DL News

When US President Donald Trump entered office in January, his political opponents were quick to allege his crypto dealings raised conflict of interest concerns.

Now, those accusations are mounting.

On Tuesday, House Democrats published a new report that they say presents extensive evidence of presidential self-dealing, foreign influence, and obstruction of justice stemming from his crypto conduct.

“Donald Trump has turned the Oval Office into the world’s most corrupt crypto startup operation, minting staggering personal fortunes for him and his family in less than a year,” Jamie Raskin, a Democratic Representative for Maryland, said in the report.

At the same time, the value of the Trump family’s enterprises, many of which are implicated in the alleged crypto corruption, are plummeting.

Shares of American Bitcoin Corp, the Bitcoin mining firm spun up by Eric Trump, Donald Trump Jr, are down over 40% since the start of October, despite the firm’s revenue growing over the previous three months, per its third quarter financial results.

Trump Media and Technology Group, which holds $2 billion worth of Bitcoin on its books, has seen its shares drop 33% in the same period.

Elsewhere, the token tied to World Liberty Financial, the Trump family’s DeFi project, has slid 50% from its all-time highs, while Trump and his wife Melania’s memecoins have collapsed more than 91% and 99% respectively.

Despite the rout, Trump’s net worth, which his crypto ventures contribute significantly to, sits at $6.7 billion, according to Bloomberg News’ Billionaires Index.

Quid pro quo

The corruption accusations put increased pressure on the president and his family.

The White House has repeatedly stated that Trump’s assets are in a trust managed by his children, and that there are no conflicts of interest.

But critics argue that Trump is the sole beneficiary of that trust, and that he still benefits from any deals or income generated by his family’s businesses during his time in office.

Also mentioned in the report are the recent allegations of a quid pro quo deal between Trump and Changpeng Zhao, founder and former CEO of crypto exchange Binance.

On November 17, a 60 Minutes investigation tied a $2 billion investment deal between Binance and Abu Dhabi’s MGX to Zhao’s recent presidential pardon.

Critics say the deal, which was conducted with USD1, a stablecoin issued by World Liberty Financial, was done as a favour in exchange for the pardon.

Binance CEO Richard Teng, and Zhao’s lawyer Teresa Goody Guillen, have both dismissed claims that the exchange helped boost USD1 before Zhao received the pardon.

Foreign influence

It’s not the only accusation to implicate World Liberty Financial, either.

The House Democrats’ report also alleges dozens of foreign nationals and the firms, many with governmental ties, invested in the project’s WLFI token sale conducted between October and March, which raised $550 million.

They include Aqua 1, a UAE-based fund allegedly run by David Jia Hua Li, a 30-year-old Chinese-Brazilian finance professional who also works for the China National Petroleum Corporation, a Chinese state-owned energy enterprise.

Another prominent investor in WLFI was DWF Labs, a crypto market maker and investment firm run by Andrei Grachev, who has a criminal history and “extensive ties to the Russian government,” per the report.

Grachev did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

There’s also Justin Sun, a Chinese-born businessman and founder of the $26 billion Tron blockchain.

Sun bought $75 million worth of WLFI tokens between November 2024 and January this year. In February, the US Securities and Exchange Commission paused its ongoing case against the crypto billionaire.

Sun was previously accused of artificially inflating trading volumes of TRX, the native token of the Tron blockchain. He previously said the SEC’s case “lacks merit.”

“The shady nature of these foreign investors raises significant legal, ethical, and practical

Concerns,” the report said. “Foreign entities might attempt to buy Trump tokens to curry influence with the Administration.”

Swaying policy

It’s a similar situation with Trump’s memecoin.

He launched the token on January 17, three days before his inauguration. It quickly shot up to a $8.8 billion market value before cratering 50% in just over a week.

On April 23, Trump announced he planned to hold an exclusive dinner for the largest 220 holders of the memecoin, while the top 25 holders would receive an exclusive VIP reception

and a White House tour.

According to the Trump memecoin’s website, two Trump-affiliated companies own 80% of the token he had just encouraged people to purchase. The value of the memecoin jumped by more than 70% after the announcement.

Of the 25 VIP guests who attended the event, 19 were foreign nationals, the report said. They included He Tianying, a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, an advisory body that seeks to broaden the Chinese Communist Party’s influence.

While it’s not clear which, if any, of the guests bought Trump’s memecoin in a bid to curry favour with the president, other buyers have been more explicit.

On April 30, Freight Technologies, a logistics firm that operates in the US, Mexico and Canada, announced plans to acquire $20 million of the memecoin.

“We believe that the addition of the Official Trump tokens are an excellent way to diversify our crypto treasury, and also an effective way to advocate for fair, balanced, and free trade between Mexico and the US,” Javier Selgas, the firm’s CEO, said.

Tim Craig is DL News’ Edinburgh-based DeFi Correspondent. Reach out with tips at [email protected].

Individuals behind a tool mapping the Russian invasion of Ukraine signalled their outrage that the tool’s data was being used on Polymarket.

Launched in 2022 at the start of the invasion, DeepState Live is an interactive map that shows how far Russian troops have advanced throughout Ukraine.

It shows the locations of airborne assaults, where the Kremlin’s troops have been pushed back, and the position of Russian rifle divisions.

On Tuesday, the tool was synced with betting markets live on Polymarket by a pseudonymous X user named Pentagon Pizza Watch.

The user used DeepState Live’s API — a kind of digital gateway that connects different platforms — to link specific locations on the map to so-called conflict markets on the popular prediction market platform.

These markets let users bet on when Russia will capture the village of Dovha Balka in Ukraine’s Donetsk region or if troops will capture the Ukrainian city of Lyman.

“Today, your outrage, as well as ours, was triggered by a message from some bookmaker service about integration with our map,” the user behind DeepState Live said on Wednesday.

They added that they have no affiliation with Pentagon Pizza Watch or its service.

“This service profits from bets on the war and connects either through a free API provided to someone for humanitarian and military needs, or through third-party parsers.”

The person behind the Pentagon Pizza Watch account said it had removed the integration after seeing the statement.

“After our tweet went viral, DeepStateLive stated that they did not want us to use their map for our purpose (prediction markets),” the person behind the account said in their Telegram channel.

“After seeing this, I immediately removed the integration.”

Neither DeepStateLive, Pentagon Pizza Watch, nor Polymarket responded to DL News’ request for comment.

Pentagon Pizza Watcher developed another tool that measures fast-food orders at restaurants around the Pentagon and the White House.

It tracks this data under the theory that spikes in such orders occur right before crisis events, such as when Israel bombed Iran in June.

The Department of Defence denied the theory’s validity.

Predicting war and sport

Prediction markets have enjoyed explosive growth this year, buttressed by Polymarket and Kalshi.

Both platforms catapulted into the Zeitgeist in the run-up to the 2024 Presidential Election via markets that let users around the world bet on who would be moving into the White House.

Since then, volumes on both platforms have ramped back up as each offers expansive markets for various sporting events, namely football and basketball. Volumes have been sufficient to even attract traditional sports betting firms, such as DraftKings and FanDuel, into the prediction market space.

The CEO of Flutter, an Irish-American sports betting company that owns FanDuel, said the launch of their prediction market product “unlocks an immediate growth opportunity.”

Many of the Polymarket markets on the conflict are still being traded at press time.

