UK Rulebook, Liquidations, and HashKey’s Hong Kong IPO

Welcome to our Crypto news in 10, a daily podcast bringing you the latest news about crypto in under 10 minutes.

Here’s what’s moving crypto on Tuesday, December 16, 2025...

A fresh UK rulebook blueprint is out for consultation. Bitcoin and ether are selling off into key macro data — with hundreds of millions in forced liquidations. Cathie Wood is shopping in the carnage. Hong Kong’s first big exchange listing in years is pricing ahead of tomorrow’s debut. And a DeFi security protocol is winding down its hosted app... with a withdrawal deadline this week.

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Let’s start in London, where the Financial Conduct Authority has published its most detailed crypto market proposals yet.

The consultation sketches rules for token listings, insider-trading and market-manipulation safeguards, prudential and liquidity standards for platforms and brokers, and risk transparency obligations for staking and lending.

It’s the first comprehensive UK package aimed at bringing core crypto market plumbing under oversight similar to traditional finance — while acknowledging the quirks of DeFi. The comment window runs through February 12, 2026, with final rules targeted for late 2026 and formal application beginning in 2027.

One nugget buried in the papers: the FCA notes UK crypto ownership slipping from twelve percent to eight percent year over year — underscoring why it’s leaning hard into consumer protection.

Sources: Financial Times and Reuters.

Markets next...

Crypto stumbled into Tuesday’s U.S. data releases. Bitcoin hovered around eighty-six thousand dollars, ether just under two thousand nine hundred, and XRP near one dollar and eighty-eight cents.

Barron’s framed today as make-or-break for a near-term recovery, because the delayed jobs reports — pushed by the government shutdown — could sway the Fed’s January decision.

Meanwhile, forced liquidations accelerated the slide. The Economic Times tallied roughly five hundred ninety-two million dollars wiped out across venues as leveraged longs were flushed. Thin liquidity plus leverage — that combo has been a recurring theme since October’s peak.

Watch whether the next macro print eases funding stress, cools basis, and draws spot buyers back in.

Sources: Barron’s and The Economic Times.

Even with the red screens, one famous dip buyer was active.

ARK Invest’s Cathie Wood scooped nearly fifty million dollars in crypto-exposed names, according to a trade notice: about sixteen point two million in Coinbase, ten point eight million in Circle, seventeen million in Bitmine Immersion Technologies, and five point two million in Bullish — the parent of CoinDesk. ARK also added roughly nine point nine million in CoreWeave, the mining-to-AI data center pivot.

The move follows drops of twenty to forty percent in many of these stocks since October — signaling she expects a rebound into 2026, even with bitcoin more than thirty percent off its highs.

Source: Barron’s.

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Over to Hong Kong... Licensed exchange operator HashKey priced its IPO at six point six eight Hong Kong dollars per share, to raise about one point six billion Hong Kong dollars — roughly two hundred six million U.S. — with trading slated to begin tomorrow, December seventeenth.

UBS, Fidelity, and CDH are among cornerstone investors — a notable endorsement as Hong Kong pushes to reassert itself as a regulated home for digital assets.

The listing lands amid a choppy market — bitcoin is down more than thirty percent from its October record — so tomorrow’s first-day performance will be a sentiment check on public equity appetite for crypto platforms.

Source: Reuters.

And a heads up for DeFi users...

Hats Finance — the decentralized security and bug bounty protocol — will cease operating its hosted web front end and servers on December thirty-first, citing sustainability and market-structure challenges.

Crucially, the team says users who need to withdraw via the custodial interface should submit requests by Wednesday, December seventeenth. After that, withdrawals require interacting directly with the smart contracts or using the I-P-F-S hosted interface — which may not stay pinned.

The D-A-O-governed core protocol remains on-chain. It’s a reminder that so-called decentralized products can still depend on centralized web infrastructure — and that shutdowns shift the user experience back to the chain.

Sources: P-A News and Bitget News summaries of the project’s post on X.

Quick recap...

The UK just put meat on the bones of its crypto rulebook as consultation opens. Bitcoin and ether sank into key U.S. data, with roughly five hundred ninety-two million dollars in liquidations. ARK’s Cathie Wood bought the dip across Coinbase, Circle, and others. Hong Kong’s HashKey priced its IPO ahead of tomorrow’s debut. And Hats Finance is winding down its hosted app — with a December seventeenth withdrawal-via-U-I cutoff.

We’ll keep tracking the macro prints, first-day trading in Hong Kong, and reaction to the FCA’s proposals as they shape how regulation in 2026 and 2027 will feel on the ground.

Thanks for listening and see you tommorow!