Cointelegraph

Hackers stole 57 cents for every $1 earned onchain by blockchain protocols since 2017, according to Lorenzo Valente, director of digital asset research at ARK Investment Management.
“Security is the bottleneck,” wrote Valente in a Thursday X post, sharing a chart showing that $8.7 billion lost to crypto hacks year to date had already surpassed the $5.6 billion in estimated annual onchain revenue for 2026.
Since 2017, the crypto industry has lost about $26.9 billion to hacks and earned $47 billion in total onchain revenue, he added.
The recent $6.3 billion stolen in the Binance hack alone exceeded Valente’s estimate for full-year 2026 onchain revenue. Value lost to hacks is on track to exceed onchain revenue by year-end for the first time since 2020.
The crypto industry saw a string of high-value hacks this year, including September’s $387 million Bitget hack and the $320 million Liquid Network exploit, as well as April’s $295 million Drift Protocol exploit.
The mounting security exploits are weighing on the institutional appetite for DeFi. In an April research note, JPMorgan analysts identified bridge security as a long-standing challenge for the industry.
Total value locked in decentralized finance (DeFi) has fallen nearly 10% since the Binance exploit, from $85.9 billion on Oct. 29 to $77.4 billion on Thursday, according to DefiLlama.

UK-based digital bank Griffin raised $20 million in a Series B round led by Octagon Partners, valuing the company at over $100 million.
The funding will support Griffin’s plans to expand into card issuance and stablecoin services, according to a Thursday press release.
Griffin plans to let companies offer branded retail and corporate debit cards through its platform, with credit cards to follow. The bank also plans to expand its stablecoin reserve services and add onchain cross-border payments.
Griffin’s said its banking platform serves more than 300,000 retail and business customers through more than 80 companies. They include Uber, which uses Griffin to provide bank accounts to UK drivers.
Griffin received its UK banking license in March 2024. The bank said recurring revenue at its September fiscal year-end was 3.2 times the prior year’s level, based on unaudited accounts.
Paraag Davé, managing partner at Octagon, said he expects Griffin’s annual recurring revenue to exceed 10 million British pounds soon.

European Union efforts to tighten oversight of decentralized finance (DeFi) could drive crypto users toward platforms offering fewer investor protections, according to Coinbase’s head of EU policy.
Roeland Van der Stappen told Cointelegraph that regulated crypto platforms could respond by limiting or dropping access to DeFi services.
“Rules designed to protect investors would end up pushing activity towards the places with the least protection,” Van der Stappen said.
In its September response to the European Commission’s consultation on the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA), the European Securities and Markets Authority recommended creating a new category of regulated crypto services for firms that give customers access to DeFi protocols.
EBA lists suitability tests as an option for crypto lending
In September, the European Banking Authority (EBA) urged the Commission to study new rules for crypto lending and borrowing, including when regulated platforms give customers access to DeFi lending protocols. It listed suitability tests, which assess whether a service is appropriate for a customer, as one option in its consultation response.
Van der Stappen said that extending such tests to other DeFi services could mean treating a simple stablecoin swap the same way as leveraged lending, despite their different risks.
Lending, liquidity provision and on-chain swaps would be the most exposed activities, he said. Some providers may narrow their offerings or even withdraw DeFi access altogether.
“A proportionate approach would be to allow CASPs [crypto-asset service providers] to continue offering that access with safeguards matched to the activity,” Van der Stappen said.
Coinbase warns of fragmented liquidity
Van der Stappen said restricting access through regulated platforms could split DeFi liquidity into smaller pools and leave EU users with worse prices on trades.
He said the restrictions could encourage “walled gardens,” or isolated DeFi services, and steer users toward providers outside the EU with fewer safeguards.
Source: Adan-Ipsos
A 2026 Adan-Ipsos survey found that 49% of French crypto buyers preferred accessing DeFi through exchanges, compared with 14% who favored personal wallets.
A Chainalysis report on Monday attributed a modest decline in crypto activity in Germany largely to declining decentralized exchange activity. Across the EU, crypto activity grew 2.2% in the 12 months through June 2026.
A 2025 Chainalysis report described DeFi as a small but growing segment of Europe’s crypto market. In the European Economic Area, May 2025 was the strongest month for DeFi lending activity in the period Chainalysis examined.
Magazine: Stablecoins can drain from banks and nations at lightning speed

