Shuttered crypto exchange Garantex is reportedly back under a new name after laundering millions in ruble-backed stablecoins and sending them to a freshly created exchange, according to a Swiss blockchain analytics company.  

Global Ledger claims the operators of the Russian exchange have shifted liquidity and customer deposits to Grinex, which they say is “Garantex’s full-fledged successor,” in a report released to X on March 19.

“We can confidently state that Grinex and Garantex are directly connected both onchain and offchain.”

“The movement of funds, including the systematic transfer of A7A5 liquidity, the use of one-time-use wallets, and the involvement of addresses previously associated with Garantex, provides clear onchain proof of their link,” the Global Ledger team said in the report.

After completing its investigation on March 13, Global Ledger says it had found onchain data showing Garantex laundered over $60 million worth of ruble-backed stablecoins called A7A5 and sent them to addresses associated with Grinex.

“In this case, the burning and subsequent minting process was used to launder funds from Garantex, allowing new coins to be minted from a system address with a clean history,” the team said.

A Garantex manager also reportedly told Global Ledger that customers have been visiting the exchange office in person and moving funds from Garantex to Grinex.

“Additionally, offchain indicators, such as transactional patterns, commentaries and exchange behaviors, further reinforce this connection,” it said.

The report also points to a description of Grinex on the Russian crypto tracking site CoinMarketRating, claiming that the owners of Garantex created it. The reports said this shows “Grinex is not an independent entity but rather a full-fledged successor to Garantex, continuing its financial operations despite the exchange’s official shutdown.”

By March 14, the volume of incoming transactions on Grinex was nearly $30 million, according to Global Ledger. CoinMarketRating shows that the trade volume for the month is now over $68 million, with spot trading topping $2 million.

The US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control first hit Garantex with sanctions in April 2022 for allegedly money laundering violations.

Related: US, UK, Australia sanction Zservers for hosting crypto ransomware LockBit

On March 6, the US Department of Justice collaborated with authorities in Germany and Finland to freeze domains associated with Garantex, which they claim processed over $96 billion worth of criminal proceeds since launching in 2019.

Stablecoin operator Tether also froze $27 million in Tether (USDT), on March 6 which forced Garantex to halt all operations, including withdrawals.

Only a few days later, on March 12, officials with India’s Central Bureau of Investigation arrested Aleksej Bešciokov, who allegedly operated Garantex, on US charges that included conspiracy to commit money laundering. 

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Crypto custody and trading firm Bakkt Holdings has appointed a new co-CEO and is cutting some of its services to focus on its crypto offerings after recently losing two major clients.

Akshay Naheta, the founder of stablecoin payments infrastructure firm Distributed Technologies Research (DTR), will join Bakkt CEO Andy Main in the role, the company said on March 19.

Bakkt added that it will enter into an agreement with DTR to integrate its stablecoin-based payment infrastructure with Bakkt’s crypto trading and brokerage technology, subject to regulatory approval.

Bakkt said the partnership would open new revenue streams in stablecoin payments and crypto trading while increasing efficiency in cross-border payments, a popular use case for crypto.

Naheta founded DTR in 2022 after a nearly six-year stint in various executive roles at investment management giant SoftBank Group, which has a history of investing in crypto firms.

In a separate statement reporting its fourth quarter and full year 2024 results, Bakkt said it wants “to focus resources on core crypto offerings” and was potentially looking to sell or wind down its loyalty services business, which allows its clients to offer travel and merchandise perks.

Bakkt added that it was selling its crypto custody subsidiary, Bakkt Trust, to its parent company, Intercontinental Exchange, for $1.5 million. It said the sale would cut operating costs by $3.8 million a year and free up around $3 million for investment into its crypto business.

The firm added it would maintain custody solutions “through a robust network of reputable custody providers.”

Its moves come after Bakkt disclosed on March 17 that its major clients, Bank of America and trading platform Webull, won’t be renewing contacts with the firm when they expire in April and June, respectively.

