Some of the world's largest market-making firms are in the mix to potentially provide liquidity for BlackRock's eagerly awaited bitcoin ETF if regulators approve the product, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. Trading giants Jane Street, Virtu Financial, Jump Trading and Hudson River Trading have held talks with BlackRock about a market-making role, according to a BlackRock slide deck reviewed by the person. BlackRock, Jane Street, Virtu and Jump declined to comment. Hudson River Trading, also known as HRT, didn't respond to a request for comment.

BlackRock headquarters (Shutterstock)

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), which regulates derivatives markets in the U.S., has paid out $16 million to whistleblowers this year, and most of the 1,530 tips involved crypto, Commissioner Christy Goldsmith Romero said on Tuesday. "The majority of the tips received this year involved crypto – an area that continues to have pervasive fraud and other illegality," Romero said in a statement published on the CFTC website. "With the rise of crypto, more retail customers have come under the CFTC’s jurisdiction, making even more critical the efforts of the CFTC’s Whistleblower Program and the Office of Customer Education and Outreach."

Etherfuse, a platform attempting to improve decentralized blockchain infrastructure, unveiled "Stablebond" at Solana’s breakpoint conference in Amsterdam, a tokenized bond offering, to retail investors in Mexico. The firm is targeting Mexico because it is the second-largest bond market in Latin America, after Brazil, according to the company's research. The market is also one of the most liquid in Latin America, with $623 billion in outstanding debt and an average daily trading volume of $200 million, the research added. The majority of trading volume in Mexico comes from institutions, governments and foreign investors, according to a press release from Etherfuse, meaning there's a lack of retail investors or individuals investing in bonds.

A message from Bitget

Bitcoin (BTC) could see rapid price gains once it tops the $36,000 mark, the recent positioning of options market makers suggests.

Options are derivative contracts, offering the purchaser the right but not the obligation to buy or sell the underlying asset at a preset price at a later date. A call, a bullish bet, gives the right to buy, while a put confers the right to sell.

The demand for higher strike price call options has recently increased, with bitcoin rallying nearly 27% in the past four weeks. That has left market makers with a significant net short gamma exposure above $36,000, according to data tracked by Amberdata and Galaxy Digital.

Options gamma is the rate that delta will change based on a $1 change in bitcoin’s price. Delta measures the sensitivity of options prices to the change in bitcoin's price.

- Omkar Godbole