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Circle's S-1 filing for its IPO revealed a strategic partnership with BlackRock on USDC reserve management, which may reshape the stablecoin market landscape. (Previous report: Coinbase joins the S&P 500 index, marking a milestone for cryptocurrency going mainstream) (Background supplement: Sovereign wealth funds bought Bitcoin wildly in April, Coinbase executive: Three factors drive funds into BTC, and the correlation with US stocks is weakening) Stablecoin USDC issuer Circle submitted an S-1 registration statement to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on April 1, 2025. Its strategic cooperation with BlackRock, the world's largest asset management company, has also been exposed, which indicates that the competition in the US dollar stablecoin market is fierce. The cooperation between USDC and Wall Street's largest investment institution may reshape the global pattern of the stable market. Revealing the Cooperation Blueprint: Circle and BlackRock's Strategic Alliance According to SEC documents, USDC issuer Circle and BlackRock, the world's largest asset management company, have reached a four-year strategic agreement. With its position as the world's largest asset management company, BlackRock has expanded the credibility and advantages of USDC in stablecoins. The core content of the agreement specifies that BlackRock will be responsible for managing the vast majority of USDC's reserve assets in the future, with a proportion of at least 90% (this calculation does not include bank deposits). These reserve assets will be mainly allocated to the "Circle Reserve Fund", which is specially managed by BlackRock for Circle. This is a government money market fund registered in accordance with Section 2a-7 of the (1940 Investment Company Act). More noteworthy is that this is a reciprocal agreement for IPO cooperation between the two parties, including a key clause: during the cooperation period, BlackRock promises not to issue US dollar payment stablecoins that compete with USDC, and in the payment application scenarios of US dollar stablecoins, it will prioritize supporting Circle's products. USDC has a strong advantage: dual improvement in transparency and stability BlackRock, a reputable and strictly regulated financial institution, has deeply participated in USDC's reserve management, which undoubtedly greatly improves USDC's stability and institutional trust. The cooperation ensures that USDC's reserves are professionally and prudently allocated by the world's top asset management experts, mainly invested in highly liquid government money market funds and cash assets, thereby effectively ensuring its 1:1 value anchor with the US dollar. In addition, USDC's reserves will be handled by BlackRock and audited monthly by the Big Four accounting firms, which greatly improves operational transparency and compliance, which is crucial for attracting institutional investors and consolidating public confidence. Furthermore, BlackRock's commitment not to issue competitive stablecoins has built a solid "moat" for Circle in the rapidly changing and fiercely competitive stablecoin market, especially helping it expand institutional-level payment and settlement business. For Circle, which is actively preparing for a potential listing (market valuation of approximately US$5 billion), the alliance with BlackRock is a major advantage. This not only strengthens Circle's market reputation, but also fully demonstrates the stability of USDC reserves to the capital market, which will have a significant positive effect on its initial public offering (IPO) process. This cooperation is also a model of deep integration between traditional financial giants and blockchain native enterprises, which will help promote USDC to be accepted and applied in a wider mainstream financial system. Stablecoin Regulatory Landscape: USDC Becomes Industry Benchmark The cooperation between Circle and BlackRock is expected to have a profound impact on the existing competitive landscape of the stablecoin market. Compared with some competitors (such as USDT issued by Tether), USDC, under the operation of BlackRock and under strong compliance, may attract more corporate-level adoption and use. Recently, the United States also passed the "GENIUS" bill on stablecoins, which shows that private enterprises and financial holding institutions are accelerating the introduction of US dollar stablecoins and other cognitions, and the current USDC is expected to become the first-tier corporate adoption object. The cooperation model between Circle and BlackRock also sets a reference case for commercial cooperation under the global stablecoin regulatory framework, guiding regulatory agencies and market participants to pay more attention to the management mechanism, transparency standards and compliance requirements of stablecoin reserves. Related reports Notable Morpho Protocol: Lending in cooperation with Coinbase, pledged assets reach 270 million US dollars If there is no compliance halo, what else is left for Coinbase? Coinbase, Circle... several giants plan to apply for "US bank license", is the era of on-chain banking coming? "Circle and BlackRock's "IPO cooperation" details exposed: Blackrock takes over 90% of USDC reserve assets and prohibits the issuance of stablecoins" This article was first published on BlockTempo, the most influential blockchain news media.

On-chain AI is expanding the crypto space to potentially billions of AI-driven participants. This article is derived from a piece written by Jonathan King and organized, compiled, and authored by Deep Tide TechFlow. (Background: Jensen Huang's Computex speech) In ten years, the 'Generative AI' revolution will penetrate the entire industry, making token production humanity's primary job.) (Background supplement: AI programming Cursor founder: 'Taste' will be valuable in the post-programming era.) Summary The fusion of cryptography and artificial intelligence is giving rise to a thriving on-chain AI economy, an ecosystem of blockchain applications and services driven by autonomous AI agents. In the past 18 months, decentralized AI projects have garnered significant funding and rapid growth, but we believe that on-chain AI is quickly rising, marking the next wave of innovation in this cross-disciplinary field. The importance of on-chain AI lies in its ability to expand the crypto landscape to billions of potential AI-driven participants. Each autonomous AI agent acts as a new 'user' of the blockchain, capable of executing complex decisions around the clock, significantly driving on-chain activity and growth. By investing in on-chain AI, Coinbase Ventures is supporting the builders of this future agent-based economy, paving the way for a new 'Agentic Web.' Companies in the Coinbase Ventures portfolio mentioned in the following article will be marked with an asterisk (*). In October 2024, Coinbase Ventures released a theoretical framework on the fusion of crypto and AI, highlighting the complementary advantages of blockchain and AI—blockchain offers decentralization, censorship resistance, verifiability, and user ownership, while AI brings powerful data processing, reasoning, and automation capabilities. We believe that this synergy can fundamentally change the way humans interact with machines in the digital economy, ultimately giving rise to an 'Agentic Web' where AI agents operate on cryptographic infrastructure, driving significant economic activity and growth. A key distinction is between decentralized AI and on-chain AI. Decentralized AI ('Crypto → AI') refers to the building of general AI infrastructures that inherit the openness and peer-to-peer nature of blockchain networks. This includes efforts to democratize the use of computing resources, data, models, and training, avoiding monopolization of AI development by a few large companies. These decentralized AI resources also support on-chain AI ('AI → Crypto')—on-chain AI is an ecosystem of applications and services that embed AI into new and existing blockchain use cases (e.g., trading agents, on-chain portfolio managers, DeFi abstractions, etc.). Although decentralized AI projects have seen significant funding and growth over the past 18 months, we believe that on-chain AI is rapidly emerging, marking the next wave of innovation in this cross-disciplinary field. On-chain AI overview Over the past year, we have witnessed an AI agent (such as Truth Terminal) equipped with a self-custodial wallet, establishing an internet-native religion, and launching a meme coin with a market capitalization exceeding $950 million, becoming the first AI agent 'millionaire.' According to data from cookie.fun, there are currently about 1,600 AI agents with a total market capitalization exceeding $11 billion. Overall, we see AI agents (and related 'agent tokens') rapidly occupying social channels, some of which have practical utility, transitioning on-chain AI from concept to a thriving reality. In particular, three interrelated concepts are increasingly gaining attention: on-chain AI agents, on-chain AI applications, and agentic commerce. On-chain AI agents are autonomous programs (driven by AI models) capable of executing on-chain operations. An AI agent can be seen as a smart software robot with a crypto wallet—it can hold tokens, interact with smart contracts, trade assets, and even vote in DAOs, all based on its programming and objectives. Unlike the isolated AI chatbots commonly seen on social platforms today, these agents can learn, reason, and act within the on-chain economy. On-chain AI applications are blockchain applications that integrate AI into core functionalities. For example, AI can be embedded into DeFi protocols to optimize yields, into games to control NPC behavior, or into decentralized social networks or consumer applications to achieve highly personalized user content. While we will explore these examples later, the key point is that these applications aim to seamlessly blur the boundaries between blockchain and AI-driven logic. Agentic commerce is an emerging business model where AI agents transact through blockchain (including transactions with humans). This represents a formal shift from manual, search-based transactions to more automated, intent-driven, and personalized trading experiences. Agents will act as shoppers, negotiators, and service providers, completing transactions at software speed while aligning with human intent. Blockchain provides these agents with identity, wallets, stablecoins as payment currencies, and a framework of programmable smart contracts. The importance of on-chain AI lies in its ability to expand the crypto field to billions of potential AI-driven participants. Each autonomous AI agent acts as a new 'user' of the blockchain, capable of executing complex decisions around the clock, laying the groundwork for significant on-chain activity and growth. Next, let’s dive deeper into the thriving on-chain AI ecosystem, understanding its building blocks (new types of infrastructure services and on-chain agent types), emerging on-chain AI applications, and how business itself might be reshaped. Agents On-chain AI agents are at the core of the 'Agentic Web.' These are AI-driven entities capable of perceiving, deciding, and acting within the on-chain economy. To understand their rise, we need to break down the infrastructure required to realize on-chain agents and explore the types of agents currently emerging. Agent infrastructure and services Building a powerful on-chain AI agent is highly complex—it requires a new suite of services and tools based on decentralized AI (DeAI) infrastructure resources (such as computing, data, models, intelligence, etc.) to support an open ecosystem of autonomous agents. These services abstract complexity and provide reusable components, making it easier to create, deploy, discover, and operate autonomous on-chain agents. Below are key emerging categories in agent infrastructure and their roles in the on-chain AI technology stack. Trusted Execution Environments (TEEs) To achieve truly autonomous and secure execution, on-chain AI agents require a tamper-proof, verifiable execution environment independent of any centralized party. Trusted Execution Environments (e.g., Intel SGX or decentralized alternatives like Eternis*, Fleek*, or Phala Network) provide a hardware-secured 'sandbox' where the agent's code...

