The Treasury's bond buyback strategy may temporarily ease yields but highlights deeper fiscal challenges and conflicting monetary policies.

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Gold's stability amid inflation data anticipation highlights its role as a hedge, influencing global monetary policies and market dynamics.

The post Gold holds steady near $4,650 as investors await critical US inflation data appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

The potential settlement could set a precedent for tech accountability, influencing future regulations and corporate practices in digital safety.

The post Meta discusses potential settlement over teen social media harm case amid billion-dollar liability estimates appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

A coordinated regulatory framework for equity perpetuals could enhance US market competitiveness and investor protection by reducing offshore trading.

The post Blockchain Association urges SEC and CFTC to coordinate on equity perpetuals appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

The potential easing of Strait of Hormuz tensions could stabilize global oil markets, reducing energy costs and geopolitical risks.

The post Brent crude falls over 2% to $86.41 as Strait of Hormuz supply hopes grow appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Bitcoin Magazine

Is Bitcoin Out of Its Bear Market? These Analysts Think So

Bitcoin is out of its bear market. But expect a possible pullback. 

That’s according to analysts at crypto research firm CryptoQuant, who say the coin is behaving like it has done in the past. CryptoQuant founder, Ki Young Ju, wrote on X Tuesday that the asset had “entered into the early bull phase.”

Ju Pointed to movements bitcoin made in its last cycle before entering a bull market, and said the coin was currently doing the same thing. 

CryptoQuant research shows that bitcoin flows to derivative exchanges have started again, confirming that traders have entered “risk-on” mode, which “has marked the start of a new bull cycle” in the past. 

And another analyst at the firm, Theophiluspep, wrote that while the coin was entering a bull market, “spot demand, ETF flows, and market momentum have turned decisively bullish, but elevated profit-taking, exchange inflows, and overbought conditions suggest a potential near-term cooldown.”

He added: “This looks increasingly like a genuine regime shift into the early phase of a new bull market, driven more by improving spot demand and institutional ETF buying than by excessive leverage.”

Bitcoin started surging last week. It is currently up 22% over a seven-day period and was recently priced at $78,716. It briefly touched $81,160 on Monday. 

Its rise comes after a sluggish June and July when it mostly traded below $65,000. 

U.S. investors last week reversed course and bought up shares in the bitcoin exchange-traded funds, which had their best week since October — the same time bitcoin notched its record of $126,080. 

Data from Farside Investors shows that the funds — managed by the likes of BlackRock, Fidelity, Grayscale, and Morgan Stanley — received $1.9 billion in new cash. 

The change in sentiment comes after the Treasury Department’s announcement last week to at least double the size of its long-dated bond buybacks.

Since the Treasury made the announcement, yields have gone down, while bitcoin and gold have shot up. The dollar last week was trading at a three-month low and on track for its worst week of August. Bitcoin, on the other hand, had its best week since 2023. 

Positive regulatory news coming out of the White House also helped: President Donald Trump held a meeting with crypto executives earlier last week, and urged lawmakers to get the Clarity Act over the line. 

This post Is Bitcoin Out of Its Bear Market? These Analysts Think So first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Mathew Di Salvo.

Bitcoin Magazine

Bitcoin Breakout Could Be Around the Corner as Asset Is No Longer Oversold: Fairlead Strategies’ Katie Stockton

Bitcoin is no longer oversold but there’s still time to buy, according to Fairlead Strategies’ Katie Stockton. 

Speaking on Tuesday to CNBC, the financial research firm’s managing partner said that Bitcoin cleared its 200-day moving average back in May, meaning that a potential breakout could be coming. 

Bitcoin started rallying last week on news that the Treasury would at least double the size of its liquidity-support buyback operations. It’s up over 22% over a seven-day period, and was recently trading for $78,915. The coin traded above $81,000 on Monday. 

“It’s not overbought yet, so that’s the good thing,” said Stockton. 

“Whenever you see a breakout above a resistance level, it’s always better to have that immediate follow-through to essentially confirm the breakout.” 

Bitcoin was trading under $65,000 for most of June and July and experiencing its lowest volatility in its 17-year history. 

Its recent rally has some analysts saying that the so-called debasement trade could be hot again. The debasement trade is when investors buy assets when they think fiat money is losing value. 

And losing value it is: The dollar slid following the Treasury’s announcement last week. Gold and bitcoin have since rallied. 

Bitcoiners have long argued that the biggest cryptocurrency can work as a hedge against government printing, along with precious metals. 

U.S. investors last week piled back into Bitcoin exchange-traded funds; the investment vehicles had their best week since October, with nearly $2 billion in inflows. 

Bitcoin’s price was also helped after President Trump last week gathered with crypto executives at the White House and said that getting the Clarity Act over the line would keep the U.S. ahead of China. 

Lawmakers were hoping to get a vote on the crypto market structure bill, or Clarity Act, in August. A vote will now go ahead in September. The bill will establish a framework for distinguishing between digital assets that are securities, commodities or payment stablecoins. 

This post Bitcoin Breakout Could Be Around the Corner as Asset Is No Longer Oversold: Fairlead Strategies’ Katie Stockton first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Mathew Di Salvo.

Bitcoin Magazine

Kraken Says ‘Dust Attack’ From Sanctioned HTX Wallet Locked Out Customers

Crypto exchange Kraken clients were reportedly locked out of their accounts after receiving tiny amounts of sanctioned digital coins. 

In a statement to Bitcoin Magazine, Kraken said the coins were transferred in what is known as a “dust attack” — when small quantities of cryptocurrency is sent to numerous wallet addresses to track and de-anonymize them.

Kraken said the aim of the transactions was to trigger compliance checks by spreading sanctioned funds onto other platforms. Bloomberg first reported the news. 

“We don’t know who is behind these attacks, but they likely expect that if sanctioned funds land in a client account, it triggers a full account lock, causing operational disruption for a large number of users,” a Kraken spokesperson said. 

The spokesperson added that its customers were briefly locked out of their accounts but its “compliance team mobilized quickly to restore access while continuing to hold the sanctioned funds as required.”

“We are working with authorities to ensure these attacks don’t have their intended impact,” the statement added. 

A total of 12,000 such transfers were sent from the wallet to addresses linked to Kraken between this month, Bloomberg reported, citing Arkham Intelligence. Arkham identified the wallet as linked to HTX based on addresses the exchange has publicly disclosed as part of its proof of reserves.

Chinese exchange HTX, formerly known as Huobi, is one of the world’s biggest crypto exchanges. The European Union sanctioned it in July because it has, according to European authorities, helped ​Russians evade sanctions. 

“Recent dust attacks from HTX-owned wallets appear to be an attempt to spread UK- and EU-sanctioned funds to other platforms in order to discredit the broader industry,” the Kraken spokesperson continued. 

Dusting has been happening for years. Back in 2022, someone sent celebrities Ethereum from a Tornado Cash wallet one day after the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned the coin mixing app used by North Korean state-sponsored hacking groups. 

Celebrities targeted in the 2022 dusting attack included comedian Jimmy Fallon, YouTuber Logan Paul and Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong. The feds said they wouldn’t prosecute the celebrities hit with sanctioned crypto. 

This post Kraken Says ‘Dust Attack’ From Sanctioned HTX Wallet Locked Out Customers first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Mathew Di Salvo.

Bitcoin Magazine

US Opens a New Front Against Iran’s Crypto Economy

The U.S. this week closed in on Iran, further targeting its crypto-related methods of dodging sanctions in a new economic campaign against the country. 

In a Monday announcement, the U.S. Department of the Treasury said it had placed Iran’s digital asset sector under the same sanctions authority it has long used against the country’s oil, banking and metals industries. 

The move, as part of Operation Economic Outcast, a campaign against the Islamic Republic dubbed “economic D-Day,” is a first, and a significant escalation in exposure for crypto businesses worldwide.

With the new action, the Office of Foreign Assets Control can sanction any person, regardless of where they are located. 

“The Iranian regime increasingly turns to cryptocurrency as a tool of choice for sanctions evasion, supporting transactions linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Iranian regime insiders,” OFAC said in a statement. 

Foreign exchanges, OTC desks, payment processors and infrastructure providers that knowingly facilitate transactions supporting Iran’s digital asset sector are now exposed to designation themselves, along with the loss of access to the U.S. financial system that typically follows.

OFAC also designated members of a group within the Ministry of Intelligence and Security accused of hacking U.S. critical infrastructure on the regime’s behalf and published their wallets.

Group co-leader Behzad Mesri and members Keyvan Fayyaz Ghareh Blagh and Arman Kahzadian each had bitcoin, and other crypto addresses added to the Treasury’s sanctioned list. The three belong to a larger MOIS contingent that has pursued U.S. targets through data theft and intrusions against corporations and government offices.

Bloomberg first reported in May that Iran had started a bitcoin-backed insurance service for Iranian shipping companies.

The U.S. in July said that it had frozen crypto linked to the Iranian regime, mostly in the form of the Tether stablecoin. 

Stablecoins like Tether’s USDT can be frozen by the company that issues the asset but bitcoin, being decentralized and having no single issuer, cannot. 

This post US Opens a New Front Against Iran’s Crypto Economy first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Mathew Di Salvo.

Bitcoin Magazine

The Human Rights Foundation Announces Support for 16 Projects Worldwide

The Human Rights Foundation has announced support for more projects around the globe, this time giving over 500 million satoshis — worth $396,854 at today’s prices — in grants to 16 projects based in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. 

Coming from the HRF’s Bitcoin Development Fund, the grants will help projects that want to strengthen the Bitcoin protocol, expand practical Bitcoin access and facilitate secure messaging and community infrastructure for dissidents, among other things, according to the NGO. 

The grants are the second round of funding to come in 2026, after the NGO announced it had supported 26 projects in April. HRF said the funding works to reinforce Bitcoin’s role as a tool for financial freedom, enabling journalists, nonprofit organizations, and activists to more securely communicate, organize, and receive support globally through Bitcoin.

Bitcoin Payments

BitSpenda

Across Africa, cross-border money transfers are often slow, costly and rely on intermediaries. BitSpenda, a mobile money-to-bitcoin bridge, offers a non-custodial, account-free tool that lets people in Nigeria, Kenya, Cameroon, Uganda, and Ghana send bitcoin from a Lightning wallet directly to a mobile money account, where it is received in local currency. With HRF’s support, BitSpenda plans to expand its payment tools to make cross-border payments faster, cheaper, and more accessible in the region.

Project Island Resilience

In parts of the Caribbean, power outages and authoritarian repression can cut people off from both communication and access to money. Project Island Resilience builds on Flash, a Bitcoin and Lightning wallet created by Jamaican developer Dread. After Hurricane Melissa devastated Jamaica in late 2025, the app raised and distributed more than $10,000 in bitcoin within 72 hours. Now, the project plans to add offline payments to Flash using Bluetooth, near-field communication (NFC), and ecash, creating a model for how Bitcoin can continue working in adversarial conditions. HRF’s grant will support this next phase, helping build practical Bitcoin infrastructure that can be used during protests and internet shutdowns.

Bitzed

In Zambia, mobile money is commonly used, but buying bitcoin still usually requires banks or centralized exchanges that maintain identity records and control individuals’ assets. Bitzed, created by Bitcoin educator Humphrey, is an account-free platform that connects mobile money networks directly to Bitcoin in Zambia. Users can buy bitcoin using existing mobile money accounts and receive it straight to their own Lightning wallet. HRF’s funding will help expand this self-custodial path into Bitcoin for Zambians excluded from traditional banking and subject to financial repression.

Bitcoin Development

Libbitcoinkernel

Many Bitcoin applications have to rebuild the protocol’s most complex security rules from scratch, which increases the risk of catastrophic errors. Libbitcoinkernel is a software project pulling the core security and transaction rules directly from Bitcoin’s original code and turning them into reusable software modules. This will allow freedom tech developers to build more secure and independent wallets, services, and infrastructure without having to duplicate Bitcoin’s critical code. Support from HRF will help developer yuvicc continue this foundational work, strengthening the foundations of Bitcoin tools on which people under financial repression rely.

A Node in Every Wallet: Utreexo Wallet Integrations

Most Bitcoin wallets still rely on centralized servers to access balance and transaction history, compromising user privacy. Floresta is a lightweight version of a Bitcoin node that embeds directly into wallet apps, reducing the storage needed to verify Bitcoin transactions, so wallets can then check data locally and privately. This grant will support developer Luis Schwab in ensuring that wallets cut out the middlemen and interface directly with the Bitcoin network. 

BDK-Dart

In many authoritarian countries, mobile wallets are the most practical way to access Bitcoin. But building apps that give users full control of their funds without relying on a central authority remains a challenge. BDK-Dart is a toolkit that gives developers pre-built Bitcoin wallet-building blocks for Flutter, a popular framework to build apps for any device. The toolkit allows developers to more easily build secure, custodial Bitcoin wallets using a single, shared codebase across platforms. Supported by HRF, software developer John Osezele will make a major release of this software and a reference wallet, lowering barriers for developers to build self-custodial Bitcoin apps worldwide.

WalletScrutiny

Most Bitcoin users have no way to check whether a wallet app actually matches the open-source code it claims to run. WalletScrutiny is a project that audits Bitcoin wallets for transparency and verifies that the distributed software matches its source code. Funding will support expanded review of wallet dependencies and third-party frameworks, helping activists, journalists, and changemakers choose trustworthy Bitcoin applications in authoritarian contexts. HRF has supported WalletScrutiny before, and this grant continues that work as the recent Coldcard hack underscores the importance that the software running on a Bitcoin wallet is actually the software users expect.

