Flash News

TREE NEWS update: Ethereum has scheduled the Glamsterdam upgrade for Sepolia on Oct. 6, bringing proposer-builder separation, block-level access lists and new gas pricing. A mainnet date for the upgrade has not yet been set.

TREE NEWS update: Aiden Pleterski, the Canadian man dubbed the “Crypto King,” will represent himself at his fraud trial, a judge has confirmed. The judge told Pleterski he will raise objections on his behalf to keep inadmissible evidence away from the jury. Pleterski faces fraud charges tied to his crypto investment scheme.

TREE NEWS update: Jamaica’s House of Representatives began reviewing the Virtual Assets Service Providers Act on September 22, creating a licensing and regulatory framework for crypto exchanges and other virtual asset service providers. Firms serving Jamaican consumers must obtain a Financial Services Commission licence regardless of headquarters, with unlicensed operation a criminal offence. Licensees must verify customer identity, monitor transactions and report suspicious activity. Finance Minister Fayval Williams said an FSC licence does not constitute official endorsement of the digital assets traded.

TREE NEWS update: Ethlabs said Chainlink’s cross-chain protocol CCIP 2.0 can shorten Ethereum transaction confirmation times to 12 to 24 seconds using Ethereum’s fast confirmation rule. The speed-up is an optional setting that must be actively enabled and carries different security guarantees than the default path. Ethereum’s full finality guarantees and CCIP’s default wait times remain unchanged.

TREE NEWS reports: An address 0xcf4c…be09 spent about $247 on Sept. 28 to buy roughly 35 million ZC tokens in two transactions, paying about $148 at 02:06 and about $99 at 02:13. The address still holds about 20.8 million ZC worth roughly $316,000, or about 2.08% of ZC’s total supply, making it the fifth-largest holder.

TREE NEWS reports: Bitget’s suspected ETH withdrawal hot wallet (0xED9…18771) saw its balance fall from 30,000 ETH to about 25,000 ETH within half an hour after the exchange reopened ETH withdrawals, on-chain analyst Ai Yi monitored. Subsequent ETH inflows followed, leaving the balance slightly above its level before withdrawals were opened. The wallet has since recovered past 30,000 ETH.

TREE NEWS reports: DeFi total value locked rose 38% to $95 billion in the third quarter of 2026, ending three consecutive quarters of decline and marking the first quarterly gain since the 2025 peak. Monad’s TVL climbed 183%, placing it among the top blockchain networks by locked value, while Robinhood Crypto, live for just two months, surpassed $1 billion in TVL.

TREE NEWS reports: US spot crypto ETF inflows fell about 80% from Friday, with Bitcoin, Ether, Solana and XRP funds attracting $64.8 million combined on Monday. The pullback follows a week in which the funds took in roughly $3.3 billion, while the multi-day inflow streaks in the products remained intact.

TREE NEWS update: US Treasury Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions Luke Pettit, who also served as acting Deputy Assistant Secretary for Domestic Finance, will leave the department in October to move to the private sector. Pettit led the Trump Accounts children’s savings program and worked on the GENIUS Act and CLARITY Act legislation.

TREE NEWS reports: Bitcoin recovered to $84,000 after early-week losses, holding what traders described as a trend-defining support zone. The bounce came as the US 30-year Treasury bond yield set a 24-year high, a macro backdrop that has pressured risk assets. Price action then consolidated, with the support level remaining intact.

TREE NEWS reports: Blockchain.com is reportedly preparing a $500 million IPO at a valuation of $4 billion to $6 billion and is telling prospective investors it aims to list this year. The wallet and exchange company filed confidentially with the SEC in May.

TREE NEWS update: NEAR Intents said attackers tried to move more than $50 million through the platform and that it froze $503,000 mid-trade, defending the move days after THORChain refused Bitget’s request to cut off the hacker’s wallets. The protocol argued that permissionless “doesn’t mean neutral.”

TREE NEWS update: The SEC’s Division of Corporation Finance added a condition to its token buyback guidance, limiting it to networks with no central party. The change came three days after the agency published its crypto FAQ. a16z crypto’s Miles Jennings called the revision “great work by the SEC.”

TREE NEWS update: Tenpay announced on September 29 that its fee-reduction policy for small and micro business operators will be extended by another year, remaining in effect until September 30, 2027. The policy continues to cover qualifying small and micro enterprises, self-employed individuals and individuals with business activity. Eligible merchants automatically receive a 10% discount on WeChat Pay’s publicly listed payment processing fees, with no additional action required.

TREE NEWS update: Greece has joined the EU’s MiCA register with four crypto providers, marking its first entrants under the bloc’s licensing regime. The Hellenic Capital Market Commission also expanded its denial of remarks attributed to officials in a report concerning Binance and European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde.

TREE NEWS update: Coinbase has received CFTC approval for Coinbase Clearing, giving the exchange its own clearinghouse for its derivatives stack. The unit will accept USDC as collateral and settle around the clock, while margined products remain with partners. The approval makes Coinbase one of the few crypto firms to control trading, clearing and settlement in-house.

TREE NEWS update: Meta has launched a regional anti-scam education campaign, “One Step Ahead,” in partnership with government agencies, law enforcement and safety organizations. The campaign will run through 2026 and includes new tools and partnerships. The company said the initiative is aimed at helping users spot and avoid online fraud.

TREE NEWS reports: BitMine could reach 5% of Ether’s total supply by early November, who has left open whether the company would continue buying beyond that level. The crypto treasury firm’s accumulation target, if met, would put it weeks away from the threshold. Lee did not commit to further purchases past the 5% mark.

TREE NEWS update: Binance will halt margin trading and delist eight tokens — REQ, WIN, GNS, TFUEL, GNO, QKC, LAZIO and OSMO — from its margin and loan products at 18:00 (UTC+8) on October 2, 2026. The tokens will no longer be available for leveraged or borrowed trading on the exchange after that date.

TREE NEWS reports: A new address, 0x487…476F1, withdrew a total of 11,610 ETH — worth $30.97 million — from exchanges over the past five hours, at an average withdrawal price of $2,667.46, on-chain analyst Ai Yi monitored on September 29. The address is now sitting on an unrealized gain of $552,000.