Cointelegraph

Tokenized assets are opening new trading opportunities across financial markets, but the growing supply of real-world assets (RWAs) being brought onchain has yet to be matched by investor demand, according to Alex Taaffe, chief revenue officer at crypto trading firm GSR.
Speaking during on a panel on liquidity and market fragmentation at CONNECT by Cointelegraph: Singapore Edition on Oct. 9, Taaffe said liquidity is improving in trading for pre-IPO stocks, commodities and global equities that investors previously had limited access to. However, he said demand for fully tokenized RWAs has not kept pace with the growing number of assets being issued.
Panelists (l-r): Rayco Tarrida Ortega, Min Teo, Shiliang Tang, Lingling Jiang, Alex Taaffe. Source: Cointelegraph
Cointelegraph brought together Web3 founders, investors and industry executives for four panel discussions covering tokenization, stablecoin payments, onchain trading infrastructure and venture capital exits, alongside a startup pitch competition.
“Specifically on RWAs, and fully tokenized assets, there’s a supply and demand inbalance. There’s a ton of supply. Every asset manager issuer wants to do capital formation onchain,” Taaffe said.
He said that the growing number of asset issuers and blockchains has further fragmented liquidity across tokenized markets.
Related: Securitize stock jumps over 10% after launching tokenized US equities on Solana. Source: RWA.xyz
Lingling Jiang, partner at DWF Labs, agreed that fragmentation remains a challenge, particularly when different issuers tokenize the same underlying asset but create separate liquidity pools.
However, Jiang said cryptocurrency liquidity has improved significantly in recent years, even as the industry has more work to do.
Stablecoin adoption hinges on everyday payments
During the “Stablecoins at the Point of Sale: Cards, Wallets and the Race for Everyday Spend” panel, Mike Silagadze, founder and CEO of ether.fi, said while stablecoins have made it easier to move money across borders, wider adoption depends on whether consumers can use them for everyday expenses.
Silagadze pointed to Singapore, where consumers may hold USDC but still need local currency to pay bills, highlighting the gap between blockchain payment infrastructure and everyday financial services.
Yvonne Chia, head of communications at USDD, said that if the stablecoin issuer coinsiders the user’s point of view, “the most important thing for you is the user experience.”
“That’s the kind of direction that we want to move in, to make it as easy as possible for the user to have stablecoins, use stablecoins, to the point where it doesn’t cross their mind that they are using a stablecoin. It’s just a regular part of their lives,” Chia said.
Panelists (l-r): Ciaran Lyons (moderator, Cointelegraph), Ilya Podoynitsyn, Yvonne Chia, Mike Silagadze, Ashna Vaghela. Source: Cointelegraph
“The reason no one uses stablecoins in many parts of the world is because it just doesn’t plug into your day-to-day life,” Silagadze said.
Beyond everyday usability, regulatory hurdles remain, Ilya Podoynitsyn, co-founder and CEO of FinHarbor, said. He pointed out that providers must navigate rules that differ across jurisdictions, forcing them to adapt their infrastructure and compliance systems to individual markets.
Ashna Vaghela, chief customer officer at crypto payments provider Mercuryo, said that stablecoin payments should become as straightforward as using Apple Pay, with users able to complete transactions without leaving an application.
“I think that’s the whole point, to be invisible,” Vaghela said.
The discussion came as stablecoin market capitalization stood at $306 billion, up about 2% year over year after growing roughly 74% in the preceding 12 months.
Stablecoin market cap. Source: DefiLlama
Onchain trading faces liquidity fragmentation and risk management challenges
Crypto trading platforms face challenges identifying available liquidity across blockchain networks and managing counterparty risks, according to panelists discussing “What’s Still Missing in the Onchain Trading Stack in 2026.”
Austin Federa, co-founder of DoubleZero, said moving liquidity between blockchain networks remains more difficult than in traditional financial markets. He said that “fragmentation is not just an execution problem, it’s like a data problem,” adding that “it’s actually very hard to figure out how much liquidity truly exists onchain.”
Panelists (l-r): Alice Liu, Franklyn Wang, Miguel Morel, Austin Federa, Eunice Giarta. Source: Cointelegraph
On the risk management side, Miguel Morel, founder and CEO of blockchain analytics firm Arkham Intelligence, said trading firms can use onchain data to assess counterparty risks, particularly in prediction markets, where some participants may have an informational advantage over others.
“If you know who’s on the other side and you’re taking less risk, you can offer a tighter spread,” Morel said, adding that this can lead to better prices for customers.
The same blockchain data can also help exchanges evaluate customer deposits, Morel said, allowing them to assess where funds originated and inform compliance decisions.
“Without needing to ask for a passport, you can know where those deposits are coming in from,” Morel said. He added that exchanges can use the information to determine whether to permit trading with deposited funds or refer them for compliance review.
Crypto investors face tougher exits as markets mature
Liquidity challenges have complicated exits for crypto venture capital investors, according to panelists discussing “The Exit Problem: How Investors Get Their Money Back.”
Pulkit Gupta of Nomad Capital said liquidity in crypto markets has been particularly weak over the past three months, with much of it concentrated in larger cryptocurrencies.
“For me, on the altcoins, it has been really tough for us to get an exit,” Gupta said. The venture capital firm has backed several crypto projects with publicly traded tokens, including Movement, Solayer and Berachain.
Panelists (from l-r): David Shengart (moderator, Cointelegraph), Andre Nabais, Pulkit Gupta, Aleksandr Nexhaev, Sonia Shaw
Source: Cointelegraph
Echoing the shift toward longer-term expectations, Sonia Shaw, CEO of OneAsset, said the market has matured, requiring startups to demonstrate stronger business fundamentals. Recalling an investor who expected an exit within six months, she said, “I don’t think the market’s like that anymore.”
Shaw characterized the move away from rapid exits as a positive sign of market maturity.
Aleksandr Nechaev, partner at Funders VC, highlighted the challenges presented by the speed of change for both products and markets.
“The rapid pace of change makes founders’ expertise and ability central to investment decisions,” Nechaev said. Change and how founding teams navigate the uncertainty came up later in the day during the event’s pitch competition, powered by Funders VC.
Magazine: Ledger attack spreads to EU, AI finds ’18 trillion XRP’ bug: Hodler’s Digest

