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Jun 15, 2026 — 5 min read

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Global markets still rely on traditional systems where payments pause at borders and innovation moves slowly. Having spent years earning trust, Arbitrum is now evolving from a scaling solution to the finance-native platform powering the programmable economy. As the largest ecosystem on Ethereum with nearly $17B in total value secured, 2.6 billion transactions, and 30+ dedicated blockchains, Arbitrum provides the proven foundation for this borderless, real-time future. 

Building on this foundation, Arbitrum is advancing the architecture to improve operational efficiency and expand global reach, helping businesses implement protocol-level compliance and configure data confidentiality to meet the needs of their category-defining products.*

Here is a look at the architecture being developed to support this next phase of growth:

Stable pricing your users can depend onStatus: Live on Arbitrum One

The programmable economy requires infrastructure built to sustain billions of transactions. If those transaction costs spike unpredictably, payment flows can break and institutional operating models become unreliable. While legacy gas models don’t always align with real-world demand, the Arbitrum Platform addresses this friction through Dynamic Pricing, a first-of-its-kind pricing model that provides businesses:

Predictable costs
Users and operators only pay for what they use on the network. Transactions that require fewer resources no longer subsidize more computationally intensive transactions, making it easier for businesses to forecast costs. Smooth User Experience
Fewer price surges, fewer dropped/failed submissions, and more confidence that your product behaves predictably when the network is experiencing high demand. Headroom to scale sustainably
Dedicated blockchains can achieve higher sustained throughput (Arbitrum One has already reached 910 MGas/s on mainnet). This is possible because pricing now accurately reflects the resources that limit performance, preventing node operators from being forced into large hardware upgrades.Support for regulatory compliance from day oneStatus: In development for dedicated blockchains

A programmable economy requires a framework that aligns with the legal mandates of the global financial system. For fintechs, banks, and asset managers, managing regulatory compliance is a prerequisite for entry. By providing tools built to support these obligations natively, the Arbitrum ecosystem aims to help move compliance from a barrier to an operational unlock, lowering the friction for the world’s most significant capital allocators to participate through the following capabilities:

Onboard your screening provider
Onboard with your preferred screening provider and apply your required policies with robust traceability for allow/deny decisions.Configure your restriction list
Define your KYC, AML, and OFAC parameters from day one. Your dedicated blockchain can be configured to automatically reference your customized lists so that onchain interactions are filtered at the protocol level.Whitelist permitted participants
Define which users, teams, or counterparties are permitted to interact with the blockchain or specific smart contracts, making it easier to enforce internal access policies across your products.Real-time reporting
View transactions as they are filtered live, or export records of blocked addresses and transaction activity to support audit trails, internal review, and reporting requirements.Confidentiality that protects your competitive edgeStatus: In development for Arbitrum One (subject to DAO vote) and dedicated blockchains

True scale in a programmable economy requires balancing public transparency with enterprise-grade confidentiality to support real-world markets and institutions. While open ledgers provide unparalleled trust, the involuntary exposure of client balances and proprietary order flow remains a significant barrier to institutional adoption. To address this, the Arbitrum Platform is building a privacy architecture that supports the full spectrum of visibility, from third-party privacy tools for applications on Arbitrum One, to fully private dedicated blockchains for more sensitive operations. Each option is engineered to help businesses safeguard proprietary data and manage strict confidentiality requirements while benefiting from the following architecture:

Selective disclosure by design
Privacy doesn’t mean hiding everything from everyone. It means keeping sensitive activity confidential in the market while still giving approved operators, auditors, regulators, and internal teams the access they need.Three ways to apply privacy
Privacy is not one model. Some products need confidential applications while operating on a public blockchain. Others require private user interactions with public, EVM-compatible applications. And others need a dedicated blockchain where privacy is built across the entire stack. The Arbitrum Platform is being designed to support all of these models.Settle capital in near real-time with ZK proofsStatus: In development for Arbitrum One (subject to DAO vote) and dedicated blockchains

We are living in a fast-paced, internet native world and capital cannot afford to be idle or trapped by latency. For global markets to operate at the speed of software, the movement of assets between environments must be near-instant and cryptographically sound. Arbitrum is achieving this by developing Zero-Knowledge (ZK) proving on Succinct's SP1 to reduce settlement from a days-long process to minutes. By layering ZK proofs alongside Fraud Proofs and TEE attestations, businesses will be able to benefit from a multi-prover architecture that maximizes both security and capital velocity, offering:

Improved capital efficiency
Dedicated blockchains already provide settlement in minutes. ZK proofs extend that settlement to native withdrawals, giving Ethereum the cryptographic verification it needs to release assets in hours upon deployment, and minutes as proving matures, freeing capital while minimizing dependence on third-party bridge liquidity.Multi-prover assurance
Choose the proving setup that fits your risk, cost, and latency targets. ZK can operate alongside TEEs and fraud proofs, reducing reliance on any single mechanism and strengthening security for regulated flows.Privacy at the protocol-level
Privacy-preserving blockchain deployments where sensitive business data can remain confidential while correctness is still provable. This protects margins, enables you to grow with confidence, comply with privacy compliance rules, and protects users.New economic levers to scale your businessStatus: In development for Arbitrum One (subject to DAO vote) and dedicated blockchains

Modern markets demand infrastructure as flexible as the business models they power. Arbitrum is introducing a suite of economic levers businesses can adjust to meet their specific requirements. Aligning technical architecture with commercial reality is precisely what scales the programmable economy for everyday business.

Arbitrum Universal Intents
This standard is being developed to allow dedicated blockchains to securely facilitate transfers and swaps between networks including Ethereum, Layer 2s, Solana, Hyperledger, Canton, and more.Yield-Bearing Bridge
Dedicated blockchains will gain the capability to optimize idle bridge reserves, allowing ecosystems to route captured efficiencies toward liquidity incentives, fee subsidies, or protocol operations.Priority Gas Auctions (PGA)*
A new ordering policy to give high-frequency traders 125ms pre-confirmation cycles and more transparency. Importantly, the increase in gas auctions can capture additional revenue to Arbitrum One (subject to DAO approval) or related dedicated blockchains without introducing structural fee increases for everyday users.Real-Time Sequencer Feeds
A new sequencer enhancement will provide a ~125ms feed of transaction ordering data prior to block finalization. This allows for fast "soft-confirmations," significantly reducing latency for high-precision users. By offering real-time market visibility, we empower those requiring millisecond accuracy without compromising the low-cost, user-friendly environment the broader community expects.The next generation of finance will be programmableIn 2026, Arbitrum is focused on building the best tech to support category-defining products in this new world. Predictable unit economics. Control over execution. Fast settlement. All of it builds toward one outcome: a global, programmable economy. 

If you're ready to build regulated finance or enterprise fintech on Ethereum, this is the year to engage. Start on Arbitrum One, grow into a dedicated blockchain when your requirements demand it, and scale alongside the platform.

Talk to our team
Explore the docs

*A DAO vote may be required for any feature that is contemplated to be enabled on Arbitrum One.

Disclaimer: This post contains forward-looking statements regarding future product capabilities, technical developments, and ecosystem milestones. These statements are based on current expectations and assumptions and are subject to risks, uncertainties, and changes in technology or regulation that may cause actual results or timelines to differ materially. Features marked as "in development" are not guaranteed to be deployed in the form described, or at all.

No Financial Advice: Nothing in this post constitutes financial, legal, investment, or tax advice, nor is it a solicitation or offer to buy or sell any digital assets, securities, or financial instruments. Readers should conduct their own due diligence before interacting with any protocols or networks mentioned herein.

Third-Party Mentions: Mentions of third-party protocols, software providers, or external blockchains (including but not limited to Solana, Hyperledger, Canton, and Succinct) are for informational purposes only and do not imply endorsement or guarantee of their security, performance, or regulatory status.

Uniswap Tightens Its Grip on Ethereum and Layer 2@Uniswap remains the dominant liquidity venue in decentralized finance, capturing 67.3% of total DEX volume on Ethereum this week. That concentration is not new, but it is deepening. Data from KuCoin's Ethereum Q1 2026 review shows Uniswap accounted for approximately $85.5 billion in Q1 volume, representing roughly two-thirds of the entire Ethereum DEX ecosystem.

The protocol's reach extends well beyond mainnet. @Uniswap controls 84.6% of DEX market share on Arbitrum and 46.6% on Base, cementing its position across the two most active Layer 2 networks. Uniswap remains the largest spot DEX by every meaningful measure, clearing roughly $73 billion in 30-day volume across Ethereum mainnet and 39 other chains.

Uniswap V4 went live in early 2026, introducing a hooks system that attaches custom logic to pools at swap, deposit, or withdrawal time, enabling features such as on-chain limit orders, dynamic volatility-responsive fees, and gated pools for institutional flows.

$UNI Earns a New Look From Institutional AnalystsThe volume story is only part of what is drawing attention to $UNI in 2026. A structural shift in the token's economics has changed how analysts frame it. With the fee switch now active, UNI can be viewed through a cash-flow lens rather than only as a governance token. The UNIfication proposal passed in late December 2025 fundamentally changed Uniswap's economics: for the first time, protocol revenue is directly captured by the system and used to buy and burn $UNI, aligning token value with actual network usage.

That shift has caught the attention of major financial institutions. Standard Chartered's digital asset research head, Geoff Kendrick, initiated coverage on Uniswap with a long-term price target of $100 for $UNI by 2030, with the bank's thesis centered on the exponential growth of tokenized real-world assets, projected to surge from roughly $340 billion to $4 trillion by 2028. Standard Chartered projects a $UNI price target of $6.50 in 2026, citing Uniswap's position as a dominant DEX to capture fees from tokenized real-world assets.

Institutional involvement is moving beyond price targets. In February 2026, BlackRock made shares of its tokenized US Treasury fund, BUIDL, tradable through UniswapX with Securitize, marking the world's largest asset manager's first step into DeFi. More recently, Fidelity deployed liquidity for its stablecoin, FIDD, on Uniswap. Separately, Bitwise Asset Management filed an S-1 registration statement with the SEC for a spot Uniswap ETF in February 2026, following the earlier creation of a Delaware statutory trust named the Bitwise Uniswap ETF.

Whether that institutional momentum translates into sustained price performance remains an open question. Competition from Solana-based DEXs and other venues is real, and analysts are increasingly evaluating $UNI through the lens of fee capture potential, protocol governance value, and network effects within liquidity provisioning ecosystems, rather than speculative narrative alone.

Sources
KuCoin: Ethereum Q1 2026 Review
Datawallet: What is Uniswap? Features, Fees and More
Talos: State of the Network, Uniswap Fee Switch Analysis

Centrifuge's largest tokenized fund, JTRSY, is among the first of its products to adopt LayerZero.

LayerZero and Centrifuge are partnering to integrate Centrifuge's institutional tokenization infrastructure into the interoperability protocol’s ecosystem, according to a press release shared exclusively with The Defiant. The companies said that the deal aims to make access and distribution of tokenized real world asset (RWA) products broader with multichain reach from launch.

The partnership addresses the issue of blockchain fragmentation for institutional tokenization. Via LayerZero's OApp standard, issuers can extend products across over 165 blockchain networks, while retaining a unified supply, according to the release.

