Flash News

TREE NEWS update: Starknet has opened a vote among STRK holders on whether to explore becoming an independent layer-1 blockchain, citing the need to reduce its dependence on Ethereum’s quantum-security upgrade timeline. The proposal asks token holders to decide whether the network should pursue a path away from Ethereum. No timeline or binding commitment has been set.

TREE NEWS update: Brooklyn prosecutors have taken down 112 servers tied to a crypto scam targeting Russian speakers, the operation also ran a fake recovery service that contacted victims weeks later promising to retrieve their stolen crypto. The takedown dismantles infrastructure behind a scheme that combined the original fraud with a follow-up con aimed at the same victims.

TREE NEWS reports: Crypto hacks in the third quarter of 2025 drove losses toward $1.2 billion, with exploits at Bitget and Liquid among the incidents, Hacken said. Compromised suppliers, developer tools and infrastructure components sitting outside security audits accounted for about 77% of the quarter’s total losses.

TREE NEWS reports: Jelitics, which had publicly said it would “accept all SI tokens,” sold 21.38 million SI tokens worth about $279,000 on October 15, dumping half its position at a loss. Its total investment in SI stands at $1.4 million, leaving an unrealized loss of $562,000.

TREE NEWS update: Huobi HTX will open DRV/USDT spot and grid trading at 20:00 (UTC+8) on October 15. Deposits open at 18:00 the same day, with withdrawals starting at 20:00 on October 16. Derive is a self-custodial crypto trading platform built from Derive Chain, Derive Protocol and Derive Exchange.

TREE NEWS reports: Bitcoin slid to $80.1K on Thursday as South Korea’s KOSPI Index closed 7.5% lower, its weakest close since April. The move extended contagion from a Korean tech sell-off into crypto markets, with the benchmark equity index’s decline tracking alongside bitcoin’s drop.

TREE NEWS update: Thailand’s new Bitcoin and Ether ETF rules take effect Friday, opening the market to crypto fund listings. CoinShares expects only modest initial inflows, saying existing investment options will compete for demand. The firm’s read suggests a slow start rather than a surge of capital into the newly permitted products.

TREE NEWS update: Elon Musk said on X that SpaceX will compensate users for losses if its Grok Bot makes errors during shopping or leaks their bank card information. The statement came in response to a community user who booked flights using the bot. Musk added that no such incident has occurred to date.

TREE NEWS update: Babylon’s proposal to bring native Bitcoin collateral to Aave V4 has entered a new governance stage. Further votes and security reviews are still required before the integration can launch. No date has been given for the remaining steps.

TREE NEWS update: Ukraine said Starlink internet service has been restored, after disruptions to the satellite network used widely by Ukrainian forces and civilians. The restoration was announced by Ukrainian authorities, who did not give a reason for the earlier outage or specify how long service was down. Starlink, operated by SpaceX, has been a critical communications link in Ukraine since the war began.

TREE NEWS reports: Arthur Hayes bought about $888,000 worth of tokens through FalconX and Flowdesk, on-chain tracker Onchain Lens shows. The purchases comprise 5.466 million AERO (roughly $459,800), 120,000 PENDLE (about $231,600) and 3 million ZAMA (around $196,700). The three assets are Aerodrome, Pendle and Zama.

TREE NEWS update: Toronto police arrested seven people, including three members of the Canadian Armed Forces, over the kidnapping of a crypto-asset holder and 82 criminal charges were laid, police said. The victim was abducted on July 25, handcuffed and beaten while suspects sought access to his crypto assets and corporate security systems, then released. Investigators also seized firearms, drugs and about 2,500 rounds of stolen military ammunition; the case remains under investigation.

TREE NEWS reports: Hyperliquid founder Jeff Yan said regulatory obligations should fall on financial firms operating markets on the Hyperliquid blockchain rather than on the blockchain itself, in an interview on Bloomberg’s “Odd Lots” podcast published October 15. Bloomberg said the distinction would let Hyperliquid expand into Wall Street without carrying the full compliance burden of a traditional exchange, as US regulators weigh how to bring offshore trading venues into the domestic financial system.

TREE NEWS update: South Korea’s Financial Services Commission will introduce stricter cybersecurity assessments after a sector-wide review found flaws at 130 of 555 financial companies, exposing roughly 100,000 customer records including names, contact details and resident registration numbers. The overhaul follows investigations into earlier security incidents at 16 firms, among them crypto exchange operators Streami, which runs Gopax, and Prabang, which disclosed a hack on October 2. Large institutions would face at least two vulnerability assessments a year.

TREE NEWS update: BNB Chain prediction market predict.fun has opened a League of Legends prediction activity, letting users trade on the tournament’s play-in matches and earn tiered treasure chests containing USDT and other rewards. Founded by NFT figure dingaling, the platform embeds into Binance’s main site and wallet, and lets users’ prediction capital generate extra yield while positions are open. RAFA Finance, an AI-driven on-chain fund protocol on Base, said its testnet went live on October 13.

TREE NEWS update: JPYC’s issuance and redemption service JPYC EX surpassed ¥10 billion in cumulative issuance as of September 18, with users expanding from individuals to Japanese companies and overseas projects; the figure is cumulative issuance, not current circulating supply. JPYC listed on South Korea’s Upbit on September 17 across KRW, BTC and USDT markets, after which its market price briefly deviated from ¥1.

TREE NEWS reports: A whale bought 6,010 ETH worth about $14.23 million during today’s market decline, on-chain tracker Lookonchain said on October 15. The same whale had previously sold 2,050 ETH for roughly $4.93 million, booking an estimated profit of about $1.08 million on that sale.

TREE NEWS update: Chinese auto information platform Dongchedi denied online rumors that it paid bloggers to smear the Zunjie V800 and that its annual revenue exceeded 24.5 billion yuan. A company official told Shanghai Securities News that the claims are false, that the 24.5 billion yuan figure originated from an AI-generated article published in March, and that Dongchedi has traced the sources and will take legal action against those spreading the rumors.

TREE NEWS update: Starknet’s community opened a seven-day non-binding vote asking STRK holders whether to explore a transition to a standalone quantum-resistant L1. A favourable result would trigger research and follow-up proposals; rejection keeps quantum-resistance work on L2. Under either path STRK is retained with no new token issuance and the Ethereum bridge stays open. No timeline has been set for a transition.

TREE NEWS update: Solana opened an office in Shanghai Tower and lit up the Citigroup Tower facade on the Lujiazui waterfront on Oct. 14, with foundation chair Lily Liu confirming the move. The foundation’s four-city ‘Solana Accelerate China’ tour opens in Shanghai on Oct. 16 and runs through Hangzhou, Shenzhen and Beijing, with an agenda focused on AI agents, robotics, Physical AI and high-performance infrastructure rather than tokens.