development kit, Agglayer CDK, now supports multi-stack configurations, with OP Stack being the first integration. The new version allows developers to launch high-performance, low-cost chains using OP Stack and natively connect to Agglayer without additional fees. Future integrations such as Arbitrum Orbit and ABC Stack are also anticipated.
The OP Stack integration offers significant advantages: First, a multi-stack compatible architecture gives developers differentiated deployment options. The Geth-based OP Stack delivers 4,700+ TPS, while the Erigon version offers custom token support and ZK security, already validated by over 500 million transactions with 99.95% commercial-grade stability. Second, a zero-fee connection model ensures developer sovereignty, eliminating ecosystem taxes that hinder innovation. Finally, the roadmap includes future integration of zkRollup/Validium modes and Succinct’s SP1 proving system, aiming for transaction costs below $0.005, strengthening its role as foundational infrastructure for cross-chain interoperability.
With OP Stack integration into CDK, Polygon Labs has taken a key step towards building a multi-stack ecosystem, offering flexible, high-performance deployment options while eliminating ecosystem barriers and laying the groundwork for seamless multi-chain interoperability. [17]

Revolut to Launch Bitcoin Lightning Payments in Europe

Digital bank Revolut has announced a partnership with Lightspark to introduce Bitcoin Lightning Network payment functionality in the UK and select countries within the European Economic Area (EEA). The initiative aims to leverage Lightspark’s payment infrastructure to lower transaction fees and accelerate payment processing speeds. Lightspark, led by former PayPal executive David Marcus, specializes in developing global payment solutions based on the Bitcoin Lightning Network.

While Revolut has not yet disclosed an exact launch date, the company stated that it is actively advancing technical integration and regulatory compliance. Testing is expected to gradually roll out to users in the UK and EEA over the coming months. This collaboration is viewed as a significant milestone in the deepening integration of cryptocurrency with the traditional financial system. It demonstrates the practical value of the Bitcoin Lightning Network in commercial payments and marks growing mainstream financial institution recognition of blockchain technology. With Lightspark’s advanced payment infrastructure, users across the EEA are expected to benefit from near-instant cross-border settlement services — a development that could significantly enhance the efficiency of international trade for SMEs and personal remittances alike. [18]

Security Incidents

LockBit Data Leak Exposes Bitcoin Addresses, Private Keys, and Negotiation Records

The notorious ransomware group LockBit has once again come under the spotlight after its official website was hacked in early May, leading to the theft and public release of a large cache of sensitive data. According to disclosed information, the leaked materials include internal communications between the LockBit team and their victims, Bitcoin addresses, private key details, ransom negotiation histories, and potential clues to the identities of some members — all highly sensitive content. The leaked data has been uploaded to a GitHub repository titled “Criminal-Leaks,” managed by user D4RK-R4BB1T. The source of the breach has been traced to Prague, Czech Republic, suggesting that the attacker may be an individual or an anonymous group with advanced cyber-offensive capabilities, or potentially a counter-operation led by law enforcement or white-hat hackers.

This incident exposes LockBit’s core operational structure and provides a critical entry point for law enforcement agencies seeking to trace its global network and affiliates. Furthermore, the exposure of ransom negotiation records may trigger legal liabilities or public relations crises for victim companies, as well as undermine LockBit’s credibility and leverage within dark web circles, weakening its future extortion efforts. Given the nature and scope of the breach, this leak also underscores a rising trend of “black-on-black” cyberattacks and escalating hacktivist actions. As ransomware groups increasingly become targets themselves, the structural balance within the cybercrime ecosystem is undergoing significant shifts. [19]

Project Highlights

LeverFi Unveils 2025 Roadmap: Pivot to Decentralised AI Network

LeverFi has announced its 2025 roadmap, outlining a major transformation from a DeFi protocol to a Layer 1-based decentralized AI network. Its core products, OmniGPT and OmniZK, aim to merge AI model capabilities with on-chain privacy technologies to build next-gen infrastructure.
As part of the transition, LeverFi will relocate its headquarters from Singapore to the U.S., aligning with the country’s increasingly favourable regulatory environment for digital assets and deepening its engagement with the U.S. crypto ecosystem. The team revealed its involvement in the issuance of the USD1 stablecoin by World Liberty Financial and plans to attend former President Trump’s upcoming crypto holders’ dinner. This demonstrates its active positioning in policy and resource integration.
Additionally, LeverFi noted that over the past year, the LEVER token faced repeated short-selling manipulation in futures markets without spot holdings, pressuring spot prices and undermining investor confidence. The team is now actively collaborating with major exchanges to crack down on such shorting practices to restore market order and protect long-term holders’ interests. [20]