The first Centrifuge products to adopt LayerZero includes three of its tokenized funds, JTRSY — its largest by total value, with nearly $861 million in tokenized U.S. Treasuries —  as well as JAAA, and SPXA, which launched in September as the first licensed tokenized S&P 500 index fund.

The three tokenized funds will expand across Ethereum, Solana, Avalanche, BNB Chain, Base, Optimism, and HyperEVM, per the release. Data from RWAxyz shows that JTRSY is currently mostly on Ethereum, while SPXA is exclusively on Coinbase’s Base.

The partnership also sets the stage for Centrifuge assets to be deployed on Zero, LayerZero's recently announced Layer 1 blockchain. The L1 is slated for launch this fall, per the company’s original announcement, and is backed by Citadel Securities, The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation, Intercontinental Exchange, and Google Cloud, and designed as core infrastructure for financial markets.

Bryan Pellegrino, CEO of LayerZero Labs, told The Defiant:

"We want partners building on LayerZero to extend into Zero, and Centrifuge, with its institutional client base and tokenization suite, is exactly the kind of asset we're designing the network for."For its part, Centrifuge framed its plans for deploying on LayerZero’s Zero as a wait and see situation, provided the L1 gains traction after launch.

"As part of our broader multichain distribution strategy, we see Zero as an important ecosystem over time," Anil Sood, chief strategy and growth officer at Centrifuge Labs, told The Defiant, continuing:

"Our objective is to make key products such as JTRSY, JAAA, and SPXA accessible across the networks where liquidity, users, and onchain utility are forming."LayerZero Labs’ told The Defiant that the interoperability protocol currently has over $90 billion in assets secured, and more than 700 projects building in its ecosystem, though The Defiant was unable to independently verify this data. As of last May, the company said it handles over 70% of all cross-chain messaging traffic in web3.

Bhaji Illuminati, CEO of Centrifuge Labs said in a statement, “For institutions, tokenization becomes strategic when products are built to move beyond a single venue or chain and enter markets with real distribution from day one.”

Centrifuge, whose CFG token rallied 60% this week on a Binance listing announcement, currently has a total of $1.33 billion in distributed asset value across its tokenized RWA products, per RWAxyz.

Today’s move comes as tokenized RWAs on chain reached $18.4 billion at end of 2025, with RWA holders growing from 84,000 to 564,000 over the course of the year, per a report from Centrifuge — a trend The Defiant documented in depth as RWAs became Wall Street's gateway to crypto last year.

Disclaimer: This story has been updated to clarify that LayerZero’s Zero chain has yet to launch.

This article was written with the assistance of AI workflows. All our stories are curated, edited and fact-checked by a human.

Amidst the chaos and uncertainty of $LIBRA and the revelation of Kelsier’s serial scam launches, DefiTuna’s Moty Povolotsky reached out to Meteora’s Ben Chow to discuss the harmful allegations made against the protocol.

After blowing the whistle on a series of extractive memecoin launches orchestrated by Kelsier Ventures via Meteora’s M3M3 launchpad, Povolotsky has made this conversation public.

Chow Denies Involvement One of the conversation’s recurring themes surrounds how much, or how little, Meteora co-founder Ben Chow knew about Kelsier Ventures’ series of extractive launches. 

According to Povolotsky, Ben Chow frequently gave Kelsier Ventures’ Hayden David “a lot of the instructions” ahead of both M3M3 launches and higher profile launches, like $MELANIA.

“I believe, Ben, you knew this, because you actually gave a lot of the instructions. From Hayden's point of view, he many times would get on a call with you, or text you, and he'd say, ‘oh, Ben said this, Ben said that, Ben said it's launching this, Ben said he's gonna tweak.’ So this is a little bit foreign, like, this is a bit weird on my side, that you sound surprised.” - Moty Povolotsky, DefiTuna Co-Founder

Chow has confirmed on 𝕏 that he worked closely with his ‘friend’ Davis and Kelsier Ventures on the M3M3 launchpad. The platform’s first launch, $M3M3, was plagued by snipers and manipulation, leading to widespread controversy and claims of manipulation.

Despite these concerns, Chow asserted that he has continually referred memecoin project teams to Hayden Davis and Kelsier Ventures. These referrals ultimately resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars being extracted through $AIAI, $MATES, $ENRON, $MELANIA, and $LIBRA launches.

Responding to Povolotsky’s concern, Chow acknowledged that he “was involved in the $MELANIA one” but only on a technical level.

“Well, look, I don't know what happens underneath Hayden. I was involved in the Melania one. I'm not involved in everything, to all degrees, right, but Melania was… people tend to not know what they're doing, and then that one was so high profile and sort of rushed… I didn't want them to f*ck it up, you know, so I was trying to help them because there were issues on things… Actually, I wasn't aware of any of this stuff.” - Ben Chow, Meteora Co-Founder

While it has been made public that Chow was aware of token addresses, like $LIBRA and $MELANIA, pre-launch, the Meteora co-founder claims that no other Meteora or Jupiter team members were involved in any sniping. This claim is consistent with Jupiter’s statement yesterday, wherein the DeFi powerhouse assured users “We have conducted our own investigation and cannot find any evidence of sniping by team members.“

The conversation also includes allegations of market manipulation and mass token sniping among key players throughout the Solana ecosystem. According to Povolotsky, extended Kelsier Ventures team members like Gideon and Dr. Tom also sniped the launch with impunity. 

It is theorized that KOLs and influencers across Solana were also given token addresses pre-launch. Feigning sarcasm, influencers like Frank have potentially put themselves into a legal gray area. In a now-deleted X post, Frank remarked: “if you’ve been in crypto for more than 4 years and you’re not somewhat of an insider you need to rethink your strategy.”

“If there's a rug, this was a rug. Like 101,and everyone was in it from the insiders to what's-his-name DeGods, to Jakey. I'm sure everyone and their mother, everybody knew about it and everybody sniped it and some people were early, other people were late and a lot of people lost money and the worst thing of all is it's the President that gets a bad image.” - Moty Povolotsky, DefiTuna Co-Founder

Despite Chow’s shocked reaction to the allegations, the Meteora co-founder admits there were “red flags”. Chow was aware that snipers were targeting Meteora launches, but “always thought they were external snipers”, rather than his trusted friends at Kelsier Ventures.

Povolotsky claims that Davis made a threatening comment regarding Chow’s involvement, with the Kelsier Ventures CEO stating “if Ben ever turns against us we have enough to pin on him”.

Jupiter Cat Herder (Head of Communications) Kash Dhanda issued a statement in support of Chow. Dhanda asserts that Chow may have made a “strategic mistake”, but assures the Solana community that Chow is “not responsible for the insider trading or the failures of tokens launched on Meteora.”

Meanwhile, protocols from across the Solana ecosystem have come out to defend Ben Chow and the wider Meteora/Jupiter organization. Representatives from long-standing Solana projects like Save Finance, Helium, and Squads Labs have vouched for Jupiter and its associated apps.

Chow to Step Down Towards the end of the conversation, Chow acknowledges that he is in a precarious position. Whether guilty of the accusations made against him or not, Chow stated that he will step down from his current position.

“I f*cked up because I enabled a guy I should not have enabled. I'm gonna have to step down. I'm gonna have to quit”

While no communication has come from Ben Chow’s account, Jupiter and Meteora co-founder Meow has issued a statement on the matter.

Meow supports Chow and stands by his statement, assuring the Solana community that no one at either Jupiter or Meteora was involved in market manipulation, or received tokens related to the Kelsier launches.

However, Meow acknowledges that Chow made an unacceptable error judgment by continually referring project leads to Hayden Davis and the Kelsier team. Chow has chosen to officially step down from his position, and Meteora will begin its search for new leadership.

Read More on SolanaFloor: Meteora faces backlash over extractive M3M3 launches

Meteora Under Fire For Ties to Kelsier Pump-and-Dumps

Zcash developers are moving toward a new auditable shielded pool called Ironwood after last week’s Orchard vulnerability disclosure reignited concerns around hidden inflation risks and unverifiable supply integrity.

In a June 6 proposal, Zcash Open Development Lab [ZODL] outlined plans for a new shielded pool. It is designed to restore publicly verifiable supply accounting while preserving user privacy.

The proposal followed the June 5 disclosure that a critical flaw inside Zcash’s Orchard shielded pool could have theoretically enabled unlimited undetectable counterfeit ZEC before an emergency fix was deployed.

Developers stressed at the time that there was no evidence the flaw had ever been exploited and that circulating supply had not changed.

Attention around Orchard intensified again on June 11 after Arkham flagged a withdrawal representing roughly 1% of all ZEC held inside the shielded pool.

Ironwood aims to restore auditable supply integrity The proposed Ironwood upgrade introduces a “turnstile” accounting mechanism designed to make Zcash’s circulating supply publicly auditable again.

Under the proposal, the existing Orchard pool would stop accepting new deposits and internal transfers. Funds could only move forward through the turnstile before entering Ironwood.

Because the mechanism rejects any attempt to withdraw more ZEC than was originally deposited into the migration process, the ecosystem says users would gain a trustless guarantee that circulating supply remains accurate.

“The total supply moved from Orchard to Ironwood will be verified by a turnstile, allowing anyone to audit Zcash’s circulating supply,” ZODL wrote in the proposal.

The ecosystem also said Ironwood would undergo additional independent audits and formal verification reviews to rule out future soundness issues.

The upgrade is currently targeting activation in late July 2026, following the planned deprecation of zcashd support.

Arkham withdrawal revives focus on Orchard balances The Ironwood proposal returned to the spotlight Thursday after Arkham highlighted a large Orchard withdrawal on-chain.

Arkham said Orchard still theoretically holds around 3.88 million ZEC, worth approximately $1.65 billion. However, the platform acknowledged shielded balances cannot be independently verified.

The transaction itself does not prove counterfeit ZEC entered circulation or that the Orchard flaw was exploited before remediation.

However, the movement attracted attention. This was because the original disclosure acknowledged that there is no way to determine if inflation occurred before the patch.

That uncertainty has become central to the broader debate surrounding privacy-preserving cryptocurrency systems.

ZEC stabilizes after sharp post-disclosure selloff ZEC price action has also shifted notably since the initial Orchard disclosure.

After experiencing a sharp selloff immediately following the June 5 announcement, ZEC later stabilized as traders reassessed the long-term implications of the flaw and the ecosystem’s proposed response.

The rebound suggests markets may be treating the issue as a contained technical vulnerability rather than evidence of a catastrophic supply failure. At the time of this writing, it was trading with an over 4% gain, around $425.

Source: TradingView The proposed Ironwood migration aims to restore long-term confidence in Zcash’s privacy infrastructure while preserving shielded transaction functionality.

Final Summary Zcash developers proposed the auditable Ironwood shielded pool after last week’s Orchard vulnerability disclosure. Renewed scrutiny around large Orchard withdrawals has intensified focus on Zcash’s efforts to restore publicly verifiable supply integrity.

The Ethereum Foundation has eliminated 54 positions, about 20% of its workforce, as part of a restructuring tied to its updated spending mandate. Vitalik Buterin announced a 40% annual budget cut targeting a reduction in treasury spend from 15% to 5% by 2030. Arkham Intelligence places EF's ETH holdings at approximately $209 million, a nearly six-year low.

The Ethereum Foundation has cut 54 employees, roughly 20% of its staff, in the most concrete austerity measure the organization has taken since pledging to reduce its treasury spending rate.

