NEAR Gains 8% in Extremely Red Market, Leads AI Token Rally
NEAR Protocol (NEARUSD) gained 8.25% to $2.12 over the last 24 trading hours, significantly outperforming a declining broader market, primarily driven by excitement over a major network upgrade.
The AI token rally extends a 38% weekly gain, fueled by technical scalability improvements, institutional inflows, and momentum in AI-themed crypto assets.
The top 10 cryptocurrencies are trading lower, led by sell-offs in Bitcoin, Ethereum, Binance Coin, Ripple’s XRP, Solana, Dogecoin, and Tron. The total market cap of all cryptos is down 2% in 24 hours.
The altcoin rally was driven by anticipation for the dynamic resharding upgrade scheduled for June 2026, which promises automatic, quantum-resistant scaling for AI applications.
The core driver is the announcement of a “dynamic resharding” network upgrade scheduled for June 2026. This will allow the NEAR blockchain to automatically add capacity (shards) as demand grows, a key feature for scaling AI agent transactions.
The upgrade also includes post-quantum-safe signatures, addressing future security concerns. Investors are pricing in a significant competitive advantage in scalability, which is critical for NEAR’s positioning as an “AI-native” Layer 1 blockchain.
Strong inflows into the regulated Bitwise NEAR Staking ETP, which reached $36 million in assets, signal growing institutional confidence and boosted momentum on Friday.
NEAR broke out of a key resistance level near $1.90 with an exceptionally high volume of $1.21 billion, confirming bullish momentum. However, the 14-day Relative Strength Index at 78 is deeply overbought, signalling an elevated risk of a short-term correction.
The immediate support is the recent breakout zone and volume shelf near $2.10. The trend is strongly bullish, but the pace of ascent is unsustainable without periods of consolidation.
A hold above $2.10 to maintain bullish structure; a break below could see a swift unwind toward the $1.90 support. XRP Price Soars 5% as XRPL Plans DeFi Expansion