Major prediction markets, such as Polymarket and Kalshi, let users trade on the odds of events such as what a CEO will say during an earnings call, who will win the Super Bowl, and how specific military campaigns will conclude.

The largest market on Polymarket regarding the Russian invasion asks whether Russia and Ukraine will reach a ceasefire in 2025.

For eight cents, users can buy a “yes” token. If the two countries reach a ceasefire agreement before the end of the year, and the market closes, the value of that token will rise to $1.

Conversely, “no” tokens, which are worth 93 cents, would plummet to $0.

Other markets exist for the capture or liberation of other smaller towns.

‘Great website’

Prediction market proponents argue that because there are clear financial incentives, the accuracy of information provided by these markets is far higher than that of news reports and punditry.

Regarding the conflict markets around Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, however, commentators online are split.

“Great website,” wrote pseudonymous X user Car, referring to Pentagon Pizza Watcher’s service. “I hope the Ukrainians understand Polymarket can give them high-quality updates and probabilities on certain events happening.”

Another user explained that data from these markets could inform evacuation plans for specific towns and cities in Ukraine.

Others find the activity appalling.

“For Ukrainians, it is a tragedy,” wrote another X user named WarTranslated. “But for some foreigners, it is a gambling game.”

Liam Kelly is DL News’ Berlin-based DeFi correspondent. Have a tip? Get in touch at [email protected].

South Korean investigators suspect North Korean hackers are behind the heist against Upbit that drained $36 million from the crypto exchange.

The timing of the attack, which unfolded amid Naver’s $10 billion takeover of Dunamu, Upbit’s parent company, has heightened suspicions of North Korean involvement, according to Yonhap.

There’s precedence for such suspicions. In 2019, hackers linked to the infamous Lazarus Group, a cybercrime syndicate widely believed to be state actors under Pyongyang’s direction, stole $41 million in Ethereum from Upbit.

If the suspicions prove to be true, it risks reviving a long-running digital confrontation between the two countries. While North Korean hackers are a menace to the industry as a whole, South Korean platforms have repeatedly been in the line of fire.

Apart from Upbit, Bithumb, another major South Korean exchange, has also suffered several breaches linked to North Korean hackers.

In 2025, North Korean hackers are estimated to have stolen $2 billion in cryptocurrency. The bulk of that sum comes from the $1.5 billion in Bybit funds stolen in February, the largest ever cryptocurrency exchange heist.

Data from blockchain analytics firm Elliptic pegs the total haul from North Korean hackers at $6 billion. Proceeds from the massive cryptocurrency crime campaign are used to support Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons programme.

Earlier in November, Pablo Sabatella, founder of blockchain security auditor opsek, told DL News, that the threat posed by North Korean hackers “is much worse than everybody thinks.”

Sabatella said cybercriminals linked to the regime had infiltrated up to 20% of all crypto companies.

On Friday, Upbit announced that it lost $4 million of its own funds in the hack, but that affected customers had been reimbursed.

The attack targeted Solana-based tokens held in one of the platform’s hot wallets.

The Upbit incident adds to a record-setting year of losses from crypto hacks and exploits.

Cybercriminals have syphoned more than $2.4 billion through attacks on cryptocurrency exchanges and DeFi protocols. Physical attacks against crypto holders have also increased this year.

Osato Avan-Nomayo is our Nigeria-based DeFi correspondent. He covers DeFi and tech. Got a tip? Please contact him at [email protected].

XRP is set to jump 65% as it accelerates towards its all-time high amid a cascade of new Wall Street products, according to Lawrence Samantha, chief executive of crypto platform NOBI.

The $133 billion cryptocurrency has “a clear path to a significant climb” which “is a testament to its structural market shift.” he told DL News. “With financial firms now exploring XRP, we see that there is a chance of it reaching its old record high.”

Samantha added that the capital inflows, regulatory clarity, and multiple spot exchange-traded funds launches show that “the institutional demand is very much there.”

Other investors have told DL News that XRP’s price is well positioned to surge by as much as 21% to $2.75.

To be sure, XRP’s price is currently down 40% from its July all-time high of $3.65, trading at $2.20.

But the Ripple-linked crypto is still up 50% on the year, outperforming Bitcoin and Ethereum in the same timeframe. For perspective, crypto’s total market value is 30% down from its October high.

ETFs and tailwinds

Spot ETFs linked to the fourth-largest cryptocurrency have attracted $644 million in investment in November across a growing roster of US funds, according to SoSoValue.

That contrasts sharply with the $3.5 billion in selling recorded by Bitcoin ETFs and the $1.5 billion in offloading seen in Ethereum funds over the same period, DefiLlama data shows.

Franklin Templeton and Grayscale launched their spot XRP ETFs on Monday, joining Bitwise’s product that began trading earlier in the month.

Franklin Templeton described its new XRPZ EFF as a “regulated way to access a digital asset that plays a foundational role in global settlement infrastructure.”

Macro conditions are also adding fuel to the crypto rally as traders expect easing financial conditions.

San Francisco Fed chief Mary Daly said supports lowering rates at the next meeting, while Governor Stephen Miran calls for “large interest-rate cuts.”

The CME FedWatch tool assigns roughly 85% odds to a 0.25% interest rate reduction in December, with Polymarket bettors placing the probability at 87%.

The Federal Open Market Committee meets on December 9 and 10.

Crypto market movers

Bitcoin is down 0.3% over the past 24 hours, trading at $91,100.

Ethereum is trading sideways over the past 24 hours at $3,030.

What we’re reading

Robinhood’s Kalshi competitor marks new threat for beleaguered prediction market — DL News

Michael Saylor’s Strategy is now worth less than the Bitcoin it owns — DL News

Cosmos Considers ATOM Tokenomics Overhaul — Unchained

Arthur Hayes’ Crypto Outlook: Why Markets Are Set to Rip Into 2026 — Milk Road

Crypto, prediction markets dominate CFTC nominee hearing — DL News

Lance Datskoluo is DL News’ Europe-based markets correspondent. Got a tip? Email at [email protected].

Can Bitcoin investors relax?

The recent brutal price drawdown isn’t the end of the cycle but instead a sign that the market is maturing, says Fabian Dori, chief investment officer at Sygnum bank, who argues that sharper swings should be expected as Bitcoin transitions from fringe speculative asset to a more established market.

“From a cycle perspective, we see a maturing phase rather than an ending one,” Dori wrote in a Thursday note to clients. “Volatility and drawdowns could indeed become more pronounced — but the macro environment remains supportive.”

Bitcoin’s correction looks excessive rather than structural, according to Dori.

Despite maximum fear in sentiment indicators and massive deleveraging across different platforms, on-chain fundamentals continue improving, he wrote. The number of addresses that consistently accumulate Bitcoin has nearly doubled since October, while exchange reserves hit new lows.

Meanwhile, macro tailwinds remain intact with hopes that the Fed will end quantitative tightening in December.

But still, the top cryptocurrency has fallen more than 20% from its October highs, erasing nearly all of its year-to-date gains, which has also pushed the broader crypto market into negative territory.

The selloff has been amplified by a toxic cocktail of macro shocks, market structure stress, and liquidity pressure.

Depending on who you ask, Bitcoin has a long way down to go. Mike McGlone, senior commodity strategist at Bloomberg Intelligence, said on Linkedin that $50,000 is on the table for 2026. Even the permabull Arthur Hayes, known for his six-figure targets for Bitcoin, has alerted investors that the top crypto could be in for some more downside.