Bank of America accounted for around 16% of Bakkt’s loyalty services revenue in 2023 and 2024, while Webull represented 74% of its crypto revenues over that same period.

The disclosure sent its share price tumbling on March 18, which closed the trading day down over 27% to $9.33.

Bakkt improves top and bottom-line earnings 

Bakkt reported on March 19 that its total 2024 revenues came in at $3.49 billion, up nearly 350% year-over-year, while its yearly net loss roughly halved to $103.4 million.

Related: Fund managers dump US stocks at record pace — Can recession fears hurt Bitcoin? 

Fourth quarter revenues increased more than seven-fold from 2024, reaching $1.8 billion, while its net loss narrowed to $40.4 million. 

It forecast revenues of between $1.03 billion to $1.28 billion for the first quarter of 2025, which would be a nearly 50% bump from the first quarter of 2024.

Shares in Bakkt (BKKT) closed flat at $9.31 on March 19 after a dip to $8.50 during trading; it reached a top of $9.88 after the bell but has since settled to around its closing price, according to Google Finance.

Bakkt is down nearly 62.5% so far this year and has essentially lost all value since peaking at over $1,000 in October 2021.

Opinion: Coinbase and Base: Is crypto just becoming traditional finance 2.0?

Solana Labs CEO Anatoly Yakovenko has broken his silence over the “America Is Back — Time to Accelerate” advertisement, which blended American patriotism and tech innovation with political messaging around gender identity.

“The ad was bad, and it’s still gnawing at my soul,” Yakovenko said in a March 19 X post after receiving immense backlash over the controversial ad. 

“I am ashamed I downplayed it instead of just calling it what it is – mean and punching down on a marginalized group.”

Yakovenko praised those in the Solana ecosystem who called out the “mess” that was posted on Solana’s X account, which accumulated around 1.2 million views and 1,300 comments before it was deleted roughly nine hours later.

Yakovenko said he will use the learning experience to ensure Solana stays focused on open-source software development and decentralization while staying “out of cultural wars.”

Solana hasn’t made an official comment on the matter, though its X account reshared Yakovenko’s post to its 3.3 million followers.

Cointelegraph also reached out to the Solana Foundation shortly after the ad was taken down but didn’t receive a response.

The two-and-a-half-minute ad for the Solana Accelerate conference showcased a man acting as America in a therapy session who said he was having thoughts “about innovation” such as crypto.

The therapist responded that he should instead do “something more productive, like coming up with a new gender” and later said the man should “focus on pronouns.”

The man snapped back, stating that he wanted “to invent technologies, not genders.”

Took them 9 hours to delete it.

Also all the major players in the Solana ecosystem suddenly delete their tweets promoting/supporting the ad and RT’d and liked takes about it being bad.

They approved this, supported it and celebrated it.

They rolled it back because it hurt… pic.twitter.com/kPMERDpTcn

— Adam Cochran (adamscochran.eth) (@adamscochran) March 18, 2025

The now-deleted ad came nine days after Solana’s X account posted: “Solana is for everyone.”

Related: Solana rallies 8% as crypto markets recover — Is there room for more SOL upside?

Cinneamhain Ventures partner Adam Cochran pointed out that transgender people contribute to open-source software and cryptography in an “insanely disproportionate amount.”

A GitHub survey from 2017 found that of the 5,500 randomly selected open-source developers, 1% were transgender, and another 1% were non-binary.

Most data obtained during 2017 and 2018 suggest that transgender and non-binary people combined represented somewhere between 0.1% and 0.6% of the population.

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Bitcoin’s corrective phase set a four-month low at $76,600 on March 11. Despite this decline, long-term holders have continued to hold large amounts of BTC, suggesting a “unique market dynamic moving forward,” new research says.

“Long-Term Holder activity remains largely subdued, with a notable decline in their sell-side pressure,” Glassnode said in a March 18 markets report.

