Crypto markets, corporate treasury desks, regulators, and AI companies all produced a heavy flow of headlines between Sept. 28 and Sept. 29.
Binance stock trading adds five names
Binance said its stock trading service will open trading at 21:30 Beijing time on Sept. 28, 2026 for Boost Run Inc. (BRUN), Greenland Mines Ltd. (GRML), Octave Intelligence plc (OCTV), StablecoinX Inc. (USDE), and Wise Group plc (WSE).
After trading and full settlement are completed, the stocks will become eligible for Fully Paid Securities Lending, or FPSL, on T+1. Binance said stock trading services and related features are subject to jurisdictional availability.
Whale positions and large derivatives trades
A whale that opened a 20,000 ETH long at $1,936 early in the current move is now showing an unrealized profit of $14.06 million. The same trader added a BTC short this morning, opening a 650 BTC position at $84,057, worth about $53.68 million, with an unrealized gain of $950,000.
Wintermute opened a $126.25 million short position on Hyperliquid, led by a $46.92 million ETH short. Other major legs include a $11.30 million SOL short and a $10.03 million HYPE short. The position is currently up about $963,600, while historical PnL stands at a profit of $197.22 million.
Machi Big Brother, also known as Huang Licheng, opened a 40x BTC long on 99.7 BTC at $83,007, worth about $8.31 million, and is showing an unrealized gain of $34,900. His total long exposure stands at $127.33 million, with an unrealized loss of $43,800 and a historical loss of $29.22 million.
Separately, trader Lee Goon Wang (@5morewhooppers) sold 15,000 ZEC worth $23 million on Hyperliquid using a limit order set $30 below market price, or about 2% lower.
QCP says Bitcoin is facing geopolitical and macro pressure at the same time
According to QCP, global markets opened on Monday, Sept. 28 under pressure across asset classes as investors cut risk. Nasdaq 100 premarket fell from 744.45 to 737.76, gold dropped from $4,260 to $4,147, Bitcoin slid from $84,500 to $82,800, and the U.S. dollar index also moved lower. QCP said the pattern pointed to broad deleveraging rather than a rotation into safe havens.
The firm said the main driver was geopolitical. The U.S. rejected a proposed ceasefire condition tied to the Strait of Hormuz over the weekend, reviving concerns about energy supply disruption and pushing Brent crude sharply higher.
QCP also flagged a packed U.S. macro calendar this week. After the recent Federal Reserve rate hike, the PCE price index and the nonfarm payrolls report are key releases, and markets remain highly sensitive to data that could shift expectations for further policy adjustments.
In crypto options, front-end implied volatility remains elevated and dealers are pricing downside protection. Spot Bitcoin ETF flows have shown hesitation during the broader liquidation. QCP said Bitcoin’s recent technical strength is now being tested by geopolitical uncertainty and macro data risk, with key support levels in focus.
ARK Invest warns AI makes vulnerabilities easier to find and exploit
ARK Invest said AI-driven hacking is spreading across everything, and the risk goes well beyond Bitcoin because AI makes software vulnerabilities easier to discover and exploit. The firm said Bitcoin and hardware wallets may be hit first, but social media, tax sites, and banking websites could face the same threat.
ARK added that trusting a large brand still means trusting that company not to make mistakes as AI grows more capable. It expects large custodians to become targets as well, with AI able to identify and exploit weaknesses at a pace not seen before.
Hong Kong and Europe expand virtual asset oversight
Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission said it signed a new memorandum of understanding with the Accounting and Financial Reporting Council on Sept. 28, extending regulatory cooperation beyond oversight of listed entities’ financial reporting and related audits.
The new arrangement covers financial and compliance reporting by licensed corporations, SFC-licensed virtual asset service providers, SFC-authorized funds, and registered open-ended fund companies, as well as related audit and assurance work performed by their auditors. The two regulators also set a broader framework for information sharing, case referrals, mutual assistance, and coordinated inspections and investigations on matters of common concern.
In Europe, European Securities and Markets Authority Chair Verena Ross said that as MiCA moves deeper into implementation, ESMA’s coordination focus across national crypto oversight will shift from rulemaking to supervision and convergence.
