WEEKLY: pseudo-crypto academy in Ukraine, Strategy losses, pressure on Telegram and a pause on the CLARITY Act

Bitcoin gained 7.36% over the month, Ethereum rose by 18.5%, and cryptocurrency ETFs recorded capital inflows again. At the same time, the market remains cautious: trading activity is declining, the Fear and Greed Index shows no confidence, and most movements look more like consolidation than the start of another rally.

Last week, a pseudo-crypto academy that defrauded nearly a thousand people was exposed in Ukraine. Strategy ended the quarter with an $8.3 billion loss, consideration of the CLARITY Act in the United States has been postponed again, Pavel Durov was placed on Russia's international wanted list, and AI infrastructure continues to absorb capital, electricity and market attention.

The market and Bitcoin

After the FOMC meeting, where the Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged, BTC temporarily fell to $63,500 before partially recovering its losses. Glassnode and CryptoQuant point to a consolidation phase, declining trading activity and shrinking BTC reserves on exchanges. Santiment, by contrast, is recording active buying by whales.

Strategy ended the quarter with an $8.3 billion loss, although it increased its reserves to 843,775 BTC. This clearly shows the contrast surrounding the company: it remains the largest corporate symbol of a bet on Bitcoin, but its financial reports are increasingly making the market nervous.

Satsuma and Smarter Web in the United Kingdom announced that they were leaving this model. This means that the story of public companies building their strategies around accumulating BTC is already facing a reality check. When growth is slow and obligations to investors remain, BTC on the balance sheet becomes both a narrative and a complex financial instrument.

Ethereum and cryptocurrency ETFs

Ethereum gained 18.5% in July and was trading near $1,857 at the time this weekly was prepared. Ethereum funds delivered a strong signal: they outpaced Bitcoin ETFs by almost three times in terms of net capital inflows.

Overall, cryptocurrency ETFs attracted more than $137 million over the week. This is a positive signal after periods of outflows, but it is not strong enough to indicate a new wave of institutional euphoria. For now, ETFs are stabilising the market rather than accelerating it.

Ethereum Institutional also closed its first funding round with the participation of more than 100 counterparties. This is important for the ecosystem because Ethereum is trying to establish itself as the core infrastructure for stablecoins, tokenisation, DeFi and corporate financial products.

Ukraine: the virtual assets law and the pseudo-crypto academy

According to NSSMC head Oleksii Semeniuk, Ukraine's draft law on virtual assets is approximately 90% complete. The document is expected to be finalised in August. The main unresolved issues remain the same: taxation and the legal status of crypto assets.

At the same time, the National Police exposed a pseudo-crypto academy that defrauded nearly a thousand people of more than $1.1 million. According to investigators, the victims were persuaded to transfer funds to controlled crypto wallets and a fraudulent investment platform.

This case matters for the entire market because scammers are increasingly approaching victims through pseudo-education, mentoring, investment clubs and the imitation of expertise rather than primitive promises of quick profits.

Why the CLARITY Act is stuck in politics again

Consideration of the CLARITY Act in the US Senate was postponed because of other political priorities, including sanctions against Russia and government appointments. The vote is expected no earlier than next week.

New York Attorney General Letitia James called for changes to the CLARITY Act because, in her view, the current version could weaken efforts to combat crypto fraud. Banks, meanwhile, are proposing a ban on any yield from stablecoins to avoid losing customer deposits.

As a result, three interests are converging around the CLARITY Act: the crypto market wants clarity, banks are protecting their business model, and politicians are trying not to overlook fraud risks.

Why Telegram is under pressure

Russia's FSB placed Pavel Durov on an international wanted list. He is accused of facilitating terrorist activity by allegedly failing to remove channels and bots that, according to the Russian authorities, were used by Ukrainian intelligence services.

Australia's eSafety regulator has also taken Telegram to court over its failure to remove videos of terrorist attacks and mass shootings. This creates another front of regulatory pressure for the platform.

Telegram has long been more than a messenger. It is infrastructure for communication, crypto communities, bots, channels, payments and Web3 services. Any pressure on the platform therefore automatically becomes important for the crypto environment.

How AI infrastructure is absorbing capital and resources

MARA CEO Fred Thiel said that directing electricity to AI data centres is more profitable than using it for Bitcoin mining. This is an important signal for miners: the industry can no longer focus only on the hash rate and the price of BTC.

Nvidia is negotiating approximately $250 billion in financial guarantees for OpenAI as part of the construction of a 10 GW data centre in Ohio. The total cost of the project, including chips, could exceed $500 billion.

The European Commission has also launched an AI gigafactory development programme with a budget of up to €30 billion. This is an attempt by the EU to build its own AI infrastructure and avoid complete dependence on the United States and China.

At the same time, Coinbase is promoting the Agentic Finance concept, in which cryptocurrencies could become the financial foundation of the AI agent economy. MoonPay introduced PayBox for crypto payments in ChatGPT and Claude, while Anthropic reported that Claude helped identify new methods of cryptographic attacks. AI is moving deeper into finance, but it is also increasing cybersecurity risks.

Other important signals of the week

The 2026 FIFA World Cup generated more than $20 billion in onchain activity, while transactions involving FIFA Collect digital assets exceeded $24 million. This is one example of crypto expanding beyond exchanges and DeFi.

Apple was sued over a fake crypto wallet in the App Store. BitMart announced a complete shutdown. Zcash released the Ironwood update. Circle acquired nearly 1,000 blockchain and fintech patents. Triple-A hot wallets were hacked for almost $12 million, while $8.5 million was stolen through a fake Flare Network website.

Kursoff's view

The market no longer reacts to every positive signal in the same way. It looks at where real infrastructure, legal clarity and a sustainable business model exist, while everything else quickly loses weight.