Stripe’s stablecoin partnerships head, Connor Fitzgerald, has stepped down after helping build the company’s global stablecoin card program from launch to operations across more than 100 markets.

Connor Fitzgerald announced on X that last week was his final week at Stripe and its stablecoin infrastructure business Bridge, ending a tenure that began shortly after Stripe completed its acquisition of the stablecoin platform.

Fitzgerald said he joined Bridge one month after Stripe completed the acquisition, at a time when no company had built a stablecoin card program backed by a sponsor bank. He said his work focused on establishing the banking and card network relationships required to launch the program before expanding it internationally.

According to Fitzgerald, the early stages required building sponsor bank partnerships from scratch while working through regulatory and operational requirements on a market-by-market basis. He said the team also created the infrastructure needed to support global expansion.

Over the following year, Fitzgerald said the program reached more than 100 markets, introduced the first stablecoin settlement flow in the United States, and increased annualized payment volume from zero to tens of millions of dollars.

“I also got to work with some of the best people in fintech, many of whom became close friends, while seeing up close how Stripe builds and operates at scale,” Fitzgerald wrote.

Connor Fitzgerald served as Stripe’s head of partnerships, where he worked with payment networks, financial institutions, and fintech companies. During his tenure, Stripe expanded relationships with companies including Visa to support stablecoin-backed card issuance for wallet providers and fintech platforms.

His departure comes as Stripe continues expanding the payments infrastructure it has built around stablecoins following its acquisition of Bridge.

Bridge acquisition strengthened Stripe’s blockchain payments business

Stripe completed its roughly $1.1 billion acquisition of Bridge to accelerate its stablecoin payments business, adding infrastructure designed to help businesses move money using blockchain-based payment rails.

Since then, the company has introduced new stablecoin products while extending regulated payment services into additional regions.

As previously reported by crypto.news, Bridge received both a Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) crypto-asset service provider authorization and an Electronic Money Institution license in Luxembourg earlier this month. The approvals allow the company to provide regulated services across all 27 European Union member states under a single regulatory framework.

According to Bridge, the licenses let businesses issue custom euro-backed stablecoins, create named virtual IBANs, and offer euro accounts throughout the European Union without establishing separate banking relationships in each country.

Bridge also said fintech companies can integrate cross-border euro accounts through a single connection, while enterprises can use stablecoins to move funds between subsidiaries instead of relying on traditional correspondent banking networks.

The regulatory approvals followed another expansion announced earlier this year. In March, Visa said it was extending its partnership with the Stripe-owned company to launch stablecoin-backed Visa card programs in more than 100 countries by the end of 2026.

Fitzgerald joined Bridge shortly after the acquisition closed and said the company built much of the underlying sponsor bank, regulatory, and network infrastructure during that period before scaling the program internationally.

Fitzgerald says banking will be built natively onchain

Looking ahead, Fitzgerald indicated that his next venture will remain closely connected to blockchain-based financial infrastructure.

After working with dozens of stablecoin companies during his time at Stripe and Bridge, Fitzgerald said he concluded that the next generation of global banking would be built natively onchain.

He did not disclose his future plans but said more information would be shared soon.

The comments come as stablecoin payment infrastructure continues to attract investment from payment companies seeking to expand blockchain-based financial services alongside conventional payment rails.

Stablecoins remain central to Stripe’s payments strategy

Stripe has continued integrating stablecoins into its broader payments business while pursuing regulated expansion across major markets.

The company has combined Bridge’s infrastructure with its own global payments network to support cross-border settlement, stablecoin payments, and card issuance for businesses and developers.

Stripe’s interest in digital payments has also extended beyond Bridge. As previously reported by Reuters, the company joined private equity firm Advent International in June to submit a roughly $53 billion proposal to acquire PayPal.

According to Reuters, PayPal’s board concluded the $60.50-per-share proposal undervalued the company while also considering financing certainty, regulatory hurdles, and execution risks before deciding how to proceed. Reuters also reported that negotiations remained active, with Stripe and Advent continuing discussions despite the board’s reservations.

The proposed acquisition would bring together PayPal’s crypto payment products, including the PYUSD stablecoin issued by Paxos, with Stripe’s growing stablecoin infrastructure built through Bridge. Reuters reported that Stripe and Advent also explored potential structural remedies should antitrust regulators require changes to the transaction.

Quantum computing is a risk factor for every encrypted system on the planet, including major banks. But crypto, due to the way it works, may be the technology that gets tested first.