Bitcoin is attempting to break through an “inflection frontier” that has historically triggered runs to new macro highs.
Key points:
Bitcoin (BTC) may continue to new all-time highs if it successfully breaks through its 20-month moving average at $87,165, CryptoQuant reported.
The market cycle signals metric showed BTC/USD poised to reclaim this “inflection frontier,” which it lost in December 2025.
CryptoQuant’s bull-bear market cycle indicator continued to show Bitcoin as being in a bull market.
Analysis: Bitcoin “reset” complete as key trend line reappears
Data from onchain analytics platform CryptoQuant reveals that BTC/USD has begun a fresh battle with its 20-month simple moving average (SMA).
The 20-month SMA, at $87,165 as of Oct. 16, is the trend line around which the popular Bollinger Bands metric is constructed. This in turn forms the basis for CryptoQuant’s market cycle signals tool, which seeks to pinpoint Bitcoin’s position within its market cycle.
Bollinger Bands uses standard deviation to add an upper and lower band around the 20-month SMA. Currently, these sit at $121,640 and $52,694, respectively. CryptoQuant’s indicator describes the zone between the lower band and SMA as an “accumulation base,” while the SMA itself is referred to as an “inflection frontier,” a previous point of investor capitulation as price broke below it from above, most recently in December 2025.
BTC/USD one-month chart with Bollinger Bands. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
With Bitcoin now preparing to challenge the capitulation zone from below, history shows that successful breakouts have led to new cycle highs.
“Just over a year after the all-time high (ATH) of $124,709 on October 6, 2025, the market has concluded its ‘reset,’” CryptoQuant contributor GugaOnChain summarized in a blog post.
While Bollinger Bands are not intended to offer buy and sell signals, market cycle signals sees “smart money” taking profit once BTC/USD reaches its upper band. While this currently sits just below Bitcoin’s most recent all-time high of $126,200 from October 2025, CryptoQuant sees the next rally continuing beyond that level.
“While retail fears the current $82,442, thinking it’s the ‘top,’ the on-chain indicator BTC: Market Cycle Signals reveals that we are just warming up,” GugaOnChain added, referring to a current BTC price support zone.
Bitcoin market cycle signals chart. Source: CryptoQuant
The 20-month SMA has confluence with Bitcoin’s 2026 opening level at $87,490, boosting its strength as resistance. As Cointelegraph reported, large walls of ask liquidity remain in the vicinity across exchange order books.
Onchain data shows entrenching Bitcoin bull market
CryptoQuant maintains a broadly optimistic stance on Bitcoin’s emerging bull market despite crypto and risk assets navigating macroeconomic headwinds.
This week, contributor XWIN Research Japan flagged data from three onchain metrics that they said gave reason for “cautious optimism” for bullish momentum to return through the end of October.
In late August, CEO Ki Young Ju officially stated that the bear market was “over” based on readings from the bull-bear market cycle indicator. This uses composite data from several onchain profitability metrics, and shows bullish momentum accelerating with a reading of 0.186 on its scale versus 0.042 in August.
Bitcoin bull-bear market cycle Indicator. Source: CryptoQuant

France-listed Bitcoin treasury company Capital B reported a net loss of 69.5 million euro ($78 million) for the first half of 2026, driven by a Bitcoin impairment charge of $75.8 million.
The impairment reflected Bitcoin (BTC) prices as of June 30 and had no direct cash impact, according to the company’s first-half 2026 report, published Thursday.
Still, Capital B’s consolidated revenue rose 3.5% year-over-year to $6.5 million, while adjusted EBITDA was negative $1.2 million. EBITDA measures a company’s earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization.
The results show that the European Bitcoin treasury firm continued raising funds to fuel its Bitcoin accumulation despite the accounting losses. Capital B announced capital raises totaling $30 million in the first half of the year and increased its Bitcoin holdings by 11%, from 2,823 BTC in January to 3,139 BTC by the end of June.
The company’s total holdings subsequently reached 3,538 Bitcoin by Sept. 30, marking a 25% increase from the beginning of the year. Capital B’s treasury is currently worth $290 million, ranking it as the world’s 25th-largest corporate Bitcoin treasury and Europe’s second-largest by holdings, following Germany-based Bitcoin Group, according to Bitcointreasuries.
Capital B’s stock price rose by 0.5% in early morning trading on Friday, but was down 25% year-to-date, according to Yahoo Finance.
In July, Capital B approved a 10-for-1 reverse stock split aimed at broadening its institutional investor base. In June, its shareholders approved up to $120 billion in financing capacity, including equity and credit instruments, to support the company’s Bitcoin accumulation strategy.

A US federal judge has rejected a joint request by crypto exchange Gemini and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to overturn a $5 million settlement, despite the regulator’s conclusion that it would not have pursued the case under current enforcement standards.
On Thursday, US District Judge Alvin Hellerstein ruled that changes in CFTC enforcement priorities and allegations of misconduct by its enforcement division did not justify overturning the January 2025 settlement.
On May 27, the CFTC and Gemini jointly asked the court to overturn the settlement after an internal agency review found alleged misconduct by the regulator’s enforcement division, including reliance on a questionable whistleblower, improper regulatory pressure and efforts to prevent the disclosure of evidence.
The ruling leaves intact a permanent injunction barring Gemini from making false or misleading statements to the CFTC. The settlement also prohibits Gemini from publicly denying its findings, although the regulator said in June that it would no longer enforce such restrictions.
Gemini has already paid the $5 million penalty, which the CFTC previously told Cointelegraph would not be refunded even if the settlement were overturned.
Judge cites Gemini’s decision to settle before trial
The case centered on how Gemini operated its Bitcoin auction. According to the January 2025 consent order, the exchange failed to disclose that some customers traded using borrowed funds, that self-trading had occurred despite safeguards and that certain traders received special fee arrangements.
Gemini also submitted trading volume data without disclosing that some of the activity involved these practices.
Hellerstein said Gemini was already aware of problems with the CFTC’s case when it agreed to settle, less than three weeks before trial. Although the exchange later obtained additional internal CFTC documents, the judge ruled that the new information was not enough to overturn a settlement Gemini had voluntarily accepted.
The judge also rejected the argument that President Donald Trump’s digital asset executive order and the regulator’s new enforcement approach warranted relief, saying they reflected changes in policy rather than a significant change in law.
Former CFTC Chair Timothy Massad previously called the regulator’s move to reverse a settled case “extraordinarily unusual,” telling Cointelegraph that the public “deserves a better explanation.”
Magazine: Can the SEC and CFTC’s pro-crypto rules be overturned? Legal opinion