MEV is an inevitable product of an efficient market; as long as there is a profit margin, there will inevitably be someone to seize it. The crux of the issue lies not in eliminating MEV, but in deciding who benefits under what conditions. This article is based on a piece written by Sumanth Neppalli for Decentralised.co, compiled, translated, and authored by Yangz for Techub News. (Background: In-depth article: The evolution of MEV landscape on Solana and its pros and cons) (Background information: How GMGN trades – a small classroom: Gas, priority fees, slippage, MEV) In 2010, Google introduced a second-price auction system for advertisements, where the highest bidder wins the ad space but only pays the second-highest bid. This seems like an ideal model for economists, helping to avoid excessive bidding by advertisers. However, behind the scenes, Google secretly extracted millions of dollars in hidden profits by manipulating the auction mechanism. For example, when the highest bid was $20 and the second-highest was $16, the winner only had to pay $16. However, Google actually paid the website publishers the third-highest price (let’s say $10), pocketing the $6 difference. This flow of funds was funneled into a secret account known as the "Bernanke Pool", used to achieve corporate goals such as Wall Street expectations. This operation was not exposed until the antitrust lawsuit in 2016. Although Google switched to a first-price auction system in 2019 (settling with publishers based on the highest bid), this lesson remains profound: when the auctioneer controls the underlying rules, even the most perfect mechanism can be distorted. Interestingly, the cryptocurrency world is replaying this scene. Blockchains are facing their own "Bernanke moment" – Maximum Extractable Value (MEV, the profits obtained through reordering, adding, or removing transactions in blocks) has become the most critical yet least understood phenomenon in the cryptocurrency realm. Like Google's hidden auction manipulation, this value extraction, while outside the view of ordinary users, affects all blockchain participants, creating a kind of "invisible tax". Will MEV follow in Google's footsteps towards dark operations and centralization, or can it evolve into a transparent decentralized system that returns profits to users? Can we design a mechanism that allows value extraction to nurture the ecosystem, rather than concentrating wealth in the hands of a few? Let’s delve deeper. The Physics of Delay Blockchains are decentralized networks composed of thousands of validation nodes (validators or miners) around the world. These nodes serve a dual role: they act as communication hubs receiving and broadcasting transactions and as computational terminals executing and validating transactions. Due to the global distribution of nodes, there will inevitably be communication delays between validators – a physical bottleneck determined by the speed of light. To ensure that all nodes follow the same transaction order, each blockchain sets a "block time": through a consensus mechanism (like Proof of Stake), a validator is chosen to propose a new block, and the remaining validators accept the block after confirming the transactions are compliant. After each block is produced, the proposal rights rotate among the validators to maintain network security. For example, Bitcoin produces a block every 10 minutes, Ethereum speeds up to 12 seconds, Solana attempts to break the limit of 400 milliseconds, while Layer 2 solutions like Arbitrum challenge the ultra-high frequency range of 10-250 milliseconds. Regardless of duration, each block time window creates opportunities for validators to reorder transactions for profit, rather than prioritizing fair treatment for users. Ideally, the "first come, first served" principle should be followed, but due to the global distribution of nodes, this principle is difficult to achieve. When a user initiates a transaction, all nodes almost certainly cannot synchronize to receive that transaction at the same time due to network delays. This means that even if the rules for block construction are fully adhered to, unfair transaction ordering (leading to users paying extra fees and MEV arbitrageurs capturing the price difference) may still be included in the block. MEV (Maximum Extractable Value) refers to the profits obtained by block producers (miners in Proof of Work or validators in Proof of Stake) and other participants (by bribing block producers to prioritize user transactions) through strategically adjusting the order of transactions within a block. MEV: The Hidden Profiteering Business Suppose Joel is using a DEX like Uniswap to buy ETH at a price of $1800. He sets his slippage tolerance at 10%, meaning he can accept the transaction completing at a price of up to $1980. Joel's transaction first enters the memory pool (mempool) – a public waiting room for pending transactions waiting to be packed into a block. At this point, a trading bot detects his transaction and immediately replicates the order, "cutting in line" by paying a higher Gas fee (a higher Gas fee is essentially a bribe to the validators to ensure this transaction gets executed before Joel's). After the bot's buy order pushes the price of ETH on the DEX up to $1900, Joel's transaction ultimately completes at this inflated price. The bot then sells the ETH back to the liquidity pool at this price, profiting from the difference (after deducting Gas fees). In the end, although Joel bought ETH, he paid an extra $100, which went into the bot's pocket. Similar operations occur thousands of times a day in the cryptocurrency market. An extreme example is when a trader forgot to set a slippage tolerance, and a bot captured a profit of $200,000 in a single transaction. The "culprit" in this incident is jaredfromsubway.eth, who consistently pays the highest Gas fees on Ethereum, always managing to execute operations before the trades it wants to target. According to statistics, Jared has profited over $10 million from such MEV attacks. MEV primarily manifests in three forms: Arbitrage trading: Identifying price differences between different exchanges and buying low and selling high within the same block. For example, when ETH is quoted at $2500 on Uniswap and $2510 on Sushiswap, the bot can complete buy and sell operations within the same block, earning a risk-free profit of $10 per ETH. It is worth noting that such operations actually benefit the market, as they promote price convergence across platforms. Sandwich attacks: The bot observes that Alice has a large buy order in the memory pool, buys in advance to push the price up, and then sells immediately after Alice completes her transaction at the higher price. The bot profits from the price difference, while Alice bears the slippage loss. The earlier example of Joel paying an extra $100 is a typical sandwich attack, and this additional expenditure ultimately translates into profits in the MEV value chain. Such operations are obviously detrimental to users, causing them to incur unnecessary additional costs. Liquidation arbitrage: In lending protocols, when a position reaches liquidation conditions, MEV extractors compete to be the first liquidator to obtain rewards. For example, Saurabh uses $15,000 worth of ETH as collateral to borrow 10,000 USDC. When the price of ETH drops, leading the collateral value to fall to $11,000, liquidation is triggered. At this point, the bot will immediately repay the $5,000 USDC loan and receive ETH worth $5,500 (including a 10% liquidation reward), easily profiting $500. The impact of such operations is twofold: from the perspective of maintaining the health of DeFi systems, the liquidation mechanism is necessary...

ARK Invest founder Cathie Wood analyzes market trends in an exclusive interview with Bloomberg. She believes that despite the ongoing shadows of trade friction and fiscal deficits, technology innovation led by AI will reduce costs and enhance efficiency at an unprecedented pace, triggering revolutionary changes in fields such as healthcare. (Background: Cathie Wood: Short-term bearish on US stocks 'but expects the Fed and Trump will soon save the market', currently buying into cryptocurrencies and Tesla) (Supplementary background: Cathie Wood's view on crypto: Full report of ARK Big Ideas) Known as the 'Queen of Stocks', Cathie Wood shared her latest insights on the current global trade situation, US tax reduction policies, technological innovation trends, and potential investment opportunities during her interview with Bloomberg's online program. In the interview, Wood specifically named several industries and companies worth paying attention to. Here are the key points from the interview: 1. Trade negotiations show glimmers of hope, tax cuts expected to stimulate the economy Wood first discussed her views on the current trade situation, noting that behind-the-scenes negotiations seem to be moving towards reducing non-tariff trade barriers and tariffs. If achieved, this would be akin to 'tax cuts', sending a positive signal to the market. She cited the opening of the US beef, ethanol, and other products to the UK market as an example of a win-win situation. Regarding the new round of tax reduction legislation being brewed in Washington, Wood expressed her support. As a believer in the 'Laffer curve', she cited the example of the corporate tax being reduced from 35% to 21% during Trump's previous term, which saw corporate tax revenue rise from $200 billion to $500 billion, proving that lowering tax rates can lead to increased tax revenue due to corporate repatriation and enhanced competitiveness. She believes that, compared to tax rates, government spending approaching 24% of GDP is the core issue that should be continuously constrained. 2. AI triggers drastic cost reductions Discussing technological innovation, Wood is particularly optimistic about the development of artificial intelligence (AI). She emphasized: 'The training costs for AI are declining at a rate of 75% per year, while the inference costs for AI are decreasing by as much as 85% to 95% annually.' This sharp drop in costs will create vast opportunities for innovative companies around the world. Wood believes that the US once faced the risk of losing its edge in digital assets, but under the new policy environment, the tech industry is expected to flourish. She specifically cautioned that the market should not only focus on the 'Magnificent Six' (the six major tech companies), which have seen their market capitalizations quintuple from 2019 to 2024, while other tech-enabled innovative companies have only grown by 30% in the same period. She anticipates that the US market will expand and reward those previously undervalued firms. 3. Focusing on 'atypical' tech stocks When asked about specific areas she is optimistic about, Wood named several 'atypical' tech potential stocks: Multi-omics field: Biotech companies benefiting from AI, such as CRISPR Therapeutics, are using gene editing technology to cure diseases like sickle cell anemia and beta-thalassemia. Twist Bioscience plays a crucial role in early cancer screening blood testing technology. Digital assets: Coinbase, as a representative company, has begun to show strong momentum. Enterprise-level AI applications: Palantir has not only successfully penetrated the US Department of Defense but has also expanded its efficient solutions to other government departments and has been included in the S&P 500 index. Smart home platforms: Roku, as the leader in smart TV operating systems in the US, is actively expanding into global markets. Wood pointed out that while the ARK investment portfolio has faced significant valuation pressure over the past four years, its relative premium compared to the S&P 500, when measured by enterprise value to adjusted EBITDA, has dropped from 275% to about 10%. She firmly believes that those innovative companies outside the 'Magnificent Six' in the US market, which are empowered by technology, are severely undervalued. 4. AI enhances government efficiency and defense transformation Regarding the relationship between government spending and innovation, Wood believes that innovation itself is part of the plan to enhance government efficiency. She used Palantir as an example, where the company assists the US Department of Defense and other government agencies in replacing outdated systems and significantly improving efficiency. Additionally, she has observed that the FDA is becoming more transparent and simplified in its regulations, such as the first approval of software code for heart disease diagnosis and gradually reducing animal testing that is not applicable for monoclonal antibody development. In the defense sector, Wood observed from the Ukraine war that the nature of warfare is becoming more electronic, with expensive equipment from traditional large defense companies being challenged by more cost-effective commercial technologies like drones. She believes this means that defense spending needs to be more precisely directed towards emerging technologies. 5. AI reshapes healthcare Wood has extremely high expectations for the application of AI in healthcare, believing it to be the most underestimated application area of AI. She noted: 'The human body has 37 trillion cells, and AI enables us to effectively analyze this vast data.' She anticipates that AI will significantly reduce drug development costs and shorten the time for bringing new drugs from discovery to market from 13 years to 8 years. Through molecular diagnostic technology, diseases will be detected earlier, and the healthcare system will shift from the current 'sick care' model, which accounts for 85% of US healthcare spending, to therapies that can truly 'cure' diseases. She once again cited CRISPR Therapeutics as an example, as its gene editing technology has not only made breakthroughs in treating sickle cell anemia but is also expected to develop a 'one-time cure' for high cholesterol, replacing the need for long-term use of statin drugs that have side effects. Wood also warned traditional pharmaceutical companies that they must actively embrace emerging tools like AI, or they risk being surpassed by startups, as traditional drug development methods are inefficient and full of guesswork. Related Reports: 30-year US Treasury yield breaks 5%! The US loses all AAA ratings, should investors be worried? How to construct an appropriate altcoin investment portfolio if the altcoin season approaches? 2025 Latest) Cryptocurrency investors' tax regulations: What are the differences between domestic and foreign income, and can losses from virtual currencies be recognized? 'Queen of Stocks Cathie Wood: In 2025, focus on 'atypical tech stocks'! AI leads a healthcare revolution, naming Palantir and Roku' This article was first published on BlockTempo (the most influential blockchain news media).

Solana infrastructure Anza proposes the Alpenglow consensus protocol, aimed at innovating the old PoH consensus of Solana, significantly enhancing transaction speed and responsiveness, and challenging the performance levels of Web2's Visa. (Background: Solana is about to undergo two major upgrades, SIMD-0123 and 0228, will validator rewards be reduced by 95%?) (Background Information: The underestimated Solana DeFi: How to break the 'ecological internal friction' between high-yield staking and lending protocols?) Since its launch in 2020, the high-performance public chain Solana has been known for its excellent transaction speeds and low costs, occupying an important position in today's blockchain space. Even though competitors like Ethereum are considered less threatening than before, this has not stopped Solana from continuing to pursue extreme performance. Recently, Anza, a company that split from the original Solana Labs team and turned its focus to infrastructure development, announced a proposal that could significantly impact the Solana network—a brand new consensus protocol Alpenglow will replace PoH (Proof of History). Anza emphasized that this will be 'the biggest change' in Solana's core protocol since its inception. Alpenglow: Solana's next-generation consensus Anza officially announced the Alpenglow consensus protocol, with the core goal of significantly improving transaction processing speed and reducing system confirmation delays on the Solana network, making it comparable to existing Web2 application infrastructure. In a presentation during a speech, Anza pointed out that the current final confirmation time for the PoH blocks (i.e., the interval at which it is confirmed that the latest block's data will not change) is about 12.8 seconds for Solana. With the introduction of optimistic consensus, this can be reduced to around 0.5 to 0.6 seconds, but the newly launched Alpenglow only requires 0.15 seconds to complete. It is worth noting that Ethereum takes about 15 minutes, which theoretically allows the upgraded Solana transactions to compete with large centralized payment systems like VISA. Votor and Rotor: Analyzing Alpenglow's dual-core engine To explain what Alpenglow is, this consensus protocol is primarily composed of two key components: Votor and Rotor. First, Votor is responsible for handling voting transactions and block finalization logic, designed to replace the currently used TowerBFT consensus mechanism in Solana. According to Anza researchers, Votor aims to complete block finalization in just one or two rounds of voting under ideal conditions with majority staking participation, significantly shortening confirmation time. Secondly, Rotor acts as a new data propagation protocol to replace Solana's original Proof-of-History (PoH) timestamp system. Rotor's design is built upon the existing Turbine propagation protocol, utilizing erasure codes technology for data distribution and adopting a single-layer relay node architecture. This design aims to reduce the number of node hops required for data propagation, thereby enhancing the overall resilience of the network and optimizing bandwidth usage efficiency. Anza researchers further pointed out that by combining the operations of Votor and Rotor, the Alpenglow protocol is expected to compress the actual block finalization time to about 150 milliseconds, achieving extremely low finalization delays. Moreover, they emphasized that Alpenglow can still operate efficiently under harsh network conditions, tolerating up to 20% of malicious node staking and an additional 20% of unresponsive node staking, demonstrating robust '20+20 resilience.' The potential of Alpenglow: Challenging Web2 speed and future applications Once the Alpenglow protocol is successfully deployed and operates stably, the Solana network will have stronger capabilities in processing speed and system responsiveness, allowing it to compete with existing Web2 application infrastructure. This not only helps consolidate Solana's leading position as a high-speed blockchain, but also has the potential to give rise to a range of innovative blockchain application scenarios that demand high real-time performance. However, despite Alpenglow's bright prospects for enhancing network performance, Anza also admits that the protocol still cannot directly address the past sporadic service interruptions on the Solana network. Anza explains that the root cause of such problems primarily lies in Solana's current high dependence on a single validator client named Agave in the production environment. This single client architecture inevitably increases the risk of single points of failure, as any security vulnerability or error at the client level could impact the stability of the entire network. To address this critical issue, independent development teams are actively developing a new validator client named Firedancer, which is expected to launch on the Solana mainnet later this year. The introduction of Firedancer will bring much-anticipated client diversity to the Solana ecosystem, effectively dispersing potential risks and fundamentally enhancing the overall robustness of the network, forming an important complement to the performance enhancements brought by the Alpenglow protocol. Alpenglow proposal and update progress It is understood that the prototype of Alpenglow is currently in the internal testing phase and plans to integrate into the Solana testnet for broader validation in the coming months. Whether it can ultimately be deployed on the mainnet will depend on subsequent Solana Improvement Document (SIMD) proposal reviews and the consensus and approval of its community. Notably, Solana founder Anatoly Yakovenko has publicly expressed support for Anza's proposal, which also reflects a positive expectation from the core development community regarding the technical potential of Alpenglow. However, ensuring the stability of Alpenglow in actual operation and effectively combining efforts for client diversity, such as Firedancer, to comprehensively address network resilience issues will be a key challenge that Solana must overcome on its journey toward a super-fast and highly reliable blockchain network. Related reports are here! Solana's second-generation phone 'Seeker' is expected to ship this summer, will there be an airdrop? Overview of specifications and features Solana's new advertisement 'American Innovation, Not Gender Innovation' has sparked controversy and was quickly removed! Is ETH saved? The Ethereum Foundation is considering shifting its focus 'from research to investment,' drawing lessons from Solana's successful model.

