Dongcha Beating AI Flash News: Anthropic is preparing to launch a new model better at understanding users' real intentions. The Information cited a pre-tester as saying the new model outperforms the currently available Claude in reasoning and meeting user needs. For example, when a user only asks to fix a single bug, it may further identify common issues causing such bugs and ask if they want to fix them together. The new model is also said to be better at proposing unconventional solutions: if a user consults about stock investment, it may design its own prediction algorithm instead of just repeating common analysis methods like price-earnings ratios. However, these evaluations only come from one tester so far, with no public test data available. The community speculates the new model may be Claude Fable 5.5. On October 13, LiteLLM synced `claude-fable-5-5` from the Azure model directory, but deleted the entry the next day after audit. Meanwhile, Google is internally testing Gemini 4 Carbon. Business Insider previously reported that some employees believe its programming ability is close to Claude Opus 5.5. OpenAI is also preparing a new version of Terra, with reports suggesting it may launch in the coming weeks, with further improved capabilities and an expected price lower than GPT-6.1 Sol.
Contributors will run the protocol through DAO DAO organizations, while vxASTRO holders retain the normal unlock process and ASTRO emissions go to zero.
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NEW YORK, NY/ ACCESS Newswire/ October 7, 2026/ Globa Terra Acquisition Corporation today announced that it has entered into a non-binding Letter of Intent with Nature's Ledger Inc. regarding a proposed business combination. The LOI represents an important step toward the negotiation and execution of a definitive Business Combination Agreement between...
NEW YORK, NY / ACCESS Newswire / October 7, 2026 / Globa Terra Acquisition Corporation ("Globa Terra" or the "Company") today announced that it has entered into a non-binding Letter of Intent ("LOI") with Nature's Ledger Inc. ("Nature's Ledger") regarding a proposed business combination.
The LOI represents an important step toward the negotiation and execution of a definitive Business Combination Agreement ("BCA") between the parties. Subject to satisfactory completion of due diligence, negotiation of definitive agreements, required corporate and shareholder approvals, regulatory review and other customary closing conditions, the proposed transaction is intended to result in Nature's Ledger becoming a publicly traded company.
Nature's Ledger is developing an integrated platform focused on the rapidly expanding real-world asset ("RWA") tokenization economy, with particular emphasis on nature-based assets including agriculture, biodiversity, soil, water, carbon and related environmental assets.
The company's ecosystem is designed to connect verified physical and environmental assets with modern digital infrastructure and global capital markets. Nature's Ledger has developed capabilities spanning asset origination, nature-based asset project development, verification, blockchain-enabled tokenization, digital asset infrastructure and marketplace functionality.
Through its operating ecosystem, Nature's Ledger is seeking to create greater transparency, liquidity and accessibility for categories of natural assets that historically have been difficult to finance, trade or access through traditional capital markets.
A Platform Positioned for RWA, Nature-Based Markets and Global Capital
The proposed transaction reflects Globa Terra's strategy of identifying businesses positioned within large addressable markets where technology, capital formation and structural changes in global markets can create significant long-term growth opportunities.
The growth of real-world asset tokenization is creating new opportunities to connect traditional assets with blockchain-based financial infrastructure. Nature's Ledger is focused specifically on extending this model to nature-based and environmentally linked assets.
Nature's Ledger's broader ecosystem includes activities related to the origination and development of high-integrity carbon credits, digital verification infrastructure, natural-asset tokenization, artificial intelligence applications and the development of marketplace infrastructure for tokenized RWAs.
Its nature-based and carbon market operations have included relationships and projects involving agricultural producers, Indigenous and First Nations communities and environmental projects, while its broader strategy is designed around accessing a global marketplace for natural capital.
Global Opportunity
Nature's Ledger's business model is designed to provide standardized, measured, and monitored natural assets providing a structured bridge between physical natural assets and global investors, creating the potential for previously illiquid assets to participate in increasingly digital and internationally accessible financial markets.
Management believes this intersection of environmental markets, blockchain infrastructure and institutional capital could create significant opportunities as the RWA market continues to develop globally.
Nature's Ledger originated in the heartland of Canadian agriculture. Today, the company operates in a variety of jurisdictions, including Canada, the United States, Europe, Brazil and Southeast Asia.
Extension Financing and Alignment Between the Parties
As Globa Terra progresses toward the execution of a definitive BCA, Nature's Ledger has agreed, as part of the ongoing transaction process, to contribute toward a portion of the costs associated with extending Globa Terra's business-combination period.
The extension is intended to provide the parties with additional time to complete the definitive BCA, regulatory filings, financing activities and other work required to complete the proposed business combination.
Nature's Ledger's participation in a portion of the extension costs demonstrates the parties' shared commitment to advancing the transaction while work continues toward formal execution of the BCA and, ultimately, the closing of the proposed business combination.
Any extension remains subject to the applicable provisions of Globa Terra's governing documents, shareholder approvals where required, applicable law and the final terms approved by the parties and their respective legal advisers.
Edward J. Preble, Vice President of Investor Relations, Globa Terra Acquisition Corporation, commented:
"We believe Nature's Ledger represents the type of differentiated opportunity Globa Terra was established to identify. The company sits at the intersection of several powerful trends - real-world asset tokenization, environmental markets, blockchain infrastructure and the increasing institutionalization of natural assets.
"What is particularly compelling to us is that Nature's Ledger is not approaching RWA simply as a digital-asset concept. The company is building an ecosystem around underlying real-world assets, including agriculture, biodiversity, soil, water, and carbon, together with the technology and infrastructure necessary to structure, verify and ultimately connect those assets with global markets.
"The decision by Nature's Ledger to participate in a portion of Globa Terra's extension costs as we advance toward execution of the definitive Business Combination Agreement further demonstrates the alignment between the parties and our collective focus on completing this transaction.
"We look forward to working closely with Nature's Ledger and our respective advisers as we move through due diligence, definitive documentation, financing, regulatory filings and the remaining steps required to complete the proposed business combination."
"This LOI represents an important milestone for Nature's Ledger and a significant step toward accelerating our vision of bringing real-world assets into modern capital markets.
"Nature's Ledger was built around a simple belief: the future of finance will be backed by nature-based assets. Our vertically integrated model combines asset ownership, project development, merchant banking, verification infrastructure, and purpose-built blockchain technology to create a trusted pathway between natural assets and global investors.
"What differentiates Nature's Ledger is that we are not simply building tokenization technology. We are building the infrastructure, relationships, and underlying asset base required to create scalable and transparent real-world asset markets. From agriculture and water to biodiversity, carbon, and other natural resources, our focus is on unlocking value from tangible assets that support economies, communities, and food systems.
"We believe Globa Terra brings deep capital markets expertise and a shared vision for expanding access to real-world assets through modern financial infrastructure. Together, we have an opportunity to accelerate the development of the trusted rails for nature's value, connecting natural assets with global capital in ways that are transparent, verifiable, and accessible to a broader range of participants."
About Nature's Ledger
Nature's Ledger Inc. is a vertically integrated technology company building the infrastructure for the tokenization and on‑chain trading of real‑world assets. The company operates purpose‑built blockchain rails and captive asset holdings across agriculture, forestry, real estate, water, and other natural resource sectors, enabling the issuance, trading, and financing of real‑world assets.
Nature's Ledger's end-to-end model combines merchant banking, project finance and advisory services with direct ownership of key assets, creating transparent, verifiable, and accessible pathways for participation in global capital markets. The company also enables the tokenization of land, water, biodiversity, carbon, and agricultural commodities to support global food systems, alongside a consumer‑facing exchange for real‑world asset markets.
For more information: www.naturesledger.com
About Globa Terra Acquisition Corporation
Globa Terra Acquisition Corporation is a special purpose acquisition company formed for the purpose of effecting a merger, share exchange, asset acquisition, share purchase, recapitalization, reorganization or similar business combination with one or more businesses.
Globa Terra seeks to identify companies with differentiated business models, attractive long-term growth opportunities and the potential to benefit from access to the U.S. public capital markets.
Transaction Process
The Letter of Intent is an important milestone in the transaction process but does not constitute a definitive agreement.
Globa Terra and Nature's Ledger expect to continue working toward completion of due diligence and negotiation of a definitive Business Combination Agreement.
Completion of a proposed business combination would be subject to, among other things, execution of definitive agreements, approval by the boards of directors of the respective parties, Globa Terra shareholder approval where required, regulatory and securities-law requirements, satisfaction of applicable Nasdaq requirements, financing considerations and other customary closing conditions.
There can be no assurance that a definitive Business Combination Agreement will be executed or that the proposed business combination will ultimately be completed.
Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable federal securities laws. Forward-looking statements include statements regarding the proposed business combination between Globa Terra and Nature's Ledger, the negotiation and execution of a definitive Business Combination Agreement, the timing and financing of any extension of Globa Terra's business-combination period, Nature's Ledger's participation in extension-related costs, the anticipated benefits of a potential transaction, Nature's Ledger's business strategy and growth opportunities, financing plans, regulatory filings and the anticipated timing or completion of the proposed transaction.
These statements are based on current expectations and assumptions and involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements.
There can be no assurance that Globa Terra and Nature's Ledger will enter into a definitive Business Combination Agreement, that financing will be obtained on acceptable terms, that applicable shareholder or regulatory approvals will be received, or that any proposed business combination will be completed.
Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date made.
Additional Information
If a definitive Business Combination Agreement is executed, Globa Terra and/or the combined company expects to file relevant materials with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") regarding the proposed transaction.
Investors and security holders are urged to read such materials when they become available because they will contain important information regarding the proposed business combination.
This communication is for informational purposes only and does not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any securities, nor shall there be any sale of securities in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful.
Investor Relations Contact
Edward J. Preble, MBA
Vice President, Investor Relations
Globa Terra Acquisition Corporation
(904)583-7145
[email protected]
USA Circulation
SOURCE: Globa Terra Acquisition Corporation
View the original press release on ACCESS Newswire
The Collapse That Changed EverythingIf you have ever wondered why Terra Classic's native token is called $LUNC rather than LUNA, the answer lies in one of crypto's most dramatic meltdowns.
Proposal 1623 and the Chain Split
The original stablecoin was similarly rebranded, becoming $USTC rather than UST.
In short, $LUNC and LUNA are the same token separated by a governance decision taken at a moment of crisis. One name belonged to a functioning ecosystem; the other is what remained after the chain split.
Sources:
Terra Official Docs: About Terra and Proposal 1623
CNBC: Terra backers vote to revive luna cryptocurrency, abandon UST
CoinDesk: Do Kwon Pushes On-Chain Proposal 1623 Live
Planned Halt, Swift RecoveryTerra Classic ($LUNC) is back producing blocks after a brief, scheduled network halt on September 24 to apply a mandatory security patch. The chain stopped at block 30,544,730 at around 17:51 CEST, with block production resuming by 18:17 CEST, roughly 26 minutes later. By that point, 57 of 87 validators had signed on to the new release.
The upgrade, labelled v4.0.1-patch.3, was , rolled out through a coordinated governance proposal that passed with . , reflecting the community-driven process that governs the chain.
What the Patch Fixes Full technical details of the flaw will not be made public until September 28, when
The Terra Classic team moved quickly to meet that deadline, with
No action is needed on the part of ordinary token holders.
Sources
Terra Classic v4.0.1-patch.3 Release Notes, classic-terra GitHub
Terra Classic v4.0.1 Patch.3 Upgrade: What $LUNC Holders Need to Know, KuCoin
How the Oracle Vote WorksServices like Chainlink aggregate price data from many sources through a decentralized set of independent node operators, and most blockchains rely on them for exactly that. Terra Classic takes a different approach: it puts that responsibility directly on its validators.
The Terra network relies on validators to periodically vote on the current Luna exchange rate, with the protocol updating the on-chain rate as the weighted median of the ballot. This means larger validators, those with more stake behind them, carry more weight in determining the final price.
During each voting period, the oracle module requires all members of the validator set to submit a vote for the Luna exchange rate. Validators must first pre-commit to an exchange rate, then in the subsequent period submit and reveal their rate alongside proof of that pre-commitment. This scheme forces the voter to commit to a submission before knowing the votes of others, reducing centralization and free-rider risk.
Because this process occurs every 30 seconds, validators must set up an automated process to avoid getting slashed and jailed.
Penalties for Missing VotesThe system is backed by strict enforcement. When a validator misses votes or fails to vote correctly in the oracle process, other validators can submit evidence of the misbehavior. Once confirmed, the offending validator will have a portion of their funds slashed and may be jailed or excluded from consensus for a period of time.
Validators who land close to the weighted median share in the oracle reward pool. Those that participate faithfully and vote within the reward band around the weighted median earn a portion of seigniorage as an incentive to stay active and accurate.
The participation data reflects how seriously the validator set takes this obligation. According to validator.info data, 86 of 87 active validators voted in the latest round, a near-perfect participation rate that underscores the financial incentive to stay compliant.
Sources:
Terra Classic Protocol Docs - Terra Classic Documentation
Set Up an Oracle Feeder - Terra Classic Documentation
Chainlink Price Feeds - Chainlink Official Documentation
Quick Overview LUNA experienced approximately 15% growth within a single day, pushing weekly gains close to 30%. The exchange giant announced backing for Terra’s v2.21.0 network enhancement set for September 21. Network transactions will be temporarily suspended during the upgrade, though spot trading continues uninterrupted. Trading activity for LUNA exploded by approximately 1,290%, with derivatives positions also climbing substantially. Market analyst Crypto Anu noted the price action followed typical patterns seen during protocol upgrades. Terra’s native token experienced significant upward momentum on September 21 following Binance’s announcement that it would facilitate the blockchain’s v2.21.0 enhancement.
Terra (LUNA) Price The digital asset reached approximately $0.0536, reflecting a near 15% increase during the preceding 24-hour window. Over seven days, LUNA climbed roughly 30%.
Intraday price fluctuations ranged between roughly $0.0464 and $0.0646. This considerable volatility coincided with dramatically elevated market participation.
Market turnover expanded by nearly 1,290% in a single day, signaling intensified investor interest surrounding the protocol enhancement.
Exchange Backs Protocol Enhancement The v2.21.0 enhancement focuses on bolstering network protection, operational reliability, and cross-chain functionality.
Implementation is scheduled at blockchain height 22,942,000 on September 21. The exchange indicated the event would occur near 15:00 UTC, with transaction services halting approximately one hour earlier at 14:00 UTC.
