Tether’s USAT stablecoin – a regulated, U.S.-market digital dollar – is leaving Ethereum mainnet for the first time, landing on Celo, a mobile-first Ethereum layer-2 network with 14 million Opera MiniPay wallet users already transacting across 66+ countries.
That’s not a minor technical footnote. It’s a direct pipeline from regulated dollar infrastructure into one of the most active real-world stablecoin ecosystems on-chain today.
Tether announced the expansion on March 31, 2026, with Google Cloud providing infrastructure support and Celo governance set to vote on enabling USAT as the network’s native gas currency. Celo already hosts 4.23 million weekly active USDT users – so USAT isn’t arriving to an empty room.
Secure. Borderless. Built for the real world. 🌍$USAT is officially coming to @Celo, bringing the most trusted digital dollar to millions of mobile users. Additionally, we're launching with a privacy-first mainnet faucet powered by @googlecloud pic.twitter.com/fN2Lphmfe5
— USAT (@usat) March 31, 2026
What Does USAT on Celo Actually Mean for DeFi Fees and Liquidity? Start with the basics. Ethereum mainnet – the original blockchain where USAT launched in January 2026 – is powerful but expensive. During busy periods, a single token transfer can cost $5–$30 in gas fees. For someone sending $50 to a family member overseas, that’s simply not viable.
Celo is built differently. It’s an Ethereum layer-2 although that’s changing – Fees on Celo run fractions of a cent. That changes who can realistically use USAT.
After much consideration pic.twitter.com/N2Ae0bi4DU
— Celo.eth/acc 🦇 🌳 (@Celo) April 1, 2026
There’s another feature worth understanding: fee abstraction. On most blockchains, you need the network’s native token on hand just to pay transaction fees – even if you only want to move stablecoins. Celo removes that friction.
Once Celo governance approves USAT as a gas currency, users will be able to pay fees directly in USAT itself. No ETH, no CELO token required. For a first-time DeFi user, that’s the difference between a manageable experience and a confusing one.
The Google Cloud integration adds another layer. A mainnet faucet – a tool that distributes small amounts of tokens to verified users – will use privacy-preserving proof-of-humanity verification developed with a platform called Self.
Verified users can claim USAT without exposing personal data. That’s meaningful for regulated stablecoins that need to confirm users are real humans without building surveillance infrastructure.
Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino framed the move around access: “More than 566 million people globally use USDT as a reliable way to access and move dollars, particularly in markets where traditional financial infrastructure falls short.
” The Celo expansion brings USAT directly into the ecosystem those users are already operating in. Standard Chartered flagged Tuesday that stablecoin velocity has doubled in two years, with coins changing hands an average of six times per month – and the bank now projects the stablecoin market reaching $2 trillion in total market cap. USAT’s Celo move is timed into that acceleration.
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Stripe-owned Bridge, the stablecoin orchestration platform, added Celo support on May 6, 2026, connecting one of crypto's most active stablecoin networks to its single API for onramps, offramps, and cross-chain stablecoin transfers. The integration gives any business building on Bridge instant access to a chain where stablecoins are a daily payment rail rather than a trading instrument.
@stripe acquired Bridge in early 2025 in what was its largest deal at the time. The platform handles fiat-to-stablecoin flows, embedded wallets, cards, and cross-chain bridging. Celo support was teased at Stripe Sessions 2026 and was formally announced at CoinDesk's Consensus 2026 on May 6.
Celo on stage at Consensus 2026Why Celo?Celo launched in 2020 with stablecoin payments as its core use case. It migrated to an Ethereum Layer 2 in March 2025, and the network now offers sub-cent fees, one-second blocks, and gas payable directly in stablecoins. That last detail matters more than it sounds. Users do not need to hold a separate gas token to move money, which removes a major friction point for non-crypto-native users in emerging markets.
The stablecoin activity on Celo is real-world rather than speculative. The chain hosts remittances, savings, peer-to-peer payments, and commerce in places where traditional rails are slow or expensive.
What do the numbers actually look like?Here's what Celo brings to the table:
1.3 billion lifetime transactions on the network.Over $65 billion in stablecoin volume since the March 2025 Layer 2 migration.8x revenue growth since the network's tokenomics overhaul.600,000+ daily active users, one of the highest counts among Ethereum L2s.25 native stablecoins in circulation, including USDC, USDT, and the upcoming USA₮.15 million+ users on MiniPay across 66 countries.For context, $65 billion in stablecoin volume in just over a year places Celo in the upper tier of chains tracked for stablecoin activity, and its daily active user count is ahead of several Layer 2s with much higher fully diluted valuations.
What is MiniPay's role?@miniPay is a self-custodial wallet built into Opera's mobile browser. It runs on Celo and has driven more than 400 million stablecoin transactions to date. Roughly 50 Mini Apps power use cases like remittances, peer-to-peer payments, and merchant commerce. @opera has signaled plans to roll MiniPay out to its wider base, which exceeds 50 million browser users.
This is the wedge that makes Celo different from Layer 2s focused on DeFi yield. The user base is not chasing points programs. They are paying utility bills.
What did Celo say?Celo co-founder Marek Olszewski (@marek_) framed the move as closing the gap between stablecoin infrastructure and actual users.
"Celo was built for the people who actually need stablecoins to work, for remittances, for savings, for daily commerce in markets where legacy rails fall short. Bridge has built the most developer-ready platform for moving stablecoins at scale. Together, we're closing the gap between stablecoin infrastructure and real-world adoption," Olszewski said in the official announcement.
What does this mean for developers?For teams already building on Bridge, the integration removes the need to write separate logic for Celo on/off-ramps or bridging. They get access to Celo's user base through the same API they already use for other supported chains.
For @Celo, the upside is distribution. Stripe's customer base now has a direct line into a chain where stablecoin activity is already happening at scale, without the long onboarding cycle that comes with most chain integrations.
Bridge (@Stablecoin) has been adding chains and features rapidly through 2026, and Celo is one of the more strategically aligned additions given its payment-first design. The pitch from both sides is that this is less about adding another network to a list and more about pairing one of the most heavily used stablecoin chains with the fintech stack that already has the merchants.
Sources:
Celo Blog - official announcement of the Bridge integration with full network metrics and the Olszewski quote.Celo on X - official Celo account, posted the announcement thread with metrics breakdown on May 6, 2026.Bridge on X - Stripe-owned Bridge's official account covering platform updates and chain integrations.MiniPay on X - Opera's self-custodial wallet account, primary source for MiniPay user counts and country reach.
TLDR: Uniswap’s temp check vote targets BNB Chain, Polygon, and Celo, expanding the fee-and-burn to 13 chains. Every swap generates a protocol fee that bridges to Ethereum and permanently burns UNI at a dead address. CryptoQuant data shows rising UNI net outflows on Binance, pointing to smart money accumulation near lows. The governance vote closes May 21st with 18.1M UNI cast, 100% in favor, and the 10M quorum already cleared. Uniswap is moving to extend its fee-and-burn mechanism to BNB Chain, Polygon, and Celo. A temp check vote is currently underway, drawing strong community support.
Meanwhile, on-chain data from CryptoQuant shows rising net outflows on Binance as UNI trades near its lower price range. Together, these developments are drawing fresh attention to the token’s near-term outlook.
Governance Vote Targets 13-Chain Fee-and-Burn Rollout The proposal, shared via Snapshot.eth on behalf of Uniswap’s governance, aims to bring the fee-and-burn system to three additional networks. If passed, the rollout would cover 13 chains in total.
Every swap on these networks generates a protocol fee, which bridges back to Ethereum and permanently burns UNI at a dead address.
The system has been live since December across Ethereum and nine other networks. BNB Chain and Polygon would connect through Wormhole’s Native Token Transfer setup.
Celo was approved in an earlier vote but failed due to a configuration error. This proposal corrects that path and re-runs the execution.
Forum member Abel189 described the move as “a coherent next step” given Uniswap’s “increasingly multi-chain reality.”
@Uniswap is running a temp check to extend its fee-and-burn system to @bnbchain, Polygon, and @Celo, bringing the rollout to 13 chains.
Every swap generates a protocol fee that bridges back to Ethereum and permanently burns $UNI at a dead address. The system has been live since… pic.twitter.com/13h6954YSG
— Snapshot.eth (@SnapshotLabs) May 20, 2026
He supports incremental, chain-by-chain expansion but flagged growing cross-chain messaging complexity as a key watch item going forward.
L2BEAT’s governance team, including members Kaereste and Manugotsuka, voted in favor after their research team verified the implementation, contracts, and expected governance payloads.
They noted the unchanged fee structure and continuity with the previously approved framework as reasons for their support.
On-Chain Outflow Data Points to Accumulation Activity On the market side, CryptoQuant data on the Uniswap Exchange Netflow chart for Binance is showing notable movement.
As UNI’s price corrected deeply, netflow bars grew denser with large net outflows becoming more frequent. This pattern tends to reflect behavior from longer-term holders and smart money participants.
These outflows typically mean UNI is being withdrawn from Binance and moved to personal wallets for holding. That reduces the available supply on the exchange and lowers direct selling pressure over time. Analyst Rei Researcher noted this trend as a potential setup for an accumulation zone near the bottom.
Source: Cryptoquant
Currently, UNI is seeing a mild price recovery. If the outflow trend continues and exchange supply tightens further, buying demand could push the price higher.
The combination of reduced sell-side pressure and growing protocol utility through the burn mechanism adds a structural layer to that potential move.
The governance vote closes on May 21st at 5:30 PM UTC. As of the latest update, 258 wallets have cast 18.1 million UNI votes, with 100% in favor and the 10 million quorum already cleared.
Uniswap is pushing its protocol fee system to three more blockchains. A governance proposal posted on May 16 seeks to activate fee collection and UNI token burning on BNB Chain, Polygon, and Celo, bringing the total number of chains with live protocol fees to 13.
The move is part of a phased rollout that started on Ethereum mainnet in late December 2025. Since then, fees have already gone live on nine additional chains including Arbitrum, Base, OP Mainnet, Soneium, X Layer, Worldchain, and Zora. The latest expansion targets three of the most active alternative networks in DeFi.
How the fee structure works Protocol fees on the new chains are set at 1/5 of the pool fee. In English: if a liquidity pool charges a 0.30% swap fee, the protocol takes 0.06% off the top. That ratio mirrors what’s already running on the other integrated chains.
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Fees are routed into what Uniswap calls TokenJars on each respective chain. From there, the collected UNI tokens get bridged back to Ethereum mainnet and sent to the 0xdead address, a well-known burn address that permanently removes tokens from circulation.
The Celo activation is actually a fix. A prior governance proposal, numbered #94, contained a configuration error that prevented fees from going live on the network. This new proposal corrects that mistake while simultaneously onboarding BNB Chain and Polygon with fresh TokenJar infrastructure.
Governance moved fast on this one The proposal bypassed the usual Request for Comment stage entirely. Under a framework called UNIfication, the expansion qualified for an expedited governance process: a five-day Snapshot vote followed by an onchain vote. No prolonged debate period required.
Community response has been strongly supportive during the Snapshot voting process.
What this means for investors and traders For liquidity providers on BNB Chain, Polygon, and Celo, the 1/5 fee take means a slightly smaller share of swap fees flowing to their pockets. On a pool with a 0.30% fee, LPs would receive 0.24% instead of the full amount.
The cross-chain bridging component introduces its own set of risks. Bridge exploits have been among the most costly attack vectors in DeFi history. While the TokenJar and bridging architecture has been operating on other chains without incident, every new chain integration expands the attack surface.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
PANews reported on May 23 that Uniswap founder Hayden Adams stated that Uniswap's protocol fee mechanism is already running on nine blockchains and is designed to burn UNI. The Uniswap Foundation has initiated a new proposal to extend the V2 and V3 protocol fee mechanism to BNB Chain, Polygon, and Celo. This move will further increase the amount of UNI burned, reducing the total supply of UNI.
Uniswap DAO has unveiled a new proposal to extend its fee collection and UNI token burn mechanism to BNB Chain, Polygon, and Celo, aiming to expand the popular UNIfication program beyond its current scope on Ethereum and other major networks. If approved, this move would integrate three new blockchains into Uniswap’s evolving ecosystem, reinforcing its multi-chain ambitions.
The proposal, titled “Protocol Fee Expansion: Vote 3” (Proposal #96), appears on the Uniswap governance portal and is scheduled for a community vote starting May 24, 2026, according to the Uniswap Foundation calendar. Should the community approve, the fee-burning mechanism—already live on Ethereum, Arbitrum, Base, OP Mainnet, and several others—would now launch on these three additional chains.
Details in the proposal specify that, on BNB Chain and Polygon, fees from v2 pools will be channeled directly to a smart contract called TokenJar, while v3 factory management will transfer to the advanced V3OpenFeeAdapter contract. On Celo, implementation will be more complex due to previous technical issues, requiring the use of cross-chain accounts for some operations.
Glossary: TokenJar and Firepit are key smart contracts for Uniswap’s fee accrual and burning process. TokenJar gathers protocol fees on each chain, while Firepit completes the burn by destroying an equivalent amount of UNI tokens.
The system is designed so that accumulated protocol fees are consolidated in a central account. Users must first burn UNI, after which the burnt UNI is sent to the famed “0xdead” address on Ethereum’s mainnet for finalization.
Impact of the fee burn program on UniswapUNIfication was introduced on Uniswap in December 2025 via community vote, directly linking fee collection and burning to increased UNI token engagement. During this period, UNI rallied from $4.95 up to $9.25 in a short span, reflecting rising interest after implementation.
Back in March, Proposals 94 and 95 saw support from a combined 139 million UNI, enabling the fee collection mechanism to expand across eight further blockchains.
The latest Proposal 96 would bring the total number of UNIfication-enabled networks to eleven. On the activated chains, v2 pools split the standard 0.3% trading fee, with 0.25% going to liquidity providers and 0.05% allocated for the protocol. For v3 pools, fee parameters are set by the new adapter contract per the proposal.
Uniswap’s financial profile and network dataData from Defillama shows that Uniswap’s cumulative protocol fees across all blockchains have reached $5.57 billion to date. Annually, the protocol generates approximately $477 million in revenue, with $3.3 billion currently locked in the platform.
