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Flow blockchain probes security incident as FLOW token plunges over 40% The Flow Foundation announced Saturday that it is investigating a potential security incident affecting its Layer 1 blockchain, prompting major South Korean exchanges to halt token transfers and triggering a sharp selloff in the “The Flow Foundation is currently investigating a potential security incident affecting the Flow network,” the team wrote on X. “Our engineering teams are actively collaborating with network partners to mitigate the issue. We will provide further, verified updates as soon as they are available.” Onchain analyst Wazz first flagged what appears to be the exploit shortly after the price crash, estimating around $4 million was stolen. According to Wazz’s analysis, an attacker used a wallet created approximately six months ago to mint millions of wrapped FLOW (WFLOW) tokens through a TransparentUpgradeableProxy contract, a pattern consistent with a private key compromise rather than a smart contract vulnerability. “Flow blockchain had [a possible vulnerability] that allowed the attacker to mint native token, FLOW, and other bridged tokens like WBTC, WETH, and stablecoins,” security expert Taylor Monahan told The Block in a direct message. “Looks like $3.9 million [lost]…All pools and bridges are now paused.” FLOW plummeted more than 40% in the hours following the incident, per The Block’s Flow Price page. The token was trading around $0.10 Saturday afternoon, down from approximately $0.17 earlier in the day. Trading volume has surged to over $170 million in the past 24 hours. South Korean exchanges Upbit and Bithumb moved quickly to suspend FLOW deposits and withdrawals following the disclosure. The Digital Asset Exchange Alliance, or DAXA, the consortium comprising Korea’s five largest crypto exchanges, issued a formal “transaction risk warning” for the token and said member exchanges may take additional protective measures, including trading restrictions or termination of support, depending on how the situation develops. Flow is the Layer 1 blockchain developed by Dapper Labs, the company behind popular NFT projects NBA Top Shot and CryptoKitties. The network was designed specifically for consumer applications and digital collectibles, and at its peak in 2021 powered hundreds of millions of dollars in monthly NFT trading volume. The blockchain has faced challenges in recent years as the NFT market cooled. Dapper Labs, which was valued at $7.6 billion in 2021, has undergone multiple rounds of layoffs since 2022. The Flow Foundation did not immediately respond to a request for further information on the breach from The Block. The incident comes as the crypto industry grapples with a record year for security breaches. Cryptocurrency theft totaled more than $3.4 billion in 2025, according to Chainalysis, with the $1.5 billion Bybit hack in February accounting for nearly half of the annual total. Private key compromises have emerged as a leading attack vector this year, accounting for 88% of stolen funds in Q1 2025.
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Bitcoin sits out Santa rally as stocks and precious metals set records A year-end rally across global markets has pushed U.S. stocks and precious metals to fresh record highs, but bitcoin has been left out in the cold, drifting lower as traders pull back risk into the holiday period. Bitcoin traded around $87,200 on Friday, down roughly 6.5% from its 2025 open near $93,000, according to The Block’s price data, despite having reached an all-time high above $126,000 in early October. Price action has remained subdued through the holiday week, with the cryptocurrency continuing to oscillate below the $90,000 level. Bitcoin (BTC) price chart. Source: The Block/TradingView Analysts have pointed to Friday’s record $28 billion crypto options expiry as the dominant short-term catalyst, amplifying price swings in thin year-end trading. “The tone remains defensive,” BRN head of research Timothy Misir said earlier this week, noting that upside attempts have struggled to gain follow-through. Wall Street flows have echoed that caution, with U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs seeing roughly $500 million in net outflows this week and about $4.3 billion pulled over the final two months of the year, alongside a more than $1.2 trillion decline in total crypto market value. Historic precious metals rally While bitcoin has drifted lower, precious metals have surged. Gold climbed to a record above $4,580 per troy ounce on Friday, while silver pushed past $75, setting new all-time highs. Silver is up roughly 160% from its 2025 open near $30, while gold has gained over 70% this year. The rally has been driven by escalating geopolitical tensions, a weaker U.S. dollar and year-end liquidity conditions that have amplified price moves, according to analysts. Central-bank purchases, ETF inflows and expectations for further Federal Reserve rate cuts in 2026 have also supported demand for non-yielding assets, according to a recent Bloomberg report. Silver’s advance has been particularly sharp, with speculative inflows and lingering supply dislocations following an October short squeeze continuing to pressure physical markets. Stocks hold near record highs U.S. equities, meanwhile, have remained resilient into the final trading sessions of the year. The S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average closed the shortened Christmas Eve session at record highs, extending a multi-day rally that has lifted major indexes through late December. The S&P 500 is up roughly 18% year-to-date, while the Nasdaq has gained more than 20% in 2025, according to Google Finance.
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Midterms, shutdown risks and negotiations: Can Congress pass a sweeping crypto bill in 2026? The next year is set to be pivotal for cryptocurrency legislation, with the big question being whether lawmakers can pass an all-encompassing bill to regulate digital assets before the midterms. Crypto advocacy sources who spoke with The Block gave a range of 50% to 60% chance of such a bill becoming law in 2026. Optimism lies in ongoing discussions between Democrats and Republicans, but there are still several issues that need ironing out. Kevin Wysocki, head of policy at Anchorage Digital, gave a bill's chance of passing into law in 2026 a 50% chance. "I think what's really good is that members of Congress are talking quite a bit between Republicans and Democrats, so that's a very positive sign," he told The Block. "Some of the issues that are still [debated] are difficult, and the legislation itself encompasses banking laws, securities law, commodity law — so it's complicated." Lawmakers in the Senate are tackling an all-encompassing bill that seeks to regulate the crypto industry at large. The Senate Banking Committee has a draft that looks to allocate jurisdiction between two main federal agencies — the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission — as well as create a new term for "ancillary assets" to clarify which cryptocurrencies are not securities. Meanwhile, the Senate Agriculture Committee, which oversees the CFTC, has drafted legislation it released last month that would give new authority to that agency. Both committee versions of the bill would need to be reconciled. There had been some optimism that the Senate Banking Committee would hold a hearing to amend and vote on the bill before the end of the year, but those spirits were dashed. However, a Senate Banking Committee spokesperson said they are now looking to markup the bill early on in the new year and noted progress had been made with Democrats. "Chairman Scott and the Senate Banking Committee have made strong progress with Democratic counterparts on bipartisan digital asset market structure legislation," the spokesperson said. "The Committee is continuing to negotiate and looks forward to a markup in early 2026." The sticking points There are several pain points in the crypto market structure bill that need to be addressed, sources said. One flashpoint has been tension between banks and crypto companies on how yield-bearing stablecoins should be regulated. Banking trade groups say that the stablecoin legislation known as GENIUS, which became law over the summer, leaves key loopholes unaddressed. In particular, they argue that the statute does not sufficiently bar issuers from offering interest on stablecoins. That omission, they warn, could turn stablecoins into vehicles for savings and credit rather than simple payment tools, introducing what they describe as “distorting market incentives” for traditional banks. Crypto advocates, by contrast, say the ability to offer yield on stablecoins represents nothing more than fair and healthy competition. Another issue has been how to regulate decentralized finance, specifically how to regulate DeFi protocols in terms of anti-money laundering concerns and whether some tokens should be under the jurisdiction of the SEC or CFTC, said The Digital Chamber CEO Cody Carbone. There is concern that the SEC would be the decision maker, given the agency's former more critical stance of crypto under former SEC Chair Gary Gensler, he added. "I will say that I know from industry, it is very worrisome to have legislation that says the SEC will be the first decision maker whether a token is a security or commodity because that looks a lot like going down the Gary Gensler route, where the SEC is the only cop on the street and is deciding everything," Carbone said. Another issue in the crypto market structure bill is around President Donald Trump's conflicts of interest in crypto. Bloomberg estimated in July that the sitting president has profited some $620 million from his family's crypto ventures, including the World Liberty Financial DeFi and stablecoin project, which lists Trump and his three sons as co-founders. The family also has a 20% stake in the mining firm American Bitcoin, and legislators have repeatedly raised concerns about the free-floating TRUMP and MELANIA memecoins launched the weekend before Trump took office. Sen. Cynthia Lummis, R-Wyo., who has been involved in the negotiations on passing a bill in the Senate, said in December at the Blockchain Association Policy Summit in Washington, D.C., that the White House had been involved in language around ethics. Lummis said she and Democratic Sen. Ruben Gallego sent over language to the White House, but it was kicked back. The absence of commissioners at the CFTC has also come under scrutiny and has become a solid negotiating tool for Democrats, Carbone said. Over the past year, four CFTC commissioners — Democrats Kristin Johnson and Christy Goldsmith Romero, as well as Republicans Caroline Pham and Summer Mersinger — have left the agency or announced plans to do so. Pham, a Republican, is now acting chair but has said she plans to leave once a new CFTC chair, Mike Selig, is confirmed. That leaves the agency, which is set to have broader jurisdiction over crypto, with one Republican commissioner. "I don't think any senator wants to hand over so much power to this small agency that only has a chair when it's supposed to be a five-member commission," Carbone said. Looming elections What happens next in the Senate is going to be really pivotal, sources said. Once the Senate Banking Committee has its bill in place and is then voted on and advanced out of the committee, it needs to be combined with the Senate Agriculture Committee's version and voted on by the full Senate, Carbone said. Then, the Senate crypto market structure bill needed to reconcile with the House version, called Clarity, which passed out of the full House over the summer. "There's just so many steps that still need to happen," Carbone said. If markups for bills in the Senate don't happen in January, Carbone said he would be worried. "They just need to show progress right out of the gate," Carbone said. "So if I see a markup in both committees and I see a compromise bill in the Senate and we've got a potential Senate floor vote in the next six weeks, then I'm feeling very good," he said. "If we don't have those things in January, I'm feeling very pessimistic." And then come the midterm elections, as some lawmakers focus on their own races. Lawmakers have about the first half of next year to pass a crypto market structure bill before election season takes hold, Anchorage's Kevin Wysocki said. "In terms of timeline, I think we're looking at the first two quarters of next month before members are really focused on election matters," he said. "And then maybe there's a small window of opportunity around the holidays at the end of 2026 to move this legislation post-election." Some Senate Democrats are really passionate about a crypto market structure bill and want to see it passed, said Saga CEO Rebecca Liao. Liao was also a member of former President Joe Biden's 2020 presidential campaign. However, having enough time is a challenge as they face midterm elections and another budget discussion, she said. Congress temporarily funded the government following a 43-day shutdown that ended in November. That funding extends through Jan. 30, 2026, but if funding isn't agreed to again, the government will shut down again, putting a pause on work on a crypto market structure bill. The closer midterm elections get, the more Trump's crypto conflicts of interest could come into the spotlight, Liao said. "We're seeing a real Democratic message coalescing around affordability, and so anything that smacks of privilege or unjustified gains by the president or the people in his administration, all of that is going to be hammered time and again in Democratic messaging," she said. As for what happens if lawmakers are ultimately not able to pass a crypto market structure bill into law in 2026, Liao said something has to get done, especially as financial institutions have gotten into digital assets. "In order for crypto to actually get to adoption and mass utilization, you really do need regulatory clarity, and so I think people will push for it again," she said.
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Crypto.com hiring quant trader for sports event prediction market making in the US Crypto.com is hiring a quant trader focused on sports event market-making as it pushes deeper into prediction markets amid growing regulatory scrutiny. The role centers on pricing and providing liquidity for sports event contracts, which allow users to trade yes-or-no outcomes tied to real-world sporting events. According to the job listing, with a low-end annual salary of $120,000, the US-based trader would be responsible for continuously quoting markets, managing risk, and adjusting prices in real-time as games unfold and new information emerges. The hiring effort comes as Crypto.com expands its footprint in prediction markets through high-profile partnerships. Earlier this month, sports apparel giant Fanatics launched a fan-focused prediction market built on Crypto.com’s regulated U.S. derivatives infrastructure, joining earlier collaborations with Truth Social and MyPrize. Those products compete in a fast-growing field alongside platforms such as Polymarket and Kalshi, which together see billions of dollars in monthly trade volume according to The Block data. The hire follows a flurry of moves across the industry, including Coinbase’s agreement last week to acquire prediction markets startup The Clearing Company as exchanges compete to own pricing, liquidity and distribution in event-based trading. At the same time, the space remains legally contentious. Connecticut regulators last week ordered Crypto.com, Kalshi and Robinhood to halt sports event contracts for state residents, arguing the products constitute unlicensed sports wagering despite federal approval pathways through the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
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MoMA adds CryptoPunks and Chromie Squiggles NFTs to permanent collection following coordinated donation The Museum of Modern Art in New York has acquired eight CryptoPunks and eight Chromie Squiggles for its permanent collection, marking one of the most significant institutional endorsements of onchain art to date. The 16 works, all donated rather than purchased, will be housed in MoMA’s Media and Performance department alongside video, experimental technology, and other new media art. The works can be viewed on MoMA’s website
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CryptoQuant says bear market has started, sees bitcoin downside risk to $70,000 A crypto bear market has already begun, according to onchain analytics firm CryptoQuant, which cited weakening bitcoin demand as a key signal. "Bitcoin demand growth has decisively slowed, signaling a transition into a bear market," CryptoQuant said in a report published Friday. "After three major spot demand waves since 2023 — driven by the U.S. spot ETF launch, the U.S. presidential election outcome, and the Bitcoin treasury companies bubble — demand growth has fallen below trend since early October 2025." The firm said this suggests that most of the incremental demand from the current cycle has already been absorbed, removing a key source of price support for bitcoin. Based on these conditions, CryptoQuant sees bitcoin downside risk toward the $70,000 level, with a deeper decline toward $56,000 possible if bitcoin fails to regain momentum. "Downside reference points suggest a relatively shallow bear market," the report said. "Historically, bitcoin bear market bottoms have aligned with the realized price, currently near $56,000, implying a potential 55% drawdown from the recent all-time high — the smallest drawdown on record. Intermediate support is expected around the $70,000 level." When asked about timing, CryptoQuant head of research Julio Moreno told The Block the move to $70,000 could occur within months, while $56,000 would be a longer-term scenario. "$70,000 could be in three to six months," Moreno said. "$56,000 would be in the second half of 2026 if it comes to that." Moreno added that the bear market effectively began around mid-November, following the largest liquidation event in crypto history on Oct. 10. Since then, demand has continued to weaken. CryptoQuant said U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs turned into net sellers in the fourth quarter of 2025, with holdings declining by roughly 24,000 BTC. That marks a sharp reversal from the same period last year, when ETFs were strong net buyers. Addresses holding between 100 and 1,000 BTC — a cohort that includes ETFs and bitcoin treasury companies — are also growing below trend, CryptoQuant said, mirroring demand deterioration seen toward the end of 2021 ahead of the 2022 bear market.