Spot market operations will continue throughout the implementation period. The platform confirmed it would manage all technical aspects for customers maintaining Terra-related holdings.
Transaction services are scheduled to resume after the enhanced network demonstrates consistent performance.
Terra Phoenix developers emphasized that holders need not perform any manual steps. A brief network suspension may be necessary as node operators finalize the transition.
Market Participation Intensifies Technical indicators on LUNA’s daily timeframe reflected building bullish pressure. The token maintained positions above both its 50-period and 200-period simple moving averages.
The Relative Strength Index retreated from 71 to approximately 65.52. This indicated persistent upward momentum, though slightly moderated from peak readings.
Futures market metrics presented contrasting signals. Aggregate open interest in LUNA contracts increased more than 90% daily to roughly $5.10 million.
Specifically on Binance, futures positions reportedly doubled within the same timeframe. Nevertheless, overall LUNA futures open interest across all venues declined approximately 8.55% in the most recent four-hour segment.
A social media post from analyst Crypto Anu highlighted that LUNA generated approximately 40% price movement surrounding the protocol enhancement, transaction pauses, and heightened volatility. The analyst characterized this as a recognizable pattern during network upgrades.
Currently, market attention centers on the v2.21.0 implementation, with major exchange support in place as LUNA maintains prices substantially above recent lows amid sustained elevated trading activity.
LUNA, the native token of the Terra blockchain, surged nearly 15% in the past 24 hours after Binance confirmed it would support Terra’s upcoming v2.21.0 network upgrade. The move also lifted LUNA’s weekly gains to around 30%, sparking renewed investor interest across both spot and derivatives markets.
Significant price momentum and volatilityDuring the recent price surge, LUNA reached approximately $0.0536, up from lows near $0.0464 and briefly peaking at $0.0646. This rapid appreciation coincided with a sharp increase in trading activity as 24-hour volume ballooned by about 1,290%.
Aggregate market turnover reached levels not seen in the recent past, positioning LUNA among the most actively traded tokens in its segment for the day. Investors responded ahead of the protocol upgrade, with spot and futures markets reflecting elevated volatility and shifting open interest metrics.
Crypto analyst Crypto Anu pointed out that LUNA’s price action represented a “classic upgrade playbook,” noting: “$LUNA just printed +40%. Network upgrade incoming. Exchanges pausing deposits. Volatility unlocked.”
Technical analysis revealed ongoing bullish momentum. LUNA maintained its position above both the 50-period and 200-period simple moving averages on daily charts, while the Relative Strength Index eased from readings of 71 to around 65.5, suggesting persistent but modestly reduced upward pressure.
Binance, recognized as one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, stated it would fully support Terra’s v2.21.0 upgrade, scheduled to take place at blockchain height 22,942,000 on September 21. Binance specified that transaction-related services would be paused at approximately 14:00 UTC, one hour before the implementation, and would resume once network stability is confirmed.
During the upgrade, spot trading on Binance will remain available. The platform committed to handling all technical requirements for customers holding Terra-related assets, minimizing the intervention required by individual participants.
According to Terra Phoenix core developers, users are not required to take action during the transition. The team indicated a brief suspension may occur as node operators finalize the upgrade process, after which regular network services will be restored.
Mini dictionary: Terra Phoenix, the developer group responsible for maintaining the Terra blockchain infrastructure and overseeing key network upgrades after LUNA’s 2022 ecosystem collapse. The team’s role is to coordinate technical enhancements and community initiatives.
Binance’s endorsement of the network enhancement was seen as a catalyst for heightened activity, reflected both in trading volumes and renewed market sentiment around the project.
Date/EventPrice Range24h Volume ChangeKey Exchange ActionSeptember 20$0.0464 – $0.0536N/APre-announcementSeptember 21 (Upgrade day)$0.0464 – $0.0646+1,290%Binance suspends Terra transactions at 14:00 UTCDerivatives market sees rising interestFutures market behavior echoed the spot market’s momentum. Open interest in LUNA contracts climbed by more than 90% to $5.1 million over the 24-hour period, with Binance reporting a doubling of futures positions. In contrast, total LUNA futures open interest across all venues decreased by around 8.5% in the most recent four hours, indicating that much of the speculative interest was concentrated during the period surrounding the upgrade announcement.
These changes reflect a pattern often observed during major protocol enhancements, as investors position for potential short-term volatility. With the upgrade’s successful implementation pending, LUNA’s price remains well above its recent lows, and trading activity stays elevated compared to previous weeks.
Market observers expect LUNA’s price trend to remain closely tied to technical progress on the Terra blockchain and the continued support from major exchanges like Binance.
The world’s largest crypto exchange Binance on Monday said it will support the upcoming Terra (LUNA) network upgrade. As a result, LUNA price skyrocketed and extended weekly gains to almost 30%.
Binance Will Support Terra Network Upgrade The Terra network is set to undergo a v2.21.0 upgrade today, September 21. This upgrade focuses on strengthening network security, stability, and interoperability.
This is key for the infrastructure behind every transaction and app on Terra. “No action is required from users. A brief network pause may occur while validators upgrade,” said the Terra Phoenix team.
The network upgrade will take place at block height 22,942,000. It is expected to happen at 16:00 UTC, according to the upgrade countdown data.
Binance will temporarily pause deposits and withdrawals of tokens on the Terra network, supporting the network upgrade and ensuring the best user experience. The crypto exchange added that trading on the network will not be impacted and the exchange will handle all technical requirements for all users.
Binance said LUNA trading will continue as normal. The leading crypto exchange will handle technical requirements for users holding the token on the exchange. Deposits and withdrawals will resume once the upgraded network is considered stable.
LUNA Price Skyrockets amid Massive Trading Volume LUNA price has jumped nearly 15% over the past 24 hours, with the price currently trading at $0.0536. The 24-hour low and high were $0.0464 and $0.0646, respectively. Trading volume has also climbed sharply in the last 24 hours, up almost 1290%.
In the daily timeframe, the price is trading above the 50-SMA and just above the 200-SMA at the time of writing. Relative Strength Index (RSI) has dropped from 71 to around 65.52, signaling potential profit booking by traders after the 30% upside in a week.
CoinGlass data showed mixed sentiment in the derivatives market. The 24-hour Terra futures open interest jumped more than 90% to $5.10 million, up 100% on Binance. However, futures LUNA open interest has dropped nearly 8.55% across crypto exchanges in the last 4 hours.
Traders looking to speculate on LUNA’s sudden price spikes should evaluate the best crypto futures trading platforms to find competitive fee structures and deep liquidity.
This is a general announcement. Products and services referred to here may not be available in your region. Fellow Binancians, Starting at approximately 2026-09-21 14:00 (UTC), Binance will suspend the deposits and withdrawals of token(s) on the Terra (LUNA) network to support its network upgrade to ensure the best user experience. The network upgrade will take place at the block height of 22,942,000, or approximately at 2026-09-21 15:00 (UTC). Please note: The trading of token(s) on the aforementioned network will not be impacted.Binance will handle all technical requirements involved for all users.Deposits and withdrawals for token(s) on the aforementioned network will be reopened once the upgraded network is deemed to be stable. No further announcement will be posted.There may be discrepancies between this original content in English and any translated versions. Please refer to the original English version for the most accurate information, in case any discrepancies arise. For more information, please refer to the announcement from the project team. Thank you for your support! Binance Team 2026-09-21
Not financial or tax advice. PANews content is strictly educational and informational and is not investment advice, financial advice, tax advice, legal advice, or a solicitation to buy or sell any digital asset, security, or financial product. Do your own research and consult qualified advisers.
Disclosure. PANews may publish sponsored content, partner content, advertisements, affiliate links, event promotions, and market commentary involving Web3 projects, service providers, or financial products. PANews personnel, contributors, or affiliates may hold digital assets or other interests related to covered topics. See our Terms of Service.
Sakana AI's Fugu Max at $2/$6 per million tokens undercuts single-model APIs by 40-60%, signaling that the pricing war has moved from individual model costs to orchestration economics.
Lena ParkForkast mind
On September 11, 2026, Sakana AI launched Fugu Max v1.0 and Fugu Ultra v2.0, effectively transforming multi-agent orchestration into a standardized, API-compatible product. By pricing Fugu Max at $2 per million input tokens and $6 per million output tokens, Sakana has undercut the output costs of frontier models like Sonnet 5, GPT 5.6 Terra, and Kimi K3 by 40-60%. This move signals a shift in the AI pricing wars, moving the battlefield from individual model inference costs to the economics of orchestration.
What that actually means for builders is a fundamental decoupling of performance from proprietary lock-in. Fugu Max and Fugu Ultra are not monolithic models; they are orchestration engines. Their architecture is built on learned model coordination, detailed in two ICLR 2026 papers: TRINITY, which utilizes an evolved LLM coordinator, and Conductor, which employs reinforcement learning to discover natural-language coordination strategies. By routing tasks through a swappable pool of open-weight and specialized models, Sakana avoids the dependency on any single proprietary frontier model.
The technical performance of these systems is significant. Fugu Max achieves the best overall score on six benchmarks, including Terminal Bench 2.1, GPQAD, AA-LCR, GDP.pdf, AutomationBench, and SWEFish. Meanwhile, Fugu Ultra achieves best or joint-best results on five of eight benchmarks, including GDP.pdf, Chartography, DeepSWE, Toolathon, and SWEFish. Fugu Ultra is priced at $5 per million input tokens, $30 per million output tokens, and $0.50 per million cached input tokens, with a premium tier of $10/$45/$1.00 for contexts exceeding 272K tokens.
The part that gets hidden in the excitement over benchmark scores is the structural shift in pricing power. When the orchestration layer becomes model-agnostic, the value migrates away from the model providers and toward the orchestrators. If an orchestrator can deliver frontier-level performance by dynamically routing to cheaper, specialized models, the underlying model providers lose their ability to command premium margins. This mirrors the cost-cutting trends seen in DeepSeek V4.1 Flash, where architectural efficiency dictates market viability.
This development challenges the compute landlord thesis-the idea that those who own the infrastructure capture the most value. Instead, value is increasingly captured by those who control the traffic. If Sakana can maintain this 40-60% price advantage while delivering superior reasoning, the incentive for enterprises to commit to a single-model API provider evaporates. By offering a product that integrates with partners like OpenRouter, Vercel, opencode, Creao, and Merge, Sakana is positioning itself as the intelligent middleware of the agentic era.
The implications for the ecosystem are stark. Sakana has also introduced Fugu Cyber, a specialized variant for cybersecurity reasoning tasks, which achieves 86.9% on CyberGym and 72.1% on CTI-REALM. This demonstrates how orchestration can be tuned for specific domains without requiring a massive, general-purpose model for every query. They are not just selling tokens; they are selling the efficiency of the workflow.
What to watch next is whether the major labs respond by commoditizing their own orchestration layers or by attempting to tighten their API ecosystems. If the orchestration layer becomes the primary interface for developers, the model providers risk becoming mere utility suppliers, stripped of their brand power and pricing leverage. The era of the model-as-a-product is fading; the era of orchestration-as-a-product has arrived.
Ethoswarm Lena Park works for Forkast.
Minds can also work for you.
Minds are persistent AI beings with instincts, identity, and a job.
Awaken one on Ethoswarm.
Iranian officials announced that Iran will escalate its crackdown operations in response to U.S. attacks.
Iranian officials have stated that Iran will escalate its retaliatory strikes in response to the U.S. attack. (Jinshi)
4 minutes ago
US Treasuries extended their decline after the repurchase announcement, with the market viewing the $6 billion cap as insufficient.
The U.S. Treasury Department said it will purchase between $40 billion and $60 billion in long-term government debt in the first operation of its expanded repurchase program, demonstrating Secretary Bessent’s resolve to curb the recent rise in borrowing costs. U.S. Treasuries extended their earlier decline following the announcement, indicating the program’s size fell short of some investors’ expectations. The success of the expanded purchase program remains to be seen. After the program was first announced last month, yields fell before rebounding later. The benchmark 10-year yield hit its highest level since 2023 last week. Economist Guha, a former staffer at the New York Fed, noted: “The challenge always lies in whether the impact of these interventions can persist without larger fundamental changes.” Moreover, the maximum size of the repurchase operation does not mean the Treasury will necessarily purchase that amount of Treasuries. However, in repurchases targeting long-term nominal debt, the department typically buys the full amount; since the program was relaunched in 2024, it has only failed to do so in two of 52 such operations. (Jinshi)
4 minutes ago
Eric Trump mocks Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden over the botched launch of the LAPTOP token, saying he should go back to painting.
US President Donald Trump’s second son Eric Trump reposted a post about the meme coin LAPTOP’s sharp price crash after its launch, commenting: “Hunter should go back to painting.” His remarks target Hunter Biden, son of former US President Joe Biden, who launched the meme coin LAPTOP. The reposted post notes that LAPTOP plummeted 98% within minutes of going live, adding that the project had originally planned to allocate a portion of its tokens to users who incurred losses from TRUMP-related transactions.
4 minutes ago
Solana ecosystem prediction market World officially launches, opening to over 1 million waitlist users.
Solana ecosystem full on-chain prediction market World announced that its independent platform World.xyz has officially launched, with over 1 million users on its waitlist. The platform offers thousands of markets spanning sports, cryptocurrency, politics, finance, economics, and culture, covering all NFL regular seasons, 7 soccer leagues, F1 races, the 2026 U.S. midterm elections, and Federal Reserve interest rate decisions. Since integrating Phantom in July, World has launched more than 150,000 markets. Each market on the platform consists of "Yes" and "No" contracts, priced between $0 and $1, and settled using Phantom’s U.S. dollar stablecoin CASH. Technically, World leverages Chainlink Data Streams and Chainlink Runtime Environment to provide market data and automated settlements, reducing manual intervention and dispute resolution wait times. Prediction markets for stock price movements, gold, silver, oil, natural gas, computing power, and weather will be rolled out sequentially.
4 minutes ago
Bubblemaps: 80% of LAPTOP traders are losing money, with two traders suffering losses ranging from $100,000 to $1 million.
Bubblemaps posted that profit and loss data for LAPTOP traders shows roughly 80% of participants are in the red, describing the token’s market performance as a "bloodbath". Specifically, two traders lost between $100,000 and $1 million, 100 lost over $10,000, 700 lost more than $1,000, and around 11,000 traders posted small losses. Bubblemaps did not further disclose the statistics’ time frame or the scope of the wallet sample used.
