Spot gold opened the week near $4,214 per ounce on June 13. Prices climbed as high as $4,330 to $4,380 by midweek on optimism around a U.S.-Iran truce deal involving President Trump. The rally reversed sharply after the Fed signaled it could raise rates later in 2026, sending gold down to $4,151 to $4,173 by
Preliminary data released Monday showed South Korea’s exports climbed 60.4% from a year earlier for the first 20 days of June. So far, adjusted exports surged nearly 50%, almost matching May’s hot pace of 52.6%. The surge, driven largely by artificial intelligence (AI) demand, has not only elevated the country’s trade surplus but is also
China Sheds US Treasuries Amid Geopolitical Uncertainty and Federal Reserve Independence Concerns China, one of the largest economies, reduced its U.S. Treasury holdings in April, reaching an 18-year low. According to data recently released by the U.S. Treasury Department, China sold part of its U.S. Treasuries in April, reducing its holdings from $652.3 billion in
Zodia Markets, the crypto subsidiary majority-owned by Standard Chartered, processed $3.4 billion in transactions involving Turkish lira stablecoins in 2025, enough to make the lira its second-most-used stablecoin currency behind the dollar, ahead of the euro and every other G10 currency. Dollar-pegged tokens, led by Tether and Circle’s USDC, still dwarfed everything at $110.5 billion,
In a landmark development for the DeFi world, Ledger Capital, a global investment platform, has made a strategic investment in PayGo, an HTTP-native payment protocol. As per the announcement shared today, Ledger Capital’s strategic financial investment and guidance will play an essential role in spearheading PayGo’s growth in its development journey. Ledger Capital is a
The Bank of Japan raised its benchmark interest rate to 1% on June 16, the highest level the country has seen since September 1995 and the furthest point yet in a normalization campaign that has slowly dismantled three decades of near-free money. Going into the decision, the track record pointed one way: every one of
Iran’s top joint military command announced it would close the Strait of Hormuz to shipping for violating the ceasefire agreement with the United States and Israel. According to Iranian state media outlet Mehr, a statement from Iran’s Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters announced that the Strait of Hormuz would be closed to shipping. The statement described
The depegging of STRC, the software-giant-turned-Bitcoin-hoarder’s much-talked-about funding vehicle, STRC, has become the hottest topic within the cryptocurrency community, and Eric Balchunas, Bloomberg senior ETF analyst, now believes that the funding vehicle has to be abandoned by the company. “I would retire it and move on. Just feels like an ongoing thorn in the side
While Bitcoin miners often trumpet hash rates and expansion plans, Bitmine Immersion Technologies is making a quieter argument for its maturity: a cash dividend on its perpetual preferred stock. The company’s board declared a payout of $0.1056 per share on the 9.50% Series A Perpetual Preferred Stock, as detailed in the original announcement. The dividend,