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IBM Joins Swift's Blockchain: 17 Banks Already Piloting It

Visa Is Shutting Down the Meme Coin Credit Card Loophole

Crypto Funds Just Posted Their Best Week of 2026 — $3.5B in a Single Week

Upcoming IPOs Are Back. Here’s What Investors Should Beware Of

Vitalik Says AI Will Make Crypto More Secure

Tokenized Stock Volume Just Exploded — But Three Platforms Control Most of It

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Tokenized stocks are moving beyond being a crypto experiment. Over the past 30 days, on-chain transfer volume jumped more than 415% to $29.5 billion , while monthly active addresses climbed 209% to about 1.3 million . The number of holders also reached roughly 2.36 million . But there's something more interesting beneath the headline numbers. Most of the market is still controlled by three platforms. The three giants According to RWA.xyz data, the total value of tokenized stocks distributed on-chain reached approximately $2.54 billion . Of that: Ondo: $842.8 million Kraken xStocks: $609.3 million Binance bStocks: $599.9 million Together, they represent roughly 81% of the market . That's a remarkable level of concentration for a market growing this quickly. Why is this happening? The products are becoming easier to access. Coinbase recently brought tokenized U.S. stocks to Base for eligible non-U.S. users, while Bitwise introduced automated portfolios using t...

Europe Is Building Two Very Different Digital Euros

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Europe could soon have two competing visions for what digital money should look like. On one side is the European Central Bank's digital euro  central-bank money designed to work across the euro area, including offline. On the other is EURR , Revolut's euro-denominated stablecoin, issued by Bridge, a Stripe company, and being rolled out initially to eligible users in Denmark, Poland and Portugal. They're built differently, but they'll ultimately compete for the same thing: How people move euros digitally. The ECB is putting privacy at the centre The digital euro is being designed with a separation between identity and payment data . Users would access it through their bank or another authorised payment provider rather than holding an account directly with the ECB. For offline payments, the privacy goes even further. A user's phone or payment device can transfer digital euros directly to another device without the transaction details being sent to the ECB o...

The IMF Just Drew a Line Around Stablecoins

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  Stablecoins are becoming too important for global policymakers to ignore. At the Jackson Hole Economic Symposium , IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva highlighted both sides of the stablecoin story: they can make payments faster and cheaper, but widespread use of dollar-backed stablecoins could accelerate currency substitution in emerging markets and make capital controls harder to enforce. The interesting part is that the IMF, BIS and ECB broadly agree on the problem. They don't agree on what should come next. The IMF wants safer stablecoins The IMF isn't arguing that stablecoins should disappear. Its approach is closer to: Regulate them properly and make them safer. That means stronger reserve requirements, internationally coordinated rules and mechanisms that ensure holders can redeem stablecoins at their promised value. The IMF has also recognized that stablecoins can improve payments, particularly cross-border transfers and remittances. But there's...

Russia Just Put Crypto Behind a Three-Asset Gate

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  Russia is opening a regulated crypto market on September 1 . But for ordinary investors, the door isn't being opened to the entire crypto market. It's being opened to just three assets: Bitcoin, Ethereum and Tether's USDT . So why these three? The Bank of Russia created a strict eligibility filter based on market size, trading activity and trading history . A cryptocurrency must have: An average market capitalization above 5 trillion rubles Average daily trading volume above 1 trillion rubles At least five years of price history on foreign trading platforms The measurements are based on the preceding two-year period. Only BTC, ETH and USDT currently satisfy the requirements. Russia isn't choosing its favorites The interesting part is that the central bank isn't simply saying Bitcoin is trustworthy or Ethereum is important. It's effectively saying: If you're going to give ordinary investors regulated access to crypto, start with assets that...

