News linked to both this project and an event.
stablecoin infrastructure company HIFI has completed a $37 million Series A funding round led by Left Lane Capital, with the specific valuation not yet disclosed. HIFI CEO Zach Walsh stated that this is the company's first priced funding round, and the platform currently processes approximately $7 billion in annualized direct transaction volume. The funding will be used to expand stablecoin payment products and tokenized capital markets infrastructure. HIFI currently supports fiat on/off ramps between USD and stablecoins, payments through the U.S. banking system and bank cards, and provides USD cash settlement services for tokenized repurchase agreements and U.S. Treasury transactions. HIFI has also previously participated in the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC)'s production trading tests for tokenized securities. (Cointelegraph)
Odaily reports: The National Council of Legislators from Gaming States (NCLGS) has filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in support of the New Jersey Attorney General and gambling regulators' petition to hear their case against prediction market platform Kalshi. The petition seeks to clarify whether state governments or federal agencies have jurisdiction over prediction market companies.NCLGS stated that if the ruling favors Kalshi, states would be unable to regulate sports betting within prediction markets, potentially leading to regulatory confusion. The council believes that gambling-related matters should be handled by state regulators, and noted that casinos and other regulated entities may adjust their operations and products accordingly.New Jersey authorities filed a petition for a writ of certiorari on September 2, stemming from their appeal of a Third Circuit Court of Appeals ruling. Kalshi has not yet formally responded and must submit its position brief by November 9; the company has previously stated that it cannot be regulated separately by 50 different regulators. (Cointelegraph)
Odaily News: The European Banking Authority (EBA), the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA), and the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) stated in a joint risk update that advances in quantum computing could weaken the cryptographic systems that secure blockchain transactions, communications, and database security.In March, Google Quantum AI researchers estimated that the number of physical qubits required to break the cryptographic techniques used by many cryptocurrencies may be about 20 times fewer than previously estimated. A computer capable of carrying out such an attack does not yet exist.In February, Bitcoin developer Jameson Lopp and others proposed phasing out current signature schemes and restricting how unmigrated funds can be used five years after the proposal's activation. The proposal has not yet been adopted. The Ethereum Foundation plans to make Ethereum's execution, consensus, and data layers quantum-resistant by December 2029. (Cointelegraph)
Odaily reports: Privacy blockchain project Zcash plans to implement the NU7 upgrade, after which it will stop accepting the fourth version transaction format that allows spending of Sprout pool funds. If ZEC is not transferred out before the upgrade, holders may lose the ability to spend the related funds.The proposal will not destroy Sprout pool funds, and access may still be restored in the future. However, the proposal warns that funds remaining in the pool may also become permanently unspendable. Zcash co-founder Zooko Wilcox has reposted the related reminder.NU7 is scheduled to activate on the testnet on October 6, and Zcash is expected to decide on October 20 whether to activate on the mainnet on November 5 as planned. The upgrade will also shorten the target block time from 75 seconds to 25 seconds and maintain the network's halving cycle. (Cointelegraph)
Odaily News: U.S. Republican Senator John Curtis of Utah has sent a letter to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley and Ranking Member Dick Durbin, calling for an investigation into whether Donald Trump Jr. and Hunter Biden used their presidential family connections to obtain private economic benefits, and requesting that both be subpoenaed.Curtis noted that Donald Trump Jr. previously accepted wedding gifts from Russian oligarch Umar Kremlev, actively promoted a family-backed crypto business, and served as an advisor to a prediction market platform; the company in question is regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Donald Trump stated that his son has returned the relevant payments to Umar Kremlev.Curtis also requested an investigation into Hunter Biden's large-scale business dealings with foreign entities, as well as whether both individuals used their relationship with the president to create business value. He mentioned that Joe Biden pardoned Hunter Biden in December 2024, and the latter had previously denied involving his father in business transactions.The call for this investigation comes one week after Senate Republicans failed to secure enough Democratic support to advance the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act. Some Democratic lawmakers opposed the bill, citing reasons including Donald Trump's use of crypto businesses to gain benefits related to the presidency; Donald Trump disclosed that he earned $1.4 billion from digital asset-related businesses in 2025. (Cointelegraph)