Nostr

Vector Privacy: Privacy by Principle

In high-risk environments, private messaging requires more than just encryption; it also means avoiding account creation, metadata trails, and censorship. Vector is an open-source messenger built on Nostr (a decentralized communications protocol) that is permissionless and uses end-to-end encryption. HRF’s grant will help Vector launch on iOS and desktop, release encrypted voice and video calls, and provide journalists, activists, and whistleblowers with a stable, censorship-resistant tool to communicate and coordinate without fear of being tracked or silenced by dictators.

Flotilla Chat

Civil society groups and communities often rely on centralized communications platforms that can delete forums, remove users, or shut down networks with little warning. Flotilla Chat, built by the Nostr client Coracle, is a Discord-style platform built on Nostr that separates a user’s identity from the hosting provider. On Flotilla, organizers control their own infrastructure. Meanwhile, members keep portable identities across the network, reducing censorship risks. HRF’s funding will help develop features such as role-based access control, voice chat, and Bitcoin-native funding tools to make online assembly more resilient under autocratic regimes.

OpenAlert: Decentralized Critical Alerts for Nostr

Critical emergency alerts often depend on centralized push notification services — such as those run by Apple or Google — which can be easily blocked, monitored, or fail during a crisis. OpenAlert, created by software developers Fernando Diego Pergolini and Jorge Carlos Franco, is an alternative notification platform to deliver urgent alerts. Its main layer uses the decentralized Nostr network to issue alerts via anonymous text and audio messages, with end-to-end encryption and programmed self-destruction, protecting user identity from censorship and repression. HRF’s support will cover hardware and personnel costs to develop a tool that helps human rights defenders receive urgent alerts about what is going on around them.

0xchat

Activists and journalists need private, reliable communication tools, but many existing apps still expose users to surveillance and censorship. 0xchat, created by software developer water783, is a messaging app built on Nostr that offers fully encrypted chat, file transfer, voice, and video calls. It features an integration with Tor, a technology that masks internet traffic to protect a user’s physical location and identity. 0xchat also includes a built-in Cashu wallet for private Bitcoin payments. HRF’s support will help advance this communication tool so people can coordinate more safely without relying on platforms vulnerable to authoritarian intervention.

Bitcoin Mining

256 Foundation

Bitcoin mining hardware is still dominated by a few manufacturers using proprietary technology, which can limit participation and the way the network is secured. The 256 Foundation is a nonprofit working to break this oligopoly by open-sourcing every part of a Bitcoin miner: from the hardware to the software that runs them. Making mining tools more accessible and transparent reduces the network’s reliance on centralized manufacturers. Backing from HRF will strengthen network decentralization while also supporting one of the most private ways to acquire bitcoin under a dictatorship. 

Bitcoin Education

My First Bitcoin

Financial education is often shaped by state institutions, leaving little room to question how monetary systems work, let alone to explore alternatives. My First Bitcoin is an educational initiative providing free, open-source educational resources through a global education node network: a group of independent educators active in more than 40 countries, including India, Uganda, and Indonesia. HRF’s support will help grow the educators trained through their Educator Training Program, from roughly 60 to 120, with a focus on communities living under authoritarian rule achieving financial freedom.

Agora: Bitcoin Lightning Activation & Civic Infrastructure Pilot

In Venezuela, activists, independent journalists, and civic organizers face blocked platforms, surveillance, and difficulty receiving international support. Agora is a decentralized activist platform built on Nostr and Bitcoin that supports coordination, censorship-resistant communication, and peer-to-peer financial support for communities under authoritarianism. Agora includes a non-custodial Bitcoin fundraising component that enables people anywhere in the world to support individuals and causes directly, with contributions sent directly to recipients’ wallets. Developed in part through an HRF-supported hackathon, this grant will support Agora’s 9-month pilot deployment in Venezuela, demonstrating how Freedom Tech functions as practical civic infrastructure in an authoritarian environment.

HODL: Hands On Design Lab

Many Bitcoin tools remain hard to use because their interfaces do not clearly guide users through the critical steps of self-custody, privacy, and security. HODL: Hands On Design Lab  is an education initiative that runs structured cohorts for early-career designers in India. HODL prepares them to contribute to apps, projects, and tools across the Bitcoin ecosystem. This will help close a usability gap in Bitcoin by training UI and UX designers to directly improve how people interact with it in practice. Funding will support personnel and three cohorts over 12 months to help make Bitcoin easier for everyone to use.

Hack4Freedom

Women in Africa and Latin America often face exclusion from the education and technical training needed to contribute to freedom tech. Hack4Freedom, created by Evento founder Brianna Honkawa d’Estries, is a two-week developer education program that trains women in Africa and Brazil to build on Bitcoin and other open-source freedom tech projects. With cohorts in cities such as Lagos, Nairobi, and São Paulo, HRF’s grant will cover event and travel costs, creating new opportunities for women to participate in developing tools for financial and digital freedom. 

This post The Human Rights Foundation Announces Support for 16 Projects Worldwide first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Mathew Di Salvo.

Software supply-chain security firm Socket found 40 Firefox add-on identities with confirmed malicious behavior, including draining crypto, including nine that had previously distributed sports-score tools under the same IDs.

Anyone whose recovery phrase, private key, or wallet keyring reached one of the malicious versions must treat that wallet as compromised because uninstalling the add-on cannot revoke an exposed secret.

The Aug. 19 report linked 77 identities to what Socket provisionally calls the “Offside Wallet Theft Factory,” with 40 containing confirmed malicious behavior. The other 37 were deceptive or suspicious sports-score shells whose analyzed versions contained no confirmed theft payload.

The campaign operated from at least March into August. Mozilla signing records for the original 59 versions analyzed by Socket ran from March 9 through Aug. 3, with activity clustering in April and late July.

Socket’s version histories show that the nine affected IDs were:

Firefox ID	Earlier sports version	Later malicious version
bright-save-feed@tabtools.org	Quick Quick 7.4.0	Rabbit For Desktop 8.20.10
swift-clip-link@fasttools.co	Dial Open Pro 7.23.25	Web3 & EVM 9.50.10
deep-tip-sharp@browsify.co	Quick Shield 5.7.1	Rby-WALLEТ 6.7.10
bolt-save-vault@devplugs.co	Lite Swatch 6.5.21	abby-WALLEТ 7.10.10
core-note-nova@webtools.net	Key Pulse 8.1.21	RABB-Walleť 8.22.30
gear-save-tip@extrakits.example	Timer Pulse 5.5.5	Rabbit WALLЕТ 11.10.10
flex-lab-save@foxplugin.co	Track Quick 6.10.24	RabbWALLЕТ 7.10.30/8.10.30
pure-net-snap@fasttools.co	Store Plus 8.3.18	RabbWALLЕТ 9.11.30
fast-zip-true@smartext.co	Pomodoro Plus 9.13.24	RABB-WALLEТ 10.20.10

Socket said several campaign add-ons were still live when it reported them to Mozilla. Its report noted that the remote-controlled phishing add-on 0KX WEB3 was live with seven users during analysis, and Mozilla removed it before publication.

What affected crypto users should do

The 40 malicious identities used distinct attack paths. Seven were remote-controlled phishing loaders, 15 captured recovery phrases, private keys, or other crypto wallet secrets, 13 modified clones of Rabby wallet software sent serialized keyrings away before local encryption, and five collected credentials and clipboard data.

A recovery phrase or private key can restore a wallet elsewhere, and a serialized keyring similarly exposes the wallet’s account state before encryption can protect it.

Anyone who entered one of those secrets, or used an affected build that transmitted its keyring, should move remaining assets to a fresh crypto wallet created from a new recovery phrase.

Users exposed only to the credential-and-clipboard group should change affected passwords, terminate active sessions where possible, and verify copied destination addresses. Wallet keys need rotation when wallet-secret or keyring exposure occurred.

Mozilla says it uses automated risk indicators and human review to identify malicious wallet add-ons, and advises users to install only extensions linked from the wallet provider’s official site.

Socket documented theft capability and exfiltration infrastructure, but did not identify confirmed victims, attributable transactions, or a campaign loss total.

The post 40 malicious Firefox add-ons targeted crypto wallets, and 9 began as sports-score tools appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Soluna Holdings is asking shareholders to substantially expand its ability to issue stock as the data-center developer tries to finance a 6.3-gigawatt pipeline that remains overwhelmingly unbuilt.

An SEC filing showed that Soluna shareholders will vote at the company’s Oct. 16 annual meeting on whether to increase its authorized common stock to 1 billion shares from 375 million.

Investors will also consider a separate proposal allowing Soluna to issue more than 20% of its outstanding shares under a standby equity agreement with YA II PN. The company had 246.7 million shares outstanding as of Aug. 21.

The second proposal relates to a March agreement allowing Soluna to sell YA up to $250 million of common stock over time.

Neither vote would immediately issue shares or guarantee that Soluna raises the full amount, but approval would give management significantly more room to use equity to fund expansion.

Soluna has said its projects require substantial capital and identified the YA facility and other equity programs among its financing options. Additional share issuance could dilute existing investors’ earnings per share and voting power.

Those capital needs are becoming more visible as Soluna advances Project Dorothy 3, a planned AI and high-performance computing campus in Texas with potential capacity of more than 300 MW.

The company has secured 397 acres for the initial buildout and begun master planning and design work.

Soluna has also acquired the 150 MW Briscoe Wind Farm for $53 million, giving it control of a renewable-energy source supporting the broader Dorothy complex. The company said some capital raised during the second quarter was used toward the Dorothy 3 land acquisition.

Dorothy 3 remains in development and is not part of Soluna’s 192 MW of currently energized capacity.

At the same time, Soluna is beginning to extract more revenue from infrastructure already built. On Aug. 25, it signed an agreement with Bitdeer to deploy about 28 MW of Bitcoin-mining equipment at Project Kati 1 in Texas, representing roughly 1.93 exahashes per second.

Bitdeer will own the mining machines, while Soluna provides the site, electricity, and operations, and both companies will share mining proceeds.

John Belizaire, CEO of Soluna, said:

“Co-mining is a natural extension of that operating history. It puts our track record to work in a structure where we participate more directly in what the infrastructure produces, alongside a partner that builds some of the most capable machines in the industry.”

The structure limits Soluna’s need to fund the mining hardware itself, though the 28 MW sits within Kati 1’s existing capacity rather than expanding the company’s overall pipeline.

Soluna currently operates about 192 MW and has another 14 MW under construction. Roughly 1.6 GW of its 6.3 GW pipeline remains in planning and development, while another 4.5 GW is still in assessment.

That leaves only about 3% of the reported pipeline energized.

The October votes therefore ask shareholders to give management significantly greater equity-financing flexibility as Soluna tries to turn projects such as Dorothy 3 and its broader development pipeline into revenue-producing infrastructure.

The post Soluna’s 1 billion-share proposal exposes the funding challenge behind its AI and Bitcoin expansion appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Phantom will remove Sui from its wallet interface on Sept. 24, one month after announcing that it and Sui had decided to end the integration. After the transition, Phantom will no longer display Sui balances, support Sui sends or swaps, or connect to decentralized applications.

The assets will remain on the Sui blockchain, tied to the credentials that authorize the account. Phantom's transition guide says users can restore access through a compatible wallet even after the cutoff. Sept. 24 ends access through Phantom; it does not end ownership or later access to the funds.

That separation turns a product sunset into a test of power in a self-custodial market. A wallet provider cannot erase a user's coins, but it can withdraw the screen, transaction tools and app connections through which people use a chain.

What Phantom is removing and what remains

Sui support went live in Phantom on Jan. 29, 2025. At launch, the Sui Foundation said Phantom users could send, receive and manage Sui assets, swap SUI and connect to applications including Suilend, Navi, Aftermath and Bluefin.

Those functions made Phantom a distribution surface for Sui as well as a place to display balances. The interface brought the network into an app used across several chains; the same interface can now remove Sui from view.

Phantom's Aug. 24 announcement said the wallet and Sui had jointly decided to end support while leaving open the possibility of other collaborations. The announcement and operational guide give no reason for the split.

The scale of the immediate impact is also unknown. Sui's launch post cited 15 million monthly active users for Phantom as a whole, up from seven million in a December 2024 integration announcement. Those figures describe Phantom's total user base, not the number of people who held or used Sui through the wallet. The shutdown materials provide no affected-user count.

The decision therefore demonstrates the ability to remove a chain from a major interface, but the public record cannot show how much Sui activity depended on Phantom.

What disappears on Sept. 24

The Sept. 24 reversal will be concrete inside the product. Phantom will remove Sui from its network list and stop displaying balances or supporting Sui transactions. Connections that users made to Sui applications through Phantom will also stop, requiring them to reconnect through another compatible wallet. These lost functions are the practical link between interface support and blockchain distribution.

For users, that platform-level decision becomes a practical choice between changing assets and changing wallet interfaces, with different fees and credential risks attached to each route.

The underlying choice is between moving value to a network Phantom still supports or accessing existing Sui assets through software that continues to support Sui.

Three paths put different risks on users

Phantom's options divide users by what they want to keep and how their account is secured. People who want to remain inside Phantom can swap out of native SUI. Recovery-phrase users who want to keep native Sui exposure can import the same account into Slush. Ledger users have a separate connection path that keeps keys inside the hardware wallet.

The fee waiver is more limited than Phantom's short announcement might suggest. The full guide limits it to Phantom's fee on cross-chain swaps from native SUI to wrapped SUI on Solana. Network and exchange fees still apply. Swaps into assets such as SOL, ETH or USDC carry standard fees.