“Cryptocurrencies are the canary in the coal mine,” Eddy Zervigon, CEO of Quantum Xchange, said in an interview with CoinDesk. Zervigon’s firm builds infrastructure to shield networks, including financial ones, from quantum-enabled attacks, and he’s blunt about where the first casualty is likely to show up.

“That’s the first place of attack because of the decentralized nature,” Zervigon said. “Once you see it happening there, then you know that someone somewhere has a cryptographically relevant quantum computer.”

A cryptographically relevant quantum computer, capable of breaking the elliptic-curve cryptography underpinning the Bitcoin blockchain’s signatures, along with the encryption securing bank rails, doesn’t exist yet. The consensus estimate for when it will is compressing, not stretching.

“The folks spending billions of dollars, like Microsoft, IBM, and others developing quantum computers, generally believe there will be a commercially relevant, cryptographically relevant quantum computer in the 2029 timeframe,” Zervigon said. “That’s not me making stuff up. That’s based on what people like Arvind Krishna at IBM have said.”

Bitcoin is likely to stay range-bound, said Jeff Ko, chief analyst at CoinEx, and he points to three reasons the backdrop has calmed.

Oil has retreated from last week’s highs after another pause in U.S.-Iran hostilities. The 10-year Treasury yield, approaching 4.7%, is doing part of the Fed’s tightening work on its own. And the Fed may want to keep its options open ahead of this week’s PCE inflation and second-quarter GDP data.

The bigger swing factor is corporate. Apple, Microsoft, Meta and Amazon all report this week, and Ko said their free cash flow and AI-spending guidance could move Treasury yields and the Nasdaq, indirectly shaping the liquidity that flows into crypto.

Ko added that the composition of ETF flows will matter as much as the headline numbers.

Garden Finance has temporarily taken its application offline after an attacker compromised the off-chain database of an independent solver, leading to the loss of solver-owned digital assets while leaving protocol contracts and user funds unaffected.

Blockchain security firm Blockaid reported on Sunday that an attacker drained about $450,000 in USDT from Garden Finance’s hash time-locked contracts (HTLCs) deployed across Ethereum, Base, Arbitrum and BNB Smart Chain, describing the exploit as active while publishing wallet addresses linked to the attacker and the affected contracts.

Garden Finance later told Cointelegraph that the protocol itself had not been breached. Instead, the company said the incident originated from the off-chain infrastructure of an independent solver, where an attacker gained access to the solver’s database and inserted fraudulent transaction records that triggered releases of funds for swaps that had never been funded by the corresponding counterparty.

As a precaution, Garden temporarily took its application offline while engineers isolated the affected infrastructure and reviewed the incident. The protocol said no user funds were lost or exposed because only assets owned by the affected solver were involved.

The company added that it is still verifying the total amount lost, along with the exact assets and blockchain networks affected by the attack.

Off-chain solver targeted rather than protocol

While Blockaid initially associated the incident with Garden’s HTLC infrastructure, the protocol said its smart contracts continued operating as designed and were not exploited.

Garden explained that HTLCs serve as escrow contracts that enable atomic swaps between Bitcoin and assets on other blockchains by locking funds until predefined conditions are met or time limits expire. According to the company, those contracts remained secure throughout the incident.

Instead, Garden attributed the loss to manipulated records inside the compromised off-chain database used by one of its independent solvers. The fraudulent entries caused the solver to release funds for swaps despite the corresponding deposits never being completed.

According to Garden, the incident remained isolated to a single participant within its decentralized network of independent solvers rather than affecting the broader protocol.

“Garden’s protocol and HTLC smart contracts were not compromised, and no user funds were lost or at risk,” the company told Cointelegraph while emphasizing that only solver-owned assets were affected.

The protocol also noted that it does not control the infrastructure operated by independent solvers, which execute swaps within the network.

Recovery efforts underway with security firms

Garden said it has engaged blockchain security and incident response firms zeroShadow, Quantstamp and Blockaid to trace the stolen assets and support recovery efforts.

Alongside those investigations, the company said it expects to restore normal services after completing additional security reviews, although it has not provided a timeline for bringing the application fully back online.

The protocol added that its immediate priorities include securing the affected infrastructure, tracing the compromised solver’s assets and ensuring every required security check has been completed before services resume.

Garden also pointed to its recently completed SOC 2 Type II attestation, saying the certification demonstrates ongoing investment in operational controls and security processes even though the latest incident originated from infrastructure operated by an independent network participant.

The latest disclosure comes only days after Singapore-based stablecoin payments company Triple-A confirmed unauthorized access to company treasury wallets that resulted in the loss of corporate digital assets while customer funds remained unaffected.