Tim Cook Leaves Apple With a $4+ Trillion Question

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  After 15 years at the top, Tim Cook's time as Apple's CEO is coming to an end. When Cook succeeded Steve Jobs in 2011, Apple was worth roughly $350 billion . Today, the company is worth around $4.7 trillion  more than 13 times it's value when he took over. That's an extraordinary transformation. But Cook's legacy isn't simply about making Apple bigger. Cook built a different Apple Job's was known for creating products that changed consumer technology. Cook's strength was different. He turned Apple's enormous product ecosystem into an increasingly efficient global business while expanding areas such as services, wearables and Apple Silicon . Apple also returned enormous amounts of capital to shareholders through buybacks and dividends during his tenure. The result was a company that became significantly more valuable without needing to reinvent the iPhone every year. Now comes the difficult part On September 1 , John Ternus will officia...

The Global Economy Is Getting Harder. Here’s What You Actually Need to Care About

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  There are plenty of reasons to feel uneasy about the global economy right now. Growth is slowing. Governments are carrying heavy debt. Trade tensions remain elevated. Energy prices are creating fresh inflation concerns, while higher borrowing costs are putting pressure on households and businesses. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) currently expects global growth of around 3% in 2026 , while the World Bank's more cautious forecast puts it at 2.5% . But here's the part that matters: You don't need to understand every economic headline to protect your finances. You need to understand which ones can actually reach your wallet. Watch your cost of living Food, energy and housing matter more to your finances than whether economists are arguing about a recession. If your rent rises 20%, your salary stays the same and your grocery bill increases, your personal economy has already changed — regardless of what Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is doing. Global inflation may...

Bitcoin Is Still 20× Smaller Than Gold

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  Bitcoin is getting bigger, but it's still nowhere near gold's market cap. Gold's total market value is currently around $32 trillion , while Bitcoin sits near $1.6 trillion . That puts Bitcoin at roughly 5% of gold's market cap . To match gold, Bitcoin's market cap would need to grow by about 20× . With roughly 20 million BTC circulating, that would put Bitcoin near $1.6 million per coin  assuming gold's market cap stays around today's level. The interesting part isn't whether Bitcoin reaches gold tomorrow. It's how much ground Bitcoin could close if institutional adoption keeps accelerating. 5% today. 100% would be a completely different financial landscape.

Ethena Just Changed the ENA Playbook

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E thena is making a major change to how ENA works. The Ethena Foundation announced four proposed changes, including buying out locked seed-investor tokens, ending monthly VC unlocks from October 5, and transferring protocol intellectual property to the foundation. But the biggest change could be what's coming next. Ethena is proposing to direct 95% of net protocol revenue toward ENA buybacks . There's just one condition: USDe must reach $7.5 billion in supply. USDe currently sits around $4 billion, meaning the stablecoin needs significant growth before the buyback mechanism can activate. ENA jumped 23% in 24 hours following the announcement. If governance approves the proposal and USDe reaches the milestone, Ethena could turn protocol growth directly into persistent buying pressure for ENA . The number to watch isn't ENA's price. It's $7.5 billion USDe.

The SEC Just Sent It's Crypto Custody Rules to the White House

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The SEC has sent a major proposed overhaul of its crypto custody rules to the White House for review. Submitted on August 25, 2026 , the proposal could provide clearer rules for investment advisers and funds holding digital assets for clients. The full proposal hasn't been made public yet. But we know which laws are at the center of it: The Investment Advisers Act of 1940 and the Investment Company Act of 1940 . The White House's Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs can request changes before the proposal returns to the SEC for consideration and a public comment process. The bigger picture? The SEC isn't just figuring out how to regulate crypto trading. It's increasingly working out how traditional investment firms can safely hold crypto for their clients. And clearer custody rules could make it easier for more institutions to enter the market. Crypto custody is becoming a Wall Street infrastructure issue.