Account structure determines the migration work. Phantom's guide tells recovery-phrase users moving to Slush to access the phrase inside Phantom, record it offline and import it into the destination wallet. Additional recovery phrases or private keys previously imported into Phantom must each be handled separately.

Hardware-wallet users are a distinct case. Phantom says a supported hardware wallet keeps private keys offline, and its credential guide says the phrase and private keys are not exposed to the app. Slush separately documents a direct Ledger connection for Sui accounts. The general sunset guide does not spell out that key-preserving path.

Migration carries a security risk

Recovery phrases make self-custody portable, but anyone who obtains one can control the wallet. A dated migration event creates an obvious period for impersonation because users expect new instructions, downloads and credential prompts.

Phantom warns that it will not contact users first, request a recovery phrase or private key, or offer to move assets. Slush's security guidance similarly says its staff will not initiate direct messages or ask for a recovery phrase.

The shutdown leaves Sui's cryptography unchanged. The practical risk comes from handling a high-value secret during a forced interface change. One response from Ivan on Tech criticized key export as bad for security. His post is a single attributed reaction rather than evidence of a wider consensus, but it captures the tension: portability gives users an escape hatch only when they can move access safely.

Wallet support is a form of distribution power

The episode separates two controls that crypto products often bundle together. Users control the credentials that authorize transactions. Wallet providers control which networks, balances, swaps and app connections their software makes easy to reach.

Sui continues operating onchain and Phantom holds no custody of the assets. Yet after Sept. 24, a Sui holder who opens Phantom may see no Sui network, no balance and no way to transact through that product. Existing Sui dapp connections through Phantom will stop, requiring users to reconnect with the wallet where their credentials are available.

Wallet support can therefore shape discovery and routine access to a blockchain even when the ledger remains permissionless and ownership remains with the user. That is distribution power at the interface layer.

The unknowns set a firm boundary around the conclusion. Phantom and Sui have disclosed neither the reason for ending support nor the number of affected users. The evidence establishes an interface-power story while leaving any economic, market or security cause unproven.

Sept. 24 marks the end of Phantom's Sui support. Users who miss the date keep their Sui and can restore access through a compatible wallet later. What disappears is the convenience and distribution Phantom supplied, showing how consequential the wallet layer can become.

The post Phantom’s plan to drop Sui exposes the hidden power wallet interfaces hold over user funds appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Crypto miner Sphere 3D said it could face approximately $2.2 million in supplemental US tariffs, before interest, on Bitcoin miners purchased in 2022 by a subsidiary it now owns.

The company said in an Aug. 24 filing that US Customs and Border Protection treated the equipment as Chinese-origin goods.

The filing stated seller-provided import documents included a certificate of origin and a certificate of manufacture certifying the miners were not of Chinese origin. It called CBP's allegation meritless, said it plans to protest, and said the amount payable remains uncertain.

The filing does not disclose CBP's origin analysis, the subsidiary or seller involved, the miner models or entries, the country Sphere 3D claims, the procedural trigger, or the certificates themselves. It also does not quantify statutory interest or say whether Sphere 3D has accrued, paid, or bonded any amount.

Why the possible $2.2 million charge matters

Sphere 3D's June 30 balance sheet, its first after completing the Cathedra Bitcoin combination, showed over $2.8 million in cash, $0.2 million in working capital, and roughly $5.9 million in current liabilities. The company also held 20.5 BTC valued at nearly $1.2 million.

The possible $2.2 million charge before interest equaled about 77% of that cash balance and roughly 11 times the reported working capital. The company subsequently received $1.7 million of additional proceeds through its at-the-market equity program.

The June 30 filing also showed over $9 million in first-half operating cash use, nearly $5.3 million in proceeds from Bitcoin sales, and over $2.4 million in net financing proceeds. Management said recurring losses and negative operating cash flow created substantial doubt about the company's ability to continue without more funding.

A later ATM prospectus gave Sphere 3D capacity to sell up to $10.3 million of shares. The company was not required to use that capacity, and proceeds depend on actual share sales.

Sphere 3D said it plans to protest the tariff claim. Federal customs rules generally give importers 180 days after the relevant liquidation, reliquidation, or other protestable CBP decision. The public record does not show its specific deadline because the company did not disclose the notice or its procedural trigger.

A separate 2022 disclosure said 4,000 S19j Pro miners arrived in July and were held pending supplier documentation, with roughly 540 released in August. It named FuFu Technologies (BitFuFu) only in the purchase-agreement context.

No public evidence connects those shipments, that vendor, or those models to the 2026 dispute.

The company also remains Sphere 3D and continues to trade as ANY. Its approved name change to DarkHorse Technologies and proposed DRK ticker remain pending.

The post Bitcoin miner Sphere 3D faces $2.2M tariff claim equal to 77% of its cash appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Cardano’s vote to seat four elected Constitutional Committee members is now in its final week, and both voter groups remain far from the required marks. If support does not catch up before Sept. 1, committee-backed governance could hit a continuity break.

The proposal would bring in four elected members before four incumbents leave. If it fails, only three seats stay active, two fewer than the committee’s current minimum, leaving committee-required actions unable to clear ratification.

A live CardanoScan reading on Aug. 25 showed support from delegated representatives, or DReps, at 41.7% against a 67% threshold. Stake pool operator support stood at 12.0%, compared with the 51% required. Intersect identifies the Sept. 1 expiry as epoch 653. The action needs both groups to clear their respective bars before it expires.

The figures have risen across the dated snapshots available. CryptoSlate’s Aug. 17 GovTool snapshot showed 32.46% DRep support and 1.95% SPO support. Intersect placed the vote at 37.9% and 7.93%, respectively, as of Aug. 21 at 20:00 UTC.

The dated readings show support rising. Exact point-to-point arithmetic remains inappropriate because the Aug. 17 baseline came from GovTool and the latest reading came from CardanoScan. Cardano’s governance system uses role-specific active-stake calculations, leaving the two displays best understood as separate measurements.

Even on CardanoScan’s latest basis, the remaining gaps were substantial: 25.3 percentage points for DReps and 39.0 points for SPOs. Votes and stake distributions can still change before expiry, so passage remains possible. The size of the deficits and the short deadline leave the outcome highly uncertain.

What a failed Cardano committee vote would change

This vote is the switch that would put four winners from Cardano’s 2026 Constitutional Committee election into their seats. If it times out without approval, the committee drops from seven active members to three, leaving it two seats short of Cardano’s five-member floor.

Under CIP-1694, an undersized committee cannot ratify governance actions that require its approval. That would create a governance bottleneck. Cardano’s operating network remains separate from this governance constraint: blocks would continue to be produced and transactions would continue to be processed.

Paths to restore governance would remain. Intersect has said Info Actions and Update Committee actions stay available in an undersized-committee state, allowing a new committee update to refill seats. CIP-1694’s ratification table exempts motions of no confidence from committee approval.

Intersect says any break in governance continuity could slow the road to the planned Dijkstra hard fork. That leaves the vote with a narrow, practical question. Can DReps and SPOs close two big gaps before the committee loses enough members to jam committee-dependent governance?

The post Cardano has days to close two huge voting gaps before governance hits a 3-seat bottleneck appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Uniswap (UNI) changes hands at 4.39 US dollars on 25 August 2026, about 59.8 percent below the twelve-month high of 10.93 dollars set on 25 August 2025 and roughly 83.4 percent above the twelve-month low of 2.40 dollars printed on 11 June 2026. A gain of 34.2 percent over seven days has carried the token above both of its main moving averages for the first time in months. The question here is narrower than that move suggests: is Uniswap a good buy at the current price?

cryptoticker.io collected the underlying price data itself on 25 August 2026. Source: market data from CoinMarketCap. Method: 365 daily closing prices from 25 August 2025 to 24 August 2026 plus the current spot quote, with the exponential moving averages and the relative strength index derived from those closes using the standard formulas, the RSI after Wilder. A longer-dated view sits in our Uniswap price prediction.

Uniswap price analysis: where the UNI price stands and which levels matter

Three levels frame the picture. The floor is the twelve-month low at 2.40 dollars, printed on 11 June 2026 and now 83.4 percent below the market. The current zone around 4.39 dollars sits about 18.8 percent above the 50-day exponential moving average of 3.70 dollars and about 10.6 percent above the 200-day exponential moving average of 3.98 dollars. Overhead there is no nearby marker at all: the next reference point of any weight is the twelve-month high of 10.93 dollars, some 149 percent away.

That gap upward is the unusual feature of the chart: between 4.39 dollars and 10.93 dollars the token spent most of the past year falling rather than consolidating, which leaves little price memory in between. The more immediate reference is the pair of averages. The price reclaimed the 200-day line at 3.98 dollars during the advance rather than merely touching it, and the 50-day line at 3.70 dollars now sits below the market as well. Both are beneath the spot price for the first time in this cycle, and both can serve as support rather than resistance.

Is the Uniswap downtrend broken or only interrupted?

By the conventional definition, the downtrend in UNI is broken rather than interrupted. A market trading above both its 50-day and its 200-day average is not in a downtrend on any standard reading, and at 4.39 dollars against 3.70 dollars and 3.98 dollars that condition is met with room to spare.

One qualification belongs next to it. The 50-day average at 3.70 dollars still sits below the 200-day average at 3.98 dollars, the residue of the decline, and it takes weeks of higher prices to unwind. The price has completed the turn; the averages have not yet followed.

That gives a falsification test rather than an opinion. If UNI closes back below 3.98 dollars and holds there for more than a few sessions, the reclaim was a spike inside a continuing downtrend and the case made here is wrong. If the 50-day average instead rises through the 200-day while the price holds above both, the transition is complete.

What RSI and moving averages mean for a Uniswap entry

The 14-day relative strength index stands at 65.5, below the 70 conventionally treated as overbought but in the upper third of the range. An RSI in the mid-sixties after a 34.2 percent week describes a market that has already done most of its repricing in public.

The distance to the averages says the same in a different unit. A price 18.8 percent above its 50-day average of 3.70 dollars is stretched by any standard for this asset, and a return to that line from 4.39 dollars is a decline of roughly 16 percent that would leave the broken downtrend intact. The case for UNI improved materially when the price cleared 3.98 dollars; the case for buying at 4.39 dollars specifically is weaker, and the two are worth keeping apart.

What Uniswap trading volume reveals about demand

Volume is the check on whether a price move reflects real demand or a thin book. Over the past 24 hours UNI turned over about 292.6 million dollars against a twelve-month median of about 225.1 million, roughly 1.3 times normal. The seven-day average is more telling at about 339.8 million dollars, close to 1.5 times that median, against a 30-day average of about 242.0 million.

The rally was therefore accompanied by a sustained rise in turnover rather than a single spike, the pattern that distinguishes a repricing with participation from a drift on a thin book. Against a market capitalisation of about 2.74 billion dollars and rank 32, that liquidity is ample for retail-sized orders.

Which structural factors speak for Uniswap

Three structural features distinguish UNI from the wider field of mid-cap tokens. The first is the protocol behind it. Uniswap is the reference implementation of the automated market maker, the design that made decentralised spot trading work at scale, and it has held a leading share of decentralised exchange volume through several market cycles. Whatever is uncertain about the token, the software is used continuously by parties who are not speculating on it.

The second is the multi-chain footprint. The protocol was built on Ethereum and has since been deployed across the major layer-two networks, where fees make small trades economic in a way they are not on the base layer. That binds its growth to the scaling programme documented in the Ethereum roadmap.

The third factor is the sharpest open question, and it concerns the token rather than the protocol. UNI is a governance token, conferring voting rights over the protocol's parameters and treasury. Whether and how a share of the fees generated by trading activity should reach token holders has been a recurring subject of Uniswap governance rather than a settled feature, and a multi-year view on UNI is a view on how that resolves.

The regulatory frame is developing rather than fixed. In the European Union the markets in crypto-assets regulation governs how venues and issuers operate, and the supervisory position is set out by ESMA on its MiCA pages. A governance token of a decentralised protocol sits less settled under that framework than an asset listed and custodied by a regulated venue, which is a question about classification rather than an allegation about anyone.

What speaks for buying Uniswap at current prices

Three arguments carry weight at 4.39 dollars. The trend evidence is the strongest. The price stands above the 200-day average of 3.98 dollars and above the 50-day average of 3.70 dollars, and most assets that recover from a drawdown of this depth fail at the long average rather than clearing it.

The second argument is that the move is funded. At 339.8 million dollars of average daily turnover over seven days against a twelve-month median of 225.1 million, the advance has been accompanied by participation rather than by a vacuum.

The third is the starting point. At 59.8 percent below the twelve-month high of 10.93 dollars, UNI is priced well beneath its own recent range even after a 34.2 percent week. For an investor whose thesis rests on continued use of the protocol rather than on a near-term move, that discount is the substance of the case.

What speaks against buying Uniswap at current prices

Three arguments cut the other way, and the first two concern timing rather than the asset. Entry price is the immediate objection: a 34.2 percent gain over seven days, an RSI of 65.5 and a distance of 18.8 percent to the 50-day average of 3.70 dollars describe a market that has moved far in a short time, and a return to that line would cost about 16 percent without changing anything structural.

Market sentiment compounds that. The crypto fear and greed index stands at 81 out of 100, in the extreme greed band. The reading is not a forecast, but it describes the environment in which an entry at 4.39 dollars would be made.