Unveiling how this SVM public chain stirs waves in the Web3 arena. This article is based on a piece by Luke from Mars Finance, organized, translated, and written by Foresight News. (Background: Binance Alpha will launch $SOON, redeemable through points) (Background information: The chain game (MapleStory N) officially launched, $NXPC listed on seven major exchanges, token economy, airdrop redemption methods, token price... all organized) Introduction: The SOON airdrop feast, a victory of community co-construction. On May 19, 2025, the Solana Optimistic Network (SOON) announced its launch on Binance Alpha and will initiate token trading and airdrop activities on May 23, opening a new chapter for its high-performance SVM public chain's global expansion. The SOON airdrop plan is at the core of its community strategy, aimed at rewarding early supporters and driving ecosystem growth. According to official disclosures, the total supply of $SOON tokens is 1 billion, with 51% allocated to the community and over 12% specifically for airdrops, distributed through the Binance Alpha points system and ecological tasks. This ratio ensures broad community participation, covering a diverse group from technical contributors to socially active users. Participants in the airdrop include: Red Pill Cabal participants, holders of the Seasoned Sooner identity on Discord, Dedicated SOON Geeks, Contributor Role recipients, Big Bang Season 1/2 participants, interSOON early supporters, SOON Eco Pioneers, Early Pioneer NFT holders, SOON Kaito Leaderboard rankers, SOON Missionaries, Builder Badge NFT holders, svmBNB early supporters, and other contributor identity holders. These groups inject vitality into the SOON ecosystem through technical development, community activities, NFT minting, and more. SOON's 'special activities'—from live trading to NFT sales, and soon to token issuance—are reshaping the user journey in Web3. This article will delve into why SOON chooses to engage in 'special activities', its token airdrop, NFT strategies, unique gameplay of live trading, and the current product architecture, unveiling how this SVM public chain creates waves in the Web3 arena. Why does a public chain engage in 'special activities'? Readers may wonder: Why does a public chain not focus solely on technology but instead take a keen interest in NFTs and live trading? The answer lies in SOON's development history and the team's strategic choices. Reflecting on the early days of SOON's establishment, there was intense internal debate over the direction of development: should they prioritize building unbreakable technology or fully embrace the community? CTO Andrew advocated for a technology-first approach, pushing for a fully decoupled SVM to ensure that SOON's Rollup has a fault proof mechanism, eliminating cross-chain bridge hacking incidents—an achievement not yet realized by other SVM projects. However, CEO Joanna Zeng firmly believed that SOON must be community-driven, abandoning traditional VC models and quickly delivering products of value to the community, even at the cost of some initial technical perfection. This conflict nearly caused the team to disband but unexpectedly led to a core breakthrough for SOON. After three months of hard work, SOON launched a decoupled SVM, achieving a unique combination of high performance and high security, while restructuring the Layer2 derivation mechanism, supporting horizontal scaling suites, and integrating the Firedancer client, pushing TPS (transactions per second) potential to 650,000. Meanwhile, SOON did not stop at technology but swiftly launched InterSOON, RedPill, COMMing SOON NFT, and BigBang events, building a solid community ecosystem. Subsequently, SOON introduced svmBNB, the soonBase mainnet, and five cooperative SVM chains, while the infrastructure team developed simpfor.fun, ushering in the LiveTrade era of live trading. SOON's 'special activities' are not a gimmick but a balanced approach between technology and community. Joanna admitted in a public letter that the success of Uniswap and Arbitrum's TGE inspired SOON: the combination of product and community is the future of Web3. Solana also emerged from the lows due to its product and community, while projects like Movement, which merely 'shout community', lack products and faced issues post-token issuance. SOON's choice is clear and firm: to build a blockchain ecosystem that users can truly use and love, based on a high-performance SVM chain, leveraging NFTs and live trading as key tools. This strategy of 'hardcore technology + community-driven activities' allows SOON to stand out in the Web3 arena. NFT Sales: A clever game between community and capital. SOON's COMMing SOON NFT is the 'stroke of genius' in its community strategy. At the beginning of 2024, the NFT minting event attracted $200 million in subscriptions within 16 hours, over-subscribing by 8 times, becoming an industry phenomenon. SOON designed three tiers of NFTs to meet different user needs: $900 NFT: Airdrop of 3,200 $SOON, linear unlock over 3 months; $2,850 NFT: Airdrop of 12,800 $SOON, locked for 12 months then linear unlock; $22,500 NFT: Airdrop of 250,000 $SOON, locked for 12 months then 36 months linear unlock. This tiered mechanism allocates 51% of tokens to the community, attracting both short-term players and incentivizing long-term builders. NFT sales not only raised funds for SOON but also avoided concentrated sell pressure through the locking mechanism, demonstrating a clever balance between community and capital. The success of the NFTs stems from SOON's community culture. Unlike projects like Movement that merely 'shout community' but lack products, SOON's NFT activities are built on a solid foundation of technology and products. Activities like Red Pill and the BigBang plan continuously stimulate community engagement, and NFT holders are not only early investors in the tokens but also co-builders of the SOON ecosystem. On platform X, NFT holders actively share unlocking progress, showing strong community cohesion. Live Trading: The disruptive gameplay of LiveTrade. SOON's latest 'special activity' is the introduction of the LiveTrade mode through simpfor.fun and its V2 version, merging on-chain copy trading with live streaming scenarios, serving as a super channel for Web3 users. simpfor.fun allows users to copy the trading strategies of top addresses with one click, no...

In this round, the giant whales are engaged in a fierce battle between bulls and bears, observing the market's shift between bullish and bearish trends from the address positions! (Background: The market is in a stalemate) Several giants have opened positions with high leverage on Hyperliquid: Bullish on BTC, bearish on ETH? (Context: Putin spoke with Trump for 2 hours: ready to discuss a ceasefire agreement with Ukraine, or just a show? Bitcoin rebounded to $106,000) On the 19th, BTC briefly surged to $107,000 before pulling back, ETH once fell below $2,400, and major coins generally entered a retracement mode. Regarding the future market direction, giant whales have started to 'speak through their positions.' Some have spent tens of millions of dollars to start their shorting journey, while others have seen their bullish positions yield nearly $30 million in profits. Odaily Planet Daily will summarize the recent positions of giant whales in this article for readers' reference. Whale Jams Wynn: Bullish profits once approached $30 million, currently retracing to around $18 million. On May 18, according to on-chain analyst @EmberCN, whale @JamesWynnReal used 40x leverage to go long on 3,788.7 BTC on Hyperliquid, with a position value of $391 million, opening at $103,083, and liquidation price at $96,474. As BTC briefly broke through $105,000, James Wynn's bullish position profit exceeded $27.7 million, with BTC 40x long profit at $8.38 million, and kPEPE 40x long profit at $20.26 million. Latest data shows that whale @JamesWynnReal's BTC long profit has retraced to $1.12 million; kPEPE long profit has retraced to around $17 million; additionally, his XRP long position has a floating loss of around $2.42 million. On-chain data: https://hypurrscan.io/address/0x5078c2fbea2b2ad61bc840bc023e35fce56bedb6. Bullish representative ETH short faction: 25x short, position value once exceeded $100 million. Yesterday, an address that had been silent for four years, 0xcddf, shorted 41,851 ETH with 25x leverage, position value of $103 million, opening price of $2,514, liquidation price of $2,525; subsequently, due to ETH's rise, it ultimately incurred a loss of $2.46 million upon closing; after closing the ETH short, it turned around to go long on BTC with the remaining funds: going long 166 BTC at $106,580 with 40x leverage, position value of $17.6 million, ultimately losing $175,000 in just 45 minutes. But later, it again shorted ETH with 25x leverage, rolling the profits again, currently increasing the position to 4,136 ETH. Latest data shows that this address's 25x leverage short position has decreased to about $9.8 million, currently with a floating profit of about $180,000. On-chain data: https://hypurrscan.io/address/0xcddf90930aa49231d55538f8f2dac97a562e5f6b. Caught in the middle representing the ETH short faction: 20x short, position once reached $70 million. The address 0x2258 previously shorted 28,248 ETH with 20x leverage, position value of $70 million, opening price of $2,561, liquidation price of $2,694. Seven hours ago, it closed all short positions, and the address has been cleared. On-chain information: https://hypurrscan.io/address/0x225864ad63ba66272cd6be3e65476a2eba48c215. Closing completed SOL short faction: 20x short, holding over 20,000 SOL. On May 16, according to OnChain Lens monitoring, a whale deposited 1.7 million USDC into Hyperliquid to set up a top-level SOL short with 20x leverage. Latest data shows that this address currently holds about 20,336 SOL, with accumulated floating profits of about $197,400. On-chain information: https://hypurrscan.io/address/0x6b0411091ad1e73a225d24304bf9d4d98fa1b0e2. Shorting is still ongoing. Major coins short faction: Previously, Hyperliquid profited over $15 million, shorting 5 tokens. According to Lookonchain monitoring, a whale who made over $15 million on the Hyperliquid platform began aggressively shorting ETH, BTC, AVAX, SOL, and USUAL. The trader also set 100 limit orders in the $2,460-$2,480 range, preparing to continue shorting ETH. Latest data shows that all short positions of this address are profitable, of which, the ETH 20x short position holds 3,034 ETH, with floating profits of about $182,000; the BTC 20x short position holds 38 BTC, with floating profits of about $84,000; the AVAX 20x short position holds about 50,000 AVAX, with floating profits of about $38,000; the SOL 20x short position holds about 1,935 SOL, with floating profits of about $9,000; the USUAL 5x short position holds about 185,000 USUAL, with floating profits of about $2,000. On-chain information: https://hypurrscan.io/address/0x8Bff50AAd8b4E06c5E148eaEB9D7Aef69e26CDC3. 20x short ETH, BTC, AVAX, SOL, 5x short USUAL. HYPE short faction: 5x short, holding over 1.87 million HYPE. Previously, according to on-chain analyst Yu Jin monitoring, a whale opened a 5x short on Hyperliquid for 1.875 million HYPE; on the 17th, its floating loss reached as high as $12.06 million, subsequently, it withdrew 3 million USDC from Binance as margin, with a liquidation price of $31.6. Latest data shows that this address currently has a floating loss of about $9.55 million. On-chain information: https://hypurrscan.io/address/0x20b141d3b74779d96b48b966807d719d5dfa08a6. Firm bears. In addition to the above-mentioned whales in contract longs and shorts, there are also whales who bottomed out in ETH's sharp decline, ultimately realizing millions in profits. ETH bottom-fishing whale: Bottom buying 6...

