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According to Blockworks, the Solana network is set to experience some relief from its recent congestion issues as the Ore project suspends all mining activities. The decision was announced by the project's pseudonymous creator, Hardhat Chad, following a series of network instability and congestion problems. The announcement led to a significant increase in Ore's price, which more than tripled from around $93 to over $300, before settling at around $215. Ore is a blockchain-based project that was launched on the Solana network with the aim of exploring a more engaging and equitable way of distributing cryptocurrency. It implemented a proof-of-work (PoW) token distribution mechanism, similar to that used by Bitcoin. However, the Solana blockchain operates differently, using a proof-of-history (PoH) consensus combined with proof-of-stake (PoS), which significantly speeds up transactions and reduces costs. Despite its initial success, Ore quickly became the most active program on Solana by transaction count, leading to a surge in failed transactions. As many as 75% of non-vote Solana transactions were not going through in early April, a figure that has since reduced to around 60%. This issue, coupled with the realization that Solana's low fees can work against the network when the transaction cost isn't high enough to discourage spam, led to the decision to pause Ore mining activities. The pause is temporary, allowing Hardhat Chad and his team to redesign the Ore contract for a Version 2 (v2). The next iteration aims to optimize the existing system, address inefficiencies that gave some miners an asymmetric advantage, and introduce structural incentives for holding the token. All existing Ore tokens will be upgradable one-for-one into the new v2 token, ensuring fairness and continuity for current participants. As Solana continues to deploy patches to improve performance and manage congestion, Ore’s v2 is being developed to better align with these network upgrades.

According to CryptoPotato, recent data from Arkham indicates that the top five identified crypto whales, with publicly known wallet addresses, collectively hold approximately $3.5 billion in digital assets. However, some of these whales are unable to access their digital wealth due to lost passwords to their digital wallets. Among these are prominent industry figures such as TRON’s Justin Sun, LHV Bank’s Rain Lõhmus, Ethereum’s Vitalik Buterin, former Ripple CTO Stefan Thomas, and crypto venture capitalist James Fickel. Rain Lõhmus and Stefan Thomas are in a unique situation, unable to access their holdings, which currently stand at around $793 million and $452 million, respectively. This represents about 35% or $1.24 billion of the total holdings of the top five identified whales. Private keys, which serve as the digital signature granting access to users’ crypto holdings, are the sole means of control and ownership over these funds. Therefore, losing these keys results in a virtual lockout from one's assets, making them effectively inaccessible and irretrievable. Many individuals have held these funds since the inception of Bitcoin ten years ago, a time when there was little confidence in the crypto industry's potential value. Lõhmus, for instance, allegedly misplaced his private keys, leaving him unable to access his funds. He admitted to owning a wallet containing 250,000 ETH, which he earned during ICO 2014, but has not made any effort to retrieve it. He has, however, expressed willingness to consider offers from experts who might assist him in reclaiming his lost cryptocurrency wealth. Former Ripple executive Thomas, who received 7,002 BTC in 2011 as payment for creating an educational video about Bitcoin, also lost access to his funds after forgetting the password to an IronKey encrypted hard drive containing the private keys. Crypto security experts at Unciphered offered potential assistance in October 2023, claiming they could bypass Thomas’s IronKey and help him regain access to his Bitcoin fortune. However, Thomas declined Unciphered’s help and instead reportedly engaged two other teams – cybersecurity firm Naxo and independent researcher Chris Tarnovsky – offering them rewards for unlocking the drive. There’s been no news of success from these parties so far.

According to PANews, the digital asset management platform Safe has disclosed its token economics. The maximum supply of SAFE tokens is set at 1 billion, with an initial circulation of 427 million. The overall distribution of SAFE tokens covers five categories: core contributors (15%), Safe Foundation (15%), ecosystem (5%), users (5%), and community treasury (60%). The realization period for SAFE tokens extends up to eight years. In previous news, SafeDAO's proposal regarding the 'open transferability of SAFE' was approved and will be implemented starting April 23.

According to PANews, an investigation into a suspected exploiter of a Prisma vulnerability, known as 0x77 or Trung, has been released by blockchain detective ZachXBT. The investigation relates to multiple vulnerabilities and an alleged loss of $11 million. On March 28, 2024, the Prisma team observed a series of transactions on the MigrateTroveZap contract, resulting in a loss of 3,257 ETH, approximately $11 million. Initially, the attacker communicated with the Prisma deployer, claiming it was a white-hat attack. However, later the same day, all funds were transferred to Tornado Cash, contradicting the previous statement. The exploiter began making excessive demands, asking for a white-hat bounty of $3.8 million (34%), significantly higher than the industry standard of 10%. This was essentially an extortion attempt, as the vault did not have sufficient assets to compensate users. Through on-chain tracking, it was found that the PrismaFi vulnerability exploiter 0x77 was also suspected of exploiting the Arcade vulnerability in March 2023 and a vulnerability on the Pine protocol from February 2024. Furthermore, the exploiter's address is linked to the deployer address of the Modulus Protocol. 0x77 is one of the few followers of this project, strengthening the connection between each event. Further analysis of the alleged scammer's phone number, email, and other details revealed a strong technical background. All personal details have now been compiled, and the Prisma team is pursuing all possible legal avenues in Vietnam and Australia. ZachXBT is urging the scammer to return the funds as soon as possible to avoid further escalation and save time for everyone.