The Foundation announced the changes Tuesday, saying the cuts conclude a months-long reorganization tied to its updated Mandate and Treasury Management Policy. Vitalik Buterin separately posted on X that the EF is cutting its annual budget by approximately 40% this year, targeting a reduction in annual operating expenses from around 15% of treasury to a long-term baseline of 5% after 2030.

[[embed:tweet url="https://x.com/VitalikButerin/status/2069428396661051587"]] Arkham Intelligence tracked the EF's ETH holdings at approximately $209 million, a nearly six-year low by dollar value, as The Defiant has reported in this arc.

New StructureThe Foundation has reorganized into five domains: protocol layer, access layer, user layer, community layer, and institutional layer, plus operations and management clusters. The protocol cluster is focused on advancing the base layer without compromising censorship resistance or self-sovereignty guarantees; the institutional cluster handles enterprise engagement, financial infrastructure, and policy coordination. The EF said the process leaves it with "the structure, activities, and people necessary for execution on the critical tasks ahead." Departing staff receive severance at one month's pay per year of service, or the locally mandated minimum if higher, plus transition grants.

The 15%-to-5% glide path was codified in the Treasury Management Policy published in June 2025, which set a plan to reduce annual operating expenses roughly linearly over five years toward a baseline typical of endowment-based organizations.

Leadership TurnoverThe layoffs follow a string of senior departures. Co-executive director Hsiao-Wei Wang stepped down earlier this month, following the prior exit of co-executive director Tomasz Stańczak. Board member Bastian Aue has taken on expanded responsibilities overseeing the transition. Nine senior figures have departed the Foundation since January, as The Defiant covered in May.

The funding picture has drawn scrutiny. An insider warned of a $20-30 million gap affecting core development teams; Fundstrat's Tom Lee argued there was "zero chance" of a funding crisis. The EF's execution plan published Monday outlined priorities including MEV elimination, default privacy, and ETH-denominated pay for contributors. As of publication, the EF has made no additional public statement beyond the Tuesday blog post.

Kaspa's upcoming Toccata hard fork will add two new programmability paths to the network: native L1 covenant programming and based zero-knowledge (zk) application infrastructure, with mainnet activation now scheduled for June 5–20, 2026, pushed back from the original May 5 target.

Michael Sutton of Kaspa Core published a detailed update on what the hard fork includes, why the date moved, and how the next few months are expected to unfold. The fork was originally initiated by Ori Newman as an effort to bring covenants into Kaspa's script engine, partly in response to the OP_CAT discussion in Bitcoin circles. It has since grown into something considerably larger.

What Is The Toccata Hard Fork?Toccata is a scheduled hard fork for the Kaspa network that introduces new capabilities directly into the base layer. A hard fork, for those less familiar, is a protocol upgrade that is not backward-compatible. All nodes must upgrade to continue participating in the network.

The name follows Kaspa's tradition of using musical references for major upgrades. This one takes its name from a classical musical form, the toccata, a piece designed to showcase technical skill across a keyboard instrument.

At a high level, Toccata adds two things to Kaspa:

Native L1 covenant programming via a new compiler called SilverscriptBased zk application infrastructure, built on top of those same covenant foundationsThese are not interchangeable systems. They serve different use cases and target different developer audiences.

What Are Covenants And Why Do They Matter For Kaspa?Covenants are conditions placed on how funds in a transaction output can be spent in the future. In a standard Bitcoin or Kaspa transaction, once coins are sent, the recipient can do whatever they like with them. Covenants change that by embedding spending rules directly into the script.

Kaspa uses a UTXO model, similar to Bitcoin, where each transaction consumes existing outputs and creates new ones. Covenants in a UTXO system allow developers to build surprisingly complex stateful multi-contract flows, even though the underlying computation remains local to each UTXO.

To make covenant development more accessible, Kaspa Core is finalizing Silverscript, a compiler initiated by Ori Newman, Michael Sutton, IzioDev, and Manyfest. Silverscript is designed to make it easier and safer to write and deploy complex covenants directly on Kaspa L1, without developers needing to work at the raw script-engine level.

What Are Based ZK Applications?The second programmability pillar introduced in Toccata is based zk applications. This is the more technically dense of the two and worth unpacking carefully.

ZK stands for zero-knowledge, a cryptographic method that lets one party prove something is true without revealing the underlying data. ZK proofs are increasingly used in blockchain scaling because they allow off-chain computation to be verified on-chain cheaply and securely.

"Based" in this context means the zk system fully follows L1 sequencing. A based zk application cannot add or drop transactions independently. It is anchored to Kaspa's own transaction order, which is what makes it trustworthy without a separate sequencer.

Toccata introduces several components to support this:

ZK verification opcodes, including a flexible Groth16 verifier and a RISC Zero STARK verifierA sequencing commitment access opcode, enabling based applications to anchor themselves to L1 orderingKIP-21, a partitioned sequencing commitment architecture that ensures a zk app's proving costs scale with its own activity, not with overall DAG activityThe RISC Zero STARK verifier is already implemented and activated on testnet 12. Whether it activates on mainnet is still being decided.

Why Proving Costs MatterFor any zk application to be practical, the cost of generating proofs needs to stay proportional to what the application itself does. If a zk app had to prove work relative to all activity on the broader DAG, costs would become unpredictable and unmanageable. KIP-21 solves this by partitioning sequencing commitments, keeping each app's workload self-contained.

What Is Already In Place?A significant portion of the hard fork is already implemented. The following features are already built:

Extended script-engine opcode support, the core covenants backbone, under KIP-17Covenant IDs for lineage management as a consensus and engine feature, under KIP-20ZK opcodes with a zk-verifier precompile subsystem, under KIP-16, authored by Alexander SafstromSequencing commitment access opcodeKIP-21, authored by Sutton and implemented by Maxim Biryukov, fully implemented and pending reviewProof-of-concept milestones, including inline zk covenants and based zk covenants with a KAS canonical bridge, have also been completed by Maxim and were instrumental in shaping the final design of the fork.

Why Did The Hard Fork Date Move To June?The original mainnet target was May 5, 2026. It has since moved to a window of June 5–20, 2026.

The reason is architectural. Once zk circuits and runtimes bind to a sequencing commitment hashing structure, any structural changes after the fact become breaking changes. Getting the design wrong and patching it later would be far more disruptive than taking the extra time now.

KIP-21 is already designed to be future-compatible with the commitment scheme that will eventually be required by vprogs, Kaspa's longer-term roadmap for synchronously composable verifiable programs. Locking in the right structure before mainnet activation avoids costly migrations later.

The feature freeze is expected on April 15, 2026.

What Happens Between Feature Freeze And Mainnet?After the April 15 feature freeze, Kaspa Core plans a clean restart of the dedicated testnet, TN12, with the full final feature set included. This is not a simulation of the hard fork transition. It is a clean network for testing the complete feature set in its final form.

From there, the team will merge the accumulated months of work from a long-lived pending branch back into the master codebase. That process involves final auditing, closing open items, perfecting hard-fork activation logic, and handling database upgradability.

Once that work is complete, a test hard fork will run over TN10, the long-term testnet, to simulate a full mainnet-style transition. The mainnet date will only be hardcoded after that rehearsal runs to the team's satisfaction.

What Node Operators Should ExpectFor miners and node operators, the upgrade is designed to be straightforward. Nodes need to be updated, and existing functionality should continue working. Disk space requirements are expected to increase by roughly 20 to 50 percent. No dramatic infrastructure changes are anticipated.

What Toccata Actually Delivers For KaspaToccata adds two working programmability systems to Kaspa's base layer: native L1 covenant scripting through Silverscript, and based zk application infrastructure through KIP-16, KIP-20, and KIP-21. A large portion of the technical work is already done. What remains is finalizing interfaces, merging the pending branch into master, and running a full rehearsal on TN10 before the mainnet date is confirmed.

The June 5–20, 2026 window exists because the team chose to get the sequencing commitment architecture right the first time rather than fix it later under live conditions. For node operators, the upgrade is designed to be straightforward, with no major infrastructure changes beyond a modest increase in disk space.

ResourcesKaspa on X: Post (April, 2026)

Blog article by Michael Sutton: Kaspa Covenants++ “Toccata” Hard-Fork Outlook

Gate has integrated Kasplex Layer 2 on Kaspa, opening a direct bridge for users to move KAS onto an EVM‑compatible DeFi environment.

Summary

Gate has connected its exchange infrastructure to the Kasplex Layer 2 network on Kaspa, enabling KAS deposits and withdrawals via L2. Kasplex uses $KAS as its sole gas and network token, aiming to bring EVM‑compatible smart contracts and DeFi to Kaspa’s high‑throughput BlockDAG chain. The integration is meant to lower user barriers, improve KAS circulation and deepen on‑chain activity across the Kaspa ecosystem. Gate has officially integrated the Kasplex Layer 2 network, allowing users to move Kaspa’s native token KAS between the Kaspa Layer 1 chain and Kasplex L2 directly through the exchange. According to Gate, customers can now “transfer KAS from Kaspa L1 to the Kasplex L2 wallet,” a step the platform says will “significantly” reduce entry barriers while “enhancing asset circulation and on‑chain interaction” for KAS holders.

Kasplex is a Layer 2 solution built on top of Kaspa’s BlockDAG‑based Layer 1 and is designed to add Ethereum‑style smart contract functionality to a network that, like Bitcoin, uses a UTXO model and has no native contract layer. In technical documentation, Kasplex describes itself as “a lightweight Rollup solution based on Kaspa,” embedding EVM bytecode into Kaspa L1 transactions and executing it off‑chain to update Layer 2 state while using Kaspa for ordering and data availability.

Kasplex’s KAS‑only gas model and DeFi goals In posts on X, the Kasplex team has stressed that the network uses bridged $KAS as its only gas token, rather than introducing a separate L2 asset, in order to “preserve economic alignment and keep value within the Kaspa ecosystem.” The project offers a two‑way bridge for moving KAS between L1 and L2 and says smart‑contract deployment is “as simple as redirecting RPC endpoints,” with the aim of making it easy for developers familiar with EVM tooling to launch applications on Kasplex.

Kasplex’s architecture is pitched as a way to unlock DeFi, NFTs and other dApps on Kaspa by combining the base chain’s high‑throughput BlockDAG design with EVM‑compatible execution. Kasplex notes that by using Kaspa L1 for canonical transaction ordering and data, its Rollup‑style design can support automated market makers, lending and borrowing markets, stablecoins and other composable protocols that “cannot be realized on the primary chain” alone.

Kaspa itself has become one of the more actively traded mid‑cap layer‑1 tokens, with a live price of about $0.0345, a 24‑hour trading range between roughly $0.0340 and $0.0353, and a recent 24‑hour volume near $26.4 million. CoinMarketCap data puts Kaspa’s all‑time high at $0.2075, meaning KAS currently trades more than 80% below its peak, a gap backers hope additional L2 utility can help narrow over time.

Kaspa community posts have framed Kasplex as “a huge milestone ahead of imminent mainnet,” highlighting growing momentum around node decentralization, liquidity pools and wallet integrations, including tutorials on bridging KAS and adding the L2 network to Kasware and MetaMask. By wiring Kasplex directly into its deposit and withdrawal rails, Gate is betting that a smoother path onto L2 will translate into more KAS moving into smart contracts, and more activity across Kaspa’s expanding DeFi stack.

