Track market-moving stories before they get noisy

Why Is Marex Accepting USDC as Margin Collateral? Marex Group has begun accepting Circle’s USDC stablecoin as initial margin collateral for regulated derivatives positions, marking a practical step in the use of tokenized collateral inside established clearing infrastructure.

The service allows eligible Marex clients to use USDC held in segregated custody to support positions cleared through the company’s US futures commission merchant business. Coinbase provides the custody, conversion, and reporting systems supporting the workflow, while Marex remains responsible for the regulated clearing relationship.

The first transaction was completed with proprietary trading firm Prime Trading. Under the arrangement, Prime Trading transferred USDC as initial margin collateral, and Marex then provided cash to fund the client’s derivatives positions.

The structure does not mean USDC is being delivered directly to an exchange as margin. Marex accepts the stablecoin from the client as collateral and uses its value within the clearing workflow, with Coinbase supplying custody and operational reporting designed to meet regulatory and clearinghouse requirements.

How Does The CFTC Relief Shape The Framework? The launch follows a December 8, 2025 no-action letter from staff at the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission that gave registered futures commission merchants limited regulatory relief to accept certain non-security digital assets as customer margin collateral.

The letter covers specified assets, including payment stablecoins, Bitcoin, and Ether, subject to conditions around custody, segregation, valuation, reporting, and risk management. It also allows futures commission merchants to take the value of qualifying digital assets into account for certain regulatory calculations and permits payment stablecoins to be deposited as residual interest under defined circumstances.

The relief is not an unrestricted approval for digital assets to replace cash or US Treasuries across the derivatives market. Firms using the framework must comply with the conditions set out in the letter, including controls over how assets are held, valued, reported, and managed.

For Marex, the result is a controlled route for bringing stablecoin collateral into a regulated clearing operation rather than launching a standalone crypto product. That distinction matters because the service is tied to existing derivatives market plumbing, not a separate digital asset venue.

Investor Takeaway The Marex structure shows how stablecoins may enter institutional markets first through collateral workflows rather than direct exchange margin. The opportunity is operational efficiency, but the model still depends on custody controls, valuation discipline, and regulatory limits.

Why Does Marex’s Clearing Scale Matter? Marex is not a crypto-native firm testing stablecoins at the edge of the market. The London-headquartered company describes itself as one of the world’s largest non-bank futures commission merchants and provides clearing access across major futures and options exchanges, including CME, CBOT, NYMEX, COMEX, ICE, Eurex, Euronext, the London Metal Exchange, and the Singapore Exchange.

Its clearing services cover financial products as well as energy, agricultural commodities, metals, and digital assets. That gives the USDC arrangement a potential route into institutional workflows already used by clients trading across traditional and digital markets.

Marex reported average clearing client balances of $16 billion during the first quarter of 2026, up 33% from $12 billion a year earlier. The company cleared 1.37 billion contracts during the 12 months ended March 31, an 18% increase from the comparable period. Clearing revenue rose 15% to $137.2 million in the first quarter.

Those figures make the initiative more significant than a limited stablecoin pilot. Marex already sits between institutional clients and some of the world’s largest derivatives exchanges, which means the collateral arrangement is being introduced inside a market structure that already handles large clearing balances and regulated risk management.

What Role Does Coinbase Play In The Workflow? Coinbase supplies the operational layer underneath the service. Its role includes New York Department of Financial Services-qualified custody, instant conversion between fiat currency and USDC, and customized reporting designed for Marex and clearinghouse requirements.

The reporting infrastructure is intended to support clearing-grade reconciliation and oversight rather than ordinary crypto wallet activity. Coinbase also provides the on- and off-ramps needed to convert dollars into USDC and back into fiat currency.

The arrangement addresses a timing mismatch between digital asset markets and the banking system. Crypto markets trade continuously, while cash collateral transfers still depend on bank operating hours, cut-off times, and conventional settlement systems.

A client facing a margin requirement outside normal banking hours may have digital assets available but be unable to move cash quickly enough. USDC can be transferred around the clock, giving Marex the ability to receive additional collateral while traditional payment rails are closed.

Investor Takeaway The main value of USDC collateral is timing. For firms trading both crypto and traditional derivatives, the ability to post collateral outside banking hours can improve capital flexibility, but it does not remove settlement, credit, custody, or valuation risk.

How Far Can Stablecoin Collateral Scale? The efficiency gain is not the same as eliminating risk. Marex still has to apply collateral haircuts, monitor the stablecoin’s value, and manage the operational and regulatory risks tied to custody and conversion. USDC is designed to maintain a one-to-one value with the US dollar, but its use introduces risks that differ from holding cash directly at a bank.

Circle issues USDC and says the token is fully backed by cash and short-duration US government obligations. Marex described the asset as a regulated, fully reserved dollar-denominated stablecoin.

Prime Trading served as the first client to test the completed process. Its chief administrative officer, Joe Balcarcel, said blockchain-based collateral could improve capital efficiency and allow trading firms to react to market events outside traditional banking hours.

Marex did not disclose the size of the initial USDC transfer, the derivatives positions it supported, the collateral haircut applied, or which CME-cleared products were funded through the transaction. Those details will matter in determining how broadly the model can scale across the firm’s client base.

The transaction still marks a concrete implementation of the CFTC’s December relief. Rather than using a stablecoin only for crypto settlement, Marex has connected USDC to the margin process of a regulated futures commission merchant, with Coinbase providing custody and conversion and a trading firm using the structure to fund cleared derivatives positions.

Crypto Briefing approved image library

Circle has reportedly added $500 million in USDC liquidity to the Solana blockchain, according to a social media post by @martypartymusic. This development comes as Solana continues to establish itself as a significant player in the stablecoin market, with its network currently hosting between $7.7 billion and $8.6 billion in circulating USDC. The expansion is aligned with the upcoming implementation of the GENIUS Act, which will provide a federal framework for stablecoins starting January 2027. This move suggests ongoing institutional interest in Solana’s high-throughput capabilities for stablecoin transactions amid regulatory advancements.