Data Highlights

Tether Mints 1B USDT on Tron, Pushing 2025 Cumulative Issuance to 14B

On May 7, Tether minted an additional 1 billion USDT on the Tron blockchain, bringing its total issuance in 2025 to 14 billion USDT. This move underscores the sustained demand for stablecoins in high-frequency trading and cross-chain transfers. Although this issuance is marked as “authorised but not issued,” it carries significant market implications, reflecting the market’s heavy reliance on on-chain USD liquidity. Tron continues to serve as a primary network for stablecoin circulation.

As of May 8, on-chain data shows USDT distribution remains highly concentrated, with 48.53% on Tron and 42.35% on Ethereum, together accounting for over 90% of the total supply. These two networks continue to dominate stablecoin use cases in centralized exchanges, payments, and settlements. Other networks, such as BSC (3.45%) and Solana (1.54%), are part of Tether’s multi-chain strategy to broaden its reach across the crypto ecosystem.

From a market structure perspective, large pre-minting events are often viewed as signals of incoming capital deployment, indicating potential fund movements by exchanges, institutions, or project teams. If this batch of USDT is later observed flowing into CEXs, DeFi protocols, or liquidity pools, it could directly boost market activity and even trigger a short-term price rebound. Tether’s issuance pace has long been regarded as a key indicator of on-chain capital sentiment; the continued expansion of its total supply suggests that liquidity remains in the system, potentially positioning the market for the next phase of activity. [21]

Solana DEX Trading Volume Surpasses $800 Billion in 2025

Since the beginning of 2025, cumulative trading volume on Solana-based decentralized exchanges (DEXs) has exceeded $800 billion, highlighting the chain’s rising prominence as a high-performance trading hub. This figure significantly outpaces previous years and cements Solana’s growing systemic role in the DeFi landscape. [22]

Driven by traders’ increasing demand for low fees and high throughput, Solana has become the primary battleground for several popular DEX platforms such as Jupiter, Orca, and Lifinity. The recent surge in meme coin trading, improvements in AMM efficiency, and the rise of token launch tools like Pump.fun have pushed on-chain trading activity to new highs. Moreover, Solana’s high-frequency trading characteristics make it particularly attractive for speculative trading, arbitrage, and bot strategies, turning it into a vital arena for capturing user behaviour data and gauging market sentiment in real-time. Amid intensifying competition from Ethereum Layer 2s and emerging blockchains, Solana’s unique architecture and continually optimized developer experience have secured its position as a DeFi powerhouse that cannot be overlooked.

Axiom Dominates Memecoin Trading Bots with 57% Market Share

According to the latest on-chain data, automated trading tools have rapidly gained traction amid the meme coin trading frenzy, with Axiom emerging as the clear market leader. Axiom currently commands a 57% share of the meme coin trading bot market — far ahead of competitors like Photon, BullX, Bloom, and Trojan. [23]

Axiom’s lead stems primarily from its optimized execution speed, on-chain composability, and user-centric interface, which enable traders to swiftly capitalize on the high volatility of newly launched tokens. On high-performance chains like Solana, Axiom users leverage preset strategies, automated slippage controls, and gas optimization mechanisms to dramatically improve trade success rates and secure favorable price ranges during initial token launches.

In comparison, while other trading bots offer similar functionalities and have introduced some UI/UX innovations, such as Bloom and BullX, or have gained traction through aggressive sniping strategies on platforms like Pump.fun (in Trojan’s case), they still lag slightly behind Axiom in contract integration depth, strategy flexibility, and slippage management. Axiom’s current dominance reflects its product strength and suggests it holds a first-mover advantage in the race to build Web3’s automated trading infrastructure. Whether it can maintain this lead will be a key factor shaping the evolution of the meme coin ecosystem.