In the world of cryptocurrency, very few people can rewrite the myth of wealth at an astonishing speed. James Wynn, this meme coin trader, is one of them—how did he turn $6 million into $43 million, influencing the entire market sentiment? (Background: Market Stalemate) Several whales have opened high-leverage positions on Hyperliquid: Bullish on BTC, Bearish on ETH?) (Background Supplement: Hyperliquid EVM ecosystem mining multiple returns here! Which protocols can still earn airdrops?) Introduction In cryptocurrency, every move by whales can become a market beacon, stirring up magnificent market trends. James Wynn, a trader who rose from meme coin frenzy, turned about $6 million into a crypto legend of $43 million in just one month with astonishing operations. His battlefield is concentrated on the Hyperliquid platform, and his trading targets are surprisingly simple: only Bitcoin and three meme coins—Pepe, Trump, and Fartcoin. Every time James Wynn opens or closes a position, or updates a tweet on X, he injects volatility into the market like a tide, swaying market sentiment. Many interpret his trading patterns as hidden signals, attracting investors to follow in his footsteps, triggering rapid fluctuations in the meme coin market. Meanwhile, some consider it nothing more than a reckless gamble, questioning whether this wealth acquisition method can withstand the test of time. Whether viewed as a hero or a villain, every move he makes undoubtedly becomes the focus of market discussions and is widely imitated. Through an in-depth analysis of James Wynn's trading strategies, including his preferences for different trading platforms and the dynamic changes in the market, this article will reveal how he navigated through the meme coin frenzy to achieve his goals. We will also explore how the rise of this emerging trader triggered short-term market fluctuations, and whether this impact could continue to influence long-term trends in the future. Who is James Wynn? The Meme Coin Battle God! James Wynn's rise in the crypto economy began with meme coin trading, causing a sensation on social media in just a few days. He first became famous for meme coins: from April 14 to April 19, 2023, he bought 4,216,203,079 PEPE tokens for 3.64 ETH, equivalent to $7,644, earning $25 million. Subsequently, on April 24, 2024, he announced on X (Twitter) that he saw a 1000x trading opportunity and released information about the ELON token. A few hours later, the ELON he bought through two addresses also approached a 100x. However, good times did not last; a few days later, the price of ELON plummeted by 70%, and James Wynn announced he was closing his positions, stating that there were issues with the project. Finally, on March 13, 2025, he began trading on Hyperliquid, using just two months to turn $6 million into $46 million in profit. From a meme coin celebrity to a derivatives magnate, James Wynn's rise has garnered significant attention and become a hot topic. From Spot to Derivatives: High-Leverage Gambling James Wynn's early success came from meme coin trading in the spot market, but he truly reached the peak stage with derivatives trading on Hyperliquid. He employs a high leverage strategy ranging from 5x to 40x, focusing on Bitcoin (BTC) and meme coins (PEPE, TRUMP, and FARTCOIN). The above image shows James Wynn's positions on Hyperliquid (as of May 11, 2025). On April 6, 2025, he went long on Bitcoin at an average price of 94,292 with 40x leverage. Shortly thereafter, the price rose from $94,000 to $100,000 within just two days, yielding $5,000,000 in unrealized profit. However, the 10x long position in PEPE had an unrealized profit of $23,000,000. The profits for Trump and Fartcoin were $5,000,000 and $4,300,000, respectively, increasing his total assets from about $6,000,000 to $43,000,000. Additionally, according to Hyperdash Terminal data, James Wynn's BTC and PEPE long positions are the largest addresses on Hyperliquid, showcasing remarkable high-risk, high-reward potential. Why the Preference for Hyperliquid? The Faith in Transparency Platform Choice and Controversy James Wynn's preference for Hyperliquid stems from his dissatisfaction with the Bybit exchange. He has publicly criticized platforms like Bybit for manipulating token listings, harming retail investors' interests, and claimed that even if he were to earn $1,000,000 monthly, he would not give up Hyperliquid's decentralized principles. As a decentralized exchange, Hyperliquid offers high transparency and fairness, which is the core reason for James Wynn's choice. Furthermore, Hyperliquid supports high-leverage trading, providing an ideal environment for his strategy. The Stop Loss Controversy: The Unexpected Bonus from Bitcoin's Spike On May 4, 2025, James Wynn tweeted about opening a short position worth $40,000,000, with a stop loss set at $95,700. Shortly after opening the position (yellow arrow), Hyperliquid suddenly spiked to $96,573. He later posted that he had set a stop loss while using the maximum position, leading to Hyperliquid's price manipulation behavior (price manipulation), but interestingly, the stop loss was not triggered, resulting in profit. The Miracle of Wealth: From $6 Million to $1 Billion Bull Market Frenzy According to James Wynn's description: HyperLiquid trading cumulative profit: $41,696,589.75 First million wealth: After reaching the goal, I found that a million had become a common threshold. Upgraded to tens of millions within two years: Can travel in first class at any time and expand diversified investments. Assets exceeding hundreds of millions: Upgraded from first class to renting private jets, enjoying airport VIP access. Lifestyle transformation: Spending over $1,000 weekly to taste top-grade steak; hiring a live-in maid to save time. Sports car collection: Owning multiple sports cars, but daily prefers a Range Rover. Ultimate goal: $1 billion: Not for the money itself, but to create a legend, planning to leverage 40x to seek top returns. James Wynn's wealth growth is astounding. His cumulative profit from trading on Hyperliquid reached $43,000,000, a feat attributed to a surge in May 2025 and his high-leverage strategy. At that time, Bitcoin broke $100,000, and Ethereum rose by 20%, providing him with...

Kaito may be making the standards for content creation assessment monotonous, binding creators into a system driven by 'algorithms' and 'scores'. (Previous context: What is Kaito? An AI-driven cryptocurrency intelligence aggregation platform: features, team, and tokenomics summarized) (Background supplement: Is 'creator tokenization' going to be the next hundred billion dollar narrative?) Is it 'Yap-to-Earn' or 'Earn-to-Leave'? In the Crypto world, 'attention' is gradually becoming a quantifiable asset. And Kaito is rising as a star project in InfoFi against this backdrop. Backed by top-tier capital such as Dragonfly and Sequoia, Kaito was once seen as an innovator in 'information financialization'. However, just a few months later, more and more voices are beginning to question its algorithmic mechanism and ecological impact. Kaito aims to capture users' attention with AI algorithms, but right now, the community seems to have lost patience first. Is the creator ecology being destroyed? Since Kaito launched the 'Yap-to-Earn' mechanism, it has been surrounded by controversy. The X platform is filled with stylistically similar 'in-depth industry analysis' posts, which on the surface are full of professional jargon and structured analysis, but in reality, the content is hollow, interactive content is merely formal, inefficient, repetitive, and created for profit. Community member @0xcryptoHowe once described Kaito's dissemination mechanism as 'Crypto version elevator advertisements'. He pointed out: 'The long-tail traffic effect of Kaito is essentially like elevator advertisements, constantly repeating content in a closed space, cycling through different time periods.' For the audience, this indeed serves as a method for quick memory and exposure, but problems arise: when the platform is occupied by 'homogeneous content', KOLs are pushed by algorithms to repeatedly produce, ultimately forming an information closed loop — like being trapped in a 'sealed elevator' playing endless advertisements, making it difficult to access truly valuable new content. At the same time, Kaito's mechanism has been questioned by many for 'leeching' traffic from mid-tier creators. Crypto KOL @connectfarm1 pointed out that some mid-tier accounts, which typically have content valued at 500U per post, are willing to accept rewards far below market price because of Kaito. This strategy not only depresses the real value of content in reality, but also forces some creators to only express 50% or even less of their potential. Kaito may be making the standards for content creation assessment monotonous, binding creators into a system driven by 'algorithms' and 'scores'. As community user @0xBeliever said: 'There are many standards for judging KOLs, but Kaito's emergence has made it a bit singular.' Frequent team errors Aside from the mechanism controversy, the Kaito team has also encountered some minor incidents recently at the operational level. On March 16, Kaito AI and its founder Yu Hu's X account was hacked, and team member Sandra posted on the X platform stating, 'The attacker chose to launch the attack in the middle of the night when Yu Hu was in his time zone, taking control of the account while he was asleep.' Following that, on April 27, founder Yu Hu posted that the platform accidentally backfilled a new algorithm for the past 12 months, causing users to see a longer time window while the front-end data was incomplete. Although neither incident caused severe consequences, the consecutive minor flaws have raised concerns about its stability. The algorithm controversy of 'heavy relationships' Kaito's core selling point lies in its AI-driven content scoring algorithm, claiming to be able to identify valuable Web3 content. However, as users delve deeper, this algorithm has frequently sparked controversy. User @Jessethecook69 climbed to the global ninth position and first in the Chinese area on the Kaito Yapper leaderboard in just 24 hours, solely based on three 'borderline' pieces of content. This inevitably raises the question: Is such an algorithm really filtering valuable information? Many users point out that Kaito places lower weight on view counts, with the algorithm focusing more on interaction performance between high-impact accounts. Unfortunately, some ICT (Inner Crypto Twitter) accounts have started to 'group together', further amplifying this algorithmic bias. Crypto KOL @sky_gpt bluntly stated that Kaito's algorithm is essentially designed to capture the KOL institutional market, severely damaging the ecology of ordinary creators. He pointed out that a 30,000-word content he wrote received almost the same score as a 2,000-ad post bought by a project, while non-Kaito related content was systematically suppressed in the algorithm. 'The top 50 KOLs are reaping enormous rewards,' he wrote, 'Kaito is cutting off the path for newcomers to rise.' When newcomers are trapped by the algorithm's invisible ceiling, and when creators are forced to cater to algorithmic preferences, we can't help but ask: Is an AI-driven content platform reshaping the information order, or merely replicating old power logic? Related reports From Dubai to Bali: Campus initiatives continue to empower the cryptocurrency content ecology for creators Pump.fun launches Pumpswap DEX free automatic migration, introducing creator revenue sharing, has Raydium really turned around? Generative art enters Ordinals) Unigraphs how to create NFTs with smart contracts 'Kaito's algorithm is strangling KOLs?' This article was first published in BlockTempo (the most influential blockchain news media).

