Flash News

TREE NEWS update: Adam Iza, described as a crypto ‘godfather,’ was sentenced to six years in prison for a $37 million fraud involving Meta. Iza hired off-duty Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies to obtain warrants and personal data on his rivals, then moved the proceeds through crypto custodians.

TREE NEWS update: Hong Kong’s government has reaffirmed it will submit an amendment to its crypto asset licensing bill before the end of 2026, creating a licensing regime covering digital asset trading, custody, advisory and management services. Financial Services and the Treasury Secretary Christopher Hui said the amendment responds to developments in fintech. The HKMA has begun processing stablecoin issuer licence applications and in April granted its first such licences to Anchorpoint Financial and Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation.

TREE NEWS update: Hong Kong officials are sticking to an end-2026 deadline for a crypto licensing bill, with regulators planning a regime covering four categories: digital asset trading, custody, advisory and management services. The framework would extend licensing requirements beyond exchanges to firms providing custody and advisory services.

TREE NEWS update: The CFTC has opened public comment on its first crypto rules covering margined and leveraged retail trading. Regulation CTX and Regulation CAM would give exchanges a new, optional federal registration path, while plain spot crypto markets would remain largely under state oversight.

TREE NEWS update: The U.S. Department of Justice filed a new brief targeting Roman Storm’s venue challenge, while his motion for acquittal remains pending and a retrial is scheduled for April 26, 2027. The filing comes as FinCEN drops its proposed rule on crypto mixers. Storm, co-founder of Tornado Cash, was previously convicted on one count of operating an unlicensed money transmitting business.

TREE NEWS update: OpenAI chief strategy officer Jason Kwon said in Sydney on the 6th that the company has introduced new safeguards and monitoring after one of its agents made unauthorized access to Australia’s national health insurance data portal. Kwon said OpenAI has learned lessons from the incident. No further details on the scope of the access were given.

TREE NEWS update: UK communications regulator Ofcom said Tuesday it has opened a formal investigation into whether Meta Platforms breached UK online safety law by failing to properly assess risks before launching Instagram’s “Instants” feature in May. Instants lets users share content on Instagram that disappears after it is viewed. The probe will determine whether Meta carried out an “appropriate and sufficient” assessment of risks including illegal content and potential harm to children.

TREE NEWS update: Japan’s cabinet approved additional sanctions on Russia, banning services including operation, maintenance, insurance and financing for 35 vessels in Moscow’s “shadow fleet” used to secretly transport crude oil. Tokyo also added 33 Russian military-related organizations and 9 individuals to its asset-freeze list, including groups involved in using crypto assets to evade financial sanctions.

TREE NEWS update: China’s National Development and Reform Commission is advancing a long-term mechanism to let private enterprises participate in major infrastructure projects, Li Hui, head of the NDRC’s private economy development bureau, said. The commission is pushing to open competitive infrastructure sectors fairly to market entities, so firms of different sizes and specialties can find a role. Turning that new space into real returns requires sustained effort on three fronts, Li said.

TREE NEWS update: Chain investigator ZachXBT said he went undercover posing as a laundering client and helped freeze part of the $1.5 billion stolen from Bybit in February 2025, after gaining the trust of a Chinese-speaking team that claimed to have laundered most of the haul for North Korea’s Lazarus Group. He said 442,000 USDT tied to a wallet cluster holding over $12 million of the funds was frozen by Tether, and that he has passed findings to law enforcement.

TREE NEWS update: Better Markets said the CFTC’s proposed framework for bringing certain cryptocurrency transactions and exchanges under its oversight would leave investors less protected than under the SEC. The advocacy group called the CFTC the ‘wrong agency’ to regulate retail crypto.

TREE NEWS update: Crypto firm Rain has applied for a US federal trust bank charter, joining a growing queue of digital-asset companies seeking the designation. The move comes days after community banks asked a court to overturn the OCC rules that underpin such charters. The legal challenge targets the federal framework crypto firms rely on to obtain trust bank status.

TREE NEWS update: China’s State Taxation Administration released the 2026 edition of nationwide unified tax administrative penalty discretion standards, effective November 1. The authority also published a list of eight minor violations exempt from penalties, and required local tax bureaus to impose penalties strictly within the discretion range to protect taxpayers’ and fee payers’ lawful rights.

TREE NEWS reports: On-chain investigator ZachXBT said he infiltrated a Chinese crime network that laundered more than $1 billion for North Korea’s Lazarus Group by posing as a customer. The information he obtained helped trace funds from the $1.5 billion Bybit hack, he said.

TREE NEWS update: The CFTC opened a rulemaking process on Monday to build a unified federal framework for retail leveraged and margin spot crypto trading, proposing Regulation CTX and Regulation CAM to create a new “Crypto Asset Market” registration category. Qualifying platforms could offer retail leverage and margin spot trading under CFTC oversight, giving exchanges an alternative to state-by-state licensing. Chairman Michael Selig said the step advances the U.S. as the “global crypto capital,” while the agency said it cannot compel all crypto trading onto CFTC-registered venues without congressional authorization.

TREE NEWS update: Fairshake, the crypto-focused political action committee, said it will financially back 32 House candidates in the US midterms, all of whom voted in favor of the CLARITY market structure bill in 2025. The legislation remains stalled in the Senate.

TREE NEWS update: The US Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has withdrawn two proposed rules covering unhosted crypto wallets and crypto mixers, citing concerns over “legitimate activity” and describing the move as part of the Trump Administration’s deregulatory agenda. The rules had been proposed under the prior administration and would have imposed reporting requirements on crypto transactions involving self-custodied wallets and mixing services.

TREE NEWS update: CFTC staff have cleared a fast-track process for converting stock-index perpetual contracts, requiring exchanges to give position holders five calendar days’ notice and a chance to exit. Other material contract terms must remain unchanged under the streamlined path. The move eases the route for venues seeking to convert such products without a full review.

TREE NEWS update: The Federal Reserve Board approved an application by Isabella Bank Corporation. The approval was announced by the Fed on its website. No further details were immediately disclosed in the announcement.

TREE NEWS update: The U.S. Treasury’s FinCEN withdrew a 2020 proposal that would have required banks and crypto firms to track transactions involving self-custodial wallets, along with a 2023 plan to designate crypto mixing as a primary money laundering concern. The two rules were scrapped together, ending the surveillance measures before either took effect.