BTC Reaches $78,000
The BTC price rose to $78,000 for the first time since early February. The rise is attributed to Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi's announcement that the Strait of Hormuz had opened. At press time, the asset is trading around $76,300, up approximately 5% in 24 hours. Glassnode analysts previously noted that a consolidation of the bullish trend is possible with a confident breakout of $78,000, which corresponds to the average market price.
Tether Launches Non-Custodial Wallet tether.wallet
Tether has introduced a non-custodial wallet, tether.wallet, supporting the stablecoins USDT, USAT, XAUT, and Bitcoin. The solution is built on the open-source WDK toolkit, announced in October 2025. Initially, the service operates on several networks: USDT and XAUT are available on Ethereum, Polygon, Plasma, and Arbitrum, USAT on Ethereum, and BTC via the Lightning Network. The company plans to expand the list of supported blockchains in the future.
The wallet allows sending funds using human-readable identifiers like name@tether.me instead of long addresses. According to Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino, the goal of the product is to make digital asset transfers as simple and convenient as possible, without intermediaries or loss of control over funds. Fees are paid in the transferred asset, and private keys remain with the user—all transactions are signed locally on the device.
Tether emphasized that the new product opens access to its payment infrastructure directly to users and is aimed at a wide audience, including those who do not use traditional financial services.
Ethereum's Largest Holder Loses Over $3.8 Billion
BitMine Immersion Technologies posted a net loss of $3.82 billion for the quarter ended February 28, 2026. The main reason for this loss was the revaluation of its Ethereum reserves amid a prolonged market decline.
In comparison, the company's losses for the same period a year earlier were only $1.15 million. Over the past six months, the cumulative loss has exceeded $9 billion, with approximately $3.78 billion of this coming from unrealized losses due to the decline in the value of digital assets.
Despite the negative dynamics, BitMine continues to expand its position. As of April 12, the company held 4.87 million ETH, worth approximately $10.7 billion, with an average purchase price of approximately $2,206. BitMine remains the largest corporate holder of Ethereum and aims to increase its stake to 5% of the total supply. Its current share has reached 4.04%.
Board Chairman Tom Lee views the current correction as an opportunity to accumulate the asset. He believes the market is nearing the end of a "mini-crypto winter," and Ethereum's current price undervalues its long-term potential.
Hyperbridge Hack
On April 13, an unknown attacker exploited a vulnerability in the Hyperbridge cross-chain bridge's smart contract, gained administrative privileges, and minted 1 billion DOT tokens, according to CertiK analysts. They then sold the entire amount in a single transaction, netting 108.2 ETH (approximately $237,000).
The incident only affected the ERC-20 version of DOT on the Ethereum network and did not impact the Polkadot mainnet. At the time of publication, the project team had not officially commented. Following the news, the DOT price fell 4% to $1.19.
Ledger Phishing App in the App Store
Scammers used a fake Ledger Live app in the App Store to steal at least $9.5 million in cryptocurrency, according to on-chain analyst ZachXBT. On April 13, one of the victims, G. Love frontman Garrett Dutton, reported the scheme. He claimed to have lost 5.9 BTC (approximately $420,000) accumulated over 10 years after installing the wallet on a new computer and entering his seed phrase. The app turned out to be fake.
ZachXBT tracked the funds: the stolen assets were transferred to deposit addresses on the KuCoin exchange through a series of transactions. The expert later clarified that this platform was used to launder the funds. At the time of publication, Apple has removed the fake app from the App Store, but how it passed moderation remains unclear.
Another Attempt to Uncover Satoshi
The New York Times published a comprehensive investigation by journalist John Carreyrou into the identity of Satoshi Nakamoto. According to his theory, British cryptographer Adam Back may be the creator of Bitcoin.
The author analyzed thousands of cypherpunk messages, finding similarities in writing style, and examined court documents and correspondence. Additional grounds for suspicion were the documentary Money Electric: The Bitcoin Mystery—in one scene, Back visibly tensed when mentioned as the possible creator of Bitcoin.
One of the key arguments was Back's 1997 publications, in which he described concepts close to the core principles of Bitcoin long before the white paper was published. Carreyrou also conducted a linguistic analysis, noting similarities in vocabulary, punctuation, and common expressions.
The journalist also noted temporal coincidences: the periods of activity between Back and Satoshi barely overlapped. Following the publication of the article, Adam Back denied these assumptions, stating that he is not Satoshi, although he confirmed his significant role in the cypherpunk movement.