If BIP 177 passes, your 1 BTC will become 100,000,000 bitcoins? (Background: Indonesian tech company DigiAsia plans to raise funds to 'buy 100 million dollars worth of Bitcoin', with stock prices soaring 91% in a single day) (Additional context: Hong Kong's 'DayDayCook' is scanning for Bitcoin! The parent company intends to acquire 5000 BTC over three years) In the Bitcoin ecosystem, the BIP 177 proposal is sparking a discussion about Bitcoin's accounting unit, display methods, and the essence of user experience. This improvement proposal aims to fundamentally reconstruct how we perceive and use Bitcoin. Furthermore, Satoshi Nakamoto also mentioned early on that if Bitcoin experiences large-scale deflation in the future, the software may display more decimal places. BIP 177 echoes this idea. What is BIP 177? BIP 177 (Bitcoin Improvement Proposal 177) is an improvement suggestion for Bitcoin aimed at redefining Bitcoin's accounting unit and display method. The core idea of BIP 177 is to make Bitcoin amounts more intuitive and easier to understand by eliminating decimal point displays, thereby lowering the entry barrier for new users and promoting the adoption of Bitcoin in daily payments. The proposal was first put forward by Bitcoin enthusiast and Synonym CEO John Carvalho (@BitcoinErrorLog) on December 10, 2024, when it was hosted in the BitcoinAndLightningLayerSpecs/balls repository on GitHub and had not yet been assigned a BIP number. On May 8, the draft of BIP 177 was officially merged and added to the Bitcoin BIP list. Currently, BIP-0177 is still in draft form and has not been formally adopted; community discussions are ongoing. Specifically, BIP 177 proposes to redefine Bitcoin's smallest indivisible unit (1 BTC = 100,000,000 satoshis) as '1 bitcoin', making the current 1 BTC equal to 100 million new 'bitcoins'. This change only involves the UI display method and will not substantively alter Bitcoin's (BTC) consensus rules, the total supply limit of 21 million, or the underlying logic of the blockchain ledger. What is the purpose of BIP 177? The main purpose of BIP 177 is to simplify the user experience of Bitcoin and address the confusion caused by the current unit display methods. Eliminating complexity from decimal points: Currently, Bitcoin's price is usually displayed in BTC. Small transactions (like buying a cup of coffee) may involve figures like 0.0001 BTC, and eight decimal places can confuse new users. BIP 177 proposes using the smallest indivisible unit as the base unit, displaying amounts as whole numbers (like 100 bitcoins instead of 0.000001 BTC), which aligns more intuitively with everyday currency use. Educational value: Newcomers can directly understand Bitcoin as a discrete unit rather than a 'divisible decimal currency'. Lowering the entry barrier for new users: Many people are unfamiliar with the term 'satoshi' and find it hard to understand the conversion relationship of 1 BTC = 100 million satoshis. By redefining 'bitcoin' as the smallest unit, BIP 177 aims to make it easier for ordinary users to understand and accept Bitcoin, especially in a high-price context. What are the pros and cons of BIP 177? Potential advantages Simplifying user experience: Displaying amounts as whole numbers (like 100 bitcoins instead of 0.000001 BTC) is more intuitive, reducing confusion for new users due to decimal points. Promoting daily use of Bitcoin: By making small transactions easier to understand, BIP 177 is expected to drive Bitcoin's application in micropayments, enhancing its practicality as a currency. This can also motivate more merchants to accept Bitcoin, creating a circular economy. Consistency with protocol logic: The proposal makes the UI display closer to the integer arithmetic of the Bitcoin protocol, reducing the complexity of human conventions and improving technical transparency. Low-risk adjustment: BIP 177 does not involve changes to consensus rules, requiring no hard forks or upgrades to miner nodes—only wallet and exchange UI adjustments are necessary. This means lower implementation costs and reduced risks. Expanding the user base: By lowering psychological and cognitive barriers, BIP 177 could attract more ordinary users into the Bitcoin ecosystem, especially in developing countries or among groups unfamiliar with cryptocurrencies. Potential disadvantages and challenges Community acceptance challenges: The Bitcoin community has a deep-rooted understanding of 'Bitcoin' as the standard unit; changing the unit name could spark controversy. Some users believe 'sats' is already the community consensus, and redefining 'bitcoin' may be seen as unnecessary complication. Transitional chaos: In the early stages of BIP 177's implementation, different wallets and platforms may adopt different unit display methods (some using the new bitcoins, some continuing to use BTC or sats), which could confuse users or even be exploited maliciously. Cultural inertia: The popular 'satoshi' culture and terminology in the community may be affected. Limited practical impact: Some critics argue that changes in unit display have limited effects on promoting Bitcoin's adoption. User experience bottlenecks may stem more from transaction fees, confirmation times, or wallet usability rather than the unit name. If passed, how will it be handled? If the BIP 177 proposal is adopted, the overall conversion rule will maintain the Bitcoin ledger and consensus rules unchanged. BTC as currency code remains unchanged. The implementation of the new standard must multiply the original bitcoin value by 100 million, converting it into integer form. Specifically: Unit redefinition: The base unit remains unchanged. Original 1 bitcoin = 100,000,000 base units; under the new definition, 1 bitcoin = 1 base unit. Terminology changes: Satoshi or sat will be discarded. All interfaces, documents, and displays should directly refer to the base unit as 'bitcoin'. 'BTC' remains unaffected and still represents 100 million base units. Display and format changes: Applications should allow users to switch between the traditional format (1 BTC = 100 million base units) and the new format (1 bitcoin = 1 base unit). The symbol '₿' may be used to represent the base unit of bitcoin (₿ is optional). Regarding satoshi and sat: While having cultural value, official documents and interfaces should uniformly use 'bitcoin' as the sole unit name. The draft document for BIP 177 provides the following examples: Old display: 0.00010000 bitcoin → New display: ₿10,000 or 10,000 bitcoins or 0.00010000 BTC Old display: 10.23486 bitcoin → New display: ₿1,023,486,000 or 1,023,486,000 bitcoins or 10.23486 BTC Old display: 0.345 BTC → New display: no change needed, or ₿34,500,000...

Former Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey calls for a rebranding of Bitcoin to break free from the personal cult of Satoshi Nakamoto, emphasizing its decentralized nature and prompting deep reflection on the future of Bitcoin. (Background: Twitter founder Jack Dorsey is Satoshi Nakamoto? deBanked CEO throws 51 clues identifying Jack Dorsey) (Additional context: Cambridge report: Bitcoin mining 'clean energy' usage has reached 52.4%, will Tesla restart BTC payments?) Former Twitter and fintech company Square (now renamed Block) CEO Jack Dorsey has proposed forward-thinking and novel views on the future development of Bitcoin. He publicly pointed out that the mysterious aura and identity of Bitcoin's anonymous founder 'Satoshi Nakamoto' may have become a 'disruptive factor' in the long run, potentially hindering the further evolution of Bitcoin. Therefore, he believes the community should abandon Dorsey's call to 'discard Satoshi' for rebranding. Jack Dorsey strongly urges the Bitcoin community on X to carefully consider conducting a deep 'rebranding,' with the core goal of helping Bitcoin detach itself from any excessive association with any specific founder's image. He emphasizes the importance of abandoning or downplaying the symbol of 'Satoshi,' as he keenly observes that the continued focus on this anonymous founder and the phenomenon of personal worship form a fundamental contradiction with the cornerstone of Bitcoin's existence — the core spirit of 'decentralization.' Dorsey believes that this tendency to overly concentrate attention on the founder's identity inadvertently misrepresents Bitcoin's revolutionary technology as merely a personal project of some genius, while ignoring that it is a truly open peer-to-peer network built and maintained by countless participants worldwide. He has publicly stated: 'I think one of the most critical tasks for the current community is to work hard to break free from the attachment to the founder's identity. Frankly speaking, the name 'Satoshi' itself has become a disruption.' Dorsey further explains that the so-called rebranding is by no means as simple as just replacing a name or logo. Its deeper significance lies in the need to communicate more accurately and effectively to global users Bitcoin's potential as an inclusive financial infrastructure, as well as a true vision and core value of a genuinely decentralized, censorship-resistant network. He believes that only by continuously strengthening its community-driven and open characteristics, which do not require specific permissions to participate, can Bitcoin more effectively attract widespread acceptance and adoption from mainstream institutions and individual users, ultimately being understood by the world as a true global public good, completely free from the image of being tied to any specific individual or organization. De-Satoshiization Some community members agree with Dorsey's view and jointly propose a new Bitcoin proposal, BIP-177. The proposer, software developer John Carvalho, mentioned that Bitcoin's smallest unit, 'satoshi,' should be renamed to 'bitcoin,' i.e., 1 BTC = 100,000,000 bitcoin. Dorsey has recently been promoting and reposting this proposal on X, which has garnered over 1 million total views on Twitter. Supporters of BIP-177 believe that further 'depersonalization' will help consolidate and strengthen Bitcoin's censorship resistance and its attributes as a public infrastructure. However, on the other hand, a considerable number of supporters may feel that Satoshi, as the founder of this epoch-making invention, has an indelible historical contribution and symbolic significance that should not be easily discarded or intentionally downplayed. Extended reading: 1 BTC = 100 million bitcoin? What exactly is Bitcoin proposal BIP 177? The dilemma of decentralization: the challenge of brand consensus. However, it is worth noting that in a highly decentralized network ecosystem lacking a central decision-making body, attempting to promote any form of 'rebranding' initiative is destined to be filled with challenges. Jack Dorsey's suggestion, while insightful, will inevitably evoke diverse and even opposing voices and responses within the loosely structured but vibrant Bitcoin community. In practice, however, any proposal's promotion in Bitcoin has fundamental challenges: how to achieve broad consensus on highly subjective and complex topics like brand positioning and public image shaping in a system without central authority that relies on participant consensus. This tests the collective wisdom of the community, requiring long-term communication, in-depth education, and a difficult consensus-building process at the cultural level, which is bound to be a time-consuming and uncertain evolutionary process.

Aave's total locked value surpasses $30 billion, injecting a strong boost into the revival of Ethereum DeFi. (Background: Coinbase's strategic director: Institutional interest has never stopped, DeFi and stablecoins are set to explode) (Additional background: Granting stETH holders 'veto power'! Lido's new proposal may restructure the governance power in DeFi) Key DeFi protocol Aave on Ethereum is in the spotlight. According to data from The Block, Aave's total locked value (TVL) broke through $30 billion around May 19, 2025, increasing by 50% from the low point at the beginning of the year, demonstrating Aave's strong momentum and indicating that the Ethereum DeFi ecosystem is 'reigniting'. AAVE surged over 80% this month. Aave's current daily average fee income exceeds $1 million, with outstanding loans of about $10 billion. About 33% of the debt to TVL ratio also shows that the protocol maintains good liquidity while providing yields. This growth is attributed to flash loans, dynamic interest rates, multi-chain deployment, and the integration of new stablecoins such as Ripple's RLUSD and its own stablecoin GHO (annual circulation increased over 4.5 times). At the same time, the warming price of Ethereum and the rebound in user confidence are also important drivers. The price of AAVE tokens surged over 22% today (20th), reaching $266.4 before deadline, with a monthly increase of 88%. Wide-ranging impact and market outlook Aave's TVL growth directly enhances Ethereum's overall liquidity, promoting lending and trading activities (the trading volume on Ethereum's decentralized exchanges has recently increased by 30%), solidifying Ethereum's leadership position in the DeFi space. Will this wave of recovery in Ethereum and the top DeFi above lead the DeFi sector into a new expansion cycle? This is worth our continued attention. Related reports Aave to initiate token buyback? Community proposal: buy $1 million weekly for six months, optimize staking rewards Aave community resolves to withdraw from Polygon lending, DeFi ecosystem feared to lose $300 million TVL Aave founder calls Solana lending protocol Kamino 'a copycat', both sides engage in a heated war of words "AAVE surges 22% intraday: TVL surpasses $30 billion, is the glory of Ethereum DeFi rising again?" This article was first published in BlockTempo (the most influential blockchain news media).