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SoFi launches SoFiUSD stablecoin to offer settlement infrastructure for banks and fintechs SoFi Technologies announced Thursday the launch of SoFiUSD, a fully reserved U.S. dollar stablecoin issued by SoFi Bank, marking what the company says is the first time a national bank has issued a stablecoin on a public, permissionless blockchain. The product aims to position SoFi as a stablecoin infrastructure provider for banks, fintechs, and enterprise platforms seeking faster, more efficient money movement, according to a statement shared with The Block. Initially deployed on Ethereum, support may also extend to other networks over time. SoFi said partners will be able to integrate SoFiUSD into settlement and payment flows using the firm's bank-grade infrastructure, enabling near-instant transactions around the clock at fractional-cent costs. The company added that the stablecoin will also be made available to SoFi members in the future, expanding its use beyond institutional settlement. Bank-issued stablecoin infrastructure SoFi Bank is an OCC-regulated, FDIC-insured depository institution, and SoFiUSD is fully backed 1:1 by cash reserves held for immediate redemption, according to the firm. As a federally chartered bank, SoFi said it can hold reserves in cash at its Federal Reserve account, eliminating liquidity and credit risk while generating yield that can be shared with partners and stablecoin holders. The company said its infrastructure will also allow banks, fintechs, and enterprise partners to issue their own white-label stablecoins or use SoFiUSD directly within their own systems. SoFi CEO Anthony Noto said the launch applies the firm's regulatory and operational framework to address slow settlement, fragmented providers, and opaque reserve models in financial services. "Blockchain is a technology super cycle that will fundamentally change finance, not just in payments, but across every area of money," Noto said, adding that SoFiUSD combines the firm's national bank charter with transparent, fully reserved onchain technology to provide a "safer and more efficient way to move funds." SoFi said SoFiUSD will be used not only within its crypto trading business but also for settlement by card networks, retailers, and other businesses seeking lower-cost, faster payments. The stablecoin is also expected to play a role in SoFi Pay for international remittances and point-of-sale purchases, as well as serve as an alternative payment method for its platform partners that process billions of transactions annually. The move comes as other major fintech and payments firms have unveiled or pursued their own stablecoin initiatives this year, including Klarna's planned KlarnaUSD, Western Union's USDPT, and Stripe's USDB — reflecting a broader push among traditional finance companies into blockchain-based settlement and payment infrastructure. SoFi's stablecoin launch also builds on its recent expansion into crypto services. In November, the firm became the first national bank to offer crypto trading directly to consumers under SoFi Crypto, allowing members to buy, sell, and hold nearly 30 cryptocurrencies within its app, following a phased rollout. SoFi previously offered crypto trading via a partnership with Coinbase in 2019, which was subsequently suspended in 2023. "One of the holds we've had for the last two years was in cryptocurrency, the ability to buy, sell, and hold crypto," Noto explained last month. "We were not allowed to do that as a bank. It was not permissible. But in March of this year, the OCC came out with an interpretive letter that it's now permissible for banks, like SoFi, to offer cryptocurrencies.
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Ethereum developers name post-Glamsterdam upgrade ‘Hegota’ as 2026 roadmap takes shape Ethereum core developers have officially named the network’s next upgrade after Glamsterdam as “Hegota,” further defining the network’s 2026 development cycle as it continues its twice-a-year release cadence. Hegota blends the execution layer’s “Bogota” upgrade, following the tradition of naming updates after Devcon host cities, with the consensus layer’s “Heze”, named after a star. Developers said the headliner EIP for Hegota will not be selected until February, while work on Glamsterdam — Ethereum’s first scheduled upgrade of 2026 — continues. The naming decision was made during the All Core Developers Execution (ACDE) call on Thursday, the final meeting of the year. ACDE calls are set to resume on Jan. 5, when developers aim to finalize Glamsterdam’s scope. 2026 release cycle The naming comes at a moment when Ethereum’s upgrade process is settling into its intended rhythm. With Pectra and Fusaka shipped in 2025, the network has effectively begun its twice-annual upgrade schedule. The approach intends to make improvements more iterative, predictable, and narrowly scoped, reducing the need for rare, sweeping overhauls. Based on the established cadence, Glamsterdam would likely land in the first half of 2026, with Hegota following later in the year. While Hegota itself remains in early planning, its eventual upgrade is expected to draw from long-running roadmap goals and any overflow items deferred from Glamsterdam. Particularly, Verkle Trees — a prerequisite for fully stateless clients — have been frequently cited as a candidate for inclusion in one of the 2026 hard forks. However, no formal selection has been made. Other areas under discussion include state and history expiry mechanisms and additional execution-layer optimizations. Notably, state expiry conversations may garner more attention following a recent batch of proposals from the Ethereum Foundation. As The Block previously reported, the EF’s Stateless Consensus team warned that state bloat — the steady expansion of Ethereum’s stored data — is becoming a growing burden for node operators. Glamsterdam focuses on Layer 1 efficiency and builder decentralization Meanwhile, developers continue to refine Glamsterdam’s hard fork. Proposals still under consideration include enshrined proposer-builder separation, or ePBS, intended to curb centralization in block building; block-level access lists, which aim to reduce state access bottlenecks; and gas repricings to better align EVM costs with resource usage. More complex changes, such as reducing slot times, have already been pushed to later cycles. Any items that prove too ambitious for the timeline may roll into Hegota, with final decisions expected once calls resume in the new year. A roadmap that stretches beyond 2026 Hegota’s reveal also situates Ethereum within its broader, multi-phase technical roadmap. Back in September 2022, developers executed the first part of this path, dubbed The Merge, which transitioned Ethereum from a proof-of-work blockchain to a proof-of-stake network. The following components have been framed as The Surge, The Verge, The Purge, and The Splurge. The Surge focuses on achieving massive rollup-driven scaling. Fusaka advanced this goal through PeerDAS and expanded blob capacity, while Glamsterdam aims to improve Layer 1 performance further to better support rising rollup activity without creating new centralization pressures. Next, The Verge centers on statelessness and light-client verification. Potential Verkle integration in Hegota aligns directly with this phase by reducing node storage requirements and enabling broader network participation. Later phases — The Purge and The Splurge — address historical cleanup and long-term protocol simplification
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'Vote before Christmas or end up on Santa's naughty list': Uniswap founder submits UNIfication proposal for final governance decision founder Hayden Adams has submitted the long-anticipated UNIfication proposal for a final governance vote, setting up a decision window that runs from Dec. 19 through Dec. 25. In a post on X early Thursday, Adams urged delegates to participate ahead of the holiday deadline. "Vote before Christmas or end up on Santa's naughty list," he wrote. The vote follows a request for comment proposal from Uniswap Labs and the Uniswap Foundation last month and could mark a significant shift for the protocol and its token holders, who have long pushed for a so-called "fee switch" that would divert a portion of trading fees from liquidity providers to the protocol. The proposal follows years in which the authors said legal battles and a hostile U.S. regulatory environment under former Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler discouraged activating protocol fees, conditions they argue have now changed. If approved, the proposal would take effect following a two-day timelock and execute a series of onchain actions designed to restructure how value flows through the Uniswap ecosystem. These include an immediate retroactive burn of 100 million UNI from the treasury (an estimate of what might have been burned if the protocol fee switch had been active at token launch), the activation of protocol fee switches on Uniswap v2 and v3 on Ethereum mainnet, and the routing of Unichain sequencer fees into the same UNI burn mechanism. Fee activation for Uniswap v4 would be addressed through a separate governance proposal, Adams said. Uniswap has been one of the best-performing DeFi protocols in 2025, generating nearly $100 million in monthly fees on average and over $1 billion year-to-date, according to The Block's data dashboard. Fee switch rollout RELATED INDICES Protocol fees would be rolled out gradually to minimize disruption, according to the proposal, beginning with Uniswap v2 pools and a selected set of v3 pools that account for 80% to 95% of LP fees on Ethereum mainnet. On v2, activating the fee switch would reduce liquidity provider fees from 0.3% to 0.25%, with the remaining 0.05% directed to the protocol. On v3, protocol fees would be set as fractions of LP fees, initially one-quarter for 0.01% and 0.05% pools and one-sixth for 0.30% and 1% pools, with governance able to adjust the parameters over time. Under the proposal, Unichain sequencer fees would also be routed to the UNI burn mechanism after Layer 1 data costs and a 15% allocation to Optimism. Unichain, which launched about nine months ago, is currently processing roughly $100 billion in annualized decentralized exchange volume and about $7.5 million in annualized sequencer fees, the team said. The rollout could later expand to Layer 2s, other Layer 1s, Uniswap v4, UniswapX, PFDA — which is designed to route certain MEV (maximal extractable value) to the protocol — and aggregator hooks, the authors wrote. Beyond fee activation, the UNIfication proposal outlines a broader reorganization of the Uniswap ecosystem. This includes contractual agreements intended to align Uniswap Labs with Uniswap governance. Under the proposal, Uniswap Labs would enter into a services agreement recognized as legally binding in Wyoming under the state's Decentralized Unincorporated Nonprofit Association (DUNA) framework, alongside indemnification agreements covering members of the independent committee that negotiated the deal. The proposal text states that this structure is intended to ensure Labs' activities remain aligned with the interests of UNI token holders. The governance package also would shift operational responsibilities historically handled by the Uniswap Foundation to Uniswap Labs, eliminate Labs' interface, wallet, and API fees, and establish an annual growth budget of 20 million UNI funded from the treasury starting in 2026. The proposal frames these changes as part of a long-term model in which protocol usage drives UNI burns while Labs focuses on protocol development and growth. Uniswap's native token is trading up around 7.5% on Thursday following the proposal's submission for a final vote, according to The Block's UNI price page.
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PancakeSwap-backed prediction markets platform Probable to launch on BNB Chain PancakeSwap has unveiled Probable, an upcoming prediction market platform incubated by the decentralized exchange and supported by YZi Labs. "Probable is built for anyone who wants a simple, transparent, and fast way to predict crypto movements, global events, sports outcomes, and unique regional markets rarely available elsewhere," PancakeSwap wrote in its Tuesday blog post. The upcoming platform is set to launch exclusively on BNB Chain and will not require any fees at launch. It will also automatically convert any deposited token into USDT on BNB Chain without requiring users to swap or bridge for tokens. The platform utilizes UMA's Optimistic Oracle for event verification and settlement. Although PancakeSwap is assisting with Probable's early growth, the prediction market is an independent project, according to the blog post. It added that Probable's launch is "coming soon" without providing a specific timeline. Prediction markets gained significant traction this year, with Kalshi and Polymarket drawing in billions of dollars in monthly volumes from October. Following the success of the first-movers, major crypto and financial players have announced investment or new ventures into prediction markets. These include Coinbase, Gemini, Robinhood and MetaMask. Still, prediction markets carry regulatory uncertainty due to their unclear distinction from sports betting or gambling. Kalshi, a federally licensed platform under the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, has faced enforcement actions across multiple states, where authorities have viewed its event contracts as illegal online gambling.
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JPMorgan launches tokenized fund on Ethereum, Ripple taps Wormhole to expand RLUSD to Layer 2s, and more Happy Monday! Bitcoin is bleeding back below $86,000 after last week's hawkish Fed cut, with analysts saying markets have shifted into wait-and-see mode as December inflation data is set to decide whether risk appetite revives or continues to fade into year-end. In today's newsletter, JPMorgan launches a tokenized fund on Ethereum, Ripple taps Wormhole to expand RLUSD to Layer 2 chains, Visa launches a new "stablecoins advisory practice," and more. Meanwhile, the UK Treasury plans to enact rules by 2027 to regulate crypto assets under the same framework as traditional financial products. Plus, Circle acquires Interop Labs, the initial developer of Axelar Network. P.S. Don't forget to check out The Funding, a biweekly rundown of crypto VC trends. It's a great read — and just like The Daily, it's free to subscribe! JPMorgan launches tokenized money-market fund on Ethereum JPMorgan is launching its first tokenized money-market fund on Ethereum, seeding the private vehicle with $100 million of its own capital before opening to outside investors on Tuesday. The fund, called My OnChain Net Yield Fund, or MONY, is run by JPMorgan's $4 trillion asset-management arm and uses the bank's Kinexys platform to issue onchain tokens representing investor holdings. MONY targets qualified investors with a $1 million minimum investment and allows subscriptions and redemptions in cash or Circle's USDC stablecoin, with yield accruing daily like a traditional money-market fund, the Wall Street Journal first reported on Monday. JPMorgan executives said client demand for tokenization is accelerating, with the bank aiming to mirror the flexibility and product choice of traditional money-market funds on blockchain rails. The move adds to a growing push by major financial institutions to bring traditional investment products onchain following recent U.S. regulatory developments. That includes growing competition in tokenized funds, with JPMorgan joining efforts by firms like BlackRock, Goldman Sachs, and BNY Mellon to bring yield-bearing assets onchain. Ripple taps Wormhole to expand RLUSD to Layer 2 chains like Base and Optimism Ripple is preparing to launch its RLUSD stablecoin on Layer 2 networks next year, tapping Wormhole's NTT standard to expand beyond XRP Ledger and Ethereum. The company is already testing RLUSD on Optimism, Base, Ink, and Unichain as part of its push toward a multichain stablecoin strategy, pending regulatory approval. RLUSD has grown to more than $1 billion in supply since its launch last December, with a focus on providing a compliant solution for onchain institutional finance. The planned expansion follows efforts to secure dual state and federal oversight for RLUSD, after the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency said last week it had conditionally approved a national trust bank charter for Ripple National Trust Bank. Visa launches 'stablecoins advisory practice' to help banks and businesses build strategies Visa has launched a new "stablecoins advisory practice" to help banks, fintechs, merchants, and enterprises design and implement stablecoin strategies. The advisory unit builds on Visa's expanding stablecoin footprint, with the company reporting a $3.5 billion annualized run rate in stablecoin settlement volume as of Nov. 30. Early clients, including Navy Federal Credit Union and Pathward, are using the service to assess payment use cases and integration paths for stablecoins. The launch reflects growing institutional confidence in stablecoins, supported by clearer U.S. regulation and rising adoption across payments and cross-border transfers. Global crypto ETPs see $864 million in weekly inflows Global crypto ETPs pulled in $864 million last week, extending inflows to a third straight week as investors remain cautious but increasingly optimistic, CoinShares Head of Research James Butterfill argued in a Monday report. U.S.-based products dominated activity with $796 million in inflows, alongside continued contributions from Germany and Canada, which together account for over 98% of total 2025 inflows. Bitcoin ETPs led weekly allocations with $522 million in inflows boosted by a positive week for U.S. BTC ETFs, while outflows from short-Bitcoin products signaled recovering sentiment, Butterfill said. Ethereum products outpaced price action with $338 million in weekly inflows, as U.S. spot ETH ETFs also attracted strong demand despite uneven crypto market performance. Strategy buys more than 10,000 BTC for second week in a row Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) bought more than 10,000 bitcoin for the second week in a row, adding another 10,645 BTC and lifting its total treasury holdings to 671,268 BTC. The latest buys were funded through at-the-market sales of the company's Class A common stock, MSTR, and its STRF, STRK, and STRD perpetual preferred stocks. The news comes after Strategy held onto its place in the Nasdaq 100 on Friday following the index's annual rebalancing, while its MSCI fate must wait until January amid increasing scrutiny of its bitcoin-heavy business model. Meanwhile, Tom Lee's BitMine also announced Monday it had added another $321 million in ETH to its corporate treasury. In the next 24 hours U.S. nonfarm payroll figures are due at 8:30 a.m. ET on Tuesday. Arbitrum is among the crypto projects set for token unlocks. Never miss a beat with The Block's daily digest of the most influential events happening across the digital asset ecosystem. Disclaimer: This article was produced with the assistance of OpenAI’s ChatGPT and reviewed and edited by our editorial team.