The third objection is specific to the token. About 623.27 million UNI are in circulation out of a total supply of about 890.52 million, and no maximum supply is disclosed in the market data. That gap is a standing consideration for a multi-year position, and it sits alongside the unresolved question of how protocol fees relate to the token. Neither point argues that the protocol is weak; both argue that a claim on its success through UNI is less direct than it appears.

How to buy Uniswap at the current price

UNI is listed on effectively every large regulated exchange serving European investors, so the practical questions are cost, custody and the standing of the venue. On cost, the spread matters more than the headline fee at this liquidity: zero commission with a wider spread can be dearer than a few tenths of a percent charged explicitly. The terms sit side by side in our crypto exchange comparison, and those weighting supervision will find that criterion isolated in the comparison of regulated exchanges. The venues we have examined most closely are covered individually: our Kraken review, the Bitpanda review and the Bitvavo review.

On custody, the decision follows the holding period. For a position to be traded within weeks, exchange custody is a reasonable trade-off; for a multi-year holding it is a counterparty risk taken for no return, and hardware storage is the usual answer. The devices are compared in our hardware wallet comparison. One point is specific to UNI: holding the token confers governance rights, not a share of trading activity, and investors interested in decentralised trading itself may find our perpetual DEX comparison closer to what they want.

Is Uniswap a good buy at current prices, short term and long term?

On a short horizon the evidence argues for patience. An RSI of 65.5, a gain of 34.2 percent in a week, a distance of 18.8 percent to the 50-day average at 3.70 dollars and a sentiment index at 81 all point the same way: the immediate move is largely priced. That does not say the trend fails. It says an entry at 4.39 dollars pays for a repricing already made, and that a test of the 200-day line at 3.98 dollars, an ordinary event in a healthy uptrend, would offer the same exposure roughly 9 percent cheaper. The assessment is wrong if the market runs on without such a test.

On a multi-year horizon the picture is more favourable. A price 59.8 percent below the twelve-month high of 10.93 dollars, a protocol with measurable usage, and turnover at about 1.5 times its twelve-month median describe an asset with a working business behind it trading well below its own recent valuations. The conditions under which that view fails are specific: decentralised exchange volume migrating away from the protocol, or the governance question about fees resolving in a way that leaves the token disconnected from the activity it governs. Neither is visible on a chart.

Neither answer is a recommendation. UNI at 4.39 dollars is an asset in a repaired but stretched position, above its 200-day average of 3.98 dollars, far above its twelve-month low of 2.40 dollars and far below its twelve-month high of 10.93 dollars, with an open question at the token level.

Buying Uniswap: what to take away

1. The downtrend is broken but the entry is stretched. UNI at 4.39 dollars trades above the 200-day average of 3.98 dollars and the 50-day average of 3.70 dollars, with an RSI of 65.5 after a 34.2 percent week. The level to watch on a pullback is 3.98 dollars; the venues are set out in our crypto exchange comparison.
2. The move is funded by real turnover. Seven-day volume of about 339.8 million dollars against a twelve-month median of about 225.1 million separates this advance from the low-volume bounces that failed earlier in the year. Investors weighting supervision as heavily as cost will find that criterion in our comparison of regulated exchanges.
3. The open question sits at the token, not the protocol. With about 623.27 million of a total 890.52 million UNI in circulation and the link between fees and token holders still a matter of governance, a multi-year position needs a view on that and a custody arrangement to match; see our hardware wallet comparison.

Disclosure: Some of the providers mentioned in this article work with us through partner programmes. This has no influence on the price analysis or on the assessment of the chart situation; the price data comes from a public market data source and can be verified there.

(As of 25 August 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices, fees and terms change; check them with the provider before every purchase. Crypto assets are subject to high price volatility and a total loss is possible.)

If a letter arrives in your postbox urging an urgent security update for your crypto wallet and supplying a QR code for it, that is phishing. No manufacturer and no exchange announces a wallet update by post, and there is no legitimate process in which you type your recovery phrase into a website. The Federal Office for Cybersecurity BACS reported on August 18, 2026, in its weekly review for week 33, that it had received various reports about precisely such letters.

What is new about this wave is the delivery route rather than the ploy. Phishing normally arrives by email or text message, because both cost nothing. A letter costs printing, enveloping and postage, and anyone going to that effort is counting on a hit rate that justifies it. That is exactly why the postal route became interesting to attackers only once they had address lists they knew belonged to crypto owners.

Crypto wallet phishing by letter: what BACS reported on August 18

The sequence the authority describes is short. A letter calls on the recipient to download an urgent update for various crypto wallets. A QR code is enclosed for that purpose. Anyone who scans it lands on a phishing website on which the recovery phrase is to be entered. Anyone typing it in there hands over complete control of the crypto wallet concerned, according to BACS.

BACS names no number of reports and no individual provider in whose name the letters were sent. It speaks of various reports and of various crypto wallets. If you read a more precise figure in an article, check where it comes from: it does not appear in the official notice.

The origin of the warning matters for placing it in context. BACS is the Swiss federal authority for cybersecurity and reports what is reported to it from Switzerland. For you as an investor in Germany, it is relevant all the same, for a substantive reason: the wallet brands are the same, the address stocks come from the same data breaches, and a letter knows no national border if the address list does not. No German official notice with the same wording exists so far. That does not mean nobody here is affected; it means only that there is no documented German figure on it.

A brief prehistory belongs here. As early as July 31, 2026, the same authority had published its own notice about letters with QR codes. The weekly review of August 18 is therefore no first finding, but confirmation that the wave was still running three weeks later.

Why "quantum resistance" works as a pretext right now

The letter justifies the supposed update with the introduction of so-called quantum resistance. What is meant is encryption that still holds once a sufficiently large quantum computer can break the methods in common use today. This is no invented piece of vocabulary. The debate about what quantum computers mean for Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies has been running for years and is conducted by serious developers.

And that is precisely where the effect lies. A pretext works best when it is half true. Anyone who has heard the term before finds the letter plausible. Anyone who does not know it finds it technical enough not to ask questions. Both groups arrive at the same conclusion, namely that something important is happening here which had better not be ignored.

The difference between the real debate and the letter is banal and decisive all the same: a switch to quantum-resistant methods would be a change to the protocol and to the device software. Such a switch would never begin with users entering their recovery phrase somewhere. A phrase once typed into a web form is lost regardless of any encryption.

The recovery phrase explained: why those twelve or twenty-four words are everything

The recovery phrase, also called the seed phrase, is a sequence of usually twelve or twenty-four words from which all of a wallet's private keys can be calculated. This sequence of words is no supplement to login details and no second factor; it is the complete mathematical basis of your holdings.

Two things follow from that which are often confused in everyday use. First: whoever holds the phrase holds the balance, without your device, without your PIN and without you noticing anything. Second: you will not notice the theft immediately afterwards either, because the wallet on your device continues to look normal. An attacker who has copied down the phrase can wait weeks.

Why a device never asks for the phrase

A hardware wallet is a device that generates the private keys and holds them permanently in a sealed-off chip, so that they never leave the device. That is its entire purpose in life. If a piece of software, a website or a letter asks you for the phrase, it is asking for exactly what the device is built not to release. The request itself is the finding. How to store the phrase properly is described in our guide to storing your seed phrase safely.

QR code in a letter: why quishing bypasses the usual protections

Quishing means phishing via a QR code. The attack is effective because it defeats three layers of protection at once that would apply to an email.

A spam filter does not see a letter. A browser warning for known fraudulent sites often fails to apply, because freshly registered domains are not yet on any list. And the most important layer falls away entirely: with an email you can hover over the link and read the destination before you click. A QR code is meaningless to the human eye. You find out where it points only after scanning, and by then you are already there.

On top of that comes the change of device. The letter lies on the kitchen table; the scanning is done with the phone. With that, the process leaves the very device on which many people keep their security software and lands on the one whose screen truncates the address bar most severely. A domain name that looks wrong at once on a monitor often does not fit into view on a phone at all.

The Ledger letters from April to June 2026: the run-up to this wave

This ploy is not new in German-speaking countries. From late April 2026, customers of the French hardware wallet maker Ledger received printed letters demanding a quantum resistance security update. Cryptopolitan described the construction: professionally printed, with a QR code, and with the recipient's correct model number and order history. Ledger itself publicly confirmed in early June 2026 that the letters are forgeries, and pointed out that the company never asks for the 24-word recovery phrase.

Comparing the two waves shows what has changed. The Ledger letters were tailored to one brand and depended on recipients actually being customers of that brand. The letters BACS reported on in August run, according to the authority, on various crypto wallets. Anyone who has only learned to distrust letters bearing one particular brand name is no longer protected by that.

Where the senders get your postal address: data breaches at wallet retailers

A phishing letter needs an address, and one behind which a crypto owner lives with heightened probability. Lists like that do not come about by guessing. The origin lies wherever order data leaks from a retailer or a shipping service provider.

In the Ledger case, the trail leads, on Cryptopolitan's account, to the company's 2020 data breach, in which customers' names, addresses and telephone numbers were stolen. Those data have been in circulation ever since and age slowly, because people rarely move house.

More current is the material from this August. On August 13 we reported on a data breach at the shipping service provider ShipMonk involving Trezor customer addresses, and on August 20 on leaked order data at SafePal. Both are reports from our own coverage rather than from the BACS notice. No public proof exists that precisely these holdings sit behind precisely these letters, and it will hardly be possible to establish that from outside.

In practical terms: if you have ordered a hardware wallet online in recent years, your delivery address is a plausible component of such lists. That is no reason to panic and no security problem with your device. It is the reason why you of all people receive such a letter and your neighbour does not. If you are reconsidering your choice of device, the criteria are in our hardware wallet comparison.

Two weeks' grace instead of time pressure: why this letter is built differently

The most striking detail of the BACS notice is a deadline. The letter grants the recipient more than two weeks, according to the authority. That is unusual for attempted fraud, because attackers otherwise build up artificial time pressure so that nobody stops to think or ask.

The authority classifies the long deadline as something that increases credibility, and that is plausible. A letter leaving you fourteen days reads like an administrative notice rather than a threat. It even allows you to set the letter aside and come back to it later, which reinforces the impression of respectability.

For you, the characteristic therefore inverts. Until now, time pressure counted as a warning sign. With this type of letter, the calm is the warning sign, because no manufacturer attaches a two-week grace period to a security update. Genuine security notices tell you to act immediately, and they reach you in the app or on the manufacturer's website rather than in the postbox.

Genuine firmware update or phishing: how to tell the difference

Firmware is the software that runs on the wallet device itself. It is installed through the manufacturer's official management software, which addresses the device directly and checks the update's cryptographic signature. That route always begins with you, never with a prompt from outside.

Three checks follow from this, none of which requires technical knowledge.

The first is the channel. An update is displayed in the manufacturer's app. It is not announced by post, nor by text message, nor in an email with a call to action.

The second is the question about the phrase. No update process asks for it. Not even when a page claims merely to be "verifying" or "migrating" it.

The third is the address. When you visit a manufacturer's site, you type it in yourself or use your own bookmark. A QR code from an unsolicited letter is no substitute for that.

Related, though technically different, is the attack via fraudulent approval dialogues, in which you disclose no phrase at all but sign a transaction that does something other than what is displayed. How to read such dialogues is something we took apart in our piece on wallet drainers and signature approvals, along with a real manufacturer case in our analysis of the signature gap in the Ethereum app. Neither case has anything to do with the letter, except that both answer the same question: what really lies behind the thing I am confirming right now?

Hardware wallet, software wallet, exchange: whom this attack actually hits

The reach of the attack depends on where your holdings sit, and the three cases differ markedly.

With a hardware wallet, the attack hits you in full as soon as you enter the phrase. There is no body that recovers the transaction and no customer service that freezes the account.

With a software wallet on your phone or in the browser, the same applies. Here too the phrase is the master key. The only difference is that such a wallet sits on a device with internet access anyway and therefore has additional attack routes. An overview of the criteria is in our software wallet comparison.

If your holdings sit with a regulated exchange, by contrast, no recovery phrase exists for you at all, because the keys lie with the custodian. A letter asking for your phrase comes to nothing there. That offers no protection against other ploys, such as forged withdrawal demands, which we covered in a separate piece on phishing around exchange withdrawals.

What to do if you have already entered your recovery phrase

If you have scanned the QR code and typed in the phrase, speed counts, and the order matters.

First create a new wallet with a new phrase on a clean device. Then transfer the balance from the old wallet to the new one. In that order, because a transfer needs a destination, and the destination has to exist before you send.

The old wallet is permanently unusable afterwards. Changing a password, setting a new PIN or resetting the device do not help, because the phrase applies independently of the device. Whoever has it can set the wallet up again elsewhere at any time.

Expect tax consequences. A transfer between two of your own wallets is no sale in Germany, but it wants documenting, so that nobody later suspects an inflow where there was none. A theft, in turn, cannot readily be claimed as a loss for tax purposes. Both belong on the record, and the tools from our overview of tax tools and portfolio trackers are suited to that. Where actual financial damage has occurred, BACS expressly recommends filing a criminal complaint.

What you can report even without any damage

If the letter reached you but you did not act on it, the letter is worth something all the same. It proves that your address is on a list. Keep it, photograph it, and report it to the manufacturer in whose name it was sent. In Germany, the consumer advice centres and the Federal Office for Information Security accept such tip-offs. And treat future post to the same address with the same distrust, because an address list sold once gets sold on.

