The Ethereum Foundation, the nonprofit organization overseeing Ethereum’s development, is backing a new startup aiming to position ether as the preferred cryptocurrency for Wall Street, along with the network’s co-founder Vitalik Buterin.

The Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) has revealed that pages on its website suggesting the launch of regulated futures contracts for XRP and SOL futures was incoming was an “error.”

Larry Fink, the CEO of the world’s largest asset manager BlackRock, has in a televised interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos speculated that the price of bitcoin could reach $700,000 if investors allocated up to 5% of their portfolios to it.

Top stories in the Crypto Roundup today:

• Ethereum Taps Wall Street Veteran to Bolster Institutional Adoption
• CME Denies Incoming Launch of XRP and SOL Futures Contracts
• BlackRock CEO Suggests Bitcoin Could Reach $700,000 Based on Significant Portfolio Allocations

Ethereum Taps Wall Street Veteran to Bolster Institutional Adoption

The Ethereum Foundation, the nonprofit organization overseeing Ethereum’s development, is backing a new startup aiming to position ether as the preferred cryptocurrency for Wall Street, along with the network’s co-founder Vitalik Buterin 

The venture, Etherealize, was founded by Vivek Raman, a former bond trader at Nomura Holdings and UBS. It launched its operations this month in New York, focusing on marketing ether to financial firms and developing tools to simplify its use for banks.

Ethereum was launched back in 2015 and gained widespread adoption for allowing for complicated financial transactions through its smart contracts. During the 2017 and 2021 crypto rallies, its native currency exploded.

In last year’s boom, however, ether has lagged behind other major assets like bitcoin. BTC, for example, has seen its popularity grow as a scarce digital asset akin to gold, and gained traction after the launch of spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs) offering exposure to it, as well as through President-elect Donald Trump’s aim of creating a strategic bitcoin reserve.

While ether ETFs were approved in July, they hold only about a tenth of bitcoin ETFs’ assets in the US. Last year’s trend also heavily focused on memecoin projects, many of which were based on Solana rather than Ethereum. The Trump family’s memecoins were also launched on Solana.

Raman has said that Ethereum needs stronger advocates, and aims to fill that role on Wall Street, with an initial primary focus being tokenization.

CME Denies Incoming Launch of XRP and SOL Futures Contracts

The Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) has revealed that pages on its website suggesting the launch of regulated futures contracts for XRP and SOL futures was incoming was an “error.”

A company spokesperson has said that a “beta page” from its website “was released in error” and added that various mock-ups were included in its testing environment, with no decisions having actually been made on these futures contracts.

The clarification came after.a screenshot of these pages started circulating on social media, sparking rumors the exchange could lead these futures contracts on Feb. 10.

BlackRock CEO Suggests Bitcoin Could Reach $700,000 Based on Significant Portfolio Allocations

Larry Fink, the CEO of the world’s largest asset manager, BlackRock, has in a televised interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos speculated that the price of bitcoin could reach $700,000 of investors allocated up to 5% of their portfolios to it.

Speaking to Bloomberg at the event, Fink described a conversation with a sovereign wealth fund he had earlier in the week about allocating between 2% and 5% of its portfolio to BTC. Per his words, if “everyone adopted that conversation, it would be $500,00, $600,000, $700,000 per bitcoin.”

During the interview, Fink also suggested bitcoin could be a vital tool for people living in countries with volatile currencies or political instability and pointed to the cryptocurrency as an instrument for those “frightened” of currency debasement.

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