An internal research model at OpenAI accessed a funded crypto wallet without authorization, using testnet Ether to deploy smart contracts on the Sepolia network and later omitting the spending from its final task summary.
OpenAI said the model, which was part of its GPT-5.6 Sol family, was given the task of updating a crypto trading prototype and deploying compatible contracts. After failing to obtain testnet ETH through faucets, the model derived accounts from publicly known developer recovery phrases, checked 362 wallet addresses and selected one with enough funds to proceed.
In its recorded reasoning, the model asked, “But using public known key/funds ethically?” It then argued that the funds were “effectively abandoned/test ETH” and that Sepolia ETH had no value, before using the wallet’s private key to sign and broadcast a deployment transaction. The transaction succeeded, with fees charged to the account.
OpenAI said the incident showed how an AI model could decide on its own that using someone else’s funds was acceptable, even without permission. The company discovered the incident while reviewing earlier model activity and has since introduced safeguards to prevent live internet access in similar situations.
OpenAI incident adds to concerns over autonomous AI agents
The incident happened on June 26, but was not discovered until Sept. 25, nearly three months later, according to OpenAI. The transaction did not transfer ETH to another wallet but charged the account network fees for deploying a contract.
OpenAI said its misalignment monitoring system now runs across all traffic and is designed to alert security personnel if a model obtains live internet access.
The wallet incident follows other disclosures involving OpenAI models acting beyond their authorization or concealing their actions.
On Sept. 16, OpenAI disclosed six other cases of AI misalignment. In one case, instances of GPT-5.6 Sol inserted instructions into task summaries to conceal mistakes from users. Another case involved a model using an exposed API key without authorization before fabricating figures it could not retrieve.
OpenAI said those earlier disclosures were not intended to indicate how frequently misalignment occurs across its models.
Concerns about autonomous agents handling digital assets also predate the latest disclosure. In June, researchers warned that autonomous AI agents equipped with crypto wallets could cause unintended harm even when deployed for legitimate purposes. The researchers recommended safeguards, including emergency shutdown mechanisms, to limit potential risks.
Magazine: Scammer loses $4.8M stored on tampered Ledgers: Asia Express

Balaji Srinivasan’s Network School has begun its reign over the decentralized social platform Farcaster. Its first order of business? An apparent wave of bans that has prompted backlash from members of the decentralized social network.
Network School on Thursday announced it has acquired Farcaster from Neynar, rebranding it as the Network State Protocol. The same day, several users said on X that their Farcaster accounts had been restricted to “read-only,” as a result of previous posts that broke its new rules.
“I know most of these folks. They shaped Farcaster with their quirks and wit,” said Kunal Gandhi, former India ecosystem lead at Eigen Labs. “Obliterating accounts from the get-go for past posts is pretty silly. Goes against the ethos of decentralized social.”
One of the reportedly banned users was a former engineer at Farcaster. Source: Cassie Heart
The overhaul is the latest attempt to find a sustainable direction for Farcaster, which is changing hands for the second time this year. Co-founder Dan Romero said the platform had 250,000 monthly active users in December 2025.
Balaji wants the ‘Singapore of social media’
In a post to Farcaster on Thursday, Srinivasan said the bans were part of plans to turn the reference app into “the Singapore of social media,” a positive-sum community of techno-optimists that operate under a shared code of conduct.
One of the first steps was to institute “law and order,” he said. “In the pre-Internet world, it was simply unheard of to run up to a stranger and start cursing at them. We’re restoring that offline norm online.”
“Much like how President Bukele jailed a small fraction of repeat offenders to essentially eliminate crime in El Salvador, we’ve moderated out the small fraction of repeat offenders that have been muted or blocked by many accounts to stop random attacks within this Farcaster reference client.”
Srinivasan said both humans and AI were used to go through millions of posts to determine those to ban, adding there is an appeals process in place for them.
Rewarding “pro-social behavior”
Under Network School’s vision for Network State Protocol, users opt into a “social smart contract” authorizing its core team to set the app’s rules. Its accompanying “Network Code” classifies violations as digital felonies, misdemeanors or infractions, with penalties ranging from warnings and suspensions to bans. The rules apply to past posts as well as new ones.
The code also promises rewards for constructive behavior, including teaching others, sharing projects and disagreeing civilly, although it does not specify what those rewards entail.
Network School says an open-weight AI model will apply the rules, with some manual judgment calls, and eventually wants to warn users of potential violations before they post.
The underlying Farcaster protocol will remain open, according to the announcement. Users who decline the contract will have read-only access to the main app but retain their keys, funds, followers and post history, allowing them to move to another client. Srinivasan described this ability to join, leave or build competing clients as “decentralized democracy.”
The eventual ambition extends beyond social media. Network School said its goal is for the online community to take physical form through meetups and pop-up events, ultimately developing into startup cities and network states.
Network School’s acquisition of Farcaster comes months after Malaysian authorities revoked its Forest City business licence and ordered it to cease operations, citing alleged licensing and premises-use violations. Srinivasan subsequently announced an agreement to establish a campus in Kazakhstan.
Magazine: Scammer loses $4.8M stored on tampered Ledgers: Asia Express