Long-term holders show signs of bullishness

Bitcoin’s recovery comes as selling pressure among Long-Term Holders (LTHs) — wallets that have held Bitcoin for at least 155 days — begins to wane. 

The Binary Spending Indicator, a metric used to determine when LTHs are spending a significant proportion of their holdings in a sustained manner, shows a slowdown (see chart below) while the LTH supply is also beginning to rebound after several months of decline.

“This suggests that there is a greater willingness to hold than to spend coins among this cohort,” Glassnode noted, adding:

“This perhaps represents a shift in sentiment, with Long-Term Holder behavior moving away from sell-side distribution.”

Bull market tops are often marked by intense sell-side pressure and strong profit-taking among LTHs, which signals a complete shift to bearish behavior. 

However, despite Bitcoin’s drawdown in recent weeks, this investor cohort continues to hold a large portion of their profits, especially for this later stage of the cycle, Glassnode said.

This could suggest that long-term holders may still be expecting more BTC price upside later in the year.

“This interesting observation may indicate a more unique market dynamic moving forward.”

New Bitcoin whale accumulation reshapes markets

New Bitcoin whales, addresses holding at least 1,000 BTC, where each coin has an average acquisition age of less than six months, are aggressively accumulating, according to CryptoQuant data.

This signals strong conviction in Bitcoin’s long-term outlook among the new large investors.

These wallets have collectively acquired over 1 million BTC since November 2024, “positioning themselves as one of the most influential market participants,” said CryptoQuant independent analyst Onchained in a March 7 analysis.

The chart below shows that their pace has accelerated notably in recent weeks, “accumulating more than 200,000 BTC just this month.”

“This sustained inflow highlights a shift in market dynamics, suggesting increased institutional or high-net-worth participation. ”

Meanwhile, several crypto executives have told Cointelegraph that Bitcoin’s recent price drop was a “normal correction,” with the market just waiting for a new narrative and a cycle top yet to come.

But not everyone agrees. For instance, CryptoQuant founder and CEO Ki Young Ju said that the Bitcoin bull cycle is over. He added:

“Expecting 6-12 months of bearish or sideways price action.”

This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.

Crypto regulations must be enacted through an act of Congress to become permanent and meaningful pieces of legislation, according to former Congressman Wiley Nickel.

In an exclusive video interview with Cointelegraph’s Turner Wright, Nickel urged bipartisan collaboration to push through comprehensive crypto regulations. The former Congressman added:

“I think it’s really important for anybody who cares about this issue to step back and realize that if you want lasting change in Washington, you must move legislation through Congress. Otherwise, if you’re talking about executive orders, it will just go back and forth.”

“You don’t want to have the mess that we saw just months ago with Gary Gensler’s SEC — you need to get legislation through Congress,” Nickel reiterated.

President Trump’s Jan. 23 executive order establishing the Working Group on Digital Assets, which also prohibited the development of a central bank digital currency (CBDC), and the order establishing a Bitcoin strategic reserve alongside a separate crypto stockpile, were both examples of executive actions that can be reversed at a later date.

Related: Congress on track for stablecoin, market structure bills by August: Blockchain Association

Both chambers of Congress rush to push through meaningful legislation

Rep. Tom Emmer, the majority whip of the United States House of Representatives, reintroduced legislation banning a CBDC in the US on March 6.

Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis also reintroduced the Bitcoin Act in March, which builds upon an earlier bill of the same title but allows the US to purchase more than 1 million Bitcoin (BTC).

Rep. Byron Donalds recently announced that he would draft legislation to codify the Bitcoin strategic reserve into law — shielding President Trump’s original executive order from being overturned by a future administration.

On March 12, the House of Representatives repealed the IRS broker rule requiring decentralized finance platforms to report information to the Internal Revenue Service in a 292-131 vote.

Speaking at this year’s Blockworks Digital Asset Summit, Democrat Rep. Ro Khanna said that Congress should be able to pass comprehensive crypto regulation in 2025, including a stablecoin bill and a market structure bill.

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