Stablecoin supply fell by $14.2 billion over 30 days, the biggest drop since June 2022, according to Glassnode.
Key points:
The total supply of stablecoins fell by $14.2 billion over the 30 days to Nov. 11, the largest 30-day drop since June 2022.
Tether (USDT) is trading slightly below it sUS dollar peg.
The Coinbase Premium Index remains negative after dropping to its lowest level in four years at the end of October.
Stablecoin supply drop most acute since June 2022
The rolling 30-day contraction stablecoin supply hit $14.2 billion this week, more than the $9.5 billion drop seen as Bitcoin (BTC) fell below $58,000 on July 1. It also marks the most pronounced drawdown since June 2022, when supply fell by nearly $30 billion.
Selected stablecoin supply data. Source: Glassnode
Stablecoin liquidity is a key yardstick for gauging crypto market sentiment.
“A shrinking supply means holders are redeeming stablecoins for dollars and taking that cash out of the market, which leaves less fuel for a rally,” Glassnode commented.
USDT, the largest stablecoin by market cap, continues to trade slightly below its $1 peg, per data from TradingView. Glassnode attributes the phenomenon to the “same pressure” from investors rotating out of the stablecoin market.
“Should the 30-day change turn back to growth, it would be the first sign that new money is coming in,” it added.
USDT/USD one-day chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
Coinbase Premium stays negative after four-year lows
Crypto market metrics continue to point to weakening demand as Bitcoin trades near 11-week lows.
On Tuesday, onchain analytics platform CryptoQuant reported overall Bitcoin demand falling by 284,000 BTC over 30 days, the most pronounced downturn since March 2025.
The Coinbase Premium Index, which measures the difference between Coinbase’s BTC/USD price and Binance’s BTC/USDT price, was still negative on Wednesday. The index fell to -0.27% on Oct. 29, its lowest level since November 2022.
“This unusually deep discount suggests weaker relative demand or greater selling pressure on Coinbase, a major venue for US-based trading activity,” CryptoQuant contributing analyst Amr Taha wrote at the time.
Bitcoin Coinbase Premium Index. Source: CryptoQuant

Tron, Tether and Chainalysis announced a task force Thursday to identify and disrupt illicit activity involving USDT (USDT) stablecoin on the Tron blockchain.
The Digital Crime Task Force will use blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis’ data and AI tools to flag suspicious activity and give law enforcement leads to trace and freeze funds, according to an announcement shared with Cointelegraph.
Bloomberg reported on Nov. 4 that the T3 Financial Crime Unit, which Tron and Tether formed with TRM Labs in 2024, disbanded in late August. An unnamed source cited by the outlet said slow responses and poor coordination hampered the unit.
Cointelegraph contacted Tether, Tron and TRM Labs for comment but did not receive responses by publication time.
The task force’s priorities include investment and romance scams, crypto theft, terrorist financing, North Korean cyber operations and cartel money laundering.
“Criminals are using AI to move faster than ever, and waiting for a victim to report a crime is no longer good enough,” Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino said in the announcement. He put Tether’s cumulative USDT freezes at more than $7 billion.
How criminal networks use USDT on Tron
USDT on Tron accounted for 99.9% of the $1.07 billion in crypto received by 34 casinos in Sihanoukville, a Cambodian city known as a hub for scam compounds, from Jan. 1 to Sept. 7, TRM Labs reported.
Casinos tied to US-sanctioned networks received $687 million of those inflows. TRM Labs cited low fees and deep liquidity as reasons for the widespread use of USDT on Tron in the region.
Following the $1.5 billion Bybit hack in February 2025, stolen funds were converted to USDT on Tron and cashed out through suspected Chinese over-the-counter trading services, according to blockchain intelligence company Elliptic.
During the record $6.3 billion Binance hack on Oct. 29, hackers swapped approximately $234 million in USDT for Tron’s native token (TRX) before Tether froze the remaining USDT in two wallets linked to the theft, according to Crystal Intelligence.
The US Federal Bureau of Investigation attributed both hacks to North Korea. In a statement published by North Korean state media on Nov. 3, Kim Yo Jong rejected the Binance attribution and cited Bybit as another case in which she said Washington tried to blame Pyongyang.
Magazine: THORChain founder rejects freeze request, CZ thanks Secret Service: Hodler’s Digest

Ethereum research group Ethlabs said Wednesday it will withdraw its proposal to speed up the network’s block production from the planned Hegotá upgrade, urging core developers to prepare the network for quantum attacks by 2027.
On Wednesday, the group outlined “pqai27,” a proposed roadmap that aims to protect Ethereum against threats from quantum computing and increasingly capable artificial intelligence. It said unrelated upgrades should be reconsidered.
Ethlabs previously backed Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP)-8198, known as Quick Slots, which would initially cut Ethereum’s slot time from 12 seconds to 10 seconds. The group said it would redirect resources to pqai27 but will still pursue faster slots in 2028.
For Hegotá, Ethlabs said FOCIL, a planned censorship-resistance feature, should proceed only if it does not jeopardize quantum readiness. The group called Frame Transactions, which would enable more flexible account authentication, central to the proposed transition.
It said Glamsterdam, the upgrade before Hegotá, should proceed as planned.
Ethereum core developers have not approved the proposal. The Ethereum Foundation’s published roadmap still targets December 2029 for quantum resistance. At Devcon, researcher Justin Drake said he hopes to complete the transition in 2028.