Others remain bullish. On a November 24 episode of What Bitcoin Did, Bitcoin analyst James Check said that his base case for 2026 remains $150,000 with a possibility of heading to $200,000.

‘Disproportionally negative’

Why has Bitcoin fallen so hard? Well, the end of 2025 has brought a cascade of negative catalysts.

First, the US and China trade war escalated once again. Second, the historically long US government shutdown limited macro visibility and delayed key data releases. Moreover, the stronger-than-expected labour data reduced prospects for a December rate cut by the Federal Reserve.

Adding fuel to the fire is the market structure. A historic liquidation cascade triggered by excessive leverage and immature price oracles wiped out overleveraged positions to a staggering tune of $19 billion.

Finally, liquidity dried up as the US Treasury built up its cash account and digital asset treasury companies exhausted their buying power.

“The reaction has been disproportionally negative,” Dori wrote.

2026 looks healthy

To be sure, market conditions should improve as 2026 arrives.

Business cycle indicators point to an acceleration driven by services, while many eyes are on the Fed to see if the agency puts an end to quantitative tightening in December.

Regulatory momentum continues despite the government shutdown delaying the Clarity Act.

So can Bitcoin investors kick their feet up? Not exactly.

Dori’s view is that even though there are some attractive buy opportunities for Bitcoin right now, “the current environment is uncomfortable.”

But that definitely beats a bear market.

Pedro Solimano is DL News’ Buenos Aires-based markets correspondent. Got a tip? Email him at [email protected].

Russian power providers have a new weapon in their arsenal to stop illegal Bitcoin miners from stealing over $16.6 million worth of electricity per year: artificial intelligence.

That’s according to Boris Ebzeev, the head of Rosseti, Russia’s state-owned electrical power company, who told the Russian publication CNews that his firm is currently “exploring and testing entirely new approaches to combating illegal mining.”

“We are looking at implementing AI data analysis technology directly within smart meters themselves, or in portable devices we install alongside them,” Ebzeev said. “We are already using big data analysis and elements of artificial intelligence.”

However, as energy providers grow smarter, so too do Russia’s illegal crypto miners, who are finding new ways to evade detection and throw investigators off their trails.

Fighting back

Ebzeev conceded that the greatest challenges for investigators looking for signs of illegal crypto mining come when illicit miners set up shop in industrial sites.

“In these sites, access to electrical installations and metering units is limited, and the load is unevenly distributed,” he explained.

An even greater problem is the rise of “roving” crypto mining units, Ebzeev noted.

“It is now commonplace to see illegal miners use mobile mining centers that are the size of a trailer or shipping container,” Ebzeev said. “This lets operators change their illegal connection locations at the drop of a hat.”

But the Rosseti chief said that embedding new AI solutions in the smart meters of ordinary residents and commercial users will help engineers fight back.

“Our proprietary AI solution lets us analyse data streams from all types of electricity meters,” Ebzeev explained. “Its algorithms let us identify consumption anomalies, detect meter tampering, and monitor a huge range of statistics.”

He concluded that Rosseti subsidiaries are now creating “dedicated teams of specialists” who will operate new diagnostic equipment and analytical systems.

Over $1.5 million in damages

While power engineers continue to develop new ways to detect illegal miners, Russian criminals are intensifying their efforts to steal electricity from public grids.

The Russian newspaper Kommersant reported that Rosseti and the Federal Security Service, also known as the FSB, have shut down a sophisticated illegal crypto mining scheme that they think was masterminded by the son of a former Presidential candidate.

The newspaper said that one of the arrestees is Maxim Yatsun, the owner of a construction company and the son of former Russian presidential candidate Andrey Yatsun.

The FSB’s Chelyabinsk Oblast branch said it had detained four individuals suspected of stealing electricity worth over $1.5 million. Officers have charged the quartet with “fraud on an especially large scale.”

Officials say that between November 2024 and April 2025, the suspects “repeatedly” sent a local electricity supplier “forged documents, falsifying the volumes of electricity consumed” at their industrial facility, where they installed banks of crypto mining rigs.

Police sources told Kommersant that security forces had raided Maxim Yatsun’s home, and suspected that the mining rigs used at the site belonged to him.

Tim Alper is a news correspondent at DL News. Got a tip? Email at [email protected].

With its joint acquisition of LedgerX on Wednesday, Robinhood is doubling down on its prediction market business — and raising fresh questions for Kalshi.

As LedgerX is licensed by the Commodities and Futures Trading Commission, Robinhood and its acquisition partner, quant trading firm Susquenha, can begin offering a proprietary service under one roof as early as next year.

The move raises serious questions for the company’s early partnership with Kalshi.

For now, the prediction market upstart is unfazed.

“When you build something as successful as Kalshi has, it’s no surprise that everyone and their mum wants a piece of it,” Jack Such, a growth executive at Kalshi, told DL News.

“It’s the ultimate compliment that companies like CME and Robinhood are validating the industry we created.”

$300 million

Robinhood first rolled out prediction markets in February, tying up with Kalshi to offer bets on NFL and college football games. Since then, the business has been one of Robinhood’s fastest-growing.

Since its launch, Robinhood has earned roughly $300 million in annual recurring revenue across nine billion contracts and over one million traders, according to a Tuesday note from Bernstein.

What’s more, that revenue is ginned up from just 30% to 50% of the total fee pool split with Kalshi.

By launching its own prediction market and taking control over fees, Robinhood could essentially double those revenues — and potentially halve Kalshi’s.

Though Robinhood will continue to host Kalshi contracts, the company’s move to launch its own platform is just another blow to the prediction market upstart.

Red-hot prediction markets

Prediction markets have emerged as one of the hottest — and most controversial — businesses in 2025.

These platforms let users bet on the outcomes of any number of events, including how far Russian troops will advance in Ukraine, who will win the Super Bowl, and the words a crypto executive will say on an earnings call.

The primary players have been Kalshi and its staunch competitor, Polymarket.

‘We’re confident in our ability to continue to define the category we built.’

Jack Such, a growth executive at Kalshi.

The two platforms facilitated hundreds of millions of dollars in trades in the run-up to the 2024 US Presidential election.

Volumes subsided after the election, but have since come roaring back as the sports season kicks off in the US.

Now, Kalshi’s notional volume over the last 30 days exceeds $4.7 billion, according to data collated by user datadashboards on Dune Analytics. So far this month, Polymarket has posted $3.7 billion in notional volume.

That action is turning heads among traditional sportsbooks. Sports betting behemoth FanDuel announced a new prediction market in partnership with CME Group on November 13, called FanDuel Predicts.

The CEO of Flutter, an Irish-American sports betting company that owns FanDuel, said the move “unlocks an immediate growth opportunity.”

As for Kalshi, it’s the same as always.

“We’re confident in our ability to continue to define the category we built,” Such told DL News.

Liam Kelly is DL News’ Berlin-based DeFi correspondent. Have a tip? Get in touch at [email protected].

Metaplanet’s shares surged by about 7% on Thursday after the digital asset treasury firm revealed it has loaned $130 million to buy even more Bitcoin.

And the Japanese hotel operator-turned Bitcoin treasury firm isn’t alone: Other DAT shares also surged on the back of the news, even outpacing the Nikkei 225, an index of leading Tokyo Stock Exchange shares, which rose just over 1% on Thursday.