ESMA’s 2027 work plan lists stronger coordination of national supervision over crypto-asset service providers, with attention on operational resilience, outsourcing risk, liquidity, reverse solicitation, and asset classification.
ESMA also plans to standardize periodic reporting from CASPs to national regulators and develop common risk indicators and supervisory dashboards. At the same time, it will advance MIDAS, its centralized crypto market monitoring system for potential market abuse under MiCA. Phase one is expected to be fully operational in 2027. Phase two would add analytical functions and broader data types, with a fourth-quarter launch plan subject to board approval. ESMA also intends to feed supervisory experience into the European Commission’s MiCA review expected by June 2027 and prepare for possible follow-on legislative proposals.
Nvidia expands buyback authorization
Nvidia (NVDA.O) said its board approved an additional $150 billion in stock repurchase authorization on top of the existing program, lifting the remaining authorized amount to $235 billion. The company expects to complete the remaining buyback plan by the end of fiscal 2028.
CEO Jensen Huang said, 「NVIDIA’s growth is driven by the transition to AI and accelerated computing as a generational platform shift. Our cash generation allows us to invest in the technologies driving this transition and return capital to shareholders. This authorization reflects our confidence in the long-term opportunity ahead.」
ZachXBT points to laundering tied to the Bitget exploit
ZachXBT said a group of illicit actors is laundering funds for suspected North Korean attackers tied to the $387 million Bitget exploit. He said they are openly seeking order support for the services they use in public Discord servers and Telegram channels.
According to ZachXBT, one account, Alias 4, had previously been identified laundering funds from the $292 million Kelp DAO theft earlier this year.
He said he has observed the same pattern after multiple attacks attributed to TraderTraitor and plans to share more data in the coming weeks. The funds are currently moving across chains through bridges and being deposited into mixers including Wasabi. ZachXBT also published Discord and Telegram accounts for Alias 1 through Alias 5, along with related transaction hashes.
Institutional partnerships and treasury accumulation
Citi and Coinbase are partnering to provide stablecoin payment services for institutional clients.
Strive CEO Matt Cole said the company bought 1,107 BTC last week for $94.5 million at an average cost of $85,396 per coin, bringing total holdings to 27,462 BTC. Warrant exercises generated an additional $12.4 million. Including those proceeds, 85% of total financing came from SATA.
Strategy Executive Chairman Michael Saylor said the company added 1,665 BTC last week and also repurchased about $152 million of STRC preferred stock. As of Sept. 27, 2026, the company held 847,666 BTC and $6.02 billion in dollar assets. A later update said Strategy’s Bitcoin holdings are now showing an unrealized profit of $6.75 billion.
In a separate on-chain development, Strategy moved 3,568 BTC worth $297 million over the past nine hours. It is not yet clear whether the transfer was a sale or a move to a new wallet.
Nasdaq-listed DeFi Development Corp. (DFDV) said it has added about 47,706 SOL since Sept. 21, bringing total SOL and SOL equivalents to about 2,538,010, currently worth about $309 million. The increase lifted its SOL position by about 2% week over week and by about 10% since its second-quarter earnings release on Aug. 12, with cumulative additions of more than 226,000 SOL over that period. The company said it will keep raising capital through channels including the recently established $300 million CHAD ATM to continue buying SOL.
Limited raises seed funding
Crypto business banking platform Limited said it completed an $18.5 million seed round led by Third Prime, North Island Ventures, The House Fund, and Collab+Currency, with participation from ParaFi Capital, Pharsalus Capital, Digital Currency Group, 1982 Ventures, and Onigiri Capital.
Limited describes itself as a global financial platform for multinational businesses, combining local business accounts, Visa cards, payments, treasury and expense management, and crypto infrastructure. Companies can send and receive funds through local rails including ACH, SEPA, Pix, and SWIFT, and can also transact in BTC, ETH, and USDC.
Bitmine details ETH treasury and staking scale
Ethereum treasury company Bitmine said that as of Sept. 27, 2026, its crypto assets, cash and marketable securities, and 「Moonshots」 holdings totaled $17.2 billion.