Crypto wallet phishing by letter: what to take away

1. Remember the one rule that covers every variant. The recovery phrase is never typed in anywhere, except when restoring a wallet on a device you are physically holding at that moment. No update, no verification and no migration needs it. If you are unsure which device maintains this separation cleanly, the hardware wallet comparison helps to place them.
2. Check your custody route, not just your postbox. Anyone holding everything in self-custody bears the full risk of this ploy alone. Anyone keeping part of it with a supervised provider shifts this particular risk, but takes on counterparty risk in exchange. Which providers are authorised in the EU is set out in the overview of regulated crypto exchanges.
3. Document every move of your holdings straight away. If you switch to a new phrase on suspicion, transfers arise that you will not reconstruct from memory a year later. A tracker from the overview of tax tools and portfolio trackers takes that work off your hands while the data are still fresh.

The real finding of this week is unspectacular and therefore easy to underestimate. The attackers have learned nothing technical; they have learned something about trust. What they have noticed is that paper carries more credibility in a digital environment than an email does, and they are paying postage for it. As long as that pays off, the next wave will not come by email. How the market is developing alongside all this can be read in our Bitcoin price prediction; the price, however, has no bearing on the safety of your phrase.

(As of August 25, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)

Your balance at bitcoin.de can still be withdrawn, according to the operator. Trading there has been unavailable since June 12, 2026, and so have deposits. On August 28, 2026, Bitcoin Group SE, the marketplace's parent company, holds its annual general meeting in Herford. It is the first firmly dated occasion since the standstill began at which the management board has to answer to shareholders.

This piece addresses the question that has been sitting in the forums for weeks: what does August 28 change for your balance, and how can you tell for yourself whether the platform is coming back? We have already published an assessment of what the trading halt means for your balance. Two things have been added since: a status report from the operator dated August 20, and the date of the general meeting.

Why trading at bitcoin.de has been suspended since June 12

The sequence is well documented. Since June 12, 2026, trading and deposits on bitcoin.de have been suspended. It was announced as a temporary pause until July 1, 2026, the day the rebuilt platform was due to go live. That date passed without a replacement.

The rebuild itself is no minor operation. The operator is moving bitcoin.de from its previous peer-to-peer marketplace model to a conventional trading architecture. A peer-to-peer marketplace is a venue on which two customers deal directly with one another and the operator merely brokers and settles; on an order-book exchange, by contrast, the venue itself steps between the parties. Alongside this, the company says, come a redesigned website, trading apps for iOS and Android, and a range extended to more than 100 cryptocurrencies.

According to the reports available, more than a million registered accounts are affected by the pause. bitcoin.de is Germany's oldest Bitcoin marketplace and launched in 2011. That is why this standstill affects more people in Germany than most news about international trading venues.

What the August 20 status report actually says

On August 20, 2026, the operator published a detailed status report with an FAQ, the first since the end of June. The key statements, each of them a company assertion:

• The technical development of the new trading infrastructure, including website and trading app, is complete and has been successfully tested.
• The launch has been postponed because the regulatory procedure connected with MiCAR licensing has not yet concluded. The company says it wants to avoid legal and operational uncertainty for customers and business partners.
• A binding date cannot be given, because the further timetable depends on the conclusion of that procedure.
• Withdrawals remain fully available and are processed under the existing procedures. Only trading and deposits are paused.
• Customer holdings have already been migrated to the new infrastructure in the course of preparations, and the previous trading system has been shut down. Reactivating the old system at short notice is not readily feasible, technically or operationally.

The last point is the most important and, so far, the least noticed in German coverage. It answers the question of why the operator does not simply let trading continue on the old platform until authorisation arrives: on the company's own account, that old platform no longer exists in operational form.

On custody itself, the operator states that customer balances are held separately from company assets and audited annually. That is a company statement rather than a finding by a supervisory authority, and you should read it as such.

What the Bitcoin Group SE annual general meeting on August 28 changes

The financial calendar of Bitcoin Group SE contains exactly one further dated event for the 2026 financial year: the annual general meeting on August 28, 2026 in Herford. The 2026 half-year report is entered there as "September 2026" with no day given, and is therefore useless as a marker.

An annual general meeting is the yearly gathering of a stock corporation's shareholders, at which the management and supervisory boards render account and shareholders vote on discharge, the use of profits and constitutional matters. For you as a customer of the marketplace, one aspect matters above all: shareholders have a right to information under section 131 of the German Stock Corporation Act. Questions about the trading halt, which the company has so far answered only in writing and in general terms, have to be answered orally there, insofar as they are necessary to assess an item on the agenda.

What August 28 does not change for your balance: it is no cut-off date at which a deadline expires, no date by which you would have to have done something, and no announced resumption of trading. Anyone telling you otherwise has not read the financial calendar. The date is an information event, and nothing is required of you on it.

In practical terms: in the days after August 28, the likelihood is higher than usual that firm statements about the timetable will become public. Shareholders regularly report from annual general meetings, and listed companies publish price-sensitive news through ad-hoc announcements and corporate news in the investor relations section of their own website.

Can you still withdraw your balance from bitcoin.de?

On the operator's account, yes, and without any change. Withdrawals of balances and transfers of crypto assets to an external address continue to run under the existing procedures, according to the company. Active trading and new deposits are what has been suspended.

If you want to check this for yourself, proceed in this order:

1. Call up your account balance and holdings overview. Note the date, the time and the exact amounts, ideally with a screenshot. That is your evidence should something fail to add up later.
2. Initiate a small test withdrawal. An amount whose loss would not hurt tells you more about the actual state of settlement than any press release. Factor in the network fee before you settle on the amount.
3. Measure how long it takes. Record how long the withdrawal actually needs. A wide deviation from your earlier experience is a signal to weigh in your further decision.
4. Only then decide about the rest. A working test withdrawal is the basis for the question of whether you pull out your full holding.

One security point that counts for a great deal in this situation: around any platform with disrupted operations, forged emails tend to appear urging an "immediate withdrawal" and leading to rebuilt login pages. Do not click such prompts; type the address yourself. How to recognise this ploy is something we took apart using the example of phishing after the MiCA deadline.

MiCAR authorisation explained: why an existing licence is not automatically enough

MiCAR is the European regulation on markets in crypto-assets. Since the transitional periods ended, the regulation requires providers of crypto-asset services in the EU to hold their own authorisation as a CASP, a crypto-asset service provider. The last transitional period in Germany expired on July 1, 2026.

Why an existing financial supervisory licence does not automatically suffice comes down to legal form. CRR credit institutions, meaning conventional banks, may provide all crypto-asset services under Article 60(1) MiCAR if they notify the supervisor in good time. For investment firms under the German Investment Firm Act, by contrast, only Article 60(3) applies: they are permitted solely those crypto-asset services which correspond to the investment services they are already licensed for. Anything beyond that requires full authorisation under Article 63.

futurum bank AG, which operates bitcoin.de, is listed in BaFin's company database as an investment firm, despite the word "bank" in its corporate name. The company itself writes in its 2025 annual report, published on June 26, 2026, that the subsidiary is "currently in the MICAR licensing procedure". A procedure under way is no value judgement on the applicant; it is an administrative process with an open outcome and no statutory guaranteed duration.

This hurdle affects more than one provider. Our analysis of the European register shows that only a small share of the authorisations granted at the time went to trading platforms: 21 of 329 authorisations were trading platforms. Anyone looking for an alternative today should therefore look specifically at the regulated crypto exchanges holding European authorisation rather than relying on advertising claims.

How to tell whether a trading platform is coming back

There is no guarantee on the question of whether it returns, but there are verifiable signals. You can observe these five yourself, without depending on rumour:

1. The public authorisation register. The European securities supervisor maintains a register of authorised crypto-asset service providers. Once the operator appears there, the decisive hurdle has been cleared. Until then, its absence says only that the procedure is still running.
2. The financial calendar and ad-hoc announcements. Listed companies must publish price-sensitive facts without delay. An authorisation granted would be such a fact.
3. The withdrawal function. As long as withdrawals go through reliably and in the usual time, settlement is working. Should they slow down without explanation, that is the clearest change you can measure at all from the outside.
4. The frequency of communication. Almost two months passed between the annual report at the end of June and the status report on August 20 without any company statement. If the cadence becomes tighter and more concrete, that points to movement.
5. Concrete dates rather than statements of intent. "As soon as the procedure has concluded" is no statement about timing. A calendar date is one.

For the sake of completeness, the economic picture includes one figure from the 2025 annual report as it was reported in the trade press: on revenue of 10.0 million euros, operating profit on an EBITDA basis fell from 1.8 to 0.5 million euros, and the bottom line showed a net loss for the year of 1.3 million euros after a profit in the prior year. This follows from the investment in the platform rebuild and says nothing in itself about the safety of customer holdings, which the company states are held separately. We are not evaluating these figures here; we are naming them so that you know them.

Self-custody instead of waiting: when moving to a hardware wallet makes sense

Self-custody means that you control the private keys to your coins yourself and no service provider stands between you and your holding. A hardware wallet is a device that stores those keys offline and signs transactions without releasing the key to the computer.

The bitcoin.de case demonstrates what the opposite looks like. Trading and deposits can be switched off from outside, resumption can depend on an administrative procedure, and the scheduling then no longer rests with the customer. Anyone holding their own assets is independent of that chain. The suitable devices, along with the effort of setting them up, are in the hardware wallet comparison.

Honesty requires the other side too: self-custody shifts the risk, it does not remove it. A lost recovery phrase means definitive loss, and nobody can reset it for you. If you do not trust yourself with that, an authorised custodian is the more honest choice than a half-understood do-it-yourself arrangement. My assessment: for holdings you have no intention of trading over the coming months anyway, the advantage of self-custody clearly outweighs the drawbacks.

Switching crypto exchange: what to look for in a regulated provider

If you would rather not wait for an indefinite launch date, switching is the obvious alternative. Three checks that come before the fee table:

Look up the authorisation in the register

Do not rely on the word "regulated" on the home page. Check the corporate name in the public register of authorised providers. Note whether this is a full authorisation or merely a notification by a credit institution, because the scope of permitted services differs.

Understand the custody model

Ask whether your coins sit in omnibus custody, meaning together with those of other customers in a single holding, or are allocated separately, and who acts as custodian. At several large providers, the custodian is a different company from the one you hold the account with.

Test the withdrawal routes beforehand

Before you transfer a larger holding, check whether the new provider permits withdrawals to an external address at all. There are houses that offer trading but restrict transfers out to your own wallet. An overview of providers and their terms is in our crypto exchange comparison.

Tax on switching: what a transfer between your own wallets triggers

The good news first: transferring coins between two wallets that both belong to you is not a disposal under the tax administration's view in Germany. No taxable gain arises, and the holding period continues to run rather than starting afresh.

The qualification that goes with it: you have to carry the acquisition data across, meaning the date of purchase, acquisition costs and quantity for each position. If your previous provider at some point stops supplying a history, proving your position to the tax office becomes laborious. Every switch therefore includes this one step: pull the complete transaction export while you still have access, and store it outside the platform.

For ongoing documentation and the later tax return, the best choice is a tool that consolidates several addresses and trading venues. Which ones manage that is set out in the comparison of crypto tax tools and portfolio trackers. Note as well that network fees arise on a transfer and fluctuate considerably depending on how busy the chain is.

Checking your bitcoin.de balance: what to take away

1. August 28 is an information event, not a deadline. You do not have to have anything done by then. What makes sense is to follow the investor relations page and the company's ad-hoc announcements in the days afterwards, because firm dates would appear there first. If you want to trade in the meantime, you will find authorised alternatives in the comparison of regulated crypto exchanges.
2. Test your access with a small withdrawal before you decide about the rest. Record holdings and processing times. A working withdrawal is the most meaningful signal available to you from outside. If you then want to move into self-custody, the hardware wallet comparison is the next step.
3. Secure your transaction history while you still have access. A transfer between your own wallets triggers no tax, but without acquisition data the later return becomes onerous. A tool from the comparison of crypto tax tools takes over the consolidation.

For further reading, the primary sources are the annual general meeting section of Bitcoin Group SE, with the date, invitation and agenda, and the operator's status report of August 20, 2026.

(As of August 25, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)

Anyone who owns a Ledger and uses it to manage Ether or ERC-20 tokens should open Ledger Live and check which version of the Ethereum app is installed on the device. Anything older than 1.22.2 is missing a security fix. That fix closes a flaw which undermined the very promise a hardware wallet is bought for: that the screen shows what the device is about to sign.

The case became public on August 24, 2026, when the security firm TestMachine published its analysis. The fix itself already existed by that point. Between the two dates lies a dispute over who found the flaw first and when Ledger shipped it. For you as an owner, that dispute is secondary. What matters is the version number on your device and the question of which approvals you granted in the past.

Ledger security vulnerability in the Ethereum app: what actually happened

Neither the device firmware nor the custody of the private key was affected. The problem sat in the Ethereum app: the small piece of software you install on the device in addition, for Ether and ERC-20 tokens. It prepares a transaction, displays it to you and collects your confirmation.

In the faulty version, that sequence could be thrown out of order. A malicious web application with access to the connected device could send a second signing command while the first transaction was still on screen awaiting review. The app then swapped the data in memory without bringing up a fresh review screen. The harmless transfer you had just examined remained on the display. Your confirmation, however, applied to the swapped data.

According to the security researchers, the pattern has been demonstrably reproduced on a Ledger Flex. Because the devices largely share the Ethereum app's program code, the Nano X, Nano S Plus, Stax and Apex are also considered potentially vulnerable. Ledger has not disclosed which version of the app first contained the error; the researchers' comparison starts at 1.22.1, the previously tagged version from May 27, 2026.