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Markets appear to be reacting to this liquidity boost, with prediction market data indicating a modest 11% probability that Solana’s price will reach $90 by the end of July 2026. This reflects a cautious yet optimistic sentiment among market participants regarding Solana’s potential price movement in the short term. The increased liquidity could enhance Solana’s ability to facilitate large transactions and improve overall network efficiency, factors that could influence its price trajectory.

Key Takeaways The addition of $500 million in USDC liquidity to Solana suggests potential positive impacts on its network capabilities and market perception. Market pricing currently indicates an 11% probability of Solana reaching $90 by the end of July 2026, suggesting moderate optimism. The GENIUS Act, effective January 2027, could further enhance regulatory clarity and institutional interest in stablecoins on Solana. What to Watch Observers will be monitoring Solana’s price movements closely as the market reacts to the liquidity addition. Key indicators include network throughput and volume, which could influence Solana’s price performance. Additionally, developments related to the GENIUS Act and further regulatory announcements will be significant, as they might provide additional support for stablecoin use on the Solana network. Market participants will also focus on institutional moves and any announcements from key figures like Anatoly Yakovenko and Ray Ozzie.

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Term Structure

Contract Odds Δ since publish Volume 24h August 1 2026 11% — — View market → August 1 2026 0.4% — — View market → August 1 2026 0.1% — — View market → August 1 2026 1.4% — — View market → August 1 2026 0.9% — — View market → August 1 2026 0.9% — — View market → August 1 2026 3.6% — — View market → August 1 2026 0.4% — — View market → August 1 2026 7.5% — — View market → August 1 2026 0.1% — — View market → August 1 2026 1% — — View market → August 1 2026 0.1% — — View market → August 1 2026 44% — — View market → August 1 2026 0.2% — — View market →

The US sanctioned four crypto wallets tied to Iran’s Central Bank this week. Within hours, Tether froze $131 million in USDT sitting inside them.

It took one Treasury update and one flip of the Tether kill switch. USDT now doubles as a US sanctions weapon, and the industry is split over how issuers should police their coins.

How the Tether Kill Switch Became a US Sanctions WeaponTreasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced the freeze. The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) simply added four Tron addresses to its existing Central Bank of Iran designation.

No new sanctions were needed. The bank has been blocked since 2019 over its support for the IRGC-Qods Force and Hezbollah.

“We will continue to aggressively follow the money and deny the Iranian regime access to the proceeds of its illicit revenue schemes,” Bessent said the campaign targets Iran’s abuse of digital assets.

The wallets had taken in more than $165 million in stablecoins, Chainalysis data shows. About $34 million slipped out first. Tether locked the remaining $131 million, nearly 80% of the total.

Here is what the freeze does. The tokens stay visible on-chain, but the addresses cannot spend or send them. It is not a seizure. Iran still holds the wallets. It just cannot use them.

The mechanics are simple and fast. OFAC names the addresses. Tether flips the switch at the token level. No court order is needed. A private offshore company now enforces US foreign policy in hours, through the third-largest crypto asset, worth $184 billion.

Tether helped block $344 million the same way in April. Frozen Central Bank funds now near $475 million. Seized Iranian crypto overall has reached roughly $1 billion.

OFAC also sanctioned Nobitex and other Iranian exchanges in June for facilitating the transfer of the bank’s stablecoins.

The fine print carries a warning, too. OFAC says its published wallet lists are not exhaustive. Any other address the bank controls is already considered blocked property.

That changes the game for Tehran. Washington is dismantling Iran’s $7.7 billion crypto network. Every remaining USDT holding sits one listing away from a freeze.

Why Circle Refuses to Do What Tether DoesTether moves fast. Circle does not. The USDC issuer faces a Wisconsin criminal complaint for defying a court order in a romance scam case. The order required recovering roughly 381,000 stolen USDC for the victim.

Tether says it has frozen about $4.7 billion tied to crime. It has returned $1.1 billion to victims, per ICIJ. Circle only acts under a strict legal process. Policy chief Dante Disparte called that gap a policy problem in an April post.

“Circle is a regulated company that complies with sanctions, law enforcement orders, and court-mandated requirements… Regarding seizure requests, the legal structures that would authorize stablecoin issuers to act faster—while preserving due process and property rights—do not yet fully exist,” a Circle spokesperson told BeInCrypto.

For now, USDT still dominates the $310 billion stablecoin market, with about 59%, DefiLlama data shows.

Tether’s Volume in Total Stablecoin Market Cap. Source: DefiLlamaThe open question is simple. Will sanctioned actors keep using a coin that can be switched off?

Keyrock acquires BlockFills' institutional trading and brokerage business for $3.25 million

Keyrock has completed the acquisition of BlockFills' institutional trading and brokerage business, with the deal covering its trading technology, institutional client relationships, and derivatives trading team. The acquisition will also expand Keyrock's regulatory scope, including an entity registered with the Cayman Islands Monetary Authority and another UK entity seeking authorization from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). Keyrock did not disclose the transaction price in its announcement. Per prior court documents and disclosures from company representatives, the total acquisition value is $3.25 million, payable in two installments, with certain arrangements subject to regulatory approval. BlockFills suffered major losses during the February 2026 crypto market crash, after which it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the U.S. Keyrock was ultimately selected as the buyer in the firm's bankruptcy proceedings.

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Serenity: Declines in storage and AI-related crypto assets likely stem from deleveraging and cascading margin liquidations.

Serenity noted that Micron Technology announced today it has signed a long-term memory agreement with Qualcomm, but Micron’s stock price still fell by 5.37% following the announcement. He believes that, with multiple structural agreements continuing to take effect, the current decline does not appear to stem from issues with storage or AI stocks themselves. The related drop is more likely due to the winding down of deleveraging and margin call liquidation chains.

