Category: Peer to Peer

Coinbase has completed the integration of crypto derivatives platform Deribit, creating Coinbase Global Exchange and preparing to introduce options trading, spot margin and unified portfolios over the coming weeks. The company said on Wednesday that Coinbase Financial Markets, its US-regulated futures commission merchant, will soon connect eligible US customers with global crypto derivatives liquidity through regulated infrastructure. The move brings together operations that had been split between Coinbase International Exchange and Deribit, with the migration completed on October 1. Coinbase said the

The Solana Foundation has introduced an open-source delivery-versus-payment program designed to let financial institutions settle tokenised assets and payments together in a single atomic transaction on the Solana blockchain. Solana DvP, announced on October 6, provides a standard escrow framework and application programming interface intended to replace bespoke smart contracts that institutions have needed for onchain settlements. The program is released under the MIT licence and has undergone an external security audit by Cantina. The system places the two legs of a

BlockTower Capital founder Ari Paul has accused Coinbase of failing to return about $25 million belonging to his firm, while alleging that similar security breaches affected at least a dozen institutions and involved more than $1 billion. Paul, BlockTower’s founder and chief investment officer, made the claims in a social-media post on September 28, saying the loss occurred “a couple years ago”. He alleged that what initially appeared to be a loss of his firm’s money was connected to repeated hacks

A US federal judge has dismissed with prejudice a proposed class action over the LIBRA and M3M3 token launches, rejecting claims against Kelsier Ventures, its principals, Meteora and former Meteora chief executive Benjamin Chow. US District Judge Jennifer L. Rochon of the Southern District of New York granted the defendants’ dismissal motions and denied plaintiffs Omar Hurlock and Anuj Mehta permission to file a second amended complaint. Her September 29 order directed the clerk to close the case, ending the litigation

Cryptocurrency exchange Bitget has published independent findings from Mandiant and SlowMist into its September 24 security breach, with both investigations tracing the intrusion to compromised third-party security products that enabled unauthorised access to the exchange’s wallet environment. The disclosure sharpens the explanation of an incident initially valued at about $351.6 million and later revised to approximately $387.5 million after additional on-chain tracing identified affected transactions involving Zcash and TRON. Bitget has said the higher figure reflected fuller accounting of transfers during

Coinbase has expanded Coinbase for Agents to US stocks and exchange-traded funds while activating x402 micropayments, allowing artificial-intelligence agents to trade across more asset classes and buy data or services needed to inform their actions. The September 22 expansion extends a platform launched in June that connected AI agents directly to customers’ Coinbase accounts for trading, payments and automated financial workflows. Coinbase said its Model Context Protocol, or MCP, can now give agents access to thousands of US stocks and ETFs

Tether has minted about $495 million of its gold-backed XAU₮ token, adding a large new batch of digital bullion as the market for tokenised gold expands. Blockchain analytics firm Arkham identified the issuance on September 29, saying Tether’s latest mint involved XAU₮ rather than its much larger dollar-linked USDT stablecoin. The transaction comprised roughly 119,670 XAU₮ and was valued at about $494.6 million at the time, based on the on-chain data. The size of the mint is substantial relative to XAU₮’s existing

Open USD, a dollar-backed stablecoin supported by major payments, technology and cryptocurrency companies, has gone live with a model that distributes reserve income and ownership to businesses that help expand its use. The stablecoin began operating on Wednesday across Ethereum, Solana, Base and Tempo, according to Open Standard, the independent company behind the project. Coinbase, Mastercard, Shopify, Stripe and Visa are its founding partners and investors, and together have committed more than $1 billion to establish Open USD liquidity. Open Standard chief

Polymarket has added 15-minute Bitcoin price markets to its US app, giving users a new way to trade contracts tied to whether the cryptocurrency rises or falls during successive quarter-hour windows. The contracts, listed as “BTC Up or Down: 15 min”, settle according to whether a specified Bitcoin reference price at the end of each 15-minute interval is greater than or equal to its level at the start. An equal or higher reading produces an “Up” outcome; a lower reading produces

California Governor Gavin Newsom has signed legislation prohibiting state and local public officials and certain government employees from issuing meme coins, while restricting crypto platforms from offering specified politician-linked tokens to California residents. Assembly Bill 2409, authored by Assemblymember Avelino Valencia of Anaheim, was signed on Sunday, September 27, after clearing both chambers of the state legislature without a dissenting final vote. The measure creates a statutory ethics framework aimed at preventing public office from being used to issue speculative digital

THORChain has rejected Bitget chief executive Gracy Chen’s call to block addresses linked to the cryptocurrency exchange’s $387.5 million security breach, arguing that its permissionless network cannot selectively censor transactions. The dispute emerged after assets stolen from Bitget were routed through cross-chain services, including THORChain, and converted into Bitcoin. Chen publicly urged the protocol to refuse service to attacker-controlled addresses that had already been identified and flagged, saying decentralisation should not become a shield for handling known stolen funds. THORChain responded that

Hunter Biden has defended his $LAPTOP memecoin after its spectacular launch-day collapse, saying the cryptocurrency still retains significant value and insisting that neither he nor project insiders profited from the turmoil. Speaking on actor Rainn Wilson’s Soul Boom podcast, Biden rejected the suggestion that the token had simply “crashed and burned”, pointing to what he said was a fully diluted valuation of about $252 million. He maintained that the project could still fulfil the objectives set for it despite severe losses