Clear signing explained: why the display is the real security promise

Clear signing refers to showing the complete transaction data in plain text on the hardware wallet's display before you confirm: recipient address, amount, and in the case of contract calls, the action the contract is meant to perform.

This is the reason such a device makes sense in the first place. Your computer may be compromised, your browser may render a manipulated interface, the website may be a fake. As long as the device in your hand has its own screen, independent of the computer, and shows the real data there, any manipulation becomes visible before you press the button. The private key never leaves the device; it does not need to, because the device signs for itself.

The flaw struck exactly this chain at its weakest point. The key stayed safe, the firmware was untouched, and yet a different consent could end up being given than the one you had read. A device whose display can no longer be read as binding is, on this one point, no better than a software wallet on an infected machine. If you want to revisit the difference between the two designs, you will find it in our software wallet comparison and in the hardware wallet comparison.

Race condition and APDU commands: the technical core of the flaw

A race condition is a bug in which the outcome depends on which of two roughly simultaneous commands gets processed first. Such bugs are treacherous, because the program code looks correct on its own and the sequence runs cleanly in the vast majority of cases. They only surface when someone deliberately engineers the order.

APDU is the command format in which smart cards and hardware wallets talk to the connected computer. Every step of a signature consists of several such commands. The Ethereum app carried a state alongside them, recording which transaction was currently up for review. That state could be overwritten while the review was still running.

WebHID in the browser: why a website talks to your device at all

WebHID is a browser interface that lets a website communicate directly with a connected USB device once you have explicitly granted permission. Without it, a hardware wallet could not be used conveniently inside a decentralised application; with it, the website sits closer to the device than many users realise.

The attack described requires that you have already granted this access to a manipulated or hijacked site and that you initiate a transaction there. It does not work remotely against a device sitting in a drawer. That limits the circle of those affected considerably, though it does not diminish the finding: anyone who works regularly with decentralised exchanges, bridges or staking interfaces grants this access all the time.

Token approval instead of transfer: why unlimited approvals are so dangerous

The damage in a swap of this kind rarely comes from the transfer itself. It comes from what can be slipped in to replace it.

A token approval is the permission granted to a smart contract to dispose of a certain quantity of your tokens in future, without you confirming each individual debit again. Many applications request this permission on an unlimited basis for the sake of convenience. An approval once granted does not expire and remains in force until you explicitly revoke it.

The difference between a transfer and an approval

A transfer costs you exactly the amount you confirm. An unlimited approval costs you, in the worst case, the entire balance of the token concerned, at a moment of the recipient's choosing. That is why swapping a small transfer for a far-reaching approval is the most rewarding attack on a signing path. How attackers collect these approvals in practice is something we set out in our piece on wallet drainers and signature approvals.

Updating the Ethereum app to 1.22.2: the route through Ledger Live

Version 1.22.2 closes the route described with two locks. The app refuses a new signing session while a review is in progress, and it rejects an incoming confirmation if the state no longer matches what was displayed. The version entry sits in the release overview of the Ethereum app at Ledger; the note there lists only fixed security issues as its content, without describing the flaw.

The update itself is unspectacular. You connect the device, open the manager for installed applications in Ledger Live and update the Ethereum app there. Existing balances are unaffected, because the keys are derived from your recovery phrase and do not reside in the app. Removing and reinstalling the app costs you no coins either.

How to identify the installed version

Ledger Live shows the version number for each application in the device manager. If it reads 1.22.2 or higher, the fix is in place. If it reads 1.22.1 or older, it is missing. A glance at the version number of Ledger Live itself is not enough.

Why a firmware update does not update the Ethereum app with it

This is the point at which the case most often goes wrong in practice. Firmware, Ledger Live and the individual coin apps are maintained separately and updated separately. Someone who updates the device firmware and comes away feeling reassured may still have an outdated Ethereum app on the device.

The same separation explains why reports on wallet security so often talk past each other. In the Coldcard case the error lay in the generation of the seed, right down at the foundations, which is why a new seed was needed there. The BitBox vulnerabilities concerned the firmware. Here the error sits one level above that, in a replaceable application, and so an app update is sufficient. Your recovery phrase does not need to be regenerated in this case.

Checking and revoking token approvals: the second step after the update

The update protects future signatures. It does not clear up what was granted in the past. If you have worked with decentralised applications over recent months, it is worth looking at the open approvals on your address.

Block explorers and specialised interfaces list, for a given address, which contracts are allowed to dispose of which tokens. Approvals to contracts you no longer use can be revoked one by one. A revocation is an ordinary transaction and incurs network fees, which is why the clean-up is best done in quiet periods with low fees. If you want to keep an eye on the Ether price while doing so, you will find our assessment in the Ethereum price prediction.

One side effect that hardly anyone thinks about: every revocation appears in your transaction history and generates fees. Those who document their movements cleanly have an easier time at the next tax return; the common tax and portfolio tools read such events in automatically.

The disclosure dispute between Ledger and TestMachine

There are two accounts of the sequence of events, and they do not match. Both are reproduced here as the accounts of the respective party; neither has been independently confirmed.

Ledger's chief technology officer Charles Guillemet stated that the in-house security lab Ledger Donjon had found the error itself, and that the fix was shipped roughly two weeks before publication. TestMachine, he said, only came forward to the bug bounty programme afterwards. He characterised the security firm's statements as generating fear in order to attract attention.

TestMachine counters that its own testing system, named Azimuth, discovered the weakness during an automated run on a Ledger Flex, and that the results were shared with Ledger. At the time of publication, in the firm's view, no fix was available.

The verifiable individual facts sit somewhere in between. The changelog entry for version 1.22.2 carries the date August 12, 2026, the signed tag in the source repository August 13. It only became visible as a published release around August 24, however, at the same time as the security firm's analysis. A user who wanted to check in the meantime whether a fix existed could not find it there. The technical reconstruction of the sequence, including these dates, was assembled by CryptoSlate.

Have funds been lost? What is known about the damage

Based on the information provided so far by both sides, there is no confirmed case in which the flaw was actually exploited. No losses are documented, and reading out private keys was not possible by this route in any event.

That is good news with a caveat that has to be stated alongside it. A signature obtained this way would look on chain like any other voluntary signature. An affected user would only notice the event once tokens later flowed out, and would then probably attribute it to ordinary phishing. The absence of confirmed cases therefore does not allow the conclusion, with any certainty, that there were none. That is an assessment, not a documented statement.

What the case says about hardware wallets and self-custody

It would be the wrong conclusion to turn this episode into a rejection of hardware wallets. The attack required device access already granted and a malicious application, it left the key untouched, and it has been fixed.

The useful conclusion is a different one. A hardware wallet moves trust from the computer to a small device with its own screen, and that device consists of firmware, applications and companion software, all maintained separately. Security at this point is not a state you acquire with the purchase, but an upkeep you perform. That includes keeping applications current, tidying up approvals regularly and, for large holdings, adding a second layer of confirmation. Which class of device suits which holding is something we broke down after the Coldcard case in our piece which hardware wallet now?

Checking the Ledger Ethereum app: what to take away

1. Check the version and update it. Connect the device, open the device manager in Ledger Live and check the Ethereum app. Anything below 1.22.2 needs updating, and a firmware update alone will not do it. Which devices handle this separation in which way is shown in the hardware wallet comparison.
2. Clear out open token approvals. Have your address checked for which contracts may dispose of your tokens, and revoke everything you no longer need. If you conclude in the process that you want a separate address with a small balance for daily use, the software wallet comparison will help with the choice.
3. Document the movements. Revocations and reallocations generate fees and show up in your history. Record them as you go, rather than reconstructing them next spring; the tax and portfolio tools take the import work off your hands.

(As of August 25, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)

Bitcoin finally punched through 80,000 dollars. The daily candle on Bitstamp opened at 78,985 dollars, ran up to 81,255 dollars, and then handed most of that back, settling near 79,121 dollars for a gain of only 0.17 percent on the session. It was the first time Bitcoin traded above 80,000 since May, and the seven-day advance now sits at roughly 25 percent.

The pullback is not a failure. It is what a market does when it sprints 25 percent in a week and arrives at a resistance band that already rejected it once this year. What matters now is whether buyers can defend the low 79,000s and turn 78,670 dollars into a floor instead of a ceiling.

Altcoins, meanwhile, have not blinked. $Solana is up more than 6 percent on the day, $Ethereum is holding above 2,490 dollars, and $XRP has posted its strongest week since November 2024. The rotation is starting, but the Altcoin Season Index still sits well below the level that would confirm a full altseason.

Why did Bitcoin fall back after touching 81,255 dollars?

Bitcoin ran straight into the same supply zone that capped the market in early May, and profit taking did the rest.

Look at the two circles on the daily chart. The first marks the early May topping cluster in the 80,000 to 82,000 area. The second marks this week's spike into exactly the same band. That is not coincidence, it is memory. Traders who bought that region in May and sat through a drop to 58,000 dollars are getting their first chance to exit flat, and that supply has to be absorbed before price can go higher.

The mechanics behind the move also invited a fade. A wave of short liquidations exceeding 220 million dollars in 24 hours accelerated the final leg into 80,000. Liquidation-driven candles tend to overshoot, and once the forced buying stops, price drifts back toward the level where real bids sit.

The underlying bid is still there. US spot Bitcoin ETFs pulled in roughly 1.9 billion dollars in net inflows for the week ending 21 August, the strongest weekly intake since October 2025, with BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust taking the largest share. That is spot demand, not leverage.

What does the 200 EMA reclaim tell us?

$Bitcoin has flipped its 200-day EMA from resistance to potential support for the first time since May, which is the single most constructive part of this chart.

The blue 200-day EMA sits at 71,841 dollars. For nearly three months it capped every rally attempt. On the breakout candle from the 62,277 area, price sliced through it in a single session and has not looked back.

That changes the structure. As long as daily closes hold above 71,841 dollars, the medium-term trend argument belongs to the bulls. A daily close back below it would tell you the breakout was a liquidity event rather than a trend change.

Positioning supports the constructive read. Coin-denominated open interest actually fell around 11 percent during the rally, from roughly 353,500 $BTC to 312,600 $BTC, while price gained more than 20 percent. A rally that reduces leverage instead of piling it on is a healthier rally.

Which upside targets matter if Bitcoin clears 81,255 dollars?

The first real test is a daily close above 82,000 dollars, and the measured target beyond that is 88,000 dollars.

Here is the upside ladder from the chart:

• 81,255 dollars: the immediate high. A reclaim on strong volume puts the May cluster back in play.
• 82,000 to 82,500 dollars: the top of the May rejection zone. This is the true breakout line, not the round 80,000 number.
• 85,000 dollars: psychological midpoint, likely a pause zone rather than a wall.
• 88,000 dollars: the marked yellow resistance and the logical destination if the May supply clears.

Options markets are already leaning that way. The 25-delta call skew has fallen to its lowest level of the year across the curve and has flipped negative at the front end, meaning traders are paying up for upside exposure rather than downside protection.

Where is Bitcoin's next support if the pullback deepens?

78,670 dollars is the line in the sand for the short term, with 74,450 and the 200 EMA at 71,841 dollars below it.

The downside ladder:

• 78,670 dollars: immediate support, essentially where price is trading now. Losing it opens the gap below.
• 74,450 dollars: the first meaningful shelf. This is the most likely destination for a routine retracement after a 25 percent week.
• 71,841 dollars: the 200-day EMA. A retest here would be textbook and still bullish, since the breakout candle originated below it.
• 66,803 and 65,000 dollars: the top of the July and August consolidation range. A drop here means the breakout has failed.
• 62,277 dollars: the launch pad marked by the green arrow. Full invalidation.

Note the air pocket between 78,670 and 74,450 dollars. There is very little traded structure in that band because price crossed it in a single vertical candle, which means any move lower can be fast.

Are altcoins actually outperforming Bitcoin right now?

Selected altcoins are outperforming, but the broader market has not yet flipped into altseason.

Solana leads the daily board with a gain above 6 percent, helped by a five-day inflow streak into Solana ETFs that pushed cumulative net inflows to a record 1.22 billion dollars. XRP has posted roughly 50 percent on the week, its best stretch since November 2024. Ethereum is more measured, holding around 2,490 dollars.

The caveat is that the Altcoin Season Index is nowhere near the threshold that would confirm a genuine rotation. Capital is still concentrating in the largest names with ETF access rather than spreading down the market cap curve. If Bitcoin consolidates sideways from here, that is when the rotation typically broadens. If Bitcoin corrects hard, altcoins usually fall further and faster.

The 10-year project in Vermilion Parish will include five launch complexes and infrastructure for Starship missions.

XRP has given back two days of gains after a vertical recovery, and the charts say the bounce just met a wall.

Alibaba's Qwen team is teasing its next architecture a day early—and the specs say it runs near-frontier scale on a fraction of the power.

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Crypto-margined Bitcoin futures have collapsed from near-total dominance to about 12%. But leveraged traders are still placing big bets.

The market stays bullish, despite the correction that hit largest assets out there for a short period of time.

Bitcoin’s quantum-computing risk is real, but it is still a long way from becoming an immediate threat, according to BitGo co-CEO Mike Belshe.

Billionaire investor Tim Draper is backing a new accelerator aimed at turning Cardano-based startups into investor-ready companies.

XRP Ledger is on the verge of switching to an out-of-the-box DeFi stack with native credit and privacy tools for all XRP holders.

XRP is facing heightened volatility risks as leverage on Binance surges to its highest level in more than seven months.