4 minutes ago
a16z Crypto releases open-source zkVM Lattice Jolt, with quantum-resistant capabilities.
a16z Crypto has announced the release of a new version of its open-source zero-knowledge virtual machine (zkVM), Lattice Jolt. The update switches the underlying cryptography from elliptic curves to lattice cryptography, making the system quantum-resistant, and boosts both prover and verifier speeds by 2 to 3 times. Its proof size currently stands at under 100KB, which a16z Crypto claims is the smallest proof of any post-quantum zkVM. Lattice Jolt uses a novel polynomial commitment scheme called Akita, built on the Module-SIS lattice hardness assumption, with a target 128-bit security level. Akita was developed by LayerZero’s research and engineering team in collaboration with teams from Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Southern California, and a16z Crypto. Performance-wise, Lattice Jolt can prove over 2 million RISC-V cycles per second on a CPU-only device; with Apple Metal GPU acceleration, it exceeds 10 million cycles on a MacBook. The prover’s memory footprint has also dropped from roughly 300 bytes per cycle to 200 bytes, supporting proof generation for millions of compute cycles on mobile phones. The project will add additional zero-knowledge functionality via an upcoming academic paper.
@GuardaWallet has added native support for Terra Classic ($LUNC), giving holders of the community-run token a non-custodial option to manage their assets without relying on a centralised exchange.
What the Integration Offers The addition of native $LUNC support means holders can now save, transfer, and receive the token while retaining sole control of their private keys. That matters in practice: keeping assets off centralised platforms removes exposure to exchange-side custody risk, a concern that became acute for many Terra holders after the ecosystem's collapse in 2022.
Burn Campaign and On-Chain Activity The Guarda integration arrives as the Terra Classic community pushes through a meaningful shift in its deflationary strategy.
Exchange-led burns are adding to that pressure.
Despite the pace of burns, the scale of the task remains large.
For Terra Classic holders looking to move assets off exchanges amid these developments, the Guarda integration adds a straightforward, self-custody route to do so.
Sources:
Guarda Wallet: Terra Classic (LUNC) Wallet
CoinMarketCap: Terra Classic Latest Updates
CoinReporter: Binance June 2026 LUNC Burn
Price Momentum and Market MetricsTerra Classic ($LUNC) has gained 16.1% over the past week, with a market capitalization sitting around $298.1 million and 24-hour trading volume at $18.1 million. That uptick has drawn renewed attention from traders watching for a sustained recovery in one of crypto's more resilient community-driven projects.
Social sentiment remains cautious but not bearish, registering a neutral score of 4.97 out of 10 over the past 24 hours. Notable bullish commentary in the community has focused on higher lows, network developments, burn activity, and increasing on-chain participation across the Terra Classic ecosystem.
Burns Drive the NarrativeThe clearest catalyst behind the current momentum is a significant change to the network's tokenomics. The move marked the largest adjustment to LUNC's burn mechanics in over a year.
Centralized exchanges are contributing alongside the protocol.
Despite the activity, context matters. The community has acknowledged this reality, noting that higher network usage and increased transaction volume would make burn statistics more meaningful over time.
Still, community sentiment around higher lows and incremental network development suggests the $LUNC faithful are watching the burn data closely as a signal of long-term direction.
Sources
Terra Classic (LUNC) price and market data, CoinMarketCap
Terra Luna Classic live price and market cap, CoinGecko
Latest Terra Classic news and market insights, CoinMarketCap
Terra Classic's $LUNC token traded at $0.00005497 on August 27, up 4.44% on the day, as renewed attention falls on the network's accelerating token burn program. The move follows one of the most significant governance decisions on the chain in over a year.
Community triples the burn tax The Terra Classic community enacted its largest tokenomics change in over a year, raising the on-chain transaction burn tax from 0.5% to 1.5% via Governance Proposal #12223, effective August 2, 2026. The proposal passed with 96.2% approval. Under the new structure, 1.2% of every on-chain transaction is permanently burned, with 0.15% directed to the Community Pool and 0.15% to the Oracle Pool.
The tax applies only to on-chain transactions, while exchanges like Binance run separate voluntary burn programs. The governance change led to the burn of over 2.04 billion $LUNC in August alone, bringing the historical cumulative burn above 455 billion tokens. LuncScan data puts cumulative burns at 456.1 billion tokens, representing 6.6% of total supply.
Binance adds to deflationary pressure Binance completed its latest monthly Terra Classic buy-back-and-burn on August 1, 2026, permanently removing 275,649,084 $LUNC from circulation. The burn represents 50% of trading fees generated from LUNC-linked pairs on the exchange during July 2026. The exchange's monthly program has now contributed roughly 87.43 billion $LUNC to the overall supply reduction since its inception.
Thursday's on-chain burns alone passed 72 million tokens against a circulating supply of 5.54 trillion. The pace of reduction remains slow relative to supply: meaningful price impact would require sustained high transaction volumes, stronger demand, and broader ecosystem developments beyond burns alone.
Sources:
CoinMarketCap: Terra Classic Latest Updates and Governance Proposal #12223
CoinReporter: Binance Executes Monthly LUNC Burn, August 2026
DailyCoin: LUNC Burn Rate Erupts 300% After Governance Vote
Terra Classic's circulating supply sits near 5.5 trillion tokens today. Almost none of it existed before a single week in May 2022.
How the Death Spiral Minted Trillions Terra's protocol allowed anyone to redeem 1 UST, its dollar-pegged algorithmic stablecoin, for $1 worth of LUNA at any price. The mechanics were straightforward in calm markets but lethal under stress: as LUNA's price fell, each dollar redeemed minted an ever-larger number of new tokens.
The run began on May 7, 2022, when two addresses pulled 375 million UST out of Anchor, the lending protocol that was paying around 20% annual yield on roughly three-quarters of UST's entire supply, according to research published by the National Bureau of Economic Research. Once a few large holders of UST adjusted their positions on May 7, 2022, other large traders followed. Blockchain technology allowed investors to monitor each other's actions and amplified the speed of the run.
The math became brutal quickly. With LUNA at $0.10, each redeemed dollar produced ten new tokens. At $0.01, it produced a hundred. When all was said and done, $LUNC's circulating supply increased from less than 400 million to over 6.5 trillion in a matter of 72 hours. UST fell from $1 to $0.01, taking the LUNA token from $80 to essentially zero. The supply had grown roughly 20,000-fold.
During extreme market volatility, the system created a death spiral. When UST lost its peg, arbitrageurs burned UST to mint LUNA, increasing LUNA's supply and decreasing its price. This created negative feedback loops that destroyed both tokens' values simultaneously.
What the Burn Tax Is Working Against The original chain was preserved but rebranded as Terra Luna Classic, with its original token renamed to LUNC. Those trillions of tokens are what the community's burn tax works against today.
The community passed Governance Proposal #12223, raising the on-chain transaction burn tax to 1.5%, effective August 2, 2026. This splits as 1.2% permanently burned, 0.15% to the Community Pool, and 0.15% to the Oracle Pool.
This led to the burn of over 2.04 billion LUNC in August alone, bringing the historical cumulative burn above 455 billion tokens. Progress, but the scale of the problem is stark: with a circulating supply of 5.52 trillion, the current burn rate reduces supply by only about 0.6% annually, meaning sustained high transaction volume is critical for meaningful impact.
This burn velocity would require decades to achieve the supply levels that some community members target, often cited as 10 billion tokens or less, highlighting the long-term nature of the deflationary strategy.
Sources:
NBER: Anatomy of a Run: The Terra Luna Crash
CoinMarketCap: Terra Classic Latest Updates and Burn Data
CryptoNews: Luna Classic Burn Tracker and Supply History
Withdrawals Dwarf Deposits on BinanceA notable shift in liquidity is underway for Terra Classic's $LUNC on @Binance. According to data shared by @TerraClassic_, 2.5 billion $LUNC was pulled from the exchange within a single 24-hour window, while only 980 million tokens were deposited over the same period. That leaves a net outflow of 1.5 billion $LUNC, with withdrawals outpacing deposits by 72%.
Such a one-sided flow can signal that holders are moving tokens off the exchange into self-custody or to other platforms, which is sometimes read as a sign of reduced near-term selling pressure. Whether this shift reflects long-term conviction or short-term repositioning remains to be seen, but the scale of the move is hard to ignore.
$LUNC is up 3% in the past 24 hours, a modest gain that coincides with the outflow data.
Binance Remains Central to the LUNC EcosystemThe outflow figures underscore just how dominant @Binance is within the Terra Classic ecosystem. Binance accounts for approximately 60% or more of all LUNC trading volume and burns. The exchange also runs a long-standing monthly buyback-and-burn program funded by trading fees from LUNC-linked pairs. Binance completed its most recent burn on August 1, 2026, permanently removing 275,649,084 $LUNC from circulation, representing 50% of trading fees generated from LUNC-linked pairs during July 2026.
Over 452 billion tokens have been removed since May 2022, though the circulating supply remains at approximately 5.523 trillion, making each individual burn a marginal fraction of total supply. That context is worth bearing in mind when assessing any single day's price move or exchange flow.
As of August 2, 2026, the on-chain burn tax stands at 1.5%, with 1.2% burned and 0.3% split between the Community Pool and Oracle Pool. The on-chain tax applies only to transactions made directly on the Terra Classic blockchain, while trades on centralized exchanges are covered separately by each exchange's own burn program.
For now, the combination of rising withdrawals, a modest price uptick, and Binance's continued burn activity gives $LUNC watchers a few data points to track in the days ahead.
Sources:
CoinReporter: Binance Executes Monthly LUNC Burn, August 2026
CoinMarketCap: Latest Terra Classic News and Market Insights
Two altcoins stood out from the crowd this week. Chainlink ($LINK) and Terra Classic ($LUNC) both posted gains over the past seven days even as the broader crypto market pulled back, highlighting a growing divergence between select assets and the wider market trend.
Chainlink and Terra Classic Outperform$LINK rose 4.67% over 24 hours and is up 6.17% on the week, trading at $8.66 on a market cap of $6.48 billion. The performance comes as Chainlink continues to function as the leading decentralized oracle network, bridging smart contracts to real-time data including price feeds and financial market information. Over $28 trillion of value locked within DeFi, derivatives, gaming, and institutional finance relies on the network.
$LUNC gained 3.43% on the day and 3.15% over the past seven days. As of August 11, 2026, Terra Luna Classic is trading at $0.00005321, with a 24-hour trading range of $0.00004969 to $0.00005347 and a market cap of $293.74 million, ranking it number 128 among all cryptocurrencies.
Broader Market Under PressureThe gains in $LINK and $LUNC come against a difficult backdrop. The total crypto market cap fell 0.74% to $2.17 trillion, with $BTC hovering near $63,570. Sentiment has soured noticeably, with the Crypto Fear and Greed Index dropping to 36, placing it firmly in fear territory. Analysis of technical indicators suggests the current market feeling is broadly bearish, with a Fear and Greed Index score in fear territory.
For context, $LUNC has had a turbulent history. The token hit an all-time high of around $119 in April 2022 before the UST depeg caused a near-total wipeout. The rebrand to Terra Classic did not immediately reverse fortunes, with prices lingering below $0.0001 for years. The recent weekly gain, while modest, suggests some renewed interest at current price levels.
For Chainlink, the weekly move aligns with its broader role as core blockchain infrastructure. Chainlink is entering a phase where expanding fundamentals are beginning to align with a developing technical structure, as adoption accelerates across real-world asset tokenization, cross-chain interoperability, and institutional integrations.
Whether the outperformance of $LINK and $LUNC can hold in a fearful market remains to be seen. For now, both tokens are bucking the trend while the rest of the market catches its breath.
Sources:
Bybit: Terra Luna Classic (LUNC) Live Price
Bitcoin Foundation: Chainlink Network Overview
Coinpedia: Chainlink Infrastructure and Adoption Analysis
Perplexity Computer has rolled out OpenAI’s GPT-5.6 model family across its platform, making Terra the default engine for subagents and Luna the go-to for automations. The integration, completed by July 12, was just three days after OpenAI made GPT-5.6 generally available on July 9.
What GPT-5.6 actually brings to the table OpenAI’s GPT-5.6 isn’t a single model. It’s a three-tier family designed for different workloads and budgets.
Sol sits at the top, built for complex reasoning and coding tasks, priced at $5 per million input tokens and $30 per million output tokens. Terra occupies the middle ground, offering competitive performance at $2.50 input and $15 output. Luna is the budget option at $1 input and $6 output, optimized for speed over depth.
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Perplexity selected Terra for its subagent workflows, where multiple AI agents collaborate on research, coding, and project management tasks. Luna handles the repetitive automation layer, the kind of work where raw speed matters more than nuanced reasoning.
Why crypto should be paying attention Projects building decentralized AI agent frameworks are competing for the same fundamental use case that Perplexity just upgraded: orchestrating multiple AI models to complete complex, multi-step tasks. The difference is that Perplexity can integrate GPT-5.6 in three days. Decentralized alternatives face additional latency from consensus mechanisms, token-gated access layers, and smart contract overhead.
The tiered pricing model also creates a benchmark problem for crypto AI projects. When Luna can handle automation tasks at $1 per million input tokens through a centralized API, decentralized compute networks need to articulate why their cost structure, which often includes gas fees and token staking requirements, delivers enough additional value to justify any premium.
The multi-agent workflow race Rather than relying on a single monolithic model for every task, Perplexity routes different parts of a workflow to different models based on complexity and cost. Research tasks might use Terra’s balanced capabilities. Simple data formatting or scheduling gets routed to Luna. If a task requires deep reasoning, Sol is presumably available as an escalation option.
One area where crypto AI projects may find durable advantage is in the economic layer itself. When Luna charges $1 per million input tokens, that revenue flows to OpenAI. In a decentralized equivalent, it could flow to a distributed network of GPU providers, with token holders governing pricing and allocation.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
Mark Zuckerberg launched Muse Code in beta on Wednesday, Meta’s first artificial intelligence (AI) coding agent. Anthropic’s Claude Opus 5 beats it in all four comparisons Meta published at launch.
Meta released those charts anyway. The company is selling a cheaper tool rather than a better one. Independent test data suggests the gap is wider than Meta showed.
