FameEX Today’s Crypto News Recap | February 16, 2026
2026-02-16 04:11:38
Strategy continued accumulating Bitcoin, XRP rebounded as exchange reserves declined, and Apollo partnered with Morpho to expand onchain lending, highlighting institutional allocation, supply shifts, and DeFi infrastructure growth. Recently, the Bitcoin market has exhibited a classic structural rebalancing phase, where price volatility has not been driven by a single speculative force but rather by the combined influence of long-term capital allocation and derivatives-related risk adjustments. Strategy is preparing to execute its 99th Bitcoin purchase, extending its accumulation streak to 12 consecutive weeks, signaling that certain institutional capital continues to treat Bitcoin as a long-term reserve asset rather than a short-term trading instrument. The company most recently acquired 1,142 BTC on February 9 in a transaction exceeding USD 90 million, bringing its total holdings to 714,644 BTC, valued at approximately USD 49.3 billion at current market prices. Notably, after retreating from its all-time high above $126K, Bitcoin briefly fell below the company’s average acquisition cost basis of around $76K, indicating a temporary divergence between prevailing market valuations and long-term institutional cost benchmarks. Despite this, the firm has maintained a consistent accumulation cadence, reflecting that certain long-horizon capital allocators have not altered their positioning strategy in response to short-term price fluctuations. At the same time, crypto treasury firms broadly continue to face valuation pressure and declining net asset value multiples, with Strategy’s mNAV falling to 0.90, below the 1.0 level typically associated with valuation equilibrium. This suggests that public market pricing of its asset holdings remains in an ongoing reassessment phase. Additionally, the company recently reported a quarterly loss of approximately USD 12.4 billion, accompanied by short-term equity price adjustments, highlighting the balance sheet sensitivity of digital asset treasury models to market valuation changes. Overall, Bitcoin’s current price behavior reflects a transitional phase characterized by the coexistence of long-term institutional accumulation and short-term liquidity redistribution, with price movements increasingly reflecting asset repricing dynamics and positioning adjustments rather than purely directional speculative flows.
Key News Highlights:
XRP Outperforms BTC and ETH Following Post-Correction Dip Buying Activity
Following the recent sharp correction in the crypto market, the payments-focused digital asset XRP has demonstrated relatively strong price performance, becoming one of the focal points of market attention. According to publicly available market data, XRP has risen approximately 38% since its February 6 low, recovering to around $1.55 and recording an additional gain of more than 5% over the past 24 hours. In comparison, Bitcoin and Ether have increased by approximately 15% over the same period, indicating that XRP’s recovery pace has significantly exceeded that of major benchmark crypto assets. Onchain and exchange flow data show that following the price decline, a substantial volume of XRP was withdrawn from a major CEX, with the platform’s XRP reserves declining by approximately 192 million tokens between February 7 and 9, falling to around 2.553 billion tokens, the lowest level since early 2024. Such declines in exchange reserves are typically interpreted as assets being transferred to onchain wallets or private custody, reflecting a shift toward longer holding horizons rather than immediate trading activity. Circulating liquidity becomes tighter, increasing the asset’s sensitivity to incremental buy-side demand. Similar patterns have been observed in prior market cycles, where sustained declines in exchange balances coincided with accelerated price appreciation. Overall, the recent price recovery has occurred alongside measurable supply redistribution, positioning XRP as a key asset of interest during the broader post-correction rebalancing phase.
Global Asset Manager Apollo Partners With Morpho to Support Onchain Lending Infrastructure
Apollo Global Management, a global asset manager with approximately USD 940 billion in assets under management, has announced a partnership with decentralized lending protocol Morpho, further expanding its presence in blockchain-based financial infrastructure. According to details released by the Morpho Association, Apollo or its affiliated entities may acquire up to 90 million MORPHO tokens over the next four years, representing approximately 9% of the token’s total supply of 1 billion. These acquisitions may be conducted through open market transactions, OTC purchases, or other structured arrangements, and will be subject to ownership limits and transfer restrictions. Morpho stated that the collaboration will focus on supporting the protocol’s onchain lending infrastructure, contributing to the continued development of decentralized credit markets. Morpho currently ranks among the leading DeFi lending protocols by total value locked, with approximately USD 5.8 billion in TVL, providing lending markets and curated vault infrastructure for yield-oriented asset allocation. The protocol has recently established partnerships with multiple digital asset firms, including initiatives involving yield-generating vault products and infrastructure supporting Bitcoin-related onchain financial accounts. Apollo has previously participated in stablecoin credit strategy initiatives and real-world asset tokenization infrastructure investments, reflecting its gradually expanding involvement in blockchain-based financial systems. This partnership represents a notable case of a traditional asset manager directly engaging in decentralized protocol governance and infrastructure support, highlighting the continued convergence between traditional financial institutions and onchain lending ecosystems.
Bitcoin Community Divided Over BIP-110 Proposal, Raising Network Governance Debate
Blockstream CEO Adam Back has publicly opposed Bitcoin Improvement Proposal BIP-110, which seeks to limit the amount of arbitrary data that can be embedded within Bitcoin transactions in order to reduce the presence of images, video, and other non-financial data on the network. The proposal was introduced by developers as a temporary measure designed to reduce transaction data load, allowing the community time to assess its impact while working toward longer-term solutions. Currently, a portion of Bitcoin nodes have signaled support for the proposal, with approximately 7.5% indicating readiness to adopt the mechanism. The proposal emerges amid increased usage of the Bitcoin network for non-financial data inscription activities, enabled by expanded transaction functionality. Adam Back stated that while some community members have expressed concerns about data usage expansion, consensus-level protocol changes could potentially affect Bitcoin’s credibility as a secure store-of-value network. He also noted that certain technical modifications could theoretically render specific transaction outputs unspendable, potentially affecting asset accessibility. The proposal’s author responded by emphasizing that safeguards were incorporated to minimize impact on existing use cases and reiterated that the measure is intended as a temporary mechanism. The ongoing debate highlights the evolving governance considerations surrounding Bitcoin’s network design, particularly as expanding usage introduces new trade-offs between flexibility, security, and monetary integrity.
Disclaimer: The information provided in this section is for informational purposes only and doesn't represent any investment advice or FameEX's official view.