Ethereum Is Preparing It's Staking System for the Quantum Era

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Ethereum developers have filed a proposal that could eventually replace the network's current validator deposit contract and prepare staking for post-quantum cryptography. The reason is simple: Ethereum's existing validator system relies heavily on BLS cryptography , and quantum computers could eventually threaten it. That's not purely theoretical. Google Quantum AI researchers have identified five potential attack paths against Ethereum using quantum computing. The proposal would expand key-size limits so Ethereum can support larger, quantum-resistant cryptographic formats. But there's one particularly important mechanism: The one-way switch The proposal includes an irreversible switch that would permanently stop the deposit contract from accepting new validators using the old BLS credential format. Once activated: BLS deposits stop → newer credential formats take over. That's significant because around 42.4 million ETH , worth roughly $104 billion , ...

Kalshi Just Raised $1.12 Billion — And It's Valuation Is Moving Fast

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  Trade On Anything Kalshi has just raised a staggering amount of money. According to an SEC Form D filing, the prediction-market company has raised $1.12 billion from 71 investors since April . The company confirmed that the money is tied to its Series F , which valued Kalshi at $22 billion . But that valuation might already be looking outdated. Investors are betting big on prediction markets Kalshi's Series F was led by Coatue , with major participation from firms including Sequoia Capital, Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), IVP, Paradigm, Morgan Stanley and ARK Invest . That's a notable mix. It's not just traditional venture capital. It's also major financial institutions and investors positioning themselves around a market that has moved from crypto-adjacent experimentation into something much bigger. And another $750 million could be coming Separate reports say Kalshi is in advanced discussions to raise another $750 million at a valuation of approximately $40 b...

Your Smart TV May Know What You're Watching. Even Through HDMI

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  Your smart TV isn't just a screen anymore. Depending on the TV and it's settings, it can use Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) to identify what's playing on the display including content coming from external devices connected through HDMI. That means your TV may be able to recognize what you're watching even when the content isn't coming from the TV's own Netflix, YouTube or other built-in apps. And that's where things get interesting. Your TV can recognize more than you think ACR works by analyzing what's displayed and creating a digital fingerprint that can be matched against known content. Research has found ACR operating across different smart-TV platforms and sources, including streaming apps, broadcasts, game consoles and HDMI-connected devices . VIZIO's current privacy documentation, for example, explicitly says its ACR technology can recognize programming, advertisements, gaming content and devices connected through HDMI when vie...

Optimism Just Redirected 546.9 Million OP Tokens — And the Vote Is Raising Questions

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OP Tokens Optimism's latest governance decision isn't getting attention simply because 546.9 million OP is a lot of tokens. It's getting attention because of how the decision was made . On August 20 2026, a governance proposal passed to move 546.9 million OP tokens originally allocated for future user airdrops into the Optimism Foundation's Strategic Ecosystem Fund . The vote came down to the wire. One delegate changed the outcome With roughly 17 minutes left, the proposal was still below the approval threshold. Then Test in Prod voted 8.486 million OP in favor and that single vote pushed the proposal over the line. And there's an important detail here: Test in Prod is funded by the Optimism Collective.  That's why the vote has sparked criticism. The focus question isn't necessarily whether Test in Prod was allowed to vote, because It was. The question is whether a delegate funded by the ecosystem should have enough voting power to effectively dete...

TECNO Just Made the Smartphone Bezel Disappear

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  TECNO's latest smart phone concept  What if the black border around your phone simply wasn't there? That's the idea behind TECNO's latest smartphone concept. The company has built a phone with what it calls a 0mm bezel , creating a display that appears to stretch from one edge of the device to the other. And after seeing the phone in person, MKBHD's reaction makes one thing clear: this isn't just another concept rendered in Photoshop. The phone actually looks unusual. It's 6.7-inch, 144Hz display reaches almost impossibly close to the physical edge of the device. From the front, there's very little of the familiar border that has surrounded smartphone screens for years. But there's a catch. The bezel disappeared. The edge didn't. TECNO's solution is clever. Rather than simply extending the display over the sides, the company has redesigned how the screen and frame are positioned. The result is a phone where the bezel virtually disa...