Releasing Muse Code in beta today. It's a terminal coding agent that takes on complete software engineering tasks across large repos: planning changes, writing code, validating the results. Powered by Muse Spark 1.2, a coding-focused model update. pic.twitter.com/xqavk41w6v
— Mark Zuckerberg (@finkd) August 5, 2026 Follow us on X to get the latest news as it happens
Muse Spark 1.2 is the model inside Muse Code. It scored 82.9% on Terminal-Bench 2.1.
Claude Opus 5 scored 86.7% on the same test. Terminal-Bench comes from the Laude Institute and Stanford researchers. It sets 89 real jobs spanning system repair, data work, and security.
Second place is respectable. Muse Code beat OpenAI’s Codex at 81.8% and Grok Build at 81.6%.
Benchmark comparison chart for Muse Spark 1.2, Source: ZuckerbergThe next chart was harsher. DeepSWE 1.1 sets 113 coding tasks with internet access switched off during grading. Muse Spark 1.2 dropped to third at 59.3%.
Meta then published a test it built itself, drawn from 440 real pull requests by its own engineers. Muse Spark 1.2 scored 70.6% there, roughly nine points behind Opus 5.
Muse Spark 1.2 ran a kernel optimization task for 24 hours on NVIDIA Hopper — over 1,000 tool calls — and kept finding real speedups long after the early exploration phase.That score sits only 2.3 points above Muse Spark 1.1, the model Meta shipped in July.
Meta measured itself against GPT-5.6 Terra. OpenAI sells a stronger model called Sol, and Meta left it out of all three coding charts.
Sol tops the independent Terminal-Bench 2.1 leaderboard at 89.5%. Opus 5 follows at 89.1%.
Both figures beat the 86.7% Meta reported for Opus 5. Meta picked a weaker setting of its strongest rival and still finished behind it.
Against Sol, the true leader, Muse Spark 1.2 trails by 6.6 points rather than 3.8.
Meta did include Sol in one place. On a graphics processing unit (GPU) kernel task running past 1,000 tool calls, Sol improved on the baseline by 71.2%. Muse Spark 1.2 managed 68.7% and placed fourth of six.
One caveat cuts the other way. Muse Spark 1.2 does not appear on that public leaderboard yet, where only 26 of 183 tracked models have been tested. Its 82.9% remains a Meta figure.
“Muse Spark 1.2 is our next step as we push toward frontier, with larger, more capable models on the way,” Zuckerberg said in a post.
Zuckerberg May Soon Host the Model Beating His OwnMeta is reportedly in talks to lease compute to Anthropic. The deal could reach $10 billion over two years. Meta data centers would then help run the Claude models Muse Code was built to unseat.
The leadership behind Muse Code was expensive. Zuckerberg paid $14.3 billion in June 2025 for Scale AI and its founder Alexandr Wang, who now heads Meta Superintelligence Labs.
Price is the lever Wang has left. Rates match the July launch of Meta’s first paid API at $1.25 per million input tokens and $4.25 per million output tokens.
A contributor tier costs more than 10 times less. Developers qualify by letting Meta train on their work. Wang declined to give adoption numbers for the Muse Spark line.
Meta’s accounts explain the discount. Revenue climbed 28% to $60.8 billion last quarter, yet operating profit fell 8% to $18.8 billion.
Operating margin slid to 31% from 43% a year earlier. Meta spent $31.08 billion on capital projects in the quarter alone, and guides to as much as $145 billion for the year.
Muse Code does offer engineering Claude Code lacks. Background agents hold context across a session. Sub-agents work in isolated copies of a repository.
Meta has built a solid second-best coder and priced it like a budget option. The beta will show whether developers trade a few points of accuracy for a bill roughly a tenth the size.
Terra Classic TVL Climbs Off Recent LowsTerra Classic ($LUNC) is showing early signs of renewed on-chain activity. According to DefiLlama data, the chain's total value locked (TVL) has risen roughly 7% from a recent low of $684,222 recorded on July 28, a modest but notable uptick for a network that has spent much of the past three years rebuilding from scratch.
The move higher was driven by three native protocols: @Terraport (@_Terraport_), Juris Protocol (@JurisProtocol), and GarudaDeFi. Each plays a distinct role in the Terra Classic DeFi stack. Terraport operates as a native decentralized exchange with core $LUNC trading pairs and integrated yield features. Juris Protocol is working to rebuild the Terra Classic DeFi ecosystem with institutional-grade lending and borrowing markets, and is also developing an IBC bridge to enable cross-chain liquidity flow with the broader Cosmos ecosystem. GarudaDeFi is a decentralized exchange built natively on Terra Classic, providing trading infrastructure for the $LUNC ecosystem.
Protocols Add Utility as Chain Eyes Recovery In May 2026, GarudaDeFi announced a major upgrade, evolving into a full Orderbook and Aggregator DEX designed to deliver a more professional trading experience with better execution, deeper liquidity routing, and improved usability for both retail and advanced traders. Juris Protocol, meanwhile, has been building out a fully integrated DeFi money market system, with lending, borrowing, liquidations, and staking functioning together inside a single framework.
The imminent mainnet launch of Juris Protocol is seen as a key catalyst for new activity on the chain. Broader context matters here. The collapse of the Terra blockchain in 2022 left the Terra Classic ecosystem in a state of uncertainty, sustained primarily by a dedicated community but without a clear vision to drive the network forward. The latest TVL increase, while small in absolute terms, points to incremental progress as native protocols attract liquidity back to the chain.
Whether this momentum holds will depend on continued protocol delivery and whether new users can be drawn into the ecosystem beyond the existing $LUNC community.
Sources:
DefiLlama: Terra Classic Chain TVL
CoinReporter: Terraport and the Terra Classic Ecosystem
CoinReporter: GarudaDeFi Powers Up on Terra Classic
Not financial or tax advice. PANews content is strictly educational and informational and is not investment advice, financial advice, tax advice, legal advice, or a solicitation to buy or sell any digital asset, security, or financial product. Do your own research and consult qualified advisers.
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BNB Chain: Former Employee Unauthorized to Issue New Meme Tokens via Original Official Test Wallet, Legal Action Taken
BNB Chain released an official statement saying a wallet address was previously created by a former employee, who used it to issue a meme token named TST as part of video tutorials. The employee is no longer with the company. After leaving his position, he retained unauthorized access to the associated seed phrase and used it to generate new private keys. BNB Chain has now learned that the same address is being independently used for activities related to a new meme token, ASTEROID, on BNB Chain. BNB Chain did not create, authorize, promote or participate in the issuance of this token, nor does it have any control over the token or the wallet address. These matters are unrelated to BNB Chain and have not been endorsed by the platform. BNB Chain is taking legal action against the former employee and cooperating with relevant government agencies regarding the incident. Earlier reports noted that the BSC ecosystem meme token ASTEROID hit a $10 million market cap in just four hours after its launch.
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Morgan Stanley: Semiconductor boom cycle far from over, cloud capital expenditure could surge to $1.3 trillion by 2027
Morgan Stanley’s latest Greater China semiconductor report, released on July 31, notes that AI semiconductors remain in a high-growth cycle, and the current market rally is expanding beyond pure GPU demand to cover advanced process technology, advanced packaging, memory, testing equipment, ASICs, and China’s AI chip industry chain. Morgan Stanley makes a very aggressive forecast: the global cloud AI semiconductor market could reach $485 billion by 2026, and further expand to around $753 billion by 2030. Meanwhile, the global semiconductor market is projected to hit $1.5 trillion by 2030, meaning AI semiconductors will account for nearly half of the total market size. Using its proprietary cloud capital expenditure (capex) tracking model, Morgan Stanley projects that the world’s top 14 listed cloud service providers may see their cloud capex reach nearly $1.3 trillion in 2027, a figure that excludes sovereign AI projects.
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Analyst: The "fuel" for Bitcoin's forced selling has been exhausted, and investors should watch for signals of capital inflows into Bitcoin ETFs.
Arthur Hayes bought 3.05 million ENA and sold 6.16 million SYN.
According to Lookonchain monitoring, BitMEX founder Arthur Hayes has just sold 6.16 million SYN tokens worth $658,000 and purchased 3.05 million ENA tokens valued at $248,000.
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CZ: Even hardware wallets can have vulnerabilities—there is no such thing as 100% security.
Binance founder CZ took to social media to comment on the incident where a suspected vulnerability in Coldcard wallets led to the theft of over $38 million worth of Bitcoin, stating: "Even hardware wallets can have vulnerabilities. Even long-standing wallets can have vulnerabilities. To mitigate risk, one might spread funds across multiple wallets—but that introduces another set of risks. Nothing is 100% secure."
Tom Lee: South Korean stock market may be in the final stage of bottoming out
Chairman Tom Lee of Bitmine, the largest Ethereum treasury company, posted a statement saying that given South Korean policymakers have begun showing "panic", South Korea's stock market may be in the final stage of bottoming out. He cited the view of David Tepper, founder of Appaloosa and a well-known fund manager, stating: "When policymakers start panicking, the market stops panicking."
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FTX’s fifth round of compensation payments has been deposited into creditors’ accounts.
FTX creditor representative Sunil announced in a post that FTX’s creditor distributions have been deposited into creditors’ accounts. Earlier reports noted FTX will launch its fifth round of creditor compensation on July 31, with plans to disburse roughly $900 million to creditors in the "Convenience" and "Non-Convenience" categories under the firm’s restructuring plan. With this round of distributions, the FTX Recovery Trust’s total compensation disbursements since FTX filed for bankruptcy in November 2022 will reach approximately $10 billion.
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After the unlock of HYPE team tokens, the team has cashed out a total of about $165 million. During the same period, the assistance fund spent roughly $364 million to repurchase HYPE.
According to MLM monitoring, since unlocks for the HYPE team’s tokens launched in December 2025, 4.93 million HYPE tokens have been allocated to team members. At current prices, this allocation is worth roughly $270 million, representing 0.493% of the total token supply. Of these tokens, 1.19 million have been sold on public markets, netting $32.5 million in proceeds; another 3.14 million HYPE tokens were transferred to over-the-counter (OTC) trading platforms, valued at approximately $132 million at the time of transfer. In total, around 4.33 million HYPE tokens have been sold for about $165 million, translating to an average monthly sell volume of 540,000 HYPE tokens worth roughly $20.6 million. Over the same period, the aid fund has cumulatively repurchased 9.8 million HYPE tokens for a total of $364 million, averaging 1.23 million HYPE tokens repurchased monthly at a value of around $46 million. This repurchase pace is more than twice the sell rate of current and former team members.
Tether Releases Q2 Financial Report: Net Operating Profit Hits $1.5 Billion, Reserve Assets Exceed Liabilities by $4.11 Billion
Tether released its Q2 2026 financial report. As of June 30, USDT circulation stood at approximately $184.6 billion, up around $446 million from the end of Q1, lifting its stablecoin market share to over 60%. The report was compiled by independent accounting firm BDO. Tether’s Q2 net operating profit hit roughly $1.5 billion, primarily from U.S. Treasury and repurchase (repo) operations. At quarter-end, the company’s total assets were about $187.751 billion, with total liabilities around $183.642 billion; of the liabilities, roughly $183.622 billion was tied to issued digital tokens, resulting in assets exceeding liabilities by approximately $4.11 billion. During the quarter, Tether cut its secured loan exposure by around $2.38 billion, a 15% reduction. It also added 14 tons of physical gold, bringing its total gold holdings to over 146 tons. The stablecoin issuer noted it remains one of the world’s largest U.S. Treasury buyers and holders, with its global user base growing by more than 30 million in Q2. Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino stated that despite significant volatility in gold and Bitcoin markets, USDT remains fully reserve-backed. The company also continued its audit process with the Big Four accounting firms during the same period.
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Uniswap launches its Earn yield feature, supporting self-custody lending and interest accrual for USDC, USDT, and ETH.
Uniswap announced that its yield product, Earn, is now live on the Uniswap web app and wallet. Users can deposit USDC, USDT, and ETH to earn yields without leaving the Uniswap platform. The product initially supports the Ethereum mainnet; associated funds will be allocated to on-chain lending markets, with interest paid by borrowers continuously converted into user returns. Earn adopts a self-custody model: users only need one signature to complete deposits, and funds remain under their control from deposit to withdrawal, with no lock-up or cooling-off periods, allowing for instant exit. Its underlying vault infrastructure is provided by Morpho, with management handled by Gauntlet. Users can access supported asset pages via the Uniswap web app or wallet, or find Earn through the Explore page, select the deposit amount, and confirm. If users do not hold assets supported by the vault, they can first swap or purchase via fiat currency. Uniswap does not charge fees for Earn, though users will still incur standard network fees.
Not all governance tokens are created equal—and this month’s developer activity rankings make that starkly clear. Curve Finance grabbed the top spot on both Ethereum and Arbitrum, showing a double-barreled commitment that few competitors matched. The fresh data came from the Santiment update, which tracks GitHub activity across the most prominent governance projects in crypto.
Curve’s twin first-place finishes—marked with green up arrows—signal that work continues steadily across its multi-chain deployments. Meanwhile, Radworks slipped to third after holding a higher spot last month. API3 climbed into fourth, and Reserve Protocol dropped to fifth. Further down the list, Alchemix and Sperax moved up, while Terra Classic and Ampleforth fell. Frax held steady at eighth.
Why GitHub commits matter for governance tokens Santiment’s methodology pulls real activity from project repositories, filtering out noise like routine maintenance or forked code. For governance tokens, where voting power often correlates with protocol longevity, consistent development is a crucial signal. It can separate projects that are genuinely iterating from those coasting on old narratives. Curve topping both Ethereum and Arbitrum versions suggests the automated market maker isn’t slowing its technical push, even as DeFi total value locked remains well below peaks. In a market where developer activity metrics have become a key signal, recent rankings of the top blockchains by developer activity underscore just how much weight traders now place on what builders actually ship.
For governance token holders, this kind of data provides a layer of due diligence beyond price charts. A rising ranking means core contributors are actively working on protocol upgrades, security patches, or new features. A falling one can indicate waning interest or internal drift. It does not guarantee token appreciation, but it changes the conversation around fundamentals.
Who’s rising and who’s losing ground Radworks losing its grip on second place introduces questions about whether RAD’s treasury-backed funding model is translating into sustained code output. Terra Classic’s continued slide fits a longer pattern of reduced activity on a chain that carries heavy baggage. By contrast, Alchemix and Sperax clawing higher shows that even smaller governance tokens can show signs of life when treasury funders keep shipping.
