The outgoing week was rich in landmark events: Bitcoin once again tested the $81,000 level but faced pressure from macroeconomic factors, while the Ethereum and Solana ecosystems demonstrated important infrastructural shifts. I break down the key moments that shaped market sentiment.

Bitcoin: Correction and Recovery

The leading cryptocurrency made several attempts to hold above $81,000, reaching a local high of $81,354 on Binance. However, on Friday, following the Fed Chair's speech, the price sharply dropped below $76,000. The regulator reaffirmed its commitment to the 2% inflation target, noting that summer data does not show sustained improvement in the underlying trend. This triggered a reassessment of expectations for the September meeting: the probability of a rate hike rose from 35.4% to 57% within just 24 hours.

At the time of writing, Bitcoin has recovered to $79,000, gaining more than 1.5% over 24 hours and maintaining a weekly increase of about 2%. Notably, inflows into spot Bitcoin ETFs slowed to $934.5 million, compared to $1.92 billion the previous week. On Friday, an outflow of nearly $202 million was recorded, breaking a nine-day streak of net inflows. Meanwhile, Ethereum funds showed robust growth in inflows, reaching $824.4 million.

Among altcoins, Solana (+12.4%) and Hyperliquid's HYPE (+4.3%) stood out, while XRP pulled back ~7.5% to the $1.4 level. The Fear and Greed Index adjusted from a local high of 74 points to 69, remaining in the extreme greed zone. Total market capitalization grew from $2.62 trillion to $2.66 trillion, while Bitcoin's dominance increased to 59.6%.

Quantum Protection: A First Step for Bitcoin

On August 26, StarkWare conducted the first transaction on the Bitcoin mainnet resistant to attacks from quantum computers. The experiment was implemented under the Quantum Safe Bitcoin (QSB) scheme, which does not require changes to consensus rules. The method is based on signature grinding, where the bulk of computation is performed off-chain. However, the approach remains expensive and slow: preparing a single operation can take hours and cost hundreds of dollars. It is important to understand that QSB does not protect the entire network but only allows moving individual coins to outputs with additional protection.

In parallel, Ethereum developers proposed a new version of the deposit contract that would allow a future transition to post-quantum signature algorithms without reworking the infrastructure. The initiative suggests a flexible public key format and identification of cryptographic schemes by numeric code, where the current BLS standard receives the status of Scheme 0.

Solana Accelerates Disinflation

The Solana community approved proposal SGP-0002, doubling the annual disinflation rate from 15% to 30%. The initiative received 176.29 million SOL in favor, with 66.19 million against. The ultimate inflation target of 1.5% remains unchanged, but the timeline to reach it will shrink from 5.7 to 2.8 years. According to the authors' estimates, this will reduce issuance by approximately 18.9 million SOL over six years. At the same time, nominal staking yields may decline from the current 5.84% to 4.34% in the first year, then to 3% and 2.25% in subsequent years.

Expert Perspective

The market's reaction to the Fed Chair's speech once again confirms Bitcoin's high sensitivity to monetary policy. However, fundamental shifts in infrastructure—from quantum resilience to disinflation mechanisms—point to the industry's long-term maturation. Investors should closely monitor the September Fed meeting: a rate revision could become a key driver of volatility in the coming weeks.