BNB Chain has contributed $117 million in total value locked (TVL) and $3.53 million in protocol fees over the last 30 days, while Polygon accounts for $76.5 million TVL and $1.02 million in fees for the same period. However, fee rewards for UNI holders are not yet distributed on these two networks pending proposal approval.
NetworkTotal Value Locked (TVL)30-Day FeesDistributed to UNI HoldersBNB Chain$117 million$3.53 millionNoPolygon$76.5 million$1.02 millionNoCelo$4.87 million$174,000NoRecent price movements captured by CryptoAppsy indicate that UNI is currently trading at $3.30, a steep decline of 92.7% from its all-time high of $44.97 in May 2021.
As part of UNIfication, a total of 100 million UNI sourced from the treasury were retrospectively burned as a lump sum, calculated to represent fees that might have been accrued from the program’s inception. The proposal was co-authored by Uniswap founder Hayden Adams.
Streamlined governance rolls out for faster changesThe latest proposal implements the expedited governance process introduced with UNIfication. Under this fast-tracked system, fee parameters discussed in the community can progress from a five-day Snapshot poll to an on-chain vote immediately, expediting important protocol updates.
Disclaimer: The information contained in this article does not constitute investment advice. Investors should be aware that cryptocurrencies carry high volatility and therefore risk, and should conduct their own research.
Polymarket confirmed a security exploit affected part of its infrastructure, pointing to a possible private key compromise involving a wallet used for top-up operations, while saying user funds and market resolution were safe.
In a Friday X post, Polymarket developers said contracts and core infrastructure were unaffected. Polymarket product lead Akanshu Jain and multiple other Polymarket employees also said user funds and market resolution are safe.
Blockchain investigator ZachXBT first flagged the exploit as a compromise to the Polymarket-linked UMA Conditional Tokens Framework (CTF) Adapter contract on Polygon, with the exploiter draining at least $520,000.
However, Josh Stevens, Polymarket’s vice president of engineering, said the contracts were safe and that the exploit was limited to a six-year-old private key used for internal top-up operations. All permissions tied to the key have been revoked, he said.
The UMA CTF adapter is an oracle contract used to help resolve Polymarket prediction markets through UMA’s Optimistic Oracle. Polymarket is the world’s second-largest prediction market with $3.7 billion in monthly trading volume, according to DefiLlama.
Polyscan data reviewed by Cointelegraph showed more than 100 small transfers into the alleged attacker wallet. Most were worth up to 5,000 Polygon (POL) tokens.
Address of the alleged Polymarket adapter contract attacker. Source: Polygonscan
Exploit losses climb past $600,000Multiple blockchain data platforms reported similar onchain activity tied to the suspected exploit.
Blockchain data visualization platform Bubblemaps said in a Friday X post that the attacker continues to remove about 5,000 POL tokens every 30 seconds, amassing about $600,000 in stolen funds at the time of writing.
Source: Bubblemaps
Blockchain data platform Lookonchain estimated that about $660,000 was drained from the Polymarket-linked contract as of 9:01 am UTC on Friday.
Polymarket integrated UMA’s optimistic oracle solution on Feb. 3, 2022, enabling automated and decentralized resolution for its prediction market contracts.
Cointelegraph contacted Polymarket and UMA for comment but had not received a response by publication.
Magazine: The legal battle over who can claim DeFi’s stolen millions
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Polymarket’s UMA CTF Adapter contract on Polygon has reportedly been targeted in a suspected exploit, with onchain analysts warning users to pause activity.
Summary
ZachXBT flagged a suspected UMA CTF Adapter exploit on Polygon with losses above $520K reported. PeckShield said two addresses were drained and some stolen funds were deposited into ChangeNOW already. Bubblemaps warned attackers were removing 5,000 POL every 30 seconds as losses kept rising quickly. A ZachXBT community alert said Polymarket’s UMA CTF Adapter contract on Polygon was suspected of being attacked. The alert listed losses above $520,000 and named the attacker address as 0x8F98075db5d6C620e8D420A8c516E2F2059d9B91.
PeckShield later said ZachXBT had reported that the contract had “potentially been exploited.” The security firm said two addresses, 0x871D…9082 and 0xf61e…4805, were drained of about $520,000. It also said part of the stolen funds had already moved to ChangeNOW.
Polymarket protocol contributor Shantikiran Chanal said the security reports were linked to rewards payout activity. He said user funds and market resolution are safe, adding that early findings point to “a private key compromise of a wallet used for internal operations, not contracts or core infrastructure.”
We’re aware of the security reports linked to rewards payout. User funds and market resolution are safe.
Findings point to a private key compromise of a wallet used for internal operations, not contracts or core infrastructure.
More updates to follow.
— Shantikiran Chanal (@ShantikiranC) May 22, 2026 Bubblemaps warns users to pause activity Bubblemaps also warned that a Polymarket contract had been exploited. The firm said attackers were removing 5,000 POL every 30 seconds and estimated losses at about $600,000 at the time of its alert.
PolygonScan data for 0x871D…9082 shows repeated outgoing transfers of 5,000 POL to an address tagged as Polymarket’s UMA CTF Adapter Admin. Several transfers occurred about 30 seconds apart, matching the pattern flagged by Bubblemaps.
Source: PolygonScan Meanwhile, Polymarket’s documentation says the UMA CTF Adapter connects markets to UMA’s Optimistic Oracle. The adapter is used to request and retrieve resolution data for prediction markets built on the Conditional Tokens Framework.
Polymarket’s newer documentation says all outcomes on the platform are tokenized through CTF, with outcome tokens backed by locked pUSD. That makes the affected contract area relevant to how markets are created, resolved, and redeemed onchain.
This is not Polymarket’s first UMA-related controversy. Earlier coverage noted that a UMA whale allegedly influenced a Polymarket market outcome tied to a Trump-Ukraine mineral deal, raising questions over oracle voting power and market resolution trust.
Attack comes as Polymarket expands The incident comes as Polymarket has been moving from a crypto-native prediction platform into a larger market structure debate. Recent crypto.news coverage said prediction markets led by Polymarket and Kalshi have grown into one of finance’s fastest-moving sectors.
The platform has also faced regulatory and market-design pressure. Earlier coverage noted Wisconsin’s lawsuit against Polymarket, Kalshi, Coinbase, Robinhood, and Crypto.com-linked entities, arguing some prediction markets function as unlicensed gambling products.
The suspected exploit adds a new technical risk layer to that debate. Polymarket is already watched for questions around regulation, resolution rules, and market integrity. A contract-level incident now puts user safety and smart contract controls back in focus.
The latest alert also follows a wider run of DeFi security incidents. Recent reports covered Echo Protocol’s paused bridge after unauthorized eBTC minting, while the Verus Ethereum bridge case took a different turn after the exploiter returned 4,052 ETH, following an $11.5 million forged-transfer attack.
SBI announced it will acquire cryptocurrency trading platform Bitbank for 46.7 billion yen.
According to Nikkei News, Japanese financial group SBI Holdings announced on the 25th that it will acquire cryptocurrency exchange platform bitbank for 46.7 billion yen (approximately $288 million). Upon completion of the transaction, SBI Group’s crypto asset custody scale is expected to exceed 1 trillion yen, making it one of the largest operators in Japan’s crypto industry. Per the plan, a subsidiary under SBI Holdings will acquire Bitbank shares from individual shareholders including its founders as early as August this year. Bitbank will then repurchase shares held by existing shareholders MIXI and Ceres by the end of October. If combining data from SBI’s own crypto exchange SBI VC Trade and Bitbank, as of April this year, the two firms had a total of around 2.92 million accounts and total custody assets of approximately 1.1 trillion yen. While different crypto exchanges disclose custody assets at varying time points, among Japan’s major industry competitors, bitFlyer held about 960 billion yen in custody assets as of the end of December 2025, and Coincheck had around 800 billion yen as of the end of March 2025.
4 minutes ago
Bithumb was fined for sharing user data overseas without consent.
South Korean regulatory authorities have ordered cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb to pay a 210 million won (approximately $136,000) fine for sharing user personal information with overseas platforms without user consent. According to an announcement released Thursday by South Korea’s Personal Information Protection Commission (PIPC), the relevant user data exposure occurred between September and November 2025. At that time, Bithumb transferred user information to overseas platforms while sharing its USDT market order book data. The PIPC also noted that when assisting users with asset transfers to 13 overseas exchanges, Bithumb failed to obtain full and sufficient user consent before sharing personal details including names, wallet addresses, and dates of birth. For the two violations, the PIPC not only imposed the fine but also ordered Bithumb to rectify its processes and management systems related to cross-border transmission of user information.
4 minutes ago
Analyst: SK Hynix’s US listing and fund-raising could trigger a valuation re-rating.
According to Bloomberg, SK Hynix is set to issue American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) on the Nasdaq on July 10. The listing aims to raise nearly $30 billion, making it one of the largest ADR issuances in history. Market participants widely believe the move will significantly expand its global investor base and may drive a valuation re-rating. Multiple asset management firms project that if its valuation converges with Micron Technology’s, its share price could rise by 30% over the next year. One fund manager noted that SK Hynix should trade at a valuation at least on par with Micron, as demand for memory chips is likely to outpace supply for years to come. The listing comes amid an unusually strong boom in the memory chip sector. Shares of Micron, SK Hynix, and Samsung Electronics have all surged over 200% this year, marking their best annual performance in decades. Demand for High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) from AI servers is widely seen as the driver of a structural "memory supercycle".
4 minutes ago
Jefferies: Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix’s example to list in the US via ADRs.
Jeff Kim, Head of Research at Jefferies, said Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix in listing on the U.S. market via American Depositary Receipts (ADRs), which will boost the share price of the South Korean chipmaker whose valuation lags behind Micron. "Chip stocks are at a turning point. ADRs will serve as an important catalyst to drive their valuations," he added.
An attacker is allegedly actively draining funds from Polymarket’s UMA CTF Adapter contract on Polygon in a live exploit first identified by onchain investigator ZachXBT. Losses have climbed from an initial $520,000 to more than $660,000 as the attack continues, with the attacker removing approximately 5,000 POL tokens every 30 seconds.
Bubblemaps, Lookonchain, and PeckShield have all independently confirmed the exploit is ongoing. Users have been advised to pause all Polymarket activity immediately.
However, in a latest update, Polymarket’s VP of Engineering has issued a clarification. No Polymarket contracts were exploited. No UMA contracts were exploited. All user funds on the platform remain safe.
How the Attack Is Unfolding
The attacker wallet is executing repeated small withdrawals from contracts linked to Polymarket’s UMA CTF Adapter system on Polygon at a consistent 30-second interval. Each transaction removes approximately 5,000 POL tokens. The cumulative total has already exceeded $660,000 and is rising.
To complicate recovery efforts the attacker has already split stolen funds across 15 separate wallet addresses. A portion of the stolen funds has been deposited into ChangeNOW, a swap service that can be used to convert and obscure the origin of funds.
The primary exploit address has been identified as 0x8F98075db5d6C620e8D420A8c516E2F2059d9B91. PeckShield also flagged two additional drained addresses: 0x871D…9082 and 0xf61e…4805.
Polymarket’s ResponsePolymarket confirmed it is investigating the issue and stated that user funds on the platform itself remain safe. The exploit appears contained to the UMA CTF Adapter contract rather than Polymarket’s core platform infrastructure.
No further official statement had been issued at the time of writing despite the attack remaining active.
What Users Should DoOnchain security analysts are advising all Polymarket users to pause activity on the platform until the exploit is fully contained and Polymarket issues a formal update. Anyone with funds in contracts connected to the UMA CTF Adapter on Polygon should monitor their positions closely.
The exploit remains active. Loss figures are expected to rise further before the attack is contained.
Story Ends Here
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What Happened on Polymarket’s Polygon Infrastructure? Polymarket opened an internal investigation on Friday after suspicious outflows were flagged from infrastructure tied to its UMA CTF Adapter on Polygon, raising fresh questions over the security of systems used around prediction market resolution.
Onchain investigator ZachXBT first flagged funds being drained from two related addresses. Blockchain analysts later put the amount at more than $660,000 as of Friday morning, up from the roughly $520,000 initially identified. The activity was linked to Polymarket’s UMA CTF Adapter infrastructure, which connects UMA’s Optimistic Oracle with the Gnosis Conditional Tokens framework used for market resolution on the platform.
Polymarket confirmed awareness of the incident in a Discord message and said early findings pointed to a possible private key compromise involving a wallet used for internal top-up operations. The company said the incident did not appear to involve a breach of contracts or core infrastructure.
“User funds and market resolution are safe,” Polymarket said in the Discord message. Josh Stevens, VP of Engineering for DeFi at Polymarket, separately wrote on X that the incident was not a contract hack and appeared to involve a compromised private key, adding that user funds on the platform are safe.
Why Does the UMA CTF Adapter Matter? The affected infrastructure sits close to a key function for Polymarket: market resolution. The UMA CTF Adapter links UMA’s Optimistic Oracle with the Gnosis Conditional Tokens framework, which helps settle outcomes for prediction markets. That makes the system operationally important even if the reported incident did not compromise user balances or core contracts.
ZachXBT identified an address tied to the suspected exploit on Polygon as 0x8F980…d9B91. PolygonScan labels one related address as “Polymarket Adapter Exploiter 1.” The contract referenced in the alert was “0x91430…4E5c5.” According to ZachXBT, the drained addresses included “0x871D7…29082” and “0xf61e3…94805.”
Security firm PeckShield said part of the funds was later deposited into ChangeNOW, a non-custodial exchange, and independently corroborated ZachXBT’s analysis. That movement matters because asset transfers into swap or exchange services can complicate recovery and tracing efforts, even when wallet-level attribution is available onchain.
Investor Takeaway The incident does not appear to be a contract exploit based on Polymarket’s initial findings, but it still exposes a core risk for crypto market infrastructure: private key security around operational wallets can create headline and trust risk even when user funds are not directly affected.
What Does This Mean for Polymarket’s Risk Profile? Polymarket is one of the highest-profile prediction market platforms in crypto, allowing users to wager on real-world events using digital assets. That visibility increases the importance of operational controls around wallets, adapters, or third-party systems connected to market resolution and liquidity operations.