Remixpoint, an energy provider and former crypto exchange operator, has also seen its share prices rise by 8.7% in the past 24 hours. The company holds Bitcoin worth $128 million.

Rival DATs SBC Medical Group Holdings, Gumi, and Agile Media Network saw their own share prices grow by 5%, 3%, and 1% respectively.

The share price rise also outstrips the growth of Bitcoin prices, which rose by around 0.24% in the same period.

This appears to suggest that the market was reacting positively to the news of Metaplanet’s intention to ramp up its Bitcoin buying despite recent crypto market price drops.

The deal also comes as traders are growing weary of DATs.

While the business plan pioneered by Michael Saylor’s Strategy attracted hundreds of copycats earlier this year, many of these firms’ shares are now worth less than their underlying assets. This raises questions about their viability as businesses.

Metaplanet eyes more Bitcoin purchases

The interest rate on Metaplanet’s latest loan is floating, and will renew on a daily basis, Metaplanet wrote in a filing declaration.

This is the second such loan Metaplanet has taken to buy additional Bitcoin, although the lender’s identity “has not been disclosed due to their own wishes,” the Japanese crypto journalist K. Kobayashi wrote in the Japanese publication CoinPost.

Metaplanet said the terms of the loan allow the firm to pay its debt “at any time.”

The Japanese company has previously established a $500 million credit facility to help it continue its aggressive Bitcoin buying strategy.

Japanese firms are growing increasingly bullish on crypto adoption. Earlier this month, six of the country’s biggest asset managers signalled their interest in launching crypto funds for retail and institutional investors.

The group has assets under management worth a combined $2.5 trillion, and includes the wealth management arm of the Japanese megabank Mitsubishi UFJ.

Regulators are also mulling proposals to green-light the inclusion of crypto in mutual funds, in addition to pro-business crypto tax reforms.

Tim Alper is a news correspondent at DL News. Got a tip? Email at [email protected].

Edel Finance, a purported tokenised stocks platform, is in the hot seat after hundreds of suspicious transactions marred its recent token launch.

On November 12, Edel Finance launched its EDEL token, which the project called a “fair-launch,” with only 12.7% of the one billion tokens going to team members.

But an onchain analysis conducted by Bubblemaps and reviewed by DL News found that a cluster of 60 wallets linked to the project scooped up more than 30% of the newly-launched token.

At the EDEL token’s current value, the haul is worth around $11 million.

On social media, James Sherborne, an Edel Finance co-founder, did not deny that his team had sniped the tokens.

He said the transactions were part of a planned manoeuvre to place 60% of the token in a vesting contract, a smart contract that automatically releases tokens to recipients over a predetermined schedule.

Token sniping is the practice of using bots to purchase newly-launched tokens the moment they become available on a decentralised exchange. The goal is often to acquire tokens at the lowest possible price before other investors can react.

Obfuscation techniques

Yet Sherborne’s response raises more questions than it answers.

DL News found no public record of Edel Finance stating that it planned to snipe tokens in advance.

The project’s tokenomics page, which Sherborne says backs up his statement, does not mention placing 60% of the EDEL token supply in a vesting contract.

Sherborne didn’t respond on X when Bubblemaps questioned those issues in his own thread.

What’s more, the sniping transactions involved sending the tokens through dozens of additional wallets and moving the tokens in and out of liquidity provider positions on Uniswap, the decentralised exchange.

While those transactions in themselves don’t constitute any inherent wrongdoing, such behaviour is often used by those seeking to obfuscate transaction traceability.

Sanctioned North Korean Lazarus Group — a cybercriminal organisation — routinely sends funds through multiple wallets to launder crypto assets it has stolen from crypto exchanges and DeFi protocols, according to Elliptic, a blockchain security firm.

Sherborne didn’t explain why he felt it necessary to segregate the tokens by sniping his project’s launch instead of simply sending the tokens directly to the vesting contract.

DL News asked Sherborne why the transactions that he claimed responsibility for employed obfuscation techniques.

Sherborne and Edel Finance didn’t respond to multiple requests for comment.

Lack of transparency

Edel Finance, founded earlier this year, paints itself as a global lending network for tokenised stocks.

The project promises to build “next-generation securities lending infrastructure,” that is “transparent, efficient, and built for scale.”

Several of Edel Finance’s co-founders and advisers have backgrounds at top firms, which the project leverages to drum up interest.

One co-founder, Giles Colwell, previously worked at Bank of America and JPMorgan. In 2021, he began a stint at crypto lender BlockFi, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2022 while Colwell served as an executive at the firm.

Rolando Gonzaga, an adviser, previously worked at Uber and at crypto exchange Binance’s US arm.

Edel Finance isn’t the first project to be marred by suspicious activity surrounding its token in recent months.

Earlier this month, Apriori, a trading infrastructure startup developed by former Jump Trading, Coinbase and Citadel Securities engineers, came under fire after onchain records showed suspicious activity surrounding its token airdrop.

An analysis, reviewed by DL News and reported by Bubblemaps and several other onchain researchers, found that approximately 80% of Apriori’s tokens were claimed by a single clustered group of more than 5,800 wallets.

Tim Craig is DL News’ Edinburgh-based DeFi Correspondent. Reach out with tips at [email protected].

The ink was barely dry on Naver Financial’s $10 billion takeover of Dunamu, operator of South Korea’s largest crypto exchange Upbit, when the platform was hacked for $36 million.

Upbit confirmed the incident on Thursday and said it suffered an unauthorised withdrawal of Solana-based cryptocurrencies, including stablecoins, from its coffers.

“To prevent any damage to member assets, the entire amount will be covered by Upbit’s holdings,” Oh Kyung-seok, CEO of Dunamu, said in a statement.

Upbit has also paused deposits and withdrawals and frozen $8.2 million in Solaire, one of the tokens syphoned during the breach.

$10 billion acquisition

The hack lands at a singularly awkward moment for Upbit and its new owner-to-be.

Naver Financial, a subsidiary of Korean internet giant Naver, agreed to a $10.3 billion stock-swap deal to acquire all of Dunamu’s equity, according to regulatory filings.

Stock-swap deals allow companies to merge without the acquirer needing to pay cash. Instead, it issues its own shares to the other company’s shareholders. Naver is issuing 2.54 of its own shares per Dumanu share.

The merger is expected to catapult Naver’s fintech arm to a market value of $13.6 billion.

Record-breaking hacks

The breach at Upbit is also the latest entry in what has already become a record-setting year for losses from crypto hacks and exploits, as attackers continue to target exchanges and DeFi protocols.

Losses from these incidents have exceeded $2.4 billion, including the massive $1.5 billion hack of the Bybit crypto exchange that happened in February.

Even long-standing DeFi protocols like Balancer, which have undergone numerous security audits from several blockchain security firms, haven’t been spared.

In November, an attacker syphoned $128 million from Balancer.

Upbit isn’t a first-time victim.

In 2019, suspected North Korean hackers stole $42 million in Ethereum from the crypto exchange.

Osato Avan-Nomayo is our Nigeria-based DeFi correspondent. He covers DeFi and tech. Got a tip? Please contact him at [email protected].

Privacy token Zcash is ready to rip 45%, says Maria Carola, CEO of crypto exchange StealthEx.