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1inch co-founder Anton Bukov stated he was fired at the end of November 2025 and announced the launch of a new project, Second Tier.

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Loss-making small-cap stocks in the Russell 2000 Index have risen 154% since mid-2025, while profitable companies have gained only 34%.

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Injective has submitted a transfer agent registration application to the U.S. SEC.

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Bank of America CEO joins ranks of banking executives warning about risks of Mythos AI

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Zama says a lending vault that accepts only confidential USDC has grown into one of the largest USDC vaults on Morpho’s Ethereum deployment, weeks after opening to depositors.

Summary

Zama says confidential USDC deposits reached $23.23 million, ranking eighth among Ethereum Morpho USDC vaults. The vault lets users earn DeFi yield while keeping individual balances and deposit positions encrypted. Morpho’s growing institutional use shows privacy tools are entering established onchain lending infrastructure at scale. According to a July 16 post from Zama, the Steakhouse Confidential Prime USDC vault held $23.23 million at Ethereum block 25,544,806. The company said that placed it eighth by total deposits among Morpho V1 and V2 USDC vaults on Ethereum. The ranking and deposit figure reflect Zama’s stated snapshot and can change as users deposit or withdraw funds.

Confidential USDC moves into established DeFi infrastructure The Steakhouse Confidential Prime USDC vault opened on June 23. Steakhouse Financial curates the strategy, Morpho provides the lending infrastructure, and Zama supplies the confidentiality technology.

Users deposit confidential USDC, or cUSDC, rather than standard USDC. Zama uses Fully Homomorphic Encryption to keep individual balances and transaction amounts encrypted while allowing the assets to interact with applications on Ethereum. Deposits ultimately enter a strategy using Morpho lending markets backed by collateral including cbBTC, WBTC and wstETH.

Zama points to $23.23M TVL as a demand signal Zama described the vault’s growth as evidence that users are willing to place capital into confidential financial infrastructure. The company said “capital is ready to flow through confidential rails,” while acknowledging that an ongoing incentive program has also helped attract deposits.

The vault launched with a 12-week reward program on top of the yield generated by its underlying Morpho strategy. Zama said the native strategy was producing about 4% when the product launched, while additional incentives rewarded early depositors. The company had reported more than $14 million deposited by July 2, before the total reached the $23.23 million figure reported on July 16.

Morpho attracts more institutional-style vault products The confidential vault arrives as Morpho attracts asset managers, wallets and professional curators. Bitwise launched its first onchain vault on Morpho in January, targeting stablecoin lending through a non-custodial structure.

Morpho has also expanded through consumer wallet integrations. As reported by crypto.news, Trezor added access to Steakhouse-curated USDC and USDT vaults in May. Those developments place Zama’s product within an existing lending market rather than requiring users to move liquidity to a separate blockchain.

Confidential finance still faces compliance questions Zama’s confidential USDC system has already faced a test involving the underlying stablecoin. In May, a US court order led Circle to temporarily freeze a Zama contract holding about $12.5 million in USDC. The order was later lifted, and Zama said the funds returned to normal operation.

As previously reported, the episode prompted Zama to accelerate work on compliance and controlled disclosure tools. The company says its system encrypts transaction details rather than making users anonymous and plans tools that can respond to legal and regulatory requirements.

Zama argues that its cross-chain confidentiality model can add privacy where liquidity already exists instead of requiring a new Layer 1 or Layer 2. The $23.23 million vault provides an early test of that approach, although continued deposits after the incentive program ends will offer a clearer measure of lasting demand.

COINBASE: A New Standard for Clearing: Marex and Coinbase Bring USDC Into Regulated Margin Workflows

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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.

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Morgan Stanley forecasts that the growth rate of storage prices will peak in Q4 this year.

Morgan Stanley forecasts that the year-on-year growth rate of DRAM contract prices will peak in the fourth quarter of 2026, after which it may decline sharply. It will be difficult to replicate the previous scenario of a four-fold annual increase, and the valuations of storage companies (12-month forward price-to-book ratio) are awaiting revaluation.

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US initial jobless claims for the week ended July 11 came in at 208,000, with market expectations standing at 217,000.

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DeepSeek Valued at Over 350 Billion Yuan

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Bank of America raises JPMorgan Chase’s price target to $420, noting the stock still has upside potential after its strong earnings report.

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Iran secretly ordered the Houthi armed group to blockade the Bab el-Mandeb Strait if the U.S. attacks Iran's power facilities.

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USDC emerges as the go-to stablecoin powering tokenized equities’ billion-dollar moment

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TSMC’s Q2 revenue posts year-on-year growth, with its high-performance computing business rising 20% quarter-on-quarter.

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Visa: AI agent payments are accelerating in development, with x402 processing approximately $15 million in on-chain transaction volume.

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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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Hanmi Semiconductor plans to build a new factory in South Korea.

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Open USD poses biggest threat yet to Circle's USDC, CoinShares says. (Circle)Summary

CoinShares said Open USD directly challenges Circle by giving partners income generated by reserves backing the stablecoin, undermining USDC's distribution economics.Open USD comprises more than 140 companies, including BlackRock, Coinbase, Mastercard, Stripe and Visa. The stablecoin is expected to debut in the second half of 2026.Despite the threat, CoinShares said USDC’s established liquidity and integrations could prove difficult for any newcomer to replicate.Open USD, a bank-backed group developing a dollar-pegged stablecoin, is the most credible threat yet to Circle Internet's (CRCL) USDC because it targets the economics at the heart of the company’s business, crypto asset manager CoinShares said in a Monday report.

Unlike traditional stablecoin issuers, who keep the income generated by their reserves, Open USD plans to distribute the yield to participating businesses, retaining only a management fee. CoinShares said the model could squeeze Circle's margins while raising the cost of maintaining USDC distribution.

“If successful, Open USD could push stablecoins further into mainstream payments by making the economics and governance more attractive for the businesses actually using them,” wrote analyst Luke Nolan.

