Singapore's largest money laundering case suspect Wang Shuiming may be extradited to China, with his accomplice being the mastermind behind the Hong Kong crypto platform scam AAX.

April 16th: Bitcoin dipped below $74,000, down 0.02% in the past 24 hours, per HTX market data.

On April 16, the Financial Times reported that the cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence (AI) industries have collectively raised approximately $250 million over the past year to support congressional candidates in the November midterm elections. In February, Andreessen Horowitz co-founders Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz donated a combined $25 million to the Super Political Action Committee (Super PAC) “Leading The Future,” which backs AI-friendly candidates. The group has raised roughly $75 million from billionaires including the two founders and OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman; when including “dark money” nonprofits that do not disclose their donors, that total climbs to $140 million. Separately, Fairshake—the crypto industry’s largest Super PAC—has raised more than $134 million. In January, Wall Street firm Cantor Fitzgerald (formerly led by current U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, now run by his son Brandon, who has ties to Tether) donated $10 million to Fell

On-chain analyst Wu Ji reported on April 16th that as HYPE climbed to $45, a whale holding a long position of 1.38 million HYPE tokens (valued at $62.13 million) from last November’s peak has shifted from an unrealized loss of $26 million to breakeven with an $8.5 million unrealized gain. Key details: - The whale entered the long position at $38.6 per HYPE in November 2023 (the token’s peak at the time). HYPE’s price fell to a low of $20.5 by late January, leaving the whale with a $26 million unrealized loss then. - Currently, HYPE has surged 120% from its $20.5 low. The whale’s position now sits at breakeven plus $8.5 million in unrealized gains.

U.S. stocks opened higher on April 16: the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.16%, the S&P 500 gained 0.2%, and the Nasdaq Composite was up 0.17%.

April 16 (Reuters) — U.S. and Iranian negotiators have scaled back ambitions for a comprehensive peace deal, now targeting a temporary memorandum to prevent a slide into conflict, two Iranian sources told Reuters. A fruitless round of talks in Islamabad over the weekend left deep divisions unresolved on nuclear issues—including the destination of enriched uranium stocks and the timeline for halting nuclear work—hampering progress, the sources said. A senior Iranian official noted the two sides have narrowed differences on issues like Strait of Hormuz management. Iran is pushing for the memorandum to include U.S. unfreezing of some funds in exchange for allowing more ships to transit the strait. A source briefed on Tehran’s position said Iran’s proposal calls for free, threat-free transit through the Oman side of the strait for ships if a lasting agreement is reached. However, sharp divisions persist—including the fate of highly enriched uranium stocks and the timeline for halt

April 16 — U.S. initial jobless claims for the week ended April 11 totaled 207,000, coming in below the expected 215,000. The prior week’s reading was revised down from 219,000 to 218,000. Per CME’s FedWatch Tool, after today’s claims release, the probability the Federal Reserve holds interest rates steady at its April meeting stands at 99.5%, with just a 0.5% chance of a 25-basis-point rate hike.