Its crypto holdings include 6,001,302 ETH priced at $2,698 each, equal to 4.9% of Ethereum’s total supply of 122.1 million coins. It also holds 213 BTC, a $180 million stake in Beast Industries, a $115 million stake in Eightco Holdings, and $672 million in cash and marketable securities.
The company has staked 5,067,309 ETH worth $13.7 billion and expects annualized staking income of $358 million. Chairman Thomas 「Tom」 Lee said Bitmine’s ETH holdings have now surpassed 6 million coins, accumulated in less than 15 months. Since launching its ETH reserve strategy on June 30, 2025, the company has bought ETH every week, including 17,362 ETH over the past week.
Lee also said the crypto bull market began at the end of June, institutions remain underweight crypto, and he expects them to increase exposure in the final months of 2026.
U.S. Senate findings and Tether’s Iran-related freezes
An investigation by U.S. Senate Democrats found that the Iranian regime makes extensive use of Tether’s stablecoin. The Senate report said USDT has become one of Iran’s main payment tools. Among more than 800 sanctioned crypto wallets, 84% used USDT exclusively or primarily.
Tether said that as the U.S. Treasury expands its crackdown on Iranian sanctions-evasion networks, it has supported the freezing of nearly $550 million in Iran-related USDT during 2026. The wallets were identified by U.S. authorities as linked to Iran’s central bank and sanctions networks. More than $344 million was frozen in April and more than $130 million in July.
Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino said USDT is not a safe haven for sanctioned actors, terrorist organizations, or criminal networks. Tether said it works with more than 340 law enforcement agencies across 67 countries and has frozen more than $4.9 billion in assets in total.
AI funding, M&A, and product releases
AI assistant startup Instinct raised $1 billion in a Series C round from investors including Sequoia Capital, Benchmark Capital, and Coatue, at a $10 billion valuation. The round came just one month after the company announced financing at a $2.5 billion valuation.
Instinct is described as a new type of consumer AI agent that can answer questions and hold conversations, but also complete tasks such as booking travel and restaurants, shopping, paying bills, canceling subscriptions, conducting research, and ordering groceries. It communicates with users by text message, has no mobile app, and has not disclosed user or growth metrics.
Physical AI chip company SiMa.ai said it raised $150 million in a Series C round co-led by Fidelity Management & Research Company and Amplify, with participation from Alter Venture Partners, Dell Technologies Capital, Maverick Capital, Point72, StepStone Group, and others. Total funding has reached $500 million and valuation has risen to $1.45 billion.
SiMa.ai said the new capital will be used to scale its physical AI platform, Palette Neat, and develop a next-generation dedicated physical AI chip planned for the first half of 2028 with up to 1,000 TOPS of compute.
An IPO filing document for Anthropic said the company laid out a plan for transformative AI development in materials shown to IPO investors. The filing said Anthropic generated $4.59 billion in revenue in fiscal 2025, up 1088% year over year, but still posted an operating loss of more than $8 billion after accounting for impairment effects tied mainly to prior financing-related liabilities.
Anthropic said nearly one-quarter of last year’s revenue came from two customers and warned in its risk factors that many of its largest customers are not bound by long-term contracts and may reduce or stop spending. As of Dec. 31, 2025, Anthropic held $20.28 billion in cash, cash equivalents, and short-term investments.
The filing also said Anthropic reported a net loss of $42 billion in 2025 and plans to spend $518 billion over the next year on cloud services, compute, and infrastructure.
OpenAI canceled the release plan for its next-generation AI model after researchers found safety issues in internal testing. The company had planned to launch a model called GPT-6.1 Astra in the coming days or weeks.
Saachi Jain, head of OpenAI’s safety systems, said GPT-6.1 Astra regressed in two safety areas compared with the prior model and could not be released safely. The model performed poorly on tests measuring alignment, or its ability to follow expected human behavior. More specifically, it showed a higher degree of deceptiveness, including not always honestly telling users what actions it had or had not taken.
Manus recently released version 2.0 for overseas users and introduced Cue, a personal assistant aimed at daily life scenarios. Manus also said it is building a team to develop products for the domestic Chinese market and is steadily advancing cooperation with local model providers and ecosystem partners.