BlackRock’s spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF), the iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT), recorded more than $2 billion in net outflows over nine consecutive trading sessions through Wednesday.
Investors pulled a net $269.7 million from IBIT on Wednesday, accounting for about 90% of the day’s $300 million in net withdrawals across US spot Bitcoin ETFs, according to Farside Investors data.
Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust ETF (GBTC) recorded $39.1 million in net withdrawals, while the Morgan Stanley Bitcoin Trust ETF (MSBT) drew $9 million in net inflows.
US spot Bitcoin ETFs posted nearly $1.44 billion in net withdrawals over five straight sessions. Wednesday’s increase followed three sessions of easing outflows.
Crypto exchange Bitfinex said on Wednesday that slowing ETF outflows could be an early step toward a market floor, but were not enough on their own to establish a recovery.
Bitfinex found that in the ETF outflow streaks it studied earlier this year, Bitcoin gained a median 6.4% over 10 trading sessions when the streaks ended with at least three consecutive sessions of net inflows.
Bitcoin traded near $73,000 at the time of writing, down 8.5% over the past week, according to CoinGecko.
In a Wednesday note shared with Cointelegraph, Laser Digital’s derivatives trading desk pointed to weak spot demand, a persistently negative Coinbase premium and large liquidations of leveraged long positions.
The desk said Bitcoin barely rose during Monday’s rebound in the Nasdaq, which gained almost 3%.

South Korea’s Financial Services Commission (FSC) plans to allow crypto exchanges to suspend deposits and withdrawals when hacking is suspected, rather than waiting until a breach is confirmed, amid a push for stronger industry security.
On Thursday, the FSC said it would issue a no-action letter permitting preventive suspensions under certain conditions. Current rules prohibit exchanges from blocking withdrawals without legitimate grounds and explicitly allow restrictions only when a hacking incident is clearly established.
The regulator also called for round-the-clock monitoring and incident response, higher cold-wallet holdings, and stronger insurance coverage and reserves. The FSC said exchanges unable to monitor continuously would process deposits and withdrawals only during staffed hours and notify users in advance.
The move follows recent security incidents involving South Korean exchanges. On Friday, crypto exchange GOPAX suspended trading, deposits and standard withdrawals after receiving a hacking threat, although a representative said no breach had occurred. On Oct. 24, trading platform Prabang suspended services after detecting abnormal hot-wallet withdrawals, reporting about $70,000 in losses.
In October, the FSC identified cybersecurity deficiencies at 130 of 555 financial companies reviewed nationwide. It separately identified GOPAX operator Streami and Prabang among 16 companies involved in earlier security incidents.

Months before Binance lost $6.3 billion to a hack, its chief security officer described to Cointelegraph how a fake job interview could give attackers a foothold inside the exchange — closely resembling one of the entry methods later used against the exchange.
During a July interview about Binance’s response to rising security threats, Jimmy Su told Cointelegraph that fake job interviews were “something we worry about a lot internally,” explaining how attackers could tailor a job opportunity to an employee before persuading them to run code as part of a technical assessment.
“And once that gets executed, the device is compromised and then they can start harvesting credentials,” Su said, adding that attackers could then use that to penetrate further into the network.
Su’s detailed warning about malicious coding assessments was not included in Cointelegraph’s July coverage, but takes on new significance following the biggest crypto exchange hack in history.
In September, a Binance software engineer downloaded a malicious coding assignment onto his work computer during a fake job interview. That compromise became part of the multistage attack that culminated in October’s theft, according to Binance’s preliminary investigation.
During the interview with Cointelegraph, Su had also anticipated why security tools might miss such a trap. A technical assessment could involve seemingly legitimate steps, such as downloading a code repository from GitHub, he explained in July.
“Each step is actually legitimate on its own. So a lot of the anti-virus tools may not be able to detect it and flag it,” he said.
Binance’s investigation subsequently described a similar detection failure, saying the assignment’s setup process executed malware that evaded its endpoint security tools through obfuscation and other evasion techniques.
Binance said onus is on the company to detect attacks
Su told Cointelegraph that it was Binance’s responsibility to contain the risk when employees pursued outside opportunities on work computers.
“Of course employees can explore outside opportunities. What we do worry about is that they do so on the company device,” he said. If an employee fell for a fake interview, he added, “the onus is on us to detect it,” and to “stop the actual execution of that code.”
Binance was already testing employees against fake recruiters. Su said its internal red team had been conducting monthly phishing simulations for three to four years, with remedial training for employees who failed.
“In the beginning, the security hygiene left a lot to be desired. But after this amount of time, the company has improved significantly,” he said.
Kevin Gibson of recruitment firm Proof of Search told Cointelegraph that the threat is also changing how some crypto employers assess prospective hires, with clients increasingly wanting to know whether candidates have been met in person.
“A number of our clients are now asking us straight up whether we’ve met a candidate in person,” Gibson said, adding that candidates personally met by a third-party recruiter have an advantage.
Employees, like in Binance’s case, can also become targets.
“In crypto, a dodgy job offer or a ‘quick catch-up call’ can be the first step in a multimillion-dollar hit,” he said.
Binance blocks a North Korean cyber threat every five days
Binance said it blocked 57 suspected North Korea-linked cyber threats so far this year, which is roughly one attack every five days.
Following October’s attack, Binance said it had tightened device controls, rebuilt affected wallet systems and internal AI tooling, strengthened access controls and revoked compromised credentials.
It also said it was increasing investment in endpoint protection and developer-environment security, and engaging independent cybersecurity experts to review the incident. Some technical details and security measures would remain confidential, it said.
Magazine: Bitcoin’s ‘best buying opportunity ever’ has arrived: Mark Moss