Major irony alert as scammer falls victim to Ledger supply chain attack
Ledger was forced to suspend its reseller network across South East Asia this week, after thieves stole more than $103.4 million from 530 addresses via tampered Ledgers inserted into the supply chain. But in a small measure of poetic justice, one of the “victims” was a scammer themselves according to Chainalysis.
The blockchain monitoring firm reports that the scammer lost 60 Bitcoin, worth about $4.8 million, from three newly purchased Ledgers containing spyware that records seed phrases. The Ledger thieves drained all three of their funds into the same wallet.
In a further irony, the scammer had operated a “task scam” where people were paid to fake sales and reviews of real items. So depending on how much they knew, their victims in turn may not have been entirely honest either. “Then a ‘negative balance’ appeared, and they were told to add their own money in order to get paid,” Chainalysis reports. So it’s possible that a scammer of scammers has just got scammed. In crypto it’s sometimes turtles all the way down.
Despite reports of tampered Ledgers showing up in Europe forcing electronics retailer MediaMarkt to suspend sales, Ledger insists that all of the confirmed thefts to date are from Asia. It has asked resellers in Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Hong Kong to remove Ledgers from sale. Trezor too, has decided to shutter some of the more far flung resellers in its network from Jan.1, as it can’t guarantee it can perform the same level of vigilance as it performs on resellers closer to home. There are no reports of tampered Trezors however.
In the midst of the worst hardware wallet scandal since the Coldcard seed phrase debacle at the end of July, Ledger decided it was the ideal moment to launch its latest device. Called Atom, the $849 device combines a crypto wallet with Android apps, which are kept separated from sensitive wallet operations. The device includes protections Ledger says would block the implants used in the Asian thefts and claims it can detect tampering even when switched off.
A first look at Ledger Atom. Source: Ledger
SOUTH KOREA
South Korea moves to block 27 overseas crypto exchanges
South Korean authorities have approved measures to block domestic access to 27 websites operated by unregistered crypto exchanges and other virtual asset service providers, including KuCoin, MEXC, Phemex and Bitrue.
The Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) said in a statement: “With this decision, blocking measures against illegal virtual asset operators will also apply to internet websites, following apps such as those on Apple and Google,” the FIU said, according to a translation.
The list also includes CoinW, BTCC, BitMart, BingX, DigiFinex and others.
South Korea plans cybersecurity overhaul after attacks hit banks, crypto firms
South Korea will tighten cybersecurity requirements for financial institutions after an investigation into earlier security incidents involving 16 companies including crypto exchanges found some big holes.
The Financial Services Commission said it would pursue improved threat monitoring, more frequent security assessments and stronger accountability for executives after an industry-wide review found cybersecurity deficiencies at 130 of 555 financial companies.
South Korean bank launches Bitcoin-backed business loans: Report
Jeonbuk Bank reportedly began offering Bitcoin-backed loans to corporate customers, with a third-party custodian holding the cryptocurrency used as collateral.
THAILAND
Thailand’s Bitcoin, Ether ETFs launch trading
Thailand’s Securities and Exchange Commission has finalized rules that go into effect Friday allowing crypto exchange-traded funds (ETFs) to list on Thailand’s main stock exchange.
Kicking off with Bitcoin and Ether ETFs, the products must list exclusively on the Stock Exchange of Thailand. Products linked to foreign crypto ETFs will not be permitted initially, and Thai brokers are barred from facilitating investments in overseas crypto ETFs for anyone except institutions and ultra-high-net-worth individuals.
However, James Butterfill, head of research at digital asset investment firm CoinShares, told Cointelegraph not to get too excited.
“I would expect modest inflows initially, with tens of millions of US dollars across the first products a more realistic starting expectation than billions,” he said.
AUSTRALIA
Australia seeks feedback on crypto platform rules ahead of 2027 rollout
Australia’s securities regulator opened consultation Thursday on proposed capital, custody and trading requirements for crypto platforms, as it prepares to implement legislation passed in April that expands oversight of the industry.
The proposals include three alternative capital models, restrictions on platforms trading for their own account and quarterly reporting of wallets holding customer assets. ASIC also proposes allowing offshore custody while seeking feedback on safeguards if an overseas parent or related company fails.
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) also proposed expanding the rules for contracts for difference (CFDs) to crypto. CFDs let traders bet on price movements without owning the underlying asset.
CHINA
Chinese fraud victims lose key court battle over 61,000 Bitcoin
Chinese fraud victims seeking to recover 61,000 Bitcoin seized by the British government have lost a key legal battle after London’s High Court ruled that Chinese law, rather than English law, should govern claims to the assets.
“The relevant damage occurred in China. The Applicants parted with their money in China,” Justice Mark Turner wrote. “The contractual relationships thereby induced were entered into in China.”
The dispute stems from an investment fraud scheme orchestrated by Zhimin Qian between 2014 and 2017, with British authorities seizing the assets during a money-laundering investigation. The claimants will appeal the ruling in British courts.
THE PHILIPPINES
Coins.ph says it still has a Philippine central bank license intact despite reports
Coins.ph said it is still licensed by the country’s central bank despite reports that it could face license revocation over alleged transactions involving restricted offshore gambling operators.
Coins.ph is one of the largest crypto exchanges in the Philippines, and the reported license risk follows restrictions imposed by the central bank on some incoming transfers involving DCPay Philippines which operates Coins.ph’s peso e-wallet services.
“Coins.ph firmly denies any claim that it knowingly serves offshore gaming or gambling operators,” the company said. “Our users’ funds are safe; we continue to operate as a BSP-licensed institution,” it added.
HONG KONG
Binance may add Asian stocks to the platform
Binance co-CEO Richard Teng said during Token2049 the exchange may add Hong Kong, Korean, Taiwanese and Brazilian equities to its platform.
Second Solana ETF lists in Hong Kong
Pando Finance’s Solana ETF has launched in Hong Kong’s HKEX under the ticker 2831.hk. It’s the second such fund and has a 0.6% fee, undercutting the first fund from ChinaAMC which charges 0.99% annually.
SINGAPORE
Singapore crypto scam losses fall by 43%
A crackdown by Singapore Police in partnership with local crypto exchanges helped contribute to a 43% fall in reported losses from crypto scams year over year.
Revolut to open new Singapore office
Revolut has announced it will open a new Singapore office, invest S$350 million (US$273M) over the next five years, and expand its local workforce from 170 to 300

