Zero-knowledge technology could let companies verify who you are without storing your identity documents. So why isn’t it already standard practice? The massive theft of more than 153 million US and Canadian driver’s licenses earlier this month should make one thing abundantly clear: the safest place for a copy of your driver’s license is nowhere at all. The leaked IDs, which appear to have come from an identity verification provider, ended up on a dark web identity service dubbed Nexus, alongside millions of other stolen identity and travel documents. The danger was underscored this week after fintech Revolut revealed it had been tricked by a hacker into handing over reams of sensitive customer data, including copies of passports and verification selfies. The hacker is now drip feeding th…
Bernstein said the federal agencies will publish new regulations to compensate for the time lost negotiating the CLARITY Act, after its cloture vote failed on Tuesday. Bernstein analysts expect “aggressive and swift” rulemaking from the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), after the Digital Asset Market Clarity (CLARITY) Act failed to pass a Senate cloture vote on Tuesday. Bernstein analysts said the regulatory agencies will publish new regulations to “make up for the time lost negotiating the CLARITY Act,” in a Wednesday note shared with Cointelegraph. The analysts said they expect agency regulations including token taxonomy for raising capital, developer protection measures concerning decentralized finance and self-custodial protoco…
Nearly 99% of ZEC holders voted to reduce block times to 25 seconds, while keeping ZEC issuance and halving schedules unchanged. Zcash token holders backed cutting the network’s target block time to 25 seconds from 75 seconds and preserving its existing halving schedule in a poll on the next major upgrade. The faster-block proposal received 99.9% of the Zcash (ZEC)-weighted vote, while 98.9% supported keeping halvings, according to results published Monday. Voting power reflected eligible ZEC holdings, with both percentages including abstentions. The shorter interval would reduce the expected wait for a transaction’s first confirmation, according to the proposal. The amount of new ZEC issued per block would fall to keep scheduled daily issuance unchanged.
Circle’s Arc mainnet is live with USDC for transaction fees, support for more than 20 fiat stablecoins and links to over 20 blockchains. USDC issuer Circle has launched the mainnet of Arc, a layer-1 (L1) blockchain targeting stablecoin payments and financial markets, particularly agentic transactions. Arc uses USDC as its native gas asset and offers Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) compatibility and deterministic sub-second settlement finality, according to an Arc blog post on Wednesday. The network supports more than 20 fiat stablecoins, including USDC, EURC, JPYC, KRW1 and TRYB, while tokenized assets including BlackRock’s BUIDL and Circle’s USYC are available natively on Arc. Arc also offers interoperability with more than 20 blockchains through Circle’s Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol (CCT…
Germany’s largest bank is awaiting regulatory approval to launch institutional custody solutions for Bitcoin, Ether and select stablecoins before expanding into tokenized assets. Germany’s largest bank, Deutsche Bank, is awaiting regulatory approval to launch digital asset custody solutions for institutional clients and corporations in Europe. Deutsche Bank plans to go live with the offering for its first clients this year, subject to completion of the applicable regulatory timeline, the bank announced on Wednesday. The bank plans to offer initial support for Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH) and select stablecoins, including Circle USDC (USDC), EURC (EURC) and AllUnity EUR (EURAU). It also plans to include support for tokenized financial instruments at a later point.
Bitcoin miners generated 35% of the state-owned power producer’s revenue last year, but declining reservoir inflows led the utility to prioritize households and manufacturers. Ethiopia has reportedly reduced electricity delivered to Bitcoin miners to 23% of contracted levels as lower water inflows strain the country’s hydroelectric reservoirs. On Tuesday, Bloomberg reported that El Niño intensified dry conditions in the east African country, reducing water inflows into its reservoirs by 20%. Ethiopian Electric Power (EEP) CEO Ashebir Balcha said the company cut power to miners to prioritize households and manufacturers. Balcha said EEP initially reduced deliveries to 75% of contracted levels, easing to 50% and then 23%. The company will reassess conditions in October and could impose furth…
Italy is probing the Revolut-linked breach after its cyber agency reported more than 650 cases involving abused or illicit certified email accounts. Italian authorities are investigating a government email breach linked to the leak of Revolut customer data after hackers allegedly used the compromised account to obtain sensitive customer information. Polizia Postale, Italy’s cybercrime police, is investigating the incident for alleged unauthorized access to a computer system and computer fraud, Italian news agency ANSA reported on Tuesday. Some Italian media reports identified the compromised account as belonging to the Prefecture of Reggio Calabria. The agency later denied sending requests to Revolut, according to ANSA.
