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These Altcoins Must Be Tracked in the New Week

Cryptocurrency analyst The DeFi Investor has shared a new “crypto watchlist” that includes the most important developments in the crypto market in the coming week. The analyst`s list includes both large-scale macroeconomic developments and important milestones for various altcoin projects. The featured titles are as follows: Hyperliquid (HYPE): Stablecoins can be used in spot trading pairs by staking 200,000 HYPE. Sonic (S): Sonic Summit 2025 will kick off on September 29th. Big announcements are expected. Macro developments: The Fed is expected to cut interest rates by 25 basis points on September 17. Thorchain (RUNE): The project will release Rapid Swaps and Limit Swaps features in the coming weeks. Kaito (KAITO): Considered one of the platform`s biggest updates, gKAITO is expected to be released soon. Related News: South Korea Sees Trading Volume Surge in These 15 Altcoins - Here`s the List Falcon Finance: The crowdsale will begin on September 16th. Resolv (RESOLV): The claim period for S2 airdrop entitlements will open on September 19th. Dogecoin (DOGE): The first Dogecoin ETF could begin trading next week. Arbitrum (ARB): $49.78 million worth of ARB will be unlocked on September 16th. Mavryk Network: Focused on real-world assets, the network will launch its token on September 18. Portal to Bitcoin (PTB): Kaito Season 1 Campaign will end on September 20th. Lombard Finance: The project`s token production event date will be announced shortly; the claim page has already been registered. *This is not investment advice. Continue Reading: These Altcoins Must Be Tracked in the New Week Decrypt

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Here’s How BRC-20 Tokens and Images Are Speeding Up Bitcoin Node Verification

In its latest report, BitMEX Research examined how BRC-20 Tokens and Ordinal images are affecting Bitcoin node verification. The study looked at Ordinal-related data on Bitcoin, including the transaction count and data size, to determine their impact on node operators. BRC-20 Tokens Strain Bitcoin Nodes More Than Images The September 8 report revealed that BRC-20 tokens create more problems for some Bitcoin node runners than Ordinal images. Notably, the former make up 92.5 million transactions while the latter account for only 2.7 million, yet both use about 30GB of storage. However, BRC-20 transactions put greater strain on nodes, while larger image-based Ordinals have little to no effect on performance. BitMEX explained that large Ordinal images are easier for nodes to handle than regular transactions since they are stored in a non-executed part of the Taproot witness, and do not require signature checks. This makes them less demanding to verify and sometimes even helpful for scaling because they take up blockspace without adding to the UTXO set. On the other hand, BRC-20 transactions function more like regular Bitcoin activity. Despite being smaller in size, they have expanded the UTXO set, growing from 84 million to 169 million between December 2022 and September 2025. This increase is creating challenges for node runners, especially those operating pruned ones. Data shows that such transactions have paid higher fees for blockspace, contributing more than 5,000 BTC since the protocol was introduced. Tests Show Larger Ordinals May Speed Verification BitMEX ran several tests for nearly three years to measure how quickly nodes could download and verify blocks with different levels of Ordinal-related data. The results suggest that large amounts of “arbitrary data” can actually speed up blockchain verification, with around 11% of the differences in speeds being due to larger inscriptions. However, the researchers warned that the results do not mean Ordinal images are good for Bitcoin. This is because data-heavy inscriptions use a lot of blockspace, which could push out financial transactions that are central to the network’s purpose. Elsewhere, a separate study by Glassnode found that Ordinals and BRC-20 tokens are not displacing regular Bitcoin transactions. The firm’s lead analyst explained that they are instead bringing more value, fees, and data into each block. Additionally, BitMex emphasized that the findings are not conclusive because factors like internet speed and hardware differences can influence performance. They also encouraged further testing, noting that any small efficiency gains for nodes must be weighed against the broader costs to the Bitcoin network. The post Here’s How BRC-20 Tokens and Images Are Speeding Up Bitcoin Node Verification appeared first on CryptoPotato . Decrypt