The White House Tech Leaders Meeting is held today; Trump will attend with the SEC and CFTC chairs and multiple crypto industry executives
BlockBeats message: On August 19, crypto journalist Eleanor Terrett posted that the White House Tech Leaders Meeting will begin today at 2:30 p.m. Eastern Time. U.S. President Donald Trump is expected to deliver remarks together with SEC Chair Paul Atkins and CFTC Chair Selig. Crypto and traditional finance executives expected to attend include Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse, Payward/Kraken co-CEOs Arjun Sethi, Gemini co-founders Cameron Winklevoss and Tyler Winklevoss, Chainlink co-founder Sergey Nazarov, a16z partner Chris Dixon, Blockchain.com CEO Peter Smith, BitGo CEO Mike Belshe, and others.
BlockBeats message, on August 19, according to Coinglass data, in the past 24 hours, liquidations across the entire network totaled $1.411 billion, including $156 million from long liquidations and $1.254 billion from short liquidations.
In the most recent 24 hours, a total of 108,406 people worldwide were liquidated. The largest single liquidation order occurred on Bitget - ETHUSDT_UMCBL, worth $32.1836 million.
BlockBeats message: On August 19, U.S. President Trump said that negotiations with Iran could take place at some point. Iran cannot be allowed to have nuclear weapons because they would use them. Last night, many ships passed through the Strait of Hormuz. When all this is over, oil prices will fall sharply. (Jin10)
Citi takes a bearish view of the minutes’ “hawkish” tone; JPMorgan focuses on inflation disagreements within the Fed
BlockBeats message: On August 20, at the July meeting, three Federal Reserve officials voted against the decision to keep interest rates unchanged. They believed the Fed should raise rates because core inflation at the time was still as high as 2.6%, clearly above the Fed’s 2% target. But data released in August is weakening the rationale for their support of a rate hike. The July CPI report showed that after excluding food and energy prices with higher volatility, core prices rose 2.5% year over year— the lowest level since March 2021. At the same time, the July employment report showed the U.S. lost 23,000 jobs that month. Citigroup’s chief U.S. economist Andrew Hollenhorst said these data “will make it difficult for the meeting minutes to significantly change the market’s current expectations for the probability of a rate hike, which has already been reduced.”
U.S. CFTC publicly solicits comments on launching computing power derivative contracts
BlockBeats message: On August 20, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) issued a notice soliciting public comments on the listing of cryptocurrency computing power derivative contracts and related market regulatory issues, in order to further understand and improve regulation of the computing power derivatives market. CFTC Chair Michael S. Selig said: "If there were no robust computing power derivatives market, the U.S. would not be able to win the AI race." He noted that just as U.S. markets once established trading standards for large-scale commodities to advance the industrial economy, they will in the future also develop corresponding rules for computing power products that drive the "intelligent economy." This public consultation is the first step toward establishing clear rules for the U.S. computing power market.
Fed rate decision preview: inflation concerns and policy splits become the focus
BlockBeats message. On August 20, Tim Duy, chief U.S. economist at SGH Macro Advisors, said that the Federal Reserve has recently seen multiple officials cast dissenting votes on interest-rate decisions, a situation that has become more common over the past few years. Especially during periods when the economy faces multiple pressures and the policy path is not clear, officials may have strong disagreements, leading to more dissenting votes. Regarding the upcoming release of the Fed meeting minutes, Duy believes the market’s main focus will be how widespread officials’ concerns about inflation are. He noted that at the time, inflation appeared to be clearly higher than the Fed’s target, and policymakers were worried that inflation would not quickly fall back to the target level.
