U.S. dollar-pegged stablecoin Tether is a go-to tool for the Iranian government to bypass sanctions, a new report from a group of Senate Democrats said.

Democrats on the Senate's Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee's Permanent Subcommittee on Intelligence published a report Monday laying out the argument that Tether $USDT$1.0000 plays a key role in allowing Iran to conduct transactions that skirt international sanctions.

"Iran's cryptocurrency-based shadow banking network has processed significant volumes of funds and implicates various Iranian interests," the report said, adding that Tether has "repeatedly failed" to block Iran-connected wallets.

Some altcoins gain attention long before they appear in every market headline. In 2026, five names are standing out for very different reasons: $NEAR for Layer-1 activity, $QNT for tokenized settlement, $ZEC for privacy, $XRP for payment-network strength, and MemeToro for AI-powered memecoin launches.

Cardano is taking a breather after last week’s rally, trading below $0.250 on Monday as traders weigh conflicting market signals.

$ADA was changing hands near $0.245 after gaining more than 11% over the previous week.

The token’s price remains above several closely watched technical levels, suggesting buyers have retained much of their recent progress.

Crypto swap platform $NEAR Intents calls itself permissionless, open and uncensorable. Yet it slammed the doors when stolen funds from Bitget tried to move through the protocol.

The attackers who siphoned off $388 million from Bitget exchange last week tried to move more than $50 million through $NEAR Intents, a service that lets users exchange assets across different blockchains, according to a report by $NEAR Intent’s general manager, Alex Shevchenko.

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A new analysis has emerged for Bitcoin and gold, which have been considered each other’s biggest rivals for years.

Accordingly, Coinbase Institutional shared a new assessment highlighting the relationship between Bitcoin and gold.

Coinbase Institutional noted that Bitcoin’s 90-day correlation with gold is nearing a record high, but stressed that high correlation does not mean the two assets will yield the same return.

El Salvador’s government has partnered with Modveon, a Palo Alto-based startup backed by Coinbase Ventures, to launch Sivar, a national digital platform designed to connect Salvadorans with verified communities, businesses and public institutions while providing cross-border payment services.

Chainlink is working on a solution that will allow financial institutions to connect their systems and signing infrastructure to SWIFT’s blockchain ledger through the Chainlink platform.

Chainlink provides blockchain infrastructure and data services, while SWIFT is a global financial messaging network.

Veteran trader Peter Brandt, who previously predicted that the Bitcoin bear market would bottom out on October 4th, has now issued a bullish prediction for $BTC.

In a recent interview, Peter Brandt predicted that Bitcoin could rise to $600,000 by 2029.

Cryptocurrency companies wishing to operate in the U.K have five months to submit applications to the country’s financial regulator.

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) opened its “authorization gateway” on Wednesday, giving firms until the end of Februrary 2027 to register.

The U.K.’s regime for the supervision of digital asset firms has been a long time coming, with the initial legislative work going back to 2022.

Petrobras, Brazil’s state-controlled energy company, is testing the Cardano blockchain to track claims about lower-carbon fuel, in two research projects announced Wednesday by the Cardano Foundation shared with CoinDesk.

One covers sustainable aviation fuel, a lower-carbon alternative to conventional jet fuel that can be used in existing aircraft and airports. The other covers Diesel R, Petrobras’ diesel made partly from renewable materials such as vegetable oils or animal fats.

JUST IN: 🇺🇸 US Treasury to buy back up to $6,000,000,000 in longer-term debt again tomorrow.

@WatcherGuru

JUST IN: 🇺🇸 SEC Chair Paul Atkins says the agency is working to provide regulatory clarity for crypto and digital finance innovation.

@WatcherGuru

MEXC added 1,000 $BTC to its Guardian Fund, its second major bitcoin allocation to the reserve this year

The Guardian Fund now totals 2,000 $BTC combined with 100 million $USDT, part of a $500 million expansion target the exchange announced in May 2026

MEXC maintains on-chain transparency for the fund through publicly disclosed wallet addresses that let users independently verify its reserve holdings

Cardano ($ADA) has gained 1.35% in the day to trade at $0.247. This is after the Brazilian oil and gas colossal Petrobras announced on September 30 that it is employing the Cardano blockchain to test tracking of clean aviation fuel and diesel.

Bitcoin is outperforming stocks and gold heading into Q4, with broader crypto market sentiment staying bullish despite record-high Treasury yields. Catalysts such as capital inflows into spot Bitcoin ETFs, Michael Saylor’s Strategy buys, and an improving macro outlook are helping sustain the rebound.

Robinhood (NASDAQ: HOOD) stock is in focus after the Cboe announced that it will launch binary contracts linked to the key performance indicators (KPIs) for multiple companies in October 2026 on the platform.

In major $XRP news today, the $XRP Ledger has reached a new milestone in AI agentic payments settled through the x402 protocol. The milestone came less than three months after the XRPL first cleared 1 million.

Crypto lost $1.26 billion in hacks while bitcoin bulls enjoyed a monster quarter

US spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) recorded about $6.34 billion in net inflows in the third quarter, marking their strongest quarter of 2026 as Bitcoin rebounded from the first half.

The funds closed September with $2.65 billion in net inflows, down around 25% from $3.52 billion in August and following $172 million in July, according to SoSoValue data.