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Brazil's largest bank recommends a 3% Bitcoin portfolio allocation: 'real diversification' A partner at the investment arm of Itaú Unibanco, the largest private bank in Latin America, is urging investors to allocate a portion of their portfolios to bitcoin as a "dual opportunity" for asset diversification and currency protection. In a recent research note, Renato Eid, Itaú Asset Management’s head of beta strategies and responsible investment, recommended a "calibrated" allocation of 1% to 3% in the cryptocurrency. He also warned against trying to time the market and emphasized maintaining a long-term horizon. "The idea is not to make crypto assets the core of the portfolio, but rather to integrate them as a complementary component," Eid wrote. "The goal is to capture returns uncorrelated with domestic cycles, partially protect against currency devaluation, and add potential for long-term appreciation." The column explicitly references its own BITI11 fund, a Brazilian-listed product that offers bitcoin exposure through an ETF wrapper. The ETF began trading on Brazil’s B3 exchange in 2022 as part of a partnership between Galaxy Digital and Itaú Asset. The ETF has assets under management worth about $115.6 million, per TradingView data. "Maintaining and/or adding BITI11 to your portfolio represents a dual opportunity — international diversification + currency protection/global store of value," Eid wrote. Eid’s pitch leans heavily on a Brazil-specific problem: currency swings. Brazil’s real slid to record lows in December 2024 — Reuters reported it fell as low as 6.30 per U.S. dollar during the month — which bolsters the argument for holding some globally priced assets as partial protection against FX shocks. The currency is currently trading at about 5.42 per U.S. dollar. The note also fits with Itaú’s recent crypto buildout. Itaú Unibanco launched bitcoin and ether trading inside íon in December 2023, with the bank acting as custodian. Brazil's central bank recently released new rules for domestic digital asset firms, mandating they register with the central bank to operate legally in the country, The Block previously reported. Bank of America recently recommended a similar 1-4% crypto allocation for its wealth clients, bringing the TradFi giant in line with Wall Street's growing acceptance of crypto.
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Fogo cancels $20 million pre-sale, will airdrop tokens instead in upcoming mainnet launch Fogo, an experimental Layer 1 blockchain built using the Solana Virtual Machine, is cancelling a previously announced token pre-sale ahead of its mainnet launch in January. Instead, the project now plans to airdrop the tokens rather than sell them. Earlier this week, Fogo announced a $20 million token presale at a $1 billion fully diluted valuation, offering 2% of the FOGO token’s total supply. The aim was to help distribute the tokens to a wider audience, and targeted a relatively small capital raise to prioritize delivery over funding. “The original goal of the presale was broad distribution to the current users and loyalists, but we determined there are better ways to do that while we focus on the launch of public mainnet,” Fogo Foundation Director Robert Sagurton told The Block in a direct message. Fogo will now instead airdrop that 2% allocation, a project representative confirmed in a message to The Block. "Always read the room, sanity check original assumptions, and don’t hesitate to pivot when something no longer makes sense,” Sagurton added. Fogo tokenomics This is not the first change to Fogo’s economics. On Thursday, the team published its token allocation plan, with 6.6% earmarked for an airdrop that would immediately be tradeable. About a third of FOGO’s initial supply would also be unlocked to fund the Fogo Foundation, while core contributors would get 34% locked under a four-year vesting schedule. In total, 38.98% of tokens unlocked would be unlocked at network launch under this initial tokenomics plan. The project also named two “institutional investors,” Distributed Global and CMS Holdings, which would receive 8.77% of the total token supply. “Advisors” would also be rewarded 7%. Apart from the airdrop, 11.25% of the FOGO supply was broken out for “community ownership,” namely investors in the two crowdfunding sales conducted on Echo, the angel investor platform founded by popular crypto trader Jordan Fish, better known as Cobie, and now-cancelled Metaplex sales. “The Echo and upcoming Metaplex sales ensure community members hold a greater share than institutional investors,” the team wrote on X on Thursday. Some 3,200 investors participated in the Echo sales alone, including an $8 million raise at a $100 million valuation in January. (Full disclosure: The Block’s former CEO Larry Cermak was a participant via the Big Brain Collective.) Moreover, ahead of the now-cancelled pre-sale, Fogo burned an additional 2% of the genesis supply initially set aside for core contributors. “It's gone forever,” the Fogo rep said. Airdrop, points, launch With the planned Dec. 17 pre-sale canceled, Fogo points farmers could receive a larger allocation, the team suggested on X. “We have taken a snapshot of Fogo Fishers, Portal Bridge points holders, and all USDC transfers since the initial presale announcement. We will attribute Fogo Flames to these groups,” Fogo wrote. These groups refer to early adopters of the Fogo testnet, including its Fogo Fishing dApp and users who bridged USDC to Fogo via the Wormhole-powered Portal Bridge before the snapshot cutoff. Fogo Flames are points that will be redeemable for FOGO tokens after the Jan. 13 mainnet launch. “We value the strong, positive support received. Rest assured, we have taken note,” Fogo wrote. “The Fogo Flames points program remains a central pillar to give meaningful distribution to developers, community members and ecosystem participants.” Sagurton, a former Jump Crypto executive, noted the canceled token sale represents a “doubling down on Flames,” and that the shifting strategy will not impact the Layer 1 launch. Fogo is a next-gen blockchain built using the technological framework underpinning Solana. The project, developed by former Wall Street executives, aims to deliver 40-millisecond block times, support real-time trade execution, and reduce malicious MEV. A testnet was launched in July that now handles over 1,000 transactions per second. Notably, Fogo plans to be the first blockchain to implement Jump Crypto's validator client software, which was launched on Friday.
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Pyth launches token buyback program, allocating 33% of DAO treasury to monthly PYTH purchases Pyth Network, a data protocol covering crypto and other asset classes, has launched a token buyback program as it looks to expand its revenue and support the value of its PYTH token. The buyback program — formally called the “PYTH Reserve” — uses network revenue to acquire tokens each month. Revenue flows into the Pyth DAO treasury, and "33% of the total treasury balance" will be used each month to purchase PYTH on the open market, Michael James, head of institutional business development at Douro Labs (Pyth developer) and a contributor to Pyth, told The Block. The program begins this month, with the first buyback expected to total $100,000–$200,000, James said, noting that the DAO treasury currently holds around $500,000. Pyth expects buyback amounts to grow as revenue increases in 2026 and beyond, James said. Pyth says revenue is growing, targets $500 million ARR James said Pyth Pro — the network’s newest data product, offering real-time market data across asset classes and geographies — is seeing strong early traction. Since launching in late September, Pyth Pro has reached $1 million annual recurring revenue (ARR) in its first month, onboarded 80+ active subscribers, and received around 10 inbound organic leads per week, he said. “Based on pipeline projections for the next 12–18 months, we’re targeting $50 million ARR,” James added. He said the broader data industry — currently a $50 billion market growing 5–6% annually — could reach $80–90 billion by 2035. But with the rapid rise in real-world asset tokenization, expanding institutional demand, and AI-driven data consumption, James believes it could be even larger, closer to $100–125 billion by 2035. “Our first mission is to have 1% of today’s $50 billion market, which puts us around $500 million ARR,” he said. Beyond Pyth Pro, Pyth’s suite includes Pyth Core (crypto market data), Pyth Entropy (an onchain random number generator), and Pyth Express Relay (a plug-and-play liquidity aggregator for trading applications). Pyth says it has supported over $2.3 trillion in transaction volume (transactions relying on Pyth data), integrates over 100 blockchains, and serves more than 600 applications. James said Pyth provides data across crypto, equities, forex, and commodities, with customers spanning centralized exchanges, decentralized exchanges, infrastructure providers, market makers, and prediction markets. Aiming for 'token utility and value accrual' James said the buyback program is intended to drive “token utility and value accrual” by tying PYTH more closely to network adoption. Purchases will occur once per month, be fully onchain, and tokens will be held in the PYTH Reserve, he said. James declined to provide long-term estimates for any impact on PYTH's circulating supply. Token buybacks have become a notable trend in crypto this year. According to CoinGecko, ten projects accounted for 92% of token buyback spending in 2025, led by Hyperliquid with more than $644.64 million in revenue deployed. Other active buyers include LayerZero, Pump.fun, Raydium, Rollbit, and Bonk, per CoinGecko.
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Silk Road bitcoin wallets wake up, SEC Chair Atkins signals quick action on crypto priorities, and more Happy Wednesday! Bitcoin ETF inflows flipped positive on Tuesday, with $152 million added ahead of the Fed's rate decision this afternoon. However, analysts said traders remain firmly defensive as leverage resets, whales accumulate, and one of 2025’s lowest pre-FOMC confidence levels sets the stage for sharp volatility. In today's newsletter, Silk Road wallets move bitcoin to an unknown address after a decade of dormancy, SEC Chair Paul Atkins signals quick action on crypto priorities, a U.S. teachers union urges the Senate to withdraw its crypto market structure bill, and more. Meanwhile, a crypto AI startup, "four times better" than ChatGPT and Grok, raises $15 million. Plus, Strategy says MSCI's 50% bitcoin test risks an index "whiplash" and conflicts with U.S. pro-innovation policy. P.S. Don't forget to check out The Funding, a biweekly rundown of crypto VC trends. It's a great read — and just like The Daily, it's free to subscribe! Silk Road bitcoin wallets wake up after decade of dormancy Hundreds of Silk Road wallets that had been dormant for over a decade suddenly activated late Tuesday, moving approximately $3.14 million worth of bitcoin into one unidentified address. Wallets belonging to the now-defunct darknet marketplace still hold around $41.3 million in bitcoin following the transfers, per Arkham labeling. After analysts flagged the new movements, Coinbase Director Conor Grogan resurfaced his prior identification of roughly $47 million in wallets linked to Silk Road creator Ross Ulbricht. Ulbricht received a full and unconditional pardon from President Trump in January and was subsequently released from prison. However, the reason for the reactivation remains unclear as onchain investigators continue to track the flows. The Block reached out to Ulbricht for comment following the unexpected activity.
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CFTC clears path for ETH, Bitcoin and USDC to be used as collateral in derivatives markets In her latest move to update financial markets, Commodity Futures Trading Commission Acting Chair Caroline Pham debuted a "digital assets pilot program" allowing certain cryptocurrencies to be used as collateral in derivatives markets. At the onset, the pilot program will be limited to bitcoin, ETH, and USDC, Pham said on Monday. "As I’ve said before, embracing responsible innovation ensures that U.S. markets are the world leader, and drives progress that will unleash U.S. economic growth because market participants can safely put their dollars to work smarter and go further," Pham said in a statement. Pham, the agency's lone commissioner, has forged ahead with defining the derivatives regulator's stance on crypto. Last week, Pham announced that Bitnomial had become the first exchange to list regulator-approved spot crypto products. Previously, Pham launched the "Crypto Sprint" program to clarify rules for crypto and floated the idea of piloting a digital asset regulatory sandbox in the U.S. Monday's announcement builds on a CFTC initiative in September to expand the use of tokenized collateral, particularly stablecoins, in derivatives markets. In a letter posted by the CFTC in response to Coinbase, the CFTC said futures commission merchants (FCMs) involved in the crypto collateral program would have to file weekly reports on the total amount of digital assets held in customer accounts, such as futures and cleared swaps. FCMs would also have to report any "significant operation or system issue, disruption, or failure" affecting the digital assets being used as collateral, according to the letter. "The CFTC's decision confirms what the crypto industry has long known: That stablecoins and digital assets can make payments faster, cheaper, and reduce risk,” Coinbase Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal said in a statement. On Monday, the CFTC also withdrew a staff advisory that restricted an FCM's "ability to accept virtual currencies as customer collateral," noting the GENIUS Act regulating stablecoins made it outdated since it passed into law over the summer.
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Jupiter exec acknowledges 'zero contagion' claim was 'not 100% correct' after backlash over vault design Jupiter Exchange's "Cat-Herder" (chief operating officer) Kash Dhanda addressed community concerns over the protocol's lending product on Saturday, acknowledging that deleted social media posts claiming Jupiter Lend vaults had "zero risk of contagion" were inaccurate. Some prior social media posts from Jupiter advertised Jupiter Lend's vaults as having "isolated risk," and one post stated that isolated vaults "mean that pairs don't cross-contaminate, removing any risk of contagion." The post containing the latter sentence was deleted by the Jupiter team amid the controversy. "There was a social media post that came out in which we said that there was zero risk of contagion because of the isolated vaults. That was not a hundred percent correct," Dhanda said in a video statement. "We deleted it to avoid it kind of going any further. In hindsight we should have issued a correction right when we deleted it." The admission comes after Fluid co-founder Samyak Jain publicly acknowledged that Jupiter Lend uses rehypothecation (reusing deposited collateral elsewhere in the protocol) for capital efficiency, meaning collateral deposited in vaults is not completely isolated from each other. Yet Jupiter Lend's vaults are "isolated in a sense that each vault has its own configs, caps, liquidation threshold, liquidation penalty, etc." Jain said. (Fluid, formerly an Ethereum-focused liquidity protocol built by the Instadapp team, powers Jupiter Lend's backend infrastructure.) "Isolated," or not? Marius Ciubotariu, co-founder of rival Solana lending protocol Kamino, took to X to criticize Jupiter Lend's structure, days after Kamino blocked Jupiter Lend's refinance tool from accessing Kamino positions. "In Jupiter Lend, if you supply SOL and borrow USDC, your SOL gets lent out to loopers, including JupSOL, INF, etc. ... You take all the risk of those loops or assets blowing up," Ciubotariu wrote. "There is no isolation here and full cross contamination, contrary to what is advertised and what people are being told." Dhanda pushed back on characterizations that Jupiter Lend's vaults aren't truly isolated in his video, though he confirmed the protocol does employ rehypothecation. "It is true that there is rehypothecation. If there is an asset that's supplied somewhere, it can be borrowed out of debt somewhere else," he said. "This is where the yield on the collateral actually comes from." The disagreement appears to be based on differing definitions of "isolated." In Dhanda's and Jain's view, Jupiter Lend's vaults are isolated in that each can be configured in unique ways, with their own loan-to-value ratios, liquidation penalties, and asset limits, though they share a common liquidity layer that allows for rehypothecation. Ciubotariu's view seems to be that any rehypothecation negates claims of fully-isolated vaults. "In TradFi but also in DeFi, the fact that your collateral is rehypothecated or not, has contagion risks or not, is material information and should be very clearly disclosed," Ciubotariu wrote on X. "That is an absurd abuse of the term 'isolated'," Ciubotariu said in a direct message to The Block, regarding Dhanda's definition. "Having a 'pair-wise config' (that's what this really means) is a normal thing to do and many protocols have, including Kamino. Nobody, in their right mind, would advertise that as 'isolated risk'." Ciubotariu said he'd be willing to unblock the migration tool, though Jupiter "would need to stop misleading to their users and the entire Solana ecosystem, and make the migration tool 2-way." "It’s very unacceptable to claim and market isolated vaults when in fact assets are being rehypothecated," said one industry insider who preferred to remain anonymous. "That’s a very serious violation of trust." Jupiter Lend's TVL is over $1 billion Jupiter Lend launched in August with what the protocol described as "dynamic limits to isolate risk," according to The Block's previous reporting on the announcement at the Solana Accelerate conference. The protocol offered loan-to-value ratios of up to 90%, significantly higher than the typical 75% seen elsewhere in DeFi, enabled by what Dhanda then called a "bespoke liquidation engine." Dhanda pointed to Jupiter Lend's performance during the October 10 market crash—when more than $20 billion in leveraged positions were liquidated across the crypto market—as evidence the architecture can handle stress. "Jupiter Lend went through [the crash], even though it was only a few months old at the time, with zero bad debt," he said. "Their platform was live for 1 month, there were barely any positions at risk," Ciubotariu countered. "[Jupiter Lend has] to go through years of battle testing to claim anything close to the word 'safe'." The protocol has seen fast growth since its recent launch, with total value locked just over $1 billion, per DefiLlama data, putting it in direct competition with Kamino, which controls over 60% of Solana's lending market. Dhanda did not respond to a request for comment from The Block, though he said Jupiter would release additional documentation and an explanatory video after the Solana Breakpoint conference, which begins December 11 in Abu Dhabi. Yogita Khatri contributed reporting.