Stablecoin issuer Tether is winding down Alloy by Tether and its gold-backed, overcollateralized aUSDT stablecoin after just two years to focus on products and areas with stronger demand. 

Tether announced its “strategic changes” on Wednesday following a review of user activity, market demand, and the company’s “broader priorities.”

Tether said it has decided to focus resources on areas where it is seeing “stronger user demand, deeper liquidity and broader long-term market opportunity,” including its gold-backed digital asset XAUT and other core products across its ecosystem.

While stablecoins remain Tether’s core business, the company has shown a growing interest in technology outside stablecoins. Its investments include Bitcoin mining infrastructure, artificial intelligence, cloud computing and robotics. Most recently, it led German tech company NEURA’s $1 billion funding round on June 11. 

Tether’s aUSDT is an overcollateralized derivative product built on top of XAUT using Ethereum smart contracts, which also reflects the demand for gold-backed and tokenized real-world assets. 

Alloy by Tether allowed users to deposit XAUT as collateral to mint aUSDT, with the value of XAUT locked exceeding the value of aUSDT issued, similar to how some stablecoins or synthetic dollars are created against crypto collateral in DeFi.

Users could borrow or mint against their XAUT holdings, letting them access dollar-like liquidity without selling their gold exposure. 

Alloy by Tether, announced in June 2024, has a current market capitalization of $1.2 million and is backed by 14.73 kilograms of gold worth around $2.2 million, according to Tether. 

Tether Gold remains popular The winding down will happen in phases, the first of which starts immediately by preventing the opening of new positions or the minting of new aUSDT. Users have three months to return their aUSDT and reclaim their XAUT until the cut-off date on Sept. 17.

XAUT remains popular with a market capitalization of $3 billion and is backed by 22,169 kilograms of physical gold, according to the company.

Its market cap surged earlier this year when gold prices hit an all-time high of just over $5,300 per ounce. However, it has retreated by 19% since then. 

Tether also bought a 12% stake in precious metals platform Gold.com for $150 million in February, with plans to integrate XAUT into the platform. 

Chinese yuan and euro stablecoins axed  Alloy by Tether is not the only product the company has shelved this year. 

In February, Tether announced it was discontinuing its Chinese yuan stablecoin, CNHT, citing “evolving market conditions, low interest in the product, and limited sustained community demand,” relative to other supported assets.

In November, it wound down its euro stablecoin, EURT, citing European regulatory issues and a focus on other initiatives such as Hadron, its asset tokenization platform launched in 2024. 

However, in May, Tether announced that it planned to launch a Georgian lari stablecoin, GELT, in cooperation with the government of Georgia. 

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Listen to this article. An upgrade to DeFi lending protocol Compound Finance has introduced a bug, “causing transactions for ETH suppliers and borrowers to revert” and leaving the platform’s ~$830 million cETH market unusable until a fix is implemented.

Compound announced the incident an hour after the upgrade was executed, stating: “Funds are not immediately at risk, but this is a developing situation.”

While the issue was quickly identified, the fix (simply reverting the smart contract in question to the previous version) cannot be implemented for seven days.

This is due to Compound’s decentralized governance process, which ensures that any changes to the functionality of the protocol can only be made by passing a proposal, voted on by COMP token holders. Any proposed changes face a two-day review followed by a three-day voting period. Successful proposals then pass into a two-day “timelock” queue, where they can be canceled if any last-minute errors are found.

Image courtesy of Compound Finance. Read more: How the FDIC works and why crypto marketers should be nervous

In return for deposits on Compound, users receive interest-bearing cTokens that can be held, accumulating interest, or used as collateral to take out over-collateralized loans.

However, due to the differences between ETH and other (ERC-20) tokens on the Ethereum blockchain, Compound uses two types of deposit tokens, CEther and CErc20. The error, introduced in Proposal 117, was in a price calculation which assumed all cTokens functioned as CErc20, leading to the reverted transactions.

According to Compound, the proposed code change had been audited by three separate smart contract auditors, though the most recent report linked in the proposal is dated April 1, 2022. 

Proposal 119 will revert to the former price oracle once it passes next week, reactivating the cETH market. In the meantime, users with outstanding debt are still able to deposit ETH to avoid liquidation when the market reopens, if necessary.

This is not the first time that Compound has been unable to fix a live bug due to its slow-moving governance. Last September, $80 million in excess rewards was accidentally distributed to depositors, and a further $68.8 million was released while the fix was pending.

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Bitget Token will become the native token of Morph, despite an audit showing that the L2 has numerous critical security vulnerabilities and other red flags.

Top-10 global cryptocurrency exchange Bitget is winding down long-term development of its platform token, Bitget Token (BGB), and transferring all tokens it controls to Morph, an Ethereum Layer 2 network designed to power the "next generation of onchain consumer finance," per the project’s description on its official website.

In a press release shared with The Defiant, Bitget said that it will transfer 440 million BGB tokens in total to the Morph Foundation, with 50% of that sum to be “burned immediately” by the foundation, and the remaining 220 million released at 2% per month to “fund liquidity incentives, use case expansion, and education.”

Bitget Token was originally launched on Ethereum in 2020. Now, according to Bitget, Morph will become the “native onchain home of BGB and serve as the core settlement layer,” with BGB established as the network’s gas and governance token.

In comments to The Defiant, Gracy Chen, CEO at Bitget, said that the exchange has always positioned BGB as “more than just an exchange token.”

“Moving the tokens into the Morph Foundation makes sure BGB’s development is guided by the community and ecosystem builders rather than a single company. Morph was the natural choice because it’s purpose-built for payments and onchain consumer finance, which aligns directly with BGB’s roadmap,” Chen explained.

Bitget's CEO added that the exchange doesn’t see the transfer as a “race to replicate someone else’s model,” adding that partnering with Morph “allows us to build directly on top of an existing payment-focused Layer 2 that’s already innovating in the consumer finance space.”

The centralized exchange also made it clear that it’s distancing itself from the asset’s further development roadmap, as the Morph Foundation will be “solely responsible for BGB’s long-term development roadmap, co-building the ecosystem with the community.”

Chen explained to The Defiant:

“Rather than splitting resources between running an exchange, wallet, and now a separate chain, we think it’s more efficient and better for users to strengthen BGB’s role within a chain that shares our vision. For us this is more about scaling real-world payment use cases for 120 million Bitget users and beyond."

Bitget said in the release that the Morph Foundation “will also update BGB’s burn mechanism to link directly to the Morph network activity until the total supply is reduced to 100 million.”

Following the announcement, the price of BGB jumped 10% to $5.20, before retracing to below $5 by press time. Bitget Token currently has a market capitalization of $5.78 billion, making it the 38th-largest crypto asset.

Bitget, meanwhile, ranks 7th by 24-hour trading volumes among centralized exchanges, according to CoinGecko data, and third overall, taking CoinGecko’s Trust Score into account.

Morph has a total value locked (TVL) in DeFi of $41.4 million, making it the 70th-largest chain in DeFi.

Centralization ConcernsData from L2BEAT shows that Morph appears to be riddled with security issues, ranging from critical exploits to serious centralization risks.

A key vulnerability involves the potential for a malicious code upgrade. L2BEAT found that there is no delay on these upgrades, meaning a bad actor could push out a harmful update and compromise user funds before the community has time to react.

Morph profile on L2BEATThe platform's fraud-proof mechanism also appears to be nonfunctional. While the system relies on a whitelisted challenger to flag incorrect transaction states, this challenger doesn't post a challenge of an incorrect state root.

Furthermore, Morph has several other risks as the network operator has the power to override finalized batches to steal funds or censor a user’s withdrawal transaction, L2BEAT warns. The operator can also censor any user's transactions, preventing them from using the network.

On top of that, due to the operator's central position, they can extract MEV by front-running user transactions.

However, it’s worth noting that Morph is far from the only network rife with these red flags. L2BEAT's data shows that more than two dozen networks have similar technical limitations or even worse centralization issues.

Commenting on vulnerabilities, Bitget's CEO said that the team is “is well aware of the risks flagged by L2BEAT.” Chen added:

“Many of the points they raise are challenges common across most new Layer 2s. Morph has already implemented solutions or mitigations to address these areas, although L2BEAT may not classify them under its own definitions. We remain confident in Morph’s security roadmap, and Bitget will continue to support the ecosystem with user protection as our top priority."

In March of last year, Morph raised $20 million from prominent venture capital firms in a round led by Dragonfly Capital, with participation from Pantera Capital, The Spartan Group, and others.

Last month, another top crypto exchange, OKX, announced a massive token burn of its platform token, OKB, sending the token on an extended rally. As part of the move, the OKB token, also originally launched on Ethereum Layer 1, became the native gas token of OKX's Layer 2 X Layer, which it launched last August.

Disclaimer: This article has been updated to add commentary from Bitget's CEO, Gracy Chen.

Table of contents

Morph has taken a major step toward turning the promise of programmable, borderless money into reality by integrating the Chainlink Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP) as the exclusive cross-chain bridge for the Bitget Token (BGB). The move routes all cross-chain movement of BGB through a single, verifiable pathway inside the Morph ecosystem, a design choice the companies say will bring predictability, stronger liquidity guarantees, and the kind of auditability that institutional users demand.

The integration pairs the protocol with the token that will serve as Morph’s gas and settlement asset, establishing a unified standard for how value moves between chains in payment rails, merchant platforms, and treasury systems. By consolidating token flows under CCIP, Morph aims to reduce fragmentation across liquidity pools and present developers and payment providers with a consistent settlement layer that behaves the same way regardless of the underlying chains involved.

“Cross-chain reliability isn’t just a technical goal — it’s essential for institutional adoption,” said Gracy Chen, CEO of Bitget. “By aligning BGB with Chainlink CCIP and the Morph network, we’re setting a clear, auditable framework that enterprises can trust. Bitget’s vision is to make interoperability a default standard for global payments, not a challenge that builders must overcome.”

The announcement comes amid significant tokenomics changes for BGB. The Morph Foundation holds more than 220 million BGB. There is a roadmap to migrate over half of the circulating supply onto Morph, and more than 50% of the original two-billion BGB issuance has already been permanently burned, a sequence of supply events that the teams say makes standardized, secure cross-chain movement especially important. Locking cross-chain transfers behind CCIP is intended to give confidence to businesses integrating BGB, since every transfer will be processed through the same cryptographically verifiable channel.

“The combination of Morph and BGB is creating one of the most transformative assets in the crypto space,” said Colin Goltra, CEO of Morph. “With supply migration and regular burning on Morph as core parts of the BGB roadmap, Chainlink CCIP plays a critical role in enabling secure, scalable cross-chain movement that supports real-world payment use cases.”

New Standard for Institutional Cross-Chain Payments CCIP’s role goes beyond basic token transfers. Because it can carry tokens and data together within a single coordinated cross-chain transaction, developers building on Morph can now orchestrate transfers of stablecoins, BGB, and programmable instructions in one go. That unlocks settlement flows where a token arrives with embedded instructions, for example, to settle a merchant invoice, trigger an FX swap, or move funds between liquidity pools, all without stitching separate bridges and manual reconciliations together.