Indonesian fintech company DigiAsia has announced a significant investment in Bitcoin as a reserve asset, sparking market discussions about its strategy and corporate asset allocation trends. (Background: JPMorgan CEO: Will allow clients to buy Bitcoin, unlocking $4 trillion in purchasing power?) (Additional context: DELL is buying Bitcoin! SEC consultation response made public: buy directly without asking shareholders first, we won't enforce.) Indonesian fintech company DigiAsia Corp (NASDAQ: FAAS) recently announced plans to invest in Bitcoin as its core reserve asset. The news caused its stock price to soar over 90% in just one trading day, highlighting the potential impact of Bitcoin on corporate valuation in the current financial environment. DigiAsia Announcement Indonesian fintech company DigiAsia Corp (NASDAQ: FAAS) officially declared on May 19, 2025, that it will establish a Bitcoin (BTC) treasury reserve, attracting global attention. To achieve this goal, DigiAsia plans to raise up to $100 million and commits to using up to 50% of future net profits to purchase Bitcoin, thereby gradually building and expanding its Bitcoin holdings. In addition to directly purchasing and holding Bitcoin, DigiAsia is also actively exploring diversified asset appreciation avenues. The company plans to research with regulated partners, utilizing institutional lending and staking—a mechanism to earn rewards through crypto assets—to generate additional yield from its Bitcoin holdings. Furthermore, DigiAsia is evaluating the possibility of issuing convertible notes linked to its future Bitcoin purchases or other crypto financial instruments to further optimize its capital structure and the efficiency of its Bitcoin assets, effectively utilizing all available company financing tools for the crypto market. Market Reaction and Stock Price Volatility After DigiAsia announced its entry into Bitcoin reserves, its stock price skyrocketed over 91% by the end of regular trading, closing at $0.36. At one point during trading, the stock price reached between $0.5676 and $0.6493, an astonishing increase of over 200% compared to the previous trading day's closing price of $0.1860. However, the initial excitement waned slightly, and the stock price fell about 22% in after-hours trading to $0.28. In fact, if calculated from the beginning of the year, the company's stock price has accumulated a nearly 53% decline, showing a significant correction compared to its peak of nearly $12 in March 2024. The drastic fluctuations in stock price clearly reflect the market's strong reaction to this strategic shift, including investor excitement over the company's embrace of Bitcoin, mixed with some short-term profit-taking selling pressure. Embracing Bitcoin: An Irresistible Trend? DigiAsia's strategy aligns with the significant trend of global companies increasingly incorporating Bitcoin into their treasury reserves. According to Bitbo data, as of now, companies worldwide hold over 3 million Bitcoins, with a total value exceeding $340 billion. The pioneer leading this trend is business intelligence software company MicroStrategy, whose CEO Michael Saylor has been a steadfast advocate for corporate Bitcoin holdings. MicroStrategy possesses the largest Bitcoin reserves among publicly traded companies, holding approximately 576,230 Bitcoins worth nearly $60.9 billion at the time of the event. Aside from MicroStrategy, other companies are also following suit, such as asset management firm Strive Asset Management, which announced its transformation into a Bitcoin treasury company; gaming retailer GameStop (GME) has also raised funds through debt issuance, using part of the proceeds to purchase Bitcoin. In this regard, Adam Back, co-founder and CEO of Blockstream, optimistically predicts that companies adopting Bitcoin as a reserve asset will strongly drive the global proliferation of Bitcoin, potentially pushing its total market value to an astonishing $200 trillion within the next decade. In contrast, according to CoinGecko data, Bitcoin's total market value is currently around $2 trillion, with a unit price of approximately $105,642. Related Reports Release of $2 trillion! The U.S. plans to lower the bank 'Supplementary Leverage Ratio (SLR)' regulations that have been in place since the 2008 financial crisis. Will MEXC exchange launch 1000x leverage? Living in a palace or sleeping in a park, Bitcoin cannot be taxed! After deleveraging ends, will BTC welcome excellent trading opportunities? "Indonesian tech company DigiAsia plans to raise funds to 'buy $100 million in Bitcoin,' stock price surges 91% in a single day." This article was first published on BlockTempo (the most influential blockchain news media).

The U.S. Senate successfully advanced the procedural vote for the GENIUS Act, furthering stablecoin regulation. However, before it becomes law, lawmakers still need to engage in the next round of debates and amendments. (Background: Payment giant Stripe launched 'Stablecoin Accounts' supporting USDC and USDB, available in over 100 countries. Is it available in Taiwan?) (Context: Urgent situation for U.S. stablecoin legislation) The Democratic Party hits the brakes: The GENIUS Act has loopholes, and crypto-friendly policies become a tool for Trump’s self-interest. The U.S. aims to regulate the stablecoin market with the GENIUS Act, but during the procedural vote on May 8, it failed to pass due to concerns from Democrats regarding consumer protection and national security provisions, as well as opposition from some Republican lawmakers. However, after another vote yesterday (19th), the Senate successfully advanced the GENIUS Act, clearing a key procedural hurdle for establishing a clear regulatory framework for U.S. stablecoins. An informed source revealed that the latest version of the bill has sufficiently addressed some of the earlier concerns of the Democrats. Although the modifications are minor, they managed to gain the support of some previously opposing Democratic senators, including Senators Ruben Gallego and Mark Warner, both of whom announced their support before the vote. What’s the next step for the GENIUS stablecoin bill? The Senate advanced the GENIUS Act with a vote of 66 in favor and 32 against (procedural vote), including 16 Democratic senators voting in favor alongside Republicans. The next step is that the bill is expected to formally enter the Senate debate and final vote on Tuesday evening or Wednesday. Notably, the U.S. House of Representatives is also pushing another regulatory bill for the digital asset market, proposed by House Republicans, which aims to expand the regulatory authority of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) over crypto assets and establish clearer registration and fundraising processes. Some legislators have suggested considering merging the GENIUS stablecoin bill with the market regulation bill to develop a comprehensive federal crypto regulatory framework. Therefore, the progress towards final legislation, whether it can effectively resolve all disputes, and the future direction of the Trump administration’s digital asset policy remain to be observed. (After passing the Senate, the bill must be sent to the House of Representatives, but due to the Republican majority in the House, it is expected not to face significant obstacles.) Core content and controversies of the GENIUS Act The core of the GENIUS Act is to establish a regulatory framework for stablecoins and their issuers, requiring issuers to obtain relevant licenses and maintain sufficient reserves, comply with the Bank Secrecy Act, implement anti-money laundering measures, require 1:1 backing with dollar assets, and also introduce consumer protection provisions. Under the global trend of 'de-dollarization,' this bill is seen as a key measure to support dollar stablecoins and consolidate dollar hegemony. Notably, the bill allows non-bank institutions issuing stablecoins not exceeding $10 billion to be regulated at the state level, while larger issuers must be subjected to federal-level regulation. The bill faced obstacles earlier due to concerns from some Democratic lawmakers about insufficient consumer protection measures and potential loopholes related to the business interests of the Trump family. Related reports: Payment giant Stripe launched 'Stablecoin Accounts' supporting USDC and USDB, available in over 100 countries. Is it available in Taiwan? Meta's crypto payment makes a significant return? FB and IG are rumored to be testing stablecoin payments, and Zuckerberg has not given up on blockchain ambitions. "The U.S. GENIUS stablecoin bill passed a vote and entered the final debate and voting in the Senate" was first published on BlockTempo (the most influential blockchain news media).

Bubble Mart's Labubu is evolving into a cross-border cultural meme, and the recent launch of the third generation plush series has triggered a buying frenzy, driving up the price of its namesake meme coin. (Background: Musk rebranded X to 'Kekius Maximus' and changed his avatar! Meme coin $KEKIUS skyrocketed to over 66 million, while $gork cooled off and corrected.) (Additional context: Investigating Trump's financial flows! The Democratic Party has called out WLF and TRUMP meme coins, and Musk and Sun Yuchen may also be implicated.) A Nordic forest elf with pointed ears, sharp teeth, and a mischievous grin, Labubu is sweeping the globe at an astonishing speed, becoming a fashion item and social currency in the eyes of Generation Z, even serving as an alternative financial tool. Recently, the third generation of Labubu's rubber plush series made a strong debut, sparking a buying spree right away. From seconds of sellouts on domestic e-commerce platforms to overnight queues at overseas flagship stores, from being the center of attention in trendy street photos to flooding social media, Labubu is rapidly evolving into a cross-border cultural meme that is spreading rapidly. Behind this global trend is not only a precise hit to the deep-seated desires of young people for self-expression and emotional release but also an alternative asset that is catching the attention of the capital market. This trend has attracted not just traditional collectors but also the crypto world, which is also experiencing a Labubu craze. The LABUBU meme coin, which has skyrocketed dozens of times in just a week, has returned to a market value of ten million dollars. Recently, the meme coin $LABUBU has seen a surge in popularity due to the release of a new product series, becoming a market focal point once again. Notable crypto KOLs like Ansem have released tweets featuring Labubu, resonating strongly with the community. According to GMGN data, as of the time of publication, the market value of $LABUBU has soared from hundreds of thousands of dollars to 18 million dollars in the past week, an increase of dozens of times, with trading volume reaching 9.5 million dollars in the past 24 hours. Data from Holderscan shows that since May 14, the number of addresses holding $LABUBU has increased significantly, indicating ongoing user engagement and market enthusiasm. In fact, this is not the first time $LABUBU has stirred up excitement in the market. Back in November 2024, during the explosion of the MEME coin sector, the market value of $LABUBU had surpassed 20 million dollars. Although this was not an officially released MEME coin, it still became one of the major IP projects that were hotly discussed at that time. The Thai market is an important flow engine for this round of market activity. At that time, Labubu had already sparked phenomenal attention in Thailand, with its image frequently appearing on the streets of Bangkok, becoming a representative symbol of trend culture. Celebrities, such as Blackpink member Lisa, posted photos with Labubu on Instagram, and Thai princess Sirivannavari used Labubu as her daily handbag 'partner,' while ordinary young people wore Labubu apparel and even used its patterns for tattoos. Amidst this high popularity, Bubble Mart's Labubu-related products were once in short supply in Thailand, so much so that the Tourism Authority of Thailand took notice, granting Labubu the title of 'Magical Thailand Experience Officer' and holding a grand welcome ceremony, with the Minister of Tourism and Sports personally attending. According to Bubble Mart's mid-2024 financial report, its overseas revenue reached 1.35 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 259.6%. Among this, the Southeast Asian market contributed 560 million yuan, accounting for over 40% of total overseas revenue. Labubu's strong performance in Southeast Asia has also greatly boosted investors' confidence in its related MEME coins. At the same time, another local Thai IP MOODENG (Little Hippo) has gained global popularity and spawned a namesake MEME coin, whose market value has been hyped to several hundred million dollars, drawing market attention toward Thai IP assets. Recently, MOODENG's strong rebound has further propelled market interest in Labubu, which may become an important spillover effect for the $LABUBU market revival. Currently, Labubu's global popularity continues to rise. According to Google Trends, in the past 30 days, Labubu's search popularity worldwide has far surpassed other MEME-related IPs like MOODENG, PEPE, DOGE, and Chillguy. This indicates that Labubu's brand influence and market attention are rapidly climbing, far exceeding other similar MEME projects. From trendy toys to social currency, the rise of the cultural economy behind Generation Z is manifesting. The goal of 'recreating a Bubble Mart overseas' is gradually being realized by Labubu's astonishing outburst of popularity. From American pop diva Rihanna being photographed at Los Angeles airport with a pink Labubu bag to veteran Hermès enthusiast Bryanboy hanging a Labubu doll on a rare platinum bag... Labubu has been humorously dubbed 'successfully breaking into America' by netizens. Behind this global cultural export, Labubu has quietly completed a cultural migration from the trendy toy circle to the global mainstream fashion circle. Driven by celebrity effects, Labubu is sweeping the globe. Just last month, Bubble Mart launched the third generation of Labubu's rubber plush products, the 'High Energy Ahead' series, worldwide, triggering a new wave of buying frenzy and noticeable premium phenomena in multiple markets. Besides domestic fans fervently pursuing it, fans lined up overnight in front of Bubble Mart stores in Chicago, Los Angeles, London, Milan, New Zealand, and Tokyo's Harajuku, just to grab their desired Labubu, becoming a striking spectacle in contemporary global trend culture. Not only has offline sales been explosive, but online sales are also unstoppable. The Bubble Mart App topped the U.S. App Store shopping list, and climbed 114 places to fourth on the free list, demonstrating its tremendous appeal in the North American market. On second-hand trading platforms, the premium for the 'High Energy Ahead' series of Labubu is particularly astonishing – a blind box originally priced at only 99 yuan has seen normal versions rise 10%-200%, while hidden versions have even reached dozens of times in premium, making it the gold and bitcoin of the trendy toy world, leaping to become a 'financial tool' in players' eyes. On social platforms like TikTok and Instagram, Labubu is also a traffic magnet. Young people are keen to release short videos featuring 'blind box unboxing,' 'trendy outfits with Labubu,' and 'doll display walls,' even creating dedicated content accounts that quickly gather millions of followers, with topic popularity and attention continuously rising. This viral spread not only amplifies Labubu's social influence but also constitutes the core leverage of Bubble Mart's content and community operations. Even more noteworthy is that unlike previous perceptions of trendy toys mainly as collectibles or hobbies, Labubu has ascended to become 'universal currency' in the social scenes of today's global youth. At midnight markets and trend gatherings in Bangkok, players have exchanged hidden Labubu for luxury bags and concert tickets; in Harrods, a collector traded a second-hand Hermès Kelly bag for a rare Labubu character; and at the Coachella music festival in Los Angeles, fans exchanged limited edition Labubu for festival passes...