Odaily News: European asset management company 21shares has launched physically-backed Zcash ETP and Ether.fi ETP on Euronext Paris and Amsterdam markets, tracking ZEC and ETHFI respectively. Investors can gain exposure through brokerage accounts without directly holding the tokens.ETHFI is the governance and utility token of the decentralized finance protocol Ether.fi. Both ETPs carry an annual management fee of 2.5%. (Cointelegraph)
Odaily reports: The U.S. Senate failed to advance the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act on September 15 with a vote of 49 in favor and 50 against, and with limited remaining legislative sessions before Congress's 2027 term, the bill's chances of passage have diminished.Fairshake, a political action committee backed by Coinbase and Ripple Labs, plans to spend $30 million in the Ohio Senate race to oppose Sherrod Brown. Fairshake spent over $130 million on advertising during the 2024 election cycle and approximately $41 million opposing Brown.Stand With Crypto, an advocacy group launched by Coinbase in 2023, said it will mobilize supporters to participate in the 2026 midterm elections based on lawmakers' voting records on the bill. As of Monday, Fairshake and its affiliated political action committees had not disclosed any new spending following the vote. (Cointelegraph)
Odaily reports: Prediction marketplace Trueo plans to migrate from Base to Ethereum, stating that Ethereum's mainnet can provide broader integration opportunities and product development space. Trueo launched on Base in March 2025.After the migration is complete, Trueo will prioritize attracting liquidity and launch a next-generation oracle system for verifying real-world outcomes and settling prediction markets. Trueo stated that integration on Base was primarily limited to its own ecosystem.Trueo co-founder Lumberg said Ethereum is suitable for building a credibly neutral oracle system and prediction marketplace. According to DefiLlama data, Trueo is currently the 14th-ranked platform by total value locked among on-chain prediction markets, with approximately $795,700 in TVL. (Cointelegraph)
Odaily News: The nonprofit organization Ethereum Institutional posted on X expressing support for the Ethereum block time reduction proposal EIP-8198 ("Quick Slots") put forward by Ethlabs, stating that as more institutional activity migrates on-chain, it is necessary to improve Ethereum's speed. The proposal plans to initially reduce Ethereum's block time from the current 12 seconds to 10 seconds. Ethlabs previously stated that 20 DeFi founders have publicly supported the proposal, and it is merging its specifications with the Ethereum main codebase to push for its inclusion in the subsequent upgrade Hegotá. (Cointelegraph)
Odaily reports: Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at crypto-focused venture capital firm Dragonfly, has proposed that under current rules, the Zcash development fund should cease operations after its expiration in 2028.Qureshi wrote: "I think this should be the last development fund." He stated that the current fund size is already sufficient to support Zcash's remaining development work, and as the fund's value approaches $100 million, it may face "politicization" risks in the future. According to ZecStats data, as of press time, the Zcash development fund holds 63,962 ZEC, worth approximately $95 million.These remarks come amid ongoing industry discussions about the growing size of the development fund. The previous rise in ZEC's price drove a significant increase in the fund's value. Some also argue that Zcash should continue to maintain the development fund. Paradigm founder Matt Huang said on Wednesday that against the backdrop of improving AI network attack capabilities and the rapid development of quantum computing, the fund is particularly important.
Odaily reports: The Zcash development team plans to activate the NU7 mainnet upgrade on November 5, after various organizations and engineering teams reached consensus on the upgrade content and expected timeline. Zcash developer Sean Bowe stated that the upgrade will activate on testnet on October 6.The team plans to evaluate NU7 testnet performance on October 20 before finalizing the mainnet upgrade and activation block height. The upgrade aims to reduce the target block interval from 75 seconds to 25 seconds, deprecate version 4 transactions, and integrate a network sustainability mechanism.The chosen network sustainability mechanism will preserve the Zcash halving cycle, with previously removed supply to be reintroduced starting February 2031. NU7 does not introduce new transaction formats and has limited impact on wallets, but full nodes, indexers, and block explorers may need adjustments. (Cointelegraph)
Odaily reports: Anchorage Digital Bank, the first federally chartered crypto bank in the United States, has added custody support for Etherlink and 7 assets on its network, including xU3O8, a token representing ownership of physical uranium.The other supported assets include WXTZ, liquid staking token stXTZ, USDT, USDC, USDSM, and WETH. Institutional clients can custody assets issued on Etherlink, a Tezos Layer 2 network, through the bank's segregated accounts. (Cointelegraph)
According to Cointelegraph, Binance officially launched its ETF wealth management service on September 15, initially offering 11 exchange-traded funds (ETFs) that primarily invest in short-term U.S. Treasury bonds and investment-grade bonds.