As on-chain payments accelerate globally, the ability to synchronize liquidity across networks has become a practical requirement for enterprises. The teams argue that a single, secure cross-chain framework simplifies integration for stablecoin issuers, payment companies, and fintech platforms that need settlement assets to operate consistently across market environments. CCIP’s adoption as the exclusive interoperability layer for BGB is intended to make Morph the dependable execution layer for those multi-chain settlement products.

“By adopting Chainlink CCIP as the exclusive cross-chain interoperability solution for BGB issuance and transfer, Morph is defining how assets should move across chains at an institutional scale. This is how you turn cross-chain from a risk factor into a strategic advantage. It’s a clear signal of where onchain payments are heading next,” said Johann Eid, Chief Business Officer at Chainlink Labs.

The infrastructure underpinning this design will be strengthened further by Morph’s upcoming Emerald upgrade, which introduces new token standards and settlement primitives. With Emerald, CCIP-secured BGB is intended to become the reference model for how future institutional tokens, stablecoins, and payment-linked instruments are issued and managed on the network. Standardized issuance and verifiable cross-chain movement are the kinds of features enterprise issuers have been asking for when they consider building global payment products.

Morph is already working with payment providers, stablecoin issuers, and fintech platforms to roll out the first wave of CCIP-enabled integrations. Those partners, the companies say, require settlement assets that work predictably at scale, and an exclusive cross-chain pathway for BGB aims to deliver precisely that: a single, auditable channel for movement, lower operational friction, and clearer guarantees around liquidity and settlement timing.

For users and builders, the practical upshot is simpler integration and new capabilities. For enterprises, it’s a test of whether standardized, verifiable cross-chain frameworks can finally make on-chain settlement a reliable part of the global payments infrastructure. Morph and its partners are betting that they can turn cross-chain complexity into a feature rather than a liability, bringing programmable money a step closer to moving at the speed of life.

AUTHOR

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.

WhiteBIT’s native token WBT has crossed the $15 billion market capitalization mark — a 50% jump from its previous $10 billion valuation — positioning it among the ten largest digital assets by market cap globally.

WBT’s tokenomics are built around a deliberate balance between controlled supply growth and sustained value creation.

A deflationary mechanism, powered by systematic buyback-and-burn cycles funded through a portion of platform trading fees, works in tandem with a scheduled token release calendar designed to fuel ecosystem expansion without flooding the market.

On March 13, the exchange released over 39 million WBT tokens — valued at roughly $1.19 billion — into WhiteBIT Funds.

Notably, these tokens were not pushed directly onto the open market. Instead, they were earmarked for strategiс allocation, a move intended to cushion any immediate downward pressure on price while preserving room for long-term ecosystem initiatives.

The token’s recent debut on Kraken — one of the longest-standing exchanges in the industry — introduced WBT/EUR and WBT/USD trading pairs. This listing broadened access for both retail and institutional market participants, deepening overall liquidity and reinforcing the token’s standing among established digital assets.

On the regulatory front, WhiteBIT has taken concrete steps toward global compliance. The company secured operational approval in Ghana via a regulatory sandbox program developed alongside local financial authorities — placing it among a limited number of crypto platforms with formal regulatory engagement in emerging African markets.

Beyond regulatory milestones, WBT has gained recognition from traditional financial benchmarks. The token was included in the S&P Dow Jones Indices, signaling growing institutional acknowledgment of its market relevance and maturity as a digital asset.

Within the WhiteBIT platform itself, WBT serves as more than a speculative asset. It is embedded across core services  — from fee structures and staking incentives to launchpad access and governance participation — ensuring that its utility remains tightly linked to platform activity and user engagement.

“Crossing the $15 billion market capitalization threshold reflects years of deliberate ecosystem building and growing trust from our global user base,” the company stated. “Our roadmap continues to prioritize compliance, product innovation, and international reach, with WBT at the center of that vision.”

DisClamier: This content is informational and should not be considered financial advice. The views expressed in this article may include the author's personal opinions and do not reflect The Crypto Basic opinion. Readers are encouraged to do thorough research before making any investment decisions. The Crypto Basic is not responsible for any financial losses.

08.06.2026 - 18:00

Update: 08.06.2026 - 18:00

The Toncoin (TON) community has accepted a proposal, supported by Telegram, to rename the network’s native token. As a result of the vote, the native token known as Toncoin will be renamed “Gram,” and its ticker symbol will change from “TON” to “GRAM.”

In the community vote that began on June 1, 2026 and ended on June 8, 2026 (today), 81.22% of participants supported the proposal. Votes in favor of the proposal amounted to 2.68 million tons, while votes against totaled 604.88 thousand tons. Abstentions accounted for 0.45%.

The proposal submitted by Telegram clarifies that the change only affects the token name and transaction code. Accordingly, the blockchain’s name will remain unchanged, and the network will continue to be referred to as “TON” or “The Open Network.” Furthermore, no token swaps, bridging transactions, migrations, or conversion processes will be implemented. User balances, addresses, smart contracts, and current positions will all remain unchanged. For example, a user with a balance of 10 TON will have their assets displayed directly as 10 GRAM.

The proposal states that the renaming decision is part of the “Make TON Great Again (MTONGA)” initiative. Telegram’s growing role in the TON ecosystem and its emergence as one of the network’s largest validators were cited as key reasons for the change. Additionally, it was noted that recent network updates have increased transaction speeds by approximately tenfold, allowing transactions to be completed in under a second, and reduced fees by about sixfold, almost to zero.

The statement also noted that the name “Gram” is not new to the TON ecosystem. It stated that the native token was defined as Gram in TON’s original technical documentation, and this name continues to be used in the network’s core codebase. Community

*This is not investment advice.

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Source: Binance EN

This is a general announcement and marketing communication. Products and services referred to here may not be available in your region. Fellow Binancians, Binance will support the Toncoin (TON) rebranding to Gram (GRAM). General TradingAt 2026-06-30 03:00 (UTC), Binance will remove all existing TON spot trading pairs (i.e.,TON/FDUSD, TON/IDR, TON/TRY, TON/U, TON/USD1, TON/USDC and TON/USDT) and cancel all pending TON spot trading orders.At 2026-07-02 08:00 (UTC), Binance will open trading for the GRAM/FDUSD, GRAM/IDR, GRAM/TRY, GRAM/U, GRAM/USD1, GRAM/USDC and GRAM/USDT trading pairs.Deposits and WithdrawalsAt 2026-06-30 03:30 (UTC), deposits and withdrawals of TON tokens will be suspended. Users should ensure they leave sufficient time for their TON token deposits to be fully processed prior to this time. Deposits and withdrawals of GRAM tokens will open at 2026-07-02 07:00 (UTC).After the event is complete, deposits and withdrawals of TON tokens will no longer be supported.Binance will handle all technical requirements for users who are involved in this event.Users may refer to the announcement from the project team for more information. Rebranding Details TON tokens will assume the ticker of GRAM tokens on Binance. All TON tokens will be swapped to GRAM at a ratio of 1 TON = 1 GRAM. Spot Binance Spot Copy Trading will remove the aforementioned spot trading pairs on 2026-06-26 03:00 (UTC). After this time, any outstanding assets will be force-sold at market price or moved to the Spot Account if the amount is unsellable. Users are strongly advised to update or cancel their Spot Copy Trading portfolios prior to Binance Spot Copy Trading delisting time to avoid potential losses.At 2026-06-30 03:00 (UTC), Binance will remove and cease trading on all Spot trading pairs for TON. The exact trading pairs being removed are: TON/FDUSD, TON/IDR, TON/TRY, TON/U, TON/USD1, TON/USDC and TON/USDT. All trade orders will be automatically removed after trading ceases in each respective trading pair.Binance will remove Trading Bots services for the aforementioned Spot trading pairs where applicable. Users are strongly advised to update and/or cancel their Trading Bots prior to the cessation of Trading Bots services to avoid any potential losses.Binance will open trading for the GRAM/FDUSD, GRAM/IDR, GRAM/TRY, GRAM/U, GRAM/USD1, GRAM/USDC and GRAM/USDT trading pairs at 2026-07-02 08:00 (UTC). Futures Binance Futures will close all positions and conduct an automatic settlement on the TONUSDT USDⓈ-M Perpetual Contracts at 2026-06-23 09:00 (UTC). The contract will be removed after the settlement is complete. Users are advised to close any open positions prior to the settlement time to avoid automatic settlement. Users are not allowed to open new orders for the aforementioned contract(s) starting from 2026-06-23 08:30 (UTC). During the final hour proceeding the scheduled settlement time of a futures contract, the Futures Insurance Fund will not be utilised to support the liquidation process in respect of that futures contract. Any such liquidation triggered during the final hour will be executed as a single Immediate or Cancel order (“IOCO”), which will be offloaded into the market in one attempt. If, following the execution of the IOCO, the assets remaining available in the user's account are sufficient to meet the required Maintenance Margin (after accounting for realized losses and any applicable Liquidation Clearance Fee), the liquidation will cease. If the IOCO fails to fully reduce the position to a level that satisfies the Margin Maintenance requirements, any unfilled portion of the position will be resolved through the Auto-Deleveraging (ADL) process. Users are strongly advised to actively monitor and manage open positions during the final hour, as this period may be subject to heightened volatility and reduced liquidity.In order to protect users and prevent potential risks in extremely volatile market conditions, Binance Futures may undertake additional protective measures toward the TONUSDT USDⓈ-M Perpetual Contracts without further announcements, including but not limited to adjusting the maximum leverage value, position value, and maintenance margin in each margin tier, updating funding rates, such as the interest rate, premium and capped funding rate, changing the constituents of the price index, and using the Last Price Protected mechanism to update the Mark Price. A separate announcement will be made for relisting.At 2026-06-23 09:00 (UTC), Binance Funding Rate Arbitrage Bot will close all arbitrage strategies and conduct an automatic settlement on the TONUSDT symbol(s). Margin At 2026-06-15 06:00 (UTC),Binance Margin will suspend Cross Margin and Isolated Margin borrowings on the aforementioned pair(s).At 2026-06-23 10:00 (UTC) (Margin Scheduled Removal Time),Binance Margin will remove TON from Cross and Isolated Margin. The cross and isolated margin pair(s) of the aforementioned token(s) will be removed from Margin. Effective immediately, users will no longer be able to transfer any amount of the aforementioned token(s) via manual transfers and Auto-Transfer Mode for Cross and Isolated Margin into their Margin Accounts. If users hold outstanding liabilities of said token(s), these users may only manually transfer up to the amount of liabilities of that token(s) into their Margin Accounts, less any collateral already available.At the Margin Scheduled Removal Time, Binance Margin will close users’ positions, conduct an automatic settlement, and cancel all pending orders on the aforementioned Isolated Margin pair(s), which will then be removed from Isolated Margin.At the Margin Scheduled Removal Time, if users hold both collateral and liabilities of the aforementioned token(s) on Cross Margin, the collateral will be used to repay the respective liabilities. If there are remaining collateral or liabilities of the aforementioned token(s), one of two options below will occur:If users only hold the aforementioned token(s) in the form of collateral: If the Collateral Margin Level (CML) is above 2, the aforementioned token(s) will be transferred to users’ Spot Accounts, up to the point when the CML reaches 2. The remaining tokens in their Cross Margin Accounts that are to be removed will then be fully sold. If the CML is below 2, the remaining token(s) in users’ Cross Margin Accounts that are to be removed will be fully sold. If users only hold the aforementioned token(s) in the form of liabilities:If CML is at or above 2, pending orders will not be affected. If the CML is below 2, all pending orders in their Cross Margin Accounts will be canceled. The system will then sell other collateral tokens to buy and fully repay the aforementioned token(s)’ liabilities.Please note that users will not be able to update their positions during the removal process, which may take approximately 3 hours. Users are strongly advised to close their positions and/or transfer their assets from Margin Accounts to Spot Accounts prior to the cessation of margin trading. Binance will not be responsible for any potential losses.A separate announcement will be made for relisting. Portfolio Margin If the aforementioned token(s) remain in the Portfolio Margin Account after the Margin Scheduled Removal Time, they will be automatically liquidated. The removal margin assets will be sold for USDT, and the proceeds will be added to the user's Portfolio Margin balance. Binance is not liable for any losses incurred.Portfolio Margin users are advised to transfer the aforementioned token(s) out of their Margin Accounts to their Spot Accounts and to top up their margin balance before the Margin Scheduled Removal Time where applicable. Users should monitor the Unified Maintenance Margin Ratio (uniMMR) closely to avoid any potential liquidation that may result from the removal of the aforementioned token(s) from the Margin Account. Please Note: For futures perpetual contracts, please refer to the relevant Futures announcements. Refer to this FAQ for more information on how any remaining balances of the aforementioned token(s) in Portfolio Margin users’ Margin Accounts will be treated. Loans At 2026-06-23 07:00 (UTC), Binance Loans (Flexible Rates) and VIP Loan will close all outstanding loan positions for TON (both loanable tokens and collateral tokens will be closed). Users are strongly advised to repay their outstanding TON loans before this time to avoid any potential losses. Please refer to the Binance Loans (Flexible Rates) and VIP Loan FAQs for more information. More details are also available in the Binance Loans and VIP Loan Terms and Conditions. Simple Earn From 2026-06-26 08:00 (UTC),Binance Simple Earn will cease support for TON Simple Earn Flexible and Locked Products. Subscriptions will no longer be available. All remaining TON Flexible and Locked Products positions, together with any accrued rewards, will be automatically redeemed to users’ Spot Accounts. Users can choose to redeem their assets from TON Simple Earn Flexible and Locked Products anytime beforehand without deduction of any accrued rewards. After 2026-07-02 08:00 (UTC), Binance Simple Earn will resubscribe the converted GRAM assets for Flexible and Locked Products for impacted users, according to the above swap ratio.If there were any changes in the user's TON balance after the redemption, the resubscription will be conducted based on the user’s previous asset allocation ratio between Flexible and Locked Products with different durations with the remaining GRAM balance.Example: The user has 30 TON in 15-Day Locked Products, 20 TON in 30-Day Locked Products, and 50 TON in Flexible Products.If the user’s total TON balance changes from 100 to 50 before the resubscription, the resubscription amount will be: 15 GRAM in 15-Day Locked Products, 10 GRAM in 30-Day Locked Products, 25 GRAM in Flexible Products.About Locked Products PositionsRewards will be distributed to the user’s Spot Account the day after accrual starts on the new subscriptions (two days after subscription).The duration of the Locked Products will be reset with the new subscription. For example, a TON 30-Day Locked Products position with 7 days till expiry will be reset to 30 days till expiry for the new GRAM 30-Day Locked Products position.After the resubscription, users can redeem the GRAM Locked Products positions before 2026-09-01 08:00 (UTC) without deduction of any accrued rewards. Dual Investment From 2026-06-15 08:00 (UTC), Binance Dual Investment will cease support for TON-related Dual Investment products, and users will no longer be able to subscribe to these products.Unsettled subscriptions TON-related Dual Investment positions will be automatically settled in the new token (GRAM) upon expiry. Relevant Auto-Compound plans will also continue using the new token GRAM. Users may disable their Auto-Compound plan via the Earn Wallet before 07:30 (UTC) on the Settlement Date.After the token swap is completed at 2026-07-02 08:00 (UTC), Binance Dual Investment will offer corresponding Dual Investment products for the new token GRAM. All other features remain unaffected. Binance Pay At 2026-06-26 08:00 (UTC), Binance will remove TON from the list of supported cryptocurrencies on Binance Pay. Gift Card At 2026-06-30 03:00 (UTC),Binance will no longer support the creation of TON Gift Cards. Users may proceed to redeem any unredeemed TON Gift Cards for TON tokens before this time. Convert Binance Convert will remove TON and all associated pairs at 2026-06-30 02:00 (UTC). Convert Low-Value Assets Convert Low-Value Assets will remove TON at 2026-06-29 02:00 (UTC). Users may choose to convert the low-value assets beforehand. Buy & Sell Crypto At 2026-06-22 03:00 (UTC), Buy & Sell Crypto will remove TON and all associated pairs. Note: 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. Thank you for your support! Binance Team 2026-06-12 Disclaimers: USDC is an e-money token issued by Circle Internet Financial Europe SAS (https://www.circle.com/). USDC’s whitepaper is available here. You may contact Circle using the following contact information: +33(1)59000130 and [email protected]. Holders of USDC have a legal claim against Circle SAS as the EU issuer of USDC. These holders are entitled to request redemption of their USDC from Circle SAS. Such redemption will be made at any time and at par value.