She argues that growing interest on Wall Street, most recently Grayscale’s exchange-traded fund filing on Wednesday, will propel the $8.3 billion crypto to new highs.

“A decisive break above $750 with sustained bullish momentum could open the path towards moving above $1,000 before the end of Q4,” Carola told DL News.

That would translate to Zcash’s price surging 45% above its current price of $515.

Privacy coins are “operating with an entirely different playbook from the wider market,” Carola said. “They are benefiting from the long-suppressed demand for privacy-preserving tools and prevalent policy legislation in this direction.”

And Carola is far from the only one bullish on Zcash. She joins the ranks of BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes, popular YouTuber Mario Nawfal, and prominent Indian investor Naval Ravikant, who have all come out in support of Zcash.

A slew of investors have also told DL News that they expect Zcash to surge higher.

The bullishness comes as influential voices in the crypto community — such as Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin — are increasingly calling for better privacy solutions.

Grayscale shoots for ETF

The bullish projections come as Grayscale, the crypto asset manager that pioneered Wall Street products, files to transform its existing Zcash Trust product into a spot exchange-traded fund.

Grayscale’s registration statement submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday would mark the launch of the first US spot ETF directly tracking Zcash. The move comes just days after it launched ETFs linked to XRP and Dogecoin.

The firm joins a growing number of major institutions that have come out supporting Zcash.

Venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz and crypto investment manager Galaxy Digital have both noted the buzz around Zcash and other privacy-focused crypto projects like Monero and Railgun.

Cypherpunk, the crypto treasury company backed by twins Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss and launched earlier this month, has deployed over $50 million into Zcash.

As of November 19, Cypherpunk holds 1.43% of the total Zcash supply and is gunning for 5% ownership of all tokens.

Privacy controversies

To be sure, not everyone backs privacy coins.

EU lawmakers have passed a bill to ban exchanges from listing tokens like Zcash and Monero, citing anti-money laundering concerns. The ban is set to take effect in 2027.

Regulators in the US and Europe are cracking down on developers of privacy tools.

In the Netherlands, Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev was convicted of money laundering in 2024. Prosecutors said his code helped criminals conceal stolen crypto.

In the US, Tornado Cash co-founder Roman Storm was found guilty of running an unlicensed money-transmitting business. Samourai Wallet’s Keonne Rodriguez received the maximum five-year sentence for similar charges.

Lance Datskoluo is DL News’ Europe-based markets correspondent. Got a tip? Email at [email protected].

Bitcoin surged to $91,000 on Thursday as investors’ renewed appetite is seen to drive the price above $100,000.

The cryptocurrency’s price has surged for six days as market watchers expect the overall crypto market to rise another 25% to reclaim a value above $4 trillion.

This is “enough to drive Bitcoin back above $100,000,” Farzam Ehsani, CEO of crypto exchange VALR, told DL News. And such a move would “unlock massive double-digit gains for many high-beta altcoins.”

The Bitcoin bullishness mirrors optimism in markets in general. American tech stocks continue to soar and confidence is growing that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates by 0.25% in December.

Lower interest rates usually result in a boon for riskier assets like crypto and tech stocks as they incentivise investors to bet on them.

Ehsani cautioned that “it is still too early to call a trend reversal,” noting Bitcoin must decisively reclaim $90,000 with stronger retail participation for a new upside cycle to form.

US spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds added $22 million on Wednesday, following $129 million on Tuesday, breaking weeks of heavy selling, according to DefiLlama data.

That improvement stands out in an otherwise brutal month. Investors have withdrawn over $3.5 billion from Bitcoin ETFs in November, matching February’s mass liquidation and underscoring how sharp the recent de-risking cycle has been.

Bullish stocks, macro

Crypto’s recovery is moving in lockstep with the resurgence of US tech equities. The Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index seen as a barometer for risk appetite, has logged four straight days of gains, driven by giants Nvidia, Microsoft and Apple.

Nvidia in particular has defied waves of controversy to keep markets afloat. The $4.4 trillion chipmaker has refuted reports that it was engaged in so-called vendor financing, a scheme in which it supposedly invested in several of its own customers, including OpenAI, Elon Musk’s xAI, and AI cloud firms such as CoreWeave and Nebius.

The reported activity has drawn scrutiny from famed Wall Street short sellers Jim Chanos and Michael Burry, but Nvidia’s stock continues to defy expectations.

JP Morgan echoes the optimism.

“Despite AI bubble and valuation concerns, we see current elevated multiples correctly anticipating above-trend earnings growth, an AI capex boom, rising shareholder payouts, and easier fiscal policy,” the bulge bracket bank said in an investor report earlier this week, Yahoo reported.

Adding to the positive sentiment, policymakers at the US Federal Reserve have also signalled they will slash interest rates next month.

San Francisco Fed chief Mary Daly said she backs lowering rates at the next meeting, arguing policy is already tight enough and risks driving the economy into an unnecessary slowdown.

Fed Governor Stephen Miran went even further, reiterating his case for “large interest-rate cuts” despite inflation remaining above target.

Traders are watching the Fed’s new signals. The CME FedWatch tool now assigns roughly 85% odds to a December interest rate cut of 0.25%, up sharply from last week. Bettors on Polymarket see a 83% chance.

The next Federal Open Market Committee is set for December 9 and 10.

Crypto market movers

Bitcoin is up 5% over the past 24 hours, trading at $91,600.

Ethereum is up 4.4% over the past 24 hours, trading at $3,030.

What we’re reading

Michael Saylor’s Strategy is now worth less than the Bitcoin it owns — DL News

S&P downgrades Tether’s stability rating to ‘weak’ as Bitcoin holdings exceed safety buffer — DL News

Berachain Documents Show Brevan Howard Fund Offered $25 Million Refund Right — Unchained

Is Bitcoin’s Bounce a Bull Trap… or the Start of a Real Recovery? w/ Fefe — Milk Road

Five reasons why 2026 will be a blockbuster year for crypto — DL News

Lance Datskoluo is DL News’ Europe-based markets correspondent. Got a tip? Email at [email protected].

Tether’s ability to maintain its dollar peg was downgraded by the S&P Global Ratings agency, citing a dangerous shift toward riskier assets in the world’s largest stablecoin’s reserves.

On Tuesday, the rating agency reassessed Tether to 5, labeled “weak,” from 4, labeled “constrained.” The Stablecoin Stability Assessment now puts Tether in the same category as TrueUSD, which has lost access to nearly all its reserves.

Meanwhile, Tether’s largest competitor, Circle’s USDC, holds an S&P rating of 2, labeled “strong.”

“Bitcoin now represents about 5.6% of USDT in circulation, exceeding the 3.9% overcollateralisation margin,” the S&P wrote. “A drop in Bitcoin’s value combined with a decline in value of other high-risk assets could reduce coverage by reserves and lead to USDT being undercollateralised.”

Tether’s reserve strategy has shifted dramatically.

High-risk assets including Bitcoin, gold, secured loans, and corporate bonds now account for 24% of total reserves, up from 17% in September 2024. Bitcoin exposure has also grown to 5.6% of circulation, exceeding the safety buffer for the first time. A Bitcoin crash combined with losses in other risky assets could leave USDT undercollateralised.

And the problem is that in the past month, Bitcoin has crashed by 20%.