What Happens When You Miss a Loan Repayment?

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  Missing a loan repayment can feel like a small problem. You might think: “I'll just pay it next month.” But depending on the lender and the terms of your loan, delaying that payment can trigger a chain of financial consequences. First, you may pay more A missed payment can lead to late fees, additional interest or other charges . That means the amount you originally agreed to repay can increase. The longer the payment remains outstanding, the more expensive the debt can potentially become. Then your credit history can be affected Lenders don't only look at how much money you earn. They also want to know: Do you actually repay what you borrow? Repeated or seriously overdue payments can negatively affect your credit history, which may make future borrowing more difficult or more expensive. That could matter when you're applying for another loan, financing a purchase or trying to access certain financial products. One missed payment isn't the same as default...

From Stock Fraud to a $24M Crypto Ponzi

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  Brent Kovar's crypto case wasn't his first encounter with financial fraud allegations. In 2009 , the SEC sued Kovar over an alleged $12 million pump-and-dump scheme involving SkyWay Global. According to the SEC, Kovar and his associates promoted false claims about the company's business, helping inflate its stock price and trading volume before selling 76.65 million shares for more than $12 million in profits . Fast-forward to 2026, and a federal jury has convicted Kovar over a $24 million crypto Ponzi scheme through Profit Connect. The alleged pitch had simply evolved: From hyping a stock → to promising AI-powered crypto mining. Different technology. Same old promise of easy money.

LayerZero Just Unveiled ATLAS — And Wall Street Is Already Involved

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LayerZero has unveiled ATLAS , a new “headless exchange” infrastructure designed to bring trading, clearing, settlement and risk management into a single on-chain system. What makes it interesting isn't just the technology, it’s who is involved . The underlying Zero blockchain has attracted collaboration from some of traditional finance's biggest institutions, including Citadel Securities, DTCC and Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) , alongside ARK Invest and Google Cloud. That means ATLAS isn't being positioned simply as another crypto exchange, It is targeting global capital markets . The infrastructure is designed to support everything from spot crypto and perpetuals to stocks, bonds and prediction markets , with LayerZero targeting extremely high throughput and low-latency execution. There's also a direct connection to the ZRO token . LayerZero says 75% of net trading fees will be used to buy and burn ZRO , creating a mechanism that could connect the success of...

Bitcoin's Bull Score Is Flashing Green — But There's a Warning

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  Bitcoin's CryptoQuant Bull Score Index has jumped from 30 to 80 , its highest level since October 2025. Eight of its 10 indicators are now bullish. But there's a warning hiding underneath the optimism. Trader unrealized profit margin has reached 20.5%. That matters because a similar spike preceded Bitcoin's roughly 30% decline in May 2026 . Meanwhile, short-term holder whales took around $1.2 billion in profits between August 20 and 22, while exchange inflows reached their highest level since June. So despite the bullish score, traders are already taking money off the table. CryptoQuant says Bitcoin needs a weekly close above $83,000 to confirm a full bull-market signal. Bullish? Yes. Risk-free? Definitely not. The next Bitcoin move could depend on whether buyers can absorb the profit-taking without losing momentum.

Pakistan Just Gave Crypto Companies a Deadline: Get Licensed or Leave

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  Pakistan is no longer treating crypto regulation as a future conversation. The country's Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (PVARA) has opened its licensing portal, giving existing crypto businesses a clear deadline: September 5, 2026 . If virtual-asset service providers that were already operating by March 5 do not submit a No-Objection Certificate (NOC) application by then, they must cease operations. From uncertainty to a rulebook Pakistan's new framework operates under the Virtual Assets Act, 2026 , establishing PVARA as the regulator responsible for licensing and supervising the country's virtual-asset industry. The framework isn't limited to crypto exchanges. It covers activities including: Exchange services Custody Broker-dealer services Advisory Lending and borrowing Derivatives Asset management Token issuance Virtual-asset transfers Mining-related services In other words, Pakistan is attempting to regulate the business infrastructure su...

