On February 23, Cointelegraph reported that Greg Cipolaro, NYDIG’s Head of Research, noted in a report that the "investable universe" in the crypto space is narrowing—focusing primarily on applications or services that "extend traditional financial products onto blockchain infrastructure." He added that beyond Bitcoin, tokenized assets, stablecoins, select DeFi infrastructure, and a handful of general-purpose blockchains (like Ethereum), "the likelihood of large-scale blockchain applications is lower than previously anticipated."

As of February 23, per 8MarketCap data, Bitcoin has slipped to 15th place in global asset market cap rankings, trailing Nvidia and Tesla. Its current market cap stands at $1.305 trillion, down 4.11% over the past 24 hours.

February 23rd – Per data from Coinglass, Bitcoin briefly dipped below $65,000 today, with major centralized (CEX) and decentralized (DEX) exchange funding rates signaling the market has shifted back to bearish territory. Specific funding rate details are available in the attached image. BlockBeats Note: Funding rates are set by crypto exchanges to align perpetual contract prices with the underlying asset’s market value. This is a capital exchange mechanism between long and short traders—exchanges do not collect this fee. It adjusts the cost or profit of traders holding positions to keep contract prices closely tied to the underlying asset. Key Rule: A 0.01% funding rate is the baseline. Rates above 0.01% indicate a broadly bullish market, while rates below 0.005% signal a broadly bearish market.

On February 23, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) announced it will halt the imposition of tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) as of 12:01 a.m. Eastern Time (ET) on Tuesday, February 24 — corresponding to 1:01 p.m. Beijing Time.

On February 23, Onchain Lens monitoring revealed a whale deposited 2 million USDC into Hyperliquid and boosted its 20x-leveraged SOL long position—with open orders currently in place to expand the position further. The whale also holds an $11.14 million 20x-leveraged ETH long position.

Feb 23 (CCTV News) — As the U.S. and Iran signal openness to talks, the risk of U.S. military action against Iran remains. Feb 22 (Sputnik News) — U.S. media cited a former CIA intelligence official as saying the U.S. may launch a military strike against Iran on Feb 23 or 24. ### Notes on U.S. language habits adjustment: 1. **Date format**: Used *Feb* (common abbreviation) instead of full "February" for brevity; placed source (CCTV/Sputnik) in parentheses after date (standard for U.S. news briefs). 2. **Vocabulary precision**: Replaced "officer" with "official" (CIA intelligence personnel are typically referred to as "officials," not military-style "officers"). 3. **Conciseness**: Omitted redundant "that" in the cited quote; simplified "signaling negotiations" to "signal openness to talks" (more natural for U.S. news context). 4. **Tone**: Kept direct, factual language (no flowery phrasing) — core to U.S. news briefs.