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Crypto sleuth ZachXBT claims British threat actor tied to $243 million Genesis creditor theft 'likely arrested' Pseudonymous blockchain sleuth ZachXBT claimed Friday that a British threat actor tied to a $243 million theft from a single Genesis creditor on Gemini may have been taken into police custody. In a Dec. 5 post on his official Telegram channel, ZachXBT alleged that “British threat actor Danny / Meech aka Danish Zulfiqar (Khan) appears to have likely been arrested by law enforcement and had crypto assets seized.” He pointed to roughly $18.58 million worth of crypto currently sitting at Ethereum address “0xb37...9f768,” which he said was associated with the suspected hacker. The web3 detective added that “multiple addresses tied to him I was tracking consolidated funds to 0xb37d in a similar pattern to other law enforcement seizures.” ZachXBT, who has built a reputation for tracking alleged crypto frauds and helping victims and law enforcement recover stolen assets, further claimed that Danny was “last known to be in Dubai” and that it was “alleged a villa was raided and others there were arrested as well,” adding that several people previously in contact with the suspect had become unresponsive in recent days, according to his post. As of publication, there have been no public statements from Dubai Police or UAE regulators, and The Block has not identified any local media reports confirming a villa raid, arrests, or seizures tied to Zulfiqar, the Genesis creditor theft, or the earlier Kroll SIM swap incident. The $243 million Genesis creditor heist The latest claims build on a sprawling investigation into one of the largest known individual crypto thefts. In September 2024, ZachXBT published a detailed thread alleging that three attackers were involved in stealing roughly $243 million in bitcoin — 4,064 BTC at the time — from a single Genesis creditor on Aug. 19, 2024. The victim reportedly held funds with Gemini, which was used as the exchange interface. According to ZachXBT and subsequent reporting by The Block, the theft was carried out via sophisticated social engineering. Attackers allegedly posed as Google support, convinced the victim to reset two-factor authentication for his Gemini account, and used remote access software to gain deeper control. From there, they obtained the victim's private keys and drained their wallet, routing the 4,064 BTC through a web of exchanges and swap services. Back then, ZachXBT identified three primary suspects by their online handles — “Greavys,” “Wiz,” and “Box,” later alleged to be Malone Lam, Veer Chetal, and Jeandiel Serrano — and shared his findings with law enforcement. U.S. prosecutors have since brought a series of cases linked to the same constellation of activity. In September 2024, the Department of Justice charged two suspects in connection with what it described as a roughly $230 million cryptocurrency scam involving thefts from victim accounts, and later unsealed broader racketeering indictments alleging a $263 million scheme that included the theft of more than 4,100 bitcoin from a Genesis creditor. Court filings and related coverage detailed a mix of social engineering, SIM swaps, and even physical burglaries, with conspirators allegedly spending millions of dollars on luxury cars, travel, and nightlife. One defendant, identified as Chetal, has faced additional legal trouble after allegedly participating in a separate $2 million crypto theft while out on bond.
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Kalshi and Polymarket post strongest months yet with nearly $10 billion in combined November volume Centralized and onchain prediction markets closed November with their strongest month on record, as Kalshi and Polymarket each set new all-time highs for trading volumes amid surging retail interest, expanding integrations, and a steady drumbeat of headline-driven macro events. Prediction markets let users buy and sell contracts tied to real-world events, with the price of each contract reflecting the market’s implied odds of that outcome happening. If the event occurs, the contract pays out; if not, it expires worthless. Traders use these markets to gauge sentiment on everything from elections to economic data in real time. According to The Block’s data dashboard, Kalshi’s monthly spot volume climbed from $4.4 billion in October to $5.8 billion in November, a 32% month-over-month increase and the platform's largest absolute monthly gain to date. Polymarket also posted its biggest month ever. The New York–based platform saw monthly trading volume rise from $3.02 billion in October to more than $3.7 billion in November, a 23.8% month-over-month jump, extending a run of record-setting activity that began in the summer. The volume surge continues a breakout year for both platforms, which have increasingly dominated global prediction market flows. Market share data from The Block shows that the two now control the overwhelming majority of monthly activity in the sector as their product sets, liquidity funnels, and media integrations deepen. A duopoly ascendant November’s record highs extend the trend highlighted in The Block's recent reporting on Kalshi and Polymarket’s emerging duopoly. The sector’s capital formation has also kept pace with its trading growth. Last month, Kalshi doubled its valuation in a matter of weeks, driven by a broad investor bet on the platform's regulated U.S. footprint. The rally followed $1 billion in fresh funding, which pushed Kalshi's market valuation to $11 billion. Across the table, Polymarket has also expanded aggressively following a pivotal regulatory reversal. Following the CFTC’s regulatory nod in mid-November, the company is poised to resume its U.S. operations. Since then, Polymarket has layered on new distribution partnerships — including Yahoo Finance’s exclusive integration of its prediction market, a multi-year deal with UFC, and widening media embeds via Google Finance, which recently began rolling out Polymarket and Kalshi data directly into search results. Galaxy Digital has also explored potential liquidity-provision partnerships with both platforms, according to reporting from Bloomberg. The developments underscore a growing institutionalization of a category that started as a niche retail curiosity.
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Upbit suffers $37 million hack on Solana assets, halts withdrawals Upbit, South Korea's largest cryptocurrency exchange, was hacked for around 54 billion Korean won ($36.8 million) early morning on Thursday, local time. The exchange said it has halted withdrawals and deposits to examine an abnormal withdrawal of cryptocurrencies on the Solana network. Its announcement said that at around 4:42 a.m. in South Korea, a portion of tokens were withdrawn to an external wallet that has not been identified by the platform. The affected tokens are SOL, 2Z, ACS, BONK, DOOD, DRIFT, HUMA, IO, JTO, JUP, LAYER, ME, MEW, MOODENG, ORCA, PENGU, PYTH, RAY, RENDER, SONIC, SOON, TRUMP, USDC and W, according to Upbit's announcement. It said the platform has moved all assets to a safe cold wallet to prevent further attacks, and has successfully frozen $8.18 million worth of LAYER tokens. Upbit said it will work with projects and authorities to freeze the remainder of stolen assets. The platform added that it will compensate damages to user assets using its reserve assets, and ensured that customers will not experience any personal losses. Upbit has not yet disclosed the details of the attack nor the point of entry.
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Texas reportedly kicks off state bitcoin reserve with $5 million IBIT purchase: 'More wild stuff' Texas may have the first leg off the starting line in the race to put bitcoin on state balance sheets. The state reportedly executed its first allocation to its Texas Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, according to posts from the Texas Blockchain Council indicating a roughly $5 million purchase of BlackRock’s IBIT last week. The reported transaction appears to be the first deployment of funds authorized under SB 21, the law enacted by Governor Greg Abbott in June that created a state-managed bitcoin reserve operated by the Texas Treasury Safekeeping Trust Company. Lawmakers backing SB 21 framed the reserve as a way for Texas to treat bitcoin alongside other long-term assets. Bill author Sen. Charles Schwertner said earlier this year that the state "should have the option of evaluating the best performing asset over the last 10 years," a reference to bitcoin's long-run returns even if the asset hasn't consistently held that title in more recent periods. Texas Blockchain Council president Lee Bratcher tweeted that the purchase occurred on Nov. 20, describing it as both the reserve's first allocation and the first bitcoin buy by a U.S. state. State officials have not yet released documentation or statements confirming the transaction. The Block has reached out to Texas Treasurer Kelly Hancock, who oversees the reserve, as well as Bratcher, but did not immediately receive a response. As of its most recent Form 13F, the Texas Treasury Safekeeping Trust Company reported about $667 million in SPY and $34 million in a Janus Henderson fund. If Bratcher’s description holds, a $5 million IBIT purchase — part of a $10 million bitcoin allocation — would become the third line in that portfolio. This month, an Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund added to its IBIT while Harvard reported holding nearly seven million shares of IBIT as of Sept. 30 — its largest declared U.S. holding.
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Galaxy Digital explores Polymarket, Kalshi partnerships as liquidity provider: Bloomberg Mike Novogratz-led Galaxy Digital is in discussions to provide liquidity for prediction market platforms Polymarket and Kalshi, Bloomberg reported Monday. Novogratz told Bloomberg in an interview that Galaxy Digital is currently doing "small-scale experimenting" with market-making on prediction markets, adding that the firm has future plans to provide "broader liquidity" on those platforms. The move signifies digital asset investment management firm Galaxy Digital's expansion into the burgeoning prediction market sector, which is increasingly being recognized as a new frontier combining information and finance. Prediction markets let users trade simple yes or no contracts, with contract prices reflecting the market-implied probability of a given outcome. Polymarket and Kalshi are the two dominant players in the field, having seen around $42.4 billion in cumulative volume. While decentralization-focused Polymarket initially led the market after it gained traction around U.S. election results, CFTC-regulated Kalshi has overtaken it in monthly volume since September. The two platforms have recently secured high-profile partners through both solitary and collaborative agreements. Galaxy Digital, Google Finance and the U.S. National Hockey League chose to partner with both platforms. Analysts at Bernstein wrote in a note to clients earlier this month that prediction markets are "evolving to be broader information markets," with demand now spreading well beyond politics and sports into economics, culture, corporate activity, and financial indicators. Meanwhile, other major players in crypto and finance are also looking to enter the space with their own platforms, with Gemini and CME Group recently announcing such plans respectively.
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Crypto ATM operator considers $100 million sale, days after founder's $10 million money laundering charge Crypto ATM operator Crypto Dispensers said on Friday it is considering a $100 million sale offer, mere days after its founder and CEO, Firas Isa, was charged by federal prosecutors in connection with an alleged $10 million money laundering scheme. In a press release issued Nov. 21, the company stated it has retained advisors to support a "strategic review" and potential sale. The release highlighted the company's 2020 pivot from physical Bitcoin ATMs to a software-first model, a move the company claimed was designed to address "rising fraud exposure, regulatory pressure, and compliance demands." Those same issues are central to the criminal case currently facing the firm. On Tuesday, the Department of Justice announced that Isa and Virtual Assets LLC, which does business as Crypto Dispensers, were charged with one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering. As The Block previously reported, the indictment alleges that between 2018 and 2025, Isa knowingly accepted millions of dollars in proceeds from wire fraud and narcotics trafficking through the company’s ATM network. Prosecutors allege Isa arranged for the illicit funds to be converted into cryptocurrency and transferred to wallets that concealed their source. Isa has pleaded not guilty to the charges and faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison if convicted. Isa previously said Crypto Dispensers was "built on compliance from day one" in a statement emailed to The Block. In the Friday announcement, Isa did not address the indictment but framed the company’s history as a successful transition away from hardware limitations. "Hardware showed us the ceiling. Software showed us the scale," Isa said in the statement. "This review is about understanding the next stage of growth and determining which path creates the most value for the platform we have built." Crypto Dispensers did not immediately respond to a request for further comment from The Block regarding how the pending criminal charges might impact a potential sale, and whether or not it has a buyer lined up.
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Coinbase Derivatives to expand 24/7 futures trading for bevy of altcoins including ADA, AVAX, DOGE and SHIB Coinbase Derivatives is planning on expanding 24/7 trading for its listed altcoin futures, including Avalanche, Bitcoin Cash, Cardano, Chainlink, Dogecoin, Hedera, Litecoin, Polkadot, Shiba Inu, Stellar, and SUI. Nonstop trading for these assets will go live Dec. 5, according to a post on X from Coinbase Markets. This adds to Coinbase Derivatives existing 24/7 support for Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, and XRP products, including nano and “perp-style” futures products. Additionally, Coinbase is looking to add U.S. perpetual-style futures for those altcoins, according to the X post on Friday. These long-dated futures are similar to other crypto-native perps contracts in that they use a funding rate mechanism to keep futures contract prices aligned with spot markets. However, they come with a five-year expiration, while true perps are indefinite. Coinbase’s CFTC-regulated derivatives arm unveiled 24/7 Bitcoin and Ethereum futures trading in May and perps-style futures in July. The product launches followed shortly after Coinbase’s historic $2.9 billion acquisition of Deribit. RELATED INDICES Coinbase’s expanding futures offerings come as more and more trading activity shifts to decentralized platforms like Hyperliquid and Lighter. The Block’s measure of DEX to CEX Futures Trade Volume is currently at an all-time high. Disclaimer: The Block is an independent media outlet that delivers news, research, and data. As of November 2023, Foresight Ventures is a majority investor of The Block. Foresight Ventures invests in other companies in the crypto space. Crypto exchange Bitget is an anchor LP for Foresight Ventures. The Block continues to operate independently to deliver objective, impactful, and timely information about the crypto industry. Here are our current financial disclosures. © 2025 The Block. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice. TAGS AUTHOR Daniel Kuhn is a Senior Journalist and Editor at The Block, where he covers the crypto industry with a particular focus on tech. He previously served as deputy managing editor of opinion/features at CoinDesk. He first appeared in print in Financial Planning, a trade publication magazine. Before journalism, he studied philosophy as an undergrad, English literature in graduate school and business and economic reporting at an NYU professional program. You can connect with him on Twitter and Telegram @danielgkuhn or find him on Urbit as ~dorrys-lonreb. See More WHO WE ARE The Block is a news provider that strives to be the first and final word on digital assets news, research, and data.