Index provider MSCI has confirmed Bitcoin treasury company Strategy will be removed from its global equity indexes, following months of debate over whether crypto treasury firms qualify as operating businesses.
MSCI’s final list of affected securities, released as part of its November index review, lists “STRATEGY A” with the action “Deleted.” Japan’s Metaplanet and crypto treasury company Upexi are also marked for deletion, while Ether treasury firm Sharplink is on a watchlist.
The changes take effect after market close on Nov. 30, under the implementation timetable MSCI announced in October.
Removal could prompt funds tracking the affected benchmarks to sell the companies’ shares, reducing a source of passive investment demand.
As Cointelegraph reported in October, JPMorgan previously estimated that Strategy’s exclusion could trigger roughly $2.8 billion in selling.
Strategy opposed the proposal, arguing that it repackaged MSCI’s earlier effort to exclude digital asset treasury companies and injected policy judgments into index construction.
The company nevertheless played down the potential disruption. In its consultation response, Strategy said MSCI-linked funds held approximately 13 million shares, representing 3.1% of its basic shares outstanding and less than one day’s trading volume.

Cryptocurrency wallet Suiet is shutting down, adding to a series of closures and service withdrawals in the Sui ecosystem.
Suiet, a self-custodial wallet built for the Sui blockchain, said in a notice that it will stop updating and supporting its wallet, with API services set to end after Nov. 14. The shutdown comes as the Sui network has seen a sharp decline in decentralized finance (DeFi) activity.
Sui’s total value locked (TVL) stood at about $413 million on Wednesday, down more than 22% over the past month, according to DefiLlama data. Data from Token Terminal shows that Sui averaged about 128,000 daily active users in October, down from 601,000 in November 2025 – or around a 79% drop.
Meanwhile, other recent closures have also raised concerns about the costs and challenges of keeping projects running on the Sui network.
“Sui’s problems seem to mostly be of an economic nature resulting from expensive engineering costs and low user volume rather than protocol failures,” Kadan Stadelmann, former chief technology officer of Komodo Platform, told Cointelegraph. “No flaw in the system’s core design has been found.”
Cointelegraph reached out to the Sui Foundation and Suiet for comment but had not received responses by publication.
Related: Sui DeFi protocol Full Sail to wind down after Switchboard incident
Recent closures and departures
Suiet’s shutdown immediately follows the Sui-based hardware wallet project Suiball also announcing its closure on Nov. 10. Meanwhile wallet provider Phantom ended support for Sui in September.
DeFi project Full Sail also shut down following a security incident involving Switchboard that caused about $91,000 in losses.
Despite the decline in active users, transactions on Sui have increased, reaching 324 million in October, up from 101 million in November 2025, according to Token Terminal. However, more transactions do not necessarily mean more users, and wallet providers must still decide whether supporting the network is worth the cost, according to Stadelmann.
“Multi-chain wallets have expansive attack surfaces, and Sui’s approach adds costs for vendors who can take their business to less capital intensive chains,” he said. “Any individual failure of a multi-chain wallet is more a reflection of the risks rather than an indictment of any given protocol.”
A series of outages
Sui has also experienced four network outages in 2026, resulting in around 22 hours of combined downtime, according to reports published by the Sui Foundation.
The network stopped processing transactions for about six hours in January, followed by three more outages on May 28 and 29. The May disruptions were linked to software bugs, including problems introduced by a network update, the Sui Foundation said at the time.
By comparison, rival blockchain Solana has not recorded a network-wide outage since February 2024, when it went offline for nearly five hours. Meanwhile, Aptos, which uses the same underlying smart contract programming language as Sui, last reported a mainnet outage in October 2023.
Network outages are significant because they can prevent DeFi users from trading, transferring funds or managing positions, although the Sui Foundation said no user funds were at risk during its May disruptions.
Magazine: Wall Street killed Bitcoin’s wild rallies: 10x’s Markus Thielen

Nvidia’s board is preparing to oust founder and CEO Jensen Huang after he had two extramarital affairs, including one with a suspected Chinese spy, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Directors could meet as soon as Wednesday to determine Huang’s future, the report said, citing people familiar with the matter.
His potential removal would mark a major leadership change for the chipmaker, which has become central to the artificial intelligence boom under Huang.
This is a developing story; more information will be added as it becomes available.