Index provider MSCI has adopted new rules that could lead to Strategy, Metaplanet and Upexi being removed from its global indexes, while leaving several other crypto treasury companies facing potential exclusion.
MSCI said Thursday it will adopt a methodology proposed in August that would make “non-operating companies” ineligible for inclusion in the MSCI Global Investable Market Indexes.
MSCI previously identified Strategy (MSTR) among the companies that would be deleted from the indexes under the “non-operating companies methodology.” Sharplink, Inc (SBET), Ton Strategy Company (TONX), Solana Company (HSDT) and DeFi Development Corp. (DFDV) are among companies that would be put on a “watchlist” for potential removal.
Removal could force funds tracking MSCI indexes to sell the affected companies’ shares, potentially putting pressure on stock prices and reducing passive investment demand.
“It removes a company from the default portfolios of tens of millions of people who never chose to remove it,” said Conner Brown, executive director of the Bitcoin Policy Institute in September, who was describing the consequences of broad-market index exclusion, with Strategy as the example.
Under the new methodology, MSCI will assess companies based on their operating assets and five financial ratios. Companies failing at least four of the five tests could be deemed ineligible. Existing companies in the index must generally fail the screening process over two annual reporting periods before removal.
The final list of companies to be removed will be released on Nov. 11 and will take effect on Nov. 30, 2026, according to MSCI.
JPMorgan analysts previously estimated that Strategy’s exclusion from MSCI indexes could trigger roughly $2.8 billion in selling. That estimate concerned MSCI’s earlier digital asset proposal, rather than the rules adopted Thursday.
In August, Strategy opposed the changes but also played down the potential disruption, saying funds tracking MSCI’s Global Investable Market Indexes hold approximately 13 million shares, representing 3.1% of its basic shares outstanding. The company said those holdings amount to less than one day’s trading volume.
Magazine: Scammer loses $4.8M stored on tampered Ledgers: Asia Express

Australia has released draft legislation that would enable the automatic exchange of crypto tax information between countries.
The draft bill, Treasury Laws Amendment Bill 2026: Tax information reporting, is open to comment until Oct. 28. It would establish a framework to implement the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Crypto-Asset Reporting Framework (CARF) in Australian law and introduce a domestic crypto reporting regime, according to the Australian Treasury.
Australia first signaled its intention to implement CARF in November 2023 and consulted on its proposed approach in late 2024. The government subsequently announced plans to implement both CARF and a domestic crypto reporting regime in its 2025–26 Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook, with international exchanges of crypto tax information expected to begin in 2028.
The OECD approved CARF in August 2022 to address tax evasion risks arising from the growth of crypto assets.

In the wake of the failed CLARITY cloture vote in the Senate, the SEC and CFTC immediately moved to issue their own rules for crypto markets.
Two days after the vote, the SEC unveiled a five-year exemption that permits the issuing and trading of stock tokens. OXK has since teamed up with ICE to launch trading in 63 NYSE-listed stocks and Securitize launched 12 Securitize Stocks, including Apple, Nvidia and Microsoft.
The SEC has also issued guidance clarifying that a crypto token doesn’t become a security just because a project is buying back its own tokens, and stated that liquid staking tokens are not securities. It has also proposed new rules for the custody of crypto assets.
The CFTC, meanwhile, moved to exempt some crypto software providers from registration requirements. It has proposed a new “crypto asset market” registration category and intends to allow registered exchanges to offer leveraged trading.
But the concern among some in the industry is that these rules could be built on shifting sands. TD Cowen has cautioned that agency rules “are the easiest to rescind” — which was demonstrated when Trump-appointed commissioners wiped away all traces of the Gary Gensler era.
A 2024 Supreme Court decision also means agency rules can more easily be overturned by the courts.
The durability of regulator rulemaking is currently being tested in court, with a community bank group suing the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency for exceeding its authority by allowing crypto firms to obtain national trust bank charters.
To discuss the legal issues involved, Magazine spoke with Yuriy Brisov from D&A Partners. This is an edited version of the conversation.
Magazine: SEC Chair Paul Atkins said after the CLARITY vote failed that the agency was releasing rules because Congress didn’t. Are agencies like the SEC supposed to create rules, or are they just supposed to interpret rules that already exist?
Brisov: They are supposed to create rules. They have this power under the Exchange Act of 1934. The SEC was created as a result of the major meltdown in the US markets in the end of the 1920s. From the moment of creation, the SEC had the power to create rules and regulations on how the laws should apply. American legislation works by creating general rules, like a frame, and then it has a watchdog watching over these regulations.
There was a reason why it was created like this — so that when, say, blockchain tokens came along, the US legislation would be ready to accommodate new technology. That’s what the Commission has been doing for ages now, and it’s obviously within their powers.
Magazine: Can they interpret the rules in the opposite way to an SEC appointed by a previous administration?
Brisov: There should be a reason for that. They can, in theory, do that, but it should be all within the formation of the body of law. Under Gary Gensler, the Commission tried to apply these rules to tokens. It turns out that it failed because there is still vagueness, and many companies left the US market for good.
This is the opening for the new Commission to oversee these rules and say, “You tried, but we can see that it’s not working. So we’ll offer our own rules.” But the power to offer rules is limited. If they offer some regulations that would lay an unbearable economic burden on companies, or something bizarre, there are also laws that allow companies or any damaged party to challenge this regulation in court and say, “We don’t like what the SEC has been doing because it’s damaging the market.”
In 2011, there was a case when the SEC applied new rules on how shareholders vote through a proxy. And the business community said, “it’s bizarre, it’s burdensome, and we don’t like it.” There was a case, Business Roundtable vs SEC, and [business] won.
Magazine: What was the Chevron decision by the Supreme Court and how does its overturning in 2024 impact court cases about rulemaking by agencies like the SEC and CFTC?
Brisov: Chevron was a famous case of 1984. The court basically said that if the law is vague or there are uncertainties and ambiguities in the statute, then we should use the agency’s interpretation as the law. In June 2024, Loper Bright was a new precedent that overruled Chevron. It’s now saying that we don’t have to. Of course, [the SEC is] a strong authority: Who knows securities laws better than the SEC? But the court should use its own brains and apply the Howey case itself.
Magazine: So that makes it more likely that SEC rules could be overturned?
Brisov: In some cases, the courts can come up with a different conclusion.
You cannot just come and say “we don’t like this regulation.” For instance, if you’re a traditional broker-dealer or traditional participant of the investment market in the United States and you say, ‘Look, I’m suffering because of this new regulation’ they should be able to prove that there was not enough research and that it’s burdensome for the business, and it’s not profitable for the US market. If they prove damages and if they prove a lack of research, then the court can overrule this regulation.
From what I can see, Paul Atkins and the SEC have been consulting with many crypto firms, with VCs. They’ve been doing their research, so it’s not something they just came up with within a day.
Magazine: Let’s assume the SEC and CFTC rules survive for the next two years, and businesses invest a lot of money into infrastructure around tokenized stocks based on the new rules. Could a new SEC unilaterally reverse the rules or do they have to take into account the businesses built on top of the old interpretation?
Brisov: They have to take them into account. If there is the potential for the US market to grow and to benefit from this regulation, they won’t be able to just overrule it. There is the same thought process that either an agency or a court goes through. It’s called IRAC: issue, rule, analysis, conclusion. They would have to apply understandable, transparent logic.
They can’t just say we don’t like it. They have to explain. They have to bring up an economic background for it. They have to bring up research, and they have to prove that it’s insufficient. And only then can they come to a different conclusion.
For the sake of argument, we could say that Paul Atkins hates the Howey test, and he would have been happy just to abandon it — but he can’t do it. In every note, he keeps repeating that the Howey case still works, it’s still a valid regulation in the United States. However, we can interpret it in this case, and this case, differently — and this is our logic. This is what allows us to do that, and he explains it transparently.
Magazine: The SEC appears to have been working on the innovation exemption for years. But the SEC more recently came up with an FAQ saying that a crypto company buying back its own token does not make a commodity token a security. Could I be secure and comfortable launching a token buyback scheme on the basis of an FAQ by the SEC?
Brisov: If you follow it, and it’s created by the people who know what they’re saying, probably you will be in the clear. But it’s not legislation. An FAQ is just like a manual. It doesn’t have any authority, even for the staff.
Magazine: So the FAQ isn’t saying they changed the rules; it is just saying this is what the rules are?
Brisov: It’s just some extra explanation, like a casebook in the university. They are staff notes. A manual that explains for the staff how they should work and how they should understand this. They rewrite them quite often.
Magazine: They rewrote the FAQ after a week because a16z’s legal counsel said it left a massive loophole.
Brisov: Exactly, and that’s how it should be done. It’s not regulation or legislation, they can change them every week.
Magazine: Could THORChain face prosecution over stolen Bitget funds? Legal opinion