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Bitcoin plunges below $86,000 as US jobs data dampens rate cut hopes Bitcoin fell to new local lows on Thursday after the latest U.S. jobs report pointed to lingering inflationary pressures. According to The Block’s bitcoin price page, the world’s largest cryptocurrency fell 7.32% to $85,700 in the 24 hours leading up to 11:50 p.m. ET on Thursday. This marks a low in nearly seven months and a 32% decline from bitcoin’s all-time high record of $126,080 set in October. The Crypto Fear & Greed Index remains at 11, signaling “extreme fear” as the market slides further. The entire crypto market is down 6.62% in the past 24 hours. “BTC slipping below $85.5K comes as stronger-than-expected US jobs data dampens expectations for a December rate cut,” said Vincent Liu, CIO at Kronos Research. “Liquidity remains thin, and short-term profit-taking is amplifying the move. The market is recalibrating risk, reacting to macro data points.” September’s delayed non-farm payroll data on Thursday showed that the U.S. economy added 119,000 jobs in the month, vastly exceeding the Dow Jones consensus estimate of 50,000, according to a report from CNBC. The higher-than-expected inflation indicator fueled concerns that the Federal Reserve may pause its easing cycle, placing additional downward pressure on the crypto market. The CME Group’s FedWatch Tool currently gives a 35.4% chance that the Fed would cut rates by 25 basis points next month. “All eyes are focused on the potential December rate cut, but much of it may be priced in,” Liu said. “BTC will bounce on the cut, yet a sustained rally needs fresh flows or renewed on-chain demand.” The Kronos Research analyst said the market would need not only Fed’s pause of quantitative tightening, but also fresh capital, strong on-chain demand, and a shift in sentiment. “Without all four, any bounce may fizzle,” Liu said. Meanwhile, LVRG Research Director Nick Ruck told The Block that the current market correction is a “healthy repricing” of overextended positioning from the price rally last month. “On-chain metrics [are] showing stabilizing spot and futures sell pressure as signs of capitulation being almost over,” Ruck said.
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RippleX engineer explores potential for native XRP staking as David Schwartz weighs in on future XRPL design RippleX Head of Engineering J. Ayo Akinyele and outgoing Ripple CTO David Schwartz sparked a discussion on how the XRP Ledger (XRPL) might evolve to expand XRP's utility across decentralized finance. RippleX is Ripple’s developer division focused on building tools and infrastructure for the XRP Ledger. In a post on Wednesday, Akinyele said XRP's role now spans tokenized assets, settlement, real-time value transfer, DATs, and, most recently, the launch of Canary's first pure spot U.S. XRP ETF, reflecting its growing place in institutional markets. Akinyele argued that this expansion naturally raises questions about future incentive models and participation, including whether native staking might make sense on XRPL. Staking in other networks aligns validators and token holders through financial rewards. "For holders, these models can offer a more direct way to participate in network governance, though they can also introduce new complexities around fairness and distribution," he said. However, such incentives would challenge long-standing design principles on the XRPL, Akinyele continued, where under its current model, fees are burned rather than redistributed and validator trust is earned through their performance, not their stake. The developer said native staking would require two foundations: a sustainable source of staking rewards and a fair distribution mechanism. The current fee-burning model would need to be reconsidered, with new programmability fees potentially directed to a rewards pool, he suggested. Staking could strengthen engagement, he added, but introduces governance and fairness trade-offs that must be handled carefully. Akinyele emphasized that the XRPL's existing Proof of Association model has remained stable for more than a decade by prioritizing trust and reliability over financial incentives. He also pointed to existing ecosystem experimentation — including Uphold, Flare, Doppler Finance, Axelar, and MoreMarkets — as evidence that developers are already exploring staking-like models without requiring protocol-level changes. Ripple CTO David Schwartz weighs in Ripple CTO David Schwartz — who recently announced his decision to depart the role at the end of this year after a decade at the firm — weighed in on the discussion. Schwartz noted on X that his "own thoughts on governance and consensus models have evolved" and that the ecosystem has reached a moment where it makes sense to discuss potential new designs. Ongoing programmability and smart contract initiatives make this an appropriate time to explore what native DeFi capabilities could look like on XRPL, he said, especially given that the network's original model was built in 2012, long before the current DeFi landscape. Schwartz outlined two technically compelling but likely impractical short-term ideas currently being discussed in the community. One would introduce a two-layer consensus model in which a small inner validator set — selected based on stake — advances the ledger, while the existing outer layer governs fees, amendments, and oversight. This structure, he said, could increase validator diversity without slowing throughput, allow faster and lighter consensus rounds, and ensure the network only halts if both layers fail. The second idea would keep XRPL's current consensus mechanism but use transaction fees to fund zero-knowledge proofs that verify smart contract execution. That would let nodes avoid running smart contracts directly while still guaranteeing correctness, he said. Both ideas, Schwartz noted, are "awesome technically but probably not realistically likely to be good, at least not any time soon." Community members raised concerns about incentive alignment, fee dynamics, and competition among validators. One user argued that incentives often create tension between validators and users over fees and validator count. Schwartz responded that in the two-layer model, outer validators would still police inner validators without staking, while the inner set would rely on slashing protections against double-signing. Even so, he questioned whether the potential performance gains justify the added complexity and risks. In both Akinyele's and Schwartz's view, the point of these early discussions is not to advocate for immediate changes but to understand how emerging incentive models, programmability features, and governance structures might influence the network's long-term trajectory. As the ecosystem grows, they said, examining ideas like staking clarifies what the XRPL should preserve and where new capabilities could fit, welcoming the community's input.
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Japan moves to reclassify crypto and adopt major tax relief: report Japan's Financial Services Agency has finalized plans to reclassify certain cryptocurrencies as financial products under the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act, while also seeking to cut taxes on crypto income. According to a report from Asahi, the reclassification will subject 105 cryptocurrencies, including bitcoin and ether, to new disclosure requirements. Exchanges listing these crypto assets will be required to disclose their key characteristics such as whether the token has an issuer, the underlying blockchain technology and price volatility. The FSA also plans to introduce preventive measures on insider trading, potentially prohibiting issuers or exchange executives from trading crypto assets based on non-public information, including exchange listing schedules. These changes are expected to be submitted as amendments to Japan's financial laws during the ordinary Diet session in 2026, according to the report. Tax cut As these 105 crypto assets move toward being treated as traditional financial products, Japanese authorities are seeking to lower the tax rate on crypto income to match that of stock investments — from a maximum of 55% to 20%. The tax reform is expected to be reviewed in the coming fiscal year, Asahi reported. Japan, which assumed a rather cautious stance on digital assets after Mt. Gox collapsed, has begun actively reforming its financial system to reinvent itself as a Web3 hub. Last month, the FSA was reportedly looking into ways to allow local banks to trade cryptocurrencies like stocks and government bonds. It has also been pushing a yen-pegged stablecoin initiative, with the country's first local stablecoin JPYC going live on Oct. 27.
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DOJ says US citizens helped North Korean IT workers infiltrate 136 companies The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has moved to forfeit more than $15 million in USDT stolen by North Korean hackers and secured guilty pleas from five people who helped Pyongyang infiltrate American companies with fake IT workers. The DOJ filed two civil forfeiture complaints seeking to keep $15.1 million worth of Tether's USDT stablecoin that was stolen by North Korean hackers in 2023, the department announced Friday. The seized crypto was traced to Advanced Persistent Threat 38 (APT38), a North Korean military hacking group that carried out heists targeting four overseas virtual currency platforms in 2023. The FBI seized the funds in March 2025 and is now seeking court approval to forfeit the assets for return to the victims. The seized crypto comes from four incidents that the announcement does not specify, but clues indicate the agency may be referring to the over $100 million Nov. 2023 hack of exchange Poloniex, the $37 million hack of crypto firm CoinsPaid in July 2023, the $60 million hack (which the DOJ pegs at about $100 million) of payments processor Alphapo that same month, and an unspecified "November 2023 theft of approximately $138 million from a Panama-based virtual currency exchange." The DOJ has not publicly confirmed which incidents the forfeiture complaints cover. "Efforts to trace, seize, and forfeit related stolen virtual currency remain ongoing, as the APT38 actors continue to launder such funds through various virtual currency bridges, mixers, exchanges, and over-the-counter traders," the agency said in its statement. U.S. citizens helped North Korean IT workers On Friday, the DOJ also announced it had secured guilty pleas from four U.S. citizens and one Ukrainian national who admitted to helping North Korean IT workers fraudulently obtain employment at U.S. companies by providing stolen identities and hosting company laptops. Four U.S. citizens — Audricus Phagnasay, 24, Jason Salazar, 30, Alexander Paul Travis, 34, and Erick Ntekereze Prince, 38 — pleaded guilty to wire fraud conspiracy for providing their identities to North Korean workers and hosting company-issued laptops at their homes to make it appear the workers were based in the United States. Ukrainian national Oleksandr Didenko also pleaded guilty on Nov. 10 to wire fraud conspiracy and aggravated identity theft for stealing U.S. citizens' identities and selling them to North Korean IT workers. Didenko helped North Koreans gain employment at 40 U.S. companies and agreed to forfeit more than $1.4 million as part of his plea deal. The schemes affected more than 136 U.S. companies, generated more than $2.2 million in revenue for the North Korean regime, and compromised the identities of more than 18 U.S. citizens, the DOJ said. North Korea has increasingly relied on both cryptocurrency theft and remote IT worker schemes to generate revenue in violation of international sanctions. A 2022 advisory from the FBI, Treasury, and State Department warned that North Korean IT workers can earn up to $300,000 annually, collectively funneling hundreds of millions of dollars into programs run by the country's Ministry of Defense. North Korean hackers have stolen more than $2 billion in cryptocurrency so far in 2025 alone, making the regime one of the most prolific crypto theft operations globally, per an Elliptic analysis.
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Tether is mulling a $1.16 billion funding round in the German tech startup Neura Robotics as the issuer of the world's largest stablecoin continues to explore new investment opportunities, according to a report from Financial Times on Friday. The company "was in discussions with Neura over a deal that was expected to value the start-up at between" $9.29 billion and $11.6 billion, FT reported, citing anonymous sources. Issuing USDT, the largest U.S. dollar-pegged stablecoin by supply, has been extremely profitable for Tether and the company has looked to diversify its investment portfolio. Having generated profits of over $10 billion during the first three quarters of this year, which followed a profitable 2024, Tether has made several investments in AI, data centers, energy infrastructure, and bitcoin mining. "Neura is seeking new investment as it prepares to sell its humanoid robot, initially aimed at industrial customers with plans to expand into home robots," FT said. "It has previously said it was aiming to produce 5 million devices by 2030, with the ambition of creating an 'iPhone moment' for robotics." In January, Neura raised nearly $140 million in a round that included investors such as BlueCrest, C4 Ventures, Lingotto, and Volvo Cars Tech Fund. The German company will compete with Elon Musk's Tesla, which is planning to mass-produce robots. Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino has taken a particular interest in the field of decentralized AI and has invested in an internal skunkworks team working on open-source, peer-to-peer machine learning tech called Tether AI.
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Singapore to trial tokenized bills settled with CBDC The Monetary Authority of Singapore plans to trial the issuance of tokenized MAS bills to primary dealers settled with central bank digital currency, with details to be released next year. MAS Managing Director Chia Der Jiun said in a Thursday speech at the Singapore FinTech Festival that tokenization has matured beyond experimentation and is increasingly being deployed in commercial settings. "Are asset-backed tokens clearly out of the lab? Without a doubt," said Chia. "But have asset-backed tokens achieved escape velocity? Not yet." Chia noted that while tokenization promises round-the-clock settlement, reduced intermediaries, and more efficient collateral usage, the industry must still overcome structural hurdles before large-scale adoption is possible. Tokenization, stablecoin regulations Chia said that three Singapore banks — DBS, OCBC, and UOB — have conducted interbank overnight lending transactions using the Singapore dollar wholesale CBDC in a trial. The testing is aligned with the country's ambition to scale tokenized finance using safe settlement assets. On stablecoins, Chia pointed out that the MAS has finalized its regulatory regime and will prepare draft legislation. "Under our regime, we have given importance to sound reserve backing and redemption reliability," he said. The MAS classifies stablecoins as "digital payment tokens" under the Payment Services Act, and has introduced a framework in August 2023 for single-currency stablecoins pegged to the Singapore dollar or major currencies like the U.S. dollar and euro. Chia warned that unregulated stablecoins have a "patchy record" of keeping their pegs and could trigger systemic runs similar to 2008 money market fund failures, when funds "broke the buck." Chia also noted that the MAS has launched the BLOOM initiative to support industry experimentation with tokenized bank liabilities and regulated stablecoins for settlement.
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‘Defi as a form of savings is finally viable’: Vitalik Buterin talks Ethereum scaling, financial freedom and protocol security Vitalik Buterin said he's encouraged by recent advancements in decentralized finance on Ethereum, most notably the sector’s improving security, maturity, and optionality. "We'll be seeing, I think, a growth in more and more cases of people, institutions, all kinds of users around the world actually using this as their primary bank account," Buterin, the founder of Ethereum, said in a pre-recorded closing statement at a Dromos Labs event on Wednesday. "Defi as a form of savings is finally viable." Echoing a recent blog post where he argued for lower-risk decentralized finance, Buterin noted that, as the sector has matured, there has been a shift away from high-risk speculation. DeFi, he argued, could become an outlet for users worldwide trying to escape the fiat money system "where your money can be taken away from you" through political shifts and other risks. Despite Buterin's optimistic outlook, he is aware of the history of protocol failures and smart contract risks that have long plagued DeFi, including, most recently, the multi-million dollar hack of Balancer, a thoroughly vetted and highly-trusted protocol. "It's a night and day difference in the kind of security that you can expect in 2025 versus if you compare it to something like 2020 or 2019," Buterin said. While the total amount lost in crypto exploits in 2025 “dwarfs” last year's total, Elliptic notes this was primarily driven by the historic Bybit hack in February. One element of security Buterin advocated for is the so-called "walkaway test," which ensures that users are always able to recover their funds. “It's really important for Ethereum and DeFi to really maintain and build and improve upon the core properties that have made Ethereum the Ethereum from the beginning," Buterin said. "This includes things like open source, following open standards, building for interoperability — rather than a walled garden — and censorship resistance." Buterin also encouraged developers to “experiment with building” for the Ethereum mainnet and wider Layer 2 "in mind," using the L1 base layer as a hub for liquidity and L2s for scalability. He added that scalability is "happening on both the L1 and L2s as the gas limit is going up" and as products like Lighter — which has hit over 10,000 transactions per second — go live. "With the right kind of engineering, that level of scaling is open to anyone to build today," Buterin said. There's "a lot of really valuable things to work on … that bring real financial freedom."
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CleanSpark to raise $1 billion in convertible note offering to expand operations Bitcoin mining firm CleanSpark is seeking to raise $1 billion through a private offering of convertible senior notes to expand its operations. The Nasdaq-listed firm said in a Monday statement that it plans to offer zero-coupon convertible bonds due 2032, with an option for initial purchasers to buy up to an additional $200 million. CleanSpark intends to use up to $400 million of the proceeds to repurchase its own shares, while the rest would go toward expanding its power and land portfolio, developing data center infrastructure, repaying bitcoin-backed credit lines, and for general corporate purposes. The zero-coupon convertible bonds will mature on Feb. 15, 2032, and may be converted into cash, shares, or a mix of both at the company's discretion. CleanSpark said that the notes will be senior unsecured obligations and will not bear regular interest. The offering is expected to price Tuesday before U.S. markets open, and will work with Cantor Fitzgerald and BTIG for the sale, according to a Bloomberg report. Last month, the bitcoin mining firm announced that it will expand into AI data center infrastructure. It also acquired the rights to 271 acres of land in Austin County, Texas, as part of its data center expansion. CleanSpark's stock closed down 3.47% at $15.03 on Monday, according to The Block's price page. The shares have fallen 22% over the past month but remain up 63% year-to-date. CleanSpark's proposed financing marks the latest example of crypto-related firms turning to the convertible debt market. Last month, TeraWulf completed a $1 billion offering of zero-coupon convertible senior notes. Galaxy Digital also announced last month a $1.15 billion exchangeable senior notes offering.