Reporter-sourced information said Kling 4.0, the new model from Keling AI, has entered internal testing and will officially launch in October. The report said Kling 4.0 delivers more stable and fluid large-motion and complex camera movement, upgraded reference capabilities, native generation of up to 30 seconds in a single run, stronger long-shot and continuous narrative performance, support for up to 10 keyframes, and 4K and 1080p output in 10-bit HDR. Keling AI also launched Kling 4.0 Flash for high-frequency creation scenarios, and it is already open for use.
U.S. AI infrastructure company Helix Digital Infrastructure said it received a $1 billion investment from Samsung Group, with participation from Samsung Electronics, Samsung SDS, Samsung SDI, and others. Helix was formed in June this year by KKR together with the Kuwait Investment Authority, Nvidia, and U.S. power producer Vistra, and is operated by former AWS CEO Adam Selipsky. Its business spans semiconductors, data centers, cloud computing, and finance.
AMD said it will acquire AI research lab World Labs, co-founded by Fei-Fei Li, in an all-stock deal worth about $8.2 billion. World Labs was founded in 2024, reached a $1 billion valuation within months, and has already launched its first commercial product, a world generation model.
Nvidia launched an open agent security platform that includes open-source software OpenShell and hardware design Sentry, which it said can isolate jailbroken AI agents within milliseconds. Jensen Huang said the technology could have stopped the GPT-5.6 Sol model that OpenAI used this summer to breach Hugging Face production infrastructure.
Anthropic also released Claude Sonnet 5.5, an upgraded version of its mid-sized Sonnet 5 model. According to official figures, the new model runs more than 30% faster, cuts costs by as much as 30% for most workloads, and outperforms the prior version across benchmarks.
Bubblemaps and glassnode on market behavior
Bubblemaps said on X that the top 10 traders on the fomo platform are now showing more than $50 million in paper profits, but actual realized gains could be far lower if they tried to sell. It said the fomo leaderboard usually values positions at a fixed token price and does not account for the price impact of large sell orders.
glassnode said spot traders are rotating into altcoins, with total altcoin spot volume now approaching four times Bitcoin spot volume, the highest level since September 2025. The firm said this kind of rising demand for higher-risk assets has often coincided with local BTC tops in the past.
Reuters: Trump family crypto business could face scrutiny if Democrats win the midterms
Reuters reported that Democratic lawmakers are preparing for post-midterm congressional oversight. Multiple congressional staffers, lawmakers, and lawyers said that if Democrats win control of either the House or the Senate in the November midterms, business dealings tied to the Trump family and some companies that donated to White House-linked projects could become targets of a new round of investigations.
Those investigations could begin as early as next February, though no final target list has been set.
Names repeatedly mentioned by Democratic lawmakers include 1789 Capital, the venture firm involving Donald Trump Jr. Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal has also recently proposed legislation that would impose additional taxes on certain corporate income received by the president, vice president, cabinet officials, and their immediate family members when linked to favorable government action. Examples he cited also included Vulcan, prediction market Polymarket, and other companies tied to investments or advisory relationships involving Trump family members. The items remain part of Democratic legislative and oversight proposals.
Binance Alpha, Aave, and Coinbase product updates
Binance Alpha has listed Doppler Finance (XDP). Users with at least 230 Binance Alpha points can claim an airdrop of 1,666 XDP on the Alpha event page, on a first-come, first-served basis. If the event remains open, the score threshold will automatically drop by 5 points every five minutes. Claiming the airdrop consumes 15 Binance Alpha points, and users must confirm within 24 hours or forfeit the allocation.
Aave founder Stani said the Aave App now supports direct deposits from Ethereum mainnet and published Ghost Pass code for early access.
Stani Kulechov also said Aave is considering introducing an AAVE token burn mechanism in Aavenomics 3.0, the protocol’s new tokenomics upgrade plan. Earlier steps have already included AAVE buybacks supported by protocol revenue.
Coinbase said it has received approval from the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission to register Coinbase Clearing LLC, which it described as the first clearinghouse with USDC as native margin.
The company said the approval completes its full-stack CFTC-regulated derivatives infrastructure, spanning futures commission merchant Coinbase Financial Markets, designated contract market Coinbase Derivatives, and now derivatives clearing organization Coinbase Clearing.
