The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has proposed its first formal crypto rulemaking, Regulation Crypto Assets, creating two registration-free paths for token sales. The smaller track would allow up to $5 million over four years, while the larger would permit up to $75 million in any 12-month period and require financial statements plus ongoing reporting. The proposal also includes narrative disclosure standards, state-law preemption for qualifying offerings and certain secondary trades, and a safe harbor that would end investment-contract treatment once an issuer finishes or permanently stops the essential managerial efforts it promised. Paul Atkins said the framework traces back to Hester Peirce’s Token Safe Harbor proposal from February 2020. The piece says the SEC had spent a decade regulating crypto fundraising through lawsuits rather than published rules, which pushed issuers toward Cayman and Swiss foundations, non-U.S. buyers, Reg D rounds, airdrops and points programs. Tyler Warner’s Morning Minute also notes broader market moves, including Bitcoin ETF inflows, Citi’s planned Bitcoin custody launch, Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev’s call to modernize securities rules for tokenized stocks, and several other market updates.

Gnosis Chain has approved a strategic shift away from operating as a standalone Layer 1 and toward becoming an Ethereum-settled rollup under the Ethereum Economic Zone framework. The proposal, announced by Gnosis Chain and published on the GnosisDAO governance forum, would retire the network’s independent validator set and replace its settlement security model with Ethereum validators. If implemented, roughly 350,000 GNO would be unlocked as the validator set winds down, and the treasury-funded staking subsidy would come to an end. For users, the transition is designed to be minimally disruptive. xDAI would remain the gas token, while wallet addresses, balances, and contract state would continue without a migration to a new chain. The technical draw is synchronous composability with Ethereum, though the first version would only support atomic calls from Gnosis to Ethereum. Calls in the other direction, as well as broader cross-instance composability, are planned for later stages. The proposal does not finalize the technical architecture or request new funding. It does, however, state that Gnosis Ltd will initially operate a centralized composer responsible for transaction ordering, block building, and submission for proving and settlement. The first Ethereum Economic Zone block is targeted for December 2026 or January 2027, with bidirectional composability and real-time proving expected in 2027.

PANews’ August 18-19 digest was packed with policy, markets, and AI updates. The U.S. debt burden may cross $40 trillion sooner than expected after tariff-related revenue losses accelerated Treasury borrowing. The SEC also proposed “Regulation Crypto Assets,” a new framework that includes startup and fundraising exemptions plus a safe harbor for digital assets that stop all managerial activity. OpenAI said it is tightening safeguards on its unreleased models, adding sandboxing and faster alerts after recent security concerns, while also pausing parts of its latest reinforcement learning training for two weeks. Elsewhere, Bhutan’s government-linked address moved 300 BTC, USDC Treasury minted 250 million USDC on Solana, and Metaplanet said it will use 2,100 BTC and $2.5 million in cash to acquire Super League and build a U.S. Bitcoin treasury platform called Superplanet. Cash App expanded beyond Bitcoin and USDC by integrating MoonPay, Ripple Prime sold $275 million of senior unsecured notes, and FASB proposed treating qualifying stablecoins as cash equivalents. The digest also covered NoOnes’ shutdown plan, a Maya Protocol exploit, Solana’s slot-time reduction, and major AI and IPO updates from OpenAI, Anthropic, Temporal, and Zhiyu/Unitree-related market listings.

GnosisDAO has formally introduced GIP-153, a governance proposal that asks the community for directional consensus on moving Gnosis Chain away from its current position as an independent Layer 1 and into an Ethereum Economic Zone, or EEZ, rollup. The proposal, written by Gnosis co-founder Friederike Ernst together with Philippe Schommers and Ben Carvill, is notable for saying plainly that Gnosis Chain’s standalone L1 positioning has failed. It argues that the chain’s promise of credible neutrality overlaps too heavily with Ethereum, while Gnosis lacks the scale and liquidity to justify carrying a full security stack on its own. The document lays out the economic pressure behind that conclusion. According to the proposal, Gnosis Chain’s fee revenue does not cover network security costs, forcing GnosisDAO’s treasury to subsidize the gap and causing about 2.3% annual dilution for non-stakers. It also points to a TVL of roughly $91 million and a GNO market capitalization of around $280 million, figures it presents as marginal in the current L1 race. Rather than becoming a standard L2, Gnosis wants to adopt the EEZ framework, whose main pitch is synchronous composability with Ethereum. If implemented, the shift would also unlock about 350,000 staked GNO, remove the existing validator set, and hand sequencing to Gnosis Ltd. Community voting is expected in August to September 2026.

Gnosis Chain is seeking directional consensus from its community on a proposal to move away from its current standalone Layer 1 model and become an Ethereum Economic Zone, or EEZ, ZK Rollup under GnosisDAO’s GIP-153. The proposal, co-authored by Friederike Ernst and others, argues that Gnosis Chain’s positioning as an independent L1 has failed because its “credible neutrality” pitch overlaps heavily with Ethereum while lacking Ethereum’s scale and liquidity. It also says fee revenue has been far too low to cover security costs, leaving those expenses dependent on DAO treasury subsidies and causing about 2.3% annual dilution for non-stakers. Under the proposed design, the network would produce blocks every two seconds, submit a state proof and settle to Ethereum L1 on every Ethereum block, and keep user addresses, balances, and contract state continuous. xDAI would remain the gas token. The plan would also unlock about 350,000 staked GNO, or roughly 27% of circulating supply, remove the current independent validator set, hand sequencing to Gnosis Ltd, and turn existing bridge validators into prover nodes. A GIP vote is expected in August to September, with a genesis block targeted for January 2027.

Gnosis Pay hit by an active exploit tied to the Zodiac delay module. Co-founder Köppelmann and PeckShield advise withdrawing all EURe and GNO. Gnosis promises to cover losses and asks bridge validators to pause.

Bitcoin rose back above $60,000 with a 2.3% daily gain, while Solana led major tokens with a 3.8% advance. Ethereum, XRP, and BNB also moved higher as smaller-cap tokens posted even sharper gains.

Altcoins diverged sharply despite Bitcoin weakness. MemeCore surged on rebound-driven meme momentum, while Taiko, Gnosis, and Morpho climbed on Layer 2, governance, and institutional catalysts, highlighting a market that is rewarding selective narratives rather than broad risk-on buying.