Developed by Open Standard, the institutional-focused stablecoin is backed by a consortium of more than 140 companies, including BlackRock (BLK), Coinbase (COIN), Mastercard (MA), Stripe and Visa (V), and is targeting a second-half 2026 launch. Key details, including its reserve structure and fee model, remain undisclosed.

The model also strengthens Coinbase's hand ahead of the Aug. 18 renewal of its revenue-sharing agreement with Circle, under which the exchange receives roughly half of USDC's reserve income, the report said.

USDC's circulating supply has fallen to about $73 billion from nearly $80 billion in March, trimming its share of the roughly $312 billion stablecoin market as competition from newly regulated issuers intensifies.

Circle shares fell more than 17% on the day Open USD was announced, though CoinShares said the decline was likely amplified by technical selling linked to the Russell index reconstitution.

Still, the report argued the market may be overreacting. Open USD has yet to launch, important details remain unresolved and Circle retains a significant advantage through USDC's deep liquidity and years of integrations across exchanges, DeFi and payments.

Open USD is unlikely to pose a major threat to Tether, whose dominance in emerging markets and offshore dollar liquidity gives USDT, the largest stablecoin by far, a different competitive moat, the report added.

For now, investors should watch whether Circle changes its distribution strategy and whether Open USD can convert its high-profile backing into adoption, CoinShares said. Until then, the project remains a credible, but unproven, challenge to USDC.

CoinShares is not alone in noting the challenge posed by Open USD. Japanese investment bank Mizuho downgraded Circle to underperform from neutral and slashed its price target to $50 from $85 in a note to clients on Tuesday, arguing that the new rival’s business model threatens the stablecoin issuer's long-term economics.

AI Disclaimer: Parts of this article were generated with the assistance from AI tools and reviewed by our editorial team to ensure accuracy and adherence to our standards. For more information, see CoinDesk's full AI Policy.

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Circle has secured a court-backed arbitration win after records made public in a Boston federal court detailed why the stablecoin issuer suspended Heka Funds’ USDC minting and redemption services over suspected market manipulation involving Tether.

Summary

Circle has won an arbitration case after an arbitrator ruled it lawfully suspended Heka Funds’ USDC minting and redemption services. Court records said Heka did not disclose Tether’s role as the fund’s main investor and Circle reasonably suspected possible market manipulation. The ruling comes as Circle continues expanding its institutional business with new banking initiatives and partnerships in the United States and South Korea. Court filings submitted by Circle on Tuesday as part of its petition to confirm a February arbitration award said the company concluded the Malta-based arbitrage fund had failed to disclose Tether’s role as its principal investor and reasonably suspected trading activity that could have manipulated the USDC market.

Retired judge Robert L. Dondero, who served as arbitrator, ruled in Circle’s favor on the remaining contract claims, finding the company acted within the rights granted under its agreements with Heka.

Hidden Tether ties became central to the dispute At the center of the case was Heka Funds, managed by London-based Abraxas Capital Management, which opened a Circle account in January 2022 for its Elysium Global Arbitrage Fund.

According to the arbitration record, Heka disclosed only investor Simon Grima during onboarding, while Tether had become the fund’s dominant capital provider. Testimony from Heka founder Fabio Frontini showed Tether’s investment reached about $800 million by the time of arbitration, accounting for roughly 75% of Elysium’s assets.

Dondero concluded the omission was intentional and wrote that the missing disclosure appeared designed to avoid revealing Tether’s involvement in the fund. Circle Chief Business Officer Kash Razzaghi testified that the company would not have approved the account had it known of Tether’s role when the relationship began.

The trading dispute emerged after Silicon Valley Bank’s collapse in March 2023 temporarily pushed USDC below its dollar peg. According to the filings, Heka bought discounted USDC in secondary markets and redeemed the tokens with Circle at face value after many other arbitrage firms had stopped once the spread narrowed.

Internal Circle communications presented during arbitration showed executives disagreed over whether the trades represented legitimate arbitrage. Razzaghi described the activity as “a manufactured arb not a market-driven one,” attributing it to Tether waiving its normal fees, while Circle employee David Norton initially argued the trades appeared commercially rational.

Circle allowed Heka to redeem more than $587 million in USDC over a two-week period while testing whether the trading opportunity depended on Heka’s activity. Court records said Norton later changed his position after asking Heka to pause its trades and observing that the market spread tightened instead of widening. Coinbase also informed Circle it was uncomfortable working with Heka because of the fund’s Tether relationship and fee structure, leading the exchange to place restrictions on the account, according to the filings.

Arbitrator upholds Circle’s contractual rights Court documents showed Circle reduced Heka’s minting and redemption limits to zero in November 2023 before suspending the account on Dec. 1 under Section 9(c) of the parties’ master services agreement after Frontini threatened legal and regulatory action.

Heka’s request to redeem $100 million in February 2024 was rejected, and the master services agreement expired the following month. Testimony presented during arbitration said Tether invested another $500 million in Elysium during the same month before Heka filed its arbitration claim.

Another issue raised during the proceedings involved Frontini’s application for an account with Circle France shortly before the hearing. According to the arbitration award, he did not disclose the ongoing dispute and submitted a board resolution stating Heka maintained an active Circle relationship, later testifying he expected his U.S. application to fail.

Applying Delaware law, Dondero found Circle did not breach either agreement because the user terms allowed the company to adjust transaction limits and suspend services at its discretion. The arbitrator also ruled Circle was not required to prove market manipulation had occurred, only that it had reached a reasonable conclusion that such activity might be taking place.

Although Circle requested about $5.15 million in legal fees and costs, Dondero awarded only $166,643.25 related to expert work after finding Heka continued pursuing a $49 million lost-profits claim that had already been excluded from the case.

A Heka spokesperson told the Financial Times the fund had never engaged in market manipulation and had never been the subject of a regulatory investigation involving such conduct. The spokesperson also said Circle sought to make the arbitration record public to divert attention from its refusal to process USDC redemptions.