Bitget chief executive Gracy Chen has said preliminary evidence indicates North Korean-linked hackers were likely behind a security breach that transferred about $387.5 million in crypto assets from the exchange’s wallets. The assessment remains unconfirmed, but Chen said investigators had identified internet protocol behaviour and on-chain patterns consistent with techniques used by known North Korean hacking organisations. Bitget has not publicly named a specific group, and the investigation is continuing with cybersecurity firms Mandiant and SlowMist and relevant authorities. Bitget on Friday

Tesla’s Bitcoin holdings moved close to the $1 billion mark after the cryptocurrency’s sharp weekly advance added about $122.6 million to the market value of the electric-vehicle maker’s position without any fresh purchase. The company held 11,509 bitcoin at the end of June, its latest regulatory filing shows, matching the balance tracked on-chain by blockchain intelligence platform Arkham. At a Bitcoin price of about $86,700, that position was valued at roughly $997.8 million, leaving it only a few million dollars short

Binance has opened its bStocks service to eligible users in the UAE, giving them round-the-clock access to tokenised securities linked to selected US shares and exchange-traded funds from as little as $5. The offering broadens the cryptocurrency platform’s reach beyond digital assets by allowing users to trade products tied to companies including Tesla and Nvidia. Binance said bStocks are designed to provide economic exposure to the underlying securities while operating within a blockchain-based trading framework. The products are issued by BTech Holdings

Bitcoin traders are bracing for a major derivatives reset on Friday, when about $15.7 billion of options tied to the cryptocurrency are due to expire on Deribit, putting the durability of this week’s rally under scrutiny. The September 25 quarterly expiry is the largest concentration of Bitcoin options on the exchange, with open interest equivalent to roughly 179,000 to 183,000 Bitcoin depending on the market snapshot. Deribit data collected this week put the notional value near $15.7 billion, while calls substantially

A malware campaign using the EtherHiding technique has exploited the Polygon blockchain to conceal and dynamically rotate command-and-control infrastructure while stealing banking and cryptocurrency credentials from infected users. Security researchers tracing the operation said it has been active since at least November 2025 and has compromised at least 31 legitimate business websites across several countries and industries. The campaign has evolved from deploying a general-purpose PowerShell backdoor into delivering a browser-based banking trojan capable of intercepting login credentials and two-factor authentication

Bitcoin’s network hashrate is showing signs of recovery, prompting CryptoQuant analysts to flag a pattern that has historically coincided with stronger prices. The improvement comes as Bitcoin trades back near $80,000 after a volatile week, while estimates of the computing power securing the network have moved higher from early-September lows. Trackers placed hashrate around 900 to 930 exahashes per second on Friday, with estimates varying because the measure is inferred from block production. CryptoQuant’s interpretation centres on the relationship between miner activity,

Lemon is expanding its regulated financial infrastructure across Latin America as the crypto-fintech platform adds payment, investment and digital-asset services to a user base now measured in the millions. Peru’s banking and insurance regulator authorised the organisation of Lima del Sol EEDE, a new electronic-money issuer linked to Lemon Group, in July, giving the company a route towards operating more of its local payments infrastructure through a supervised entity. The approval is an organisational step rather than permission to begin operations,

The United States has sanctioned Iranian cryptocurrency exchange BitBank, accusing it of helping move hundreds of millions of dollars in Bitcoin to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and processing payments linked to Tehran. The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control designated BitBank on September 17 under Executive Order 13902, which targets sectors of Iran’s economy. The action also covered BitBank’s software developer, Pishtaz Simorgh Electronic Trade Company, and three associates of sanctioned financier Babak Zanjani: Hossein Ali Zaker Hossein, Mohammad

PayitFast has signed a memorandum of understanding with Dubai-based luxury travel company Zameera to give members access to curated high-end journeys through Verati, its lifestyle and concierge platform. The agreement, announced in Dubai on September 16, brings Zameera’s travel portfolio into the PayitFast ecosystem, extending the digital payments company’s member offering beyond financial services. The companies said the first selection will include a private safari camp in Kenya’s Maasai Mara, heli-skiing beneath Iceland’s midnight sun and a two-part journey along Saudi

CoinEx will shut its cryptocurrency exchange on December 22 after nine years of operation, citing a prolonged market downturn, falling trading activity and mounting regulatory and compliance costs. The platform began an orderly wind-down on September 15, halting new user registrations and restricting several services, while allowing customers to withdraw assets until 02:00 UTC on December 22. CoinEx said all user assets were fully backed and that its reserve ratio exceeded 100 per cent. Most non-spot services, including futures, margin trading, loans,

Circle has opened its Arc blockchain to the public, bringing a purpose-built network for institutional finance, stablecoin payments and tokenised assets into live production. The New York-based digital finance company said Arc’s public mainnet went live on Wednesday with more than 100 applications and more than 100 institutional and ecosystem builders spanning banks, asset managers, payment networks, exchanges, custodians, decentralised finance protocols, wallets and artificial intelligence platforms. Arc is a Layer 1 blockchain integrated with Circle’s financial platform and USDC, its dollar-backed

Publicly listed Bitcoin miners fell below cash breakeven as a group in the second quarter, with their weighted average pre-tax production cost reaching about $75,500 per coin against Bitcoin’s quarter-end price of $58,400. The gap of roughly $17,100, or 29%, marked a sharp deterioration in industry economics during the three months to June, according to a new sector review by digital-asset investment group CoinShares. The report said the aggregate listed-miner cohort moved below cash breakeven as weaker Bitcoin prices collided with