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NEAR Protocol, Virtuals, and Morpho crypto stood as some of the best performers on Tuesday amid a broader market rebound back above the $2.4 trillion mark.<\/p>\n
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According to data from CoinGecko, the global crypto market rose 5% to $2.45 trillion before stabilizing around $2.4 trillion at press time. The market recovery was largely fueled by Bitcoin, the bellwether\u2019s rally on Monday with the flagship crypto jumping from intraday lows near $65,000 to over $69,800 in a matter of hours.<\/p>\n
Besides this, investor appetite for risk assets also returned after U.S. manufacturing data exceeded market expectations, fueling optimism surrounding Fed rate cuts this year.<\/p>\n
The crypto market recovery triggered a short squeeze across major crypto assets. Data<\/a> from CoinGlass shows nearly $202 million worth of short positions were liquidated in the past 24 hours, out of the total $331 million liquidated from both sides across leveraged markets.<\/p>\n Amidst this volatility, NEAR Protocol, Virtuals, and Morpho emerged as the standout winners. These assets capitalized on the easing market sentiment to post double-digit gains.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n NEAR Protocol (NEAR) was the strongest gainer of the day with its 24% rally to a 5-week high of $1.45 on Monday. The surge extended its weekly gains to over 50%.<\/p>\n The AI token\u2019s gains follow AI chip-making giant Nvidia announcing<\/a> a multiyear strategic partnership with Coherent Corp, a global leader in photonics and networking, to advance its optical interconnect technology.<\/p>\n As part of the agreement, Nvidia would be investing $2 billion in Coherent to support research and development, along with expanding manufacturing capacity.<\/p>\n NVIDIA shares rose by 2.93% shortly after the announcement, sparking a broader rally in AI-focused cryptocurrencies. The partnership also comes just days after the chip giant revealed bullish quarterly earnings, easing fears of a slowdown in AI spending.<\/p>\n As Nvidia is the market bellwether for artificial intelligence, its bullish earnings and stock rally serve as a major impetus for related assets such as NEAR Protocol.<\/p>\n Project-specific catalysts, including the launch of Near FM and Near Intents has also supported the recent rally.<\/p>\n Virtuals Protocol (VIRTUAL) rose over 15% today to $0.79, its highest price since late January this year. The gains followed after it broke out of a consolidation from the $0.60-$0.75 range it had been stuck within over the past week.<\/p>\n Besides sharing the AI market hype surrounding Nvidia news and its stock gains, the agentic AI coin also benefited from strengthening fundamentals supporting it.\u00a0<\/p>\n In a recent X post, the Virtuals Protocol team revealed<\/a> that agent transactions on the network soared by around 128% over the past two weeks, as 3,421 agents competed in Epoch 2 of its AI revenue incentives program. Agent-to-agent revenue reached $2.8 million during the period, with roughly $200,000 distributed to builders.<\/p>\n The team also outlined upgrades for Epoch 3 aimed at tightening reward quality and making it materially harder to manufacture artificial signal, with a stronger focus on genuine demand and sustained utility.\u00a0<\/p>\n Morpho (MORPHO) rose 11% on the day to $1.97, extending its weekly gains to around 25%.<\/p>\n Morpho\u2019s gains today can be largely attributed to a surge in network activity following the launch<\/a> of the OKX Onchain Earn product on the Morpho protocol. The event includes a 65 million KAT (Katana Network) reward pool for users staking USDT on the protocol.<\/p>\n At the same time, there\u2019s also noticeable chatter around Apollo Global\u2019s recent commitment to the protocol, which has provided a strong fundamental backstop for the current price action. Under a newly established four-year cooperation agreement, the $940 billion asset manager is authorized to acquire up to 90 million MORPHO tokens, representing roughly 9% of the total supply.<\/p>\n <\/p>\nNEAR Protocol<\/h1>\n
Virtuals Protocol\u00a0<\/h2>\n
Morpho\u00a0<\/h2>\n