According to PANews, venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) has successfully raised $7 billion in new funds, surpassing the company's initial fundraising target by approximately 4%. This capital will be allocated to various sectors within the company. The American Dynamism sector, which focuses on promoting startups of 'national interest', has raised $600 million. The growth sector or late-stage startups have raised $3.75 billion, and the gaming sector has also raised $600 million. An individual familiar with the company's thinking stated that Artificial Intelligence (AI) is not a separate fund as it now plays a significant role in almost all startups. Another person knowledgeable about the matter indicated that Andreessen Horowitz still plans to raise more funds focused on cryptocurrency and biotechnology by 2025.

According to BlockBeats, Safe has officially announced that the SAFE tokens will be transferable from April 23. Previously, it was reported that SafeDAO had tentatively set April 23 as the date for enabling the transferability of SAFE tokens, a proposal that was approved through voting. This move marks a significant step for Safe, as it allows for greater flexibility and liquidity for SAFE token holders. The decision to make SAFE tokens transferable was made following a democratic voting process, reflecting the decentralized nature of the blockchain-based organization. It's important to note that the transferability of SAFE tokens is subject to the rules and regulations of the respective jurisdictions. Token holders are advised to stay informed about the latest updates and changes in the crypto market. The transferability of SAFE tokens is a significant development in the crypto space, and it is expected to have a substantial impact on the market dynamics.

On Apr 16, 2024, 15:02 PM(UTC). According to Binance Market Data, Bitcoin has dropped below 62,000 USDT and is now trading at 61,927.539063 USDT, with a 3.04% decrease in 24 hours.

On Apr 16, 2024, 15:02 PM(UTC). According to Binance Market Data, BNB has dropped below 530 USDT and is now trading at 529.900024 USDT, with a 4.66% decrease in 24 hours.

According to PANews, BounceBit, a Bitcoin collateral chain, has announced the launch of its Liquid Custody service. The concept of Liquid Custody, named after Liquid Stake, is similar to liquid collateral. It involves generating derivatives tied to the value of the underlying asset to offset the commitment to income-generating activities for locked assets. Unlike Liquid Stake, users do not pledge their assets to a network security protocol, but instead entrust them to centralized custody. Users receive a token, similar to a voucher, which allows them to withdraw anything they have pledged or committed. When users deposit assets (BTC, USDT, FDUSD, ETH) into BounceBit, they receive a token (BBTC, BBUSD, BBETH) that represents their assets being supervised and held in a 1:1 ratio. These tokens can be bridged to BounceBit and further utilized. For instance, BBTC can be pledged to a dual-token PoS to receive stBBTC, which can then be re-pledged. Alternatively, users can directly participate in regular liquidity mining within the BounceClub ecosystem via DApp.

According to Foresight News, the account abstraction application, Plena, has successfully raised $5 million in funding. The investors in this round included Big Brain Holdings, DeWhale, GBV, WebWise, Galxe, Normie Ventures, and FounderHeads. The company has announced plans to launch a Token Generation Event (TGE) for the PLENA token in 2024, along with a series of community participation events known as Plena Quests. Further details about these upcoming events are yet to be disclosed.

According to PANews, PayPal has announced a new policy that will exclude Non-Fungible Token (NFT) purchases from its buyer protection plan. The policy, which will take effect on May 20, 2024, also states that NFT sales exceeding $10,000 will not be protected against false claims and refunds. The company's website revealed that a notice was issued on March 21, outlining plans to cease protection for certain NFT-related transactions. However, these changes have not been reported until now. Under the 'Amendment to the PayPal Purchase Protection Plan' section on its policy update page, PayPal stated, 'Effective May 20, 2024: We are amending PayPal's Purchase Protection Plan to exclude NFTs from eligibility.' In the 'Amendment to the PayPal Seller Protection Plan' section, PayPal indicated that it is revising its seller protection plan to exclude NFT transactions amounting to $10,000.01 or more from eligibility. This move by PayPal is significant as it affects the security measures in place for buyers and sellers involved in high-value NFT transactions.

According to Foresight News, Alchemy Pay, a provider of cryptocurrency payment services, has announced its decision to identify Hong Kong as a key strategic market. This move aligns with Hong Kong's ambition to become the next cryptocurrency hub in Asia. Alchemy Pay's decision underscores the growing importance of Hong Kong in the global cryptocurrency landscape.