The reserves problem

Tether maintains around $181 billion backing about $174 billion of USDT in circulation.

Most reserves sit in short-term US Treasury bills at 64% and Treasury-backed repos at 10%. But it’s that remaining 24% in high-risk assets that worries the S&P.

These assets are “subject to credit, market, interest-rate, and foreign-exchange risks,” with limited disclosures, according to the report.

Moreover, the opacity extends beyond asset types. Tether provides limited information on the creditworthiness of its custodians, counterparties, or bank account providers — despite promises by management to help combat the use of USDT in illicit activities.

“There is limited public disclosure on group-level governance, internal controls, and the segregation of activities,” the S&P wrote.

Regulatory concerns

Tether moved to El Salvador from the British Virgin Islands in 2025, securing a digital asset service provider license.

But the S&P considers El Salvador’s framework less robust than standards in the US or Europe. The country presided by Nayib Bukele allows for high-risk assets like Bitcoin and gold to be part of their reserves and doesn’t mandate asset segregation to protect against issuer insolvency.

Despite the downgrade, Tether remains largely profitable.The company generated $10 billion in profits over the first three quarters of 2025,and already in 2024 it had bested some of Wall Street’s best performing funds with a $13 billion profit last year.

Pedro Solimano is DL News’ Buenos Aires-based markets correspondent. Got a tip? Email him [email protected].

Just after breakfast at the sprawling La Rural exhibit hall in Buenos Aires on a November morning when Vitalik Buterin lumbered on stage, sporting a button-up shirt with a colourful baby hippopotamus print and sunglasses. He glossed over the crowd with curiosity, fidgeting slightly in his chair.

The crowd of nearly 500 crypto enthusiasts, most of whom were local Argentines, stared back at Buterin, in awe that their hero was in their city speaking about his creation: The 10-year-old blockchain network, Ethereum.

Ethereum, over its ten-year lifespan, has gone through herculean changes. From the DAO hack in 2016 that spawned Ethereum Classic to a comprehensive move to proof-of-stake mid-flight with no downtime, the network has had a knack for spotting necessary changes and implementing them.

Constant change is in the network’s very DNA.

Now, it’s 31-year-old Canadian-Russian creator wants to slow things down.

“More and more ossification over time is good for Ethereum,” Buterin said. “We have a much lower rate of surprises now.”

And what better time to announce a change of pace than the Ethereum community’s largest gathering in the world.

Welcome to Devconnect.

Over 16,000 true believers descended on Buenos Aires for a week of talks, workshops, and over 200 side events that sprawled across the city.

Conversations at Devconnect revolved around technical roadmaps, Layer-2 rollups, and — more than anything — privacy.

“Privacy is so hot right now because it finally works,” Masa, a six-year smart contract developer from openbands.xyz, told DL News between sessions.

Whether zero-knowledge proofs, private transactions, or encrypted messaging, privacy infrastructure dominated the agenda.

Conspicuously absent from Devconnect? Any mention of Ether’s price.

An especially notable fact given that during the time of the convention, Ether lost around 20% of its price in just a matter of days.

Ether, in fact, has been unable to pick up steam, barely topping its previous record of $4,850 once before tumbling.

It now trades at $2,900, a staggering 30% drop this month alone.

But speculation felt immaterial.

The only thing that seemed to matter was what got built.

Top of mind

At Devconnect, every one of Buterin’s talks mentioned ZK technology.

Zero-knowledge proofs — cryptographic methods that let users prove something is true without revealing the underlying data — have been in development since Ethereum’s first days.

He first wrote about them in 2016, envisioning a future in which Ethereum transactions could be both verifiable and private.

One decade later, that future has arrived.

Projects like Aztec and Railgun now offer private transactions on the network, shielding wallet balances and transaction amounts from public view. Other teams are building encrypted messaging protocols that run entirely on-chain, replacing the transparent-by-default nature of smart contracts.

The shift is fundamental.

Ethereum’s transparency was always a bug disguised as a feature — useful for auditability, but a nightmare for anyone who didn’t want their financial life readable by anyone with a block explorer.

The demigod

Walking through La Rural, a vast 45,000m2 fairgrounds with multiple halls typically used for livestock shows, you could hear attendees chattering about when Vitalik would speak and where.

His presence at Devconnect carried an almost religious quality.

That’s because for many in the crowd — particularly the Argentinians who made up a significant portion of attendees — Buterin isn’t just a tech founder.

He’s the architect of a system that offered an alternative to their country’s failed monetary institutions, a moribund peso, and the inability for local citizens to access secure and long-lasting financial instruments.

“If you’re not here, do you even believe in Ethereum?” one attendee, a young 25-year Argentine developer, asked DL News.

When attendees emerged from a room where he had just spoken, their faces were flush with a giddy smile. Still others would loiter, hoping to catch a closer glimpse – perhaps even a picture – with Buterin himself.

Crypto’s role model

Choosing Buenos Aires as Devconnect’s host city wasn’t arbitrary.

For years, Argentina has become crypto’s obvious role model. It’s a country where hyperinflation, currency controls, and economic instability have, at times, brought the country to its knees.

For instance, in 2001, the government froze bank accounts in a desperate attempt to stop capital flight — a measure known as the “corralito” or little fence. From one day to another, millions of Argentinians couldn’t withdraw their own savings. The peso, pegged to the dollar, collapsed. Middle-class families lost their life savings overnight. The crisis scarred a generation and created deep distrust of traditional banks that persists today.

That’s created the perfect conditions for grass-roots, broad-based cryptocurrency adoption.

Unlike the rest of the world, locals don’t use crypto for speculation. They use it for survival. Stablecoins like USDT offer protection against the peso’s collapse.

Peer-to-peer networks enable cross-border payments. DeFi protocols provide access to dollar-denominated savings accounts that Argentine banks can’t freeze or seize.

Bitcoin, a staple of many Argentine asado conversations, is a household name discussed by people from the elderly to schoolchildren.

Crypto is rampant here — not necessarily for good reason.

Still, some say Argentina should be at the centre of the crypto industry.

“Argentina is crypto’s role model,” a Devconnect volunteer told DL News.

Pedro Solimano is DL News’ Buenos Aires-based markets correspondent. Got a tip? Email him [email protected].

Strategy is now worth less than the Bitcoin it owns — at least according to one key metric.

The company’s market-to-net-asset value, also known as mNav, dropped to 0.879 this week, according to BitcoinTreasuries.net. This metric tells investors how much equity value they’re paying for every $1 of crypto the company holds.

In Strategy’s case, investors are spending roughly 80 cents for every $1 of Bitcoin the company holds, which raises a very uncomfortable question.

If the stock trades at a discount to Bitcoin, why not just buy Bitcoin?

Strategy has long traded at a premium to its Bitcoin holdings, acting as a leveraged bet on Bitcoin’s price.

That premium — which hit 1.8x in May — has evaporated as Bitcoin tumbled 30% this month, pricing out bullish expectations.

It’s the first time Strategy has traded below 1.0 mNAV since it began buying Bitcoin way back in August 2020.

Analysts say the compression is cyclical, not structural. But it marks a dramatic reversal for a company that convinced Wall Street to pay multiples above net asset value.

It’s Bitcoin

For André Dragosch, European head of research at Bitwise, the drop below one reflects lower expectations for Bitcoin’s performance, and not a fundamental problem with Strategy’s business model.