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Ledger considering New York IPO or fundraise as demand for hardware wallets climbs: FT Nov 09, 2025, 12:41PM EST Ledger considering New York IPO or fundraise as demand for hardware wallets climbs: FT Hardware wallet manufacturer Ledger is preparing to raise additional capital, likely next year, as surging demand for crypto security devices propels the company to its strongest financial performance on record, according to a recent Financial Times report. Ledger CEO Pascal Gauthier told the FT the Paris-based company is considering either a listing in New York or a private funding round, and is actively expanding its presence in the city. "Me spending more time in New York is with the understanding that money is in New York today for crypto, it's nowhere else in the world, it's certainly not in Europe," Gauthier told the British publication. The fundraising plans come amid Ledger's best year yet, according to the report, with revenues hitting triple-digit millions so far in 2025. The surge comes ahead of the company's typically strongest sales period during Black Friday and the holiday shopping season. The company currently secures about $100 billion worth of bitcoin for its customers and was last valued at $1.5 billion in 2023 after raising money from investors including 10T Holdings and Singapore's True Global Ventures. The firm recently rolled out an iOS app for its enterprise customers and launched native TRON support, though its native multisig wallet feature drew a mixed response from developers and long-time users. Ledger competes with other hardware wallet manufacturers including Czech Republic-based Trezor and Switzerland-based Tangem in the growing market for secure crypto storage solutions. 2025 has been one of crypto's worst years yet for security compromises, with criminals stealing $2.17 billion in the first half of 2025, according to a Chainalysis estimate, more than in the entire year of 2024. So-called "wrench attacks," or physical assaults on individuals believed to hold crypto wealth, have also been on the rise; Ledger co-founder David Balland himself was kidnapped in January of this year by criminals who demanded a 10 million euro cryptocurrency ransom and severed one of Balland's fingers. A 24-year-old French-Moroccan citizen suspected of orchestrating a series of high-profile crypto-related kidnappings in France, including Balland's, was later arrested in Tangier, Morocco.
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Fed Governor Miran calls stablecoins 'a force to be reckoned with' that could put downward pressure on interest rates Fed Governor Miran calls stablecoins 'a force to be reckoned with' that could put downward pressure on interest rates Stablecoins are an "area of enormous growth," said Federal Reserve Governor Stephen Miran as he spoke about cryptocurrency for the first time in his new position. "Based on the surveys that I've seen, the forecasts that I've seen, it's a force to be reckoned with absolutely," Miran said on Friday when he was asked about crypto during a panel at the BCVC Summit in New York City. Miran seemed less sure of where the rest of crypto is headed, but said lots of innovation was happening either way. "However, I do think there's a lot of innovation happening and that innovation is already starting to have economic consequences of the type that matter for the Fed and of the type that matter for monetary policy," Miran added. Miran assumed his role as Fed chair in September after being confirmed by the Senate. Before, he served as chair of the Council of Economic Advisers under President Donald Trump. On Friday, in a prepared speech at the summit ahead of answering questions, Miran said that the widespread use of stablecoins could put "downward pressure on interest rates." "Even relatively conservative estimates of stablecoin growth imply an increase in the net supply of loanable funds in the economy that pushes down r*," Miran said, referring to the neutral rate of interest measured when the economy is at full employment and stable inflation. "If r* is lower, policy rates should also be lower than they would otherwise be to support a healthy economy." Miran joined the central bank amid tension over cutting interest rates, and as Trump has pushed for steeper cuts, which received pushback from Fed Chair Jerome Powell and other top leaders at the central bank. Miran has called for rate cuts, and on Thursday said he expected rate cuts in December, according to reporting from Reuters.
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Balancer identifies rounding error as root cause of multi-chain DeFi exploit DeFi protocol Balancer has published its preliminary incident report on the Nov. 3 exploit that drained tens of millions from its Composable Stable Pools (CSPs) across multiple networks, including Ethereum, Base, Avalanche, Arbitrum, Optimism, Gnosis, Polygon, Berachain, and Sonic. As The Block previously reported, the decentralized automated market maker (AMM) and liquidity platform suffered massive outflows from its vault. Initial estimates of the loss quickly rose from around $70 million to over $128 million within a few hours, blockchain analytics providers like Nansen and Peckshield reported. According to Balancer, its security partner Hypernative first detected the suspicious activity early Monday. Several contributors and whitehat responders, such as SEAL 911, BitFinding, and StakeWise, were then contacted to help stem the bleed. Root cause: rounding flaw in swap logic In its preliminary report, Balancer attributed the exploit to a rounding error in the upscale function for EXACT_OUT swaps within the v2 vault’s batchSwap feature. This function allows users to combine multiple swap operations into a single transaction to save gas. Attackers exploited how deferred settlement was implemented in composable pools, which allowed liquidity to fall below minimum thresholds, the team explained. Specifically, the bug occurred when non-integer scaling factors caused the system to round down during specific calculations, creating small discrepancies that the attacker leveraged to manipulate balances and drain value. In many instances, funds were first redirected into the Balancer Vault’s internal balances before being withdrawn through follow-up transactions. The bug primarily affected Composable Stable v5 pools with expired pause windows, while Hypernative’s emergency automation automatically paused v6 pools. “The incident was limited to Composable Stable Pools on Balancer v2 and its forks on other chains such as BEX and Beets,” Balancer wrote. “Balancer v3 and all other pool types remain unaffected.” Meanwhile, CSPv6 pools were automatically transitioned into recovery mode under emergency controls. Multi-chain impact and recovery Balancer said the attack spanned several networks and forks, including BEX on Berachain, Beets on Sonic, and Gnosis-based deployments. However, ecosystem partners initiated emergency actions to contain the fallout. StakeWise DAO recovered approximately $19 million in osETH and $1.7 million in osGNO, roughly 73.5% of the stolen osETH. Berachain validators halted the network to perform an emergency hard fork addressing BEX’s v2 exposure, which was completed on Nov. 4. Also, Sonic Labs froze suspected attacker addresses, restricting fund movements tied to its Balancer fork. Gnosis temporarily restricted bridge activity to prevent cross-chain propagation, while Monerium froze 1.3 million EURe in the affected vault. Additionally, BitFinding and Base MEV bots recovered smaller sums — about $750,000 in total — and returned them to the Balancer DAO. The team added that a portion of the affected assets has been recovered or frozen and that a final verified accounting will be published once all partners complete on-chain reconciliation. Balancer claims that any circulating loss figures are unconfirmed until independent verification is concluded. Mitigations and next steps As part of its response, Balancer has disabled the CSPv6 factory to prevent the creation of new vulnerable pools and halted liquidity gauges for affected pools to stop further emissions. Furthermore, the team has enabled liquidity pool exits from paused pools to allow safe withdrawals. The protocol’s Safe Harbor legal framework (BIP-726), adopted last year, allowed whitehat teams to intervene immediately without legal risk, a structure Balancer said “materially improved response speed and coordination.” A final report, including confirmed loss and recovery figures, is expected “once all partner validations are complete,” according to Balancer’s latest update.
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SEC crypto treasury probe frozen by shutdown, but subpoenas could fly soon after government reopens What's shaping up to be the longest government shutdown in U.S. history most likely brought to a halt the Securities and Exchange Commission's inquiry into whether publicly listed crypto treasuries committed any acts that could be construed as insider trading. But once the government reopens, multiple former SEC lawyers say the regulatory agency will almost certainly restart their probe, which could possibly result in the regulator issuing subpoenas within as little as one to two months should the inquiry escalate into full-blown investigations. "If the trading is suspicious and there's a strong relationship between a corporate insider — who had material, nonpublic information — and an individual that traded on that information, that may be enough for a subpoena," David Chase, a former SEC enforcement lawyer who now works as a defense attorney, told The Block. In late September, roughly a week before the U.S. government shutdown began, The Wall Street Journal reported that both the SEC and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) contacted multiple publicly listed companies, which earlier this year adopted new business strategies of purchasing crypto, with questions about irregular patterns of trading volume and share price movements that may have occurred days before crucial corporate information was made public. SEC officials specifically warned companies about potential violations of Regulation Fair Disclosure, according to WSJ. The regulation strictly prohibits public companies from disclosing material, nonpublic information to people who might use the intel to inform stock trading decisions. "The SEC and FINRA don't start off necessarily saying this is an insider trading case," Howard Fischer, a former senior trial counsel at the SEC, told The Block. "They say: 'Let's take a look at this because it looks like before the information was released to the general public, about the adoption of a digital asset treasury strategy, there was anomalous trading in the equities of this company.'" Besides Bitcoin and Ethereum digital asset treasuries (DATs), the two most popular cryptocurrencies among treasuries, several publicly traded companies have also decided to accumulate large quantities of different altcoins. So far, billions of dollars have been invested in DATs. SEC probe frozen with skeleton crew For now, neither the SEC nor FINRA is saying anything. FINRA, which is a self-regulatory organization that writes and enforces rules for registered brokers, is fully up and running during the government shutdown. SROs are not part of the federal government and are funded by regulated members, according to the regulator. FINRA declined to comment when asked about the probe. In the SEC's case, with less than 10% of its staff currently working, the agency's inquiry into crypto treasuries is most likely on ice, as most employees who work on investigations have likely been furloughed. During the shutdown, which began on Oct. 1, the SEC is working off an agency plan, a spokesperson told The Block. The SEC can respond to emergencies related to either the safety of human life or the protection of property. Most people expect the stalemate between Republicans and Democrats will eventually end and the U.S. government will be allowed to reopen, with people returning to work. At the SEC, that likely means lawyers, accountants, and other individuals who specialize in investigations picking up where they left off before the shutdown. Responses to SEC letters important Whether or not subpoenas are eventually sent out once the government reopens will depend a lot on how different parties, who received letters, choose to respond to regulators, according to former SEC lawyers. The agency could also send out voluntary information requests, which Fischer said is happening more now than under the previous Biden administration. Voluntary information requests are where the SEC asks for documents during an investigation. Although the requests are not legally enforceable, if the contacted parties decline, that response can trigger a subpoena. Kris Swiatek, a partner at Seward & Kissel LLP, where he specializes in digital assets, told The Block that how companies respond to initial inquiries will play a major role in whether or not the SEC pursues further action and issues subpoenas. "Every public issuer, and any parties that are related to them in terms of the deals that were struck, will be viewed in its own light at the end of the day," said Swiatek. Chase said the SEC will want to establish a timeline. "They send what's called a chronology letter, basically who knew what and when at the company in terms of the material, nonpublic information," he said. And as to who could be facing insider trading allegations? "It could be insiders at the company. It could be people outside the company. It could be people who are approached to finance these transactions. There's a whole host of people who they could be looking at," said Fischer. Responses and subpoenas aside, at least one former SEC lawyer said the existing data could be enough to jumpstart a proper investigation. "If this was a real insider trading investigation that they wanted to pursue, they could make a lot of headway just based on the market information," one former SEC lawyer told The Block. Fischer said although it's unclear exactly what regulators are looking at, they are likely analyzing market activity. "If you look at a chart of average daily volume before they announce this kind of activity, there's a huge spike … so clearly someone knew what was going to happen or predicted it based on other information and purchased the securities in anticipation of that market move," he said. Chase said if subpoenas are issued, the SEC will likely ask to see phone, email, text, and social media communications. Then, after testimonies are taken, the SEC would probably determine whether there is enough evidence to move forward with recommending charges and issuing a Wells notice. That notice is a form of communication from SEC staff that lets a firm know that the agency's staff may recommend an enforcement action against them. Crypto treasuries a 'risk area' While the DAT phenomenon is a recent one, the SEC scrutinizing crypto companies and individuals who work in crypto is nothing new. In 2023, the SEC charged Terraform Labs and Do Kwon with securities fraud. Coinbase and Binance have also been targeted. The SEC ended up settling with Terraform and later dismissed the cases against Coinbase and Binance. The SEC also brought a lawsuit against crypto-project Unicoin for allegedly offering fraud rights certificates to investors of its cryptocurrency and common stock. That lawsuit is still ongoing. Since President Trump took office, however, the U.S. government's, including the SEC's, treatment of crypto organizations has been markedly different, with digital asset executives celebrating the seemingly pro-crypto administration. "Regulators have been certainly warming up to crypto under this new administration," said Swiatek, adding that this SEC probe could end up being the first instance of the agency questioning the behavior of companies operating in the digital assets space during Trump's second term. "This is sort of one of the first new signs of 'Look, there's something happening here that we need to look into.' That's an interesting dynamic," he said. David Namdar, who is CEO of the Nasdaq-listed crypto treasury BNB Network, which owns over $450 million in BNB tokens, seems to think some people in crypto need to become accustomed to a new, and more regulated form, of doing business. "As the digital asset and venture worlds intersect more with public markets, there’s a learning curve about how material information must be controlled," he told The Block. "One issue in certain deals in the sector has been what people describe as information leakage, related to situations where bad actors have shared pieces of information related to a potential transaction, leading to market chatter about pending transactions before official filings." Namdar said that to the best of his knowledge, BNB Network, which is officially named CEA Industries Inc., is "not among the companies subject to in-depth inquiries from the SEC or FINRA." 'Touchy subject' given Trump ties to DATs One legal advocate for a major crypto venture capital firm warned that the digital asset treasury boom could end up being a considerable "risk area" for the digital assets industry if DATs take on too much debt to buy crypto. But the advocate also said there's a worry among some monitoring the situation that the SEC looking into DATs might reveal irregular activity within an organization tied to the Trump family. "On the DATs, there is some fear about the Trump family," the person said, adding that the policing of DATs is a "touchy subject" due to the president's close ties to crypto treasuries. While there is no proof that the Trumps have done anything wrong or that the SEC is looking into any companies with ties to the president, Trump is connected to more than one DAT, including Nasdaq-listed ALT5 Sigma Corporation, which holds a reserve of WLFI tokens, the native cryptocurrency of World Liberty Financial, which is a Trump-backed DeFi project. Trump-owned Trump Media & Technology Group Corp., the company behind Truth Social, also adopted a crypto treasury strategy. Trump Media is also listed on the Nasdaq. ALT5 Sigma and Trump Media didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. The advocate, however, is encouraged that the SEC is trying to get to the bottom of whether or not wrongdoing occurred, regardless of how crypto-friendly Trump's government has been. "This is what the SEC should be doing. You want them actually focused on nascent areas where there's a burst of activity and some questionable, inter-person trading," they said. "This is what we would want out of the SEC if we want crypto to work well."