Binance.US is reportedly seeking to raise up to $100 million in a funding round that could value the cryptocurrency exchange at $1 billion.
According to a Thursday Bloomberg report, the US-based crypto exchange is pursuing private investment as it looks to expand its business. The potential $1 billion valuation would be well below the $4.5 billion pre-money valuation it secured in 2022, when it raised $200 million in seed funding.
Binance.US reportedly informed World Liberty Financial, the crypto platform co-founded by US President Donald Trump and his sons, about the funding round, but the company will not be participating. Last year, Binance was embroiled in a controversial $2 billion investment between an entity tied to the United Arab Emirates royalty and World Liberty using the platform’s USD1 stablecoin.
The proposed funding round is reportedly part of Binance.US’ efforts to regain market share against larger rivals following a 2023 settlement between Binance Holdings Ltd. and US authorities. As part of the agreement, Binance Holdings agreed to pay $4.3 billion in penalties and accept additional monitoring and oversight, while its then-CEO, Changpeng Zhao, pleaded guilty to a felony charge. Zhao served four months in prison before receiving a pardon from Trump in 2025.

Bo Hines, previously a crypto adviser to US President Donald Trump who later joined stablecoin issuer Tether, reportedly kept a stake in a company that profited from the passage of a stablecoin bill when he was still at the White House.
According to a Wednesday report from The Wall Street Journal, Hines had a one-third stake in the investment company he co-founded, Nxum, while pushing US lawmakers to pass the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for US Stablecoins, or GENIUS, Act. The legislation reportedly came amid Nxum receiving $6.3 million as part of a deal with stablecoin issuer Tether, behind the USDt (USDT) token, with the first payment going through while Hines was still serving in government.
The Wall Street Journal reported that Hines kept in contact with his partners at Nxum, updating them on progress with the GENIUS Act through the Signal app while serving as Trump’s crypto adviser.
He also reportedly pressed the Nxum partner to label any Republican lawmakers opposing the stablecoin bill as “undermining the president” and “bought and paid for by democratic shills like Coinbase and a16z.” Hines joined Tether as a “strategic adviser” in August 2025, becoming CEO of its US arm the following month.
The reported deal between a former White House official and a crypto company continues to shine a spotlight on accusations that Trump and his family and staff are personally benefitting from laws they help to draft and pass. The president disclosed earning $1.4 billion from investments tied to digital assets in 2025, which included millions of dollars from his family’s crypto company World Liberty Financial, behind the issuance of the USD1 stablecoin.
The GENIUS Act passed Congress and was signed into law in July 2025 in a ceremony attended by many cryptocurrency executives, including those behind stablecoins like Tether and Circle. Hines was in attendance and personally recognized by Trump at the event.
Though it was signed into law in 2025, the GENIUS stablecoin bill requires rules from government agencies overseeing the tokens, including the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, Federal Reserve Board and Treasury Department. The law is scheduled to go into effect in January 2027.
Cointelegraph reached out to Tether for comment on the accusations in the report but did not receive an immediate response.
‘Revolving door’ of US policymakers to crypto companies continues
Several figures previously in government have left to become executives or advisers to digital asset companies. In addition to Hines joining Tether, Summer Mersinger, a former commissioner with the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), resigned her position three years before her term was scheduled to end for a position as CEO of the crypto advocacy group Blockchain Association.
On Wednesday, Solidus Labs announced that Kevin Webb, a former CFTC senior counsel and adviser to former Commissioner Brian Quintenz, would join the fintech company as its vice president of policy. Webb isn’t the first former commissioner at the company, as the CFTC’s Dawn Stump left the agency in 2022 to join Solidus as a “strategic adviser.”
Magazine: Can the SEC and CFTC’s pro-crypto rules be overturned? Legal opinion