Distressed crypto holders who had their assets trapped in Singapore-based bankrupt firm Hodlnaut could soon have relief if the judicial system approves a bid to acquire the assets. According to a recent report by Bloomberg, a digital asset exchange dubbed OPNX, which is closely associated with the founders of failed crypto hedge fund Three Arrows Capital (3AC), is seeking to have the controlling share of Hodlnaut. Reportedly, the OPNX crypto exchange has offered to inject up to $30 million in FLEX tokens into Hodlnaut in a bid to offer the creditors a way out amid the court restructuring process.

Persons familiar with the matter told the media outlet that the OPNX exchange offer, which would see a 75 percent takeover, was submitted to the Singapore court after the interim judicial managers supervising Hodlnaut’s restructuring objected to the distressed company’s directors e-mailing the bid directly to its users.

Hodlnaut Potential Takeover by OPNX The close relationship between CoinFlex exchange and OPNX was highlighted in April 2023 when the former halted all its operations to transition through the latter. Moreover, the FLEX token is associated with founders Mark Lamb and Sudhu Arumugam who started OPNX earlier this year. In the recent report, the dual highlighted the importance of the Hodlnaut acquisition in their portfolio for future growth prospects.

“We see a lot of potential in the Hodlnaut platform, and look forward to working closer with them,” Lamb noted.

If the Singapore court approves the acquisition bid of Hodlnaut by the OPNX crypto exchange, the creditors would get up to 30 percent of their claims in FLEX tokens and other tokens. In other terms, the Hodlnaut creditors would get a pro-rata payment of up to 95 percent of the total available corporate asset pool, whichever would be higher than the former.

Market Outlook The FLEX token has gained more than 49 percent in the past week to trade around $6.97 on Monday. Additionally, the FLEX price has gained more than 1500 percent in the past year to a market capitalization of about $678 million. The relationship between FLEX and OPNX is strategic since the latter is used to trade crypto claims, especially for failed projects like FTX. As a result, the FLEX coin has gained more utility amid high crypto competition.

The buyout of Hodlnaut assets and loans could significantly help the distressed creditors who were locked out after the firm was liquidated by the implosion of Terra Luna UST stablecoins last year. Nonetheless, the acquisition deal stands to either be approved or rejected by the court in the coming weeks.

Disclaimer: Coinspeaker is committed to providing unbiased and transparent reporting. This article aims to deliver accurate and timely information but should not be taken as financial or investment advice. Since market conditions can change rapidly, we encourage you to verify information on your own and consult with a professional before making any decisions based on this content.

FTX (FTT) News, Blockchain News, Cryptocurrency News, News

Let’s talk web3, crypto, Metaverse, NFTs, CeDeFi, meme coins, and Stocks, and focus on multi-chain as the future of blockchain technology. Let us all WIN!

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@SuiNetwork cleared roughly $65 billion in stablecoin transfers over the past 30 days, all without charging a single fee. The volume surge follows a May protocol update from Mysten Labs that zeroed out transfer costs and removed the requirement to hold $SUI to move funds on-chain, according to data from blockchain security firm CertiK.

What Changed and Why It Matters The upgrade is a permanent, protocol-level change, not a temporary subsidy. It removes what Mysten Labs describes as one of the most persistent barriers to stablecoin adoption: the need to hold a separate gas token just to complete a transfer. Supported assets at launch include USDC, USDY, AUSD, FDUSD, USDB, USDsui, and suiUSDe.

The $65 billion figure needs context. Sui's standing stablecoin supply sits at roughly $472 million. The high transfer volume relative to supply suggests the same capital is cycling through the network rapidly, functioning as a payment rail rather than reflecting a large influx of new liquidity. CertiK has also reported that Sui has processed more than $2.27 trillion in total stablecoin volume since the start of 2024.

Mysten Labs co-founder and CPO Adeniyi Abiodun framed the case for zero-fee transfers plainly: "Stablecoins are becoming a core part of global finance, but the infrastructure around them still creates unnecessary complexity." He has previously argued that even a fraction-of-a-cent gas obligation forces businesses to maintain token reserves, build separate payment logic, and manage an additional asset, overhead that compounds at scale.

Enterprise Integration and the Road Ahead Fireblocks, the institutional digital asset platform that secures more than $14 trillion in transactions, integrated the feature ahead of the broader rollout. Mysten Labs is pitching Sui as a settlement layer for businesses and AI agents, where automated systems can route payments along the cheapest, most frictionless path available. The primary focus is business-to-business payments and high-frequency microtransactions, though retail users benefit from the change as well.

Sources:
Sui Blog: Sui Launches Gasless Stablecoin Transfers With Support From Fireblocks
CoinTrust: Sui's Gasless Stablecoin Push Drives Massive Transaction Growth
Bitcoin.com News: Sui Blockchain Registers $65 Billion in Stablecoin Volume

ChainTrust is bringing its real-time AML screening and risk intelligence tools to Sui Network, marking the Layer 1 blockchain’s latest move to bolster its compliance infrastructure. The integration pairs Sui’s high-throughput architecture with ChainTrust’s AI-driven monitoring capabilities, a combination designed to catch illicit activity before it metastasizes across the network.

ChainTrust Labs isn’t a household name, but its pedigree is hard to ignore. The company’s leadership team includes former Alipay executives with over 20 years of experience in AI and risk modeling. The firm’s product suite spans real-time address screening, transaction monitoring, and risk scoring, all powered by machine learning models trained on blockchain-specific data. ChainTrust currently serves more than 35 blockchains and claims a database covering over 1 billion digital assets.

By integrating these tools directly into Sui’s ecosystem, developers and protocols building on the network gain access to compliance screening without having to source and integrate third-party AML solutions independently.

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Sui’s growing compliance playbook This isn’t Sui’s first compliance-focused partnership. In January 2025, the Sui Foundation announced a collaboration with Chainalysis, the blockchain analytics giant, to enhance on-chain compliance and security. That partnership focused on tracking illicit activities across the network, with Chainalysis expanding its tracking capabilities for SUI tokens and other fungible assets on the chain.