The timing is sensitive. Polymarket was reportedly in talks as recently as April 2026 to raise about $400 million at a valuation near $15 billion, after a $600 million strategic investment from Intercontinental Exchange, the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange. A security incident tied to internal infrastructure does not necessarily change the platform’s commercial trajectory, but it gives investors and partners another due diligence item to review.
The company’s initial message attempts to separate the incident from the platform’s contracts and core infrastructure. That distinction is important. A private key compromise tied to an internal top-up wallet is narrower than a protocol-level exploit. Still, for a platform built around trusted market resolution, any infrastructure-linked incident can draw scrutiny from users, regulators, and institutional partners.
Why Is This Not the First Infrastructure Concern? The Friday incident follows earlier scrutiny of Polymarket’s underlying systems. In March 2025, a single actor controlling roughly 25% of UMA’s voting power allegedly forced the resolution of a $7 million prediction market to “Yes” even though the underlying event did not occur. Polymarket reportedly described that case as an “unprecedented” governance attack on the protocol.
In December 2025, Polymarket also confirmed that several users had lost funds after a vulnerability was discovered in a third-party authentication provider. Together, the episodes show that prediction market risk is not limited to smart contracts. It can also come from oracle governance, operational wallets, authentication providers, and other systems surrounding the main platform.
For exchanges, investors, and market participants watching the prediction market sector, the latest incident reinforces the same point: infrastructure security is now part of the investment case. Polymarket’s growth has made it a central venue in crypto prediction markets, but its scale also means every operational failure receives more attention. The next test will be how quickly the company completes its investigation, traces the funds, and clarifies whether any additional internal controls are being changed.
PANews reported on May 22 that, according to Josh Stevens, VP of Engineering at Polymarket, with the assistance of ZachXBT, BitcoinVN, and ChangeNOW, $164,000 in funds related to the Polymarket private key breach has been frozen, representing approximately 28.6% of the total transferred amount of $573,200. Josh stated that the incident did not affect Polymarket or the UMA smart contract, user funds are safe, and the platform is operating normally. The investigation revealed that the incident stemmed from the leakage of a private key that had existed for approximately six years. This private key was used for internal recharge configuration, causing funds to be continuously sent to affected addresses. The team is currently continuing to track the remaining stolen funds.
SBI announced it will acquire cryptocurrency trading platform Bitbank for 46.7 billion yen.
According to Nikkei News, Japanese financial group SBI Holdings announced on the 25th that it will acquire cryptocurrency exchange platform bitbank for 46.7 billion yen (approximately $288 million). Upon completion of the transaction, SBI Group’s crypto asset custody scale is expected to exceed 1 trillion yen, making it one of the largest operators in Japan’s crypto industry. Per the plan, a subsidiary under SBI Holdings will acquire Bitbank shares from individual shareholders including its founders as early as August this year. Bitbank will then repurchase shares held by existing shareholders MIXI and Ceres by the end of October. If combining data from SBI’s own crypto exchange SBI VC Trade and Bitbank, as of April this year, the two firms had a total of around 2.92 million accounts and total custody assets of approximately 1.1 trillion yen. While different crypto exchanges disclose custody assets at varying time points, among Japan’s major industry competitors, bitFlyer held about 960 billion yen in custody assets as of the end of December 2025, and Coincheck had around 800 billion yen as of the end of March 2025.
4 minutes ago
Bithumb was fined for sharing user data overseas without consent.
South Korean regulatory authorities have ordered cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb to pay a 210 million won (approximately $136,000) fine for sharing user personal information with overseas platforms without user consent. According to an announcement released Thursday by South Korea’s Personal Information Protection Commission (PIPC), the relevant user data exposure occurred between September and November 2025. At that time, Bithumb transferred user information to overseas platforms while sharing its USDT market order book data. The PIPC also noted that when assisting users with asset transfers to 13 overseas exchanges, Bithumb failed to obtain full and sufficient user consent before sharing personal details including names, wallet addresses, and dates of birth. For the two violations, the PIPC not only imposed the fine but also ordered Bithumb to rectify its processes and management systems related to cross-border transmission of user information.
4 minutes ago
Analyst: SK Hynix’s US listing and fund-raising could trigger a valuation re-rating.
According to Bloomberg, SK Hynix is set to issue American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) on the Nasdaq on July 10. The listing aims to raise nearly $30 billion, making it one of the largest ADR issuances in history. Market participants widely believe the move will significantly expand its global investor base and may drive a valuation re-rating. Multiple asset management firms project that if its valuation converges with Micron Technology’s, its share price could rise by 30% over the next year. One fund manager noted that SK Hynix should trade at a valuation at least on par with Micron, as demand for memory chips is likely to outpace supply for years to come. The listing comes amid an unusually strong boom in the memory chip sector. Shares of Micron, SK Hynix, and Samsung Electronics have all surged over 200% this year, marking their best annual performance in decades. Demand for High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) from AI servers is widely seen as the driver of a structural "memory supercycle".
4 minutes ago
Jefferies: Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix’s example to list in the US via ADRs.
Jeff Kim, Head of Research at Jefferies, said Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix in listing on the U.S. market via American Depositary Receipts (ADRs), which will boost the share price of the South Korean chipmaker whose valuation lags behind Micron. "Chip stocks are at a turning point. ADRs will serve as an important catalyst to drive their valuations," he added.
PANews reported on May 23 that a representative from prediction market Polymarket stated that the security incident was caused by the leakage of a private key that had been used for six years. This private key was used for internal deposit configuration, and some funds subsequently flowed to related addresses.
The team has completed the private key rotation and reclaimed all production environment access. The next step is to migrate all private keys to a Key Management Service (KMS), abandoning the traditional storage method. The platform and UMA contract were not attacked, user funds are safe, and platform operations are unaffected.
Hyperliquid has expanded its HIP-4 outcome market to let users trade prediction-style contracts on offchain events like U.S. inflation data and Federal Reserve decisions alongside crypto derivatives.Unlike rival Polymarket, which relies on UMA’s external oracle, Hyperliquid resolves these markets through its own validator set, which ingests news, decides which markets to list and votes on settlement outcomes.The fully collateralized Yes/No contracts, which settle at either 1 USDC or zero, position Hyperliquid as a potential multi-asset venue where traders can combine crypto perps with macro and event-driven bets without shifting collateral across platforms.Decentralized platform Hyperliquid is now competing with established betting platforms such as Polymarket, but with a differentiated mechanism for resolving bets.
The leading decentralized exchange has expanded its HIP-4 outcome contracts beyond crypto price milestones into real-world events. This native prediction-market infrastructure allows users to trade macro contracts, such as inflation data and interest-rate decisions, directly alongside their standard crypto perpetuals out of a single account.
Outcome markets mark a notable expansion for the decentralized derivatives venue, which built its business around crypto perpetual futures and initially tested the product using price‑outcome contracts settled against its own market data.
Hyperliquid first tested the product on exchange‑native outcomes, such as whether bitcoin would trade above a specific level by a fixed time using Hyperliquid’s own reference prices. The latest rollout expands that model into real‑world macro events, or offchain outcomes, like U.S. inflation and Federal Reserve decisions, directly competing with prediction market platforms like Polymarket.
Native resolutionWhat sets it apart is that HIP‑4 brings dispute resolution and settlement in‑house, rather than depending on an external oracle network like Polymarket.
Here’s why it matters. Offchain events introduce a new problem: determining truth.
Polymarket handles this through UMA, an external oracle protocol that uses an optimistic dispute system. A proposed settlement stands unless challenged, at which point UMA tokenholders vote on the final result. That model has faced criticism following controversial resolutions, prompting accusations that large tokenholders could influence outcomes.
Hyperliquid uses a more vertically integrated model. Validators themselves ingest external information through automated newsfeed software, determine whether markets should launch, and vote on settlement outcomes.
Multi-purpose platformThe launch also fits into Hyperliquid’s broader effort to evolve into a multi‑asset trading venue. FalconX said in a recent report that the exchange’s expanding product stack could position it as a challenger not just to crypto‑native rivals but also to traditional exchanges.
“For example, you could pair a HIP‑3 perps position on NVDA with outcome markets that NVDA will miss or beat earnings,” CoinDesk previously reported.
Hyperliquid’s outcome markets are structured as fully collateralized contracts rather than leveraged bets, thereby limiting losses to the amount paid upfront. Traders buy “Yes” or “No” positions tied to a defined event, with contracts settling at either 1 USDC or zero USDC depending on the result. If a trader buys a “Yes” contract at 0.65 USDC, their maximum loss is limited to that upfront amount, unlike perpetual futures, where leverage can trigger liquidations.
That makes the product sit somewhere between a prediction market and a simplified binary options contract.
If Hyperliquid’s outcome markets gain traction, traders could eventually use the same venue to express directional crypto views, hedge macro risks, and speculate on event outcomes without moving collateral between platforms.
PANews reported on May 26th that, according to Bloomberg, the adjudication of disputed contracts on Polymarket is being dominated by a small number of UMA holders. Bloomberg statistics show that of the more than 6,400 addresses that participated in Polymarket dispute adjudication votes over the past three years, just nine large wallets contributed about half of the UMA voting power and were on the winning side in almost all disputes. In April 2026, approximately 230 contracts with a total trading volume exceeding $1 billion entered the dispute adjudication process, representing less than 1% of all Polymarket contracts, but the frequency of disputes increased with the trading volume. Some traders criticized the mechanism, arguing that it effectively grants anonymous whales a "fact-based decision-making power" driven by economic interests, and that plans by Polymarket and Risk Labs, which is responsible for UMA, to improve the process have been shelved.
SBI announced it will acquire cryptocurrency trading platform Bitbank for 46.7 billion yen.
According to Nikkei News, Japanese financial group SBI Holdings announced on the 25th that it will acquire cryptocurrency exchange platform bitbank for 46.7 billion yen (approximately $288 million). Upon completion of the transaction, SBI Group’s crypto asset custody scale is expected to exceed 1 trillion yen, making it one of the largest operators in Japan’s crypto industry. Per the plan, a subsidiary under SBI Holdings will acquire Bitbank shares from individual shareholders including its founders as early as August this year. Bitbank will then repurchase shares held by existing shareholders MIXI and Ceres by the end of October. If combining data from SBI’s own crypto exchange SBI VC Trade and Bitbank, as of April this year, the two firms had a total of around 2.92 million accounts and total custody assets of approximately 1.1 trillion yen. While different crypto exchanges disclose custody assets at varying time points, among Japan’s major industry competitors, bitFlyer held about 960 billion yen in custody assets as of the end of December 2025, and Coincheck had around 800 billion yen as of the end of March 2025.
4 minutes ago
Bithumb was fined for sharing user data overseas without consent.
South Korean regulatory authorities have ordered cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb to pay a 210 million won (approximately $136,000) fine for sharing user personal information with overseas platforms without user consent. According to an announcement released Thursday by South Korea’s Personal Information Protection Commission (PIPC), the relevant user data exposure occurred between September and November 2025. At that time, Bithumb transferred user information to overseas platforms while sharing its USDT market order book data. The PIPC also noted that when assisting users with asset transfers to 13 overseas exchanges, Bithumb failed to obtain full and sufficient user consent before sharing personal details including names, wallet addresses, and dates of birth. For the two violations, the PIPC not only imposed the fine but also ordered Bithumb to rectify its processes and management systems related to cross-border transmission of user information.
4 minutes ago
Analyst: SK Hynix’s US listing and fund-raising could trigger a valuation re-rating.
According to Bloomberg, SK Hynix is set to issue American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) on the Nasdaq on July 10. The listing aims to raise nearly $30 billion, making it one of the largest ADR issuances in history. Market participants widely believe the move will significantly expand its global investor base and may drive a valuation re-rating. Multiple asset management firms project that if its valuation converges with Micron Technology’s, its share price could rise by 30% over the next year. One fund manager noted that SK Hynix should trade at a valuation at least on par with Micron, as demand for memory chips is likely to outpace supply for years to come. The listing comes amid an unusually strong boom in the memory chip sector. Shares of Micron, SK Hynix, and Samsung Electronics have all surged over 200% this year, marking their best annual performance in decades. Demand for High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) from AI servers is widely seen as the driver of a structural "memory supercycle".
4 minutes ago
Jefferies: Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix’s example to list in the US via ADRs.
Jeff Kim, Head of Research at Jefferies, said Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix in listing on the U.S. market via American Depositary Receipts (ADRs), which will boost the share price of the South Korean chipmaker whose valuation lags behind Micron. "Chip stocks are at a turning point. ADRs will serve as an important catalyst to drive their valuations," he added.
A multi-million-dollar Polymarket contract on whether Strategy sold any bitcoin by May 31 has been disputed twice and is now in front of UMA tokenholders, reigniting an analyst argument that prediction-market oracles built on token voting are structurally unfit for high-stakes settlement.
A Polymarket contract that drew more than $60 million in trading volume is sitting in UMA's optimistic-oracle queue after two proposed "No" resolutions on the question "MicroStrategy sells any Bitcoin by May 31, 2026?" were challenged, sending the dispute to a token-weighted vote.
The trigger is a Strategy 8-K filed Monday that disclosed 32 BTC sold between May 26 and May 31 at an average net price of $77,135, the first disposal since 2022. The sale closed before the contract's 11:59 PM ET cutoff. The 8-K hit the wire on June 1. The contract is now reading 12c Yes / 89c No.
The dispute is being framed across Crypto Twitter not as an edge case but as a structural verdict on Polymarket's resolution stack. "UMA's token-voting model is structurally broken," analyst Eric Conner (@econoar) posted Monday. "Whales weaponize ambiguous rules to resolve Polymarket markets incorrectly and save their own positions. Zero legitimacy remains until deterministic settlement replaces it. This is exactly what Hyperliquid fixes with HIP-4."
UMA's VotePolymarket outsources contested settlements to UMA's optimistic oracle, where a proposed resolution can be challenged twice before the question escalates to a token-holder vote. The native token's voting power, not a court of facts, decides the payout.
A Wall Street Journal investigation in May found that in most disputed Polymarket markets more than half the UMA votes came from the ten largest wallets, at least 60% of active UMA voters could be linked to live Polymarket accounts, and roughly one in five disputes had at least one voter with a financial stake in the contract they were ruling on. Polymarket has logged more than 1,150 disputed markets in 2026, already past its full-year 2025 total.