The disclosure comes as Circle continues expanding its institutional business globally. The company recently received final approval from the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to establish Circle National Trust and is preparing to host its invitation-only Current Seoul event on July 23, where executives from banks, crypto exchanges, and payments companies are expected to discuss future partnerships as Circle pursues wider USDC adoption in South Korea.

Circle just got put on notice. CoinShares published an analysis on July 13 identifying Open USD, the new stablecoin from the Open Standard consortium, as the most credible competitive threat USDC has faced since its inception.

The warning comes less than two weeks after the OUSD announcement sent Circle’s stock into a tailspin, dropping roughly 17.5% to a four-month low near $62.63 on June 30.

The economics that spooked Wall Street Instead of the issuer pocketing the reserve yield, OUSD redirects the majority of that income to partner businesses in the consortium. The companies that distribute and integrate the stablecoin get paid for doing so, rather than watching the issuer collect all the economics.

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The Open Standard consortium includes over 140 companies, with Visa, Mastercard, and BlackRock among the headline names.

What OUSD actually looks like OUSD is scheduled to launch in the second half of 2026, with Solana as its initial blockchain. The stablecoin will offer fee-free minting and redemption at launch.

Reserve composition, custodian arrangements, and long-term fee structures haven’t been publicly disclosed yet.

CoinShares acknowledged that while the threat is real, OUSD faces an enormous lift in replicating the network effects USDC has built over nearly a decade of integrations across DeFi protocols, centralized exchanges, and payment platforms.

The Coinbase variable The revenue-sharing agreement between Coinbase and Circle is up for renewal on August 18, 2026. Coinbase has been a major distribution channel for USDC, and the economics of that arrangement have been a point of ongoing negotiation between the two companies.

What this means for investors Circle’s revenue model depends heavily on reserve interest income. If competitive pressure forces Circle to share more of that yield with distribution partners, whether through an OUSD-like model or simply through renegotiated deals like the Coinbase agreement, margins compress.

CoinShares suggests the short-term impact on USDC itself will be limited, given its deep liquidity, years of protocol integrations, and regulatory track record that a brand-new stablecoin cannot replicate on day one.

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.

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.

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A hacker exploited Ostium, a decentralized perpetuals exchange on Arbitrum, in a sophisticated oracle manipulation scheme that resulted in the loss of $18 million in USDC from the protocol’s liquidity vault.

Attacker exploited automated price-feed systemBlockchain security firm Blockaid first detected the exploit, which targeted a key component of Ostium’s price automation setup known as the PriceUpKeep forwarder. The attacker submitted falsified oracle reports featuring future-dated timestamps, effectively making losing trades appear as if they were profitable.

This manipulation enabled the attacker to trigger an $18 million payout from Ostium’s vault. Blockaid’s analysis shows that the exploit succeeded by leveraging the privileged role of automation components responsible for reporting on real-world asset prices.

The attacker used a registered PriceUpKeep forwarder to push manipulated price data with future timestamps, forcing the protocol to recognize fabricated profits and enabling an $18 million USDC withdrawal from the liquidity vault.

The exploit underscores persistent vulnerabilities across decentralized finance, particularly in the systems that automate and verify price reporting from real-world sources onto blockchains.

Mini dictionary: Ostium is a decentralized trading protocol on Arbitrum that enables users to trade perpetual contracts of real-world assets such as gold, foreign currencies, and equity indices, typically with high leverage and onchain settlement in stablecoins.

Pattern of DeFi oracle system vulnerabilitiesIncidents similar to the Ostium attack have plagued other decentralized protocols, with DeFi platforms frequently targeted through exploits involving oracle or keeper infrastructure. Just last week, $6 million was drained from Summer.fi in a comparable attack where privileged components manipulated the timing or content of price data.

Ostium’s system relies on a third-party network called Gelato to automate the delivery of real-world price data to its onchain contracts. The central PriceUpKeep contract writes the latest asset prices to Arbitrum whenever a user executes a trade. Attackers have increasingly targeted these automated update mechanisms, seeking out weaknesses in how and when price data is written to the blockchain.

By controlling or spoofing trusted automation components, bad actors can fabricate trading outcomes on paper and extract protocol funds by triggering illegitimate settlements.

PlatformDate of ExploitLoss AmountAttack VectorOstiumJune 2026$18 millionOracle manipulation via PriceUpKeepSummer.fiJune 2026$6 millionKeeper/oracle system breachOstium’s growth and funding backgroundBefore the exploit, Ostium had raised a total of $27.8 million, including a $24 million Series A co-led by venture investors General Catalyst and Jump Crypto in late 2025. The protocol had also reported over $50 billion in cumulative trading volume, reflecting strong user interest in onchain derivatives tied to real-world markets.

At the time of the incident, Ostium allowed traders to access commodities, forex pairs, and equity indices, offering up to 200x leverage and USDC-settled contracts.

Ongoing investigations are underway after security alerts surfaced, with the extent of the attacker’s identity and the possibility of recovering the drained funds currently unknown.

Incidents like Ostium’s highlight the risks associated with DeFi protocols’ increasing reliance on complex automation and oracle infrastructure, especially when these systems are entrusted with large amounts of investor capital.

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.

Ostium, a decentralized perpetuals exchange operating on the Arbitrum network, experienced a significant security breach on Wednesday that resulted in a loss of approximately $18 million in USDC. Attackers gained access to a critical oracle signer key and manipulated the platform’s price feed, leading to artificial trading profits and a major drain on assets.

Attack exploited price oracle via compromised keyBlockchain security firm Blockaid reported that the exploit was executed using a registered PriceUpKeep forwarder and future-dated oracle price reports. By submitting these manipulated inputs, the attackers were able to generate large, fake profits from trading activities. The resulting payouts were issued from Ostium’s liquidity vault directly in USDC, a widely used stablecoin issued by Circle.