TLDR

• Johnson & Johnson gains momentum after FDA approves Imaavy for rare blood disorder.
• JNJ expands cancer care reach after Europe approves Tecvayli combination treatment.
• New approvals strengthen Johnson & Johnson’s growing immunology and oncology portfolio.
• Imaavy and Tecvayli approvals highlight JNJ’s focus on specialized medicines.
• Johnson & Johnson advances global healthcare strategy through key regulatory wins.

Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) gained attention after regulatory approvals expanded its healthcare portfolio across rare diseases and cancer treatments. The company secured U.S. FDA approval for Imaavy in warm autoimmune hemolytic anemia treatment. Meanwhile, European regulators approved expanded use of Tecvayli with daratumumab for multiple myeloma patients.Johnson & Johnson shares traded at $273.44, gaining 0.64% after recovering from early market volatility.

Johnson & Johnson, JNJ

FDA Expands Imaavy Approval for Rare Blood Disorder Treatment

Johnson & Johnson received approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for Imaavy’s expanded use. The treatment now covers patients aged 12 years and older with warm autoimmune hemolytic anemia. This approval applies to patients who currently receive or previously received steroid treatment.

Warm autoimmune hemolytic anemia is a rare condition where the immune system destroys red blood cells. Therefore, patients can experience severe anemia, fatigue, blood clots, and kidney complications. Johnson & Johnson developed Imaavy to reduce harmful antibodies while maintaining broader immune functions.

The treatment works by blocking a protein that supports antibody activity in the bloodstream. Additionally, Imaavy is delivered through intravenous infusion every four weeks based on patient weight. The approval followed a study involving 115 adults during mid-to-late stage clinical development.

The study showed stronger lasting improvements in hemoglobin levels among patients receiving Imaavy. After 24 weeks, more patients achieved sustained improvement compared with those receiving placebo treatment. However, reported side effects included swelling, diarrhea, fever, infections, and infusion-related reactions.

European Approval Expands Tecvayli Cancer Treatment Use

Johnson & Johnson also received approval from the European Commission for Tecvayli’s expanded application. The approval allows Tecvayli combined with daratumumab to treat adults with relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma. The treatment provides another option for patients after previous therapies fail.

Tecvayli is a bispecific antibody administered through a subcutaneous injection. It targets B-cell maturation antigen and CD3 to activate immune responses against cancer cells. Furthermore, combining Tecvayli with daratumumab creates a treatment approach that targets multiple disease pathways.

The European approval relied on results from the Phase III MajesTEC-3 study. The trial included patients who received one to three previous treatment lines. It compared the Tecvayli combination against established treatment options using daratumumab with other therapies.

The study reported improved progression-free survival and overall survival outcomes. The treatment combination reduced the risk of disease progression or death compared with standard therapies. Moreover, more than 90% of patients without progression at six months remained stable after three years.

Johnson & Johnson Strengthens Pharmaceutical Growth Strategy

Johnson & Johnson continues expanding its pharmaceutical business through new approvals and treatment developments. The company has focused on immunology, oncology, and rare disease medicines. These areas remain important parts of its healthcare growth strategy.

In January 2026, Johnson & Johnson reported fourth-quarter 2025 sales of $24.56 billion. The company recorded a 9.1% increase in sales compared with the previous period. Net earnings also increased 49.1% to $5.11 billion during the quarter.

The latest regulatory decisions strengthen Johnson & Johnson’s position in specialized healthcare markets. Imaavy expands the company’s immunology portfolio through rare disease treatment. Meanwhile, Tecvayli’s wider European use supports its presence in cancer care.

The post Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) Stock: Surge as FDA Approval and European Cancer Treatment Expansion Drive Market Attention appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR

• SpaceX plans a $100 billion Louisiana Starship spaceport to expand launch capacity.
• New Louisiana facility will support thousands of Starship flights every year.
• SpaceX adds another launch hub as Starship operations continue scaling globally.
• The 125,000-acre site will feature launchpads, production, and support systems.
• Louisiana Starbase project strengthens SpaceX’s long-term space exploration plans.

Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SPCX) gained 2.60% to $138.51 after announcing plans for a $100 billion Starship spaceport in Louisiana. The project will expand SpaceX’s launch infrastructure and support future Starship missions. The company aims to increase operational capacity through another major launch hub.

Space Exploration Technologies Corp., SPCX

SpaceX Expands Starship Operations With New Louisiana Spaceport

SpaceX announced plans to develop Starbase Louisiana near Pecan Island in Vermilion Parish. The company expects construction to begin by the end of 2027. The facility will become another key location for Starship activities.

The planned spaceport will cover about 125,000 acres of coastal land in southern Louisiana. SpaceX will build launch facilities, processing areas, and production infrastructure. The site will support thousands of Starship flights annually.

The development will include five launch complexes with two launchpads each. It will also feature power generation, propellant production, and transportation systems. SpaceX plans to create a fully integrated space operations center.

Starship Infrastructure Expansion Supports Long Term Space Goals

SpaceX currently operates Starship development and testing from Starbase in Texas. The company also launches missions from Cape Canaveral in Florida and Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. The Louisiana project will add another strategic location.

The new facility will help SpaceX improve Starship launch frequency and mission flexibility. The company continues preparing Starship for commercial, government, and exploration missions. The vehicle remains a central part of SpaceX’s future plans.

The Louisiana location provides access to southern launch paths over the Gulf of Mexico. This positioning supports specialized orbital missions and future satellite deployment programs. SpaceX also plans expanded Starlink operations using Starship vehicles.

SpaceX Strengthens Expansion Strategy Through Major Spaceport Development

The Louisiana spaceport reflects SpaceX’s broader effort to scale its launch operations. The company continues investing in infrastructure to support higher mission demand. The project will require significant development across technology, logistics, and workforce operations.

SpaceX expects the facility to generate economic activity through construction and long-term operations. The site will include employee housing, transportation links, and industrial facilities. Louisiana officials have highlighted the project’s potential regional impact.

The company targets initial site operations around 2030 after completing construction phases. The spaceport will support future Starship launches, satellite deployments, and exploration missions. SpaceX continues expanding its capabilities across multiple launch locations.

The post SpaceX (SPCX) Stock: Surges as $100 Billion Louisiana Starship Spaceport Plan Expands Launch Ambitions appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR

• AstroNova shares traded at $28.99 after merger approval with Arcline.
• Shareholders approved the $29 per share cash acquisition agreement.
• More than 99% of votes supported the merger transaction.
• AstroNova will become private after the August 26 closing.
• Arcline acquisition expands AstroNova’s industrial growth strategy.

AstroNova, Inc. (ALOT) shares traded at $28.99, gaining 0.28%, after shareholders approved its acquisition by Arcline Investment Management. The aerospace and defense technology company secured approval for the merger during a special shareholder meeting held virtually. The transaction will move AstroNova into private ownership after completion.

AstroNova, Inc., ALOT

More than 99% of votes cast supported the merger agreement, representing about 64% of AstroNova’s outstanding common shares. The approval clears a major step toward completing the acquisition scheduled for August 26, 2026. Under the agreement, shareholders will receive $29.00 per share in cash.

AstroNova Receives Shareholder Approval for Arcline Deal

AstroNova shareholders approved the acquisition agreement with Arcline Investment Management following the required voting process. The company said the final certified results will appear in a Current Report on Form 8-K filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The approval allows both companies to continue preparations for closing.

The merger agreement was signed on June 16, 2026, between AstroNova and affiliates of Arcline Investment Management. Following completion, AstroNova will become a privately held company and its common stock will stop trading on Nasdaq. The transaction values each outstanding share at a fixed cash payment of $29.

The acquisition marks a transition period for AstroNova as the company enters a new ownership structure. Arcline Investment Management will support the company through its private investment platform and industrial expertise. The deal follows AstroNova’s long presence in aerospace, defense, labeling, and packaging markets.

Aerospace and Identification Solutions Drive AstroNova Business

AstroNova provides mission-critical identification and marking solutions across aerospace and defense industries. The company designs, manufactures, distributes, and services systems that help customers identify, track, and communicate important information. Its solutions support applications where durability and reliability remain essential.

The company’s aerospace segment focuses on airborne printing solutions, avionics products, and data acquisition systems. It supplies flight deck printing products, networking hardware, and specialized aerospace-grade materials. These offerings serve aviation customers requiring reliable information management systems.

Meanwhile, AstroNova’s Product Identification segment delivers complete marking solutions for multiple industries. The segment provides hardware, software, and consumable products for manufacturers, commercial printers, and brand owners. Its solutions support labels, flexible packaging, corrugated materials, and industrial applications requiring traceability.

Arcline Acquisition Expands Long-Term Industrial Platform Strategy

Arcline Investment Management manages more than $30 billion in assets and focuses on industrial businesses. The firm seeks to develop market-leading platforms that provide essential products and services across specialized sectors. Its investment approach targets companies with long-term growth potential.

The acquisition will allow AstroNova to operate under Arcline’s ownership while maintaining its focus on aerospace and identification markets. The company’s products serve industries where compliance, safety, and operational performance remain important. The new ownership structure will remove AstroNova from public market trading.

AstroNova has built operations around specialized technology solutions that support global customers. The company combines engineering capabilities with manufacturing expertise across different market segments. The Arcline transaction represents a significant corporate milestone as AstroNova moves into its next phase.

The post AstroNova, Inc. (ALOT) Stock: Approves $29 Per Share Acquisition Deal With Arcline Investment Management appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR:

• Morningstar shares fell 1.41% as Gemini Enterprise integration plans emerged.
• Morningstar and PitchBook will ground Gemini responses with trusted market data.
• New MCP integrations will connect public and private market research in Gemini.
• Eligible subscribers can access source-attributed investment intelligence in Gemini.

Morningstar (MORN) shares traded at $214.43, down 1.41%, after the company announced a financial research integration with Google Cloud. Morningstar and PitchBook plan to connect market intelligence with Gemini Enterprise for Financial Services through Model Context Protocol integrations. The move expands Morningstar’s strategy to place trusted investment information directly inside enterprise research workflows used by financial professionals.

Morningstar, Inc., MORN

Morningstar and PitchBook Join Gemini Enterprise

Morningstar and PitchBook will join Google Cloud as launch partners for the Gemini Enterprise for Financial Services preview. The companies expect the integrations to become available soon for eligible Morningstar and PitchBook subscribers across supported software products. Together, the services will combine public and private market intelligence inside one research environment built for professional financial workflows.

Morningstar will provide investment data, ratings, research, analysis, and market intelligence through the planned Gemini Enterprise integration. Meanwhile, PitchBook will contribute private capital information covering companies, funds, transactions, market participants, and broader deal activity worldwide. This combination gives financial professionals access to public and private market sources without repeatedly moving between separate research platforms.

The integration also emphasizes source attribution, allowing users to trace the information supporting responses generated within Gemini Enterprise. That feature supports transparency when professionals review company data, fund research, transaction activity, market trends, or due diligence material. Morningstar and PitchBook will therefore serve as grounding sources across multiple investment research tasks handled through Gemini Enterprise.

MCP Integration Targets Faster Financial Research

The Model Context Protocol connections will allow eligible subscribers to ask targeted financial questions directly within Gemini Enterprise workflows. Users can research investments, companies, funds, transactions, managers, and private capital activity using Morningstar and PitchBook information. The system can return research supported by identifiable source material from both platforms, improving visibility into the underlying information.

Morningstar expects the setup to reduce repeated movement between separate applications used for investment research and market analysis. Financial professionals can incorporate data, research, and market intelligence into existing digital workflows and emerging agent-based enterprise tools. The approach can also simplify routine research steps while keeping underlying source material visible during analysis and review.

PitchBook brings its AI plus human insight methodology into the broader partnership with Google Cloud and Gemini Enterprise. The company uses technology and human review to source, structure, and validate private market information at global scale. Morningstar adds independent research covering listed companies, managed funds, debt securities, private markets, and other investment products worldwide.

Morningstar Expands Access Across Financial AI Platforms

The Gemini Enterprise partnership extends Morningstar’s strategy of distributing proprietary investment intelligence through major enterprise technology platforms and workflows. Morningstar aims to place data and human-led research closer to digital tools financial professionals already use during daily analysis. PitchBook follows the same approach by connecting private capital intelligence with emerging research environments and automated enterprise workflows.

The announcement comes as financial firms increase their use of automated systems for research, analysis, and information discovery. Reliable inputs remain essential because generated answers depend heavily on the quality, transparency, and structure of underlying financial information. Morningstar and PitchBook are positioning verified market intelligence as a foundation for workflows that require transparent and attributable source support.

Morningstar operates across 32 countries and provides data, research, ratings, and investment services across public and private markets. The company reported about $375 billion in assets under management and advisement as of June 30, 2026. PitchBook serves more than 100,000 clients worldwide, extending Morningstar’s private capital coverage across companies, funds, deals, and market participants.

The post Morningstar, Inc. (MORN) Stock: Targets AI Investment Research With New Gemini Enterprise Integration appeared first on Blockonomi.

TLDR

• Quantum Cyber stock rises as new sales leadership boosts U.S. defense expansion plans
• QUCY advances drone manufacturing strategy with stronger commercial operations
• Quantum Cyber appoints veteran distributor to lead U.S. sales growth efforts
• Defense technology firm expands domestic production after facility acquisition progress
• QUCY builds autonomous defense market presence through manufacturing and sales growth

Quantum Cyber N.V. (QUCY) rose 5.70% to $1.3850 as the company expanded its U.S. defense sales strategy. The move followed the appointment of Dennis Schnur as Head of U.S. Sales. The company aims to strengthen commercial operations for autonomous defense systems across the United States.