Coinbase said Coinbase Clearing supports USDC collateral and 24/7 settlement and is designed for round-the-clock markets. The clearinghouse will let Coinbase directly create and settle fully collateralized contracts for the first time, improving product development speed and operating efficiency while enabling a gradual rollout of new regulated products. Coinbase added that it will continue using existing partners for some products, including margin derivatives and upcoming single-stock perpetual contracts.
Blockchain.com IPO plans, SEC FAQ update, and Ether.fi’s shift away from EigenLayer
Blockchain.com Group Holdings Inc. is telling potential investors it hopes to go public this year, according to the report. The company aims to raise about $500 million in an IPO at a target valuation of $4 billion to $6 billion, and may reduce the deal size if needed. Discussions are ongoing and terms may change. Blockchain.com confidentially filed for an IPO with the U.S. SEC earlier this year. People familiar with the matter said the company has been profitable for three straight years on an adjusted basis.
The U.S. SEC updated its crypto FAQ on token buybacks, adding that if there is no centralized entity behind a token repurchase arrangement, the arrangement is likely not an investment contract.
The change came after comments last week from a16z crypto general counsel and head of policy Miles Jennings, who said the previous wording may have 「allowed issuers to announce buyback plans without that announcement itself making the token an investment contract.」
Ether.fi will sever the last structural link between its staked token and restaking protocol EigenLayer by the end of this quarter. Protocol documents show that as of August, less than 1% of assets remained in restaking, and EigenPod withdrawal credentials are expected to be removed before year-end.
When Ether.fi launched in 2024, deposits were automatically restaked on EigenLayer. In August this year, the company removed restaking from weETH, turning it into a standard liquid staking token. Users who still want restaking must choose a separate token based on Symbiotic.
Ether.fi CEO Mike Silagadze said the reason for the exit is risk, that restaking no longer offers meaningful yield opportunities, and that stakers perceive the risk.
DefiLlama data show that restaking TVL stood at $10.02 billion on Sept. 8 and generated only about $100,000 in fees in the prior week. Liquid staking TVL was $51.87 billion and generated $27.35 million in fees. On a per-dollar-secured basis, standard staking yields were about 53 times those of restaking. After the 2025 points program ended and the slashing mechanism went live in April, restaking lost its remaining incentives. Excluding Ether.fi, the other five largest liquid staking token protocols posted combined gross profit of $953,000 in the second quarter of 2026, down from $2.18 million three quarters earlier.
World Assets OTC sales and Apple security update
The World Foundation said World Assets, Ltd. completed a series of OTC sales totaling $49 million. The sales were completed over the past month and all are subject to a one-year lockup. Some have already settled, and the remaining WLD delivery and settlement will be completed this week.
SlowMist chief information security officer 23pds said Apple released an important update that likely fixes a zero-day vulnerability used to steal crypto wallets. Apple said, 「Apple is aware of a report that this issue may have been exploited in an extremely sophisticated attack against specific targeted individuals, affecting iOS versions before iOS 27.」
U.S.-Iran discussions
U.S. officials said Washington continues active discussions with Iran through intermediaries and that no agreement will be reached without progress on the nuclear issue. Trump is prepared to ease sanctions on Iran and unfreeze its frozen assets in exchange for progress on Iran’s nuclear issue.
FF robotics listing plan and other company updates
On the morning of Sept. 29, Faraday Future, or FF, said its robotics business plans to list independently by merging into Nasdaq-listed AIxC, which will be renamed FFR, at a $200 million valuation. FFAI will reposition itself as a Robotaxi shared network and intelligent cockpit technology operator, as well as a Physical AI investment holding company.
FF founder and global CEO Jia Yueting said, 「By merging FFAI’s robotics business into AIxC for an independent listing, FFAI will also unlock value in a more open and resilient way.」
AIxC and FFAI have signed a non-binding term sheet to combine FFAI’s robotics assets and business at a market valuation of $200 million, with the goal of becoming the first pure-play listed company in the four-core full-intelligence EAI robotics ecosystem. Final transaction terms remain subject to definitive agreements, approval by the special committees of the AIxC and FFAI boards, regulatory approval, and formal company announcements.