Stephen Alpher

Stephen is CoinDesk's managing editor for Markets. He previously served as managing editor at Seeking Alpha. A native of suburban Washington, D.C., Stephen went to the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, majoring in finance. He holds BTC above CoinDesk’s disclosure threshold of $1,000.

Stephen Alpher

Latest from Stephen Alpher


Policy

Bitcoin Sinks to $100K as Trump Imposes Tariffs on Canada, Mexico, China

Altcoins fared far worse than bitcoin as the new U.S. president seemingly ignited a trade war.

President Donald Trump (TheDigitalArtist/Pixabay)

Markets

Trump Tariff Promise Snuffs Out Bitcoin Rally for Second Consecutive Day

The White House confirmed sizable tariffs on Mexico, Canada and China will go into effect tomorrow.

Bitcoin falls despite coming rate cuts (Unsplash)

Finance

Tether Reports $13B Profit for 2024, With Rising Bitcoin, Gold Prices Contributing

The group also increased its bitcoin holdings last quarter for the first time since March, holding nearly 84,000 BTC worth about $7.8 billion as of year-end.

Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino (Tether)

Finance

Grayscale Unveils New Dogecoin Trust

The asset manager said the token has transitioned from a memecoin to a tool for global financial inclusion.

Grayscale ad in NYC (Nikhilesh De/CoinDesk)

Markets

MicroStrategy Upsizes Preferred Stock Offering, Raising $563M for More Bitcoin

The initial dividend yield will be 10%, up from an originally expected 8%.

MicroStrategy Executive Chairman Michael Saylor (Credit: CoinDesk/Danny Nelson)

Markets

XRP Ledger ‘Clawback’ Goes Live in Boost For Ripple USD Trading

Clawback refers to tokens that have a feature allowing the issuer to reclaim coins from user wallets under certain conditions.

Ripple Labs maintains XRP. (Ripple Labs)

Finance

Tether Brings Its $140B USDT Stablecoin to Bitcoin and Lightning Networks

Stablecoins are increasingly popular for everyday uses like payments, remittances and savings, and Tether's expansion aims to spur activity to the Bitcoin-based ecosystem.

Heading of Bitcoin Whitepaper

Markets

Bitcoin Rally to Record High Knee-Capped as Trump Tariff Threat Hits Risk Assets

The president said he intends to impose 25% tariffs on Mexico and Canada on February 1.

Bitcoin moved lower after Trump tariff threat (Shutterstock)

Finance

OpenAI's Reported $340B Valuation Could Bode Well for AI-Linked Crypto

Wall Street Journal reported that OpenAI is in talks to raise new $40 billion funding, at a valuation of $340 billion.

OpenAI CEO Samuel Altman (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

Policy

Czech National Bank Approves Proposal to Study Bitcoin as Reserve Asset

ECB President Lagarde said she's "confident" bitcoin will not be a part of the assets of any EU central bank.

Czech Republic flag ( Resource Database / Unsplash)