Bitcoin hovered around $88,000 on Wednesday as year‑end trading in Asia thinned and investors kept risk light after October’s $19B liquidation wave. Holiday closures across Hong Kong and Australia, with Japan and South Korea shut for the session, coincided with subdued volumes that kept prices below $90,000 into late December.

BitMine, led by chairman Thomas Tom Lee, plans to activate its Made in America Validator Network (MAVAN) in early 2026 to earn staking fees from a 4,110,525 Ether treasury worth about $12 billion. The company has already staked 408,627 Ether with three providers, added 44,463 Ether in the past week, and projects that fully staking its holdings could generate around $374 million in annual fees based on current assumptions.

Bitcoin hovered near $87,000 on Tuesday while Asian equities eased after a seven-day advance and US tech futures dipped. Broader crypto prices and total market capitalization slipped, trading volumes thinned into year-end, and metals such as silver and gold pulled back from recent record highs amid profit-taking.

Mirae Asset Group has entered discussions to acquire South Korean crypto exchange Korbit for an estimated 100B to 140B won, with talks handled by affiliate Mirae Asset Consulting. Korbit, majority-owned by NXC and SK Planet, holds about 0.5% of local trading volume but is seen as valuable for its regulated exchange license and banking connections as institutional interest in Korean crypto markets grows.

Bitcoin traded around $89,127 in thin Boxing Day sessions while Asian equities inched higher and silver extended record-breaking gains. Low liquidity kept BTC capped below $90,000 even as Wall Street's latest record closes and a strong run in gold and silver underpinned year-end risk appetite.

BlackRock is expanding its digital assets team with new roles in New York, London and Singapore. According to job listings, openings span associate to managing director, including a New York MD role paying $270,000 to $350,000 and an APAC MD in Singapore. The push covers tokenization, stablecoins, market structure, fund services and compliance.

On Tuesday, the S&P 500 finished at a record after a US Q3 GDP revision to 4.3%, and on Wednesday Bitcoin eased in early Asian trade. Bitfinex analysts said BTC rebounded from the low $80,000 support but faces supply between $94,000 and $120,000. Gold set a fresh high above $4,500, with $4,520 shown in a CoinGecko post on December 24, 2025.

Decentralized perpetual futures exchange Hyperliquid stated that a wallet flagged by the community for shorting and selling $HYPE is controlled by a former staff member dismissed in Q1 2024. On-chain observers had tracked the address’s large $HYPE balance, alleged TWAP-style selling and links to HyperEVM after the token’s launch. In response, Hyperliquid reiterated its code of conduct, including a ban on team trading $HYPE derivatives and a zero-tolerance policy toward insider trading.

Gemini Asia Pacific head Saad Ahmed said institutional investors now dictate how crypto markets digest shocks, focusing more on long-term positioning than daily price swings. He highlighted the November to December 2025 sell-off, when Bitcoin fell from near $100,000 to about $87,000 and Ethereum dropped from around $3,900 to roughly $2,745 before partially recovering, as an example of more disciplined risk management. Ahmed added that ETF flows, stablecoin activity and real-world asset usage are increasingly important signals of market health alongside on-chain fundamentals.