Bloomberg reported that one of the reasons for the recent decline in the US dollar and US Treasury bonds is that Moody's, one of the three major global credit rating agencies, downgraded the US credit rating last week, marking the first time the US has lost its AAA rating from all three major credit rating agencies (Moody's, S&P, and Fitch), further intensifying Wall Street's concerns about the US fiscal outlook. (Background: Bitfinex announces 'the return of the Bitcoin bull market': BTC is expected to challenge historical highs, but concerns about the US economy and policies remain unresolved) (Supplementary Background: The US economy is booming) The GDP unexpectedly shrank by 0.3% in the first quarter, while core inflation is heating up; is the economic recession genuine or just a technical distortion?) According to the latest market data, the US dollar and US Treasury bonds, both of which rely on US credit, showed a downward trend yesterday (19). The yield on 30-year US Treasury bonds rose by 9 basis points to 5.03%, reaching the highest level since November 2023; the yield on 10-year Treasury bonds also reached 4.56%, close to last month's high. 30-year US Treasury bond yield Source: Investing.com The US dollar index declined. Source: Trading View In response to this situation, Bloomberg reported that this decline is closely related to Moody's Ratings downgrading the US credit rating from Aaa to Aa1 last week. Moody's downgrade marks the first time the US has lost its top AAA rating from all three major credit rating agencies, further intensifying Wall Street's concerns about the US fiscal outlook. Reasons for Moody's downgrade: fiscal deficit and political deadlock According to a statement released by Moody's, the main reasons for the downgrade of the US credit rating are the continued deterioration of the US fiscal situation and the challenges posed by political deadlock. Specifically, Moody's emphasized the following points: Surge in fiscal deficit: The US federal budget deficit continues to expand, with the annual deficit approaching $2 trillion, accounting for over 6% of GDP. Moody's predicts that by 2035, the deficit will further rise to nearly 9% of GDP, primarily driven by increased debt interest payments, rising welfare expenditures, and relatively low tax revenues. Increased debt burden: The US federal debt has reached $36.2 trillion, and it is expected to reach 107% of GDP by 2029, exceeding the historical peak after World War II. Uncertainty in politics and policy: The polarization of US politics has led to inefficiencies in fiscal policy-making, and repeated debt ceiling negotiations have intensified default risks. In addition, the recent tax cuts and trade tariff policies promoted by the Trump administration are further deteriorating the fiscal outlook. Economic growth pressure: Moody's pointed out that Trump's tariff policies may weaken the long-term economic growth potential of the US, further exacerbating fiscal pressures. Divergent expert opinions However, while Moody's downgrade indicates heightened concerns about the US economic outlook, experts' views on the impact of the downgrade are not consistent. Elias Haddad, a currency strategist at Brown Brothers Harriman & Co., stated in a report: "The synchronized selling pressure on the dollar, US Treasury bonds, and the US stock market highlights the growing loss of confidence in the US economy." He believes that the downgrade has intensified market skepticism about US assets and may further drive the trend of 'de-dollarization'. However, Mark Haefele, Chief Investment Officer at UBS Global Wealth Management, holds a more optimistic view, stating: "We believe this credit rating action is a headline risk rather than a fundamental shift in the market. Although the downgrade may weaken some recent 'good news' momentum, we expect it will not have a significant direct impact on financial markets." Similarly, Alfonso Peccatiello, Chief Investment Officer at Palinuro Capital, also believes that, according to the Basel regulatory framework, there is no difference in capital requirements for government bonds rated AAA to AA-, thus the downgrade has limited impact on the core status of US Treasury bonds in the global financial system. He added: "Unless investors actively trigger a sell-off, Moody's action should not have a significant impact." Against the backdrop of the Trump administration's promotion of trade tariffs and tax cuts, uncertainty around the US economy and the global economy is intensifying. Moody's downgrade of the US credit rating not only highlights the severe challenges facing US finances but also rings alarm bells for global financial markets. The decline of the dollar and US Treasury bonds reflects investors' wavering confidence in the US economic outlook, and the future direction of fiscal policy and its impact on the global economy still require close observation. Related reports: Fed's Powell says 'no rush to cut rates', the US economy is still strong; Trump responds: actions are too slow. Moody's analysis: Trump's tariffs could kill '5.5 million jobs'; combined with AI, it could destroy the US economy. Trump's 2.0 policies could reignite inflation! Krugman warns: tariff wars and repatriating migrant workers are detrimental to the US economy..."This article was first published in BlockTempo (the most influential blockchain news media).

According to the latest data from the U.S. Department of the Treasury, the issuer of the U.S. dollar stablecoin USDT, Tether, currently holds U.S. Treasuries worth $120 billion, surpassing Germany's $111.4 billion in U.S. bonds, making it the 19th largest U.S. Treasury buyer in the world. (Background: Tether launched its own AI platform QVAC: supporting P2P, crypto payments, and locally run high privacy, with the first applications set to debut) (Additional background: Tether Q1 report: holding nearly $120 billion in U.S. Treasuries, breaking records, with a quarterly profit of $1 billion) According to the latest data from the U.S. Department of the Treasury, the issuer of the U.S. dollar stablecoin USDT, Tether, currently holds U.S. Treasuries worth $120 billion, surpassing Germany's $111.4 billion in U.S. bonds, making it the 19th largest U.S. Treasury buyer in the world. Tether profits over $1 billion from U.S. Treasury investments. Notably, Tether disclosed in its Q1 2025 financial report that it holds over $120 billion in U.S. Treasuries and, through its traditional investment portfolio (including U.S. Treasuries and gold), achieved over $1 billion in operating profit in the first quarter. The report indicated that the robust performance of these traditional assets almost entirely offset the losses from the volatility in the cryptocurrency market. Tether firmly holds the leading position in the stablecoin market. Currently, Tether's USDT is the largest stablecoin in the world, with an unshakeable market dominance. According to CoinGecko data, as of the time of writing, the market capitalization of USDT has reached approximately $151.3 billion, accounting for about 75% of the stablecoin market share, far surpassing its main competitor Circle's USDC (market capitalization approximately $60.5 billion). At the same time, USDT's daily trading volume also reached $102 billion, accounting for 82.7% of the stablecoin trading volume, ranking third among global cryptocurrencies, only behind Bitcoin and Ethereum. Additionally, USDT's wide application across multiple blockchains (such as Ethereum, Tron, Solana, etc.) and its important role in decentralized finance (DeFi) and cross-border payments further solidify its market position. Tether's AI investment and operational innovations. It is worth mentioning that Tether not only focuses on the stablecoin business but also actively expands diversified operational strategies while seizing the wave of artificial intelligence (AI) innovation. According to a report from Dongqu, Tether has announced that it will soon launch its intelligent development platform QVAC (QuantumVerse Automatic Computer). According to Tether's announcement, QVAC (QuantumVerse Automatic Computer) is a decentralized AI development platform that emphasizes local operation, privacy protection, and high scalability. Its main features include: Local operation, no need for the cloud: QVAC allows AI models to run entirely on user devices (such as smartphones, laptops, embedded systems, or even brain-machine interfaces), without needing to connect to the cloud, to ensure data privacy and autonomy. Modular architecture: The platform adopts a modular design, allowing developers to use small, combinable components to construct and expand applications, flexibly adapting to different needs. Peer-to-peer (P2P) network: Through P2P technology, devices can communicate and collaborate directly without relying on centralized servers, achieving a decentralized AI ecosystem. No single point of failure, extremely high scalability: QVAC's architecture supports trillions of AI agents and applications running without a single point of failure, aiming to create an 'unstoppable infinite intelligent cluster.' Integrated cryptocurrency payments: Through Tether's WDK (Wallet Development Kit), AI agents can autonomously conduct transactions in Bitcoin (BTC) or USDT, opening up new possibilities for decentralized, self-sustaining AI systems. Cross-hardware compatibility: QVAC supports a variety of hardware, from low-end smartphones to high-performance servers, and may even support brain-machine interfaces in the future. Due to these technological characteristics, Tether claims that QVAC provides developers and users with a powerful platform for building and deploying decentralized AI applications. Specific uses include: Developers: Developers can use QVAC's single framework to build AI agents on smartphones, laptops, large hosts, or embedded systems, and the applications can run in connected or completely offline states. Users: Users can run fully local AI applications through QVAC, without needing to upload data to the cloud, to ensure personal privacy. For example, functions such as translating documents, health data tracking, or voice assistance can all be completed independently on devices and support P2P collaboration, such as directly sharing translation results between devices or conducting cryptocurrency transactions. Enterprises and startups: Enterprises can use QVAC to develop customized AI solutions, such as decentralized financial applications, healthcare data management, or smart IoT devices, without relying on the infrastructure of large technology companies. Related reports: Tether anticipates its own AI platform: supporting USDT and Bitcoin payments, open-source & no API key required, feature summary. Tether Q1 report: holding nearly $120 billion in U.S. Treasuries, breaking records, with a quarterly profit of $1 billion. Understand USDT in three minutes: Is Tether's cross-chain stablecoin reliable? 'Tether holds $120 billion in U.S. Treasuries, becoming the 19th largest globally, surpassing Germany, with a profit of $1 billion in Q1 this year.' This article was first published on Dongqu BlockTempo (Dongqu Trends - the most influential blockchain news media).