Blockaid stated that nearly one-third of Ostium’s total liquidity, which amounted to about $63 million at the time of the breach, was drained in the attack. The manipulation targeted Ostium’s core mechanism for pricing assets, which relies on oracles—external data feeds that set current trading values.

Mini dictionary: Oracle signer key — A cryptographic key used by trusted entities to validate and submit price or data reports to blockchain networks. If compromised, it can enable attackers to falsify on-chain information, undermining protocol security.

Ostium posted on X, “We are aware of the issue with the OLP vault. We have paused all trading. The team is investigating.”

Vulnerability shakes decentralized finance sectorOstium functions as a decentralized exchange (DEX), enabling users to trade perpetual futures that track real-world assets such as stocks, commodities, foreign exchange markets, and indices. As a typical DEX, the platform allows users to retain custody of their funds and does not require personal identification.

This incident highlights persistent vulnerabilities in the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector. More than $840 million has already been stolen from DeFi protocols in the first five months of 2026 alone, with notable attacks on KelpDAO, which lost $292 million, and Drift Protocol, which lost $285 million. In June, hackers also stole over $25 million from Resolv Labs.

ProtocolLoss AmountDateOstium$18 millionJune 2026KelpDAO$292 millionEarly 2026Drift Protocol$285 millionEarly 2026Resolv Labs$25 millionJune 2026Rising concern over AI-driven exploitsSecurity professionals are increasingly warning that advances in artificial intelligence are making it easier to discover vulnerabilities within smart contracts and blockchain infrastructure. Danny Jenkins, CEO and co-founder of cybersecurity firm ThreatLocker, noted that modern AI systems are outperforming humans in reviewing code and identifying weaknesses.

Jenkins explained, “AI is far better at reviewing code than most people and finding potential vulnerabilities in it,” and emphasized that newer models like Mythos could make the discovery process even more effective, signaling an imminent major challenge for security teams.

He added that it is only a matter of time before malicious actors leverage state-of-the-art AI tools to exploit these vulnerabilities at scale.

Recently, security researcher Taylor Hornby used Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4.8 model to uncover a four-year-old counterfeiting bug in Zcash, demonstrating that advanced AI tools can now identify even complex and longstanding software flaws.

Mini dictionary: Zcash — A privacy-focused cryptocurrency that uses advanced cryptography to shield transaction details. Security vulnerabilities in such protocols can undermine privacy or allow unauthorized coin creation.

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.

Solana price has climbed to around $78 on July 15 after a 250 million USDC mint on the network, combined with softer U.S. inflation data, injected fresh buying momentum across crypto markets.

Summary

Solana price jumped toward $78 after a 250 million USDC mint boosted on-chain liquidity and risk appetite improved. Technical charts show a breakout above a descending channel, with $80 emerging as the next key resistance. Rising active addresses, institutional developments, and liquidation clusters support upside, while $70-$75 remains critical support. The move gathered pace after the USDC Treasury minted 250 million USDC on Solana, adding immediate liquidity to the ecosystem as traders returned to risk assets following the latest U.S. inflation print. Capital quickly rotated into Solana-based decentralized exchanges, helping SOL recover from recent weakness while the wider crypto market also moved higher.

Earlier selling pressure had left Solana trading well below its May highs as geopolitical tensions, institutional distributions and weaker on-chain activity weighed on sentiment.

Today’s rebound, however, arrives with stronger participation. Daily trading volume has climbed above $2.1 billion, suggesting buyers, rather than short-term speculation alone, have supported the advance.

Technical structure favors another test of $80 The daily chart shows Solana (SOL) price holding above a long-standing support area between $70 and $75 after repeatedly defending that range over recent weeks. Price now trades above the 20-day and 50-day moving averages near $73.3-$74 while remaining below the declining 100-day moving average around $80.3 and well beneath the 200-day moving average near $91. 

Solana daily price chart — July 15 | Source: crypto.news A sustained close above the 100-day average would expose the psychologically important $80 level before opening room toward the May swing high near $82.

The 4-hour chart adds another constructive development. SOL has broken above a descending channel that had contained price action since early July, while the RSI has recovered to roughly 52 after bouncing from oversold territory. 

Solana 4-hour price chart — July 15 | Source: crypto.news The Aroon Up reading near 93 also holds well above the Aroon Down line, suggesting buyers currently control short-term momentum, although resistance remains concentrated just below $80.

Derivatives positioning reinforces that technical picture. CoinGlass liquidation data shows dense short liquidation clusters stacked between $78.5 and $80, with another concentration extending toward $81.5.

Solana liquidation heatmap | Source: CoinGlass A decisive push through those levels could trigger forced buying from bearish positions, while the largest long liquidation pockets remain clustered around the $76-$76.5 region, making that zone an important area for bulls to defend.

Commenting on the latest setup, analyst Ali Martinez argued that Solana has regained a bullish structure after its SuperTrend indicator flipped positive for the first time since October. He wrote:

“If buying pressure continues to build, $SOL could rally toward $96 or even $121. However, $60 remains the key level to watch.”

Outside the charts, network fundamentals have also improved. Active addresses have climbed toward seven million, while anticipation continues to build ahead of the Alpenglow upgrade, which is expected to reduce transaction finality to around 150 milliseconds later this quarter. 

Solana has also strengthened its institutional footprint through its partnership with SBI Holdings to expand on-chain financial infrastructure in Japan, while tokenized real-world assets on the network have grown to roughly $3.3 billion.

A break below key support would weaken the bullish outlook Bullish momentum still faces several hurdles. The declining 100-day moving average around $80 represents the first major technical barrier, and failure to clear that level could keep SOL trapped inside its multi-week consolidation range.

A return below the 20-day and 50-day moving averages would shift attention back to the $75 support area, where leveraged long positions remain concentrated.