The Strategy market is the highest-dollar live test since the $237 million Zelenskyy-suit market last year. Polymarket itself can't override the vote; it posted a bulletin telling voters that "no information from MSTR, on-chain data, or consensus of credible reporting confirmed that MicroStrategy sold Bitcoin within the market's timeframe. Confirmation achieved outside of the market's timeframe does not qualify."
Yes-side traders, including a holder pseudonymous as "Surprised-Legacy" whose $19,610 wager at roughly 11c would pay about $200,000 if Yes resolves, argue the 8-K's stated sale window, not the filing's date, is what the rules ask about.
Deterministic-Settlement Hyperliquid's HIP-4 outcome markets, live on mainnet since May 2, replace the optimistic-oracle layer entirely. Settlement is determined by the chain's own validator set running automated newsfeed software; there is no token-vote backstop, no two-round dispute window, and no path for a holder of the settlement-layer token to also be a participant in the market being settled. Each binary contract resolves to 1 or 0 against a pre-specified data source.
Kalshi reaches the same end-state through opposite infrastructure: an exchange-cleared central-counterparty book run through Kalshi Klear LLC, CFTC-registered as a derivatives clearing organization in August 2024. Disputes are handled by the exchange under rules filed with a federal regulator, not by anonymous tokenholders.
Polymarket's U.S. arm is itself now a CFTC-registered designated contract market, but the international book where the Strategy market sits still settles in USDC on Polygon under UMA.
Where the $60M Sits NowUMA's voting window runs roughly two days. The June 30 and December 31 children of the same market have already resolved Yes without dispute, meaning the $60 million in question turns entirely on whether "selling in May" requires public disclosure inside the month or only on-chain execution inside the month.
Polymarket has finalized a disputed prediction market with a “No” outcome after 98.6% of voting power backed the decision in a final UMA review, despite Strategy disclosing that it sold 32 Bitcoin before the market’s May 31 deadline.
Summary
Polymarket finalized the disputed Strategy Bitcoin sale market with a “No” outcome after 98.6% of UMA voting power backed the decision. Traders challenged the ruling because Strategy disclosed that it sold 32 Bitcoin between May 26 and May 31, before the contract deadline. The dispute has fueled debate over whether prediction markets should be resolved based on when an event occurred or when it was publicly confirmed. According to Polymarket’s market data, the contract asking whether Strategy would sell any Bitcoin by May 31 completed its final review on Wednesday, ending a dispute that had already triggered two previous “No” resolutions and subsequent challenges.
At the center of the disagreement is Strategy’s June 1 regulatory filing, which revealed that the company sold 32 BTC for roughly $2.5 million between May 26 and May 31.
Traders who supported a “Yes” outcome argued that the sale itself occurred before the deadline stated in the market question. Others maintained that the transaction was not publicly confirmed until after the deadline had passed.
Days before the final review concluded, Polymarket added a note to the market page stating that “confirmation achieved outside of the market’s time frame does not qualify.” The clarification became a key point in the debate over how the contract should be resolved.
Traders challenge resolution standards Across social media, several traders criticized the decision and questioned whether the outcome matched the original wording of the contract.
Among the most vocal participants was trader 0xDinosaur, who previously disclosed that he had purchased 49,695.76 “Yes” shares for about 35,000 USDC.
In a public statement issued before the final ruling, he argued that the contract referred to whether Strategy sold Bitcoin by May 31 and did not explicitly require the sale to be publicly disclosed before that date.
“My position was aggressive, and maybe I was greedy,” 0xDinosaur wrote on X. “But risk-taking does not change the facts, and it does not allow a platform to apply an unclear or unwritten rule after real money has already been placed.”
Earlier reporting on the dispute noted that Strategy’s filing showed the company sold 32 Bitcoin during the final week of May, while still holding 843,706 BTC as of May 31. The filing stated that proceeds from the sale were expected to support preferred stock distributions.
Elsewhere on X, trader willo2 argued that UMA voters were obligated to follow Polymarket’s published rules rather than their personal interpretation of the outcome.
“Even if UMA voters think that this outcome is ridiculous… they are forced to ratify it,” willo2 wrote. “This is because UMA is forced to respect the rules as written by Polymarket. Polymarket changed the rules, and now the outcome is literally in the rules.”
Here's my honest opinion on the MSTR market resolution.
It will close NO.
This is because UMA is forced to respect the rules as written by Polymarket. Polymarket changed the rules, and now the outcome is literally in the rules.
Even if UMA voters think that this outcome is… pic.twitter.com/nOGMibeaBh
— willo2 (@willo2_Poly) June 3, 2026 The trader claimed to have lost $500,000 after placing large “Yes” positions on June 1, alleging that the market remained open for betting after information about the sale had emerged.
Debate expands beyond a single market Beyond the financial losses reported by traders, the dispute has drawn attention to how prediction markets handle events that occur before a deadline but become public afterward.
Galaxy Research said the controversy was less about the outcome itself and more about which set of rules should govern the contract’s resolution.
“The core issue is whether the original rules (event-based) or the post-trade clarification (confirmation-based) governs,” Galaxy Research wrote on X. “Traders correctly predicted the future. The platform is about to tell them they were wrong anyway.”
It argued that prediction markets should prioritize the occurrence of an event rather than reinterpretations introduced after trading has taken place.
“Prediction markets should price what happens, not how the oracle will reinterpret rules after the fact,” the firm said, adding that clearer listing criteria, deterministic resolution methods for verifiable events, and structural changes ahead of potential regulatory oversight could help prevent similar disputes.
Polymarket resolved its disputed bitcoin-sale prediction markets by ruling the May 31 contract No and the June 30 contract Yes, following a vote by UMA token holders.The dispute centered on whether Strategy’s sale of 32 bitcoin between May 26 and May 31 should count toward the May deadline, with UMA voters deciding that only the June 1 public disclosure date mattered.A small group of large UMA holders, including wallets linked to Risk Labs and prominent ecosystem participants, overwhelmingly swung the vote toward No, causing May bettors to lose despite the sale occurring in late May.Strategy’s recent bitcoin sale, the first in more than three years, sparked a major dispute on Polymarket, with the dispute settlement body led by UMA token holders ultimately ruling against bettors who wagered the sale would occur by May 31.
The controversy began after Strategy disclosed in a June 1 filing that it had sold 32 bitcoin between May 26 and May 31. Traders who bought Yes on the May market argued the company had clearly sold bitcoin before the deadline. Others countered that the transaction was not publicly disclosed until June 1 and therefore should not count toward a May 31 cutoff.
UMA token holders, who serve as the dispute-resolution layer for Polymarket's oracle system, sided decisively with the latter view.
The resolution means bettors who wagered that Strategy would sell bitcoin by May 31 lost despite the company later disclosing the sale occurred during the final week of May. The June contract, meanwhile, resolved Yes because the transaction became public during June.
The result was driven by a handful of large token holders, which undercuts the core promise of decentralized finance where governance is democratized and not led by few whales.
The biggest vote came from borntoolate.eth, which cast 3.11 million voting weight for No. Other major No votes included UMA contributor Kevin Chan with 1.53 million voting weight and several wallets casting more than 1 million each. Together, the four largest No voters controlled nearly 7 million voting weight, more than 25 times the entire Yes side.
Several wallets identified as affiliated with Risk Labs, the company behind UMA, also voted No, alongside other prominent UMA ecosystem participants.
Not everyone is pleased with the resolution. Galaxy Research, which had significant exposure to the May contract, pushed back sharply on X. The firm stressed that Strategy explicitly sold the 32 Bitcoin between May 26 and May 31, and that the market’s resolution criteria should focus on when the sale occurred — not when it was publicly announced on June 1.
"Strategy's SEC-filed Form 8k explicitly stated that Strategy sold between May 26–31. A plain reading of the resolution criteria would suggest that the market should have resolved to YES, hence the controversy," the firm said.
Polymarket paid mostly college-age creators to stage fake winning bets on copycat versions of its website. A Wall Street Journal investigation found none of the roughly $1.9 million in bets shown across 1,105 videos were real.
The findings run counter to the company’s core pitch. Polymarket settles every real trade on a public blockchain that anyone can audit. Its growth campaign relied on the opposite, staged trades on fake sites that no ledger could verify.
How Polymarket’s Alleged Fake Bets WorkedReal Polymarket trades run on the Polygon blockchain and settle in USDC. Markets resolve through UMA’s permissionless oracle, where anyone can propose or dispute an outcome by posting a $750 bond. Every position is public.
The marketing operation lived entirely off that ledger. The Journal reportedly reviewed 1,105 videos from 10 promoted creators between December and mid-May. Around 70% showed a bet, and none were genuine.
One video showed a creator winning $100,000 after Trump appeared to say the word McDonald’s in January. Trump never said it publicly that month, and the clip was older.
NEW investigation for @WSJ:
– Polymarket is paying scores of offshore clippers to quietly promote its international exchange in the U.S. (though it’s banned from letting Americans trade on the platform)
– Polymarket made dummy websites mirroring its real site, then paid creators… pic.twitter.com/vHU62JdoIH
— Neil Mehta (@neilmhta) June 21, 2026 On the real market, public data shows more than 50 accounts made that bet, and all lost.
Many clips were filmed on dummy sites such as poiymarket.com, built to mirror the real platform. Across 118 videos, creators celebrated roughly $900,000 in fabricated wins. The same bets would have lost more than $166,000.
Creators earned about $2,000 to $3,000 a month and were told not to disclose the payments. A hired marketing firm then pushed the clips past 140 million views. The pattern echoes an earlier market resolution dispute that dented user trust.
Scandal Hits During Polymarket’s US ComebackThe timing is awkward. US regulators fined Polymarket $1.4 million in 2022 for running an unregistered market and ordered the winding down of non-compliant trades.
The company later reincorporated in Panama, with its headquarters reportedly a shared law office that also worked with FTX.
We looked into Polymarket's presence in Panama, obtained its government paperwork and visited its headquarters in Panama City.
There was no sign of Polymarket. Nobody had heard of Polymarket there.
After more digging, we found that more than a dozen other crypto companies…
— Bobby Allyn (@BobbyAllyn) May 5, 2026 Polymarket has since won a regulated US market entry and now wants to bring its exchange onshore.
The fake campaign specifically targeted American users, who can still reach the offshore site through a VPN.
Trust questions are not new. A separate Journal analysis found most users lose money, even as the videos sold easy profit.
Now competing with regulated rival Kalshi, Polymarket said it will audit its promotional content.
That review, which is changing how regulators view its onshore push, may shape the next phase of the prediction market race.
SBI announced it will acquire cryptocurrency trading platform Bitbank for 46.7 billion yen.
According to Nikkei News, Japanese financial group SBI Holdings announced on the 25th that it will acquire cryptocurrency exchange platform bitbank for 46.7 billion yen (approximately $288 million). Upon completion of the transaction, SBI Group’s crypto asset custody scale is expected to exceed 1 trillion yen, making it one of the largest operators in Japan’s crypto industry. Per the plan, a subsidiary under SBI Holdings will acquire Bitbank shares from individual shareholders including its founders as early as August this year. Bitbank will then repurchase shares held by existing shareholders MIXI and Ceres by the end of October. If combining data from SBI’s own crypto exchange SBI VC Trade and Bitbank, as of April this year, the two firms had a total of around 2.92 million accounts and total custody assets of approximately 1.1 trillion yen. While different crypto exchanges disclose custody assets at varying time points, among Japan’s major industry competitors, bitFlyer held about 960 billion yen in custody assets as of the end of December 2025, and Coincheck had around 800 billion yen as of the end of March 2025.
4 minutes ago
Bithumb was fined for sharing user data overseas without consent.
South Korean regulatory authorities have ordered cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb to pay a 210 million won (approximately $136,000) fine for sharing user personal information with overseas platforms without user consent. According to an announcement released Thursday by South Korea’s Personal Information Protection Commission (PIPC), the relevant user data exposure occurred between September and November 2025. At that time, Bithumb transferred user information to overseas platforms while sharing its USDT market order book data. The PIPC also noted that when assisting users with asset transfers to 13 overseas exchanges, Bithumb failed to obtain full and sufficient user consent before sharing personal details including names, wallet addresses, and dates of birth. For the two violations, the PIPC not only imposed the fine but also ordered Bithumb to rectify its processes and management systems related to cross-border transmission of user information.
4 minutes ago
Analyst: SK Hynix’s US listing and fund-raising could trigger a valuation re-rating.
According to Bloomberg, SK Hynix is set to issue American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) on the Nasdaq on July 10. The listing aims to raise nearly $30 billion, making it one of the largest ADR issuances in history. Market participants widely believe the move will significantly expand its global investor base and may drive a valuation re-rating. Multiple asset management firms project that if its valuation converges with Micron Technology’s, its share price could rise by 30% over the next year. One fund manager noted that SK Hynix should trade at a valuation at least on par with Micron, as demand for memory chips is likely to outpace supply for years to come. The listing comes amid an unusually strong boom in the memory chip sector. Shares of Micron, SK Hynix, and Samsung Electronics have all surged over 200% this year, marking their best annual performance in decades. Demand for High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) from AI servers is widely seen as the driver of a structural "memory supercycle".
4 minutes ago
Jefferies: Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix’s example to list in the US via ADRs.
Jeff Kim, Head of Research at Jefferies, said Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix in listing on the U.S. market via American Depositary Receipts (ADRs), which will boost the share price of the South Korean chipmaker whose valuation lags behind Micron. "Chip stocks are at a turning point. ADRs will serve as an important catalyst to drive their valuations," he added.
SBI announced it will acquire cryptocurrency trading platform Bitbank for 46.7 billion yen.