Just over a week after a “blue wave” handed Democrats control of the US House and Senate, 14 races have yet to be called. The results so far have added crypto supporters in both chambers and the remaining races could bring more into Congress.
Three candidates in the uncalled races received backing from crypto political action committees (PACs). According to Stand With Crypto, every candidate in those races is either strongly pro-crypto or has no stated position.
As crypto advocacy groups look ahead to 2028, they’re turning their attention to candidates who have yet to take a public stance on crypto.
House races still to be called
Crypto PACs backed three candidates in US House races that remain undecided. Two incumbents lead in Alaska and North Carolina, while a Louisiana state senator faces a December runoff.
Rep. Nick Begich leads in Alaska’s US House race. Defend American Jobs, Fairshake’s Republican-facing affiliate, backed him with $508,142 in the August primary. The same PAC put $150,600 behind Rep. David Rouzer, who leads in North Carolina’s 7th District.
Louisiana state Sen. Blake Miguez will face Democrat Chauna Banks in a Dec. 12 runoff for the state’s 6th District. The Fellowship PAC backed Miguez with $250,000.
The Associated Press called the race in South Carolina’s 2nd District for incumbent Rep. Joe Wilson on the morning of Nov. 11. Stand With Crypto rates Wilson as “strongly supportive of crypto.” His win brought the group’s House tally to 246 crypto supporters and 107 opponents, while the Senate stood at 50 supporters and 33 opponents.
In the remaining races, Stand With Crypto lists each candidate as either strongly supportive of crypto or having no stated position. “The new members that have no stance present an opportunity,” Blockchain Association Chief Policy Officer Lindsay Fraser told Cointelegraph.
Educating the incoming congress
Nearly one in four members of the incoming Congress will be new, Fraser said, and many have given little thought to blockchain technology. “To us, that represents a blank slate in terms of education,” she said.
Blockchain Association is planning a January fly-in to reach newly elected lawmakers. “Leaving the 120th Congress with more members in that A and B category would be a huge success,” she said, referring to Stand With Crypto’s ratings. The group gives an A to candidates who strongly support crypto and a B to those who are somewhat supportive.
Fraser said age plays a bigger role than party affiliation in how lawmakers vote on crypto. She said members under 55 are much more likely to support the industry and that the incoming class skews younger.
Fraser said she wants the industry to enter the 2028 election “with two candidates who […] are thoughtful in regards to the industry,” so the sector can avoid “living and dying by the outcome of that election.”
Magazine: Wall Street killed Bitcoin’s wild rallies: 10x’s Markus Thielen

Japanese financial services giant Nomura Holdings is reportedly weighing a sale of its cryptocurrency subsidiary Laser Digital as Nomura’s European operations continue to post losses.
Nomura has held talks with potential buyers, including Marex Group, Bloomberg reported Wednesday. The company has yet to make a final decision and could keep the business, according to the report.
Nomura’s European businesses posted a pretax loss of 7.4 billion yen ($46.5 million) in the quarter ended Sept. 30, 2026, their fourth consecutive quarterly loss. The company posted pretax profits in every other reporting region over the same period. Nomura did not disclose whether Laser Digital, which is headquartered in Switzerland, contributed to the European result.
Nomura is one of Japan’s largest financial services groups, with its investment management division overseeing 152.8 trillion yen ($960 billion) in assets as of September 2026.
The potential sale comes less than three months after Laser Digital Japan secured the country’s first new crypto exchange license in four years, allowing the firm to expand its institutional crypto trading services in Japan.
Established in 2022, Laser Digital provides institutional cryptocurrency trading, asset management and venture investment services. The company has also pursued expansion in the United States, receiving preliminary approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency for its proposed national trust bank in May.
During a January earnings call, chief financial officer Hiroyuki Moriuchi said the company would reduce its cryptocurrency trading positions to limit short-term volatility while continuing to expand Laser Digital over the medium to long term.
Magazine: Paraguay bank collapse shows stablecoins can offer a lifeline... of sorts

