Ethereum’s Next Surge? Tornado Cash Dev Roman Storm’s Legal Battle Heats Up
Ethereum bulls are back—can ETH defy gravity again? Meanwhile, Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm fights to stay out of prison as regulators tighten the screws.
Ethereum's Rollercoaster Ride
ETH's price action looks like a caffeine-fueled algo trader—wild swings, but the trend stays stubbornly up. Whispers of ETF approvals and institutional inflows keep the hopium flowing.
Tornado Cash's Legal Typhoon
Roman Storm's case could set a precedent: Is writing code a crime? The DOJ says yes when it enables money laundering—even if the dev never touched dirty funds. Crypto's favorite legal gray area just got darker.
Bonus Wall Street Jab
Meanwhile, traditional finance still can't tell a blockchain from a spreadsheet—but they'll charge you 2% to manage your crypto ETF anyway.
Will Roman Storm be found guilty?
Market Open: July 30
Market Close: July 31
Volume: $400
Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm is on trial for criminal conspiracy to commit money laundering and evading U.S. sanctions for the alleged role Storm’s Ethereum-based coin-mixing software played in helping criminals launder money.
The case, which may play a pivotal role in setting precedent for whether developers are responsible for how their software is used, is potentially on its final day—meaning that jurors may need to deliberate on a verdict soon.
Therefore, a new flash market on Myriad asks whether or not Storm will be found guilty of the charges with 65% of predictors currently predicting “guilty” as of Wednesday afternoon.
Predictors are leaning guilty despite the fact that Storm alleged the DOJ botched key evidence, and his lawyers began mulling whether to seek a mistrial.
Tornado Cash was blacklisted and placed on sanctions by the Department of the Treasury in 2022, but was removed from the sanctions list this March. In early July, the Treasury dropped its case against the coin mixer, though Storm still stood trial.
What’s Next? A verdict could be rendered as soon as Wednesday night.
ETH above $4K at the end of July?
Market Open: July 29
Market Close: July 31
Volume: $3.43K
A Myriad flash market on layer-2 network Linea asks predictors whether or not Ethereum will breach $4,000 and stay there in the final days of July.
Most predictors think not, with 87% odds of “no” standing as of Wednesday morning as ETH trades at $3,773.
Those odds stand even as ETH has outperformed all of its high-cap peers lately, rising 4.5% in the last week as Bitcoin has sunk lower over the same timeframe. Analysts told Decrypt on Wednesday that “bullish fundamentals” are now apparent for ETH as the ETF inflow streak extends and the possibility of staking ETFs looms.
However strong its prospects are, ETH will need to jump more than 6% to reach $4,000 based on its current price… and it will need to stay there until the calendar flips to August for the “yes” predictors to be paid off at 12.3% odds.
What’s Next? This market is closed for predictions on Wednesday evening.
Will more than 1.5 million birds fly over Texas on the first night of August?
Market Open: July 29
Market Close: August 1
Volume: $1K
Is it a bird or a plane?
Myriad predictors can test their knowledge of science and nature in one of the protocol’s first-ever bird markets, which asks whether or not more than 1.5 million birds will fly over the state of Texas on August 1.
Texas is an important state for bird migration, evidenced by the fact that 98.5% of all Nearctic-Neotropical migrating birds, or birds that migrate from north of Mexico, have been recorded in the state according to data from the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. These migrating birds account for more than 50% of all the documented bird species recorded in Texas.
But how many of those migrating birds are doing so in August, and more importantly, how many will cross the state on the night of August 1?
Predictors on Myriad give a slight edge to less than 1.5 million birds, with odds standing at 53.4% on Wednesday morning. Those odds fall in line with 2024 data according to Birdcast, which recorded just over 1.1 million birds crossing the state on August 1, the first night of the fall migratory season.
That number is a significant uptick from each of the two previous years, which saw just 283,000 and 133,000 birds approximately cross the state.
After a significant jump in 2024, will another jump push the state over 1.5 million in 2025?
What’s Next? Predictions for this market close on Friday evening, ahead of evening bird migrations in Texas.
Ethereum's new all-time high by end of 2025?
Market Open: July 17
Market Close: December 31
Volume: $71.6K
One of the highest-volume prediction markets on Myriad asks users whether or not Ethereum will make a new all-time high this year, eclipsing the 2021 peak of $4,891.70 in the process.
Thanks to its recent surge, plus bold price predictions from personalities like Arthur Hayes, predictors on Myriad give ETH a nearly 64% chance of making a new all-time high, a 4% gain in those odds since the week began.
To do so, ETH will need to jump around 22% from its current price on Wednesday, a mark it easily sustained over the last month as it surged more than 55%.
Sean Dawson, the Head of Research at options platform Derive, told Decrypt on Wednesday that he expects the asset will make a new all-time high by Christmas. That jives with options data from earlier this week, which showcases a nearly 4x increase in the odds of ETH hitting $6,000 by December 25.
What’s Next? A potential major catalyst for the asset is due in the coming months, after the SEC acknowledged requests to allow for ETH staking ETFs on Tuesday.
