Top Stories of The Week
SharpLink shares drop 12% on Q2 crypto impairment loss
SharpLink Gaming, an online gaming company with the second-largest corporate Ether treasury, announced a net loss of $103 million for the second quarter of 2025, driven by a paper loss from accounting for liquid staked Ether (LsETH). The loss marks a steep drop from a $500,000 loss in the same period of 2024 — a year-over-year change of -25,980%.
According to a Friday announcement, SharpLink now holds 728,804 Ether worth approximately $3.5 billion at this writing. The only publicly traded company with more ETH is BitMine Immersion Technologies, which holds a little more than 1.15 million ETH worth approximately $5.1 billion.
Of SharpLink’s Q2 loss, $87.8 million — or 85% — is related to the company’s LsETH. A SharpLink representative told Cointelegraph that the company still has all its LsETH and that the impairment “reflects accounting rules, not a sale or loss of ETH.”
“Under US GAAP, LsETH is currently treated as a digital intangible asset, which is recorded at cost and subject to impairment,” a SharpLink spokesperson said. “In Q2, the lowest market price of LsETH was $2300, triggering the $87.8M non-cash impairment.”
US Fed to end oversight program for banks’ crypto activities
The Federal Reserve Board said that it would end a “novel activities supervision program” set up in 2023 to supervise certain activities related to crypto assets and distributed ledger technology.
In a Friday notice, the Fed said it will sunset the program created in August 2023 and return to “monitoring banks’ novel activities through the normal supervisory process.” The 2023 program said it would be “risk-focused” and include supervision of banks providing “deposits, payments, and lending to crypto-asset-related entities and fintechs.”
“Since the Board started its program to supervise certain crypto and fintech activities in banks, the Board has strengthened its understanding of those activities, related risks, and bank risk management practices,” said the Fed. “As a result, the Board is integrating that knowledge and the supervision of those activities back into the standard supervisory process and is rescinding its 2023 supervisory letter creating the program.”
Coinbase says a ‘full-scale altcoin season’ may be just ahead
Altcoins have seen significant recent growth, while crypto market conditions suggest there could soon be a shift toward cryptocurrencies outside of Bitcoin, according to Coinbase.
“We think current market conditions now suggest a potential shift towards a full-scale altcoin season as we approach September,” Coinbase’s global head of research, David Duong, wrote in a monthly outlook report on Thursday.
The Coinbase analyst joined a growing chorus of traders and market observers tipping for an imminent altcoin season.
The firm defines altcoin season as when at least 75% of the top 50 altcoins by market capitalization outperform Bitcoin over the preceding 90 days.
Duong added that there was “significant retail capital sitting on the sidelines” in money market funds, and Federal Reserve easing could “unlock greater retail participation in the medium term.”
FBI warns of ‘fictitious law firms‘ targeting crypto scam victims
The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has issued a public service announcement for victims of crypto scams looking for legal advice to recover their funds.
In a Wednesday notice, the FBI said that fictitious law firms were targeting individuals who had previously been scammed out of some or all of their crypto holdings, putting them at additional risk. According to the bureau, the scammers’ actions left victims at risk of compromising their personal data and other funds.
The announcement, based on an update for similar warnings from the FBI in August 2023 and June 2024, cautioned people against accepting assistance from anyone recommending a “crypto recovery law firm” or any law firm “requesting payment in cryptocurrency or prepaid gift cards.”
“Be cautious of law firms contacting you unexpectedly, especially if you have not reported the crime to any law enforcement or civil protection agencies,” the notice reads.
Justin Sun, Bloomberg in legal dispute over billionaires index
Justin Sun, founder of the Tron blockchain, has sued Bloomberg and sought a temporary restraining order, alleging it published false and private financial information in its billionaires list.
Sun’s representatives said on Tuesday in a blog post by Tron that his profile on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index released on Monday had “published inaccurate data that dramatically and dangerously misrepresents Mr. Sun’s assets.”
Sun sued Bloomberg in a Delaware federal court on Monday, asking a judge to stop it from publishing the information, claiming the…
cointelegraph.com