Trump rules out SBF pardon, Bitcoin in 'boring sideways': Hodler’s Digest, Jan. 4 – 10

CoinTelegraph

by Editorial Staff

January 10, 2026

AI-Generated Deep Dive Summary

President Donald Trump has ruled out granting a pardon to Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF), the former CEO of FTX who is serving a 25-year sentence for his role in the exchange’s collapse. In an interview with The New York Times, Trump emphasized no intention of pardoning SBF or others, including music producer Sean Combs and former Senator Robert Menendez. Meanwhile, BitMine Immersion Technologies, the largest known corporate holder of Ether, has resumed purchasing Ethereum, signaling sustained confidence in the cryptocurrency despite expectations of near-term price weakness. The company acquired $105 million worth of Ether at the start of 2026 and continues to hold $915 million in cash. The Nasdaq Stock Exchange and the CME Group have joined forces to launch a unified crypto index, rebranding it as the Nasdaq CME Crypto Index. This new benchmark includes Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP, Solana, Chainlink, Cardano, and Avalanche, according to spokespersons for Nasdaq. Sean Wasserman, head of index product management at Nasdaq, highlighted the shift toward index-based approaches in crypto investing, noting that this aligns with trends seen in other asset classes. Stablecoin payment flows are projected to reach $56.6 trillion by 2030, up from $2.9 trillion in 2025, representing an annual growth rate of around 80%. Bloomberg Intelligence attributes this growth to increasing institutional adoption and the use of stablecoins in economies grappling with inflation and financial instability. While Tether remains the most-used stablecoin for everyday transactions, Circle’s USDC is preferred on decentralized finance platforms. However, the share of stablecoin volume on decentralized crypto platforms has declined, likely due to growing usage in emerging markets facing geopolitical instability. Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin recently compared the blockchain network to Linux, emphasizing their shared open-source ethos and custom-tailored implementations. While Linux achieves this through developers modifying software, Ethereum does so via its layer-2 scaling networks. Buterin stressed Ethereum’s role as a decentralized platform for financial autonomy, enabling individuals and organizations to access network power without intermediaries. These developments underscore the evolving landscape

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Originally published on CoinTelegraph on 1/10/2026