Sweden’s central bank is revisiting the possibility of introducing a digital krona, citing the European Central Bank’s (ECB) progress toward a digital euro and the growing use of stablecoins as reasons to reconsider a central bank digital currency (CBDC).
In an Oct. 7 letter to parliament’s Finance Committee, published Thursday, the Riksbank urged lawmakers to begin preparing legislation for a potential digital krona, three years after a government inquiry concluded there was insufficient need for one.
The letter pointed to the ECB’s planned digital euro pilot in 2027 and a potential public launch in 2029. According to the Riksbank, Sweden’s payment system could become less competitive without a comparable digital version of its own currency.
The central bank also identified the growing use of foreign-currency stablecoins, particularly those pegged to the US dollar, as a longer-term concern, though it sees the near-term risk as limited.
“If stablecoins pegged to foreign currencies are considered attractive as a means of payment, the use of the Swedish krona could come under pressure even within Sweden’s borders,” the letter read.
The Riksbank estimates that introducing a digital krona would take at least five years, excluding the time required for legislative changes. For this reason, it recommends beginning legal preparations now, even if Sweden ultimately decides against launching a CBDC.

Mastercard is expanding its role in stablecoin payments with a new platform that lets businesses integrate digital currencies into traditional banking and card services, a move that could make it easier for companies to offer stablecoin payments without building their own infrastructure.
The service, dubbed Global Money Platform, is Mastercard’s first major integration with BVNK since it acquired the stablecoin infrastructure company in August, the payments giant announced Thursday.
According to Mastercard, businesses can use the platform to hold and convert fiat currencies and stablecoins, offer stablecoin-linked cards and make payments directly from stablecoin balances into recipients’ local bank accounts.
The service connects to Mastercard Move, the company’s global money transfer network, which can route payments to more than 17 billion destinations, including bank accounts and cards. It also connects stablecoin balances to Mastercard’s merchant network, allowing customers to spend them with payment cards. Nuvei, Marqeta and several other fintech companies are among the first integration partners.
The launch extends Mastercard’s role beyond processing payments to providing infrastructure that financial companies can use to offer stablecoin services under their own brands. It also puts Mastercard in closer competition with Visa, which launched a platform in July that lets financial institutions hold, mint, and transfer stablecoins.
It comes as research from Standard Chartered points to growing stablecoin transaction activity, even as the circulating supplies of major tokens such as USDt and USDC have remained relatively flat this year.

Bitcoin (BTC) dipped below $80,000 on Thursday as US Producer Price Index (PPI) data significantly beat expectations.
Key points:
Bitcoin briefly traded below $80,000 on the back of a 100-basis-point overshoot in US PPI inflation data.
September PPI measured 6.3% against market expectations of 5.3%, the biggest monthly jump since March 2022.
BTC price analysis saw the potential for a “volatile retest” of trend lines around $78,000 next.
Biggest PPI increase since March 2022 adds to Bitcoin tailwinds
Data from TradingView showed BTC/USD slipping to its lowest levels since Sept. 18, declining as much as 1.8% on the day, before rebounding to around $81,000.
BTC/USD one-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
September PPI came in at 6.3%, a full 100 basis points above its anticipated level, while core PPI rose to 5% versus an expected 4.4%, per data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
“The September increase is the largest advance since rising 1.7% in March 2022. On an unadjusted basis, the index for final demand climbed 6.3% for the 12 months ended in September, the largest 12-month increase since moving up 6.4% in December 2022,” an official news release confirmed.
US PPI one-month % change. Source: BLS
The numbers come a day after the Consumer Price Index (CPI) also overshot estimates, causing crypto and risk assets to fall. Risk assets were already under pressure from a tech sell-off centered in South Korea, where the KOSPI Composite Index fell 7.5% on Thursday.
Economist Mohamed El-Erian described PPI as “even more striking” than the CPI result. El-Erian and others noted that US bond yields were not rising on the back of higher inflation numbers. The US 10-year bond yield was down almost 3% at the time of writing, at its lowest levels since Sept. 23.
US 10-year bond yield one-day chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
Robin Brooks, former chief FX strategist at Goldman Sachs, repeated earlier findings which suggested that yields had “decoupled” from US macro data as market priorities switched to the government’s handling of the federal budget deficit.
Brooks compared the 30-day correlation between upside data surprises and daily moves in the 10-year yield, and revealed that it had dropped from near 0.6 earlier in 2026 to just below zero as of the end of August.
“That indicates that yields have decoupled from data and the obvious explanation for this is that markets are more focused on the trajectory of the deficit, so they’re pushing up longer-term yields regardless of what data surprises are doing,” he summarized in a blog post last month.
Analysis eyes “early-stage bull market” support retest
BTC price action meanwhile brought two support trend lines back into focus: the 21-week and 50-week exponential moving averages (EMA) at $76,144 and $78.459, respectively.
Trader and analyst Rekt Capital noted that BTC/USD could still retest both and preserve its overall bullish trend.
“Deviating below them on a volatile retest to find a pullback bottom has historically happened in early-stage Bull Markets. These deviations however would occur after a bullish crossovers of these two EMAs, whereas Bitcoin is still pre-crossover,” Rekt Capital said in an X post.
BTC/USD one-week chart. Source: Rekt Capital on X.com
Bitcoin remained below the area between $82,500 and $82,800, a key support zone of interest in recent weeks.
Analyst Aksel Kibar said that Bitcoin’s latest weekly close around $83,700 lacked strength as a breakout.
“A weekly close inside the range can resume wide consolidation between 60K-82.8K 75K can be utilized as the pattern (rectangle bottom reversal) negation level,” he said.
BTC/USD one-day chart. Source: Aksel Kibar on X.com