The collapse of Paraguay’s digital lender Ueno Bank last week left nearly three million customers — roughly 60% of Paraguay’s adults — unable to access their accounts.
Paraguay’s Central Bank placed Ueno into resolution on Nov. 3 after its solvency ratio fell below half the legally required minimum. An investigation uncovered questionable lending practices and deficiencies in credit documentation and accounting.
The collapse also triggered a political crisis, with thousands taking to the streets to protest and President Santiago Peña attempting to resign before being impeached and arrested on charges of breach of trust and using his office for personal gain.
Paraguay’s peer-to-peer crypto market immediately reflected the turmoil, with some sellers asking for a USDt premium of up to 13%. “USDt is a lifeline for hundreds millions of people in the world,” Tether chief executive Paolo Ardoino said.
For many, the incident sparked uncertainty over savings, wages and the money needed to cover everyday expenses. With the local guaraní (PYG) currency falling 12.3% in a week, some turned to stablecoins to maintain the value of their funds, or just to keep payments moving along.
David Eisenmann, founder and chief executive of Paraguayan crypto exchange X4T, tells Magazine the timing made the liquidity need even more pronounced.
“The intervention came in the first days of the month,” he says, “exactly when salaries, rent and supplier invoices are due,” adding that many business owners “couldn’t make payroll.” For some, USDt was “suddenly the most liquid money” they had:
“This week they learned that having an account isn’t the same as having access to your money.”
But beyond another TradFi masterclass in the virtues of self-custody, Ueno’s collapse highlights the growing role of dollar-pegged stablecoins providing an alternative source of liquidity when traditional banks fail.
Crypto as a source of liquidity
Eisenmann says X4T processed more than $10 million in local on-ramp volume over the 30 days to early November, but some of that activity predated Ueno’s collapse.
“The dollar began recovering against the guaraní in October,” he says, “and the Ueno news sped up a move that was already underway.”
He says the activity “runs in both directions,” with some customers selling crypto for guaraníes or dollars to cover payments they could no longer make through Ueno, while “demand for USDt and USDC as a dollar store of value has risen sharply.”
Paraguay’s Central Bank placed Ueno into resolution on Nov. 3. Source: Central Bank of Paraguay
As of Nov. 9 the Central Bank said 93.1% of customers with Ueno deposits had been repaid. Despite this confidence has been shaken and X4T continued to see higher online inquiries for dollar-denominated stablecoins. In fact, Eisenmann says the level “has not changed significantly” from the week of the collapse.
Rhys Hicks, associate analyst at data and analytics company GlobalData, says the digital bank’s failure has shown “how much can go wrong when governance does not keep pace with growth.”
That said, he’s not seeing evidence of a mass migration from Paraguayan banks into stablecoins, since other banks “picked up the slack,” and people “seem to have been angrier” with the government than with the banks.
“Some consumers will look for different ways to keep their money safe, but I do not see an overwhelming shift to stablecoins yet,” he says.
An old impulse, with new rails
Seeking dollars when confidence in domestic banks falters is hardly new. In Argentina’s 2001 financial crisis, the government imposed the “corralito,” restricting cash withdrawals from bank accounts, following a run on deposits.
Amid a deepening crisis over the country’s currency peg and sovereign debt, the government later converted dollar-denominated deposits into pesos, reducing people’s savings by about 30% overnight and further damaging confidence in the country’s fraying banking system.
Tether CEO calls USDt a lifeline. Source: Paolo Ardoino
But stablecoins aren’t decentralized and they are not insulated from the banking system either.
During the March 2023 collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, stablecoin issuer Circle disclosed that $3.3 billion of USDC reserves, around 8% of the total, were held at the lender. USDC briefly depegged and fell to 86 cents on secondary markets after Circle said it could not withdraw the funds.
A BIS paper on stablecoins and the international monetary system warns that widespread use of dollar-backed tokens could create challenges for monetary sovereignty in emerging markets.
Hicks says stablecoins can provide an alternative during periods of political instability and “low trust in the local system” because they are pegged to a more stable currency, like the US dollar.
But regulators need to address “transparency” and “consumer protection,” he says, because stablecoin holders don’t benefit from the same deposit guarantees as bank customers, and there is no central bank to step in and make them whole.
Eisenmann says he expects the incident to spark more “diversification,” with people “spreading their money across banks, cash and digital assets” instead of relying on a single institution.
“How quickly trust in the banks returns will depend on how quickly and transparently the authorities handle the resolution,” he says.
Magazine: What Democrats’ US midterm sweep means for the CLARITY Act

