BlackRock is launching the iShares Staked Ethereum Trust ETF (ETHB), a staked Ethereum fund set to begin trading on Nasdaq on Thursday, March 12. The product is the asset manager's third crypto ETF and its first to integrate staking, holding spot ETH and delegating a portion for staking rewards. ETHB charges a 0.25% sponsor fee, temporarily cut to 0.12% on the first $2.5 billion in assets during its first year.

On Wednesday, March 4, BlackRock increased its exposure to Bitcoin and Ethereum by roughly $350 million through its spot crypto ETFs. The firm's iShares Bitcoin Trust took in $306.25 million, while its Ethereum vehicle saw $45.5 million of inflows, lifting the manager's weekly additions to about $1 billion and total crypto ETF holdings to around $63.3 billion.

According to data cited from Etherscan, the count of daily active Ethereum addresses slid from 1,329,193 on February 7 to 746,062 on March 3, 2026, a drop of roughly 45% from levels that were near the December 9, 2022 record. Despite this on-chain slowdown, Ethereum's price has risen 6.62% over the past 24 hours to around $2,078, with traders now watching resistance near $2,150 and potential downside if the price falls below $2,000.

DeepSeek, a Chinese artificial intelligence model, expects Ethereum’s price outlook this year to remain constructive, even as the asset trades near $1,936 and is down 35% since the start of the year. The model forecasts a potential rebound to a $3,500–$5,500 range over the next ten months, which would exceed Ethereum’s August 24, 2025 all-time high of $4,953. As a base-case scenario, DeepSeek pinpoints $4,000 by 2026, linking this to Ethereum’s role in DeFi, RWA tokenization and growing institutional access via spot ETFs.

On February 28, crypto markets sold off after reports of U.S. and Israeli strikes in Iran, pushing Bitcoin funding rates to -0.0165 and coin-margined open interest to 676,000 BTC. Bitcoin fell up to 6 percent within minutes, erasing about 70 billion dollars from crypto market value and nearing 63,000 dollars.

On Saturday, February 28, the global crypto market capitalization plunged by about $70 billion within an hour following news of a U.S. strike on Iran, dropping from roughly $2.24 trillion to $2.17 trillion between 7:00 a.m. and 8:00 a.m. (UTC+1). Bitcoin slid toward $63,000 and major altcoins such as Ethereum, XRP, and Solana posted steeper losses, while tokenized gold assets advanced alongside a rise in spot gold prices. Within minutes of the headlines, around $100 million in long positions were liquidated, with total daily long liquidations nearing $445 million.

On February 27, 2026, Ripple executive Reece Merrick said Ctrl Alt and Dubai-based Billiton Diamond completed a $280 million (AED 1 billion) diamond tokenization, now live on the XRP Ledger. Merrick added XRPL's tokenized asset value is about $1.96 billion, with Ripple custody, vaulting and compliant issuance underpinning the assets.

On Friday, February 27, Solana fell 2%, lifting its monthly decline to over 32% as volumes stayed muted. According to Finbold, its AI tool blending ChatGPT, Grok, and DeepSeek Chat points to $89.47 by Sunday, March 1, 2026, with individual calls at $88.90–$90.25, while technicals note a pivot at $87.56 and an RSI of 58.26.

On February 25, U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs drew more than $506 million in daily inflows, the strongest reading since February 2, with weekly totals above $760 million. BlackRock added $297 million and Grayscale just over $102 million, while the crypto market rose 6.5%, reclaiming about $140 billion and lifting Bitcoin to around $68,000.