Flash News

TREE NEWS update: Malaysia and Thailand have joined Singapore’s BLOOM digital-money initiative, expanding the participant group to include Visa, Mastercard and the World Bank Group. The work focuses on cross-border settlement frameworks and interoperability. The initiative now spans a broader set of countries and institutions working on digital-money infrastructure.

TREE NEWS reports: Bitcoin slid below $81,500 on Friday as the Wall Street tech sell-off spread to Asian equities, with South Korea’s Kospi down 2.3% and Japan’s Nikkei 225 down 1.6% in morning trade. The move extends a broader risk-asset retreat from U.S. markets into Asia.

TREE NEWS reports: An Ethereum OG deposited 3,000 ETH worth about $7.23 million to Kraken 10 hours ago, matching the wallet characteristics of a previously tracked address. If the identification is correct, the address has sold a cumulative 6,000 ETH since August 2025, with estimated total profit exceeding $15.74 million.

TREE NEWS reports: Machi (@machibigbrother) sold two Mutant Ape NFTs held for three years at 1 ETH each, realizing a combined loss of 11.28 ETH, or 85%. The two NFTs were originally purchased for 6.13 ETH and 7.5 ETH. The proceeds will be used for further trading and paper trading on Hyperliquid.

TREE NEWS update: Operation Confrontation Ghost, a UAE-led international scam crackdown, has identified more than $39 billion in funds and cryptocurrency, with over 960 arrests and raids on 29 fraud centers, participating countries said. Authorities are now working toward asset recovery.

TREE NEWS update: Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission has added BTCC to its list of suspicious virtual asset trading platforms. Operated by Poland-based BTCC Poland Limited, the platform has only an English name, holds no SFC licence and is suspected of conducting unlicensed activities in Hong Kong.

TREE NEWS update: Visa plans to acquire crypto custody firm Fireblocks for $2.5 billion. The deal would put a major payments network in control of a custody provider used by institutions to store digital assets. No further terms or timeline were disclosed.

TREE NEWS reports: Fidelity Digital Assets analyst Zack Wainwright said in an October 20 note that bitcoin-linked preferred stock financing could draw capital from the roughly $15 trillion global fixed-income market. Fidelity estimates such preferred stock totals about $12 billion and has funded the purchase of 135,979 bitcoin as of October 5, including more than 95,000 bought between March and May. Strive Inc. closed a $630 million Series A perpetual preferred offering on October 20, while Strategy Inc. disclosed holdings of 848,517 bitcoin.

TREE NEWS update: South Korea’s government and central bank are pushing to amend the Foreign Exchange Transactions Act to bring stablecoins under regulation as payment instruments. The country is also drafting a Basic Act on Digital Assets that would establish a licensing regime for crypto exchanges and set rules for stablecoin issuance.

TREE NEWS update: BIT Asset Management’s Bitcoin Fund ETF is expected to begin trading on the SIX Swiss Exchange in November, marking Switzerland’s first retail spot Bitcoin ETF. The public offering will be restricted to Switzerland, limiting access to domestic investors. The launch would add a regulated spot Bitcoin product to Europe’s largest exchange.

TREE NEWS update: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has barred US military personnel from using military information to place bets in prediction markets, warning that such wagers could expose operations to adversaries. The Pentagon directive targets betting activity that could leak sensitive operational details. Hegseth said the risk is that adversaries could exploit prediction market positions tied to military information.

TREE NEWS update: Alibaba Cloud will raise .com domain prices effective 1 November 2026, citing higher upstream registry costs. First-year registration for a .com English domain will cost 90 yuan, with renewals at 99 yuan and transfers at 90 yuan. The new pricing takes effect at midnight on that date.

TREE NEWS update: Hong Kong has added 18 companies to its list of strategic enterprises encouraged to set up or expand operations in the city, half from mainland China and half from elsewhere. The new batch brings the total number of firms brought in to 142, expected to generate about HK$84 billion in investment and create roughly 26,700 jobs. The new entrants include Johnson & Johnson (Hong Kong), gold refiner Valcambi SA, AI and robotics firms AGIBOT and Phancy Group, and blockchain platform Solana.

TREE NEWS update: SpaceX canceled a Starlink launch due to weather, the company said. The next launch window for the satellite mission is October 23. No further details on the number of satellites or the affected launch site were provided.

TREE NEWS update: The Bank of Russia has approved 17 crypto exchangers, including state-backed lenders Sberbank and VTB, as both banks prepare to offer retail cryptocurrency trading by 1 December. The central bank’s clearance marks a step toward regulated retail access to digital assets through major Russian banks. Sberbank and VTB are among the 17 approved exchangers readying the service for the December deadline.

TREE NEWS reports: Ethereum contracts can already verify alternative signatures, but securing existing accounts requires more than adding a new signer, while Bitcoin’s P2MR proposal does not itself introduce post-quantum signatures. The two networks are taking different technical routes toward wallets resistant to quantum attacks, with Ethereum facing the challenge of migrating already-active accounts and Bitcoin’s proposal stopping short of adding quantum-safe signing.

TREE NEWS reports: A historical ETH-to-USDC Uniswap receipt itemizes how deductions from swap output are reconciled, distinguishing costs taken from the trade from those paid separately. The example also notes that UniswapX handles network costs differently from a classic pool swap. No figures or dates were provided in the material.

TREE NEWS update: Senator Richard Blumenthal has asked Tether and Nxum to provide payment records, crypto wallet addresses and lobbying communications related to payments to Bo Hines’s firm, with a deadline of Nov. 3. The request seeks documentation of the financial ties between the stablecoin issuer and the firm.