Macro risks also remain unresolved. Fresh geopolitical tensions, another rise in Treasury yields, or stronger-than-expected U.S. economic data could reduce expectations for monetary easing and pressure risk assets across the crypto market.

If selling accelerates and Solana loses the $70-$75 support zone, the bullish breakout thesis would weaken considerably, while Ali Martinez’s longer-term invalidation level near $60 would return to focus.

Disclosure: This article does not represent investment advice. The content and materials featured on this page are for educational purposes only.

Nick Sawinyh on 15 Jul 2026

At 14:18 UTC on Wednesday, July 15, 2026, a single Arbitrum transaction bundled twenty calls into Ostium’s trading contracts and walked out with roughly $11.86 million in USDC. The recipient wallet had opened its first position minutes earlier with a rounding-error deposit. By the time most people saw the security alerts, the money was already moving out.

Ostium is one of the more credible names in on-chain real-world-asset trading: a perpetuals exchange for stocks, commodities, indices, and currencies, backed by General Catalyst and Jump Crypto. What makes it work is a custom price layer that decides what every trade settles at. That layer is exactly what got turned against it, and not on some exotic asset either.

This piece reflects what was verifiable on the afternoon of July 15, 2026, a few hours after the first transaction. The on-chain facts here (the transaction, the contracts, the amount that moved, the receiving wallet) are confirmed directly against block explorers and are cited below so you can check them yourself. What is not settled is the reconciled total loss and the exact authorization failure that made the attack possible; both await Ostium’s own accounting. Treat the confirmed transactions as bedrock and any single loss total as provisional until the team or an independent analyst publishes one.

What Is Ostium, and Why Does It Matter? Ostium is a decentralized perpetuals exchange on Arbitrum whose pitch is real-world assets: leveraged exposure to gold, oil, the S&P, EUR/USD, or individual equities, all from a self-custodial wallet, on markets that traditionally close at 4pm and gate retail behind brokers. It is one of the clearer product-market fits in the RWA narrative. It also lists the major crypto pairs, BTC and ETH among them, and that detail matters more than it looks.

The traction is real. Ostium was founded by Harvard alumni, raised a $3.5 million seed in 2023 led by General Catalyst and LocalGlobe (with SIG, DeFi Alliance, and Balaji Srinivasan among the backers), and in December 2025 added a $20 million Series A co-led by General Catalyst and Jump Crypto, bringing total funding to roughly $27.8 million. As of its December 2025 raise, Ostium had advertised more than $25 billion in cumulative trading volume, including around $5 billion in metals. On July 15, DefiLlama showed Ostium’s TVL near $63 million.

Traders’ collateral and the counterparty liquidity that pays out winning trades sit in Ostium’s vault, called the OLP (Ostium Liquidity Pool). Liquidity providers deposit USDC and, in effect, take the other side of the book. That vault is what an attacker wants to reach, and on July 15 someone found a path to it.

How Ostium Prices a Trade, and Where the Trust Sits To understand the exploit you have to understand how Ostium gets a price at all.

A crypto perp can read an on-chain price from deep DEX liquidity. Gold and Apple can’t be priced that way, because they don’t live on-chain. So Ostium built its own pull-based oracle system, with real-world-asset feeds operated by Stork Network and crypto feeds from Chainlink Data Streams. In a pull design, prices aren’t sitting on-chain continuously. Instead, a signed price report is delivered on-chain at the moment it’s needed: when a trade opens, when it closes, when a limit order or liquidation fires. Automated “keeper” or forwarder services carry those signed reports to the contract and trigger settlement.

This is a sensible architecture for assets that trade off-chain. It also concentrates enormous trust in one place. Whoever is authorized to submit a price report effectively decides the number your PnL is calculated against. If that authorization leaks, or if the check that a submitted price is fresh and legitimate is missing or weak, then the party feeding the price can trade against a number they chose. That is the failure surface, and it is a close cousin of the one that broke Resolv’s USR stablecoin in March, where a single privileged role could mint without on-chain limits.

The Exploit: What the Transaction Shows Here is what the chain shows for the primary transaction, 0x359f8c05…d4870e0, confirmed on both Arbiscan and Blockscout:

It succeeded at 14:18:48 UTC on July 15, 2026. It called executeBatch, running twenty calls that alternated between Ostium’s Trading contract (0x6D0bA1f9…7702411, which Arbiscan labels “Ostium: Trading”) and a contract named OstiumPrivatePriceUpKeep (0xB71ec9eB…3d36), the piece that delivers signed prices on-chain. USDC moved through Ostium’s Trading Storage, Trading Callbacks, and Vault contracts along the way. Every trade in the batch was on pairIndex 0. Ostium’s own subgraph maps pair 0 to BTC/USD, so this was not an exotic real-world-asset market. It was Bitcoin. The trade events show the position opened at a delivered price of exactly $5,000 and closed at roughly $60,000. Bitcoin does not move twelvefold inside one atomic transaction, so at least one of those prices was fabricated and delivered on demand; the exactly-round $5,000 open is the obvious tell. A single deposit of about 1,000 USDC went in. Roughly 11,861,520 USDC came back out to the attacker’s wallet. The same batch that opened and closed the trades also drove OstiumPrivatePriceUpKeep to deliver the $5,000 and $60,000 prices those trades settled against. Whoever sent it therefore held, or had usurped, the right to submit prices, and used it to stand on both sides at once: the price authority and the counterparty were the same operation. The batch came from 0xD1794196…85869 through an entry contract at 0xfE12F636…5bd2E; the trades and the payout belong to 0x321df194…bfd9.

You do not need anyone’s alert to read this. The prices are right there in the trade events: open a Bitcoin long at $5,000, close it near $60,000, collect the difference from the vault, and a ~1,000 USDC deposit comes back as ~$11.86 million. That is not an inference from fund flows, it is in the price fields the contracts recorded. What the trace cannot tell you is how the attacker was allowed to deliver those prices at all, whether a signing key was compromised, a malicious price upkeep was registered, or a validation check on submitted prices was missing or weak. That distinction is the whole post-mortem, and only Ostium can close it.