Russia will ban direct peer-to-peer (P2P) cryptocurrency transactions between individuals starting next year, requiring individuals to use authorized intermediaries for such trades.
The restriction will end individuals’ ability to exchange crypto assets directly without intermediaries, the Bank of Russia, the country’s central bank, explained in guidance updated Monday. The regulator confirmed that such transactions will remain permitted only until July 1, 2027.
The regulator also clarified that individuals are not allowed to transfer crypto assets from their digital accounts to their own non-custodial, or self-custodial, wallets.
The move comes as Russia expands its regulated crypto market. On Monday, the Bank of Russia authorized Sberbank, the country’s largest bank, to offer crypto exchange services after earlier approving it as a digital asset custodian.
The approval follows Russia’s new crypto rules, which came into force on Sept. 1 and brought exchange operators and custodians under central bank oversight. The country also continues to prohibit cryptocurrency payments for goods and services.
Industry executives have previously told Cointelegraph that restrictions on P2P crypto trading and noncustodial wallets may be difficult to enforce. Jan3 CEO Samson Mow said P2P trading is more resilient to regulatory crackdowns than centralized platforms, while SatoshiLabs executive Stepan Uherik said wallet app bans would leave hardware and desktop wallets unaffected.

Nasdaq-listed Tron (TRON) has filed for a new at-the-market (ATM) share offering allowing it to sell up to $200 million of common stock that will fund an even-larger Tron (TRX) treasury.
The deal allows Tron to periodically sell shares of its common stock at $0.0001 par value through Clear Street, which acts as an agent and retains a commission of up to 3% of gross proceeds, according to a Wednesday filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
The company’s existing TRX accumulation program, announced in February, called for the purchase of approximately $50,000 worth of TRX per day for 360 consecutive days. Tron’s treasury holds 718.9 million TRX tokens, currently worth about $237 million, after the company’s latest acquisition of 149,369 TRX at an average price of $0.3347 on Thursday.
Tron SEC filing on a $200 million ATM program with Clear Street LLC. Source: sec.gov
The company’s shares opened 4.7% lower on Thursday, poised to extend their roughlly 67% 12-month decline, according to Yahoo Finance.

The Hex (HEX) token fell nearly 30% in the past 24 hours after local media reports of founder Richard Schueler, also known as Richard Heart, being detained by authorities in Istanbul.
The HEX token declined to $0.0006 as of 11:28 am UTC on Thursday, erasing about $160 million from its market capitalization, from more than $500 million on Wednesday to $340 million by press time, according to CoinMarketCap. It previously topped $0.44 in September 2021.
On Wednesday, news outlet Ihlas Haber Ajansı (IHA) reported that Schueler and his wife were detained in Istanbul by Turkish authorities. Police reportedly seized multiple devices, hardware wallets, jewelry and handguns.
The reported arrest comes nearly two years after the world’s largest international police organization, Interpol, issued a “Red Notice” for Schueler for allegedly committing tax fraud and assault, with Finnish authorities seeking his arrest.
A spokesperson for Finland’s National Bureau of Investigations declined to comment on the matter.
Schueler was also listed on Europe’s most wanted fugitives list on similar allegations, claiming that he “physically assaulted a 16-year-old victim by grabbing their hair, dragging them into the stairwell and knocking them to the ground.”
In July 2023, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sued Schueler, alleging he raised $1 billion in an unregistered securities offering and misappropriated at least $12 million.
US District Judge Carol Bagley Amon dismissed the case in February 2025, after ruling that the activities were not sufficiently directed at US investors. In April 2025, the SEC said it didn’t intend to refile its securities fraud complaint against Schueler.

Ledger unveiled a new device on Thursday with stronger protections against tampering, days after confirming that wallets sold through a reseller in Asia contained malicious implants.
The French hardware wallet maker introduced Atom, an $849 device that combines a crypto wallet with everyday apps through a smartphone-like design. Atom separates Android apps from sensitive wallet operations and includes protections Ledger says would block the implants used in the recent Asia incident. It’s also advertised to detect tampering even when switched off.
The company expects to begin shipping the device in summer 2027, according to an announcement shared with Cointelegraph.
Ledger said Atom will also support AI agent approvals, encrypted messaging and post-quantum cryptography.
The announcement follows a security incident that surfaced on Friday involving malicious implants found in wallets sold through authorized reseller CryptoBilis. Ledger has requested that distributors in Southeast Asia and Hong Kong suspend sales of its products. European retail chain MediaMarkt has also pulled Ledger wallets off its shelves.
A first look at Ledger Atom. Source: Ledger
Asked when Atom’s anti-tampering protections were developed, a Ledger spokesperson said the work was not a response to isolated incidents. The spokesperson did not provide a development timeline.
In a separate blog post on Thursday, Ledger said it had introduced new rules requiring authorized resellers to keep devices off display and hand them to customers at purchase. It also reiterated that returned devices must never be resold.
Magazine: ‘Bunker mode’ won’t protect your crypto, critics say

Patrick Witt, the executive director of the White House’s Crypto Council, is leaving his current role for a new opportunity in the private sector.
“Serving in this administration has been the privilege of a lifetime,” wrote Witt in a Thursday X post, adding that he looks forward to continuing to support US technological advancements “in the private sector.”
Witt served as the White House’s leading advisor on the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, would have created the first comprehensive US regulatory framework for the crypto market. The US Senate failed to pass a cloture motion on the legislation in September and further progress this session is unlikely.
Witt’s exit leaves a leadership gap as he was the last remaining staffer on the White House’s council, following the March departure of White House crypto and AI czar, David Sacks and the July departure of deputy director Harry Jung.
The council’s former executive director, Bo Hines, announced his departure in August 2025. Weeks later, Hines took a role as a strategic adviser at stablecoin issuer Tether, to coordinate the company’s US expansion.
Cointelegraph has approached the White House for comment on Witt’s departure and whether they have a potential replacement to fill his role and will update when available.