According to Nikkei News, Japanese financial group SBI Holdings announced on the 25th that it will acquire cryptocurrency exchange platform bitbank for 46.7 billion yen (approximately $288 million). Upon completion of the transaction, SBI Group’s crypto asset custody scale is expected to exceed 1 trillion yen, making it one of the largest operators in Japan’s crypto industry. Per the plan, a subsidiary under SBI Holdings will acquire Bitbank shares from individual shareholders including its founders as early as August this year. Bitbank will then repurchase shares held by existing shareholders MIXI and Ceres by the end of October. If combining data from SBI’s own crypto exchange SBI VC Trade and Bitbank, as of April this year, the two firms had a total of around 2.92 million accounts and total custody assets of approximately 1.1 trillion yen. While different crypto exchanges disclose custody assets at varying time points, among Japan’s major industry competitors, bitFlyer held about 960 billion yen in custody assets as of the end of December 2025, and Coincheck had around 800 billion yen as of the end of March 2025.
4 minutes ago
Bithumb was fined for sharing user data overseas without consent.
South Korean regulatory authorities have ordered cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb to pay a 210 million won (approximately $136,000) fine for sharing user personal information with overseas platforms without user consent. According to an announcement released Thursday by South Korea’s Personal Information Protection Commission (PIPC), the relevant user data exposure occurred between September and November 2025. At that time, Bithumb transferred user information to overseas platforms while sharing its USDT market order book data. The PIPC also noted that when assisting users with asset transfers to 13 overseas exchanges, Bithumb failed to obtain full and sufficient user consent before sharing personal details including names, wallet addresses, and dates of birth. For the two violations, the PIPC not only imposed the fine but also ordered Bithumb to rectify its processes and management systems related to cross-border transmission of user information.
4 minutes ago
Analyst: SK Hynix’s US listing and fund-raising could trigger a valuation re-rating.
According to Bloomberg, SK Hynix is set to issue American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) on the Nasdaq on July 10. The listing aims to raise nearly $30 billion, making it one of the largest ADR issuances in history. Market participants widely believe the move will significantly expand its global investor base and may drive a valuation re-rating. Multiple asset management firms project that if its valuation converges with Micron Technology’s, its share price could rise by 30% over the next year. One fund manager noted that SK Hynix should trade at a valuation at least on par with Micron, as demand for memory chips is likely to outpace supply for years to come. The listing comes amid an unusually strong boom in the memory chip sector. Shares of Micron, SK Hynix, and Samsung Electronics have all surged over 200% this year, marking their best annual performance in decades. Demand for High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) from AI servers is widely seen as the driver of a structural "memory supercycle".
4 minutes ago
Jefferies: Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix’s example to list in the US via ADRs.
Jeff Kim, Head of Research at Jefferies, said Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix in listing on the U.S. market via American Depositary Receipts (ADRs), which will boost the share price of the South Korean chipmaker whose valuation lags behind Micron. "Chip stocks are at a turning point. ADRs will serve as an important catalyst to drive their valuations," he added.
SwissBorg has announced its partnership with Mastercard to launch the SwissBorg Debit Card. This collaboration marks a significant milestone for both companies and represents a crucial step in integrating cryptocurrency with traditional finance. The SwissBorg Crypto Card aims to provide users with an easy way to spend cryptocurrencies across a wide range of services and merchants that accept Mastercard.
Big news breaking 🚀
We’re proud to announce our partnership with @Mastercard as we prepare to launch the SwissBorg Debit Card. This marks a significant milestone both for SwissBorg and for the integration of cryptocurrency with everyday finance.
— SwissBorg (@swissborg) December 10, 2025 SwissBorg and Mastercard to Ensure Instant Crypto-to-Fiat Conversion The SwissBorg Debit Card will allow users to convert their cryptocurrencies into fiat currencies instantly during transactions. This feature ensures that individuals can use their digital assets in everyday purchases without the need for multiple conversions or lengthy processes. The card will function similarly to traditional debit cards, making it easier for cryptocurrency holders to access their funds in a manner familiar to most consumers.
The partnership enables seamless transactions at millions of locations worldwide where Mastercard is accepted. This collaboration enhances the user experience by bridging the gap between crypto and fiat currencies, ultimately making cryptocurrencies more accessible for day-to-day usage.
Bringing Web3 to Real-World Utility The SwissBorg Crypto Card is designed to bring true ownership of digital assets to its users, emphasizing the integration of Web3 technologies into everyday finance. By offering direct access to cryptocurrencies for daily spending, the card provides an innovative solution that connects the crypto world with the real economy. SwissBorg aims to continue its efforts in enhancing the utility of cryptocurrencies while offering a rewarding and secure financial tool for its community.
As the demand for crypto adoption grows, this partnership with Mastercard marks an important development in the cryptocurrency sector, helping to bring digital assets into mainstream financial ecosystems.
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Crypto journalist with years of experience providing in-depth analysis and news on blockchain and decentralized finance. With a keen eye for detail, Shahzaib delivers insightful articles that explore the latest trends, market movements, and innovations within the crypto and blockchain ecosystem. His work focuses on educating readers while offering expert commentary on the evolving landscape of digital assets, DeFi protocols, and the broader impact of blockchain technology.
Base’s integration eliminates the complexity of cross-chain interaction while preserving the app’s one-tap simplicity. SwissBorg’s Meta-Exchange combines liquidity from fiat rails, decentralized exchanges, and centralized exchanges into a single, user-friendly trading platform. Today, SwissBorg, the leading cryptocurrency investment and earning app in Europe, revealed that Base has been integrated into its Meta-Exchange (MEX), increasing access to the rapidly developing Layer 2 ecosystem. SwissBorg users benefit from reduced slippage execution, improved access to new Base-native coins, and deeper liquidity channels as a result of this connection.
Key Base DEXs including Uniswap, PancakeSwap, and Aerodrome—the network’s native liquidity layer optimized for capital efficiency and early-stage token markets—now provide liquidity to the Meta-Exchange as part of the integration. As the ecosystem develops, more integrations will come.
SwissBorg’s Meta-Exchange combines liquidity from fiat rails, decentralized exchanges, and centralized exchanges into a single, user-friendly trading platform. Base’s integration eliminates the complexity of cross-chain interaction while preserving the app’s one-tap simplicity.
“Base is today the most active Layer-2 on Ethereum, home to some of the most exciting projects and tokens in the ecosystem,” said Cyrus Fazel, Co-Founder and CEO of SwissBorg. “With Base, Solana, BNB Chain, Avalanche, and more now live, SwissBorg covers almost all liquid tokens across crypto. One tap is all it takes to swap cross-chain, as our Meta-Exchange arbitrages liquidity and delivers execution that often outperforms traditional CEXs, without bridges, friction, or complexity.”
Based on the OP Stack and developed in partnership with Coinbase, Base provides a quick, affordable environment that is compatible with EVMs and has a growing development community. Base has established itself as a very busy center for DeFi, consumer-facing apps, and new token launches because to its high throughput and low transaction costs.
In addition to more recent integrations like Solana, Avalanche, Berachain, Hyperliquid, and BNB Chain, SwissBorg is expanding its multi-chain liquidity infrastructure by linking to Base. With just one touch, users may exchange Base-native assets for any SwissBorg-compatible token, eliminating the need for network switches, bridges, or external wallets.
Since the Meta-Exchange offers greater liquidity, wider token access, and less friction via a single, smooth interface, Base’s arrival is another advancement in SwissBorg’s goal to create the most potent cross-chain liquidity layer.
The leading community-driven cryptocurrency wealth management platform is SwissBorg, which was developed in Switzerland and has an EU license. SwissBorg is dedicated to openness and trust, and its goal is to democratize the future of finance so that everyone may achieve financial independence. At its heart is the innovative Meta-Exchange, which easily links to a number of decentralized and centralized exchanges to provide customers the greatest pricing and liquidity. In addition to trading, SwissBorg enables customers to access early Web3 possibilities via its Alpha Pre-Sales and provides tailored yield strategies with DeFi. At the center of their ecosystem, Swissborg’s token, BORG, offers its owners a host of advantages.
A diploma graduate who is passionate about digital currency and loves writing. He loves the concept of crypto and keeps himself up to date with the latest development and news of the crypto world.
Lausanne, Switzerland, January 15th, 2026, Chainwire
SwissBorg, Europe’s leading app for investing and earning crypto, today announced the integration of Base into its Meta-Exchange (MEX), expanding access to the fast growing Layer 2 ecosystem. Through this connection, SwissBorg users gain deeper liquidity routes, better access to emerging Base-native tokens, and lower-slippage execution.
As part of the integration, the Meta-Exchange now supports liquidity from key Base DEXs, including Uniswap, PancakeSwap, and Aerodrome, the network’s native liquidity layer optimised for capital efficiency and early-stage token markets. Additional integrations will follow as the ecosystem matures.
SwissBorg’s Meta-Exchange aggregates liquidity from centralized exchanges, decentralized exchanges, and fiat rails, consolidating them into a unified, intuitive trading experience. The integration of Base maintains the app’s one-tap simplicity and removes the complexities of cross-chain interaction.
“Base is today the most active Layer-2 on Ethereum, home to some of the most exciting projects and tokens in the ecosystem,” said Cyrus Fazel, Co-Founder and CEO of SwissBorg. “With Base, Solana, BNB Chain, Avalanche, and more now live, SwissBorg covers almost all liquid tokens across crypto. One tap is all it takes to swap cross-chain, as our Meta-Exchange arbitrages liquidity and delivers execution that often outperforms traditional CEXs, without bridges, friction, or complexity.”
Base, built on the OP Stack in collaboration with Coinbase, offers a fast, low-cost environment with EVM compatibility and an expanding developer ecosystem. With high throughput and inexpensive transactions, Base has positioned itself as a highly active hub for DeFi, consumer-facing applications, and emerging token launches.
By connecting to Base, SwissBorg continues to extend its multi-chain liquidity infrastructure, adding to recent integrations such as Solana, Avalanche, Berachain, Hyperliquid, and BNB Chain. Users can swap Base-native assets against any SwissBorg-supported token in a single tap, without needing external wallets, bridges, or network switching.
The addition of Base is another step forward in SwissBorg’s mission to build the most powerful cross-chain liquidity layer broader vision, as the Meta-Exchange delivers more liquidity, broader token access, and less friction through a single, seamless interface.
About SwissBorg
SwissBorg is the leading community-driven crypto wealth management platform, engineered in Switzerland and licensed in the EU. Committed to trust and transparency, SwissBorg is on a mission to democratise the future of finance to make financial freedom possible for everyone. At its core is the groundbreaking Meta-Exchange, which seamlessly connects to multiple centralised and decentralised exchanges to secure the best liquidity and prices for users. Beyond trading, SwissBorg offers curated yield strategies through DeFi, and empowers users to access early Web3 opportunities through its Alpha Pre-Sales. Swissborg’s token, BORG, sits at the heart of their ecosystem providing a multitude of benefits to its holders.
Website | X | LinkedIn | Discord
Base Network
Base is an Ethereum Layer 2 (L2) network that provides a secure, low-cost, and developer-friendly environment for building decentralized applications. Its mission is to help make onchain the next online and support the onboarding of more than one billion users into the cryptoeconomy. Designed to serve as both the home for Coinbase’s onchain products and an open ecosystem for builders everywhere, Base aims to create an accessible, scalable foundation for the next generation of onchain applications and communities.
[PRESS RELEASE – Lausanne, Switzerland, January 15th, 2026]
SwissBorg, Europe’s leading app for investing and earning crypto, today announced the integration of Base into its Meta-Exchange (MEX), expanding access to the fast-growing Layer 2 ecosystem. Through this connection, SwissBorg users gain deeper liquidity routes, better access to emerging Base-native tokens, and lower-slippage execution.
As part of the integration, the Meta-Exchange now supports liquidity from key Base DEXs, including Uniswap, PancakeSwap, and Aerodrome, the network’s native liquidity layer optimised for capital efficiency and early-stage token markets. Additional integrations will follow as the ecosystem matures.
SwissBorg’s Meta-Exchange aggregates liquidity from centralized exchanges, decentralized exchanges, and fiat rails, consolidating them into a unified, intuitive trading experience. The integration of Base maintains the app’s one-tap simplicity and removes the complexities of cross-chain interaction.
“Base is today the most active Layer-2 on Ethereum, home to some of the most exciting projects and tokens in the ecosystem,” said Cyrus Fazel, Co-Founder and CEO of SwissBorg. “With Base, Solana, BNB Chain, Avalanche, and more now live, SwissBorg covers almost all liquid tokens across crypto. One tap is all it takes to swap cross-chain, as our Meta-Exchange arbitrages liquidity and delivers execution that often outperforms traditional CEXs, without bridges, friction, or complexity.”
Base, built on the OP Stack in collaboration with Coinbase, offers a fast, low-cost environment with EVM compatibility and an expanding developer ecosystem. With high throughput and inexpensive transactions, Base has positioned itself as a highly active hub for DeFi, consumer-facing applications, and emerging token launches.
By connecting to Base, SwissBorg continues to extend its multi-chain liquidity infrastructure, adding to recent integrations such as Solana, Avalanche, Berachain, Hyperliquid, and BNB Chain. Users can swap Base-native assets against any SwissBorg-supported token in a single tap, without needing external wallets, bridges, or network switching.
The addition of Base is another step forward in SwissBorg’s mission to build the most powerful cross-chain liquidity layer broader vision, as the Meta-Exchange delivers more liquidity, broader token access, and less friction through a single, seamless interface.
About SwissBorg
SwissBorg is the leading community-driven crypto wealth management platform, engineered in Switzerland and licensed in the EU. Committed to trust and transparency, SwissBorg is on a mission to democratise the future of finance to make financial freedom possible for everyone. At its core is the groundbreaking Meta-Exchange, which seamlessly connects to multiple centralised and decentralised exchanges to secure the best liquidity and prices for users. Beyond trading, SwissBorg offers curated yield strategies through DeFi, and empowers users to access early Web3 opportunities through its Alpha Pre-Sales. Swissborg’s token, BORG, sits at the heart of their ecosystem providing a multitude of benefits to its holders.
Website | X | LinkedIn | Discord
Base Network
Base is an Ethereum Layer 2 (L2) network that provides a secure, low-cost, and developer-friendly environment for building decentralized applications. Its mission is to help make onchain the next online and support the onboarding of more than one billion users into the cryptoeconomy. Designed to serve as both the home for Coinbase’s onchain products and an open ecosystem for builders everywhere, Base aims to create an accessible, scalable foundation for the next generation of onchain applications and communities.