Market Opportunities

Airdrop Campaigns

Talus Network

Talus Network is built on the Move Virtual Machine (MoveVM) and adopts a Protochain blockchain architecture, emphasizing security, scalability, and modular design. Its object-oriented programming model enables developers to create complex and secure smart agent applications. Talus Network is currently running its testnet and incentive campaigns, allowing users to earn rewards by completing tasks and participating in events. [24]

How to participate:

1. Visit the official website and connect your wallet.
2. Complete social and other designated tasks to earn reward points.

Reminder:
The airdrop campaign and participation guidelines may be updated at any time. Users are advised to follow Talus Network’s official channels for the latest information. Participation involves risk, and users should conduct thorough research before engaging. Gate.io does not guarantee the future distribution of airdrop rewards.

Fundraising Weekly Report

Several projects secured successful funding rounds this week, spanning sectors such as infrastructure and DeFi. According to RootData, between May 2 and May 8, a total of six projects announced fundraising deals, amounting to approximately $68.85 million. (Data as of May 8, 2:00 AM UTC) [25]

Top 3 Funding Deals of the Week:

Doppel**

Raised $35 Million in Series B, Led by Bessemer Venture Partners

Doppel, an AI platform focused on social engineering defence, secured $35 million in a Series B round on May 2, reaching a valuation of $205 million. The round was led by Bessemer Venture Partners with participation from Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and others. The funding will support the development of Doppel Vision, enhancing its ability to detect and respond to phishing, impersonation, deepfakes, and other social engineering attacks. The platform integrates large language models with expert-driven analysis to trace attack vectors across multiple channels (email, social media, messaging apps) and boasts an average phishing site takedown time of under one hour.

Sentora

Raised $25 Million, Led by New Form Capital

DeFi analytics platform IntoTheBlock and liquidity services provider Trident Digital have merged to form Sentora. On May 6, Sentora announced a $25 million funding round led by New Form Capital, with participation from Tribe Capital, Ripple, Curved Ventures, and others. Sentora aims to combine the strengths of both companies to offer institutional investors a one-stop platform featuring yield strategies, compliance, risk management, and structured products. The platform is led by Anthony DeMartino, former Head of Risk Strategy at Coinbase, and is designed to simplify institutional access to DeFi and prepare for the on-chain migration of trillions of dollars in assets.

DogeOS

Raised $6.9 Million, Led by Polychain Capital

DogeOS, a purpose-built application layer for the Dogecoin blockchain, aims to broaden Dogecoin’s ecosystem and real-world utility. On May 6, the project secured $6.9 million in a funding round led by Polychain Capital. The capital will fuel the development of consumer-facing applications, enhancing Dogecoin’s decentralized finance (DeFi) offerings and expanding its use cases. DogeOS seeks to bridge Dogecoin’s community-driven ethos with on-chain innovation by integrating DOGE into a diverse range of applications—from gaming to AI-powered platforms—further strengthening the Dogecoin ecosystem.

Watchlist for Next Week

Token Unlocks**

According to data from Tokenomist, several significant token unlock events are scheduled for next week (May 9–15, 2025), with a total unlock value of approximately $1.252 billion. [26]

Here are the top 3 unlocks for next week:

WBT: Approximately 39.5 million WBT tokens, representing 27.41% of its circulating supply, are scheduled for release at 12:00 AM UTC on May 13, 2025. This unlock is valued at around $1.13 billion. With WBT’s recent daily trading volume averaging $25 million, this unlock could significantly impact price fluctuations.

APT: Around 11.31 million APT tokens, or 1.82% of its circulating supply, will be unlocked at 6:00 PM UTC on May 12, 2025, with an estimated value of approximately $54.85 million. With APT’s daily trading volume recently averaging $115 million, this unlock may have a modest effect on its price.

LAYER: Approximately 27.02 million LAYER tokens, or 0.41% of its circulating supply, are set to be unlocked at 2:00 PM UTC+0 on May 11, 2025, valued at about $35.39 million. LAYER has been seeing the daily trading volume of around $990 million, and this unlock could have a minor impact on its price.