BitMine Is Getting Very Close to Owning 5% of Ethereum

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BitMine is getting closer to one of the biggest accumulation targets in crypto. The company just purchased another 32,447 ETH , worth roughly $81 million , bringing its total Ethereum holdings to about 5.85 million ETH . That represents approximately 4.8% of Ethereum's total supply . BitMine's target? 5%. It now needs roughly 187,000 more ETH to reach that milestone. The bigger story isn't simply how much ETH BitMine has bought. It's what happens when a single public company controls a stake equivalent to roughly one-twentieth of Ethereum's supply . BitMine is turning Ethereum accumulation into a corporate treasury strategy and it's getting very close to its target. The 5% milestone is now within reach.

Can $2.6B in Weekly ETF Inflows Sustain Bitcoin’s Rally Above $75K?

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  Bitcoin’s latest rally is being backed by strong institutional demand, with U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs recording approximately $1.92 billion in net inflows between Aug. 17 and Aug. 21. When combined with Ethereum ETF inflows, the weekly figure reached roughly $2.6 billion. Bitcoin is trading around $77,096, up 21.8% over the past seven days, while Bitcoin ETF assets under management have climbed 10%. The numbers suggest that institutional demand is playing an important role in the move above $75,000. However, ETF inflows alone do not guarantee that Bitcoin will remain above that level. Strong Demand Meets Rising Leverage The rally is also accompanied by a sharp increase in market leverage. Bitcoin open interest has risen roughly 27% over the past week, while funding rates remain positive. That creates both an opportunity and a risk. Positive funding and rising open interest can reinforce an upward move when prices continue climbing. But if Bitcoin reverses, highly leveraged positions...

Bitcoin ETFs & Institutional Investment

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  U.S. spot Bitcoin and Ether ETFs just recorded their strongest weekly performance in months, attracting a combined $2.6 billion in inflows during the week ending Aug. 21. The surge marks a major reversal from the previous week, when the two markets experienced approximately $392 million in combined outflows . Bitcoin ETFs accounted for the majority of the latest inflows, with about $1.92 billion entering the products throughout the week. Institutional Demand Returns BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) was among the biggest contributors to the surge. The fund alone attracted approximately $503 million on Thursday , highlighting the strength of institutional demand during the rally. The renewed inflows come as Bitcoin and Ether both posted significant weekly gains, climbing roughly 24% and 28% , respectively. At the same time, combined ETF trading volume tripled to around $29 billion , signaling a sharp increase in investor activity. The numbers suggest that the latest ...

Tokenized Stocks & Digital Securities

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  Tokenized stocks are gaining momentum, but Fairmint CEO Joris Delanoue warns that the industry could be repeating a problem that once threatened Wall Street. The concern centers on a crucial distinction: a token representing equity is not necessarily the same as owning the equity itself . A token can provide exposure to a stock without making the holder the legally recognized owner of the underlying shares. Ownership rights, voting power and claims to dividends may instead depend on an intermediary, SPV or other legal structure. Delanoue argues that this distinction becomes increasingly important as tokenized securities scale. Multiple platforms could maintain separate records for the same underlying assets, creating fragmented ledgers that may eventually disagree over who actually owns what. That risk echoes Wall Street’s 1960s paperwork crisis, when the rapid growth of trading overwhelmed existing systems for recording and transferring securities. The lesson, according to ...

