Last week we went deep on two major structural stories: Wall Street's race to tokenize money market funds, and prediction markets at a crossroads — scandal, criminal indictment, and a regulatory bet all in the same week.

This week we are zooming out. Beyond Bitcoin, beyond the institutional headlines — into altcoins with real fundamentals, and the new tools quietly rewiring how pro-retail investors trade and save. The next phase of digital finance is wider than most people think.

Yesterday we also published Episode 3 of Kaupr Weekly — if you missed it, it is right below, or available on Spotify, Apple, and YouTube. And towards the end of today's edition, we share a Kaupr TV interview and articles on Deploi, a fascinating Swedish startup tokenizing private credit.

Other stories in today's newsletter:

♦️ Dogecoin, Cardano, and NEAR — altcoins building real infrastructure, not just hype. ♦️ Jito launches a self-custodial trading terminal for traders who want to trade anything and everything.
♦️ Stablecoin rewards: banned in law, but inevitable in practice.
♦️ Virtune turns three — and holds 93% of Nordic crypto ETP market share.

Have a great read and happy listening!

Morten Myrstad
Founder & Editor

Listen directly by clicking on the paragraph above. You can also listen to this podcast episode on Spotify, Apple, or YouTube podcast / music.

A new episode drops each weekend — three episodes so far. Kaupr Weekly is Morten Myrstad's short, news-oriented podcast on the week's biggest stories in crypto and fintech.

DogeOS CEO Jordan Jefferson says Dogecoin is entering a phase of independent ecosystem growth — beyond Musk-driven attention cycles. Recent signals: Thumzup Media's $2 million DOGE purchase and DogeOS's $6.9 million Polychain-led raise. The goal is a real onchain economy, not a celebrity catalyst.

Why it matters: With a $17.6 billion market cap and a top-10 position, Dogecoin now has the scale to justify serious infrastructure investment — with or without Elon.

Source: Dogecoin has 'crazy things on the horizon' as ecosystem grows beyond Elon Musk — The Block

Wallets holding at least one million ADA control 67% of circulating supply — the highest whale concentration since July 2020 — after accumulating through a 71% price drop. Meanwhile the chain has gone quiet: DeFi TVL down 80% to $137 million, daily DEX volume at $1.95 million, active addresses at 16,000.

Why it matters: Whales stacking through a brutal drawdown is a classic pre-cycle pattern — but conviction has not yet translated into usage. That gap is the story.

Source: Cardano whales now hold 67% of ADA supply in highest share since 2020 — CoinDesk

NEAR Protocol is up nearly 50% in 90 days on two bets: NEAR Intents — a crosschain liquidity protocol with $18 billion in total volume, $5 billion since February alone — and NEAR AI, infrastructure for autonomous agents to move value securely across chains.

Why it matters: NEAR is one of the few L1s with measurable traction in both crosschain liquidity and AI agent infrastructure. The rally has fundamentals behind it.

Source: NEAR's Intents and AI Bets Fuel Revival — Bankless

Jito Labs is launching JTX — a self-custodial trading terminal for pro-retail traders, launching in July with spot trading, then perpetual futures and prediction markets. CEO Lucas Bruder: "They don't even think of themselves as a crypto trader anymore. They're just traders. And they want to trade anything and everything." Jito has $100M+ in cash and $50M from a16z.

Why it matters: The next wave of onchain users are not crypto natives — they are traders who want self-custody, speed, and access to any asset class. That changes how crypto infrastructure thinks about distribution.

Source: It's a 'new era' for crypto users who 'trade anything and everything' as Jito goes consumer — The Block

The Clarity Act prohibits passive yield on stablecoins — but industry players say it does not matter. Borderless CEO: "If it's not rewards for holding balances, it's going to be rewards in some other way." Over 100 amendments were filed this week, including a banking industry push to strip all rewards language entirely. MoneyGram's CEO argues stablecoins are already treated like fiat — making yield on them increasingly hard to justify banning.

Why it matters: This is a battle over whether digital dollars can compete with bank deposits for user balances. The law may say no — the market is already saying yes.

Source: 'A million different ways to skin the cat': Stablecoin backers see incentives as inevitable under Clarity Act — The Block

Swedish Virtune marks three years since its first crypto ETP on Nasdaq Stockholm. It now manages $320 million across 23 products on six European exchanges, with 160,000+ investors and 14 billion SEK in 2025 trading volume — its first profitable year.

Why it matters: A 93% Nordic market share and a first profitable year signal that the infrastructure phase is over — institutional demand is now the growth driver.

Source: Virtune celebrates three years since the listing of its first crypto ETP — NTB

Leon Aleksander Karlsen Solbakken and Morten Myrstad sit down with Oskars Jepsis, founder and CEO of Deploi — a Stockholm-based startup tokenizing private credit assets on blockchain. Jepsis explains how the current fund model is broken: locked capital, infrequent valuations, and fees paid to the same agencies that helped trigger 2008. Deploi replaces funds with tokenized loan assets, enabling real-time pricing and daily yield.

Why it matters: Private credit is one of the world's largest and least transparent asset classes. Deploi's infrastructure could bring real-time pricing and AI-driven capital allocation — without the intermediaries.

Watch now: Reshaping Private Credit with Blockchain
Read and watch: The Trillion-Dollar Market No One Sees — Deploi Wants to Open Private Credit
Read: Deploi Issues Private Credit Directly on the Blockchain

Thank you for reading Kaupr Today. If you find this briefing useful, please share it with a colleague or friend who should be following Nordic and European digital‑finance news more closely.

Kaupr Today now has its own home — read, listen, watch and explore at today.kaupr.io.

Best regards
Morten Myrstad
Founder & Editor