Quantum Cyber N.V., QUCY

Quantum Cyber Strengthens U.S. Sales Leadership

Quantum Cyber appointed Schnur immediately to lead its U.S. sales expansion efforts. The role supports the company’s transition toward broader commercial activity in domestic markets. Meanwhile, Quantum Cyber continues developing systems for drone defense, counter-UAS, demining, and command operations.

Schnur brings more than six decades of wholesale distribution experience to the company. He previously managed product movement, supplier relationships, and large-scale distribution activities across multiple industries. Therefore, Quantum Cyber expects his background to support customer engagement and sales development.

His experience includes partnerships with global brands in consumer and technology sectors. His career also involved negotiating agreements and managing distributor networks at scale. The appointment adds commercial leadership as the company builds its U.S. manufacturing presence.

Quantum Cyber Advances Domestic Defense Manufacturing

Quantum Cyber recently completed the acquisition of a U.S.-based manufacturing facility in Bridgeport, Connecticut. The facility supports the production of domestically manufactured autonomous defense platforms. The company also assembled its first mini-interceptor drone at the location.

The Nevada subsidiary Quantum Drones Corporation assumed previously reported purchase orders for its products. This development supports Quantum Cyber’s efforts to advance manufacturing and sales activities. The company focuses on integrating advanced systems for defense and security applications.

Schnur also brings military experience from his service with the U.S. Army Reserve. He served with the 77th Army Reserve Command during the late 1960s. His background includes decades of support for law enforcement and first responder communities.

Quantum Cyber Expands Defense Commercialization Strategy

Quantum Cyber continues building its presence in the U.S. defense technology sector through manufacturing growth. The company develops autonomous platforms designed for modern security challenges. Its product focus includes drone operations, counter-UAS solutions, and command systems.

The company operates through its subsidiaries to support production and commercial expansion. Quantum Drones Corporation manages key activities related to domestic drone manufacturing. This structure allows Quantum Cyber to advance its operational goals.

The appointment of Schnur marks a new stage in the company’s sales development plans. Quantum Cyber combines manufacturing investments with experienced commercial leadership. The company continues positioning its systems for wider defense market adoption.

The post Quantum Cyber N.V. (QUCY) Stock: Gains as Company Expands U.S. Defense Sales appeared first on Blockonomi.

XRP has flipped the script this week, emerging as one of the market’s strongest performers after weeks of lackluster performance. The crypto asset briefly tapped $1.76 before stabilizing near $1.50.

A sharp rise in network participation has now added fresh weight to the rally.

Higher Levels

Ali Martinez reported that active addresses climbed from 47,180 to 356,070, an astonishing 654.71% increase in days. A spike of this size usually reflects a sharp rise in participation and can come alongside increased volatility in the token’s price.

If this is really the start of a new XRP trend, analyst Casi Trades said that the $1.20 level could soon become a thing of the past. She expects the asset to first move toward $1.78, followed by a pullback to roughly $1.30 before another push to $2.57.

The full five-wave structure could eventually take XRP to around $2.90, according to the analysis, completing Wave 1 of a much larger macro Wave 3. A later correction may bring the asset back toward $1.65, which could turn the resistance seen today into support. In that scenario, the important point is not just how high XRP could go, but whether the token ever gets another chance to trade below $1.20.

As the Ripple token cleared seven months of resistance with a roughly 70% gain in one weekly candle from the accumulation zone, Crypto Patel said that the focus is now turning to $1.55. Holding above that level could set up another bullish move, while a break below may lead to retracement or re-accumulation. The $5-$10 range remains the long-term target.

Strong Week For ETFs

On the institutional front, US-based spot XRP ETFs began last week quietly, recording zero flows on Monday, but the numbers quickly changed. Flows reached $5.81 million on Tuesday before coming in at $2.35 million on Wednesday.

From there, activity picked up following the US Treasury Department’s announcement that it would double the maximum size of liquidity-support buybacks for longer-dated government debt. Thursday saw $13.24 million, while Friday reached $18.38 million, which was the strongest level since mid-May.

The buying trend has continued into this week. $13.82 million in inflows were recorded on August 25th. Bitwise’s fund led the chart with $8.25 million, followed by Franklin and Canary’s ETFs with $4 million and $1.57 million, respectively.

The post Ripple (XRP) Just Posted a Huge Network Jump: Here’s the Level That Matters Now appeared first on CryptoPotato.

The OG meme coin followed the green wave sweeping through the cryptocurrency sector, with its price climbing to a nearly three-month high.

Some analysts think the token is set for a relatively mild increase ahead, while others foresee an explosion to a new all-time high.

What’s Next?

DOGE currently trades just south of $0.09, representing roughly a 30% pump from a week ago. It remains the biggest meme coin and even widened the gap between itself and Shiba Inu after its market capitalization neared $14 billion.

Not long ago, Ali Martinez identified $0.0813 as key resistance, where more than 30 million DOGE were previously traded. He believes a sustained close above this level (as it happened) could result in a further upside, setting the next target at around $0.177.

In addition, the analyst outlined numerous factors that point to a bullish move ahead. Among those are the whales’ accumulation and the Tom DeMark Sequential indicator, which flashed a buy signal.

Martinez’s prediction is modest compared to those of many other analysts. X user MikybullCrypto envisioned an “explosive move on the horizon” that could result in a pump to $3. Vuori Trading was even more bullish, opining that DOGE is “most likely going to $10.”

It is worth noting that such an ascent would require the meme coin’s market capitalization to surpass $1.5 trillion. Even with the recent crypto boom, that type of increase seems quite unrealistic (to put it mildly).

The Key Formation

Approximately a week ago, X user The Great Mattsby paid attention to Dogecoin’s Bollinger Bands. They noted that the channels have tightened and wondered whether this isn’t the biggest squeeze in the asset’s history.

Such a setup usually occurs during periods of low volatility and could be a precursor to a major move (though the direction is unclear, as it may also lead to a violent pullback). At the moment, it seems the squeeze was followed by a significant pump, but who knows what the future holds.

In the meantime, certain elements suggest a correction could be on the way. DOGE inflows into exchanges have surpassed outflows over the past several days, suggesting that some investors have abandoned self-custody and flocked to centralized platforms. This increases the immediate selling pressure and could negatively impact the price in the short term.

The post Dogecoin (DOGE) Rises 30% in a Week: What Are the Next Targets? appeared first on CryptoPotato.

The exchange has signed a non-binding letter of intent with Apex Fintech Solutions that would make its subsidiary, Gemini Titan, the exclusive regulated venue for crypto event contracts.

According to the press release, these contracts will be distributed through Apex’s futures commission merchant (FCM) to its brokerage customers.

Brokerages offering those contracts through the Apex FCM would use Gemini for execution and clearing. The release said Gemini also gives Apex flexibility to collaborate on sports, economics, and financial markets contracts on a non-exclusive basis. Both firms said they look forward to finalizing details in the coming weeks.

Gemini’s forward-looking statements described the arrangement as a non-binding letter of intent and listed the possibility that the parties fail to reach a definitive agreement among the risks investors should weigh.

Two Licenses Came First

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) approval arrived in stages, and Gemini Titan already secured a Designated Contract Market (DCM) license in December 2025, which let Gemini start offering regulated prediction markets to US customers.

Gemini first filed for that license in March 2020. In April, subsidiary Gemini Olympus obtained a Derivatives Clearing Organization (DCO) license, moving derivatives clearing and settlement for Gemini Titan in-house.

“Leveraging more than a decade of experience building and operating a regulated platform for crypto, a new and emergent asset class, we deliberately chose to build our predictions platform in-house,” Gemini CEO Tyler Winklevoss said.

He added that predictions are “the future of markets” and that the approach lets Gemini “expand our offering and open access to valued partners like Apex as demand for event contracts grows.”

The two companies have shipped together before. Gemini launched stock trading at 0% commissions for certain US customers in July, with Apex Clearing Corporation acting as custodian and clearing broker.

Event Contract Revenue

Apex Global Head of Digital Markets Travis McGhee noted that brokerage clients “get regulated access to crypto event contracts without having to build the plumbing themselves.”

Apex says its infrastructure supports hundreds of clients and tens of millions of end investors, and its Apex Clearing Corporation subsidiary is licensed in 53 states and territories.

Similarly, Robinhood booked $156 million in event contract revenue in the second quarter, more than 10 times higher than a year earlier, on a record 13.6 billion contracts.

Gemini’s prediction market arm is already in court, though. New York Attorney General Letitia James sued the prediction market arms of Coinbase and Gemini, arguing that they run unlicensed gambling without New York State Gaming Commission approval.

“Gambling by another name is still gambling, and it is not exempt from regulation under our state laws and Constitution,” James stated.

The post Gemini Signs Apex Letter of Intent to Bring Crypto Event Contracts to Brokerages appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Cosmos Labs has urged affected networks in contact with its team to halt operations amid an ongoing security incident involving the EVM module.

Statements issued by KiiChain, TAC, and MANTRA have all pointed to flaws within the Cosmos EVM infrastructure when describing the attacks they faced in recent days.  Cosmos Labs, however, has yet to establish publicly whether the incidents stemmed from one common flaw or clarify which networks were specifically instructed to suspend operations.

EVM Security Crisis Escalates

Cosmos Labs said it will publish an incident report once the situation has been resolved. Meanwhile, KiiChain said an attacker drained 148,326,583.15 KII from wallets on August 22, repeating the same technique 18 times against different targets. The chain detected the activity internally and halted at block 9,355,723, thereby stopping further theft and freezing funds that remained on the network. According to KiiChain, the root cause had been identified, reproduced and fixed.

It said that the vulnerability was in the shared Cosmos EVM module, rather than KiiChain-specific code. The chain said three upstream defects combined to enable the attack, including an underflow in the staking precompile when it writes a post-delegation balance back to the EVM, along with two other undisclosed bugs.

KiiChain said the same class of vulnerability affected Cosmos EVM chains with vesting accounts enabled and linked the issue to the compromises of MANTRA and TAC during the same week.

The handling of the vulnerability has also come under scrutiny. A security fix for one of the three flaws was made public on August 19, but KiiChain said affected networks were not given advance notice and the release was not clearly flagged as a critical security update. When communication reached the affected chains two days later, the fix was included with unrelated issues already being handled privately. It was not accompanied by a recommendation to halt networks.

By then, MANTRA had already been exploited. KiiChain said an emergency halt could have contained the risk much faster than a software upgrade, which requires validators to review, test, and deploy the patch.

TAC separately said an attacker exploited a vulnerability in the Cosmos EVM precompile layer on the same day and drained a single account. The chain was halted to stop the attack, and it was said that the defect was not in TAC-specific code. The chain said 2,985,651,403 TAC was moved between accounts. No new tokens were created, and the total supply remained unchanged. Only TAC was affected, while other assets on the network remained intact.

Mantra Security Incident

MANTRA halted its Layer 1 network last week as a precaution for about 30 hours. The project later said it had identified the root cause, contained the immediate threat, and that no user funds were exploited.

MANTRA said the incident affected two wallet addresses, and the network resumed operations after a patch was deployed.

The post Cosmos Labs Urges EVM Chains to Halt as KiiChain and TAC Attacks Raise Security Fears appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Bitcoin (BTC) broke higher last week, ending a multi-month range and closing near $77,700. The move followed a $62,750 weekly low, marking a nearly 24% rise as the leading cryptocurrency topped $71,000 on August 20.

The rally came despite August’s historically weak performance for Bitcoin, according to the Bitfinex Alpha report. The report noted that August has typically delivered negative median returns, making last week’s move a notable shift from the month’s historical pattern.

Liquidity and ETF Demand Strengthen Bitcoin’s Breakout

A key catalyst was the U.S. Treasury’s expansion of its bond buyback program. The announcement triggered a liquidity response, while $3 billion in Bitcoin short positions were liquidated over two days, marking the largest short-side wipeout on record.

Long liquidations remained limited, while futures open interest rose to $51 billion. That combination suggests fresh positions entered the market rather than the rally coming only from traders closing leverage.

Beyond the derivatives market, spot demand provided another source of support. U.S. Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) posted about $1.92 billion in weekly net inflows, their strongest weekly total since October 2025. That lifted assets under management above $96 billion.

Corporate activity, however, remained subdued. Strategy, the largest publicly traded corporate Bitcoin holder, reported no BTC purchases or sales in its filing. The pause came after a period of activity and left its average acquisition price at around $75,385, below the market price.  With BTC now above that level, the company has moved from a $9.5 billion paper loss to a $4.7 billion paper profit.

Mixed Signals Emerge Beneath the Breakout

Bitfinex analysts said Strategy could influence whether Bitcoin maintains the breakout because the company stopped selling shortly before BTC moved beyond its summer range. The shift removes one source of supply pressure that had been present during the consolidation.

Meanwhile, on-chain activity presents a more cautious picture. Bitcoin transfer volumes remain close to eight-year lows, suggesting network activity has not matched the price move. At the same time, short-term holders with cost bases near $64,500 and $73,500 have moved into profit.

Those holders could help turn previous resistance into support if the breakout holds. Bitfinex identified thin supply between current prices and a heavier concentration around $84,000 to $85,000, creating a potential next hurdle.

The broader liquidity backdrop also supports this interpretation. Mortgage rates fell for a second week while housing activity remained weak. Builders kept cutting prices as housing starts fell, suggesting easier financial conditions may reach asset markets before the wider economy.

The post Bitcoin’s Massive Breakout: Here’s Why Analysts Say This Rally Is Different appeared first on CryptoPotato.