The Chainalysis deal was primarily about surveillance and forensics: seeing what happened and tracing where funds went. ChainTrust’s integration appears oriented more toward prevention, screening transactions and addresses in real time before problems escalate.

Sui, developed by Mysten Labs, has positioned itself as a scalability-first Layer 1 with ambitions to attract institutional-grade applications.

Why AI-driven AML is becoming the standard Traditional AML systems work on predefined rules: flag transactions above a certain threshold, block addresses on a sanctions list. These approaches catch the obvious stuff but miss the creative stuff. AI models can detect anomalous patterns, cluster related wallets, and score risk dynamically based on behavioral signals that no human-written ruleset would capture.

ChainTrust’s Alipay heritage is particularly relevant here. Alipay processes billions of transactions and has spent years refining AI models for fraud detection in a high-volume, adversarial environment.

The risk to watch is execution. Integrating real-time screening without introducing latency or false positives that degrade the user experience is genuinely difficult. How ChainTrust’s models perform under Sui’s transaction throughput will be the real test.

Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.

ENS dropped plans for Namechain, its own Layer-2 network, as the ENSv2 upgrade stays on Ethereum L1. The ENSv2 will remain fully compatible with Layer-2 networks. In a significant strategic shift, the Ethereum Name Service (ENS) has announced that its next-generation protocol, ENSv2, will stayon Ethereum’s Layer-1 mainchain, dropping previous plans of building its own Layer-2 network, Namechain, according to a blog post by ENS co-founder Nick Johnson on February 6.

ENSv2 is the Ethereum Name Service’s upcoming major upgrade,  intended to expand ENS capabilities to a Layer-2 network, providing users with lower fees and faster transactions than the Ethereum mainnet, as well as to provide structural modifications such as hierarchical registries, which give name owners more power and support for numerous chains.

Why ENS Dropped Its Layer-2 Plans Johnson wrote, “ Ethereum is scaling faster than almost anyone predicted two years ago; we’ve seen a 99% reduction in ENS registration gas costs over the past year, coinciding with Ethereum’s gas limit increases from 30M to 60M in 2025. By staying on L1, we’re aligning ENS with the strongest possible infrastructure guarantees, Ethereum itself.”

As Johnson mentioned, ENSv2 will still be released as planned, and halting work on Namechain will not affect the company’s broader roadmap. By having everything on one blockchain rather than two, he expects names to load faster and run more smoothly for users. Also, Johnson noted that the majority of the improvements made to make ENS easier to use over the last two years will stay in place.

Further, ENS Labs COO Katherine Wu shared a post via her X handle, “It is important to note that ENSv2 is ultimately an upgrade to ENS as it exists today — it’s still ENS! Regardless of where it ultimately gets deployed,” and highlighted new features such as individual registries for each ENS name and new apps currently in testing.

Vitalik Backs ENSv2’s Ethereum L1 Move Vitalik Buterin supported the ENS labs decision by saying, “It’s a good decision!” As he noted that ENS names and records represent a critical on-chain state for the Ethereum ecosystem, should remain easily accessible from anywhere.

Further, he added, “It’s also a semi-financial application, in the sense that buying and holding ENS names has a cost, and ENS names can become very valuable objects. With the expanded scaling roadmap, Ethereum L1 is the ideal place for these applications.”

Highlighted Crypto News:

Shiba Inu Eyes Recovery as Bitcoin Rebounds Above $60K

Writer with roots in journalism and international relations, actively exploring blockchain and crypto, with curiosity for the field and a passion for simplifying complex ideas.

Ripple has highlighted the growing utility of XRP, with Flare co-founder and CEO Hugo Philion explaining how Flare is giving XRP holders access to new use cases.

Speaking on Ripple’s Onchain Economy series, Philion said Flare aims to extend the XRP ecosystem by bringing XRP into a smart contract environment. This allows XRP holders to access decentralized finance (DeFi) applications and other blockchain-based services.

Flare Connects XRP to Smart Contracts Philion described Flare as a Layer-1 network focusing on interoperability and data protocols. One of its key products is FXRP, a bridge that connects the XRP Ledger to the Flare network.

Through FXRP, XRP can be used in smart contract applications. This opens the door to DeFi services that are not available directly on the XRP Ledger.

For example, users can use XRP as collateral, borrow against it, access stablecoins, and interact with tokenized assets. These assets can include commodities such as gold and other real-world assets.

According to Philion, these tools allow XRP holders to do more with their tokens instead of simply holding them.

Given this utility, FXRP has gained wide acceptance in the crypto community. The most recent data show that FXRP has a circulating supply of 155.76 million and a TVL of $186 million.

New Yield Opportunities for XRP Holders Philion also highlighted yield generation as an important use case. Through Flare, users can deposit XRP as collateral to borrow stablecoins. They can then deploy those stablecoins into other markets that offer returns.

This approach allows users to earn yield while still maintaining exposure to their XRP holdings.

Flare has also integrated wallet features that let users manage XRP on Flare directly from the XRP Ledger. Philion said this creates a smoother experience between the two networks.

Privacy May Drive Institutional Adoption Looking ahead, Philion discussed a new initiative called Flare Confidential Compute.

The system operates outside the blockchain and uses trusted execution environments to verify confidential computations. It is designed for applications that require significant computing power, such as AI models and continuous risk-monitoring systems.

Philion believes privacy will be an important requirement for institutional participation in blockchain networks. He previously noted that FXRP surpassed 100 million in supply solely through retail, without institutional participation.

Flare Sees Growth Potential in Tokenized Assets Philion said Flare’s technology significantly expands the capabilities of Ripple and the XRP Ledger, especially in the real-world asset (RWA) sector.

He noted that once RWAs are issued on blockchain networks, Flare’s interoperability and smart contract tools can unlock additional functionality for those assets.

According to Philion, this could become a major growth area for both Flare and the XRP ecosystem as demand for blockchain utility continues to increase.

DisClamier: This content is informational and should not be considered financial advice. The views expressed in this article may include the author's personal opinions and do not reflect The Crypto Basic opinion. Readers are encouraged to do thorough research before making any investment decisions. The Crypto Basic is not responsible for any financial losses.

Ras Al-Khaimah, United Arab Emirates, December 18th, 2025, Chainwire

BDX is integrated with LayerZero and live on Stargate, enabling fast and secure value transfers across multiple chains. 

Beldex, a privacy-focused blockchain network, has announced the integration of its native token, BDX, with LayerZero’s Omnichain Fungible Token (OFT) standard. As part of this integration, BDX is now live on Stargate, a cross-chain liquidity protocol and one of the most widely used bridges in decentralized finance (DeFi) by transfer volume.

The integration enables BDX to be transferred seamlessly across multiple supported blockchains, including BNB Smart Chain, Ethereum, Solana, Base, and Arbitrum, at a 1:1 ratio with no slippage. This development enhances interoperability for BDX, allowing for broader accessibility across decentralized ecosystems while preserving its native privacy-focused attributes on the Beldex network.

The Challenge: Assets Need To Be Where Users Are

Crypto no longer operates on a single chain. Liquidity, applications, and users shift rapidly across ecosystems, and assets require the ability to follow. However, most assets remain anchored to their native chains.

This fragmentation can prevent assets from reaching wider markets, hinder integration, and create challenges for developers aiming to build unified experiences across chains.

While BDX has operated natively on the Beldex network, extending compatibility to Ethereum, BNB Smart Chain, Solana, Base, and Arbitrum allows for broader access and improved interoperability.

BDX Adopts LayerZero’s OFT Standard

BDX becomes one of the first privacy-focused assets issued on LayerZero’s OFT standard, enabling cross-chain compatibility while maintaining privacy on its native chain. The OFT representation of BDX operates transparently across supported networks.

This integration enables BDX to expand its cross-chain presence using LayerZero’s technology, with future potential to support up to 150+ blockchains.

With LayerZero and Stargate Finance, users can now:

Move BDX across chains in a unified 1:1 model For example: BDX (BNB Smart Chain) → BDX (Ethereum) BDX (Ethereum) → BDX (Solana) Connecting BDX to the broader crypto landscape via LayerZero provides greater interoperability and utility, supporting more use cases across ecosystems.

Privacy With Multi-Chain Access

The LayerZero integration aligns with Beldex’s mission to balance privacy with usability. Key benefits include:

Two Forms, One Token: Native BDX remains private on the Beldex blockchain, while its OFT representation operates across supported chains. Supported Across Blockchains: Users can access BDX in multiple blockchain environments to support liquidity movement and interoperability. Frictionless Cross-Chain Transfers: BDX is no longer siloed; users can move the tokenized asset across integrated networks. Future-Ready Infrastructure: LayerZero’s infrastructure positions Beldex to support modular, interconnected blockchain systems. This integration connects Beldex’s privacy-focused foundation with the expanding demand for multi-chain accessibility.

The Beldex Ecosystem: Built for Private Interactions

Beldex offers a decentralized suite of products designed to support private, secure communication and access within internet and blockchain environments:

BChat: A decentralized messaging app that secures private conversations through the Beldex network. BelNet: A decentralized VPN and onion-routing protocol for secure, anonymous connections. Beldex Browser: A privacy-focused web browser offering ad-free, secure browsing powered by the Beldex chain. BNS Domains: A decentralized identity system enabling human-readable blockchain addresses. Masternodes: A network infrastructure supporting transaction validation and network integrity. With LayerZero support, BDX extends beyond the Beldex ecosystem. The network also continues to advance its privacy and scalability technologies, including Bulletproof++ from the Obscura hardfork, along with ongoing research into Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE).

Expanding Across Every Chain

Multi-chain compatibility has become the default in DeFi. By integrating LayerZero and going live on Stargate, BDX can now be accessed across additional chains while retaining its native privacy model on Beldex.

This integration enhances BDX’s utility in cross-chain environments and contributes to Beldex’s continued development of privacy-enabled, interoperable blockchain infrastructure.

About Us

Beldex combines the decentralized power of blockchain with AI’s intelligence to build a confidentiality-centered ecosystem. Our solutions prioritize confidentiality, scalability, and usability, redefining how you interact with the digital world. At Beldex, we believe the future of the internet lies in secure, confidential communication and data usage. By leveraging confidential computing, we protect sensitive data even during processing, ensuring a secure and confidential digital experience. Our integration of Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE) enables encrypted data to be processed without decryption, providing unmatched confidentiality for decentralized applications.

Wemix Foundation CEO addressed the late announcement of Feb. 28 security breach and announced full services resumption on Mar. 21.

In a press conference held on Mar. 17, Wemix Foundation (WEMIX) CEO Kim Seok-hwan addressed the delayed announcement of the recent security breach and announced full services resumption on 21 March, as initially reported by Business Korea.

The incident in question occurred on Feb. 28 and involved a security breach of the Wemix Foundation’s “Play Bridge Vault” crypto wallet, which transfers WEMIX to other blockchains.

Around 8.6 million WEMIX tokens were withdrawn, worth around $6.04 million (8.75 billion won). Following the hack, the affected server was shut down immediately, and the company reported it to the Cyber Investigation Team of the Seoul National Police Agency.

Although the incident was noted on Feb. 28, Wemix Foundation didn’t report it until Mar. 4, sparking public backlash. In the press conference today, Wemix Foundation CEO Kim Seok-hwan addressed the late announcement, explaining that it had been delayed due to concerns about additional attacks and to avoid panic selling.