Bitcoin exchange demand on Coinbase declined after the US Senate voted against the CLARITY Act, while traders sent BTC to exchanges at an unrealized loss. Bitcoin (BTC) demand is under pressure in the US as investors react to the failure of the CLARITY Act to advance in the Senate. Key points:
Euro-area online and mobile merchants can apply until Oct. 27 to test beta digital euro payments in a 12-month pilot. The European Central Bank (ECB) is seeking online and mobile merchants to participate in a 12-month digital euro pilot expected to begin in the second half of 2027. On Tuesday, the ECB said e-commerce and mobile-commerce merchants operating in the euro area can apply until Oct. 27. Selected businesses will enable beta digital euro payments in remote commerce environments and test how the currency could fit into checkout processes. The pilot will assess user experience, technical functionality and operational processes of the digital euro. The ECB said the beta version will be close to the currency described by the draft legislation but will not have legal tender status.
Federico Variola says AI has diverted capital from crypto and is empowering attackers, while rising cybersecurity costs could push the industry toward greater centralization. Phemex CEO Federico Variola says AI has been a ‘net negative’ for crypto, despite the crypto exchange announcing an AI-focused transformation earlier this year. Speaking on Cointelegraph’s Chain Reaction, Variola said AI has diverted capital away from the industry, while empowering attackers and driving up cybersecurity costs for smaller teams — pressures that risk pushing crypto toward greater centralization. “It’s difficult to be bullish about AI in crypto,” he said. “Liquidity have been significantly diverted to to that industry on one side. On the other hand, AI has empowered a lot of bad actors that have been e…
The former employees allegedly earned more than $50,000 each by trading Hyperliquid perpetuals ahead of Robinhood token listings. US prosecutors on Tuesday charged two former Robinhood engineers with commodities fraud and wire fraud for allegedly using confidential information about upcoming cryptocurrency listings to profit from perpetual futures trades on Hyperliquid. According to the US Department of Justice (DOJ), Hefu Chai and Huaisong “Jerry” Xiang bought perpetual contracts linked to tokens ahead of Robinhood Crypto listings. The DOJ alleged each profited more than $50,000 from the trades between 2025 and 2026. The DOJ said Chai and Xiang had access to a private company Slack channel containing information about planned listings. Prosecutors allege they used that information to op…
The $450 million withdrawal came as Bitcoin fell 2.5% and the CLARITY Act failed to advance in the Senate, with Fidelity and BlackRock funds leading the outflows. Spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds recorded their largest day of outflows since late June after a major crypto bill stalled in the Senate. The 13 US-listed funds saw a net $450.4 million outflow on Tuesday, after attracting $159.9 million on Monday, according to data from Farside. It marks the largest outflow since June 24, when Bitcoin ETFs lost $469 million as a tech stock sell-off pressured risk assets. Data shows Fidelity’s FBTC saw the biggest outflows, shedding $214.8 million, followed by $161.7 million from the BlackRock iShares Bitcoin Trust, $44.1 million from Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust ETF (GBTC), $17.4 million from ARK…
The CLARITY Act still has a procedural path after Senator Thom Tillis moved to reconsider the failed cloture vote, though industry executives are divided over whether Congress has enough time left. Crypto industry leaders are looking to US financial regulators to fill the regulatory gap after a major crypto bill establishing a regulatory framework for digital assets stalled in the Senate on Tuesday. The Senate voted 49-50 on a motion to invoke cloture and advance the CLARITY Act, short of the 60 votes needed as Democrats raised concerns over US President Donald Trump’s crypto investments. Industry executives said the result was a disappointment, but pointed to potential rulemaking from the US Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission as the next best sourc…