A giant 40x short whale added another 800 BTC to its short position, jumping to become the largest BTC short seller on Hyperliquid
BlockBeats message: On August 20, according to monitoring by TradingBeats (formerly Hyperinsight), a whale address starting with 0x66 added to its short position tonight when BTC saw a rapid surge. It bought an additional 800 BTC short, increasing its 40x short position size to 1,200 BTC, jumping to become the largest BTC short seller on Hyperliquid. It is currently sitting on an unrealized loss of $2.39 million. The average entry price is $66,891, with a liquidation price of $70,039. Data shows that this whale address has been labeled as “huge profits” + “giant whale,” meaning its cumulative historical realized and unrealized P/L exceeds $1 million. The perpetual account’s net asset value (excluding spot holdings and collateral) ranges from $1 million to $5 million. Its historical completed trades have a win rate of 55%.
BlockBeats message: On August 19, according to TradingBeats (formerly Hyperinsight), monitoring shows that on Hyperliquid, BTC’s second-largest long position has increased its unrealized profit to $5.82 million. This address currently holds a leveraged 40x Bitcoin long position comprising 1,000 BTC, with a position value of $68.18 million and an opening price of $62,353.
In addition, this address also holds a leveraged 20x Ethereum long position worth $20.67 million, with an unrealized profit of $3.05 million and an opening price of $1,761.
BlockBeats message: August 19, according to TradingBeats (formerly Hyperinsight), monitoring shows that a certain whale shorted 1,800 BTC, with a position value of approximately $125 million. As BTC continued to rebound, the short position was fully liquidated, resulting in a loss of about $2.9 million.
Aster launches the “Niu Lai” contract trading contest, with a total prize pool of $10,000
BlockBeats message: On August 19, Aster announced the launch of a Meme coin “Niu Lai” perpetual contract trading contest, with a total prize pool of $10,000. The event runs from 22:00 on August 19, 2026 to 07:59 on August 24. Eligible trading pairs are “Niu Lai USDT,” with a maximum leverage of 5x. Rewards will be distributed in ASTER. This event sets up two independent leaderboards. Users may participate in both at the same time and receive rewards separately. The trading volume leaderboard has a prize pool of $8,000. Prizes are awarded based on cumulative trading volume; the first-place winner receives $2,500. The realized profit and loss leaderboard has a prize pool of $2,000. Prizes are awarded based on realized profit and loss denominated in US dollars; the first-place winner receives $800. Rewards from the two leaderboards can be combined.
Binance Blockchain Week will be held in Bangkok, Thailand in November, focusing on the integration of traditional finance and the crypto industry
BlockBeats News. On August 19, Binance announced that Binance Blockchain Week will be held in Bangkok, Thailand, at the Queen Sirikit National Convention Centre (QSNCC) on November 28–29, 2026. This marks Binance Blockchain Week returning to Asia again after Singapore, Istanbul, Paris, and Dubai. This year’s event, themed “EVOLVE,” is expected to bring together thousands of developers, institutional investors, fintech leaders, and policymakers. It will focus on industry trends such as bitcoin institutionalization, stablecoin payments, DeFi institutionalization, tokenization of RWA (real-world assets), tokenized stocks, cross-border payments, the integration of AI and the crypto industry, and regulatory frameworks.
BlockBeats news: On August 19, according to market data from BIT (bit.com), the Nasdaq Biotechnology Index rose 5.3%, hitting a record high, and Moderna (MRNA) surged 153%.
BlockBeats messages, on August 19, according to official information, X Layer officially launched an RWA ecosystem liquidity incentive program. The total incentive pool amounts to 5 million US dollars. The program aims to enhance the liquidity of RWA ecosystem assets and improve the trading experience. This round of incentives will be carried out in multiple phases. The first phase will provide a liquidity incentive of 300,000 US dollars, covering the liquidity of trading pairs related to RWA in a comprehensive manner, including trading pairs between RWA and stablecoins, as well as trading pairs between RWA and ecosystem tokens.
It is reported that X Layer is continuously improving the RWA ecosystem infrastructure to support the issuance, trading, and liquidity of more RWA assets on-chain.
BlockBeats news, August 19, according to Coinglass data, during the past 24 hours, a total of $298 million was liquidated across the entire web, including $98.84 million liquidated from long positions and $199 million liquidated from short positions.