Crypto Market Fear Subsides Significantly, Today's Fear and Greed Index at 45

**U.S. DOJ Takes Formal Ownership of $400M+ in Helix Dark Web Crypto Mixer Assets** Jan. 30: The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced it has formally secured legal ownership of over $400 million in assets tied to Helix, a dark web cryptocurrency mixing service. The assets include cryptocurrency, real estate, and cash. Jan. 21: District of Columbia federal judge Beryl A. Howell signed the final forfeiture order authorizing the seizure. Helix, run by Larry Dean Harmon, processed roughly 354,468 Bitcoin transactions between 2014 and 2017—valued at $300 million at the time. The service primarily catered to dark web drug dealers’ money laundering needs. Harmon pleaded guilty to money laundering conspiracy in August 2021. In November 2024, he was sentenced to 36 months in prison, 3 years of supervised release, and ordered to forfeit assets.

DLNews reported on January 30 that Kazakhstan Central Bank’s National Investment Corporation (NIC) plans to use cryptocurrency seized by law enforcement to boost the nation’s crypto reserves. NIC head Timur Suleimenov stated on January 28 that the central bank has allocated $350 million in foreign currency and gold for the fund. Initially, NIC will not directly purchase or hold crypto—instead, it will do so through five pre-vetted hedge funds, with plans to later expand its investment scope to crypto-focused venture funds. Per Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, law enforcement has shuttered 130 illegal crypto exchanges (generating roughly $124 million in total revenue) and seized assets valued at over $5 million.

As of January 30th: On-chain analyst Ai Auntie (@ai_9684xtpa) reported that over the past 9 hours, Trend Research (a division of Easy Fintech) has withdrawn a total of 109 million USDT from Binance. The funds were deposited into Aave to mitigate liquidation risk on its Ethereum holdings. Currently, Trend Research holds 661,272.65 ETH with an unrealized loss of $192 million, at an average cost of $3,104.36 per ETH.

On January 30, El Salvador’s Central Bank announced a $50 million gold investment, while the country’s government will continue holding Bitcoin.

**January 30th** Flying Tulip—a unified on-chain financial system founded by Sonic Labs founder Andre Cronje—has raised an additional $25.5 million in a private token sale, bringing its total institutional funding to $225.5 million. The project has also secured an extra $50 million via the Impossible Finance platform and plans to host a public token sale on CoinList. As of now, Flying Tulip has received over $1.36 billion in investment commitments, with roughly $400 million still available for allocation. BlockBeats previously reported that the CoinList public sale is targeted to raise $200 million, representing 20% of the total FT token supply (20 billion tokens). The token is priced at $0.10, with a corresponding fully diluted valuation (FDV) of $1 billion. The sale kicks off at 00:00 UTC on February 3 and runs through 21:00 UTC on February 6, with a minimum purchase requirement of $100. Flying Tulip aims to integrate spot trading, lending, perpetual contracts, insurance,

On January 30, US-based Bit Digital (BTBT) announced plans to completely cease Bitcoin mining operations, shifting its focus to expanding Ethereum infrastructure, staking, and its high-performance computing strategy. In a shareholder letter, CEO Sam Tabar stated that mining is no longer the most capital-efficient option. The company will concentrate its digital asset exposure on Ethereum to drive sustainable, liquidable, and compounding long-term growth.