Something’s happening at GameStop… again

Plus: 1946 laws might finally get left behind

GM. Serving crypto cider today: fermented headlines with a kick, NO rotten apples allowed.

🗣 The SEC’s crypto roundtables.

🍋 News drops: BitBoy gets arrested, Hawk Tuah girl gets a documentary + more

🍍 Market flavor today

Bitcoin took a quick espresso shot yesterday and briefly jumped to $88K.

One of the reasons for the mini pump: BTC ETFs saw inflows for the eighth day in a row (the longest positive streak of 2025 so far).

On top of that, GameStop – the meme stock that once broke Wall Street – is apparently gonna buy Bitcoin for its treasury.

Which wasn’t that shocking, tbh. GameStop CEO Ryan Cohen posted a pic with the BTC maxi Michael Saylor a month ago:

The problem: we keep getting positive news like this… and yet Bitcoin is still down about 20% from its January all-time high. Make it make sense?? 🤨

Well, thing is, everyone’s still on edge about Trump’s tariffs, which are supposed to drop next Wednesday, April 2.

(He pushed them back a day so people don’t think it’s an April Fools joke lol.)

No one knows exactly who or what they’ll target, and markets hate this kinda confusion.

This shaky mood showed up in the latest Consumer Confidence report (aka the economic vibe check) – it dropped to a 12-year low.

So yeah, vibes = not great = consumers are likely to spend less and avoid financial risks.

But there’s a flip side: if the economy starts looking too fragile, the Fed might ease up on interest rates to avoid making things even worse.

And lower rates = bullish for crypto, since cheap borrowing and a weaker dollar often drive investors toward higher-risk assets.

Now we gotta watch Friday’s PCE inflation data – the Fed’s fave inflation metric. If it shows that prices are cooling off, markets could get excited. If not… back to doomscrolling, I guess.

Anyways, I hate to say it again, but yup… we’re in wait-and-see mode. Still.

🥝 Memecoin harvest

If making money off a rat coin is wrong, I don’t wanna be right... ❤️

Data as of 05:20 AM EST.

Check out these memecoins and plenty more here.

The SEC is continuing its glow-up – from crypto’s #1 hater to a helpful friend 😄👍

On Friday, they kicked off their series of crypto-focused roundtables called “Spring Sprint Toward Crypto Clarity”.

And the big question was: how tf do we classify digital assets?

(Because right now, the rules are pretty much based on vibes.)

Here’s what came out of it:

1/ The Howey test is… not it

The Howey Test is a legal tool used to figure out whether something is a “security”. And many agreed it doesn’t really work well for crypto.

I mean, who would’ve thunk? 😯 A test from 1946, made for orange farms, is not ideal for crypto? Craazy…

Some suggested using a “control test” instead – basically, if no single entity controls a crypto project, maybe it shouldn’t count as a security. But that might be just as messy, since you’d still have to review each project one by one.

2/ Who’s the boss here?

There was also debate about which agency should regulate crypto.

3/ The industry wants clarity

Some people noted that crypto companies aren’t mad at rules – they just wanna know what they are.

One idea that came up was a temporary framework – kinda like giving crypto companies a learner’s permit while the SEC figures out a long-term plan.

Also, someone reminded everyone that the SEC has the power to adjust definitions. So technically, they could just say, “Hey, this stuff isn’t a security,” if they really wanted to.

4/ Court cases still matter

Even as the SEC tries to figure things out, the courts shape how crypto is treated legally.

Panelists made it clear: lawsuits are still a major part of the picture and probably will be for a while.

So even if new rules come in, the threat of getting sued is still very real for crypto companies.

And that was just the warm-up. There are four more roundtables coming up:

• April 11 – Between a Block and a Hard Place: Tailoring Regulation for Crypto Trading

• April 25 – Know Your Custodian: Key Considerations for Crypto Custody

• May 12 – Tokenization – Moving Assets Onchain: Where TradFi and DeFi Meet

• June 6 – DeFi and the American Spirit

So yeah – for the first time in forever, it feels like the SEC is actually having a conversation with market participants.

Progress might be slow, and the road ahead’s still a bit bumpy, but hey… at least we’re not stuck in 1946 anymore.

🗞 Final Ripple case update (hopefully)

So, remember last week when we said the SEC dropped their appeal against Ripple? (Missed that Squeeze? Go catch up here.)

Well, at the time, Ripple still had a big decision to make: whether to keep pushing forward with its cross-appeal.

And now, Ripple CLO Stuart Alderoty posted what he called his final update on the whole SEC v Ripple drama.

It’s official: Ripple’s dropping their cross-appeal.

So, what’s the final deal?

• The SEC keeps $50M out of the original $125M fine, and the remaining $75M will go back to Ripple;

• The SEC will ask the court to remove the standard injunction they previously pushed for – this means Ripple will no longer be legally restricted from selling XRP to institutional investors.

All this still needs to go through the usual endgame routine: a vote by the Commission, some legal paperwork, and the court signing off.

But yeah – that’s the last chapter. The fight is over… for real this time.

🍋 News drops

🚔 Crypto influencer Ben Armstrong (aka BitBoy) got arrested in Florida yesterday. He says it’s because of emails he sent to a judge while representing himself in court.

🎶 AI startup Infinite Reality bought Napster – the old-school music pirate turned streamer – for $207M. Next up? A music metaverse, apparently.

🤖 ​​ChatGPT can now make images right in the same chat where you have conversations. It’s supposed to get your prompts better, handle text in pics, and take hints from images you upload.

🤠 Hawk Tuah girl: first a meme, then a podcaster, then a scammer… and now? She’s getting her own documentary.

🔎 Another day, another SEC case closed. Web3 gaming company Immutable says the SEC closed its investigation into ‘em – no fines, no further drama.

🍌 Juicy memes