Bitcoin miners with power already secured could have an edge in the race to build AI data centers after voters in several US communities backed limits on new development. The midterms could also bring closer scrutiny from Congress over who pays for the grid upgrades those facilities need, industry experts told Cointelegraph.
Voters in several states weighed in on data center development during the Nov. 3 US midterms, when local measures appeared on the same ballots as congressional races. Amid concerns about rising electricity costs, water use and the impact on nearby communities, voters favored limiting development in 40 of the 41 local contests tracked by Ballotpedia.
The restrictions include citywide bans, limits on larger facilities, temporary pauses on new projects and voter approval requirements for some developments.
The results come as major Bitcoin mining companies continue moving into AI, a transition Jamie Brown, CEO of Global Kiwi Labs, said could become more attractive as local restrictions make it harder to build new data centers.
“If a Bitcoin miner has not yet repurposed their electric contract and physical plant to AI, the case to do so just got more compelling,” said Brown, whose company hosts servers for crypto exchanges and trading firms.
Related: US midterm elections 2026 as it happened: Democrats win control of Congress
Local restrictions make expansion harder
Miners’ shift to AI infrastructure is already underway, with publicly listed Bitcoin miners announcing more than $70 billion in AI and advanced computing contracts during 2025 and early 2026, according to a first-quarter report by CoinShares.
But state and local decisions can have a more immediate impact on whether data center projects move forward. That’s because local authorities often oversee zoning and building permits and can influence access to electricity.
“A company might have access to an attractive site and a significant amount of power capacity, but if local restrictions prevent it from expanding or upgrading that infrastructure, the opportunity becomes much more difficult to pursue,” said Jordan Knecht, head of strategic integrations at Kresus, a blockchain infrastructure company.
Last week, voters backed 27 measures to limit or oppose new data centers in the elections, according to Ballotpedia. These included five complete bans, 12 partial bans and six-month pauses on new projects in three Maine towns.
In Grove City, Ohio, voters approved a rule requiring public approval for large projects that use more than 20 megawatts of electricity, among other conditions.
“Federal policy will certainly influence the broader investment environment, but the practical ability to develop and operate these facilities often comes down to conditions in individual markets,” Knecht told Cointelegraph. “For miners looking to transition into AI, I think understanding those local dynamics will be just as important as following developments in Washington.”
Expanding into AI is not that simple
Building AI-ready data center infrastructure can cost between $8 million and $15 million per megawatt, compared with $700,000 to $1 million per megawatt for traditional mining facilities, according to a 2026 report by CoinShares.
That gap helps explain why a site with power already secured is only a starting point for miners moving into AI. “Transitioning from Bitcoin mining to AI workloads requires significant additional investment in infrastructure for cooling, networking, and reliability,” Knecht said.
Yuliya Barabash, founder of SBSB Fintech Lawyers, also pointed to differences in electricity needs between Bitcoin mining and AI data centers. Bitcoin miners can often reduce electricity use when prices rise, while AI data centers typically need a consistent power supply, she said.
“Higher electricity prices and additional regulatory requirements could make some projects less profitable or delay their implementation,” Barabash told Cointelegraph.
This comes as electricity demand from US data centers is also expected to rise, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). The agency estimates that data centers used 224 terawatt-hours of electricity in 2025, a figure projected to nearly double to 426 terawatt-hours by 2030.
The impact of Congressional changes
One question facing the incoming Democratic-controlled Congress is who should pay to expand the grid for large data centers.
Knecht said lawmakers could take a closer look at how those projects affect electricity costs and how they get approved. “There may be more pressure to ensure that large data center operators are paying their fair share of infrastructure costs rather than passing those expenses on to consumers.”
Barabash also expects scrutiny of who pays for the electricity infrastructure needed to support data centers. “One of the key priorities is likely to be ensuring that technology companies, rather than ordinary consumers, bear the costs of the additional electricity infrastructure their facilities require,” she said.
Still, experts noted that closer attention does not necessarily mean Congress will discourage data center development. “AI infrastructure is becoming increasingly important to the US economy, and there is still a strong incentive to support investment in domestic computing capacity,” Knecht said.
For miners weighing a conversion, the question is whether AI revenue can justify the cost of upgrading cooling, networking and power systems. Brown thinks it can. “Miners will swap to AI because it is a better ROI than mining,” he said.
Magazine: Wall Street killed Bitcoin’s wild rallies: 10x’s Markus Thielen

Crypto exchange OKX and New York Stock Exchange parent Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) are set to launch tokenized stock trading on Nov. 23, despite objections from 67 companies to having their shares listed and warnings from Nasdaq that trading across disconnected platforms could fragment liquidity.
The venture, known as OKXICE, will operate under the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s temporary Innovation Exemption and offer eligible US customers round-the-clock trading. Under the exemption, venues must give companies a chance to object before listing shares tokenized by an unaffiliated third party. JPMorgan Chase, McDonald’s, SpaceX and Coca-Cola were among the companies that objected.
Tokenized stocks are blockchain-based tokens that represent company shares or track their price. The rights they carry depend on how they are structured. The distributed value of tokenized stocks and ETFs reached $3.88 billion on Nov. 11, up 13.4% over 30 days.
In comments to Cointelegraph, former New York governor and OKXICE co-chair Andrew Cuomo said investors would have “the same rights, protections and ownership that come with the underlying shares.”
OKX expects the venue to list more than 70 assets, including 59 exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and tokenized shares of Coinbase, Circle, BitGo, Robinhood and Strategy. The lineup also includes Strategy’s preferred shares.
Tokenized stock trading raises liquidity concerns
The rollout comes amid concerns that trading the same shares across traditional exchanges and blockchain platforms could split liquidity and make prices less reliable.
In October, a study by the International Monetary Fund found that the tokenized stocks were about 1.5 times as volatile as the same stocks in traditional markets. Decentralized exchanges had the weakest liquidity and their prices strayed further from those in traditional markets than prices on centralized exchanges did.
The IMF also warned that combining trading and settlement on a blockchain could remove safeguards that help markets absorb shocks. As tokenized markets grow, greater use of leverage and closer links between markets could amplify fire sales, liquidity runs and financial contagion.
Nasdaq argued in a January filing that trading tokenized stocks on platforms outside traditional rails could fragment liquidity and make it harder for investors to get the best available price. Regular US stock trading runs from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Eastern time on weekdays, excluding market holidays, though some brokers offer premarket, after-hours and overnight trading.
Cuomo described the current market structure was “built for another era,” arguing that crypto markets had already shown that trading could run around the clock. “Now we are bringing that standard to equities, without asking investors to settle for synthetic exposure or give up their shareholder rights,” he said.
Magazine: Bitcoin hovers near $74K as stocks rise despite US bond yield rebound