According to Foresight News, DFINITY has announced the integration of its ICP with Threshold-Schnorr technology. This integration will enable ICP smart contracts to mint runes, mint Ordinals, send and receive BRC-20 tokens, and directly sign taproot transactions on Bitcoin. The full implementation of Threshold-Schnorr in ICP is expected to be completed by mid-2024.

According to BlockBeats, Tether Treasury has minted 1 billion USDT on the Tron blockchain. The operation was detected by Whale Alert, a blockchain monitoring and analytics service, on April 16th. This significant addition to the Tron blockchain took place within a span of approximately 40 minutes. Tether (USDT) is a well-known stablecoin, a type of cryptocurrency that attempts to peg its market value to some external reference. In this case, USDT is pegged to the US dollar. The Tron blockchain is a decentralized platform designed to support a wide range of applications. It is known for its high throughput, scalability, and availability. The minting of such a large amount of USDT on the Tron blockchain is a noteworthy event in the cryptocurrency world. It indicates a growing demand for stablecoins and a strong belief in the capabilities of the Tron blockchain. However, it's important to note that the minting of new tokens doesn't necessarily mean an increase in the overall supply of USDT. The new tokens could be used to replace older ones or to provide liquidity in the market.

According to Foresight News, Scroll has announced plans for a Bernoulli upgrade set to take place on April 29, 2024. The upgrade will introduce the EIP-4844 data blob for L1 data availability and support for precompiled SHA2-256. Scroll anticipates that the Bernoulli upgrade will reduce transaction costs by tenfold, depending on L1 Gas fees.

According to Foresight News, Mesh, a cryptocurrency transfer and payment company, has announced a partnership with MetaMask. The collaboration aims to simplify the management and monitoring of digital assets within the MetaMask wallet. The integrated features include account aggregation, transaction history viewing, connection to over 300 trading software via the Mesh API, and ensuring user security and privacy. The partnership will enable seamless digital asset transfers and account aggregation. This move is expected to streamline the process of managing digital assets within the MetaMask wallet. The integration of these features will provide users with a comprehensive view of their transaction history. Moreover, the partnership will allow users to connect to more than 300 trading software through the Mesh API. This feature will provide users with a wide range of trading options. In addition, the collaboration will ensure user security and privacy, a critical aspect in the digital asset management space.

According to Foresight News, Contango Digital Assets, a venture capital firm specializing in cryptocurrencies, has announced the successful initial fundraising for its new fund, Contango Blockchain x AI Fund. So far, the fund has raised $5 million, which will be used to support companies established in the intersection of blockchain and artificial intelligence. A portion of the fund has already been allocated to projects within the Bittensor ecosystem.

According to Foresight News, Arbitrum has announced a delay in the launch of the third phase of its foundation funding program. Originally scheduled for Monday, April 15, the launch has been postponed to Wednesday, April 17 due to internal maintenance. The delay is intended to ensure the smooth operation of the program and to address any potential issues before the launch. Further details about the maintenance or the specific reasons for the delay were not provided. The foundation has not made any further comments on the matter.

According to CryptoPotato, Ethereum (ETH) has seen a surge in discussion rate within the crypto community, following the approval of Ethereum ETFs in Hong Kong. This has placed Ethereum at the top of a particular ranking, despite a recent 5% decline in its value over 24 hours and a 15% weekly drop. Market intelligence platform Santiment revealed that Beam (BEAM) and Tether (USDT), the largest stablecoin by market capitalization, followed Ethereum in the ranking. Other cryptocurrencies that made the list include Cat in a Dogs World (MEW), Avalanche (AVAX), Toncoin (TON), and Ondo (ONDO). The increased interest in Ethereum is largely attributed to the recent approval of spot Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs in Hong Kong. This move by the regulators of China's special administrative region is seen as an indication of the city-state's ambition to become a global crypto hub. Despite the popularity of Ethereum among industry participants, the native token of the blockchain platform, ETH, has experienced a significant setback. Its price has fallen by 5% in the last 24 hours and 15% over the week, coinciding with a broader market decline that has also affected Bitcoin (BTC). Crypto analyst Rekt Capital suggested that Ethereum's price trajectory is mirroring the downside wick of mid-2021. The analyst believes that a new bullish momentum for Ethereum depends on a weekly close above $2,800. Another user, Crypto Tony, also weighed in on the discussion, stating that maintaining a price above $3,040 is crucial for bullish momentum.

According to Foresight News, PancakeSwap has announced that it is currently working on code optimization for its V4 version. The code freeze and audit are scheduled to take place later this quarter. The V4 version is set to be made available to users in the third quarter. This development is part of PancakeSwap's ongoing efforts to improve its platform and provide better services to its users. The code optimization process is a crucial step in ensuring the platform's efficiency and reliability. The upcoming audit will further ensure the platform's security and trustworthiness. The V4 version, once released, is expected to bring about significant improvements and new features to the platform.