Solana Network Upgrade & Alpenglow Consensus

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Solana has taken another step toward making its network faster, cutting its mainnet slot time from 400 milliseconds to 350 milliseconds on Aug. 21. The change is the first of four planned reductions that could eventually bring slot times down to 200 milliseconds. But this upgrade is different from another major Solana improvement on the horizon: Alpenglow . What Is a Slot Time? A slot is the short window in which a designated Solana validator is responsible for producing a block. Reducing the slot time means validators rotate more frequently and certain confirmation thresholds can be reached faster. The current upgrade, known as SIMD-0525 , is therefore primarily a latency improvement. It reduces the time between block-production opportunities from 400ms to 350ms, with further planned steps toward 300ms, 250ms and eventually 200ms. However, faster slots do not automatically mean Solana can process proportionally more transactions per second. The change is mainly designed to reduc...

NASA Is About to Open a New Window on the Universe

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  NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope has reached one of its final milestones before launch: the observatory has been sealed inside the protective payload fairing of a SpaceX Falcon Heavy. NASA and SpaceX are targeting August 30, 2026 , for liftoff from Launch Complex 39A in Florida. But Roman isn't simply another telescope heading into orbit. A telescope built to see the universe differently Roman is designed to survey enormous areas of the sky while investigating some of astronomy's biggest unanswered questions — including dark energy, dark matter, the formation of galaxies and planets beyond our solar system . Its Wide Field Instrument will give scientists an exceptionally broad view of the cosmos. NASA expects Roman to survey billions of galaxies and use gravitational microlensing to discover thousands of exoplanets. That's where the mission becomes particularly exciting. Instead of focusing on a small patch of space at a time, Roman is designed to map huge po...

AI Stocks Have a New Problem: Investors Want Their Money Back

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The AI boom has been one of the biggest forces in the stock market. But investors are beginning to ask a different question. Not “How much more can companies spend on AI?” But: “When does all this spending start producing returns?” That question is becoming harder to ignore after Alibaba announced a $10.2 billion share sale to finance its AI expansion — and investors promptly sent the stock lower. Alibaba just gave investors a warning Alibaba plans to issue 710 million new shares , equivalent to roughly 3.6% of its enlarged share capital, with the proceeds dedicated to AI infrastructure, chips, models and other capabilities. The offering was priced at HK$112.70 per share, an 8.4% discount to the previous closing price. Despite strong demand for the deal, Alibaba's shares fell sharply. Why would investors sell a company that is raising billions to participate in one of the world's biggest technology trends? Because AI spending has a cost . Alibaba's latest quart...

Yong Social Morning Brief

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  The Market Has a Lot to Prove This Week Global markets are starting the week cautiously, with investors facing a packed calendar that could determine the direction of stocks, bonds and crypto. 🤖 Nvidia takes center stage Nvidia reports earnings on Wednesday , giving investors their next major test of whether the AI boom is still strong enough to justify massive technology valuations. A strong outlook could reignite tech stocks. A disappointment could trigger another wave of selling. 🏦 All eyes on the Fed The Jackson Hole symposium begins Thursday, with Fed Chair Kevin Warsh scheduled to speak Friday. Investors will be looking for clues about interest rates and inflation — especially while long-term Treasury yields remain elevated. 🛢️ Oil remains a wildcard Brent crude is around $93 a barrel after slipping at the start of the week. Lower oil would ease inflation concerns, but geopolitical risks could quickly push prices higher again. ₿ Bitcoin is holding strong ...

The SEC Just Changed the Crypto Game — And Most Traders Haven’t Realized It Yet

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  Bitcoin's price is getting most of the attention in crypto right now. But something potentially much bigger happened this week in Washington. On August 18, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) proposed a new framework called “Regulation Crypto Assets” that could fundamentally change how some crypto projects raise money, launch tokens and eventually transition their tokens away from being treated as investment contracts. And the timing is particularly interesting. Because Congress is simultaneously trying to pass the CLARITY Act , which would create a broader statutory framework for digital assets. In other words, America's crypto rulebook is being rewritten from two directions at once. A potential new fundraising route for crypto projects One of the most significant parts of the SEC proposal is what it could mean for token issuers. The proposed framework creates two exemptions from traditional Securities Act registration requirements for qualifying cryp...

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