Bitcoin Price Drops to $121.5K Amid Stronger US Dollar - Binance Launches New Meme Rush Platform

Bitcoin (BTC) declined to $121,500 on Thursday, reversing Wednesday's gains as European equity markets showed flat-to-negative performance and the U.S. dollar maintained its strength. JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon warned of potential significant stock market corrections in coming months. Contrasting views emerged from industry leaders. Arthur Hayes of Maelstrom Fund declared Bitcoin's four-year halving cycles obsolete, predicting continued crypto bull market momentum from impending global fiat liquidity increases. BRN's research head Timothy Misir noted central banks shifting from tightening to easing policies, with markets pricing 90% probability of Federal Reserve rate cuts in October and December. In derivatives markets, AVAX, ASTER, PUMP and XPL led futures open interest declines. BTC and ETH open interest dropped 1% and 3% respectively, indicating potential profit-taking. Perpetual funding rates remained below 10% for major tokens, suggesting healthy market conditions without excessive speculation. Binance introduced Meme Rush, a new platform targeting Chinese-language memecoins. The service integrates early-stage token curation and trading directly within Binance Wallet, leveraging community launch hubs and rewarding users with 4× Binance Alpha points. PancakeSwap v2 recorded $15.55 billion daily volume, with lesser-known tokens like 币安Holder generating approximately $1 billion across 163,000 transactions.