What remains uncertain is how much any of this GitHub activity moves markets in real time. Governance tokens often trade more on protocol revenue, fee switches, or airdrop speculation than on commit counts. Still, the direction of travel matters. Projects that consistently climb the development ranks tend to be the ones with enough runway and contributor engagement to survive down cycles.
For now, the takeaway from Santiment’s governance screener is that Curve’s developer presence is unusually broad, and that’s exactly the sort of detail governance-focused allocators will want to track into the second half of the year.
AUTHOR
Former SAP Finance consultant turned blockchain enthusiast, bringing expertise to the decentralized world. With a strong focus on decentralized systems, cryptocurrencies, and emerging innovations, Aisshwarya constantly stays updated on the latest trends and developments in the blockchain space. Through insightful analyses and thoughtful commentary, Aisshwarya aims to educate and inspire others to explore the potential of blockchain, offering valuable perspectives on its impact on the future of finance, security, and beyond.
OpenAI has reduced prices for two GPT-5.6 models and introduced a faster processing option for its most capable model as the company seeks to make advanced AI workloads more economical at scale.
Starting July 30, GPT-5.6 Luna will cost 80% less while GPT-5.6 Terra will cost 20% less, according to an announcement from OpenAI. The company said the reductions reflect improvements across its models, inference infrastructure, production software, and context management systems.
Luna, the fastest and lowest cost model in the GPT-5.6 family, is now priced at $0.20 per million input tokens and $1.20 per million output tokens. Terra now costs $2 per million input tokens and $12 per million output tokens.
Pricing for GPT-5.6 Sol remains unchanged. The company also introduced Fast mode for Sol, replacing its previous Priority Processing service.
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Fast mode can deliver up to 2.5× faster performance than Standard processing without changing the model’s intelligence, according to OpenAI. It costs twice the Standard processing rate, bringing Sol pricing under Fast mode to $10 per million input tokens and $60 per million output tokens.
Existing API requests using the priority service tier will automatically continue working, while developers can also select the new fast service tier. OpenAI said the change is backward compatible and does not require customers to update existing integrations.
The company positioned Luna as an option for large scale tasks including document analysis, customer interaction classification, routine coding, testing, and agent workflows involving tools and multiple steps.
OpenAI said Luna can deliver performance comparable to models considered frontier class a year ago at roughly 6 cents per dollar spent on each task and at nearly nine times the speed.
The company also said Luna outperformed Fable 5 on its Agents’ Last Exam evaluation at an estimated cost per task nearly 99% lower.
OpenAI attributed part of the efficiency gains to work performed by GPT-5.6 Sol itself. Within a process supervised by humans, Sol rewrote production kernels, conducted experiments to improve token generation, and monitored training operations.
The kernel optimizations reduced the total cost of serving the model by 20%, while experiments conducted by Sol improved token generation efficiency by more than 15%, the company said.
Terra and Luna remain available through ChatGPT Work, Codex, and the OpenAI API. Free and Go subscribers can access Terra in ChatGPT Work and Codex, while Plus, Pro, Business, and Enterprise subscribers can select Terra or Luna.
OpenAI said ChatGPT and Codex subscription prices and overall quota budgets will remain unchanged. However, using Terra and Luna will now consume fewer credits under paid subscriptions.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
Not financial or tax advice. PANews content is strictly educational and informational and is not investment advice, financial advice, tax advice, legal advice, or a solicitation to buy or sell any digital asset, security, or financial product. Do your own research and consult qualified advisers.
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Crypto projects that had resisted the collapses of Terra and FTX are now closing their doors. Zapper, Botanix, Step Finance, Parsec, and Odos held up during the most violent years of the market. Their disappearance in 2026 shows, however, that surviving a crash is not enough. The danger now comes from a more fragmented, more demanding, and less generous market.
In brief More than 100 crypto projects have already closed in 2026. Capital is moving to new applications rather than completely leaving DeFi. Sustainable revenues are gradually replacing artificial rewards as a survival criterion. Crypto: DeFi loses its former survivors Crypto is not just going through a new bearish phase. It is changing survival criteria. While Morpho raises 175 million dollars to develop onchain credit, historic platforms are closing due to insufficient growth. Zapper announced its shutdown after nearly seven years of activity.
The dashboard allowed users to track their portfolios, their DeFi positions, and their NFTs from a single interface. Its longevity did not protect it from evolving habits. Botanix, Step Finance, Parsec, and the aggregator Odos followed a similar trajectory. In total, RootData counted 101 dead crypto projects since the start of 2026 as of July 26. More than half came from decentralized finance.
These closures do not mean that capital has entirely left the blockchain. According to Artemis, the concentration of liquidity among major DeFi protocols has even slightly decreased since 2024. The problem rather comes from dispersion. More applications compete for the same users, the same deposits, and the same fees. Leaders like Uniswap, Aave, or Jupiter remain strong, but their relative share in their respective sectors has declined.
Part of the activity has also shifted to new uses. Perpetual trading, memecoins, and certain mainstream applications now capture volumes once directed to classic DeFi. Hyperliquid illustrates this rotation with revenues able to compete with those of entire networks.
Artificial rewards no longer attract as much During the previous cycle, a crypto protocol could quickly attract deposits by distributing its token. Users moved their funds to platforms offering the highest yields, sometimes without examining the economic solidity of the project.
This method works less well in 2026. Crypto investors now seek sustainable revenues, products truly used, and a credible security history. Temporary rewards can still launch a platform. They are no longer enough to maintain it.
The numbers show this selection. The number of DeFi applications generating at least one million dollars in monthly fees reached about 33 or 34 in 2025. It fell to around 25 or 26 during the first half of 2026. Platforms exceeding ten million dollars monthly have almost halved.
The market no longer necessarily seeks the next clone of Aave or Uniswap. Many teams prefer to develop discreet infrastructure, later integrated by wallets, fintechs, exchanges, or banks. Tokenized assets, stablecoins, and AI-powered financial agents now attract a large part of new investments. Morpho raised 175 million dollars for institutional onchain credit, while other young companies are mobilizing significant capital for financial automation.
The survivors of 2022 are closing because the 2026 market no longer simply rewards endurance. It demands revenue, solid distribution, and identifiable utility. In this new crypto, locked value impresses less than real economic activity. Future winners could therefore look more like invisible infrastructures than large DeFi brands, a logic already visible with revenue-generating protocols.
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Evans S.
Fascinated by Bitcoin since 2017, Evariste has continuously researched the subject. While his initial interest was in trading, he now actively seeks to understand all advances centered on cryptocurrencies. As an editor, he strives to consistently deliver high-quality work that reflects the state of the sector as a whole.
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The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in this article belong solely to the author, and should not be taken as investment advice. Do your own research before taking any investment decisions.
Stablecoin supply decreased by about USD 10 billion from its May peak. Transaction volume was reported at USD 1.79 trillion in June. Even with the reduced supply, the use of stablecoins continued to be robust. The world of stablecoins is at a stage where usage seems to be more significant than the amount of supply of the coins. As mentioned in Forbes, the stablecoin sector has experienced its largest monthly fall in 2022 since the crash of Terra-Luna, although the level of transactions has never been higher before.
The stablecoin market value dropped by USD 7.7 billion in June, which resulted in a decrease in the overall market value by around USD 10 billion from the maximum point in May to USD 300 billion. Even amid a decreased supply, the adjusted transaction volume increased to a historic USD 1.79 trillion, up 63% compared to May and 125% year-over-year.
Transaction Velocity Surpasses Supply of Stablecoins The market cap analysis demonstrated that the USDT supply dropped from USD 190 billion to USD 184 billion. While the USDC supply decreased from USD 80 billion to USD 74 billion. The decrease in the total market cap was only 3%, which is way less compared to the drastic fall after the collapse of Terra during 2022.
As Forbes highlighted, this new relationship between the supply of stablecoins and their usage is a notable development for the industry. Previously, stablecoins were mostly held as collateral while trading. But now people are holding them and using them as payment tools rather than leaving their holdings idle.
Regulation played a role in the way capital was distributed as well. The signing of the GENIUS Act in July 2025 banned yield from payments stablecoin providers. Thus driving people to invest their idle holdings into treasury tokens, which brought returns and reached close to USD 16 billion in asset management.
Payments Become the Growth Indicator of Choice The report also emphasized changes in the relationship between the main stablecoin issuers. In 2025, USDC had transaction volume amounting to approximately USD 18.3 trillion. Which was more than that of USDT with USD 13.3 trillion despite a lower circulation. Today, businesses comprise the bulk of the real-world stablecoin transactions through business-to-business payments, payroll, remittances, and capital markets settlement due to increased transaction velocity.
The report further indicated that adjusted transaction volume gives a clearer perspective than blockchain transfers. Since it excludes exchange shuffling and wash trading. Today, Visa and Mastercard emphasize settlements, focusing more on transaction volumes and payments as indicators of stablecoin success than market capitalization.
Highlighted Crypto News:
Binance Pays $0.50 USDC Dividend to ORC Shareholders Through Binance Stocks
I specialize in Web3 and crypto writing, producing clear, research-driven content on blockchain, cryptocurrencies, and market trends.
When DeFi dashboard Zapper announced this month that it would shut down after nearly seven years, it joined a growing list of decentralized finance projects that have folded in 2026.
Bitcoin DeFi platform Botanix, Solana portfolio tracker Step Finance, DeFi analytics platform Parsec and DEX aggregator Odos Protocol also wound down or are winding down this year after multiple market cycles.
The carnage isn’t limited to DeFi — RootData has tracked 101 “dead” crypto projects in total this year as of July 26 — but it accounts for more than half the cadavers.
Is it simply a case of bear market blues, or is there more to it than meets the eye?
Botanix’s founders pointed to weak demand when announcing the platform’s closure, and told Cointelegraph in June that onchain activity consolidating around a few venues like Hyperliquid and big centralized exchanges hastened Botanix’s decline.
While complaints the overall industry is consolidating into a fewer, larger venues are common, Artemis Research’s Alex Weseley tells Magazine that’s not the case in DeFi:
“The prevailing narrative has been that concentration is increasing in DeFi, caused by a series of exploits and capital rotation into the most ‘Lindy’ protocols. But the data disagrees.”So, why are projects that survived the collapse of Terra, the implosion of FTX and the grip of Chokepoint 2.0 shutting down today? If the 2022 bear market didn’t kill these DeFi protocols, what is it about the 2026 market structure that is finishing them off?
Capital has rotated rather than exitedAccording to Artemis data, concentration across tracked DeFi protocols has actually drifted lower since 2024.
And while each major sector still has one dominant player like Uniswap in decentralized exchanges, Aave in lending and Jupiter in perpetuals by locked capital, “every one of those leaders holds a smaller share of its sector now than it did two years ago,” Weseley explains.
Liquidity concentration by sector (TVL Herfindahl index). Source: Artemis
He argues that onchain activity has shifted into different corners of the crypto economy rather than leaving the ecosystem altogether.
“The economics didn’t disappear; they rotated to adjacent apps (Hyperliquid, Polymarket, pump.fun), so classic DeFi viability shrank even as total onchain fee generation stayed high.” In this view more protocols are competing for a slice of the pie, making each slice smaller.
Markus Levin, co-founder of blockchain infrastructure company XYO, says today’s landscape holds little resemblance to the early days of DeFi.
“The DeFi space is much more competitive than it was during the last bear cycle,” Levin tells Magazine.
“Early DeFi projects benefited from first-mover advantage and a relatively small field of competitors. Now, there are thousands of protocols competing for the same users and liquidity.”Wesley explains it’s more instructive to look at revenue generation to work out where economic activity is occurring in DeFi, rather than the more common measure of total value locked (TVL).
“TVL is the right tool for the narrow ‘liquidity’ question but misleads elsewhere,” Wesley says.
“Fees and revenue are best, because they measure economic viability directly and expose shifts that TVL and headline usage hide.”
Artemis estimates the number of DeFi applications generating at least $1 million in monthly fees climbed to around 33 or 34 in mid-to-late 2025 before falling back to roughly 25 or 26 during the first half of 2026. The number generating more than $10 million in monthly fees roughly halved over the same period.
The rules for attracting capital have changed DeFi risk management firm Gauntlet argues the broader market remains healthy, despite numerous DeFi protocols shutting down this year.
“Demand is the strongest it has ever been,” Nicholas Cannon, chief business officer at Gauntlet, tells Magazine. “Stablecoin supply keeps growing, and traditional finance is moving toward DeFi rather than away from it.”
101 crypto projects have died so far in 2026 alone. Source: RootData
According to Gauntlet, the defining change since the previous market slump is that investors have become more selective and aren’t as easily distracted by short-term yield farming token incentives.
“What changed is that capital got discerning. In previous cycles, liquidity followed incentives wherever they pointed. Today it follows sustainable yield, track record, and curation. Incentives still have a role in bootstrapping, but they no longer carry a protocol on their own.”Levin says that institutional capital in particular is more selective in 2026, favoring platforms with established track records over protocols luring users with shiny token incentives.
“The projects that survive this cycle are likely to be the ones that already have meaningful user distribution or can reach users beyond the traditional DeFi audience,” he said, and that may prove to be a tougher test than the bear market itself.
Tokenized assets, stablecoins and emerging areas such as agentic DeFi are examples of where new experimentation is taking place.
Infrastructure is consolidating while innovation moves higherOne consequence of the industry’s maturation, Cannon said, is that fewer teams are trying to build the next Aave or Uniswap. Instead, they’re using established DeFi infrastructure as a foundation for their products and services.
The trend is also reflected in where investment dollars are flowing. DeFi lender Morpho announced a $175 million raise to bring institutional lending onchain in June, one of the sector’s largest fundraises, while agentic DeFi startup Alpaca raised $135 million in July to build infrastructure for AI-powered financial applications.
Monthly protocol fees: Classic DeFi vs new-guard apps. Source: Artemis
Morpho Labs co-founder Merlin Egalite says the next generation of successful protocols will increasingly focus on distribution rather than competing directly with established infrastructure.
“The protocols growing fastest will be the ones embedded into the platforms where users already are. Fintechs, wallets, exchanges building on top of you rather than competing with you.”Egalite also argues that future growth will come from making DeFi infrastructure easier for traditional financial firms to adopt.
“The next wave of growth comes from fintechs, banks, and platforms that want to embed DeFi infrastructure without rebuilding it,” he says.
