News linked to both this project and an event.
Robinhood has announced the official launch of the public mainnet for its proprietary Layer 2 network, Robinhood Chain. Built on the Arbitrum technology stack, the chain is positioned as an institution-grade, permissionless, AI-native network specifically designed for Real World Assets (RWA).Robinhood Chain's launch partners include Uniswap, Pleiades, Alchemy, BitGo, and Chainlink. Among them, Uniswap will deploy a dedicated AMM on the chain as the primary public liquidity protocol, while Pleiades will deploy its own AMM as the primary proprietary trading venue. The chain will also offer basic DeFi functionalities such as lending.Eligible users can trade tokenized stocks 24/7 on Robinhood Chain. Simultaneously, Robinhood Earn will introduce USDG-based decentralized lending products within the main app. In certain jurisdictions, the new version of Robinhood Wallet will also support access to Lighter's perpetual contract trading.Robinhood also announced the expansion of its European perpetual contract product range, its official entry into the Canadian market, and the acquisition of a Singapore Capital Markets Services license. Furthermore, Agentic Accounts for crypto trading are planned to begin rolling out in the US soon, allowing AI agents to participate in trading and fund management.Robinhood stated that this update represents its most ambitious global expansion and product vision to date, with the goal of establishing a more direct connection between traditional finance and DeFi, integrating stocks, crypto, RWA, perpetual contracts, and AI trading into a unified financial experience. (The Block)
World Liberty Financial, a crypto project backed by the Trump family, is expected to receive approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) to operate as a national trust bank in the near future. Two former OCC employees who spoke on condition of anonymity revealed that the application is almost certain to be approved.World Liberty Financial established a U.S. trust company in January of this year and submitted an application to the OCC. Obtaining a federal trust bank charter would allow the project to issue and redeem its USD1 stablecoin, manage reserves, provide digital asset custody, and offer conversion and settlement services under a single federal regulatory body, without relying on third-party intermediaries. Currently, the project's intermediary institution is BitGo. (The Block)
Circle has announced the launch of a wrapped Bitcoin product, cirBTC, on the Ethereum blockchain. The token is fully backed 1:1 by Bitcoin, designed to help users integrate BTC assets into DeFi scenarios such as lending, decentralized exchanges (DEXs), tokenized assets, and stablecoins.Circle stated that cirBTC is primarily aimed at institutional investors, whose target client base typically holds Bitcoin as a core crypto asset allocation and has already established trust in Circle's infrastructure through products like USDC. Currently, USDC's market capitalization exceeds $75 billion, making it the second-largest stablecoin in the market.The wrapped Bitcoin market is currently dominated by wBTC and cbBTC, launched by Coinbase. Among them, wBTC, launched in 2019, has a market cap of approximately $7.3 billion and remains the largest wrapped Bitcoin product; cbBTC, which went live in 2024, has a market cap close to $5.4 billion. With the launch of cirBTC, Circle will directly compete with Coinbase and BitGo, the primary custodian of wBTC, for institutional wrapped Bitcoin market share.Data shows that the total market capitalization of all wrapped Bitcoin tokens currently stands at approximately $12.5 billion to $13.5 billion, accounting for roughly 1% of Bitcoin's total market cap of about $1.25 trillion. (CoinDesk)
Stacks Releases Q1 2026 Ecosystem Metrics: sBTC Total Value Locked (TVL) Reaches $545 Million, and Deposit Caps Have Been Fully Removed; Decentralized Finance (DeFi) Active Deployed Capital on the Stacks Protocol Stands at $121 Million—Zest Protocol TVL Accounts for $75.9 Million, Granite $26 Million, and StackingDAO $20 Million. During the Same Period, the Bitcoin Staking Pilot Product Dual Stacking App Attracted Over $100 Million in Participating Capital. On the Infrastructure Front, Integrations with Fireblocks, BitGo, Circle, and Nansen Are Now Live. Regarding Network Upgrades, Stacks Completed Version 3.3.0.0.6 in March 2026, and SIP-034 Enhancements Increased Network Capacity by up to 30x.
According to Ondo Finance’s official blog, Ondo Finance recently submitted a “no-action” request to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), seeking confirmation from the SEC that it will not take enforcement action against Ondo’s model for recording and managing certain security interests in tokenized form on the Ethereum mainnet. The request concerns its Ondo Global Markets (OGM) product, which currently offers non-U.S. investors tokenized notes providing exposure to U.S. equities and ETFs. Under this model, the underlying securities remain within the existing legal, custodial, and recordkeeping frameworks; official books and records remain unchanged. Only in limited circumstances are the relevant security interests mapped onto the Ethereum mainnet in tokenized form, held by custodian BitGo to support recordkeeping and operational processes.