"The current administration has signaled that it is very pro-business and wants to make it as easy as possible for these new fintech business models such as prediction markets and crypto to operate."
The VIX closed last week at almost 27, an 11% jump on the final trading day, and early signals this week show it climbing further. The fear gauge now sits at its 93rd percentile over the past year, meaning volatility has been this elevated or higher only 7% of trading days in the last 12 months.
America's financial markets are the envy of the world because they scale and adapt to meet investor demands. Like our markets, the CFTC's and SEC's regulatory frameworks must also evolve and modernize to accommodate the needs of our market participants.
Hedge funds and other money managers spent $2.8 billion on alternative data in 2025, according to a new report from consultancy Neudata, a 17% jump from the year before. It's more than double what asset managers spent on alternative data in 2021, which includes a wide range of non-traditional information sources. The report projects that the total spend on alternative datasets could jump to more than $23 billion in the consultancy's bull case in 2030 and just under $8 billion in the bear case.
The deal represents a defining milestone for the firm. It reflects not only the continued strength of the non-QM RMBS market, but also the confidence investors place in our platform and in AD non-QM mortgages as a premier asset class.
From its IPO in 2016 to its peak in late 2024, the stock gained more than 4,000% as it regularly put up revenue growth of 20% or more, and delivered strong profit margins as well. The stock also benefited from a premium valuation. However, over the last year, The Trade Desk has collapsed. The adtech stock has fallen 83% from its peak in late 2024 as the business has slowed to its weakest growth rate ever, except for a brief dip during the pandemic.
Ondo Finance, in partnership with Franklin Templeton, is tokenizing five ETFs, marking the first time that tokenized FT-managed ETFs are available onchain. This initiative introduces new distribution channels for established asset classes.
Oil futures touched $100 per barrel this week as Iran's new Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei vowed to keep the Strait of Hormuz closed, the waterway through which a fifth of the world's oil and liquefied natural gas transits. The International Energy Agency called the conflict the biggest-ever disruption to oil supply, and Iran's security chief has stated the war won't end soon.
For Missouri-based community bank OMB Bank, finding the right fintech partner used to be a slow, manual process. Executive Vice President and Chief of Staff Jessica Sims recalls working from static PDFs of the bank's preferences, followed by endless back-and-forth emails whenever a fintech expressed interest. The process worked, but painfully slowly, and promising opportunities often slipped through the cracks.
Over the last few years, the market has seen a number of trends that have led to huge market moves. Apart from AI, which is the main impetus to the jet fueled "Magnificent 7" tech stocks leading the S&P 500 and still going strong, some of the booms that became busts in the latter part of 2025 going into January 2026 are: ETFs with extreme leverage Ultra high yield ETFs using options for income
The blockchain is coming to Wall Street. The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) said on Monday that it was developing a platform to trade tokenized securities, digital representations of assets like stocks and bonds. But exactly when the 233-year-old financial institution will turn it on is still up in the air. Supporters of the technology argue that the change could modernize the NYSE, giving traders some of the same advantages that are enjoyed by investors in the cryptocurrency world.
The Commission has full authority to police illegal trading practices occurring on any DCM, including those described above related to prediction markets. Kalshi used its own announcement to underscore that we ban insider trading and said it had launched about 200 investigations over the past year. More than a dozen of those inquiries led to formal enforcement actions.