SwissBorg has stated that its Meta-Exchange will be upgraded significantly so that customers will be able to access native USDC and ETH within the Base network. The update will represent another move towards the goal of SwissBorg of simplifying the use of crypto, as well as transforming traditional finance and integrating it into onchain ecosystems. The platform encourages native assets as opposed to wrapped versions of the same, thus improving the security and efficiency of users who visit Base.
🟦 You can now access native $USDC and $ETH directly in the Meta-Exchange.
SwissBorg isn’t just the one-tap gateway to an expanding Marketplace of @Base tokens.
We’re the seamless bridge from 15 fiat currencies, Apple Pay, or Google Pay straight to Base, ready for swaps, apps,… pic.twitter.com/q4MuxEnOMN
— SwissBorg (@swissborg) January 16, 2026 Such an integration makes SwissBorg a simple access point to users who want exposure to Base-based applications, tokens, and decentralized services without having to play a full game on elaborate bridges and a variety of platforms.
At the heart of the SwissBorg product offering is the Meta-Exchange, which pools centralized and decentralized liquidity in a single application. Since Base now supports both native USDC and ETH, users now have direct access to one of the most rapidly expanding Layer 2 ecosystems on Ethereum.
The shift will facilitate smooth exchanges between centralized exchange liquidity and opportunities of decentralized finance with a single turn of the tap. SwissBorg stresses that the absence of this nuisance does not contradict its overarching objective of ensuring sophisticated crypto tools for both inexperienced and seasoned users.
A Direct Bridge From Fiat to Base Among the best aspects of this update is the increased fiat onramp features available to SwissBorg. The Base ecosystem supports 15 fiat currencies that users can transfer money to using the well-recognized payment systems like Apple Pay and Google Pay. This erases the conventional process with multiple steps that can discourage people to go window shopping through onchain applications.
Simplify the trip between fiat and Base SwissBorg is removing the barriers to entry, increasing the adoption rates of the decentralized apps, swaps, and valuable applications of onchain to more widespread applications.
Powering the Growing Base Economy Base is still available in the Ethereum ecosystem and it has continued to draw developers and users who require scalability, reduced fees, and high uncompromised security. The support of native USDC and ETH by SwissBorg is in line with this expansion, where users have access to key assets utilized throughout the Base economy.
The Meta-Exchange by SwissBorg offers a single layer of access as Base applications proliferate through DeFi, gaming, consumer applications and other applications. Users are able to communicate with Base tokens, allocate capital effectively, and discover some new opportunities without switching between apps.
One App, One Tap Vision SwissBorg writes that the update represents a manifestation of its one app, one tap philosophy. As opposed to dividing the user experience between wallets, bridges, and exchanges, the platform will strive to make everything one smooth experience.
Being a multi-chain and cross-chain access gateway, supporting native assets, offering cross-chain access and fiat options, SwissBorg is placed at the stage of crypto adoption. The Base integration serves to support that vision as it directly links traditional finance to an onchain ecosystem that is growing.
Looking Ahead The introduction of native USDC and ETH on Base underlines the fact that SwissBorg remains interoperable and user-centered. Of course, with faster onchain and increased prominence of Layer 2 networks, platforms that help ease access may be a necessity.
The latest SwissBorg update is an indication of a more widespread direction at seamless finance, where users can easily pass between fiat, centralized exchanges, and decentralized networks all in a single interface.
AUTHOR
With over five years of experience in crypto, blockchain, and tech content, Ishtiyaq makes complex topics easy to understand. He simplifies blockchain and digital currency concepts for a wide audience, ensuring that beginners and experts alike can grasp key ideas. His clear and engaging writing helps readers stay informed about the latest trends, developments, and innovations in the crypto space. Whether explaining blockchain technology, digital assets, or DeFi, Ishtiyaq breaks down complicated ideas into simple, digestible content. His goal is to help people navigate the fast-changing world of cryptocurrency with confidence, clarity, and a deeper understanding.
Users are able to choose a delay period that may last anywhere from one to ninety days, during which time they are unable to withdraw funds. Physical assaults that are based on fear and a sense of urgency are discouraged by Withdrawal Protection because it eliminates the potential of rapid rewards. Even in the event that a user is compelled to unlock their device and start a withdrawal, the application will still impose the waiting time. The prominent leading app in Europe for investing and earning cryptocurrency, SwissBorg, just made an announcement on the availability of Withdrawal Protection. This new security feature protects users against the increasing number of physical “wrench” assaults by imposing a time-lock that cannot be bypassed on all cryptocurrency withdrawals. This prevents the immediate transfer of assets out of a user’s account.
In light of the growing number of extortion attempts in the real world that include gaining unauthorized access to cryptocurrency wallets, there is a pressing need for additional protective measures on the human level. Withdrawal Protection is a strategy that was developed to confront and protect against this new and rising issue. A required, non-bypassable time-lock is applied to all cryptocurrency withdrawals when the feature is engaged. This prevents the immediate transfer of assets out of a user’s account during the withdrawal process. Users are able to choose a delay period that may last anywhere from one to ninety days, during which time they are unable to withdraw funds.
Physical assaults that are based on fear and a sense of urgency are discouraged by Withdrawal Protection because it eliminates the potential of rapid rewards. Even in the event that a user is compelled to unlock their device and start a withdrawal, the application will still impose the waiting time, which will theoretically prevent the user from having rapid access to their assets.
“Security must go beyond simply protecting accounts from hackers,” said Cyrus Fazel, Co-Founder and CEO of SwissBorg. “Crypto is reaching a point of widespread adoption, so it’s equally important to protect people in real-world situations. Withdrawal Protection is designed to give users time, control, and peace of mind in circumstances when digital safeguards alone may not be sufficient.”
The function is intended to be a “set and forget” safety protection once it is activated. After being activated in the security settings of the application, the delay that was determined will apply to all cryptocurrency withdrawals. There is no way to circumvent the wait, not even by SwissBorg support, which guarantees that the feature will continue to serve as an advantageous deterrent. At any moment, users have the ability to remove the Withdrawal Protection feature; nevertheless, the same wait period will apply until withdrawals are returned to immediately accessible status.
Within the SwissBorg app, trading and asset management are not impacted by the Withdrawal Protection feature. As usual, users are able to continue exchanging assets, managing portfolios, and making use of internal services. However, cryptocurrency withdrawals made outside of the SwissBorg ecosystem will continue to be time constrained. Also unaffected are internal transfers such as Smart Send, which necessitates the recipient’s Know Your Customer (KYC) documents.
SwissBorg has spent years developing a solid digital security architecture, which includes MPC keyless technology and visible Proof of Liabilities. As a result, the app is now considered to be one of the most secure places for the management of crypto assets. The implementation of Withdrawal Protection is a supplementary measure to SwissBorg’s more comprehensive “defense in depth” security approach. This strategy incorporates MPC keyless technology, Proof of Liabilities, and now a specific precaution against physical coercion.
It is possible to enable Withdrawal Protection by going to the Security section of a user’s profile, which is accessible in the most recent version of the SwissBorg app.
SwissBorg is the most prominent cryptocurrency wealth management platform that is driven by the community. It was developed in Switzerland and is licensed in the European Union. SwissBorg is not only dedicated to trust and transparency, but it is also on a mission to democratize the future of finance in order to make it possible for everyone to access financial independence. At the heart of it all is the revolutionary Meta-Exchange, which establishes a seamless connection to a number of different centralized and decentralised exchanges in order to provide consumers with the greatest possible opportunities for liquidity and pricing. In addition to trading, SwissBorg provides customers with tailored yield strategies via its DeFi platform. Additionally, the Alpha Pre-Sales platform gives users the ability to access early Web3 prospects. The Swissborg token, known as BORG, is at the center of the company’s ecosystem and offers its holders a wide range of financial and other advantages.
A devoted content writer having 3 years of crypto trading experience. Loves cooking and swimming. Stays up to date with the latest developments on blockchain technology.
SwissBorg, a digital asset investment platform with over $1 billion in assets under management, has obtained approval under the European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation from the French Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF), the firm announced Friday.
The authorisation permits the platform to offer multiple crypto-asset services, including custody, administration, order execution, transfers, portfolio management, and crypto-asset advisory services.
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SwissBorg CEO Cyrus Fazel described the milestone as a defining moment for the company and the European crypto ecosystem, saying regulatory alignment is essential for building trust and enabling long-term innovation.
“At SwissBorg, we have always believed that embracing regulation is the only true path to mass adoption and long-term trust,” said Fazel. “Securing our MiCA approval is a defining moment for our community and the broader European crypto-asset ecosystem. It empowers us to innovate with legal certainty while offering our users the highest standard of protection.”
In the coming months, SwissBorg will migrate its European operations from its existing entity in Estonia to the newly authorised CASP entity in France.
The transition will occur gradually, and users will be informed of the process as it progresses.
SwissBorg has grown rapidly since launching its crypto app in 2021. The company completed a Series A community funding round in 2023, raising $23 million from 16,660 investors.
The company has a history of community-focused initiatives, including a successful 2017 ICO that raised $52 million and a 2018 blockchain referendum allowing users to vote on product development priorities. SwissBorg has also received industry recognition through its participation in the Venture Leaders Fintech programme and awards within the Swiss startup ecosystem.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Vivian Nguyen. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
With the intention of establishing its European operations under MiCA, SwissBorg sought approval in a country that is well-known for having high regulatory criteria. It is a proof of SwissBorg’s solid internal controls, risk management, and dedication to the protection of user assets that the French authority has granted approval to SwissBorg. Following the completion of the migration, users throughout Europe will be able to take full use of the protections and precautions that are provided by MiCA. SwissBorg has been able to effectively get approval in accordance with the European Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulations. This accreditation, which was granted by the French Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF), reinforces SwissBorg’s continuous commitment to offering crypto-asset wealth management that is safe, transparent, and completely compliance with all applicable governmental regulations.
This grants SwissBorg the authority to provide a wide range of services related to crypto-assets, such as custody and administration, order execution, transfer and putting, portfolio management, and the provision of advise on crypto-assets products and services. The authorization that was given by the AMF is quite all-encompassing, and the breadth of permission guarantees that SwissBorg will be able to continue to provide its present services while also extending its platform in a way that is compliant with the law.
“At SwissBorg, we have always believed that embracing regulation is the only true path to mass adoption and long-term trust,” said Cyrus Fazel, CEO and Co-Founder of SwissBorg. “Securing our MiCA approval is a defining moment for our community and the broader European crypto-asset ecosystem. It empowers us to innovate with legal certainty while offering our users the highest standard of protection.”
With the intention of establishing its European operations under MiCA, SwissBorg sought approval in a country that is well-known for having high regulatory criteria. The AMF of France is widely acknowledged as being among the most vigilant and stringent financial regulators in Europe. It is a continuous advocate for strong investor protection, and it has previously collaborated with market regulators in Austria and Italy to advocate for a more stringent framework for the regulation of crypto-assets. It is a proof of SwissBorg’s solid internal controls, risk management, and dedication to the protection of user assets that the French authority has granted approval to SwissBorg.
Justine Lamberger, Head of Legal at SwissBorg, added:
“Securing our MiCA approval through the AMF is no small feat; it is a testament to the uncompromising standards we set for ourselves. The AMF is rightfully recognised as one of the most demanding regulators in Europe, and successfully going through their rigorous assessment process ensures our users can have the utmost confidence in how their assets are protected. MiCA is propelling SwissBorg into a new era of institutional-grade crypto brokerage.”
Mr. Fazel also stated:
“I want to extend my deepest gratitude to the Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF) for their rigorous and constructive engagement throughout this process. Above all, I want to congratulate our incredible team. Their relentless hard work, expertise, and dedication have turned this vision into a reality.”
Over the course of the next several months, SwissBorg will arrange for the transfer of its European user activities from the operational company that is now located in Estonia to the new CASP-authorized organization that is located in France. This shift will become completely effective as soon as all of the relevant stages in the operational process have been finished. The migration procedure will be detailed in a specific letter that will be sent to existing users as the formal launch draws closer. Existing users do not need to take any action at this time. Following the completion of the migration, users throughout Europe will be able to take full use of the protections and precautions that are provided by MiCA.
SwissBorg is developing its unique wealth management services with legal certainty, and it is doing it while operating a fully authorized organization in one of the most tough regulatory environments in Europe.
SwissBorg is the most prominent cryptocurrency wealth management platform that is driven by the community. It was established in Switzerland and is managed by a licensed organization established in the European Union. SwissBorg is not only dedicated to trust and transparency, but it is also on a mission to democratize the future of finance in order to make it possible for everyone to access financial independence. At the heart of it all is the revolutionary Meta-Exchange, which establishes a seamless connection to a number of different centralized and decentralised exchanges in order to provide consumers with the greatest possible opportunities for liquidity and pricing. In addition to trading, SwissBorg provides customers with tailored yield strategies via DeFi. Additionally, the Alpha Pre-Sales gives users the ability to access early Web3 prospects. The BORG token, which is used by SwissBorg, is located at the core of their ecosystem and offers its holders a wide range of advantages.
A diploma graduate who is passionate about digital currency and loves writing. He loves the concept of crypto and keeps himself up to date with the latest development and news of the crypto world.
There’s a particular kind of crypto security threat that no amount of two-factor authentication can solve. Someone shows up at your door with a wrench, or a gun, and politely asks you to transfer your Bitcoin. Right now. All of it.
SwissBorg is betting that a simple delay mechanism can defuse that scenario entirely. The European crypto platform launched its Withdrawal Protection feature on February 10, 2026, introducing a non-bypassable time-lock on crypto asset transfers that ranges from 24 hours to 90 days.
How the feature works The logic is elegantly straightforward. If you can’t move your crypto instantly, there’s no point in someone forcing you to try. Withdrawal Protection imposes a platform-enforced delay on all outgoing transfers, and here’s the critical part: it cannot be overridden under duress. Not by the user, not by customer support, not by the attacker standing behind you.
Users can activate the feature by navigating to Profile, then Security in the latest version of the SwissBorg app. From there, it’s a simple toggle. You pick your preferred delay window, anywhere from one day to three months, and the system locks it in.
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The feature is designed to work alongside existing security measures like biometric authentication and multi-factor verification. But where those tools protect against digital intrusions, Withdrawal Protection addresses something those measures were never built for: physical coercion.
