Flash News

TREE NEWS update: Circle said 59 cents of every dollar of first-half 2026 revenue went to USDC distribution partners and transaction costs, with 34 cents spent on licenses, banking and other infrastructure, leaving 7 cents of net profit per revenue dollar. The stablecoin issuer disclosed the breakdown in a post responding to unnamed new stablecoin issuers.

TREE NEWS update: A federal judge refused to let the CFTC reopen the $5 million settlement it reached with Gemini, rejecting the agency’s argument that a shift in enforcement priorities and misconduct allegations inside its enforcement division justified unwinding the deal. Gemini signed the agreement weeks before trial. The ruling leaves the settlement in place.

TREE NEWS reports: NEAR Intents published a postmortem attributing a $3.8 million exploit to a deposit bug, and said all affected users have been made whole. The protocol also removed deposit notifications after a separate critical bug report.

TREE NEWS reports: Former Mt.Gox CEO Mark Karpelès said at least two people reported tampered Ledger devices as early as December 2025, while security researcher Joe Grand said he told Ledger on March 4, 2026 that a Nano X contained a malicious hardware implant. Ledger confirmed Grand’s finding and said it is investigating internally. Both questioned why Ledger did not promptly warn customers; Ledger declined further comment on Grand’s report and pointed media to its public statement on X.

TREE NEWS reports: Bitcoin bounced, with technical indicators suggesting the bullish trend remains intact. Prediction market traders, however, are sending mixed signals on where the price goes next. The divergence leaves the near-term direction of the largest cryptocurrency unresolved.

TREE NEWS reports: Bitcoin’s mining difficulty rose 5.92% to 140.58T at block height 971712, adjusted at 20:37:31 Beijing time on October 16.space data. The increase follows the previous adjustment, which cut difficulty 0.03% to 132.72T.

TREE NEWS reports: Bitcoin held above $80,000, trading around $82,000, after Federal Reserve official Kevin Warsh avoided signaling a rate hike. The steadiness came as South Korean tech stocks recovered from a sell-off and traders lowered their expectations for a Fed rate increase.

TREE NEWS update: Three Canadian Armed Forces members have been charged in connection with the kidnapping of a crypto exchange owner. Police seized guns, silencers and more than 2,000 rounds of ammunition, nearly all of it allegedly stolen from the Canadian military.

TREE NEWS reports: Crypto futures liquidations across exchanges totaled $234 million over the past 24 hours, split nearly evenly between $118 million in long positions and $116 million in shorts, CoinGlass data show. BTC liquidations reached $57.42 million and ETH $62.68 million. The largest single liquidation was a $7.43 million ETHUSDT order on Binance.

TREE NEWS update: A Delaware bankruptcy court approved a settlement agreement involving MVMT Labs (Movement Labs), parties tied to former founder Rushikesh Manche, and foundation-related parties including the Movement Network Foundation. The approval is recorded in Order No. 212 filed with the court.

TREE NEWS update: Deutsche Bank plans to launch a crypto custody service within weeks, serving corporate and institutional clients in Europe. The bank targets expansion into Asian financial centres in 2027.

TREE NEWS update: Mizuho, MUFG and SMBC completed a joint pilot of a yen stablecoin in July, covering issuance, transfer and redemption for Mitsubishi Corporation. The three banks have targeted commercial transactions using the stablecoin in fiscal 2026.

TREE NEWS reports: Binance.US is seeking to raise up to $100 million at a $1 billion valuation, Bloomberg reported. Trump-affiliated World Liberty Financial was made aware of the fundraising but is not participating. The exchange’s raise comes as it seeks new capital amid a shifting US regulatory environment for crypto trading platforms.

TREE NEWS update: Lighter launched the Lighter EVM devnet, an EVM-equivalent Rollup built in partnership with Axiom and powered by OpenVM, running in parallel with Lighter Core. The two are designed to settle jointly to Ethereum via a single ZK proof. Developers can deploy contracts using Foundry, Hardhat, Viem and Ethers, read Lighter Core account, balance, position, order and market data, place, modify and cancel orders via smart contracts, and move assets between the devnet L1, Lighter Core and Lighter EVM. Access is being rolled out in batches, with all developers to be opened in the coming weeks.

TREE NEWS update: Network School has taken over Farcaster posting rules through a new social smart contract that gives its core team authority to update conduct rules, with humans and AI already reviewing posts. The arrangement shifts moderation control to the core team under an on-chain contract. Human reviewers and AI systems are both conducting the reviews.

TREE NEWS update: CFTC Chair Mike Selig said the agency holds exclusive jurisdiction over prediction markets, arguing fraud and manipulation do not stop at state lines. In an X post, Selig said prediction market exchanges operate interstate, matching buy and sell quotes from customers nationwide. Congress has authorized the CFTC to enforce uniform standards, monitor and prosecute fraud and manipulation, and protect customer funds across state borders.

TREE NEWS update: Unagi has put the Persona and Ultimate Champions game assets up for sale as part of a liquidation, offering the Persona intellectual property, a treasury of 957 NFTs and the UNA token contracts. Bids are due November 2. The sale bundles the studio’s remaining Web3 gaming assets, including the UNA token contracts, into a single liquidation process.

TREE NEWS reports: Injective’s INJ rose 27% over 24 hours, outpacing NEAR, Sei and Cosmos Hub. The move coincided with a proposed 21Shares fund that would hold the token directly and allow discretionary staking. No further details were disclosed.

TREE NEWS update: China Unicom said it will give customers who bought a genuine iPhone through its channels in 2009 top-priority purchase rights for the iPhone Duo. Eligible users can verify their identity on China Unicom’s website; those shown as “Honored Friend” can buy the device first at nearby Unicom Apple authorized stores. The carrier held its first iPhone China sales event in Beijing on October 30, 2009, issuing numbered certificates to buyers.