Here is the part that should unsettle people most. The attacker did this on BTC/USD, the most liquid and most easily cross-checked market Ostium runs, not on gold, not on a thinly traded stock, not on an overnight forex cross. If the pricing layer will accept $5,000 for Bitcoin, the asset was never the point. The authorization to submit a price was.

The Cashout The receiving wallet, 0x321df194…bfd9, is a fresh externally owned account with no prior history and no Arbiscan label yet. It took in the $11.86 million from the primary transaction and additional USDC from several sibling batch transactions sent the same way.

The money did not stay. A few hours later, the wallet held no USDC at all, just about 99.6 ETH (gas-scale, a low six figures) and a spoofed lookalike “ETH” token of the kind that gets airdropped to any address in the news. Where the stablecoin went from there, whether swapped, split across wallets, or bridged off Arbitrum, I did not trace, and the balance snapshot may not be complete. What is clear is that it moved out fast, which is the entire point of moving before a protocol can react. It is the same race Resolv’s attacker ran in March, and the same reason “we’ve paused the protocol” statements so often land after the funds are already gone.

How Big Was the Hit? This is where the honest answer is a range, not a headline.

Figure Value Status Largest single transaction ~$11.86M USDC to the attacker Tx confirmed on-chain; amount read from explorer transfer logs Additional sibling transactions Several, same pattern Confirmed they exist; total not cleanly summed Ostium TVL on July 15 ~$63M (DefiLlama) Live figure; may lag the incident So the floor is real: at least the better part of $12 million left in the primary transaction, going by the explorer transfer logs, and the same wallet pulled more through several sibling batches I did not fully sum. Loss estimates circulating on launch day ran higher, into the high teens of millions, alongside a “$34 million vault, 35% drained” framing. I could not confirm those numbers, and note that a $34 million liquidity vault could sit inside the ~$63 million total TVL DefiLlama shows, so even those two are not necessarily in conflict. The honest position is a confirmed floor and an open total until Ostium or an independent analyst publishes a reconciled figure.

The Uncomfortable Questions How did an attacker become authorized to submit prices? Everything about this incident routes back to that question. A pull oracle only works if the set of parties allowed to deliver signed prices is tightly controlled and their reports are validated on arrival. Whether the attacker obtained a legitimate signer key, got a malicious forwarder registered, or exploited a gap in how reports are checked, the outcome is the same: they got to name the price that settled their own trades.

Where were the on-chain guardrails? The recurring lesson of 2026’s exploits is that off-chain trust needs on-chain limits behind it. Was there a bound on how far a settlement price could deviate from the last accepted one? A freshness or timestamp check strict enough to reject a “future-dated” report? A per-block or per-account cap on vault payouts? The batched, atomic nature of the theft suggests at least one of those checks was missing or bypassable.

What about the audits? This was not an unreviewed protocol. Zellic audited the contracts in early 2024 and returned 19 findings, two of them critical, with the price-upkeep and vault contracts in scope; it even raised upkeep-specific issues at the time, one titled “Chainlink feed ID not checked in upkeep.” Pashov Audit Group ran a further review in September 2025, and Ostium also lists a ThreeSigma audit, a Chaos Labs economic audit, and an Immunefi bug bounty. Two things stand out anyway. Zellic’s 2024 engagement expressly put “key custody” and “infrastructure relating to the project” out of scope, which is close to where the abuse of a registered PriceUpKeep would live. And the September 2025 review covered only the trading-engine contracts, not any price-upkeep or vault contract. The exact component the attacker used, OstiumPrivatePriceUpKeep, was either reviewed years ago on an older design or left out of the most recent pass entirely. Audits cut risk; they do not certify its absence, least of all for the price-authorization plumbing that sits at the very edge of what a contract audit covers.

The Asset Was Never the Point The intuitive worry about an RWA perp is the exotic feed. Gold, a single stock, an overnight forex cross: none of them have a deep on-chain market to check a submitted price against, so a bad number is harder to catch. That worry is legitimate and worth keeping. But it is not what happened here. The attack ran on Bitcoin, where a fabricated $5,000 print should have been the easiest thing in the world to reject. The weak point sat upstream of the asset, in whatever governs who may submit a price and whether the contracts bound-check it before paying out. An RWA venue carries that risk on top of the exotic-feed risk, not instead of it.

Ostium is not a fly-by-night project. It has real funding, real volume, and a design many people saw as one of the better expressions of the RWA thesis, this site’s coverage of onchain forex and tokenized metals included. That is exactly why the incident matters. A well-funded, name-backed team let its pricing layer accept $5,000 for the most-watched asset in crypto. The custom-oracle problem is not a rough edge on some immature protocol, and it is not confined to the exotic assets everyone was worried about. It is a category risk that the whole “bring global markets on-chain” movement has to solve before it asks users to post real size.

What Happens Next In the hours after the attack, Ostium had not posted an official statement or a loss figure. Expect the usual sequence: an acknowledgment, a pause of affected functions, a claim that the team is investigating and tracing funds, and eventually a post-mortem. The questions that post-mortem needs to answer are specific: how price-submission authorization was secured, what validation a submitted report had to pass, whether a key was compromised or a forwarder maliciously registered, and what caps or circuit breakers stood between a “profitable” trade and the vault.

For anyone with funds in Ostium, particularly OLP liquidity providers who sit on the counterparty side of every trade, the practical advice is the same it always is in the first hours of an incident: check your exposure directly, watch Ostium’s official channels rather than secondhand figures, and don’t assume a stated total is final.

And for everyone building or allocating in RWA land, file this next to Resolv. The mechanisms differ, but both trace back to the same weak point: a single privileged component, trusted off-chain, with too little standing between it and the money on-chain. RWA protocols are lining up to put a lot more of the world’s assets behind components exactly like that. This is what it looks like when one of them gives.

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