SwissBorg CEO Cyrus Fazel framed the update as a necessary evolution in how crypto platforms think about security. The threat of physical extortion targeting crypto holders is real and growing, and Fazel positioned Withdrawal Protection as a “human-level defense” against it.
The wrench attack problem In crypto circles, the scenario is known as a “wrench attack” or sometimes a “$5 wrench attack.” The name comes from an old XKCD comic strip that made a simple observation: it doesn’t matter how sophisticated your encryption is if someone can just hit you with a wrench until you hand over your private keys.
Traditional banks have built-in friction. Wire transfers take time. Large cash withdrawals require advance notice. But crypto wallets can be drained in seconds, which makes them uniquely vulnerable to coercion scenarios. The entire value proposition of instant, permissionless transfers becomes a liability when someone has a weapon pointed at you.
SwissBorg’s approach essentially reintroduces that friction, but makes it voluntary and user-controlled. You’re choosing to give up instant access to your own funds in exchange for a guarantee that nobody else can force you to move them quickly either.
What this means for investors For high-net-worth crypto holders, particularly those in Europe where SwissBorg operates as a regulated wealth management tool, this kind of feature could meaningfully influence platform choice.
The tradeoff is real, though. A 90-day withdrawal lock means you can’t respond to market crashes, sudden liquidity needs, or time-sensitive opportunities without planning well ahead. Even a 24-hour delay could cost you during a volatile trading session. Users will need to calibrate their delay window against their actual trading habits and risk tolerance.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
SwissBorg’s governance body, known as the Guardians, has put forward a proposal to simplify how the community decides what happens with BORG tokens accumulated through platform buybacks. The change would reduce voting options from four to three, with the headline addition being a permanent DAO Fund designed to provide steady, ongoing support to the broader BORG ecosystem.
A community vote on the proposal closed on June 14, 2026. Participation required users to lock or stake their BORG tokens within the app to earn voting power, a mechanism that ties governance influence directly to skin in the game.
What’s actually changing Every quarter, SwissBorg’s Guardians Pool, which gets funded through buybacks from platform profits, distributes BORG tokens based on a community vote. Token holders currently choose between four allocation buckets: Burn, Safety Net, Governance Rewards, and Special Initiative.
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The proposed system trims that to three options. The most notable shift is the introduction of a permanent DAO Fund as one of those three choices, replacing the more ad hoc nature of some previous categories.
The “Special Initiative” category, which previously allowed for one-off community proposals and dynamic decision-making, appears to be the option making way for this more permanent funding vehicle.
Why a permanent DAO Fund matters Quarterly allocation votes are inherently reactive. Community sentiment shifts, market conditions change, and the result is that ecosystem funding can look very different from one quarter to the next. A permanent DAO Fund creates a baseline, ensuring that some portion of buyback-derived tokens is consistently earmarked for ecosystem development.
It’s also worth noting that BORG itself is the product of an earlier governance evolution. The token was previously known as CHSB before transitioning to its current form.
What this means for BORG holders The staking requirement for voting power creates a natural incentive loop. If you want a say in how tokens are allocated, you need to lock up your BORG. That reduces circulating supply during governance periods and ties holders more tightly to the ecosystem.
Simplifying from four options to three reduces cognitive load on voters. Fewer choices, clearer stakes. Whether the permanent DAO Fund actually delivers better outcomes for the BORG ecosystem will depend entirely on how the funds get deployed once they’re allocated.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
SwissBorg has finished migrating its European user base to a fully MiCA-authorized entity, completing the transition on June 22, 2026. That’s just eight days before the July 1 deadline when non-compliant crypto platforms get effectively locked out of serving customers across the European Economic Area.
The move shifted users from SwissBorg’s former Estonian entity, SwissBorg Solutions OÜ, to its French subsidiary, BlockNodes SAS. BlockNodes received its MiCA authorization, license number A2026-011, from France’s financial markets authority (AMF) back on March 5, 2026. The company says balances, portfolios, and transaction histories carried over untouched, with no action required from users.
What MiCA compliance actually means here MiCA, the Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation, covers everything from custody standards to transparency requirements to how platforms segregate user assets from their own. July 1, 2026, marks the hard cutoff, after which any crypto service provider without proper authorization cannot operate in the EEA.
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For users, the practical implications center on enhanced protections. MiCA-compliant platforms must adhere to strict rules around how they hold customer funds, what they disclose about their operations, and how they handle potential conflicts of interest. Customer assets are required to be kept separate from the company’s money, and regulatory mechanisms are in place if something goes wrong.
New incentives to sweeten the deal The refreshed referral system ties rewards to SwissBorg’s existing Loyalty Rank structure. Users at the Elite tier can earn up to 2x rewards for bringing new members onto the platform.
The updated loyalty cashback structure offers up to 99% cashback on exchange fees for users at the highest loyalty tiers.
The competitive landscape after July 1 After July 1, any platform that hasn’t secured MiCA authorization will be barred from serving EEA customers. SwissBorg is among a limited group of platforms with full MiCA authorization in Europe.
The current lack of any noticeable price impact on SwissBorg’s BORG token following the migration suggests the market had already priced in compliance.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
SBI announced it will acquire cryptocurrency trading platform Bitbank for 46.7 billion yen.
According to Nikkei News, Japanese financial group SBI Holdings announced on the 25th that it will acquire cryptocurrency exchange platform bitbank for 46.7 billion yen (approximately $288 million). Upon completion of the transaction, SBI Group’s crypto asset custody scale is expected to exceed 1 trillion yen, making it one of the largest operators in Japan’s crypto industry. Per the plan, a subsidiary under SBI Holdings will acquire Bitbank shares from individual shareholders including its founders as early as August this year. Bitbank will then repurchase shares held by existing shareholders MIXI and Ceres by the end of October. If combining data from SBI’s own crypto exchange SBI VC Trade and Bitbank, as of April this year, the two firms had a total of around 2.92 million accounts and total custody assets of approximately 1.1 trillion yen. While different crypto exchanges disclose custody assets at varying time points, among Japan’s major industry competitors, bitFlyer held about 960 billion yen in custody assets as of the end of December 2025, and Coincheck had around 800 billion yen as of the end of March 2025.
4 minutes ago
Bithumb was fined for sharing user data overseas without consent.
South Korean regulatory authorities have ordered cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb to pay a 210 million won (approximately $136,000) fine for sharing user personal information with overseas platforms without user consent. According to an announcement released Thursday by South Korea’s Personal Information Protection Commission (PIPC), the relevant user data exposure occurred between September and November 2025. At that time, Bithumb transferred user information to overseas platforms while sharing its USDT market order book data. The PIPC also noted that when assisting users with asset transfers to 13 overseas exchanges, Bithumb failed to obtain full and sufficient user consent before sharing personal details including names, wallet addresses, and dates of birth. For the two violations, the PIPC not only imposed the fine but also ordered Bithumb to rectify its processes and management systems related to cross-border transmission of user information.
4 minutes ago
Analyst: SK Hynix’s US listing and fund-raising could trigger a valuation re-rating.
According to Bloomberg, SK Hynix is set to issue American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) on the Nasdaq on July 10. The listing aims to raise nearly $30 billion, making it one of the largest ADR issuances in history. Market participants widely believe the move will significantly expand its global investor base and may drive a valuation re-rating. Multiple asset management firms project that if its valuation converges with Micron Technology’s, its share price could rise by 30% over the next year. One fund manager noted that SK Hynix should trade at a valuation at least on par with Micron, as demand for memory chips is likely to outpace supply for years to come. The listing comes amid an unusually strong boom in the memory chip sector. Shares of Micron, SK Hynix, and Samsung Electronics have all surged over 200% this year, marking their best annual performance in decades. Demand for High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) from AI servers is widely seen as the driver of a structural "memory supercycle".
4 minutes ago
Jefferies: Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix’s example to list in the US via ADRs.
Jeff Kim, Head of Research at Jefferies, said Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix in listing on the U.S. market via American Depositary Receipts (ADRs), which will boost the share price of the South Korean chipmaker whose valuation lags behind Micron. "Chip stocks are at a turning point. ADRs will serve as an important catalyst to drive their valuations," he added.
The hacker behind the Kelp DAO bridge exploit has moved nearly all unfrozen funds through privacy channels, leaving only a small balance in the original wallets.
Summary
Kelp DAO exploiter has laundered nearly all $220 million, leaving about $1.7M in original wallets. The funds moved through THORChain, Wasabi, Tornado Cash and Umbra, reducing direct tracing options now. Arbitrum’s $71M freeze remains the largest recoverable slice, with court claims now pending against it. The Kelp DAO hacker has laundered about $220 million in unfrozen funds, according to on-chain data cited by Arkham Intelligence. The funds moved through THORChain, Wasabi, Tornado Cash and Umbra, making direct tracking harder for investigators.
Source: Arkham Intelligence The report described the amount moved as “nearly all” of the unfrozen funds. It also said “roughly $1.7 million” remains in the original attacker wallets. That leaves a narrow path for direct recovery of the funds that were not frozen earlier.
Kelp DAO Hacker Has Laundered Nearly All $220M in Unfrozen Funds, Closing the Recovery Window
According to The Defiant, on-chain tracking data shows that the hackers behind the Kelp DAO bridge exploit, identified as North Korean threat group TraderTraitor, have laundered… pic.twitter.com/UlCj44BTa4
— Wu Blockchain (@WuBlockchain) June 2, 2026 Exploit traced to North Korea-linked actors The April attack drained about $292 million from Kelp DAO’s bridge. Chainalysis said the attackers released about 116,500 rsETH against a fake burn event after targeting off-chain bridge infrastructure, not Kelp DAO’s core smart contracts.
LayerZero’s incident report linked the attack to TraderTraitor, a North Korea-linked group also tracked as UNC4899 and part of the wider Lazarus ecosystem. The same wider threat network has been tied to other large crypto attacks this year.
Frozen funds remain the main recovery path A large part of the stolen assets did not move freely after the attack. Arbitrum’s Security Council froze more than 30,000 ETH soon after the exploit, creating the main pool still within reach of a recovery process.
The Defiant reported that the frozen portion is about $71 million. That sum is now tied to legal claims in the U.S., after families with unpaid judgments against North Korea sought control of the funds. The remaining unfrozen funds have largely moved through privacy tools.
Broader hack pattern As previously reported by crypto.news, North Korea-linked Lazarus attacks drained $577 million from Drift Protocol and KelpDAO in April. The same report said those two attacks made up 76% of all crypto theft tracked in 2026 through April.
Moreover, Radiant Capital will wind down operations after failing to recover from a $50 million exploit linked to North Korea-aligned actors, as crypto.news reported. The Radiant case showed how slow recovery, lost funding and laundering through Tornado Cash can leave a protocol with limited options.
For Kelp DAO, the latest laundering update does not close every legal or recovery route. The frozen ETH remains important. However, the unfrozen portion now appears much harder to recover through normal address-by-address tracing. The case adds pressure on bridge operators, DeFi teams and investigators to act before stolen funds enter privacy routes.
The window for tracing and recovering more than $220 million stolen from Kelp DAO’s bridge has all but closed. On-chain tracking data laid out in the original report shows that the North Korean threat group TraderTraitor has now laundered nearly every dollar of previously unfrozen funds, using a chain of privacy-focused platforms. Only around $1.7 million remains in the hackers’ original wallets, effectively ending any realistic prospect of direct, transaction-by-transaction asset recovery.
The speed and scale of the operation underscore a growing structural problem for DeFi bridges. Kelp DAO, an Ethereum-based restaking protocol, was hit by an exploit that exposed users to losses on par with some of the largest cross-chain breaches. The cleaning process moved assets through THORChain, Wasabi, Tornado Cash, and Umbra—a stack of mixing tools and cross-chain liquidity networks that make on-chain tracing extremely difficult. It also raises urgent questions about what, if anything, can still be done to disrupt the flow of funds into the hands of a state-sponsored unit already sanctioned by the U.S. for funding weapons programs.
How the $220 million disappeared The laundering did not rely on a single method. THORChain, a decentralized cross-chain liquidity protocol, let the attackers move assets between blockchains without requiring wrapped tokens or custodial bridges. Wasabi and Umbra added coinjoin-style privacy layers for Bitcoin and Ethereum, while Tornado Cash—already designated by OFAC—was used to break on-chain links further. Such a combination is not new, but the fact that it was executed by a group tied to the Lazarus umbrella shows the operational sophistication that regulated industry participants are up against.
Ethereum remains the most active chain by developer count, as recent activity data confirms, but its open composability is a double-edged sword. The same infrastructure that powers liquid staking and restaking can be exploited when bridge contracts are not airtight. For Kelp DAO users, the near-total movement of unfrozen funds marks a point of finality that few in the community wanted to accept this early.
The North Korea factor and regulatory friction TraderTraitor is one of several aliases linked to North Korean cyber teams that the U.S. Department of the Treasury and the FBI have identified as instrumental in stealing billions in crypto over the past few years. These operations are not ordinary hacks; they are viewed by intelligence agencies as a direct source of hard currency for Pyongyang’s sanctions-evasion apparatus. Every dollar that disappears into these laundering pipelines ends up beyond the reach of civilian recovery efforts and, often, beyond swift law enforcement intervention.
The laundering closes a chapter on traceability just as Washington lawmakers wrestle with the shape of future crypto oversight. A landmark bill that would set new rules for digital asset markets is now under fresh attack from the banking lobby, as reported in the legislative drama unfolding in the Senate. While legislative fights play out over market structure, hacks like the one at Kelp DAO continue to expose the gap between enforcement ambition and on-the-ground capability.
What remains uncertain Despite the closure of the direct tracing window, law enforcement and blockchain intelligence firms retain options, though they are limited. Funds that eventually hit centralized exchanges can be frozen if they are flagged in time, but the combination of THORChain swaps and mixing layers makes that a high-effort, low-probability endeavor. Some portion of the stolen value may already be outside any cooperative jurisdiction.
For DeFi protocols building bridges and restaking layers, the episode is a harsh reminder that recovery design must be baked into the earliest stages of smart contract architecture. Post-exploit freezes and negotiation, as seen in other incidents, did not produce a meaningful outcome here. The industry will be watching whether the remaining $1.7 million can yield any final intelligence—or whether it, too, will slip into the same opaque channels that swallowed the other 99.2 percent of the haul.