“An mNAV below one is largely reflective of lower Bitcoin performance expectations which are baked into the mNAV,” Dragosch told DL News.

He pointed to the strong correlation between Strategy’s mNAV and Bitcoin futures curves. As futures flattened — indicating that traders are pricing out bullish expectations — Strategy’s premium compressed.

“The moment Bitcoin rises again, we should see an expansion of the mNAV as well,” Dragosch said. “I personally think that the decline below one is largely cyclical and not structural.”

Alexandre Schmidt, head of research of CoinShares agreed.

“Strategy has historically behaved as a leveraged play on Bitcoin and what we are seeing now is consistent with that pattern,” he told DL News.

An unsustainable summer

Several digital asset treasury companies have traded below mNAV since the summer. Strategy held out longer than most, but ultimately couldn’t escape the broader compression.

“The extreme levels at which DATs traded over the summer — in some cases, 3x, 5x or even 7x mNAV — were not sustainable and eventually unwound,” Schmidt said.

Those premiums made sense when Bitcoin was rallying, and retail investors wanted leveraged exposure. But as Bitcoin’s momentum stalled, flows rotated away from treasuries, some even risking delisting from the New York Stock Exchange.

October, in fact, recorded the lowest amount of buying by Bitcoin treasuries in 2025.

“Compared with its peers, MSTR has had one of the more stable mNAV trajectories,” Schmidt noted.

Legendary short seller Jim Chanos warned about this exact scenario in July, comparing Bitcoin treasury companies to the SPAC mania of 2021.

“We are seeing SPAC-like 2021 numbers in the Bitcoin treasury market right now,” Chanos said on the Bitcoin Fundamentals podcast. SPACs raised $90 billion in three months before collapsing spectacularly, something could be unravelling today as companies start to slip below their Bitcoin holdings.

Chanos has been betting against Strategy’s premium since May, arguing the treasury model is built on financial engineering rather than sustainable business fundamentals.

By early November, Chanos began to unwind his short position.

Strategy’s diluted mNAV sits at 0.980, slightly better than its basic mNAV of 0.879. Its enterprise value mNAV — which accounts for debt — is 1.143, meaning the company still commands a slight premium when adjusted for leverage.

All eyes on Bitcoin

Both Dragosch and Schmidt expect Strategy’s mNAV to recover if Bitcoin rallies.

But the days of triple premiums may be over.

“Looking ahead, it is unlikely that we see mNAV levels as high as in the summer,” Schmidt said.

Strategy holds 649,870 Bitcoin worth about $56 billion at an average cost of $74,430 per coin.

The company is up 16.3% on its holdings despite Bitcoin’s recent selloff.

But its stock has fallen harder than Bitcoin, reflecting the market’s scepticism about the treasury model in a risk-off environment.

Pedro Solimano is DL News’ Buenos Aires-based markets correspondent. Got a tip? Email him [email protected].

Tokenised money-market funds have ballooned to a $9 billion crypto market sector, but what looks like quiet progress has got the Bank for International Settlements sounding early risk warnings.

Analysts at the Basel-based global forum of central banks and the Collegio Carlo Alberto, a research institute, said that, despite their digital packaging, these crypto funds remain exposed to traditional money-market tensions, according to a report published on Wednesday.

Tokenised money-market funds are just like their traditional counterparts: they allow investors to earn yield on cash instruments directly on-chain.

“Tokenised money-market funds give rise to risks that mirror and may even amplify those found in conventional money market funds and stablecoins,” the report stated.

The analysts said decentralised finance integration may heighten market stresses through leverage and interconnected protocols, or what industry proponents call composability. Given the tight coupling between such funds and stablecoins, market shocks could spread more quickly and cause greater damage than in traditional markets.

The warning comes as tokenised money-market funds surge alongside crypto’s broader expansion into real-world assets, a trend that even the BIS sees as a gateway for institutional capital to flow into the digital asset market.

Tokenised money-market funds grew 265% in the last year, according to data from RWA.xyz. And the sector could grow to $250 billion in the next three years, Geoff Kendrick, head of digital assets research at Standard Chartered, predicted in October.

Even as it sounded the alarm, the BIS said these crypto products may become a backbone of the global financial system, given their growth and rising institutional interest.

Traditional finance juggernauts like BlackRock, Franklin Templeton, and Swiss Bank UBS are some of the institutional players in the tokenised money market sector.

But with this growth potential comes the need for proactive measures to curtail market risks before they harden into systemic threats that could upend both the crypto and traditional markets, the report stated.

Osato Avan-Nomayo is our Nigeria-based DeFi correspondent. He covers DeFi and tech. Got a tip? Please contact him at [email protected].

The UK Financial Conduct Authority is getting serious on stablecoins.

On Wednesday, the financial watchdog launched a special cohort within its Regulatory Sandbox for firms issuing blockchain-based tokens pegged to currencies like the British pound and US dollar.

“It’s a unique chance for innovative firms to test their stablecoin products and services under the UK’s evolving regulatory regime,” David Geale, the FCA’s executive director for payments and digital finance, said in a speech shared with DL News.

Geale added that the initiative will support agile policymaking and industry development, and gives firms the opportunity to provide the regulator with practical feedback.

The announcement follows several previous consultations and requests for comment from the regulator.

In October, the FCA outlined plans to support tokenisation of the UK’s nearly $19 trillion asset management industry. In September, it launched an open call for comment on how it should regulate crypto companies in the country.

Lagging regulation

In the UK, crypto assets are still largely unregulated.

And when the government has weighed in, its ideas haven’t always been well received.

The Bank of England has forged ahead with a proposal to temporarily cap individual stablecoin holdings to between £10,000 and £20,000, and business to £10 million.

The limits have drawn broad criticism from both industry insiders and UK legislators.

“Does this not send a terrible signal to people who want to base their crypto businesses in the UK?” Lord Ed Vaizey, co-chair of the UK Parliament’s Crypto and Digital Assets All Party Parliamentary Group, asked in an October debate.

In comparison, the EU and US have been more proactive in regulating digital assets.

The EU’s Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation — or MiCA — rules came fully into effect in December, while the US passed landmark stablecoin regulation in July, and is currently working on a more comprehensive crypto market structure bill.

The UK’s sluggishness to regulate the crypto industry has pulled it behind these regions, Bivu Das, crypto exchange Kraken’s UK general manager, told DL News last month.

“At least they’re on the road, but we’re sitting there on the hard shoulder, waiting to see if the other two crashes before deciding what to do,” Das said.

‘A major firm’

The FCA’s stablecoin cohort is a significant step towards regulating the crypto industry, although policy statements from the regulator are still likely many months away.

Geale said “a major firm” has already been accepted into the cohort, and is gearing up to test a British pound stablecoin in the next couple of months.

It’s not the FCA’s only iron in the fire, either.

Yesterday, the regulator announced that Eunice, a financial regulatory platform, has joined its sandbox to explore how disclosure templates can boost transparency for crypto investors.

Eunice will seek input from industry players to help consumers understand what they’re investing in, influencing how the FCA approaches disclosure requirements, Geale said.

There are also plans for several in-person stablecoin policy sprints in March.

“These sprints will further consider retail and wholesale use cases for stablecoins, and help determine where regulation is or is not needed,” Geale said.

Stablecoin firms wishing to participate in the FCA’s sandbox will have until January 18 to apply.

