Tom here.

This week cemented a major trend that’s solidified over the past years — namely that crypto isn’t just a playground for retail investors, but a big fish battlefield.

Take Coinbase. The major public crypto exchange is now actively targeting financial professionals as the number of retail investors using the platform is 53% lower than during the 2021 bull run.

Elsewhere, we’ve reported on how a lot of blockchain innovation these days comes from the likes of JPMorgan Chase and Visa — hardly your typical shadowy super-coders.

And, don’t forget, the launch of 10 spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds — run by financial Goliaths like BlackRock — drove the first-quarter rally, and is predicted to manage over $100 billion in assets in 2025.

And, as we mentioned last week, the ETFs are also attracting pension funds to crypto.

Meanwhile, Bitcoin miners are diversifying their operations by leasing computing power to tech companies — think Google, Microsoft, Amazon — to train their AI models.

A final sign of the times: This week, Donald Trump finally threw his support behind the industry as Joe Biden threatened to veto a pro-crypto resolution — a combination seemingly setting up crypto as an election issue.

Angry investors say ZKasino stole $30m in crypto as Dutch police make arrest linked to scam’

An explosive Dutch arrest and asset seizure adds a new twist in a controversy over ZKasino, which vanished with some $30 million in user deposits in April, Tim Craig reports.

My tour of Hong Kong’s abandoned crypto outlets revealed a city whipsawed by an erratic industry

Visiting Hong Kong's closed over-the counter outlets displayed the city's love-hate relationship with crypto to Callan Quinn.

Arsenal has a sports coin and so does PSG — inside the wacky $3bn market where prices soar for no reason

Holders of Paris Saint-Germain's coin had a wild ride this week in Champions League action, Liam Kelly reports.

Post of the week

Bitcoin may have broken new all-time highs, but that doesn’t mean crypto is back to being cool. Maybe young investors remember how cringe the 2021 bull market was — or they’re still smarting from the NFT losses. Probably a bit of both.