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Standard Chartered sees major RWA growth on Ethereum, CZ challenges Sen. Warren, and more The following article is adapted from The Block’s newsletter, The Daily, which comes out on weekday afternoons. Happy Halloween, on this Friday, Oct. 31! Bitcoin rebounded near $110,000 after a thaw in U.S.–China relations, despite continuing ETF outflows. In today's newsletter, Standard Chartered says tokenized RWAs can reach $2 trillion by 2028, Ex-Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao's lawyer demands an "immediate retraction" from Sen. Warren of previous claims, Ether.fi DAO proposes a $50 million token buyback plan, and more. Meanwhile, Coinbase and Strategy posted Q3 earnings on Thursday — analysts remain bullish on both companies. Let's get started! P.S. CryptoIQ is now available to everyone. Take the test for a chance to win $20,000! Standard Chartered sees tokenized real-world assets reaching $2 trillion by 2028 — 'vast majority' on Ethereum Standard Chartered predicts the market cap for onchain real-world assets could increase roughly 5,600% by 2028 to $2 trillion, up from about $35 billion today, according to an analyst note. Moreover, the majority of those assets will be tokenized on Ethereum. Geoffrey Kendrick, Standard Chartered’s head of digital assets research, said tokenized money market funds and listed equities alone could each grow to $750 billion markets, with onchain private equity, commodities, and corporate debt also growing in size. "Stablecoins have created several necessary pre-conditions for a broader expansion of DeFi via the three pillars of increased public awareness, onchain liquidity, and onchain lending/borrowing activity in fiat-pegged product," Kendrick said. The main risk, Kendrick cautioned, would be if regulatory clarity in the U.S. fails to materialize — a possibility if the administration cannot push through changes before the November 2026 midterm elections — "but not our base case." While other chains will also likely see growth, Kendrick predicts most real-world assets will find a home on Ethereum due to the network's historical reliability and network effects. Ex-Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao's lawyer demands 'immediate retraction' from Sen. Warren over post-pardon remarks The lawyer for Changpeng Zhao is demanding that Sen. Elizabeth Warren retract "defamatory statements" she made about the former Binance CEO following his pardon by President Donald Trump. Last week, Warren criticized the president's move, saying on X that Zhao pleaded guilty to a criminal money laundering charge, and circulated a resolution urging Congress to block "this blatant corruption." Zhao's lawyer, Teresa Goody Guillén, sent a letter to the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee this week, requesting an apology over her statements related to CZ's 2023 guilty plea for failing to maintain adequate money-laundering controls and subsequent pardon. Earlier this week, Fox News' Charles Gasparino reported that Zhao is weighing whether to bring a libel suit against Warren. Although Zhao has denied lobbying the Trump administration for a pardon, ties between the Trump-backed DeFi project World Liberty Financial and Binance have raised questions among several observers. Canaan’s Japan deal marks first state-linked bitcoin mining project in the country Canaan is reportedly supplying bitcoin mining rigs to a major Japanese utility for a grid-stability research project, marking the country’s first publicly disclosed state-linked mining initiative. While Canaan did not identify the partner, the move follows earlier reports that a subsidiary of Japan’s largest utility, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), had studied using surplus energy generated by solar and wind to mine bitcoin. Canaan said in its Thursday release that its hydro-cooled Avalon A1566HA servers will be used to “stabilize regional power-grid load through controlled overclocking and underclocking,” dynamically adjusting hashrate and voltage to balance energy use in real time. Ether.fi DAO proposes $50 million ETHFI buyback as DeFi’s repurchase wave tops $1.4 billion Ether.fi DAO has introduced a proposal to allocate up to $50 million from its treasury on token buybacks, which, if approved, would enable the Ether.fi Foundation to execute open-market purchases of ETHFI if the token dips below $3. With ETHFI down over 89% from its 2024 high to trade around $0.93 on Oct. 31, the program would activate immediately upon approval. Ether.fi is not the first to execute token buybacks, which have reached $1.4 billion alone this year, led by projects such as Hyperliquid and Pump.fun, Aave, and Uniswap. Ethereum devs officially target Dec. 3 for Fusaka upgrade In an All Core Devs call on Thursday, Ethereum researchers officially selected Dec. 3 as the date to push out the mainnet activation of the much-anticipated Fusaka upgrade. Fusaka went live on the Hoodi testnet on Tuesday in its final step towards mainnet activation following successful deployments on the Holesky and Sepolia testnets earlier this month. The backward-compatible Fusaka hard fork will implement about a dozen Ethereum Improvement Proposals to improve the sustainability, security, and scalability of the basechain and surrounding Layer 2 ecosystem, including the introduction of the PeerDAS streamlined data sampling technique
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Western Union files ‘WUUSD’ trademark after Solana stablecoin reveal Western Union has filed a U.S. trademark for "WUUSD," one day after unveiling plans to launch a stablecoin called USDPT on the Solana blockchain. The Oct. 29 filing, listed under serial number 99468604, covers downloadable cryptocurrency wallet software, stablecoin payment processing, trading, and exchange services, according to U.S. Patent and Trademark Office records. The mark was filed by Western Union Holdings Inc. and is currently listed as "awaiting examination." Both names point to U.S. dollar-based tokens, raising questions about how Western Union plans to differentiate between the two, or even whether the company intends for both assets to exist simultaneously. WUUSD could serve as a simplified consumer-facing brand or potentially a placeholder for future digital-asset products within the company’s planned Digital Asset Network. Western Union has not responded to The Block's request for comment on the WUUSD filing. On Tuesday, Western Union said it intends to launch USDPT in early 2026, issued by Anchorage Digital Bank. The token will allow users to send, receive, and hold stablecoins through Western Union's global infrastructure, marking one of the company's most significant forays into blockchain since its Ripple trials in 2018. Analysts at William Blair called the announcement "a clear opportunity rather than a threat" for remittance providers, noting that stablecoin rails could lower settlement costs, improve capital efficiency, and expand access in high-inflation markets. "We see a clear use-case for USD-denominated stablecoin holdings by remittance receivers in highly inflationary/FX-volatile economies as a means to mitigate purchasing power erosion," the analysts wrote in an Oct. 28 note to clients. "Further, stablecoin-enabled solutions should increase settlement speed and lower distribution partner pre-funding requirements, essentially reducing reliance on the historically constrained."
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William Blair analysts forecast ‘slingshot recovery’ for Visa amid stablecoin tailwinds Visa’s subdued stock performance this year could be nearing a turning point, according to analysts at investment bank William Blair, with stablecoins becoming a major tailwind for the payments giant. During the company’s earnings call on Tuesday, Visa CEO Ryan McInerney confirmed plans to support four stablecoins across four unique blockchains that it can accept and convert to over 25 traditional fiat currencies. McInerney also noted that quarterly stablecoin-linked Visa card spend had quadrupled compared to a year ago, and it had facilitated over $140 billion in crypto and stablecoin flows since 2020. In a note to clients on Tuesday, William Blair analysts Andrew Jeffrey and Cristopher Kennedy argued that Visa’s integration of blockchain-based payments positions it for renewed growth as stablecoin adoption accelerates across global commerce. “Although we see certain niche use-cases, such as Coinbase and Shopify’s tie-up, we believe domestic B2C stablecoin payments are a solution looking for a problem. Bank cards are ubiquitous, cheap, secure, and fast,” the analysts said. “The real stablecoin opportunity is cross-border payments, in our opinion. Stablecoins can sharply lower the cost of cross-border B2B commerce, speed settlement, and reduce errors.” Cross-border opportunity is key The William Blair analysts noted that cross-border transactions make up under 15% of Visa’s total payment volume but argued the company is well-positioned to capture a growing share of stablecoin-based commerce as traditional correspondent banking fragments. While stablecoin adoption remains nascent, greater regulatory clarity, emerging standards, and improving infrastructure could move a significant share of the roughly $20 trillion cross-border B2B market onto emerging digital payment rails, they added. In September, Visa launched a pilot to test stablecoins for cross-border payments, providing businesses with a new way to transfer money abroad more quickly. “The passage of the GENIUS Act served as a catalyst for companies to refocus longtime efforts to leverage stablecoins and blockchain technologies,” Jeffrey and Kennedy said. “We sense most of the blockchain/stablecoin start-ups will require partnering with the existing ecosystem over the near term, while established fintechs will offer new services to existing customers and may benefit from increased internal efficiencies.” Visa’s laggard status is ‘unsustainable’ William Blair views Visa’s expanding stablecoin offerings, integrated within its broader multi-layer payments architecture, as an evolution of its role in facilitating global money movement rather than a departure from it. Jeffrey and Kennedy project that Visa’s stablecoin momentum will complement its core payments and tokenization businesses, contending that its year-to-date laggard status is “unsustainable,” and calling for a “slingshot recovery” in its stock. While bank stocks have generally performed well in 2025, Visa’s roughly 10% year-to-date rise — compared with the S&P 500’s 17% — leaves room for a rebound, the analysts said, reiterating their outperform rating on the stock and projecting 15%-plus 12-month upside. William Blair or an affiliate is a market maker in Visa securities and expects to receive or seek compensation for investment banking services from Visa or an affiliate within the next three months. Some William Blair employees, excluding research analysts, may also hold financial interests in Visa stock.
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Visa adding support for four stablecoins on four unique blockchains, as spend quadrupled last quarter In an effort to increase the ways payments can be settled and money moved across the Visa network, the debit and credit card giant plans to support multiple stablecoins. "We are adding support for four stablecoins, running on four unique blockchains, representing two currencies, that we can accept and convert to over 25 traditional fiat currencies," Visa's CEO Ryan McInerney said during a fourth-quarter earnings call on Tuesday. Additionally, McInerney highlighted that "in Q4 stablecoin-linked Visa card spend quadrupled versus a year ago." Like many other traditional financial institutions and payments companies, Visa sees increased potential for stablecoins, especially after the U.S. created regulatory certainty as it relates to USD-pegged tokens. While Visa has forged partnerships with crypto native firms in the past, in September, the company launched a pilot to test stablecoins for cross-border payments, providing businesses with a new way to transfer money abroad more quickly. McInerney also said Tuesday that Visa has, since 2020, "facilitated over $140 billion in crypto and stablecoin flows." He added that included users leveraging Visa credentials to purchase more than $100 billion in crypto and stablecoin assets. "We now have more than 130 stablecoin-linked card issuing programs in over 40 countries," McInerney said on the call. Visa's CEO also noted that his company has started enabling banks to mint and burn their own stablecoins.
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Standard Chartered says bitcoin may never fall below $100,000 again 'if this week goes well' Bitcoin may never fall below $100,000 again if the current positive macro and geopolitical developments continue through the week, according to Standard Chartered Bank’s global head of digital assets research, Geoffrey Kendrick. In a new note on Monday, Kendrick said improving trade talks between the U.S. and China have turned last week’s market fear into hope. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent indicated over the weekend that China's rare-earth export controls could be delayed for a year and that China plans to buy substantial quantities of U.S. soybeans for several years in exchange for Washington dropping its earlier 100% tariff threat. The details of the deal are expected to be finalized after the meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping in South Korea on Thursday. The easing tensions have lifted sentiment across risk markets, with the bitcoin-gold ratio climbing back to just above pre-Oct. 10 levels, when 100% tariff headlines triggered a selloff, especially in crypto. The bitcoin-gold ratio compares the market cap of bitcoin to that of gold and rises as bitcoin’s market cap grows. "I will watch for this ratio to break back above 30 to signal an end to such fear," Kendrick said. He added that another key sign of renewed strength would be fresh inflows into spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds. Kendrick noted that more than $2 billion exited U.S. gold ETFs between Wednesday and Friday last week, saying it would be a strong sign of improving sentiment if even half of that re-entered bitcoin ETFs Monday through Wednesday this week. Bitcoin ETF inflows have lagged behind gold ETFs in recent weeks, he said, and "some catch-up is due." The next "absolute positive confirmation" would be a fresh all-time high in bitcoin, "as if it comes this would signify the death knell for those hanging onto the halving cycle as a reason for Bitcoin prices to peak now," Kendrick said. "To clarify, I think the halving cycle is dead (ETF flows matter more), but it will take confirmation to convince everyone of this." Kendrick also noted that Wednesday’s Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting is expected to bring another 25-basis-point rate cut, which he views as positive for bitcoin — especially as attention shifts to the next Federal Reserve chair and potential implications for Fed independence. He pointed to a busy week for U.S. tech earnings, with five of the "Magnificent Seven" companies — Microsoft, Meta, and Google reporting on Wednesday, followed by Apple and Amazon on Thursday. Crypto companies' Strategy and Coinbase are also due to report this week. "If this week goes well, bitcoin may NEVER go below $100,000 again," Kendrick concluded. Bitcoin is currently trading at around $114925, up 1.22% in the past 24 hours, according to The Block’s bitcoin price page.
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Tether-backed Rumble will debut Bitcoin tipping for its 51 million monthly users in December Nasdaq-listed video streaming platform Rumble (ticker: RUM) will roll out crypto-based tipping for its 51 million active monthly users in mid-December, the company announced during the Plan ₿ Forum in Lugano, Switzerland. Rumble Wallet, a non-custodial wallet built into the platform, will soon support payments and tips in Bitcoin, Tether's USDT stablecoin, and Tether Gold (XAUT), according to Rumble's website. The feature is expected to launch in December of this year. Lawyer and content creator David Freiheit was the first to receive a Bitcoin tip, Rumble said on X. The company is also offering users a chance at winning 1 BTC through a promotional sweepstakes that runs until the end of October. Tether, the stablecoin giant that owns about 48% of Rumble following last year's $775 million investment in the company, developed the feature in partnership with Rumble. Its CEO, Paolo Ardoino, recently said the firm will leverage its connections with Rumble to promote adoption of its U.S.-compliant stablecoin, USAT. (Its flagship stablecoin, USDT, does not comply with the U.S. GENIUS Act regulations.) "The aim there is to prove how we can convert [Rumble's] 51 million [monthly] active users, mostly in the United States, to use stablecoins within the U.S., the most sophisticated country nation for financial rails," Ardoino said on a panel at Singapore's Token2049 conference. Rumble also holds 210.8 BTC worth about $23.6 million as part of its Bitcoin treasury strategy, according to BitcoinTreasuries.net data.
