The driving question in crypto is no longer "what" could be built, but "how" things actually work. This marks a fundamental shift for the market, moving on from ambitious blueprints to focusing on working engines that generate revenue, attract real users, and integrate with the off-chain world.

In this edition of Vester Pulse, we explore this ongoing transition, highlighting key developments that reflect this new, more pragmatic phase of the market.

Vester Updates

As promised, our news agent launched this week and is now live on our product.

It’s designed to help users make sense of breaking developments in real time - across regulation, markets, protocols, and macro events. Rather than dumping headlines, it contextualizes them, offering insight into why they matter and what they mean for your portfolio.

This fundamentally changes how you can interact with financial information. Instead of passively scrolling feeds, you can now actively question the market.

Ask the Vester agent directly: “How will the SEC’s latest move affect DeFi?” or “Summarize the impact of this new Layer 2 on Ethereum’s ecosystem,” and receive clear answers grounded in data and historical context.

This is the second core agent in our stack, following the on-chain analytics agent released last month. Each agent is purpose-built, composable, and designed to reflect how real research gets done.

We will tease the third agent in our development roadmap next week, and let’s just say it’s the most exciting one yet.

Crypto News

JP Morgan to offer Crypto-Backed Loans

Imagine being able to get a loan against your stocks or your house. Now, what if you could do the same with your Bitcoin? That's exactly what JPMorgan is planning to offer, with the new service set to roll out in 2026.

This program will allow the bank's wealthy clients to borrow U.S. dollars using their Bitcoin and Ethereum holdings as collateral. This is a major step in crypto "growing up," moving it from a risky gamble to something you can actually use to generate capital in the real world.

So, why does this matter?

• It connects two different worlds: JPMorgan is essentially building a bridge between the new, fast-moving world of crypto finance and the old, established system of traditional banking.

• It unlocks your crypto's value: If you're a long-term crypto holder, you no longer have to sell your assets to get cash. This lets you access money without creating a taxable event, turning your digital wealth into something you can use today.

• It sets a new trend: When a giant like JPMorgan does something, other banks pay attention. Expect to see similar loan products pop up everywhere as competitors rush to keep up.

At its core, this is JPMorgan recognizing a simple fact: for a growing number of people, digital assets are a real and valuable part of their portfolio, and they can't be ignored anymore.

Meme Tokens Spike on Celebrity Deaths

Last week, the wild world of meme coins gave us another perfect example of how fast a story (true or not) can be turned into a money-making machine. When fake rumors about the deaths of Hulk Hogan and Ozzy Osbourne hit the internet, two brand-new tokens named HULK and OZZY appeared and went parabolic, soaring 122,000% and 16,800% respectively.

To give you an idea of just how dramatic this was, here’s a visualization of the HULK token's price chart over those few days:

The sudden, near-total collapse of both tokens wasn't a random market event; it was the final stage of a carefully executed playbook designed to exploit human emotion for profit. This pattern is a textbook example of a modern pump-and-dump scheme, and understanding how the trap is set is crucial.

Phase 1: The Setup Long before any news breaks, the scheme begins. Insiders create a functionally worthless token and distribute the overwhelming majority of the supply among themselves at virtually no cost. These tokens have no product, no team, and no purpose. They are empty vessels, prepared and waiting for a catalyst.

Phase 2: The Catalyst and Amplification The moment a powerful, viral narrative emerges - in this case, a tragic news event - a pre-planned promotional machine kicks into gear. A network of bots is deployed across social platforms like Telegram and X (formerly Twitter), relentlessly blasting news of the tokens and manufacturing the illusion of a grassroots movement.

Phase 3: The Pump This manufactured hype funnels a rush of retail investors toward decentralized exchanges. There, they see what appears to be a buzzing market with soaring prices, triggering a powerful wave of FOMO.

Phase 4: The Dump Once enough outside money has poured in, the insiders execute the final step. They simultaneously dump their massive holdings onto the very market they created, cashing out their profits and instantly collapsing the token’s price to near-zero. They vanish, leaving thousands of investors holding a worthless asset.

Ultimately, this predatory behavior inflicts deep, long-term damage on the entire crypto ecosystem. It burns new investors, attracts deserved regulatory scrutiny, and undermines the credibility of thousands of legitimate projects striving to build a more transparent financial future.