This is not the first time Wemix Foundation was criticized for issues with information disclosure. In October 2022, Digital Asset Exchange Joint Consultative Body has warned investors to exercise caution with WEMIX due issues with disclosing WEMIX circulation volume.

That being said, delaying the announcement appears justified, as the CEO explained that without identifying the infiltration method, the platform risked further attacks.

In addition to addressing the delayed announcement, Seok-hwan said that Wemix Foundation is investigating the cause of the infiltration and relocating all blockchain-related infrastructure. Complete service resumption is slated for Mar. 21.

In addition to these efforts, Wemix Foundation introduced a series of buyback initiatives to stabilize the market. On Mar. 13, they announced a 10 billion won buyback, followed by an additional acquisition of 20 million WEMIX.

Meanwhile, the WEMIX token has risen from the close of $0.45 on Mar. 4 (when the company disclosed the hack) to $0.57 at the time of writing, according to CoinGecko. However, it remains down 3% on the daily timeframe.

In a massive phishing scam, $12 million vanished from four victims within five days, exposing critical gaps in cryptocurrency security. The prevalent use of create2, a standard tool, empowers malicious actors to exploit temporary addresses and sidestep wallet defenses based on address blacklists. Moreover, the crypto scam drained millions worth of Chainlink (LINK), SatoshiVM (SAVM), Optimism (OP), Tether (USDT), USD Coin (USDC), Binance USD (BUSD) and SuperVerse (SUPER) tokens.

Details Of Recent Crypto Scam According to Scam Sniffer, a Web3 scam tracking platform, the ERC20 permit has become a standardized weapon. It intensifies the impact of wallet-draining attacks, with collateral tokens, including LP tokens and NFTs.

Moreover, the post highlighted that the calculated use of ERC20 permit signatures has become the primary mode of operation for such crypto scams. This is a significant peril to users who unsuspectingly fall prey to seemingly legitimate ERC721 signatures designed for gasless token approval.

In addition, the snapshots shared by Scam Sniffer on X reveal that apart from the above-mentioned digital currencies, collateral tokens, such as aEthWETH, aEthUNI, and aEthLink were also affected Furthermore, the most recent incident further underscores the severity of the threat.

The latest update underscores that a victim lost a staggering $2.34 million worth of SUPER to a crypto scam via phishing. This eventually caused an immediate 20% plummet in SUPER’s market cap within a mere 45 minutes.

Also Read: Bitcoin Price Jumps 5% In Catch-Up To Equities, $43,000 In Sight

Ripple CTO Unveils New OpenSea Scam Ripple Chief Technology Officer David Schwartz has recently revealed a phishing scam targeting users of OpenSea, a prominent NFT marketplace. He noted that the scam involves fraudulent emails that claim to be from OpenSea and notify users of bids on their NFTs.

Schwartz added that these emails contain a malicious link, disguised as a SurveyMonkey survey, redirecting users to a fake OpenSea page aiming to steal their credentials. The Ripple CTO’s revelation highlights the increasing sophistication of hackers in the digital asset space.

Furthermore, similar scams have been reported, suggesting a growing trend of fraudulent activities in the crypto community. Moreover, this displays the necessity for heightened vigilance and security measures among users and industry platforms.

Also Read: 7 Reasons To Buy Solana (SOL) This Year

Zug, Switzerland, October 17th, 2024, Chainwire

Most zero-knowledge proofs are generated server-side for scaling, but Aleph Zero’s zkOS does that directly on users’ devices, offering privacy in a fraction of second

Aleph Zero, the leading blockchain platform recognized for its focus on privacy and scalability, announces the launch of the first feature of zkOS (zero-knowledge operating system)—Shielding, on its EVM Testnet. This release marks the first opportunity for users to experience the shielding feature of zkOS in action, demonstrating the speed and privacy capabilities of Aleph Zero’s zero-knowledge proof (ZK) technology optimizations. 

Privacy at Lightning Speed Table of Contents

Privacy at Lightning SpeedHow the Shielding Demo WorksWhy zkOS Matters: A Glimpse Into the FutureUnlocking Privacy for New Use CaseNext Steps for Aleph ZeroContact The Shielding Demo release is a significant milestone for Aleph Zero, representing its commitment to developing practical privacy solutions for the blockchain industry. Aleph Zero’s zkOS enables zero-knowledge proofs to be generated client-side—meaning data is encrypted locally on the user’s device and never leaves unencrypted—providing high levels of privacy without compromising transaction speed. The Shielding Demo serves as the first practical interface for users to experience this privacy functionality, with zero-knowledge proofs generated within 0.5-3 seconds, ensuring that privacy has minimal impact on transaction performance.

“Privacy has long been a challenge in blockchain, often due to poor user experience,” said Adam Gagol, Co-Founder & CTO of Aleph Zero. “With today’s release, we’re delivering one of the fastest client-side ZK directly to users, combining privacy and performance. The release of the Shielding Demo offers a glimpse into how zkOS can bring privacy to DeFi without sacrificing speed or usability.”

How the Shielding Demo Works The Shielding Demo provides an intuitive interface for users to test Aleph Zero’s zkOS privacy layer. Here’s how it works:

Data Privacy: zkOS generates zero-knowledge proofs locally on the user’s device, ensuring that data remains private and secure. Transaction Flow: Users generate ZK proofs, send transactions to a relayer, and then they are executed on-chain—all while maintaining privacy. Fast Proving Times: The system delivers ZK proofs in 0.5-3 seconds on most devices, demonstrating zkOS’s speed and its minimal impact on transaction times. The Testnet version of zkOS allows users to interact with the system and witness its capabilities, though Aleph Zero notes that the privacy features will be built directly into the upcoming Common app.

Why zkOS Matters: A Glimpse Into the Future The launch of the Shielding Demo on Testnet is only the beginning. Aleph Zero’s roadmap for zkOS extends far beyond this initial release, with ongoing work on simplifying the user experience and the introduction of additional privacy features, such as ZK-ID and anonymity revokers, to ensure both privacy and protection against fraudulent use of the platform.

The system is designed to be easily integrated by developers, providing a privacy framework that requires minimal cryptographic knowledge. This simplicity, combined with Aleph Zero’s rapid client-side ZK proof generation, makes zkOS a critical tool for developers building privacy-centric applications across DeFi and other web3 sectors.

Unlocking Privacy for New Use Case The privacy space in blockchain has been facing increased challenges, such as regulatory scrutiny and delistings, often due to concerns over non-compliance. Aleph Zero’s zkOS offers a fresh approach by delivering privacy solutions that balance user confidentiality with regulatory requirements. Instead of focusing solely on anonymity, zkOS is designed to meet both the needs of users and the evolving demands of compliance.

zkOS enables users to manage their assets securely across multiple blockchains, ensuring their transactions remain private. Unlike traditional privacy methods that rely on centralized or hardware-based systems, zkOS operates directly on the client-side, safeguarding privacy without external dependencies.

Next Steps for Aleph Zero As the Testnet release progresses, Aleph Zero is focusing on refining Shielding and zkOS for its Mainnet deployment. Users who engage with the Shielding Demo will have the opportunity to be whitelisted for upcoming zkOS Beta testing on Aleph Zero’s EVM Mainnet.

About Aleph Zero

Aleph Zero is an ecosystem of blockchain solutions that are engineered for speed, data confidentiality, and ease of development. It achieves efficiencies akin to conventional web2 systems, upholds rigorous standards for data protection via zero-knowledge proofs (ZKP), and offers a comprehensive toolset for development across web3, ranging from WASM-based Rust to EVM-based Solidity environments. Aleph Zero’s versatility is highlighted by over 40 use cases being actively developed, showcasing its adaptability across various sectors and applications. These use cases are part of an engaged community and growing ecosystem of web3 applications supported by Aleph Zero programs.

For more information, visit https://alephzero.org/.

For any inquiries about this release, please contact [email protected] or [email protected].

Contact PR Manager
Josh Adams
Aleph Zero
[email protected]

Disclaimer: This is a Press Release provided by a third party who is responsible for the content. Please conduct your own research before taking any action based on the content.

The following is a guest article from Matthew Niemerg, co-founder of Aleph Zero.

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals handed down a landmark ruling yesterday that could fundamentally reshape how cryptocurrency protocols are regulated. In Van Loon v. Department of Treasury, the court found that the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) exceeded its authority when it sanctioned Tornado Cash's immutable smart contracts.

The ruling hinges on a deceptively simple question: can computer code that cannot be modified or controlled be considered “property”? The appellate court's answer was an emphatic no.

Tornado Cash is a cryptocurrency anonymizing service that helps preserve privacy by pooling users' digital assets together, making transactions harder to trace. In 2022, OFAC sanctioned it after North Korean hackers allegedly used it to launder over $455 million in stolen funds. But the court found that since Tornado Cash's core protocols are “immutable” – meaning they cannot be changed or controlled by anyone – they don't qualify as property that can be sanctioned under existing law.

A Watershed Moment for Crypto“Because these immutable smart contracts are unchangeable and unremovable, they remain available for anyone to use,” wrote Judge Don Willett, noting that even under sanctions, “the targeted North Korean wrongdoers are not actually blocked from retrieving their assets.”

This represents a watershed moment for the cryptocurrency industry. For the first time, a federal appeals court has acknowledged that certain decentralized protocols operate entirely as something completely different from traditional property or businesses. Since no one “owns” the protocols underlying email or the web, these autonomous smart contracts exist independent of any controlling entity.

The implications are significant. The ruling effectively creates a safe harbor for truly decentralized protocols that cannot be modified or controlled. While OFAC can still sanction individuals and companies, it cannot sanction the underlying code itself – at least under current law.

Balancing Privacy and SecurityHowever, the court explicitly left the door open for Congress to update the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to address modern technologies. “Perhaps Congress will update IEEPA, enacted during the Carter Administration, to target modern technologies like crypto-mixing software,” the ruling noted. “Until then, we hold that Tornado Cash's immutable smart contracts…cannot be blocked under IEEPA.”

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This highlights the broader challenge of regulating privacy-preserving technologies that can be used for both legitimate and illegitimate purposes. As the court record shows, Tornado Cash was used by individuals seeking to protect their privacy when donating to Ukrainian war efforts and avoid harassment. But it was also exploited by bad actors for money laundering.

The crypto industry still has work to do in preventing illicit use while preserving privacy rights. Some proposed approaches include allowing users to voluntarily prove the legitimacy of their funds, or implementing “anonymity revoking” systems that could unmask users only under specific circumstances with proper oversight.

The Path ForwardJudge Willett acknowledged the government's concerns about illicit finance as “undeniably legitimate.” But he emphasized that courts must apply the law as written, not “tinker with it.” The ruling concludes:

“Mending a statute's blind spots or smoothing its disruptive effects falls outside our lane.”

This balanced approach – recognizing both the importance of preventing criminal activity and the need to protect privacy-enhancing innovation – points the way forward. Rather than trying to force new technologies into old regulatory frameworks, legislators need to craft updated laws that understand the unique nature of decentralized systems while addressing legitimate security concerns.

For now though, this ruling represents a victory for technological innovation and a recognition that not everything in the digital age fits neatly into traditional legal categories of property and ownership. The challenge ahead is building a regulatory framework as sophisticated as the technology it aims to govern.