Crypto Calendar

Next week (May 9 - May 15, 2025) will witness a series of significant events expected to have a profound impact on the cryptocurrency market, the global economy, and the energy markets. In the crypto space, on May 9, ETHDam 2025 will be held in Amsterdam. As a key annual event for the Ethereum ecosystem in Europe, it is expected to focus on privacy computing, ZK technologies, and Layer 2 scalability solutions. [27] On May 10, TON will officially retire the Toncoin Bridge, which could affect the liquidity and compatibility strategy for cross-chain assets within the TON ecosystem. [28] On May 14, the major industry conference Consensus Toronto 2025 will open, covering core topics such as institutional investment, tokenization, Web3 application development, and regulatory frameworks. [29] On the macroeconomic front, the U.S. will release several key data points. On May 10, the total number of oil rigs for the week ending May 9 will be published, providing a leading signal of changes in oil production capacity. [30] On May 13, the U.S. will release the seasonally adjusted CPI year-on-year for April, a core inflation indicator that may directly influence market expectations regarding the Federal Reserve’s policy path. On the same day, the EIA will release the oil inventory change data (in barrels), offering a reference for assessing the energy supply and demand balance. [31] On May 15, the U.S. will report initial jobless claims and April retail sales data, which the market will use to assess the U.S. labor market and consumer fundamentals, re-evaluating inflation persistence and economic resilience. [32]

References:

1. Gate.io, https://www.gate.io/trade/BTC_USDT
2. Gate.io, https://www.gate.io/trade/ETH_USDT
3. Coingecko, https://www.coingecko.com/categories
4. Coinglass, https://www.coinglass.com/pro/options/OpenInterest
5. Investing, https://www.investing.com/indices/usa-indices
6. Investing, https://www.investing.com/currencies/xau-usd
7. DefiLlama, https://defillama.com/stablecoins
8. Etherscan, https://etherscan.io/gastracker#chart_gasprice
9. Coingecko, https://www.coingecko.com/en/categories
10. Coingecko, https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/kaito
11. X, https://x.com/followin_io_zh/status/1919939907205873733
12. Coingecko, https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/mog-coin
13. X, https://x.com/PANewsCN/status/1920071694149914693
14. Coingecko, https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/maple-finance
15. Techflow, https://www.techflowpost.com/newsletter/detail_83428.html
16. Jin10, https://flash.jin10.com/detail/20250508023102205800
17. Polygon, https://polygon.technology/blog/cdk-goes-multistack-aggregate-everything-starting-with-op-stack
18. Coindesk, https://www.coindesk.com/business/2025/05/07/revolut-to-roll-out-bitcoin-lightning-payments-for-europe-users-through-lightspark
19. X, https://x.com/wublockchain12/status/1920267624979546374
20. Medium, https://medium.com/leverfi/leverfi-2025-roadmap-powering-into-decentralized-ai-with-growth-centric-economic-transformation-4e8fb57f1f0d
21. Whale Alert, https://whale-alert.io/transaction/tron/38d034cdd47293c27d7bf5ac2f9fc0ba8498aa2b1c86dba7f33d76e9d8fd649f
22. DefiLlama, https://defillama.com/chain/solana?tvl=false&volume=true&groupBy=cumulative
23. Dune, https://dune.com/adam_tehc/trading-bots-on-solana
24. Talus Network, https://hub.talus.network/loyalty
25. Rootdata, https://www.rootdata.com/Fundraising
26. Tokenomist, https://tokenomist.ai/unlocks
27. ETHDam, https://www.ethdam.com/
28. Blog TON, https://blog.ton.org/ton-retires-toncoin-bridge
29. CoinDesk, https://consensus2025.coindesk.com/
30. Jin10, https://www.jin10.com/
31. Jin10, https://www.jin10.com/
32. Jin10, https://www.jin10.com/

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Disclaimer
Investing in the crypto market involves a high level of risk. Users are advised to conduct independent research and fully understand the nature of any assets and products before making investment decisions. Gate.io assumes no responsibility for any losses or damages resulting from such investment activities.