Flash News

TREE NEWS reports: North Korean cyber group WaterPlum targeted developers with fake job offers at crypto, AI and NFT companies, infecting at least 30,000 devices across more than 100 countries and stealing $10.7 million in crypto. The campaign used fraudulent recruiters to compromise developer machines.

TREE NEWS reports: Garrett Jin (@GarrettBullish), trading from wallet 0x92ea…050e9, closed a ZEC short position after holding it for three months, realizing a $36.13 million loss, on-chain tracker Onchain Lens shows. His cumulative historical losses now stand at $12.77 million. Jin currently holds a long position of 1,330 BTC worth $108 million, with an unrealized profit of $3.71 million.

TREE NEWS update: Kraken joined X’s US Cashtag partner program on September 16, letting users who click ticker tags such as BTC on the platform jump via a trading link to the Kraken app or website, where they log in or sign up and complete the purchase. Trades still execute on Kraken’s side. A 2024 UK Financial Conduct Authority experiment involving more than 9,000 consumers found push notifications lifted trading volume 11%, while points and prize draws lifted it 12%.

TREE NEWS update: ZetaChain has voted to shut down its Layer 1 network and move the ZETA token to Solana, with the team planning to focus instead on Anuma, its private AI app. The migration still requires one more vote before it can proceed. No timeline for the shutdown or the token move was given.

TREE NEWS update: RippleX engineering head Ayo Akinyele said 30 of 35 tracked XRP Ledger validators now back the Batch V1.1 amendment, above the 28 votes needed to start the activation countdown, which began Sept 15 at 14:06:41 UTC. If support stays at 80% or higher through the 14-day window, the feature is expected to activate around Sept 29. Batch V1.1 bundles up to eight transactions into a single all-or-nothing operation for delivery-versus-payment settlement.

TREE NEWS reports: Wintermute’s wallet (0xecb…2b00) is holding $160 million in perpetual futures shorts against an unrealized loss of $3.57 million. The position includes $53.05 million short ETH, $26.66 million short BTC, $17.84 million short SOL and $11.62 million short HYPE, with 30-day trading volume of $16.91 billion.

TREE NEWS update: Evernorth has signed a note purchase agreement with NH Investment & Securities to issue 4% convertible preferred PIK notes maturing in 2031, raising $30 million. The deal is contingent on Evernorth completing a business combination with Armada Acquisition Corp. II, Pathfinder Digital Assets and Ripple Labs, expected in the fourth quarter. The combined entity plans to list on Nasdaq under the ticker XRPN, subject to exchange approval.

TREE NEWS update: The US Treasury’s OFAC sanctioned Tehran-based crypto exchange BitBank, saying it moved hundreds of millions of dollars in bitcoin to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. OFAC said BitBank is controlled by Iranian financier Babak Zanjani, designated in January, who used the platform for transfers between June and July under Executive Order 13902. The action also covers Pishtaz Simorgh, BitBank’s software developer, and three executives of its parent Dot One. OFAC did not publish wallet addresses.

TREE NEWS reports: Solana’s SOL token broke above 110 USDT and last traded at 110.03 USDT, narrowing its 24-hour decline to 1.52%, OKX market data showed. The move marks a partial recovery from the token’s intraday slide.

TREE NEWS update: Solana lowered its target slot time from 300 milliseconds to 250 milliseconds on September 18, the network’s third speed-up since August. The change is the third phase of the four-stage SIMD-0525 plan, which has cut slot times from 400ms at genesis through 350ms and 300ms. Overall network throughput did not rise because each slot carries proportionally less computation and data. No mainnet activation date is set for the final step to 200ms, contingent on stable validator skip rates.

TREE NEWS reports: Bitcoin climbed back above 81,000 USDT, trading at 81,002.8 USDT, with its 24-hour decline narrowing to 0.75%. The move marks a partial recovery for the largest cryptocurrency after a lower session, though it remains down over the past day.

TREE NEWS reports: Bitcoin crossed above $81,000, trading at $81,002.80 per coin with a 0.11% gain on the day. The move marks a fresh push past the $81,000 level for the largest cryptocurrency.

TREE NEWS reports: Polymarket faced a $10 million fraud attempt, while a separate attack saw hackers compromise nearly 500 users’ accounts using stolen personal information. The incidents come as the prediction market’s CEO pushed growth over compliance concerns.

TREE NEWS update: Visa is shutting down a checkout loophole, supported by crypto payment infrastructure firm Crossmint, that let users buy meme coins with credit cards while transactions were classified under merchant category codes for digital media such as ebooks, films and music. Visa has told processors including Checkout.com to stop using the code for meme coin purchases, with a grace period expected to end next week. Meme coin buys must then be treated as crypto transactions under Visa’s rules.

TREE NEWS update: Visa is moving to stop meme coin purchases from being coded as ordinary “digital media” and earning credit card rewards. The change follows banks’ failed push for tighter stablecoin rules under the Clarity Act, and marks a narrower win for JPMorgan. The reclassification would cut off rewards on meme coin transactions processed through card networks.

TREE NEWS reports: Crypto futures liquidations across major exchanges totaled $316 million over the past 24 hours, CoinGlass data shows, with $183 million in long positions and $133 million in shorts liquidated. Bitcoin accounted for $56.88 million of the total and Ethereum $55.30 million. The largest single liquidation, worth $5.34 million, occurred on Binance’s ETHUSDT contract.

TREE NEWS reports: Gemini Space Station (ticker GEMI) has fallen about 80% since listing, with its market value dropping from a peak of roughly $4 billion to about $753 million. Second-quarter trading revenue fell 38% year-on-year to $12.5 million, spot trading volume slid to $3.8 billion and custodial assets shrank to $8.4 billion from $18.2 billion. Gemini and its subsidiaries still hold key regulatory licenses and compliance approvals, seen as core assets for a potential acquirer seeking US market access.

TREE NEWS update: ZetaChain’s proposal 68 passed with 99.4% support and 58% participation, above the 40% quorum, converting ZETA 1:1 into a Solana-native SPL token with the total supply unchanged. A second proposal will still set the migration mechanics, including snapshot height, claim process and L1 shutdown timeline. Private AI app Anuma, which has over 300,000 users, will migrate to Solana alongside ZETA.

TREE NEWS update: US Senator Cynthia Lummis said Democrats had demanded audited financial statements from crypto projects raising more than $25 million from the public, a requirement written into the CLARITY Act — yet Democrats ultimately voted against advancing the bill. The Senate held a procedural vote on September 15 to move the CLARITY Act forward, which failed.