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THORChain has moved into the next phase of its recovery from the May 15 vault exploit.
Summary
Validators must approve v3.19.0 before THORChain begins its staged restart and fully restores network services. The upgrade adds compromised-vault quarantine and temporary keyshare checks before signing resumes across the network. ADR-028 applies the recovery plan without minting new RUNE or diluting existing token holders further. Validators are now reviewing version 3.19.0, which combines security patches with the ADR-028 loss-recovery plan.
The release also introduces a mechanism that can quarantine a compromised vault. THORChain said this would stop an affected vault from processing transactions while keeping its activity visible to the network.
Validators review THORChain v3.19.0 “The next major step in the recovery process is now underway,” THORChain said in its sixth incident update. Validators must vote to approve v3.19.0 before the network can begin the staged upgrade.
THORChain Incident Update #6
The next major step in the recovery process is now underway. Validators are being asked to review, approve, and prepare for the v3.19.0 upgrade, which contains the TSS security patches and ADR028 implementation designed to address the economic impact…
— THORChain (@THORChain) June 8, 2026 The release contains patches for the threshold signature system used to control THORChain vaults. It also implements ADR-028, the governance plan approved after the exploit. The protocol said the upgrade would move the network closer to restoring normal operations.
Version 3.19.0 includes a new Compromised Vault Mimir setting. Once enabled, the setting will isolate the drained vault from transaction processing without removing it from network monitoring.
Keyshare checks come before signing resumes THORChain plans to validate the ADR-028 data migration after validators complete the upgrade. Every node must then verify the integrity of its keyshares through a temporary protocol called keyverify.
Keyshares allow validators to sign vault transactions together without one operator holding the full private key. The added check aims to confirm that the remaining shares are intact before signing restarts.
After those checks, validators will unhalt signing and start a churn. Churning replaces the active validator set and transfers assets into newly generated vaults. The network will wait for that process to finish before restoring other services.
Secured and Trade assets will return first. Liquidity-provider actions will follow, while trading will resume at the end of the 11-step process. Each stage depends on the previous checks completing successfully.
ADR-028 covers losses without new RUNE As previously reported by crypto.news, THORChain validators approved ADR-028 in May. The plan uses protocol-owned liquidity to absorb losses before allocating any remaining shortfall across synthetic asset holders.
The framework does not mint or sell new RUNE. It also avoids direct dilution for existing holders. Future system income will help rebuild protocol-owned liquidity after the restart.
THORChain also activated a bounty window for the attacker and approved the full slashing of the linked node. The protocol said innocent nodes that shared the affected vault would remain protected.
Full restart still depends on validators The May 15 exploit drained about $10.7 million from one of THORChain’s five vaults. THORChain’s report said a newly added node exploited a weakness in the GG20 threshold signature implementation. Four other vaults remained unaffected.
Automatic solvency checks detected the imbalance and halted signing within minutes. Node operators later paused trading, chain observation and churning while developers investigated the attack.
Validator approval of v3.19.0 would begin the final technical sequence, but it would not restore every service at once. THORChain will reopen signing, asset functions, liquidity actions and trading in stages after completing the vault, migration, keyshare and churn checks.
THORChain (RUNE) is restarting. The decentralized cross-chain DEX, paused since May 15 after a $10.7M exploit drained one of its vaults, is rolling out v3.19, its official restart release, with mainnet adoption targeted for the first week of June.
RUNE is trading near $0.38–$0.41 at the time of writing, down sharply from pre-exploit levels and -35% over the past 30 days. It has a market cap of roughly $133M, making it the 222nd-largest digital asset.
$RUNE is pushing directly into a heavy resistance zone around $0.382–$0.385.
This is where rejection risk is high.
If bears defend this zone, RUNE can cool off towards $0.370 first, then $0.360–$0.365. pic.twitter.com/rpEV0LXP5V
— ChiefraT (@ChiefraFba) June 9, 2026
The headline addition waiting in the wings once trading resumes: Monero. XMR is confirmed as the first asset in the DEX queue, giving THORChain a privacy-coin narrative no other major cross-chain protocol can currently match. The community is calling it a renaissance.
Here is the central tension this article unpacks: v3.19 fixes the immediate cryptographic problem and adds a genuinely unique asset. Whether that’s enough to reverse months of RUNE damage depends on execution, and THORChain’s execution track record is currently on trial.
The TSS THORChain Exploit Explained and What V3.19 Actually Fixes 🚨 THORChain Has Entered The Final Restart Phase 🚨
The excitement is reaching another level.
Today validators are voting to quarantine the compromised vault, one of the final critical security milestones before THORChain can continue toward a full network restart.
This means…
— fincontrarian (@fincontrarian) June 9, 2026
THORChain employs a Threshold Signature Scheme (TSS) where multiple nodes must sign transactions, preventing any single node from moving funds independently.
An attacker exploited a flaw in the GG20 TSS implementation, leveraging undisclosed cryptographic weaknesses. Soda Labs confirmed it was a zero-day vulnerability and required human cryptographers to verify it, as AI models couldn’t replicate the attack.
The rollout of version 3.19 addresses this by patching the TSS library, resolving a ~$10M gap through a governance-approved migration and initiating an 11-stage restart that takes about a week to fully resume operations. Separately, a $700K accounting issue was also addressed.
A controversial decision was to temporarily close-source the TSS library during Soda Labs’ audit. Kenton, a THORChain member, noted that this choice allowed for faster recovery at the cost of transparency, sparking debate within the community. The library is expected to return to open-source status in upcoming releases.
EXCLUSIVE: Earn $10 USDC Via Binance Sign-Up
Why Monero First and Whether XMR Can Move the RUNE Needle
(SOURCE: TradingView)
Monero’s prominent position in the DEX queue stems from the lack of trustless, non-custodial options for XMR users, especially since major centralized exchanges have delisted it. If THORChain enables native XMR swaps, it could dominate permissionless Monero liquidity, allowing it to set a starting fee of 50 bps due to its pricing power.
For RUNE holders, increased Monero volume translates to greater demand for RUNE since every swap settles through it. This has sparked the “THORChain renaissance,” in which the integration of Monero is seen as a significant step beyond mere recovery. However, the protocol’s prior issues with privacy-asset integrations raise concerns about its ability to safely manage high-privacy L1S.
While Monero volume is expected to be moderate initially, the broader roadmap includes other assets such as Zcash and Polygon. Monero serves as the opening act for THORChain, not the entire show.
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PANews, June 20 – THORChain has posted an incident update on the X platform, stating that the network is in the final phase of recovery. Currently, the key share integrity of each node is being verified through the new KeyVerify protocol. This step confirms the security of each vault before fund transfers can begin. Once verification is complete, the next major step is the fund transfer itself, during which the network will move all funds to new vaults. The duration of the fund transfer is the main uncertainty and may take anywhere from a few hours to several days. After the fund transfer is complete, the remaining steps will proceed rapidly: re-enabling secured assets and trading assets, liquidity provider operations, and finally, trading functionality.
Earlier news, THORChain released its attack incident recovery plan, and node operator voting has begun
SBI announced it will acquire cryptocurrency trading platform Bitbank for 46.7 billion yen.
According to Nikkei News, Japanese financial group SBI Holdings announced on the 25th that it will acquire cryptocurrency exchange platform bitbank for 46.7 billion yen (approximately $288 million). Upon completion of the transaction, SBI Group’s crypto asset custody scale is expected to exceed 1 trillion yen, making it one of the largest operators in Japan’s crypto industry. Per the plan, a subsidiary under SBI Holdings will acquire Bitbank shares from individual shareholders including its founders as early as August this year. Bitbank will then repurchase shares held by existing shareholders MIXI and Ceres by the end of October. If combining data from SBI’s own crypto exchange SBI VC Trade and Bitbank, as of April this year, the two firms had a total of around 2.92 million accounts and total custody assets of approximately 1.1 trillion yen. While different crypto exchanges disclose custody assets at varying time points, among Japan’s major industry competitors, bitFlyer held about 960 billion yen in custody assets as of the end of December 2025, and Coincheck had around 800 billion yen as of the end of March 2025.
4 minutes ago
Bithumb was fined for sharing user data overseas without consent.
South Korean regulatory authorities have ordered cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb to pay a 210 million won (approximately $136,000) fine for sharing user personal information with overseas platforms without user consent. According to an announcement released Thursday by South Korea’s Personal Information Protection Commission (PIPC), the relevant user data exposure occurred between September and November 2025. At that time, Bithumb transferred user information to overseas platforms while sharing its USDT market order book data. The PIPC also noted that when assisting users with asset transfers to 13 overseas exchanges, Bithumb failed to obtain full and sufficient user consent before sharing personal details including names, wallet addresses, and dates of birth. For the two violations, the PIPC not only imposed the fine but also ordered Bithumb to rectify its processes and management systems related to cross-border transmission of user information.
4 minutes ago
Analyst: SK Hynix’s US listing and fund-raising could trigger a valuation re-rating.
According to Bloomberg, SK Hynix is set to issue American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) on the Nasdaq on July 10. The listing aims to raise nearly $30 billion, making it one of the largest ADR issuances in history. Market participants widely believe the move will significantly expand its global investor base and may drive a valuation re-rating. Multiple asset management firms project that if its valuation converges with Micron Technology’s, its share price could rise by 30% over the next year. One fund manager noted that SK Hynix should trade at a valuation at least on par with Micron, as demand for memory chips is likely to outpace supply for years to come. The listing comes amid an unusually strong boom in the memory chip sector. Shares of Micron, SK Hynix, and Samsung Electronics have all surged over 200% this year, marking their best annual performance in decades. Demand for High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) from AI servers is widely seen as the driver of a structural "memory supercycle".
4 minutes ago
Jefferies: Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix’s example to list in the US via ADRs.
Jeff Kim, Head of Research at Jefferies, said Samsung is likely to follow SK Hynix in listing on the U.S. market via American Depositary Receipts (ADRs), which will boost the share price of the South Korean chipmaker whose valuation lags behind Micron. "Chip stocks are at a turning point. ADRs will serve as an important catalyst to drive their valuations," he added.
THORChain has resumed activity after over a month of security verifications and upgrades, following a $10.7 million exploit that prompted a trading halt on May 15.
In a Tuesday X post, THORChain said it restored its network, including trading, signing, swaps and liquidity provider actions.
On Sunday, the protocol said it had confirmed the safety of most of its vaults through the KeyVerify protocol and retired the remaining legacy vaults as part of a migration to a new set of vaults. THORChain called the upgrade the “most significant milestone” in its recovery process. It also said it completed verification of every node's keyshare on Friday.
THORChain is one of the crypto industry's largest cross-chain trading protocols, enabling swaps between networks such as Bitcoin and Ethereum. The protocol has drawn scrutiny from blockchain investigators because hackers have used it to move stolen funds between blockchains.
Source: THORChain
THORChain ships security upgrades and migrates old vaultsTHORChain attributed the exploit to a vulnerability in its GG20 threshold signature scheme, which is used to secure protocol vaults by distributing key control across multiple node operators. According to the protocol, the flaw allowed a malicious node operator to reconstruct a full private key through what it described as “progressive key material leakage,” enabling the theft of $10.7 million.
The protocol implemented an emergency patch on May 20 to protect the remaining vaults before releasing an upgrade on June 9, which included a fix for the exploited vulnerability. A follow-up upgrade was rolled out on June 11 with additional stability improvements and fixes to the KeyVerify protocol.
THORChain network overview, node upgrades. Source: THORChain Explorer
With the recovery process largely complete, THORChain has also outlined plans for new network integrations.
THORChain said it will launch native swaps and vaults for privacy-preserving cryptocurrency Zcash (ZEC) within the next two weeks, followed by Monero (XMR).
It also plans to launch support for the Bittensor (TAO) token in about six weeks after the network’s restart.
Magazine: 53 DeFi projects infiltrated, 50M NEO tokens could be ‘given back’: Asia Express
Cointelegraph is committed to independent, transparent journalism. This news article is produced in accordance with Cointelegraph’s Editorial Policy and aims to provide accurate and timely information. Readers are encouraged to verify information independently.
THORChain has resumed activity after over a month of security verifications and upgrades, following a $10.7 million exploit that prompted a trading halt on May 15.
In a Tuesday X post, THORChain said it restored its network, including trading, signing, swaps and liquidity provider actions.
On Sunday, the protocol said it had confirmed the safety of most of its vaults through the KeyVerify protocol and retired the remaining legacy vaults as part of a migration to a new set of vaults. THORChain called the upgrade the “most significant milestone” in its recovery process. It also said it completed verification of every node's keyshare on Friday.
THORChain is one of the crypto industry's largest cross-chain trading protocols, enabling swaps between networks such as Bitcoin and Ethereum. The protocol has drawn scrutiny from blockchain investigators because hackers have used it to move stolen funds between blockchains.
Source: THORChain
THORChain ships security upgrades and migrates old vaultsTHORChain attributed the exploit to a vulnerability in its GG20 threshold signature scheme, which is used to secure protocol vaults by distributing key control across multiple node operators. According to the protocol, the flaw allowed a malicious node operator to reconstruct a full private key through what it described as “progressive key material leakage,” enabling the theft of $10.7 million.
The protocol implemented an emergency patch on May 20 to protect the remaining vaults before releasing an upgrade on June 9, which included a fix for the exploited vulnerability. A follow-up upgrade was rolled out on June 11 with additional stability improvements and fixes to the KeyVerify protocol.
THORChain network overview, node upgrades. Source: THORChain Explorer
With the recovery process largely complete, THORChain has also outlined plans for new network integrations.
THORChain said it will launch native swaps and vaults for privacy-preserving cryptocurrency Zcash (ZEC) within the next two weeks, followed by Monero (XMR).
It also plans to launch support for the Bittensor (TAO) token in about six weeks after the network’s restart.
Magazine: 53 DeFi projects infiltrated, 50M NEO tokens could be ‘given back’: Asia Express
Cointelegraph is committed to independent, transparent journalism. This news article is produced in accordance with Cointelegraph’s Editorial Policy and aims to provide accurate and timely information. Readers are encouraged to verify information independently.
