Over the latest trading week, the crypto market swung sharply as macro factors kept Bitcoin volatile and pushed risk appetite lower. Canton, Audiera and Uniswap led the upside with double‑digit percentage gains, while XDC Network, Hyperliquid and MemeCore ranked among the weakest performers. Several smaller altcoins recorded extreme moves in both directions, underscoring an environment of heightened speculation and fragile conviction.

Intel's shares rose 86% in 2025 amid $9 billion from the US government via the CHIPS Act, plus $5 billion from Nvidia and $2 billion from SoftBank, alongside Lip‑Bu Tan's appointment as CEO in March 2025. Entering 2026, the foundry remained loss‑making and lacked a major outside customer, with analysts warning Intel has 12–18 months to secure a 14A client.

On December 21, 2025 in San Francisco, Gem Wallet announced a unified USDT infrastructure across 10+ chains, adding integrated swaps, bridges, and anti-scam protections. The self-custody, open-source app supports Tron, Ethereum, Solana, BNB Chain, and TON, with biometric security and address-poisoning alerts. Availability spans iOS, Android, and web, with fiat on/off-ramps via MoonPay, Paybis, and Transak.

Alex Thorn, Galaxy Digital's head of firmwide research, expects Bitcoin to reach $250,000 by the end of 2027. He cautioned that 2026 is hard to forecast and said options markets currently assign equal odds of $50,000 or $250,000 by the end of next year, reflecting heightened near‑term uncertainty.

Wang Chun, co-founder of Bitcoin mining pool F2Pool, recounted a 2024 incident where he reportedly sent 500 BTC into a wallet he believed was compromised to test if it was under hacker surveillance, resulting in the loss of 490 BTC. He shared this story after a separate December 20 phishing case in which a user mistakenly transferred about 50 million USDT in an address poisoning attack and is now working with law enforcement to recover the funds. The Ethereum Community Foundation has urged wallets and explorers to stop truncating addresses with dots, arguing that this interface choice unnecessarily increases the risk of such scams.

Artificial intelligence-driven growth in U.S. data centers is sharply increasing electricity demand and pushing utilities into one of their largest capital spending and borrowing cycles in decades. As companies finance multi-year upgrades to generation, transmission, and grid resilience largely through bond markets, investors face a changing risk profile shaped by higher leverage, regulatory constraints on rates, and differing protections between operating-company and holding-company debt.

On December 21, 2025, Bank of America, Bernstein and Jefferies reaffirmed buy ratings on Nvidia, citing a $500 billion outlook across Blackwell, Rubin and networking through 2026. BofA and Bernstein kept $275 targets, Jefferies set $250. Analysts highlighted early‑2026 Blackwell‑based LLMs, valuation metrics, and pending H200 export licenses to China.

On December 21, Bitcoin fell 0.21% over 24 hours and traded at $87,844. The hourly setup shows pressure near $87,576 support, with a possible move toward $87,000 next week if no rebound. Broader charts suggest low volume and likely consolidation in the $85,000–$95,000 range through month-end.