Odaily News: Solana has increased the maximum size of a single transaction from 1232 bytes to 4096 bytes. The upgrade went live on the mainnet on Tuesday at approximately 1:00 UTC, at the start of epoch 1035.The upgrade introduces the v1 transaction format and maintains full backward compatibility with legacy transactions. Existing applications and wallet providers can continue using the original format, while protocols that need to leverage the increased capacity must upgrade to v1 transactions.The Solana Foundation stated that the capacity increase will support more complex operations within a single transaction, such as zero-knowledge proofs, multisig transactions, and new on-chain signing schemes. (Cointelegraph)
According to Cointelegraph citing Politico, Senate Democrats involved in negotiations over U.S. crypto market structure legislation are preparing to submit a counterproposal to the latest revised CLARITY Act introduced by Republicans. When Republican lawmakers released the new draft on Sunday, they described it as the "last, best, and final offer" to Democrats, but some Democrats remain unwilling to accept the current version.
Senate Democrats involved in negotiations over the CLARITY Act are preparing to file a counterproposal in response to the latest revised text from Republicans. Republicans had previously described the version released on Sunday as their "last, best, and final offer" to Democrats.Some Democrats remain dissatisfied with the crypto asset ethics provisions in the latest text. Senator Mark Warner said that Democrats who have been involved in the negotiations are putting forward a counterproposal. The proposal will be introduced before a key procedural vote on Tuesday, which will determine whether the CLARITY Act can advance to full Senate consideration. (Cointelegraph)
North Korea is using remote IT workers from third countries such as Iran and Lebanon to infiltrate US companies in order to obtain funding to support its weapons programs. After the relevant individuals pass interviews, their positions are usually taken over by North Korean personnel.The US government and multiple foreign agencies issued warnings in July stating that North Korean IT workers seek contracts and send salaries back to their affiliated North Korean organizations, while also posing insider threats to companies, involving data leaks, cryptocurrency theft, and the theft of sensitive information.Some third-country IT workers are recruited through LinkedIn, and some of them work part-time as "interview facilitators," earning $500 in cryptocurrency per month.Data from cybersecurity company CrowdStrike shows that in 2025, cryptocurrency losses caused by North Korea state-linked hackers and threat actors exceeded $2 billion, an increase of 51% year over year. South Korea's central bank estimates that North Korea's GDP grew 3.5% in 2025. (Cointelegraph)
According to Cointelegraph, Standard Chartered Bank published a report providing first-time coverage of the SKY token from the decentralized finance platform Sky, assigning it a year-end 2028 target price of $0.325. This represents an approximate fivefold increase from the $0.065 reference price cited in the report. Geoff Kendrick, Global Head of Digital Asset Research at Standard Chartered, compared Sky to a "federal bank," noting its issuance of stablecoins, establishment of governance frameworks, and charging of wholesale interest rates to borrowers.
the UK House of Lords on Wednesday passed an amendment by a vote of 194 in favor to 138 against, requiring the government to formulate a digital asset strategy, despite opposition to the measure from the ruling Labour Party.The amendment, proposed by Conservative peer Baroness Neville-Rolfe, requires the UK Treasury to formulate, publish, and seek consultation on the strategy within 12 months after the Financial Services and Markets Act takes effect.The strategy will cover crypto assets, stablecoins, and tokenized securities, and address issues including innovation, consumer protection, and enterprises' access to banking, payment, and settlement services. The related bill still needs to be submitted to the House of Commons, where lawmakers may accept, amend, or reject the Lords' amendments.The UK Cryptoasset Business Council expressed support for the vote result. Previously, Lord Stockwood, the UK Treasury's Minister for Investment, had stated that the government already has a digital asset strategy and is implementing it. (Cointelegraph)
According to Cointelegraph, the Coinbase connector has officially launched on Grok, enabling users to view their account balance, analyze data, and place trades directly within the chat interface, significantly lowering the barrier to managing Coinbase accounts.