Precious Metals Across the Board Drop, Spot Silver Down 3.82%

**Polygon Nears Deal to Acquire U.S. Bitcoin ATM Operator Coinme for $1B-$1.25B** Polygon is close to acquiring Coinme, a U.S. Bitcoin ATM operator, with a deal value pegged between $1 billion and $1.25 billion, sources familiar with the matter said on January 9. The transaction remains in a confidential stage. The acquisition is advised by investment bank Architect Partners. Coinme—one of the earliest Bitcoin ATM operators in the U.S.—rolled out its first compliant Bitcoin kiosk in May 2014. It now operates across roughly 49 U.S. states, supporting major cryptocurrencies at offline locations like supermarkets. Polygon closed a $450 million funding round in 2023, led by Sequoia Capital India. The potential deal is viewed as a key move for the firm to expand into crypto payments and offline access points.

On Jan 9, per GMGN market data, the Chinese meme token "I've Arrived" briefly topped $16 million in market cap to set a new all-time high. It has since retraced to $15.02 million, with a 24-hour gain of 483%. Binance Life's current market cap stands at $146 million, down 2.68% over the past 24 hours.

**January 9 – The National Bank of Cambodia (NBC) announced Wednesday that Prince Bank, a subsidiary of Prince Group, has entered liquidation and is barred from all banking operations, including accepting deposits and issuing loans.** The central bank said the decision complies with Cambodian law, and it has appointed auditing firm Morison Kak MKA as the legal liquidator to oversee the bank’s operations and asset disposal. Prince Bank must immediately halt all new banking activities, per the announcement: opening new accounts, taking new deposits, and approving or disbursing any business or personal loans. Cambodia’s Ministry of Interior confirmed Chen Zhi, along with associates Xu Jiliang and Shao Jihui, was arrested on January 6 and extradited to China. The trio is suspected of involvement in large-scale transnational online fraud, with related charges filed by a U.S. court. Chen’s previously granted Cambodian citizenship was formally revoked by royal decree in December 2025

On January 9, Bitmine deposited over 1 million ETH into Ethereum Proof-of-Stake (PoS) staking, pushing its total staked ETH to 1.032 million—valued at $3.215 billion, per EmberCN monitoring. That staked amount accounts for 25% of the firm’s total ETH holdings, which stand at 4.143 million. As a result, the queue of ETH waiting to be staked has grown to 1.778 million, while the exit queue has already been cleared.

ARK Invest founder Cathie Wood said on January 9 that the U.S. government may directly purchase Bitcoin in the future to build up the nation’s Bitcoin strategic reserve, instead of just relying on Bitcoin seized by law enforcement. Appearing on the *Bitcoin Brainstorm* podcast, Wood noted that while the Trump administration created a national Bitcoin reserve via executive order, the reserve has only included seized Bitcoin so far—no market purchases have been made. “The initial target was 1 million Bitcoin, so I think they’ll eventually start buying,” she said. Wood believes Trump will keep prioritizing crypto issues amid midterm election pressure, which bodes well for the Bitcoin strategic reserve. For one, Trump and his family have growing stakes in the crypto space; for another, the crypto community was a key factor in his presidential win. “He doesn’t want to be a lame duck—he wants one or two productive years in office, and he views crypto as a path forward,” Wood added.

January 9: Per alternative data, today’s Crypto Fear & Greed Index dropped to 27 (down from 28 yesterday), signaling a market downturn. The index averaged 28 last week, marking several consecutive days of market “fear.” Note: The Crypto Fear & Greed Index ranges from 0 to 100, tracking six metrics: Volatility (25%), Market Trading Volume (25%), Social Media Sentiment (15%), Market Surveys (15%), Bitcoin’s Market Dominance (10%), and Google Trends Analysis (10%).