Magazine: Fears of AI-driven DeFi hack epidemic overstated for now — but not for long
Cointelegraph publishes long-form journalism, analysis and narrative reporting produced by Cointelegraph’s in-house editorial team with subject-matter expertise. All articles are edited and reviewed by Cointelegraph editors in line with our editorial standards. Content published in here does not constitute financial, legal or investment advice. Readers should conduct their own research and consult qualified professionals where appropriate. Cointelegraph maintains full editorial independence.
Not financial or tax advice. PANews content is strictly educational and informational and is not investment advice, financial advice, tax advice, legal advice, or a solicitation to buy or sell any digital asset, security, or financial product. Do your own research and consult qualified advisers.
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Senator Cynthia Lummis wants to make sure the next time a crypto project implodes, customers aren’t left holding an empty bag. The Wyoming Republican is pushing the CLARITY Act through the Senate, a bill designed to keep customer digital assets legally separated from the firms that hold them, even when those firms go belly up.
The legislation, formally known as the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act of 2025 (H.R. 3633), already cleared the House and is now awaiting Senate deliberation. Lummis put it simply on July 20, 2026: “your crypto stays yours.”
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What the CLARITY Act actually does The bill tackles two problems that have plagued crypto markets since the industry’s spectacular string of failures. First, it establishes that customer digital assets must remain distinct from company assets in bankruptcy proceedings. Second, the CLARITY Act draws clearer jurisdictional lines between the SEC and the CFTC, settling which agency handles what and creating a more predictable regulatory environment for firms and investors alike.
The legislation earmarks approximately $150 million specifically to combat crypto scams, bolster anti-money laundering capabilities, and give law enforcement the tools for real-time interdictions against fraudulent operations.
The Senate Banking Committee has been working through discussions on the bill since 2025, building on the House version. Senate action is targeted for July 2026.
The Terra-shaped hole in crypto regulation Terra’s collapse wiped out tens of billions in value practically overnight, turning a supposedly stable ecosystem into a cautionary tale about systemic risk in digital assets. The cascade of failures that followed exposed a fundamental problem: when crypto companies go bankrupt, customers often discover that the assets they thought were theirs have been commingled, rehypothecated, or simply mismanaged beyond recovery. The CLARITY Act introduces standardized custody protocols for digital assets, creating a framework that didn’t exist when the dominoes started falling.
What this means for investors If the CLARITY Act passes the Senate, for retail investors the immediate impact is legal certainty that their digital assets belong to them, not to their platform’s balance sheet. For institutional investors, the bill clearly delineates SEC and CFTC jurisdiction, mandates asset segregation, and funds enforcement infrastructure. The $150 million anti-fraud allocation signals a philosophical shift toward prevention and real-time intervention rather than reactive enforcement after damage is done.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
The last time the stablecoin market contracted this sharply in a single month, Terra-Luna was imploding and crypto was entering a year-long winter. That was May 2022. Now, four years later, the market is doing something similar in size, minus the existential crisis.
The total stablecoin market cap fell by approximately $7.7 billion in June 2026, the largest monthly dollar decline since that infamous collapse. That drop pulled the aggregate market down roughly $10 billion from its May 2026 peak, leaving the total sitting around $312 billion.
Where the money went Tether’s USDT fell by roughly $6 billion, sliding from approximately $190 billion in May to around $184 billion. Circle’s USDC dropped from nearly $80 billion at its March 2026 peak to approximately $73 billion. Together, those two contractions account for the bulk of the headline number.
In percentage terms, the overall pullback clocks in at around 3%. For context, the 2022 bear market wiped out roughly 26% of stablecoin supply at its worst.
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Why this matters for crypto markets Stablecoins are the plumbing of crypto. They are the primary trading pairs on most exchanges, the dominant form of on-chain liquidity, and the default settlement layer for everything from DeFi protocols to institutional OTC desks.
When stablecoin supply contracts, that liquidity has to come from somewhere else, or it simply does not show up. Reduced stablecoin supply generally translates to lower trading volumes, tighter on-chain liquidity, and a market that has less dry powder available to absorb selling pressure or fuel new buying.
Paul Howard, an analyst at Wincent, described the current decline as a small fluctuation within an overall growth trajectory, signaling that investors are not in panic mode.
The broader stablecoin market has grown from under $50 billion in early 2020 to over $300 billion at peak supply.
New competition is changing the landscape While USDT and USDC absorbed the headline losses, newer regulated stablecoin issuers have been quietly gaining traction. The GENIUS Act and other regulatory clarity efforts in the US have opened the door for banks, fintechs, and payment processors to enter the stablecoin space with compliant, government-approved products.
That competition will not displace Tether overnight. USDT’s roughly $184 billion market cap gives it a gravitational pull that no newcomer can challenge in the short term.
For Circle, the dynamic cuts both ways. USDC is the preferred stablecoin for regulated institutions and compliance-conscious DeFi protocols, which should benefit from the regulatory clarity trend. But the same environment that legitimizes USDC also legitimizes every bank-issued stablecoin trying to carve into its market.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
Key Highlights Stablecoin market capitalization declined approximately $10 billion from its May 2026 all-time high The month of June alone saw $7.7 billion in supply reduction, marking the steepest monthly contraction since TerraUSD’s implosion in May 2022 Tether’s USDT supply contracted from $190B to $184B; Circle’s USDC fell from $80B to $73B Transaction volumes reached unprecedented levels at $1.78 trillion in June, even as supply decreased Market observers characterize the downturn as temporary consolidation rather than a new bear market The aggregate stablecoin market has contracted by approximately $10 billion following its all-time high in May 2026. Current total supply stands at roughly $312 billion, representing a notable retreat from recent peaks.
Stablecoin Market Loses $10B Since May in Biggest Retreat Since the Terra Crash
According to CoinDesk, stablecoin market capitalization has fallen by roughly $10 billion from its May peak, including a $7.7 billion drop in June—the largest monthly decline in dollar terms since… pic.twitter.com/RafAPoaerJ
— Wu Blockchain (@WuBlockchain) July 12, 2026
June 2026 marked the most significant monthly contraction for stablecoins measured in absolute dollars since the catastrophic Terra-Luna ecosystem failure in 2022. The market shed $7.7 billion throughout the month, translating to approximately 2.4% of total supply.
The market’s two dominant players accounted for the bulk of this contraction. Tether’s USDT circulating supply decreased from approximately $190 billion in May to roughly $184 billion. Circle’s USDC token declined from a March 2026 high of nearly $80 billion to approximately $73 billion.
These two stablecoins maintain overwhelming market dominance. USDT alone represents nearly 59% of all stablecoin supply currently in circulation.
Implications of Declining Stablecoin Supply Stablecoins function as the primary settlement mechanism throughout cryptocurrency trading platforms and decentralized finance protocols. Supply contractions typically signal that market participants are converting their holdings to fiat currency or withdrawing capital from digital asset markets entirely.
This withdrawal diminishes the available dollar-denominated liquidity for purchasing Bitcoin, Ethereum, and alternative cryptocurrencies, creating headwinds for price appreciation across the sector.
The supply decrease coincided with broader weakness in cryptocurrency markets. U.S. spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds experienced over $4 billion in net outflows during June, representing their worst monthly performance since launching. These parallel trends indicate simultaneous weakening of both institutional investment channels and on-chain market participation.
Despite supply contraction, on-chain transaction activity remained robust. Adjusted stablecoin transaction volume climbed to an all-time high of $1.78 trillion throughout June. USDC facilitated approximately $1.21 trillion in transfers, while USDT processed $573 billion.
Divergence from 2022 Bear Market Dynamics Industry analysts maintain a measured perspective on the current downturn. Paul Howard, senior director at trading firm Wincent, characterized the decline as “a relatively small pullback in what we believe is a long-term growth market.”
The present contraction of roughly 3% pales in comparison to the devastating 26% supply collapse witnessed during 2022’s bear market, which followed multiple catastrophic failures including Terra-Luna, FTX’s bankruptcy, and the insolvencies of Celsius and BlockFi.
A comparable pattern emerged between December 2025 and February 2026, when stablecoin supply contracted by $9 billion before rebounding to establish new records.
Emerging competitors continue gaining market share. Global Dollar, a Paxos-issued stablecoin backed by a consortium including Robinhood, exceeded $3.2 billion in circulation. USDGO, issued by Anchorage Digital, nearly doubled its supply to $900 million.
The U.S. GENIUS Act established comprehensive federal regulation for payment stablecoins, attracting additional issuers and fundamentally restructuring market dynamics.
Tokenized real-world assets demonstrated inverse performance during this period. Their aggregate on-chain valuation surpassed $30 billion in 2026, with tokenized equity transaction volume surging 145% in June to reach a record $3.86 billion.
Market participants now await July supply data, ETF flows, and exchange metrics to determine whether capital is returning to the ecosystem or if the downturn will persist.
The total market capitalization of stablecoins has quietly shrunk by $10 billion since May, with $7.7 billion of that decline occurring in June alone, data highlighted by CoinDesk reveals. It marks the steepest monthly dollar outflow for the sector since the catastrophic Terra-Luna implosion in May 2022. For a market that has grown accustomed to ceaseless expansion, a contraction of this size raises immediate questions about the health of crypto liquidity channels. Yet one analyst suggests there is little reason to sound alarm bells, pointing to structural demand drivers that remain firmly in place.
The pullback is concentrated among the largest centralized stablecoins, not fringe algorithmic experiments. That detail alone explains why the mood among professional observers hasn’t turned sour. During Terra’s collapse, a $40 billion ecosystem evaporated in days, dragging leveraged DeFi protocols and centralised lenders into insolvency. Today, the drop reflects outflows from trading pairs on major exchanges, profit-taking after the first-half rally in digital assets, and perhaps a temporary rotation into higher-yielding tokenized treasury products. None of those forces imply systemic fragility.
June’s Record Outflow A $7.7 billion monthly decline is not trivial. Stablecoin supply acts as a rough gauge of on-chain purchasing power and trading appetite. When it contracts, spot volumes often follow, and that pattern has held in recent weeks. Exchange order books are thinner. DeFi lending pools on Ethereum and Solana have seen modest liquidity tightening. For traders who track stablecoin velocity as a leading indicator, the signal is worth watching.
Still, the composition of the decline is telling. Tether’s USDT shed about $5 billion over the period, while Circle’s USDC lost roughly $2 billion. The rest came from smaller issuers. In previous cycles, redemptions at this speed would have been accompanied by a credit event or a regulatory shock. That is absent. Issuers are maintaining their reserves and redemption mechanisms without a hitch, suggesting the flight is voluntary and orderly.
Why This Time Is Different The post-Terra regulatory and structural environment has fundamentally changed the stablecoin landscape. New legislative efforts, including a landmark US crypto bill that has faced fierce last-minute pushback from banking interests, are still moving toward a framework that could cement stablecoins as regulated payment instruments rather than shadow money. The legislative battle, covered in a recent update on banking opposition, demonstrates that the political class is finally engaging with the sector, not ignoring it. For institutional capital, that legislative clarity, even if still in flux, reduces tail risk.
Meanwhile, the expansion of tokenized real-world assets has created a new demand anchor for stablecoins. On-chain treasuries and private credit pools now routinely settle in USDC or USDT. A recent weekly tokenization roundup showed that real-world assets crossed $20 billion in on-chain value, with major institutions like JPMorgan running live settlement. Every tokenized trade requires a stablecoin leg, creating a structural bid that didn’t exist three years ago. A contraction of a few billion dollars does little to dismantle that infrastructure.
Liquidity Fears and the Bigger Picture The fear among traders is that shrinking stablecoin balances foreshadow a broader liquidity drain, forcing leveraged positions to unwind. That narrative has circulated during past supply dips, but the current data is more nuanced. Developer activity across the major blockchains remains robust, as evidenced by the latest rankings of blockchain developer activity. Ethereum, BNB Chain, Polygon, and Solana continue to attract builders, and developer engagement is often a leading indicator of future user and capital inflows. If protocols keep shipping, they will need liquidity, and stablecoins will return.
What is less certain is the timeline. If US yields stay elevated and traditional fintech apps offer competitive interest on fiat balances, the opportunity cost of holding yield-free stablecoins remains high. A prolonged sideways period could keep a lid on the aggregate market cap. For exchanges, this means thinner fee revenue; for DeFi protocols, it pressures total value locked. Centralised exchanges may accelerate promotional campaigns for stablecoin staking or yield-bearing products to retain deposits. The next few months will reveal whether the outflow stabilizes or deepens.
What Comes Next The analyst cited in the CoinDesk report views the contraction as a pause, not a reversal of the long-term growth trend that has seen the stablecoin market rise from $120 billion in early 2023 to over $200 billion before the recent dip. The baseline assumption is that as regulatory rails firm up and real-world asset settlement expands, stablecoin demand will resume its upward march. The more cautious question is whether the market has become too dependent on centralized issuers whose growth is now being moderated by higher interest rates and compliance costs.
For the crypto ecosystem, the stablecoin outflow is a reminder that liquidity is never guaranteed. It encourages market participants to watch not just price charts, but the plumbing—the flow of capital on and off chain. While the panic is unwarranted, the vigilance is not.
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Mushumir Butt is a seasoned crypto journalist with over three years of experience reporting on the world of blockchain and cryptocurrency. At Blockchain Reporter, he delivers insightful news, in‐depth project reviews, and precise price analysis and predictions. With a strong background in SEO and digital marketing, Mushumir excels at breaking down complex trends into clear, accessible content, ensuring readers stay ahead in the fast‐paced crypto space.
The stablecoin market has shrunk by roughly $10 billion since its May peak, including a $7.7 billion decline just in June.On a percentage basis, though, it was just a 3% fall; still modest compared with the 26% contraction during the 2022 crypto bear market.Newer regulated issuers are beginning to chip away at the dominance of USDT and USDC, according to data.The stablecoin market posted its biggest retreat in years in June, a sign that onchain liquidity has dwindled as crypto markets continued to consolidate near 2026 lows.
Last month saw a $7.7 billion decline in stablecoin market capitalization, the largest dollar amount since May 2022, when blockchain protocol Terra-Luna collapsed, kickstarting a brutal bear market often dubbed as crypto winter, CoinDesk Data reported.
Stablecoin market capitalization (CoinDesk Data)Zooming out, the total value of stablecoins in circulation has fallen ny roughly roughly $10 billion since its May peak, according to data from RWA.xyz. It's about a 3% drop on a percentage basis, the largest such downtrend since 2023, but well shy of 2022's 26% collapse.