A BIS study found widely used crypto metrics can obscure economic activity, with measurement challenges spanning Bitcoin, Ethereum and stablecoins. Researchers at the Bank for International Settlements found that estimates of Bitcoin onchain transfer values can vary by as much as sixfold depending on how transactions are measured. The finding concerns onchain Bitcoin transfer values, rather than trading volume on crypto exchanges. The sixfold gap reflects differences between measurement methods, including how change outputs and other transfers back to the sender are treated. The discrepancy stems largely from Bitcoin’s transaction structure. When users spend Bitcoin, unspent funds are often returned to the sender as change, which can be counted as another output even though it does not rep…
Circle and Coinbase shares fell about 10% as the failed Senate vote weighed on crypto-linked equities, with Bitcoin miners and treasury companies also declining. Crypto-linked stocks fell sharply on Tuesday after the US Senate failed to advance the CLARITY Act, with shares of Circle and Coinbase dropping about 10%. Bitcoin treasury companies were also hit, with American Bitcoin falling around 8%, while Strategy and Strive each declined about 5%, according to Yahoo Finance data. Bitcoin miners joined the selloff, with Riot Platforms falling about 6%, CleanSpark nearly 5%, Hut 8 more than 4% and IREN almost 4%. Coinbase (COIN) shares fell 9.9% on Tuesday. Source: Yahoo Finance
The failed procedural vote leaves the CLARITY Act facing an uncertain future after months of negotiations over crypto oversight and ethics provisions. The US Senate on Tuesday failed to pass a cloture motion on the Digital Asset Market Clarity (CLARITY) Act that would have established the country’s first regulatory framework for digital assets. The motion received 49 votes in favor and 50 against, short of the 60 votes needed to advance the legislation to debate on the Senate floor. With less than 36 days of business before 2027, when a new session of Congress is scheduled to be sworn in after November’s midterm elections, the bill will likely not see further action for the rest of the year.
A Bank of England policy maker said digital dollars could expand access to the US currency while turning stablecoin issuers into bigger buyers of government debt. Carolyn Wilkins, a member of the Bank of England’s Financial Policy Committee, says the rise of stablecoins could reinforce the US dollar’s global dominance and increase demand for US Treasurys, underscoring how the growing market for digital dollars could have consequences well beyond crypto. In a Tuesday speech at Queen’s University Belfast, Wilkins said dollar-denominated stablecoins could strengthen the greenback by making cross-border settlement easier, expanding access to dollar-linked assets outside the US and increasing demand for Treasurys held as reserves. The largest stablecoin issuers are already significant buyers of…
The crypto exchange is expanding its traditional finance offerings with 11 US-listed exchange-traded funds focused on US Treasurys and investment-grade bonds. Binance has launched a wealth management service offering access to 11 US-listed exchange-traded funds focused on short-term US Treasurys and investment-grade bonds. The new Binance Earn offering groups the ETFs into cash management, steady income and yield enhancement products based on investment horizons ranging from less than six months to more than a year. Users can browse the available ETFs and place orders through Binance Earn, with purchases processed through the exchange’s stock trading service. Binance said investors receive the economic benefits of the shares, including price movements and cash distributions.
Bitcoin price action weakened over market nerves prior to the Senate CLARITY Act vote, while surging bond yields pressured risk assets across the board. Bitcoin (BTC) saw month-to-date lows at Tuesday’s Wall Street open as global bond yields spiked and crypto markets awaited a key US Senate vote on the CLARITY Act. Key points:
Standard Chartered sees Robinhood Chain as an early sign that tokenization could transform Arbitrum’s economics and drive ARB sharply higher by 2030. Standard Chartered says layer-2 network Arbitrum could emerge as one of the digital asset industry’s top performers through 2030 as traditional financial firms move more assets onchain, giving the network a potentially lucrative revenue source beyond crypto-native activity. In a note shared with Cointelegraph, Geoff Kendrick, Standard Chartered’s global head of digital assets research, said Arbitrum’s economics offer considerable upside because the network receives 10% of the net protocol revenue generated by companies building on it. Robinhood Chain, developed by the online brokerage, is the first major example. According to Kendrick, Robinh…