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Paul Atkins recently emphasized the importance of innovation at the SEC Speaks conference, particularly highlighting strong support for innovation in the cryptocurrency sector to provide clear regulatory rules for the market and investors. (Background: SEC's new chairman Paul Atkins reveals three major directions for cryptocurrency regulation: issuance, custody, and trading) (Context: Paul Atkins officially assumes the role of SEC chairman, next step to approve ETFs for altcoins like XRP, SOL, etc., and open Ethereum staking?) U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Paul Atkins recently emphasized the importance of innovation at the SEC Speaks conference, particularly highlighting strong support for the development of the cryptocurrency sector to provide clear regulatory rules for the market and investors. This article is sourced from Paul Atkins' speech, which is compiled and translated by the team. Thanks to Cicely for the enthusiastic introduction. Ladies and gentlemen, I am delighted to attend the SEC Speaks conference for the first time as the chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), although I have been a regular attendee of this event for the past 15 years. This event has experienced some ups and downs over the past few years, but I will ensure that it stabilizes and develops into a valuable and comprehensive public outreach activity for this agency. I would like to thank the staff of the Practising Law Institute for organizing this conference. I would also like to thank: SEC staff, who have the opportunity each year to publicly share their work over the past year and discuss expectations for the coming months; panelists participating in various discussions, whose questions and observations help focus the discussion on key issues and perspectives that may be overlooked internally by the SEC; the audience present, who have the opportunity to interact with one another and with the panelists; and the online audience, who can participate in this event through convenient virtual means. Innovation and SEC Today I want to talk about innovation, particularly that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission should not fear innovation but should embrace and drive it. The nature of markets is evolutionary; they are vibrant because of humanity. When humans encounter problems, they seek to solve them through innovation, driven by demand and the rewards of solutions. In a free society, human creativity and competitive spirit rise to meet challenges, combined with Adam Smith's 'invisible hand,' providing incentives beyond pure altruism. All of this is a good thing. Over the past few decades, including my tenure as an SEC commissioner from 2002 to 2008 and before that serving as staff for two SEC chairmen, the SEC has both facilitated innovation and, regrettably, at times stifled it. Fortunately, innovation—in other words, progress—ultimately prevailed. Let me take a few minutes to reflect on some modern history. In the late 1960s, the U.S. experienced a massive bull market. Daily trading volume surged to about 12 million shares, which, while seeming trivial today, overwhelmed the paper-based settlement and clearance systems as well as the work of transfer agents. With paper stock certificates piling up, staff had to transport them between brokerages on Wall Street and across the U.S. using carts, leading to a rapid decline in efficiency. Investors paid the price for this inefficiency, as securities were frequently misplaced, misdelivered, lost, or delayed in delivery, resulting in a surge in failed settlements, causing many undercapitalized brokerages to collapse under the weight of unfinished transactions. The ad hoc solution at the time was to shorten daily trading hours, even suspending trading on Wednesdays to allow firms to process paperwork. The New York Stock Exchange even closed for two days a week just to catch up on paperwork. This collapse due to an outdated system was termed the 'Paperwork Crisis.' As the first CEO of the Depository Trust Company (DTC), William Dentzer stated: 'The Paperwork Crisis led to billions of dollars in trades being delayed or completely failing, with investors' dividends being misdistributed and brokers going out of business.' But it is worth noting that the SEC was very proactive at the time, understanding that it needed to promote electronic trading and bookkeeping systems. But how to achieve this? The SEC held roundtables and collaborated with the industry, leveraging legislative authority and persuasion to drive innovation and technological advancement in back-office trade processing. Ultimately, the DTC was established as an industry cooperative, which later evolved into the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC). The SEC's proactive efforts facilitated the computerization of securities. That subsequent bull market was inevitably replaced by a long bear market. This time, many brokerages failed not due to inadequate back-office processing capability, but because of a collapse in revenues. The SEC worked with Congress and the industry to pass the Securities Investor Protection Act in 1970, establishing the Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC) to provide insurance protection for investors when brokerages fail. This was a positive innovation for investors, and the SEC played an important role in it. In the late 1980s to early 1990s, the American Stock Exchange and other entities proposed an innovative solution to the program trading issues identified by the SEC in the 1987 market crash. They proposed a tool for trading a basket of stocks called 'SPIDERS', or S&P Depository Receipts, which was a fund-traded stock portfolio. This was one of the earliest exchange-traded funds (ETFs). However, this proposal was delayed within the SEC for several years as various issues were raised by the departments at the time. Then-Chairman Richard Breeden explicitly directed department heads to 'solve the problems' and gave them a limited timeframe. He emphasized that it needed to be completed immediately. The SEC ultimately succeeded. SPDR was launched in 1993. Some within the SEC worried about whether the market would accept this innovation. In fact, sponsoring companies needed to work hard to persuade institutions to buy the product. But within three years, its scale grew to $1 billion. Chairman Breeden's viewpoint was to let the market decide; we cannot act as arbitrators. I think we can all agree that the innovation of SPDR and ETFs has been a great boon for investors. In the mid to late 1990s, during Arthur Levitt's chairmanship, proprietary trading systems became very popular, controversially shifting trading from exchanges to over-the-counter markets. Chairman Levitt believed that the SEC needed to provide regulatory flexibility for electronic markets to foster innovation. Therefore, the Alternative Trading System Rule (Reg ATS), passed in 1999, allowed alternative trading systems (ATS) to be regulated like brokers rather than exchanges. Entering the new century, the market proposed another innovation: the gold fund, which was the first commodity ETF. This concept bounced around like a pinball among various SEC departments and even crossed over to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Although it took some time, innovation ultimately prevailed, providing investors with the option to invest without needing to actually hold gold. Cryptocurrency innovation Speaking of which, the cryptocurrency market has been lingering in the SEC's gray area for many years. Initially, the SEC adopted a 'ostrich approach', seemingly hoping that cryptocurrencies would disappear on their own. It then shifted to a 'shoot first, ask questions later' enforcement action. The so-called 'welcome visit' often turns out to be receiving a subpoena at home.

JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, who has long been skeptical of cryptocurrencies, recently announced that the bank will allow its clients to purchase Bitcoin but will not provide custody services. (Background: JPMorgan: Bitcoin is expected to outperform gold in the second half of the year! BTC and MSTR are releasing bullish signals in sync) (Additional background: JPMorgan: If Solana and XRP ETFs are approved, they could attract $13.6 billion in funds in the first year) According to a report by The Block, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon recently announced that as the world's largest bank, JPMorgan Chase will allow its customers to purchase Bitcoin but will not offer custody services, only listing it on clients' statements. According to a person familiar with the bank's plans, JPMorgan is considering offering clients Bitcoin ETF services. So far, JPMorgan's cryptocurrency investments have primarily been limited to futures-based products rather than direct ownership of Bitcoin. Has Jamie Dimon shifted his skepticism towards cryptocurrencies? This decision marks a significant step for the bank in the Web3 space, especially considering Dimon's history of extensive criticism of the cryptocurrency market, which also signals Bitcoin's accelerated entry into mainstream investment. However, does this mean Dimon has changed his stance? Not necessarily; during a recent interview, he stated that his personal view on Bitcoin remains unchanged, but that doesn't mean he would refuse to provide services to clients. Dimon cited, "I think you shouldn't smoke, but I defend your right to smoke." Looking back, Jamie Dimon has maintained a strong critical stance on cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin since 2014, publicly criticizing its lack of intrinsic value multiple times. As early as 2017, during a CNBC meeting with institutional investors, he referred to Bitcoin as a "fraud" and likened it to being "worse than the 17th-century Dutch tulip bubble," even warning that any JPMorgan employees trading Bitcoin would be "immediately fired" for violating company policy and being "stupid and dangerous." In January 2025, during an interview with CBS News, he reiterated, "Bitcoin itself has no intrinsic value and is used mainly for sex trafficking, money laundering, and ransomware." He even likened Bitcoin to a "useless pet rock," bluntly stating that Bitcoin is a "Ponzi scheme," showing that his negative view on Bitcoin has not changed. JPMorgan's Active Positioning in Blockchain and Cryptocurrencies However, despite Dimon's personal reservations about Bitcoin, JPMorgan is at the forefront of the application of blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies. For example, in 2019, the bank launched its own digital currency, "JPM Coin," which is a stablecoin backed by the US dollar, used for real-time payment settlement between institutional clients. Currently, its daily transaction volume has reached $1 billion. Additionally, in 2020, JPMorgan established a blockchain division called "Onyx" (now renamed Kinexys), based on the Ethereum network, supporting wholesale payments, peer-to-peer lending, and cross-border transactions, having processed over $700 billion in transactions, with partners including Goldman Sachs, DBS Bank, and BNP Paribas. At the same time, JPMorgan has also invested in Bitcoin-related products, such as holding BlackRock's IBIT Bitcoin ETF and providing clearing services for CME's Bitcoin and Ethereum futures and options. Related reading: JPMorgan "first" completes a transaction on a public chain, collaborating with Ondo and Chainlink to settle tokenized assets, accelerating the integration of DeFi. Additionally, it is worth noting that according to JPMorgan's Q1 2025 financial report, as of March this year, the bank's Asset and Wealth Management (AWM) division had assets under management (AUM) of $4.1 trillion, a 15% increase from the same period in 2024. This figure includes investment assets managed for institutional and individual clients, such as stocks, fixed income securities, and alternative investments. Even if JPMorgan's clients allocate only 1% of their assets to Bitcoin, it would bring $41 billion in buying power to Bitcoin. JPMorgan: Bitcoin is expected to outperform gold in the second half of this year. Additionally, JPMorgan's managing director Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou's analysis team pointed out in a report last week that the current price trends of gold and Bitcoin exhibit a "zero-sum game" relationship, meaning one rises at the expense of the other: from mid-February to mid-April, the rise in gold was at the expense of Bitcoin; whereas in the past three weeks, the situation has reversed, with Bitcoin's rise suppressing gold. Based on this observation, JPMorgan expects this "zero-sum pattern" to continue until the second half of 2025 but emphasizes that Bitcoin has several bullish factors that could give it a relative advantage. The report stated: Overall, we expect this zero-sum game between gold and Bitcoin that has occurred since the beginning of this year to continue into the second half of this year, but we tend to believe that specific catalysts for cryptocurrencies will give Bitcoin greater upside potential compared to gold. Related reports: JPMorgan: The risks of Trump's tariff war are becoming clearer, it's time to "stop selling on the highs" in the US stock market. Is Tether forced to sell Bitcoin? JPMorgan: In line with new US stablecoin regulatory guidelines, the CEO responds quickly. JPMorgan: "Devaluation trading" is prevalent, and Bitcoin is becoming a more important investment! Last year, $78 billion flowed into the cryptocurrency market, setting a record. "JPMorgan CEO: Allowing clients to purchase Bitcoin unlocks $4 trillion in purchasing power?" This article was first published on BlockTempo (BlockTempo - the most influential blockchain news media).

Is Russia and Ukraine finally going to ceasefire? According to foreign media reports, Russian President Putin has currently stated that he had a fruitful phone conversation with U.S. President Trump on Monday (19). Emphasizing that Moscow is ready to cooperate with Ukraine on relevant memoranda for future peace negotiations. (Background: Is this for real? Putin suddenly announces a '30-hour Easter ceasefire'! Bitcoin surges past $85,000) (Background info: Will the Russia-Ukraine war end this year? Zelensky: Trump's tough stance will prevent Putin) According to the latest foreign media news, Russian President Putin has currently stated that he had a fruitful phone conversation with U.S. President Trump on Monday (19). During the conversation, Trump clearly expressed support for a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine, and Putin expressed gratitude for the U.S. involvement in restoring direct dialogue between Russia and Ukraine, emphasizing that Moscow is ready to cooperate with Ukraine on relevant memoranda for future peace negotiations. WSJ: Trump's stance is more in line with Ukraine. However, according to (The Wall Street Journal) reports, although White House officials have confirmed that the call between Trump and Putin is the latest effort by the U.S. government to initiate peace negotiations between Moscow and Kyiv, the White House described the call as 'highly uncertain', as Trump had previously coordinated with Ukrainian President Zelensky, asking what should be discussed with Putin. It is understood that Zelensky suggested Trump push Putin to accept a 30-day unconditional ceasefire agreement and agree to hold a meeting between Putin and Zelensky in the future (Trump can participate), while reiterating that the U.S. would not make any decisions regarding Ukraine without Kyiv's consent. This series of initiatives shows that the U.S. government increasingly believes that Putin remains the main obstacle to peace negotiations, while the U.S. and Ukraine's diplomatic strategies are more aligned. Moreover, regarding the specific content of Trump's conversation with Putin, (The Wall Street Journal) pointed out that the focus of discussion was whether Russia would agree to the 30-day unconditional ceasefire that Ukraine has expressed support for. Trump urged Putin to stop attacking Ukraine, especially as Russia launched hundreds of drone attacks on Ukraine again in the last two days. However, Putin's position appears more ambiguous; although he publicly stated support for stopping the war, he has repeatedly delayed the diplomatic process. In response, U.S. Vice President Pence stated that if Russia is not interested in a peace agreement, 'we can completely choose to withdraw.' He emphasized: 'The U.S. will not waste effort here. We want to see results. I'm not sure if Putin himself has a strategy to end the war.' Additionally, after talking with Putin, Trump is expected to speak with Zelensky again to further coordinate positions. What is Putin considering? (The Wall Street Journal) also pointed out that Putin has actually resisted reaching a ceasefire agreement with Ukraine, believing that Kyiv might use the ceasefire opportunity to regroup. The report continued to point out that Putin insists that any peace agreement must address what he calls the 'root causes' of the war, a phrasing that suggests he has not given up on his initial goal of depriving Ukraine of military capabilities and cutting its ties with the United States and the European Union. However, in response, White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt stated that Trump's options for imposing sanctions on Russia are still 'under consideration,' showing that the U.S. retains leverage in negotiations. Bitcoin rebounds to $106,000. Returning to the cryptocurrency market, Bitcoin quickly dropped from $107,000 to $102,000 last night, and began to rebound rapidly early this morning (20), reaching as high as $106,500 shortly after 8 AM. Related reports: Vitalik Buterin speaks in Chinese: recalling the story of Ethereum in China, ETH and BTC have cultural differences, the Russia-Ukraine war has changed me… Chainalysis: Due to the Russia-Ukraine war, high-risk and illegal on-chain activities in Eastern Europe have surged. Federal Reserve Chairman Powell states: March will raise by 25 basis points, the impact of the Russia-Ukraine war on the U.S. economy is unclear. 'Putin talks to Trump for two hours: ready to discuss a ceasefire agreement with Ukraine, or is it just a show? Bitcoin rebounds to $106,000.' This article was first published on BlockTempo (Blockchain news media with the most influence).