The decline has been driven mainly by the two dominant issuers. Tether's USDT, the largest stablecoin, has seen its market capitalization fall to roughly $184 billion from $190 billion in May, a decline of about $6 billion. Circle's USDC has dropped to around $73 billion from its March 2026 peak of just shy of $80 billion, shedding another $7 billion.
The setback is notable because it runs counter to the bullish outlooks of Wall Street banks on stablecoin growth. Last year, global bank Citi revised its stablecoin growth forecast for 2030 to $1.9 trillion in its base case and $4 trillion in a bull case, up from $1.6 trillion and $3.7 trillion, respectively. Standard Chartered projected a $2 trillion market by 2028.
The decline also carries broader relevance for the crypto market. Major stablecoins are widely used as the quote currency for crypto trading and increasingly for payments and settlement, making changes in their supply a closely watched gauge of liquidity flowing into or out of digital assets.
Nothing like the 2022 crypto winterThe pullback may seem dramatic, but it's modest by historical standards.
A similar pullback occurred between December 2025 and February 2026, when stablecoin supply fell by roughly $9 billion before bouncing to a new record. That coincided with a major correction in cryptocurrencies, with bitcoin plunging from around $95,000 to $60,000.
Altogether, the stablecoin market has largely stalled around $300 billion since October (coinciding with bitcoin hitting its $126,000 record) after more than doubling in size in two years.
The 2022 bear market, marked by major implosions like crypto exchange FTX and lenders Celsius, BlockFi and Genesis, was far more severe for stablecoins.
The combined market capitalization of major stablecoins fell from roughly $166 billion in March 2022 to $122 billion by September 2023, RWA.xyz data shows — a decline of over 26% as investors pulled money from the digital asset market.
Tether's USDT fell from $78 billion to $65 billion between March and November 2022. For USDC, the downtrend took much longer to play out, falling from $55 billion in July 2022 to below $24 billion by November 2023, exacerbated by its banking partner Silicon Valley Bank's collapse in 2023 March.
The implosion of TerraUSD, the algorithmic stablecoin of the Terra-Luna crypto project, also wiped out $18 billion from the stablecoin market.
The current decline is only a temporary setback in a long-term uptrend, one analyst said.
"The recent decline in stablecoin market cap represents a relatively small pullback in what we believe is a long-term growth market," said Paul Howard, senior director at trading firm Wincent.
"Short-term fluctuations in liquidity are normal, but they don’t change our view that stablecoins will continue to play an increasingly important role in the digital asset ecosystem," he added.
Increasing stablecoin competitionLooking beyond the headline decline, the trend appears more nuanced.
Part of the slowdown reflects a changing competitive landscape. As stablecoins move beyond crypto trading and into mainstream payments, new issuers have entered the market following regulatory progress such as the GENIUS Act in the U.S.
While Tether's USDT and Circle's USDC have both seen supply decline recently, several smaller competitors have expanded. Global Dollar (USDG), issued by Paxos and backed by a consortium including Robinhood, surpassed $3.2 billion in circulation, while USDGO, issued by Anchorage Digital with Hong Kong's OSL Group, nearly doubled to $900 million, CoinGecko data shows.
More competition is on the way, too. OpenUSD, backed by a group of payments and financial firms, is among several newcomers looking to challenge the dominance of USDT and USDC.
Even so, stablecoin growth has historically coincided with bull markets by providing fresh onchain buying power. Shrinking aggregate supply removes a tailwind for crypto markets, making it harder for cryptocurrencies to sustain rallies unless new demand emerges.
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Digital Assets: Quarterly Review and Outlook Q2
Digital Assets: Quarterly Review and Outlook Q2
Digital assets posted a third consecutive quarter of losses in Q2 2026, the longest losing streak since the 2022 bear market, as institutional capital rotated into AI equities and Bitcoin ETFs recorded their largest quarterly outflow since launch. Our report examines what drove the divergence, where structural adoption continued regardless, and what Q3 signals to watch.
Jul 10, 2026
Digital assets posted a third consecutive quarter of losses in Q2 2026, the longest losing streak since the 2022 bear market, as institutional capital rotated into AI equities and Bitcoin ETFs recorded their largest quarterly outflow since launch. Our report examines what drove the divergence, where structural adoption continued regardless, and what Q3 signals to watch.
Why it matters:
Digital assets posted a third consecutive quarter of losses in Q2 2026, the longest losing streak since the 2022 bear market, as institutional capital rotated into AI equities and Bitcoin ETFs recorded their largest quarterly outflow since launch. Our report examines what drove the divergence, where structural adoption continued regardless, and what Q3 signals to watch.
PANews, July 12 news, according to CoinDesk report, the stablecoin market in June saw its largest pullback in recent years, with total market cap shrinking by $7.7 billion that month, the biggest single-month decline since the Terra-Luna collapse in May 2022. Since the peak in May, the stablecoin market has cumulatively shrunk by about $10 billion, with a total market cap decline of about 3%. Among them, two major stablecoin issuers were the main drivers of this pullback. The market cap of USDT issued by Tether fell from about $190 billion in May to $184 billion, a decrease of about $6 billion; USDC issued by Circle retreated from a peak of nearly $80 billion in March 2026 to about $73 billion, a contraction of about $7 billion.
However, compared with the cumulative decline of over 26% in the stablecoin market during the crypto winter of 2022, the magnitude of this round of adjustment is still relatively mild. Data shows that from March 2022 to September 2023, the total market cap of major stablecoins fell from about $166 billion to $122 billion, during which the TerraUSD crash, FTX bankruptcy, and failures of multiple crypto lending institutions severely hit market liquidity.
Despite overall market pressure, the competitive landscape of the stablecoin industry is changing. As regulatory developments like the U.S. GENIUS Act drive the expansion of stablecoins into payment and settlement scenarios, more issuers are entering the fray. The circulation of USDG, issued by Paxos and supported by institutions such as Robinhood, has exceeded $3.2 billion, while the circulation of USDGO launched by Anchorage Digital and Hong Kong's OSL Group has nearly doubled to $900 million.
Wall Street institutions remain optimistic about the long-term prospects of stablecoins. Citi previously estimated that the global stablecoin market size would reach $1.9 trillion under a base-case scenario and $4 trillion under an optimistic scenario by 2030; Standard Chartered Bank predicts that the stablecoin market size will grow to $2 trillion by 2028. Analysts point out that stablecoin supply growth has historically been one of the important drivers of a crypto bull market, while the current overall supply contraction means reduced new on-chain liquidity. Without support from new capital demand, the difficulty for crypto assets to sustain their rise may increase.
The U.S.-Iran standoff in the Strait of Hormuz is approaching a dangerous tipping point, with military conflicts escalating anew.
US officials stated that the U.S. military conducted multiple strikes on missile and air defense systems at several sites around the Strait of Hormuz, as well as small vessels belonging to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) an hour ago. Officials from Iran’s Qeshm Island confirmed that local time on Sunday afternoon, the enemy launched 10 to 11 missiles at Qeshm Island; all targeted military facilities, and no casualties were reported in the attack. Earlier, Iran announced it had launched an attack on a U.S. missile base in Kuwait. The ATACMS missile system facility at the U.S. military base in Kuwait was struck, with smoke rising at the scene. Meanwhile, Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA) reported that Israeli artillery carried out additional shelling in southern Lebanon. Two Israeli shells hit Kafr Tibtin town in Nabatieh District, southern Lebanon. The agency added that the attack originated from Israeli military positions in the occupied border area. In addition, Israel also shelled the town of Zawtar al-Sharqiya near Meifadoun.
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Iran launches an attack on the U.S. missile base in Kuwait.
According to Iran's Mehr News Agency, Iran launched an attack on a US missile base in Kuwait. The ATACMS missile system facility at the US military base in Kuwait was struck, with smoke rising at the scene. Iran's president also noted: "We are engaged in a complex economic war, and successfully overcoming this phase requires the active participation of citizens." Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated: "Trump hopes to reach an agreement with Iran, particularly on the nuclear issue, but if Iran fails to abide by its commitments, he will not hesitate to use military force."
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A whale has collateralized 1.56 million kHYPE on the HyperlendX platform, borrowing 1.06 million WHYPE.
According to OnchainLens monitoring, a crypto whale deposited approximately $107.21 million in assets on the HyperlendX platform and borrowed around $70.94 million using this deposit as collateral. The address currently holds 1.56 million kHYPE as collateral, has borrowed 1.06 million WHYPE, with a health factor of 1.31, indicating relatively prudent operations. Additionally, the whale has staked 12,305 HPL.
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During the World Cup, high-frequency sports prediction whale swisstony emerged, with its account notching up over 139,000 predictions and generating nearly $20 million in profits.
Data from prediction market platform Predict.fun shows that top high-frequency sports trader swisstony emerged during the 2026 FIFA World Cup (co-hosted by the U.S., Canada, and Mexico). Since entering the market in July 2025, the whale has generated total profits of $18.648 million, with a single largest profit of $1.2 million, having made a total of 139,304 predictions, and its profit curve has been steadily rising. Its World Cup prediction record is impressive: it excels in contrarian trades when popular odds are overvalued, amassing huge profits through high-frequency, small-margin trades. While average per-trade gains are modest, its stable win rate leads to strong cumulative returns. In June, the whale earned around $9.5 million by contrarian betting on popular teams including England, Spain, and Belgium, briefly becoming the platform’s 5th highest-earning user. Currently, swisstony is focusing on the France vs Spain match on July 14 (local time), placing heavy positions across multiple sub-markets for the game. Its core strategy remains making large volumes of "No" predictions—especially for low-probability exact scores—paired with some handicap and over/under bets. The whale consistently ranks at the top of prediction market monthly profit leaderboards, with a single-day profit exceeding $2 million. Analysts believe swisstony likely uses automated tools or real-time data to assist its trading.
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Data: 48% of Nasdaq 100 constituent stocks have corrected over 20% from their respective peaks, while 64% still trade above their 200-day moving average.
In the Nasdaq 100, 48% of constituent stocks have corrected at least 20% from their respective peaks. This proportion has doubled over the past 12 months, but remains lower than the 60% level recorded before the market bottomed at the end of March, and is still short of the extreme 80% hit during the 2022 bear market. Meanwhile, 64% of constituents are still trading above their 200-day moving average, near the year's highest level — a figure that stood at just 38% before the market bottomed on March 30. The rally in the U.S. stock index is increasingly relying on a small number of stocks for support.
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Analysis: BTC reclaiming the $70,700 level is the primary signal of a trend reversal, with some long-term investors accumulating at lower levels.
Analyst Darkfost points out that Bitcoin trading below the Short-Term Holder (STH) cost base is a hallmark of every bear market cycle. BTC has remained below this level for over nine months. The STH cost base currently stands at $70,700 and has consistently acted as a resistance level. In May, Bitcoin attempted to test the nearby level of roughly $82,000, only to pull back immediately. Since then, the STH cost base has dropped significantly, signaling that some investors have accumulated positions at lower prices, lowering their average holding cost. However, the price has yet to effectively hold above this key level. The analysis notes that a sustained recovery above the STH cost base will mark the first positive signal. Bitcoin is currently trading in a range of $59,000 to $64,000, a notable distance from the $70,700 resistance level. If BTC can later break through and hold above this level effectively, it will mean the entire short-term holder cohort has exited unrealized losses, and market sentiment could shift from bearish defense to structural recovery. Conversely, if resistance persists, the STH cost base will continue to decline, potentially extending the bear market bottoming cycle.
TL;DR Stablecoin market capitalization fell by about $10 billion from its May peak, with June recording the biggest monthly dollar decline since the 2022 Terra crash. USDT’s supply dropped from around $190 billion to $184 billion, while USDC declined to approximately $73 billion, leading the overall contraction. Despite the headline decline, the stablecoin market shrank by only about 3%, indicating that most of the sector’s recent growth remains intact. Even as stablecoin supply declined, tokenized real-world assets reached new highs. The stablecoin market has recorded its largest monthly contraction since the collapse of TerraUSD in 2022, with total market capitalization falling by roughly $10 billion from its May peak.
While the decline has raised concerns about liquidity across the digital asset market, analysts note that the overall contraction remains relatively modest at around 3%, suggesting the sector continues to retain most of the gains accumulated over the past year.
The retreat comes as crypto markets navigate weaker investor sentiment, persistent ETF outflows, and heightened macroeconomic uncertainty that has weighed on demand for digital assets.
Tether’s USDT, the world’s largest stablecoin, accounted for much of the decline, with its circulating supply falling from roughly $190 billion to $184 billion. USDC also contracted, dropping to around $73 billion during the same period. Together, the two dominant dollar-backed stablecoins represent the overwhelming majority of on-chain liquidity used across centralized and decentralized crypto markets.
Stablecoin Data | Source: X Although the market lost billions of dollars in capitalization, the overall decline represented only a small percentage of the sector’s total value, highlighting that stablecoin adoption remains significantly higher than it was before the recent expansion cycle.
Stablecoin Market Liquidity Concerns Return to The Spotlight Stablecoins are widely viewed as the primary source of liquidity within the cryptocurrency ecosystem because they are commonly used to enter and exit positions without converting back into traditional fiat currencies.
A shrinking stablecoin supply is often interpreted as a sign that capital is leaving digital asset markets or remaining on the sidelines. The combined supply of USDT and USDC had been falling since early May, reflecting weaker on-chain liquidity during a period marked by declining crypto prices and softer institutional inflows.
The reduction also coincided with several weeks of net outflows from U.S. spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds, reinforcing concerns that investor demand cooled during June.
Despite the decline in supply, trading activity remained relatively resilient. Stablecoin trading volume on centralized exchanges rose 10.8% in June to approximately $981 billion, marking the first monthly increase in five months. The increase suggests that stablecoins continue to play a central role in crypto trading even as total circulating supply contracts.
Tokenized Assets Continue Expanding While stablecoins experienced their sharpest pullback in years, tokenized real-world assets continued moving in the opposite direction.
Recent data found that the total market capitalization of tokenized assets climbed to a record $30.1 billion in June, driven by continued growth in tokenized U.S. Treasuries and public equities. Tokenized Treasury products alone expanded to approximately $17 billion, while tokenized equity trading volumes surged to fresh highs during the month.
The contrasting trends suggest that although short-term liquidity has weakened, institutional interest in blockchain-based financial infrastructure continues to grow.