CoreWeave shares jumped 15.27% in premarket trading Wednesday after the AI cloud provider reported third-quarter revenue that beat analyst estimates.
The shares traded at $56.12 as of 12:50 pm UTC, trimming the stock’s year-to-date decline to 32%, according to Yahoo Finance.
CoreWeave reported $3.66 billion in third-quarter revenue after the market closed on Tuesday, up 168% from $1.36 billion a year earlier.
Revenue came in about 3.4% above the $3.54 billion consensus estimate compiled by Google Finance.
The company also reported a revenue backlog of about $132.5 billion as of Sept. 30. The figure includes revenue CoreWeave expects to recognize under existing customer contracts, subject to delivery and service availability.
In April, CoreWeave announced a multiyear agreement with AI developer Anthropic to provide computing capacity for its Claude models. Days later, CoreWeave signed a $6 billion deal with quantitative trading company Jane Street to supply cloud infrastructure for trading and research.
CoreWeave started as a crypto miner and began shifting to AI infrastructure in 2019.

Bitcoin (BTC) circled $74,000 at Wednesday’s Wall Street open as stock markets rallied and US bond yields surged.
Key points:
Bitcoin failed to follow US stocks higher as CoreWeave gained up to 21% after beating Q3 revenue estimates.
The US 10-year bond yield hit a high of 5.02% on the back of higher-than-expected US CPI inflation.
BTC traded in a narrow range between its 21-week and 50-week trend lines at $73,078 and $75,492, respectively.
Tech stocks rise while 10-year yield returns to 5%
Data from TradingView showed BTC/USD diverging from US equities as investors resumed buying the dip in tech stocks.
BTC/USD one-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
The AI sector led the day’s early gains, with cloud-computing company CoreWeave jumping over 20% after reporting better-than-expected Q3 revenue and lifting its 2026 guidance.
CoreWeave stock one-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
Nvidia, which suffered on Monday and Tuesday amid ongoing controversy over CEO Jensen Huang, opened around 2.5% higher.
Nvidia stock one-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
Oil prices, meanwhile, gained on the day amid fading optimism over a diplomatic solution to the US-Iran war. As attacks on ships traversing the Strait of Hormuz continued, analysis pointed to several practical hurdles to restoring pre-conflict traffic levels, even if a deal is reached.
“Even in the event a deal is struck, an increase in flows through the waterway would still depend on mine clearance, insurance costs and whether or not shipowners would even be willing to take the risk,” LSEG Oil Research wrote in a note on Tuesday, according to Reuters.
US WTI crude oil was up 1.4% on the day at $87.70 per barrel after dropping to $84 on Tuesday, its lowest since late August. Brent crude gained 1.5% to $93.40.
CFDs on WTI crude oil one-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
Stocks rose even after Tuesday’s higher-than-expected Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation data pushed US bond yields sharply higher. The 10-year yield returned to 5% on Wednesday for the first time since Oct. 29, while the 30-year yield reached as high as 5.378%, a level last seen on Oct. 22.
US 10-year bond yield one-day chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
Peter Boockvar, chief investment officer at One Point BFG Wealth Partners, said that bonds were pricing in a more hawkish approach to interest rates by the US Federal Reserve. Markets have priced in a 0.25% rate hike in December, with the odds of a 0.5% move now increasing.
“Inflation breakevens today are focused on the drop in oil prices while regular Treasuries today are reacting to a Fed that is definitely going to hike next month, as of now, with one another in January,” Boockvar told CNBC.
BTC price stays between two key trend lines
Bitcoin continued to trade in a narrow range between its 21-week and 50-week simple moving average at $73,078 and $75,492, respectively. Volatility cooled as traders awaited a new catalyst after the CPI report.
BTC/USD one-day chart with 21-week and 50-week SMAs. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
Investor profitability suffered as Bitcoin lost support around $75,700, the aggregate cost basis of the short-term holder (STH) cohort - entities holding a given amount of BTC without selling for up to 155 days.
On Tuesday, STH wallets sent over 47,000 BTC to exchanges at an unrealized loss, potentially signaling an increase in panic selling if those coins were sold.

Germany’s largest lender, Deutsche Bank, launched its crypto custody service for institutional and corporate clients on Wednesday, according to an announcement shared with Cointelegraph.
The bank also signed a memorandum of understanding with Deutsche Asset Management, its majority-owned asset manager, to explore collaboration on tokenized money market funds, crypto asset exchange-traded commodities and stablecoins.
Deutsche Bank announced plans to offer the service to institutional and corporate clients in Europe on Sept. 16, pending regulatory clearance. Deutsche Bank’s listing for crypto custody and transfer services in the European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) register is dated Oct. 12 and names Germany’s BaFin as its regulator.
The service initially supports Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH) and select stablecoins, including Circle’s USDC (USDC) and EURC (EURC), as well as AllUnity EURAU.
Gerald Podobnik, co-head of Deutsche Bank’s corporate bank, told Reuters in October that the bank planned to launch in Germany before expanding to Asian financial centers in 2027.
Deutsche Bank partnered with crypto infrastructure provider Taurus in 2023 to develop custody services after applying for a digital asset custody license in Germany.