Goldman Sachs and BNY Mellon Tokenize Money Market Funds

A major turning point for blockchain in high finance is happening right now, as Goldman Sachs and BNY Mellon have launched a live platform that turns traditional money market funds into digital tokens. This is not an experimental sandbox; the infrastructure is fully operational and accessible to institutional clients managing real capital.

The collaboration represents a perfect match of old and new finance. Goldman Sachs provides the cutting-edge blockchain technology with its private network, while BNY Mellon, a giant in asset management, handles the custody and administration of the actual funds. Top-tier funds from BlackRock, Fidelity, and Federated Hermes are already part of the offering.

What makes these tokens so special is that they are direct digital representations of the fund shares themselves, creating a new kind of asset that is fully regulated, professionally managed, and earns interest from day one.

Think of it this way: a typical stablecoin is like a claim ticket for a dollar held in a vault. This tokenized share, however, is the asset. It’s the digital equivalent of owning the fund directly, which means it’s constantly working and earning yield. This structure is incredibly attractive to corporate treasurers and large asset managers who need their cash to be both safe and productive.

With a friendlier regulatory outlook, underscored by the recent passage of the GENIUS Act, the path is clearing for wider adoption.

Considering the money market industry is worth over $7 trillion, tokenizing even a tiny fraction of that would mean unleashing hundreds of billions of dollars onto a faster, more efficient, and programmable financial system.

Tether Prints $7B+ in July

If you're looking for a sign of where the crypto market is headed, one of the biggest is unfolding right now. So far this July, Tether has injected a massive amount of fuel into the system by minting over $7 billion in new USDT, one of the largest monthly increases on record. The visualization below of USDT's total circulating supply shows just how sharp this recent expansion has been.

This hasn't been a slow drip; it has been a deluge, with $2 billion hitting the market in the past week alone. The surge isn't for cashing out; it's pure, raw demand for on-chain liquidity on networks like Tron and Ethereum.

To understand the impact, think of USDT as the poker chips for the vast, global crypto casino. When the house suddenly pushes $7 billion in new chips onto the table, it doesn't just sit there. It emboldens players to make bigger bets, take more risks, and fuel speculative frenzies in everything from altcoins to derivatives.

For seasoned market watchers, this pattern is unmistakable. A massive injection of USDT is often the prelude to that capital rotating into riskier assets. With altcoins already showing signs of strength and new ETF products providing fresh on-ramps for capital, this $7 billion infusion feels less like a spark and more like pouring gasoline on a smoldering fire.

Beyond the immediate trading implications, this month's event is solidifying Tether's iron grip as the crypto world's default financial layer. Even as regulators circle and regulated alternatives emerge, when the market needs to move vast sums of money with speed and efficiency, it overwhelmingly turns to USDT. It remains the neutral, go-to asset, influencing everything from exchange liquidity to which narratives gain traction.

Closing Thoughts

The crypto market today feels like a paradox: drenched in optimism and flush with capital, yet more complex to navigate than ever. Events like the massive $7 billion USDT minting are powerful bullish signals, but they are just one piece of an increasingly intricate puzzle. From institutional giants tokenizing real-world assets to meme coins exploding on rumors, the market is constantly buzzing with high-stakes developments.

With market sentiment running this high, it’s easy to get swept up in the excitement. But discerning between genuine, data-driven trends and fleeting, hype-fueled narratives is the single biggest challenge for investors today.

This is the problem Vester is being built to solve. Our vision is for Vester to act as your AI-powered analyst, designed to decipher this complexity in a market moving at the speed of headlines.

This work is guided by a single, focused purpose:

To achieve this, Vester will synthesize billions of data points, from on-chain metrics like the USDT supply to institutional news and social sentiment. Translating them into clear, actionable insights.

The goal is to move beyond just seeing that capital is flowing into the market, and instead help you understand where it's coming from, where it’s likely headed, and what it means for your strategy.

For crypto to continue to mature from a speculative niche into a foundational part of the global economy, the clarity and trust that Vester is being built to provide is not just helpful, it's essential.

Thank you for reading, see you next week.