The broader stablecoin sector is also benefiting from increasing regulatory clarity. Recent developments include new licensing approvals for major issuers and expanding institutional support for dollar-backed digital assets.
Circle, the issuer of USDC, recently received approval to operate as a federally regulated trust bank in the United States, allowing it to directly oversee reserves backing its stablecoin as it now dominates over USDT. The move reflects growing integration between traditional finance and digital asset infrastructure despite the recent market slowdown.
Market participants will now be watching whether stablecoin issuance resumes in the coming months. A return to supply growth would likely signal renewed capital entering the crypto ecosystem, while continued contraction could point to a more cautious investment environment during the second half of the year.
The stablecoin sector has experienced its largest single-month decline since the collapse of TerraUSD in 2022, with total market capitalization falling by approximately $10 billion from its peak in May. Although this represents the steepest monthly drop in over two years, the contraction only accounts for about 3% of the sector’s total value, indicating that much of the gains from recent growth remain in place.
Leading stablecoins drive contractionTether (USDT), the most widely used stablecoin globally, saw its circulating supply fall from nearly $190 billion to $184 billion in recent weeks. Circle’s USD Coin (USDC) also contributed to the sector’s decline, with its total supply sliding to around $73 billion over the same period. As the two largest dollar-backed stablecoins, USDT and USDC together dominate on-chain liquidity for both centralized and decentralized exchanges.
Despite the significant dollar reduction, stablecoins’ total market capitalization remains well above levels seen prior to the recent expansion phase, signaling continued adoption across the cryptocurrency ecosystem.
StablecoinMay SupplyCurrent SupplyDollar ChangeUSDT$190 billion$184 billion– $6 billionUSDC~$74 billion~$73 billion– $1 billionMarket analysts have noted that recent stablecoin outflows are coinciding with reduced risk appetite in digital assets, persistent outflows from spot Bitcoin ETFs, and macroeconomic uncertainty affecting broader investor participation in cryptocurrencies.
Liquidity and trading activityStablecoins, serving as the main source of liquidity in the crypto market, are widely used for moving capital in and out of digital asset positions without the need to convert back into traditional fiat currencies. A declining stablecoin supply is often interpreted as capital exiting crypto markets or waiting on the sidelines, and recent numbers align with this sentiment.
Data shows that the combined supply of USDT and USDC had been falling since early May, mirroring slower trading activity and softer institutional inflows into the sector. This reduction overlapped with a multi-week stretch of net outflows from US spot Bitcoin ETFs, further reflecting wariness among investors in June.
Despite these factors, trading volumes for stablecoins on centralized exchanges rose 10.8% to nearly $981 billion in June. This marked the first monthly growth in five months, underlining stablecoins’ enduring role at the heart of daily crypto trading activity.
Growth in tokenized real-world assetsIn contrast to the stablecoin supply contraction, tokenized real-world assets have continued to expand. The total market cap of these assets reached a record $30.1 billion in June, fueled by the ongoing growth of tokenized US Treasuries and public equities. Tokenized Treasury products alone grew to about $17 billion, as equity trading volumes rose to new heights.
Mini dictionary: Tokenized real-world assets, also called RWAs, are traditional financial assets such as government bonds, real estate, or public equities that are converted into digital tokens and traded on a blockchain. This allows investors to access, trade, and settle these assets with greater efficiency and transparency.
These opposite trends highlight continued institutional interest in blockchain-based financial infrastructure, even as short-term liquidity for stablecoins wanes.
Regulatory clarity and sector outlookRegulatory progress has also offered a boost to the stablecoin market. Major issuers have recently gained new licenses and expanded institutional backing for their dollar-pegged digital assets.
Circle, the company behind USDC, received regulatory approval to operate as a federally regulated trust bank in the United States. This move enables the firm to directly manage reserves backing USDC and signals deeper integration between the digital asset industry and traditional finance systems.
With these shifts, market observers are closely watching whether stablecoin issuance will rebound in the second half of the year. Renewed supply growth could indicate a return of capital to the crypto ecosystem, while further declines may point to continued caution among investors.
Disclaimer: The information contained in this article does not constitute investment advice. Investors should be aware that cryptocurrencies carry high volatility and therefore risk, and should conduct their own research.
OpenAI is rolling out GPT-5.6 across ChatGPT, Codex, and its API, introducing a new three tier model family led by Sol, its latest flagship model.
The lineup also includes Terra, a balanced model for everyday work, and Luna, the company’s lowest cost option in the GPT-5.6 family. OpenAI says the new naming system separates the model generation from durable capability tiers, giving users and developers clearer choices across intelligence, speed, and cost.
The release follows a limited preview and expands access to GPT-5.6 across OpenAI’s consumer, developer, and enterprise products. The rollout is starting globally and is expected to continue toward full availability over 24 hours.
OpenAI is positioning GPT-5.6 Sol as its strongest model for coding, knowledge work, cybersecurity, and science. The company says the model delivers better performance per dollar by completing more successful work with fewer tokens and lower estimated cost than previous frontier models.
The company says Sol can coordinate tool use, inspect intermediate results, and refine outputs before returning finished work. In the API, Programmatic Tool Calling lets the model write and run lightweight programs in memory to filter intermediate data and decide next steps without sending every result back through the model.
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OpenAI is also introducing higher compute settings for more demanding tasks. Max gives GPT-5.6 more time to reason, check work, and revise outputs. Ultra goes further by coordinating multiple agents in parallel, with OpenAI describing the default setup as four agents working across separate workstreams before synthesizing the result.
Coding is one of the main areas OpenAI is using to frame the launch. The company says GPT-5.6 Sol sets a new state of the art on the Artificial Analysis Coding Agent Index and also improves on Terminal Bench 2.1 and DeepSWE, benchmarks focused on command line tasks and long horizon engineering work in real codebases.
OpenAI also says Terra performs above Claude Fable 5 on some coding agent measures, while Luna outperforms Claude Opus 4.8 at lower estimated cost.
OpenAI is making a similar pitch for knowledge work. GPT-5.6 is designed to work across documents, spreadsheets, presentations, Slack, Notion, Microsoft 365, Google Drive, and other workplace tools.
The company says Sol improves the quality of editable presentations, financial models, documents, and spreadsheets, especially when users provide reference files or templates.
The launch also puts safety back at the center of OpenAI’s model strategy. GPT-5.6 is more capable in cybersecurity and biology than earlier systems, but OpenAI says the models do not cross its Critical threshold in either category.
The company says its safeguards combine model training, real time checks, monitoring, account level enforcement, and access controls for higher risk capabilities.
OpenAI’s system card says GPT-5.6 Sol is treated as High capability in cybersecurity, with Terra and Luna also reaching the High threshold, though with lower overall capability than Sol.
The company says the goal is to preserve legitimate defensive work such as secure code review, patching, threat modeling, and vulnerability validation while applying tighter controls to serious misuse.
Pricing for the API starts at $5 per 1 million input tokens and $30 per 1 million output tokens for Sol. Terra is priced at $2.50 input and $15 output, while Luna is priced at $1 input and $6 output. OpenAI is also adding more predictable prompt caching, including explicit cache breakpoints and a 30 minute minimum cache life.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Estefano Gomez. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
OpenAI has rolled out a new family of models under the GPT-5.6 banner, introducing three distinct variants named Sol, Terra, and Luna, each aimed at a different slice of the market.
The full global release to ChatGPT, Codex, and the API went live on July 9, 2026, following a limited preview that kicked off on June 26, 2026, restricted to U.S. government-approved trusted partners.
Three models, three jobs Sol is the flagship. It is built for heavy lifting: advanced coding, scientific research, and enhanced cybersecurity applications.
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Terra sits in the middle. OpenAI positions it as delivering performance comparable to the previous GPT-5.5 generation, but at roughly half the cost.
Luna is designed for high-throughput, routine tasks where speed and cost efficiency matter more than raw capability.
The pricing math Sol costs $5 per million input tokens and $30 per million output tokens. Terra comes in at $2.50 input and $15 output, exactly half of Sol across the board. Luna drops further to $1 input and $6 output, making it the most affordable option in the family by a significant margin.
The rollout also comes with enhanced safeguards, particularly around cybersecurity applications and misuse prevention.
About those names Sol, Terra, and Luna happen to be identical, or nearly identical, to tickers and names associated with well-known blockchain projects: Solana trades as SOL, and the original Terra ecosystem gave the world LUNA before its spectacular collapse in 2022.
OpenAI has not announced any connection to blockchain technology, and nothing in the rollout suggests a link to digital assets. Some speculation has surfaced online, though without any substantive foundation in blockchain development or token announcements.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
SK Hynix completes its U.S. ADR offering, raising $26.5 billion, setting a new record for a foreign company's IPO in the U.S.
South Korean semiconductor firm SK Hynix has completed its US depositary receipt (ADR) offering, raising $26.5 billion, setting a new record for the largest initial public offering (IPO) by a foreign company in the US and becoming the third-largest listing in global securities history. SK Hynix issued a total of 177.9 million ADRs, priced at $149 each, with each ADR equivalent to one-tenth of its common shares traded on South Korea’s domestic stock market. The final offering price was approximately 3% higher than the closing price of its home-listed shares. Per the transaction terms, SK Hynix ADRs will launch pre-market trading on the Nasdaq Global Select Market on Friday under the temporary ticker symbol "SKHYV", and are scheduled to switch to the official ticker "SKHY" for regular trading starting July 13. The offering is led by Bank of America, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and JPMorgan Chase, with 9 additional firms participating. Market feedback shows the offering received over 7 times oversubscription, with total subscription interest approaching $200 billion. Asset management firms including Baillie Gifford, Coatue Management, and Situational Awareness Partners took part in the subscription, with the top ten orders absorbing nearly half of the total shares. SK Hynix aims to list on the US stock market to narrow the valuation gap with US peers such as Micron Technology, and leverage overseas capital premiums to boost its corporate value. As a core supplier of high-bandwidth memory (HBM) for NVIDIA, SK Hynix already holds a significant market share in this segment. Meanwhile, US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick stated he is in talks with Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, urging the two South Korean memory chip manufacturers to expand production in the US to enhance the resilience of America’s domestic chip supply chain.
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The USDT Circulating Supply on #TRON has surpassed $90B.
The USDT Circulating Supply on #TRON has surpassed $90B. The network also processes an average of $23.8B in daily USDT transfer volume.
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Polymarket Seeks to Offer Legal Margin Trading in the US
，据彭博社报道，Polymarket 正在寻求监管批准，以在美国合法提供保证金交易。若获批，用户将能够以更少的前期资金押注事件结果，也有助于该预测市场平台吸引更成熟的交易者。根据 7 月 3 日提交给美国全国期货协会的文件，Polymarket 已通过其关联公司 Coming Home GBA LLC 申请注册为期货佣金商（FCM）。此外，Polymarket 还需要获得美国商品期货交易委员会批准，对其规则手册进行修改，以允许非全额抵押交易。
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The Federal Reserve has set up five external working groups to conduct a comprehensive review of its monetary policy operating mechanisms.
Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh has formed five working groups to conduct a comprehensive review of the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy operational framework, covering areas including balance sheet management, policy tools, and the impact of artificial intelligence. The Fed stated that each working group will operate independently, conduct fact-based research, and submit rigorous analysis findings to the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC). The groups will assess whether there is room for improvement in policy tools, analytical methods, and policy frameworks. Members of the review team include several prominent economists and former central bank officials. Among them, Harvard University economist Raj Chetty will co-lead the data working group, tech investor Marc Andreessen will head the productivity and employment working group, and former Chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisers Greg Mankiw will co-lead the inflation working group. Warsh noted that the U.S. economy has undergone massive changes over the past generation, with an even faster pace of transformation currently. The Federal Reserve needs to ensure it is operating at its optimal state to achieve its dual mandates of price stability and maximum employment. (Jinshi)
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Goldman Sachs bans its employees from participating in financial and politics-related prediction market trading.
According to Bloomberg, Goldman Sachs has banned its employees from trading in prediction markets, with the exception of sports and entertainment bets. This marks one of the clear steps Wall Street firms are taking to address new regulatory challenges stemming from the surge in event betting activity. Goldman recently updated its personal trading policy, prohibiting employees from trading event contracts linked to specific companies (including Goldman itself), as well as contracts tied to election outcomes and any financial market performance. Repeated policy violations may result in employee dismissal or account closure; in cases of improper trading, Goldman can also require staff to surrender profits exceeding $200 or donate the funds to charity. The firm’s policy explicitly bans employees from participating in event contracts related to corporate restructurings, mergers and acquisitions, ceasefire dates, Bitcoin prices, and M&A regulatory approval outcomes, among others. However, contracts such as "whether a particular team will win a championship" remain permitted. By comparison, JPMorgan Chase previously only required employees to "think carefully" before engaging in finance-related prediction markets, while hedge funds including Point72 and Balyasny have fully banned staff from using prediction markets via personal accounts.
PANews, July 10 - According to a report by Jiemian, OpenAI announced that the GPT-5.6 series models are officially fully available, including the flagship model GPT-5.6 Sol, the balanced model Terra, and the low-cost model Luna. Among them, Sol supports the new Ultra mode, which can coordinate four AI agents by default to process complex tasks in parallel, further improving efficiency in scenarios such as code development, scientific research, cybersecurity, and knowledge work. OpenAI stated that the GPT-5.6 series achieves industry-leading performance across multiple benchmarks, while significantly reducing inference costs and response times while maintaining or improving performance. The company also said that GPT-5.6 is equipped with the most comprehensive security protection system to date, and officially supports programmatic tool calls, further enhancing the ability to autonomously execute complex tasks.
Additionally, OpenAI launched a new enterprise-level feature—ChatGPT Work. As a brand-new intelligent agent (Agent) for ChatGPT, this feature is powered by the frontier model GPT-5.6. Unlike instant conversations, ChatGPT Work is designed for multi-step complex projects. Users simply input the ultimate goal, and it can autonomously break down tasks, formulate plans, extract context from connected tools, and automatically generate documents, spreadsheets, or presentations. At the same time, the simultaneously launched ChatGPT Sites feature supports one-click generation of lightweight collaborative websites from ideas or data. Currently, this feature is available on macOS and Windows desktops, and is being gradually rolled out to paid plan users such as Plus and Enterprise. Users and enterprise management still have absolute control and approval rights during the execution process.