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Coinbase’s Base token could be worth as much as $34 billion, JPMorgan says JPMorgan analysts said Coinbase could unlock up to $34 billion in value through the eventual launch of a Base network token, calling it a major new monetization path alongside the company’s push into USDC yields and onchain trading. The report, published Friday by JPMorgan’s equity research team, raised Coinbase’s rating and lifted its December 2026 share price target to $404, citing “emerging monetization opportunities and abating risks” as the company leans further into its Layer 2 ecosystem and stablecoin economics. JPMorgan said a Base token could “equitize the success” of Coinbase’s Ethereum-based Layer 2 network, which launched in August 2023 and has since grown to more than $5 billion in total value locked and over 9 million daily transactions according to DefiLlama data. Coinbase Base TVL and Daily Transactions. Source: DefiLlama Based on current network activity and “lofty token economics,” the bank modeled a $12 billion to $34 billion market cap over time, with Coinbase likely retaining 40% of supply equal to roughly $4 billion to $12 billion in equity value. The projection follows Coinbase’s own recent comments suggesting it is “beginning to explore” a native token for Base. At the BaseCamp conference in Vermont last month, Base creator Jesse Pollak said a token could accelerate decentralization and “expand opportunities for builders.” CEO Brian Armstrong later confirmed on X that Base is exploring the idea but has “no definitive plans.” JPMorgan also pointed to Coinbase’s USDC yield program as a potential margin lever. The firm currently passes most of the interest it earns from Circle’s USDC reserves, about $400 million per year, back to customers as rewards. But analysts said Coinbase is evaluating a change that would limit those payouts to Coinbase One subscribers, similar to the tiered model used by Robinhood Gold. If regular users stopped earning yield, Coinbase could retain roughly $374 million annually that it now distributes to customers. Finally, analysts pointed to Coinbase’s integration of a DEX aggregator within the Base app as a way to hedge against the growth of decentralized exchanges, which now account for roughly 25% of total spot crypto trading volume. Coinbase shares are trading around $355 according to The Block price data, making JPMorgan’s $404 price target by next December appear attainable, especially given the stock’s record high near $430 in July, when the GENIUS Act stablecoin bill was passed.
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Coinbase, Ripple among crypto titans donating to Trump's new White House ballroom Crypto heavyweights — including Ripple, Coinbase, Tether, and Gemini founders Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss — are reportedly among a list of donors contributing to President Donald Trump's new White House ballroom. According to multiple news outlets, major tech companies such as Apple, Comcast, Google, and Microsoft are also on the list of contributors. It is currently unclear how much each corporation or individual donated. The White House announced the construction of the ballroom in July describing it as a 90,000 total square foot addition that could seat 650 people. The project began in September 2025 and reportedly costs $300 million. It has also sparked criticism after the East Wing of the White House was demolished, and questions over how the administration managed the process. In a statement earlier this week, the White House pushed back and called criticism the "latest instance of manufactured outrage, unhinged leftists and their Fake News allies are clutching their pearls over President Donald J. Trump’s visionary addition of a grand, privately funded ballroom to the White House." Trump has received donations from the crypto industry over the past year. In August, Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss donated 18 bitcoins to a pro-Trump political action committee. In January, Circle, Ripple, and Coinbase donated funds to Trump's inaugural committee. The crypto industry played a significant role in the 2024 elections when Trump was elected, with millions of dollars going toward key races. Fairshake, for example, raised over $200 million in the election cycle to put behind key races, according to Open Secrets, with funding coming from large crypto firms, including Ripple and Coinbase. As a result, Washington D.C. has what some call the most pro-crypto Congress yet and support from the top. On Thursday, Trump issued a controversial pardon for former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao, who previously served four months in prison related to his exchange's lax anti-money laundering controls.
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Legacy asset manager T. Rowe Price files for its first crypto ETF T. Rowe Price, a legacy asset management company with $1.77 trillion in assets under management, submitted an S-1 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission to launch its first crypto exchange-traded fund. The T. Rowe Price Active Crypto ETF is described as an actively-managed product that seeks to outperform the FTSE Crypto US Listed Index, which tracks the performance of the top 10 largest U.S.-listed crypto assets by market capitalization, over a period of a year or longer. The Wednesday filing shows that the fund will invest in "eligible" cryptocurrencies, which include bitcoin, ether, Solana, XRP, Cardano, Avalanche, Litecoin, Polkadot, Dogecoin, HBAR, Bitcoin Cash, Chainlink, Lumen and Shiba Inu. Having long focused on mutual funds, T. Rowe Price's venture into crypto ETFs came years after other issuers such as BlackRock and Fidelity had rushed to launch such products to great success. "Can't overstate significance of T. Rowe Price filing for an actively managed crypto ETF out of left field," NovaDius Wealth Management President Nate Geraci wrote in an X post. "A firm founded in 1937 is now building out the full infrastructure to handle crypto trading and manage a crypto ETF." Geraci pointed out that this shows how legacy asset managers are scrambling to figure out how to integrate crypto assets into their strategies. "Hoping crypto goes away is not a good biz strategy," Geraci said. The filing also came after the SEC recently approved new listing standards that effectively shorten the timeline for crypto ETFs to begin trading. Since then, dozens of new crypto-related products have gushed in. On Wednesday, Osprey Funds filed its S-1 statement to launch its spot Solana ETF with staking. However, the processing of these applications is currently halted amid the U.S. government shutdown, which has lasted 23 days since beginning on Oct. 1. The shutdown leaves the SEC with limited resources and the agency is unlikely to process crypto ETF filings until the government reopens, a source previously told The Block.
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India, US continue to lead global crypto adoption as stablecoin momentum builds: TRM Labs Global cryptocurrency adoption accelerated in 2025, with South Asia emerging as the fastest-growing region and the U.S. cementing its position as the world's largest crypto market by transaction volume, according to a new report from TRM Labs. In the 2025 Crypto Adoption and Stablecoin Usage Report released Tuesday, TRM Labs highlighted that South Asia, including India and Pakistan, recorded an 80% increase in crypto adoption between January and July 2025 compared to the same period in 2024, reaching roughly $300 billion in transaction volume. India maintained its top ranking for the third consecutive year when it comes to crypto adoption, followed by the U.S., Pakistan, the Philippines, and Brazil, according to the report. The U.S. market also saw robust growth, with crypto transaction volume rising roughly 50% in the first seven months of the year to exceed $1 trillion. This expansion was supported by regulatory developments, including the passage of the GENIUS Act and the White House's 180-Day Digital Assets Report, according to the TRM report. TRM noted that stablecoins played a central role in crypto adoption, accounting for roughly 30% of the entire crypto transaction volume. By August 2025, stablecoin transactions reached a record $4 trillion, marking an 83% increase year-over-year. Tether and Circle accounted for about 93% of the total stablecoin market capitalization. TRM's analysis also revealed that retail-led adoption accelerated, with retail transactions rising more than 125% between January and September 2025 compared to the same period in 2024. This underscores the growing role of individuals in driving crypto's evolution, especially in areas like payments, remittances, and value preservation during economic volatility, according to TRM. "In some jurisdictions, adoption has accelerated in response to regulatory clarity and institutional access; in others, it has expanded despite formal restrictions or outright bans," said the report. "These contrasting dynamics point to a consistent trajectory: crypto is moving further into the financial mainstream. A key trend underscoring this shift is the rise of stablecoins."
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Hackers siphon $3 million in XRP from US user's wallet: ZachXBT A U.S. crypto user has lost approximately $3.05 million in XRP after their Ellipal wallet was compromised, with the stolen funds being transferred through bridges and ultimately laundered to over-the-counter venues adjacent to Huione, according to blockchain investigator ZachXBT. In a detailed X thread posted on Oct. 19, the sleuth identified the theft address, mapped more than 120 Ripple to Tron swaps via bridges on Oct. 12. He also published onchain findings showing the funds consolidating on Tron before being dispersed to Huione-linked OTCs by Oct. 15. U.S. authorities have alleged that Huione and its related marketplaces facilitate massive laundering tied to scams and cybercrime in Southeast Asia. Recently, treasury officials proposed sweeping sanctions against entities affiliated with the illicit organization. Earlier in 2025, FinCEN also proposed a rule targeting Cambodia’s Huione as a primary money-laundering concern, citing billions in suspicious flows. Meanwhile, ZachXBT said the victim appeared inexperienced and that available details point to user error rather than a hardware zero-day. Products that offer both custodial and non-custodial options can be confusing to users. Here, the victim believed they were using a cold-storage product when in reality, it functioned as a hot wallet, according to the web3 detective. The episode spotlights enduring attack vectors that have persisted through 2025. A recent TRM Labs report found more than $2 billion stolen in the first half of the year, driven by front-end compromises, private-key thefts, and wallet breaches. Both categories often end in cross-chain swaps and OTC off-ramps similar to those flagged by ZachXBT. As is typical with such cases, ZachXBT said the recovery outlook appears low given reporting delays and jurisdictional hurdles. The security expert urged stricter controls from centralized exchanges and stablecoin issuers to curb OTC-based laundering. XRP — the native token of the XRP Ledger, a payments-focused network used for fast value transfer — traded around $2.46 today, The Block’s price page shows. The token has increased by 6% in the past 24 hours, as cryptocurrencies have stabilized after a recent multi-billion-dollar liquidation cascade.
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UK tax authority sends 65,000 letters to suspected crypto tax evaders, more than double last year's count: FT HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC), the UK tax authority, has sent out 65,000 letters to crypto investors suspected of owing taxes on their holdings, an increase of 134% compared to the year prior, according to a report from the Financial Times. Accounting firm UHY Hacker Young filed a Freedom of Information Act request to obtain the figures, and the FT reports that the "nudge" letters are typically sent out to individuals suspected of tax avoidance or evasion before a formal investigation is launched. Neela Chauhan, a partner at UHY Hacker Young, told the FT that HMRC receives data from crypto exchanges directly, and is likely using that data to find cases of tax avoidance. India's tax authority is likewise targeting more than 400 suspected tax evaders likely using data received directly from Binance, indicating that tax agencies around the world have better access to crypto trading data than in prior years. Starting in Jan. 2026, HMRC will also receive detailed user information from exchanges as part of the Crypto-Assets Reporting Framework (CARF) adopted by about 70 jurisdictions, including OECD members. Under the framework, crypto exchanges will report information on crypto traders and their activity to national tax authorities. The agency will collect data throughout 2026, with the first filing set for May 31, 2027. The UK's complicated crypto tax scheme treats most personal-use crypto as an investment, so selling, swapping, or spending it is a "disposal" that triggers Capital Gains Tax (CGT). “Earning” crypto through mining, staking rewards, some airdrops, and employment can be considered income, subject to a separate income tax. The CGT rates were raised last autumn, from a 10% basic-rate and 20% higher-rate for disposals before Oct. 30, 2024, and 18% basic/24% higher for disposals after that date. Meanwhile, the UK financial regulator recently lifted its four-year ban on crypto-based exchange-traded notes (ETNs), opening the door for asset managers to offer crypto ETNs to retail traders on the London Stock Exchange, with some asset managers already receiving approval to offer their products to retail investors. IG Group research projects that the country's crypto industry could grow by up to 20% in the wake of the change.
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OKX expands custody partnership with Standard Chartered into Europe, letting clients trade while keeping assets off exchange Crypto exchange OKX has expanded its custody partnership with Standard Chartered into the European Economic Area, introducing a model that lets institutional clients trade on OKX while keeping their assets in the bank's custody. The move extends a program first launched in the UAE earlier this year, creating a barrier between trading and custody that is standard practice in traditional finance, but not as common in crypto. Traders have been seeking to mitigate the risk of holding assets on crypto trading platforms in general following the FTX debacle in 2022, which left billions of dollars trapped in bankruptcy proceedings. Through the collaboration, institutional clients can hold assets with Standard Chartered — a Global Systemically Important Bank — while mirroring those balances on OKX for trading. This approach is designed to reduce counterparty risk and give clients the ability to access liquidity and trading opportunities without transferring custody of their assets to the exchange. Bank-grade protection for digital assets The model offers bank-grade security with direct exchange access, allowing clients to trade within a more protected framework, OKX Europe CEO Erald Ghoos said in a statement, adding that OKX's MiCA license provides the regulatory clarity institutions need to deploy capital confidently. "The expansion highlights not only Standard Chartered's confidence as the first and only G-SIB to work directly with a crypto exchange, but also the growing trust of regulators in this model," he said. Margaret Harwood-Jones, Global Head of Financing and Securities Services at Standard Chartered, said the combination of the bank's established custody infrastructure with OKX's regulatory framework will deliver secure and compliant solutions for institutional clients in Europe. OKX previously partnered with Komainu to provide a similar custody arrangement for institutional clients in 2024. However, it's not the only crypto platform looking at such off-exchange solutions, with Deribit, Binance, and Bitget also announcing plans in recent years.
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Bernstein projects USDC stablecoin supply to triple by end of 2027, capturing one-third of market Analysts at research and brokerage firm Bernstein project Circle's USDC will emerge as the main beneficiary of the new U.S. stablecoin regime, with supply estimated to nearly triple within two years. In a note to clients on Tuesday, the analysts led by Gautam Chhugani said USDC's stablecoin market share could climb to 33% by the end of 2027 — gaining ground against rivals from 29% today — having already risen 6% in the past 18 months, as investors and payment platforms pivot toward regulated, dollar-backed tokens. Tether's USDT remains the dominant stablecoin, accounting for over $180 billion (62%) of the sector's $290 billion market cap, according to The Block's data dashboard. USDC's share of stablecoin supply is worth around $76 billion, followed by USDe, Dai, and USDS with $12.6 billion, $5 billion, and $4.8 billion market caps, respectively. The analysts argue that Circle's compliance-first model and partnerships with major crypto exchanges have created a liquidity advantage that is difficult to replicate, supported by integrations across 28 blockchains and deep distribution through Coinbase, Binance, and OKX. They estimated that Circle facilitated $3 trillion in USDC transactions in the first half of 2025 alone, up 120% from 2024 at the current run rate. The passage of the GENIUS Act in July has further cemented Circle's position, the analysts said. The new law establishes a federal framework for "payment stablecoins," limiting foreign issuers and defining them as digital cash rather than securities or deposits. Bernstein said the high regulatory bar favors U.S.-based issuers like Circle, which already maintains full cash and U.S. Treasurys backing, daily reserve disclosures, and independent attestations. The analysts described USDC as "the largest regulated stablecoin globally" and said it is well placed to partner with banks and payment providers that need compliant infrastructure and are unlikely to issue their own tokens. Bernstein expects the total stablecoin market to expand to $670 billion by the end of 2027, driven by growth in crypto capital markets and new use cases such as cross-border payments and remittances. Circle's share of that market would translate to $220 billion in USDC supply, supported by new integrations across Fiserv, FIS, Corpay, and Shopify, the analysts said. Bernstein also highlighted that other entrants, including PayPal's PYUSD and Tether's new U.S. subsidiary, USAT, face "cold-start" liquidity challenges and fewer exchange integrations. Rate-cut risks and float-income resilience Circle's financial model remains heavily dependent on float income from reserves, and looming rate cuts could reduce those earnings, though the analysts only expect interest rates to fall to around 3% by the end of 2027 from 4.25% today. However, Bernstein said expanding USDC supply, non-interest income such as cross-chain transfer fees and payments network income, and operating leverage should offset the impact, noting those have already risen from 1% of total revenue in 2024 to 4% in the first half of 2025. Bernstein forecasts Circle's revenue to grow at a 47% compound rate through the end of 2027, driven by a 71% compound annual growth rate in USDC supply over the same period as the company scales its infrastructure and payment network. Over the longer term, the analysts see stablecoins reshaping financial services and digital payments, projecting total supply to reach $4 trillion by 2035. They expect USDC to maintain about 30% of that market, supported by Circle's ongoing buildout of products like the Circle Payments Network and its purpose-built blockchain, Arc. "Digital dollars will form the money-rail of the internet and Circle is best positioned given its headstart," the analysts wrote, reiterating their outperform rating and $230 price target for the stock — 67% to the upside from Monday's closing price of $137.47, according to The Block's Circle price page.
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