Tim Craig is DL News’ Edinburgh-based DeFi Correspondent. Reach out with tips at [email protected].

Financial regulators pushed Bithumb to suspend its Tether Market services, which allowed customers to buy and sell Bitcoin and nine high-cap altcoins using USDT, say South Korean publications.

The crypto exchange said the service was still in Beta mode and involved an order book sharing agreement with the Australian crypto exchange Stellar.

Bithumb says it will close the service at 11am KST on November 28 due to system maintenance and that it will be reorganised to “provide a more stable and advanced trading environment.”

“We will provide a separate update regarding the service’s reopening schedule,” Bitthumb wrote.

The move could put an end to the practice of order book sharing with international partners, with regulators apparently unconvinced that exchanges are meeting their anti-money laundering-related obligations.

Bithumb has ‘given up’ on order book sharing, say sources

All pending orders placed after the November 28 deadline will be automatically cancelled, the exchange added.

The South Korean publication Dailyan, quoting unnamed sources, said the crypto industry thinks Bithumb has “effectively given up” on its service “after two months of intense investigation and pressure from financial regulators.”

Neither Bithumb nor Stellar immediately responded to DL News’ requests for comment.

A crypto exchange’s order book is a real-time list of all active buy and sell orders for a trading pair. Order book sharing allows for the real-time integration of buy and sell order histories across different exchanges.

These allow Bithumb customers to execute orders from not only other Bithumb users, but also from overseas partner exchanges: in this case, Stellar.

Regulatory scrutiny intensifies

Shortly after Bithumb launched its Tether Market service, the regulatory Financial Intelligence Unit, also known as the FIU, summoned the exchange’s CEO Lee Jae-won for questioning.

The FIU expressed concerns over the service’s potential to expose domestic customers to personal data leaks and money laundering-related risks.

Order book sharing means that “domestic and international transactions are processed together, which increases the risk of money laundering,” an unnamed crypto industry insider told Korea Times in September. “That makes it an issue that regulators cannot ignore.”

Earlier this week, the FIU conducted an on-site inspection at Bithumb, as well as the exchanges Dunamu, Coinone, Korbit, and GOPAX.

The regulator said it wanted to gauge the exchanges’ compliance with money-laundering regulations.

The South Korean media outlet Newsis reported that Bithumb also “underwent an additional on-site inspection” at the hands of the FIU. This probe was “related to its order book,” the outlet explained.

Tim Alper is a news correspondent at DL News. Got a tip? Email at [email protected].

Trading tokenised stocks in unlisted companies is inching closer to becoming a reality in South Korea.

The South Korean National Assembly is getting closer to signing off on a draft law that aims to legalise security token offerings, or STOs, reports South Korean outlet Hanz Kyungjae.

This is a bullish signal for the country’s traders, Yoon Ji-ho, a Seoul-based stock trader, told DL News.

“We lack the ability to trade in companies that aren’t listed on major stock exchanges,” Yoon said. “Of course, we want to have these kinds of options at our disposal.”

South Korean business leaders have been pushing for STO legalisation for several years, as have lawmakers. But they have been frustrated by successive governments’ seeming inability to overturn 2019’s total ban on all forms of token issuance.

The momentum for the bill comes as tokenised stocks are gaining momentum across the world, with ventures like Robinhood and Kraken having launched the trading of such assets earlier this year, including trading representations of shares of companies that have yet to be listed.

Long time coming

STOs are envisaged in South Korea as a blockchain token-powered version of an initial public offering that does away with the need for stock market listings.

If the Political Affairs Committee approves the bill as expected, it will then be passed on to the Legislation and Judiciary Committee before being tabled for debate during the National Assembly’s final plenary session of 2025.

With the ruling and opposition parties having reached a consensus, observers now expect the bill to pass before the end of the year, Hanz Kyungjae reported.

The media outlet said that if the bill passes without any major friction, politicians think this will “accelerate the passage of subsequent legislation, including bills relating to stablecoin and crypto exchange-traded fund approvals.”

The bill in question is an amalgamation of draft proposals created by Democratic Party lawmakers Kang Jun-hyun, Min Byoung-dug, and Jo Seung-rae, as well as Kim Jae-seop of the main opposition People Power Party.

The terms of the existing Electronic Securities Act do not recognise distributed ledger technology-powered solutions or blockchain technology.

The draft bill would seek to change that. It also includes clauses that would allow “qualified issuers” to “directly issue and manage tokenised securities using blockchain technology.”

Furthermore, the bill proposes establishing a legal basis for trading STO coins on over-the-counter exchanges.

Military law fiasco delays

The draft law also contains clauses that would let South Korean companies issue real-world assets in the “real estate, music copyright, artwork, and livestock sectors,” the media outlet wrote.

South Korean lawmakers have been trying to fast-track STO legislation for several years, but have been thwarted in their efforts.

Their last concerted push to pass a bill came in September last year, but was eventually derailed by former South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol’s attempt to declare martial law.

His successor, President Lee Jae-myung, has prioritised STO and tokenised securities-related legislation as part of his administration’s efforts to revitalize the domestic stock market.

Tim Alper is a news correspondent at DL News. Got a tip? Email at [email protected].

World Liberty Financial, the Trump family’s crypto project, is buying back its own token.

Over the past 12 hours, the project spent $10 million buying just over 59 million WLFI tokens through CoW Swap, a decentralised exchange, onchain records show.

It comes after a September proposal for the project to use fees it generates to buy back and burn WLFI tokens passed a governance vote.

The buybacks have so far done little to spur investor interest, with WLFI trading up just 0.4% over the past 24 hours, per CoinGecko data. The token trades down 50% from its September all-time high.

World Liberty Financial is a decentralised finance protocol that plans to offer lending, borrow, and exchange services using its USD1 stablecoin.

The project came under increased scrutiny earlier in November after a 60 Minutes investigation tied a $2 billion investment deal between crypto exchange Binance and Abu Dhabi’s MGX to former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao’s recent presidential pardon.

Critics say the deal, which was conducted using World Liberty’s USD1 and catapulted the asset into the top 10 biggest stablecoins, was done as a favour in exchange for the pardon.

Binance CEO Richard Teng, and Zhao’s lawyer Teresa Goody Guillen, have both dismissed claims that the exchange helped boost USD1 before Zhao received the pardon.

Buyback boom

World Liberty Financial sold 35 billion WLFI tokens to investors for a total of $550 million between October and March.

The token allows holders to vote on protocol decisions, although the project does not refer to itself as a decentralised autonomous organisation, or DAO, a type of popular crypto collective based around token holder voting.

It’s not the first time World Liberty has bought back its own token. On October 10, the protocol spent around $9 million buying back almost 51 million tokens.

In recent months, more and more DeFi protocols are experimenting with buying back their own tokens in a bid to shore up investor confidence.

An October report from crypto market maker Keyrock found that the top 12 revenue-distributing DeFi protocols spent almost $800 million on token buybacks and other revenue-sharing activities in July, a more than 400% increase since the start of 2024.

“Much like public companies that use buybacks to signal long-term commitment and instill investor trust, crypto teams leverage them to enhance token value and communicate conviction in the project’s future,” Amir Hajian, the Keyrock researcher who wrote the report, said.

Tim Craig is DL News’ Edinburgh-based DeFi Correspondent. Reach out with tips at [email protected].