According to Triple-A, the July 25 incident impacted only company-owned treasury assets because customer funds are held separately in safeguarded trust accounts rather than inside company wallets. The company temporarily placed certain services into maintenance mode before restoring normal payment operations after additional security checks.

Triple-A also said it is working with blockchain forensics specialists, cybersecurity experts and the Singapore Police Force to investigate the breach and trace the stolen assets. Although blockchain investigators estimated losses eventually reached about $11.8 million, the company has not confirmed the total amount or disclosed how the unauthorized access occurred.

Garden’s latest disclosure also follows an earlier security incident involving one of its independent solvers.

According to the protocol, an attacker compromised the operating environment of another solver in October 2025 and stole approximately $11.4 million. Garden said that the attack likewise did not affect its protocol contracts or place user funds at risk because the compromise remained limited to the solver’s operating environment rather than the protocol itself.

The latest attack adds to a series of security incidents reported across the cryptocurrency sector during 2026.

Last week, decentralized finance protocol Lien Finance disclosed the loss of approximately 542,144.63 USDC after attackers exploited weaknesses in its bond validation and pricing logic. Blockchain security firm SlowMist said the flaw allowed unsupported bond tokens to be minted and exchanged for real USDC liquidity without consuming the required collateral.

Garden Finance is investigating an exploit that reportedly involved its cross-chain bridge and atomic swap infrastructure after an attacker drained roughly $450,000 worth of USDT from Garden-linked hash time-locked contracts (HTLCs) across multiple networks, according to Blockaid. The incident has also triggered a temporary pause in Garden’s services while the affected systems are isolated and reviewed.

Garden’s position differs from the initial description of the breach: the company says its protocol and on-chain HTLC smart contracts were not compromised. Instead, Garden attributes the event to an intrusion into the off-chain database of an independent solver, where fraudulent transaction records were allegedly inserted—leading to incorrect swap releases.

Key takeaways

• Blockaid reported an attacker drained about $450,000 in USDT from Garden HTLCs on Ethereum, Base, Arbitrum, and BNB Smart Chain.
• Garden says the protocol and HTLC smart contracts were not altered or hacked; the compromise was limited to an off-chain database belonging to one independent solver.
• Garden stated no user funds were lost or placed at risk, and that only solver-owned assets were affected.
• Services were paused as a precaution while Garden, and multiple security firms, trace and recover the funds.

What Blockaid says happened

Earlier Sunday, Blockaid said the exploit was ongoing and involved Ethereum-based HTLCs used by Garden to coordinate atomic swaps. In its public update, Blockaid described the attacker draining approximately $450,000 in USDT from Garden’s HTLCs deployed across Ethereum, Base, Arbitrum, and BNB Smart Chain.

HTLCs function as time-bound escrow contracts that help ensure assets are released only under the correct conditions—an essential mechanism for atomic swaps spanning different chains. Blockaid also published addresses it linked to the attacker and the contracts believed to be affected.

Garden’s rebuttal: off-chain solver database breach

Garden Finance disputed the implication that its core contracts were compromised. A spokesperson told Cointelegraph that neither the Garden protocol nor its HTLC smart contracts were breached.

According to Garden, the attacker accessed the off-chain database of an independent solver and inserted falsified transaction records. In Garden’s account, those incorrect records led the solver to release funds for swaps that were not actually funded by the intended counterparty.

Garden added that the incident did not place user funds at risk and that no funds belonging to users were lost. Instead, the company said the impact was confined to solver-owned assets. Garden also indicated that it is still confirming the full extent of the event—total amount, assets, and the precise networks involved.

Why an off-chain compromise can matter

While HTLCs are executed on-chain, cross-chain swap systems often rely on off-chain infrastructure to coordinate actions, track swap state, and trigger settlement steps. Garden’s explanation centers on this split: the protocol’s on-chain components were allegedly left intact, but the solver’s off-chain data was manipulated in a way that caused settlement to occur incorrectly.

For market participants, this distinction is important. If the core smart contracts remain secure, the long-term trust impact may be smaller than in a scenario involving altered HTLC logic or compromised protocol contracts. Still, the incident highlights a persistent vulnerability class for cross-chain systems: even with audited or well-designed on-chain escrow logic, operational processes and off-chain databases can become critical attack surfaces.

Garden’s immediate response—pausing services and isolating the suspected infrastructure—reflects how quickly operational compromises can cascade into on-chain fund movements. The difference between a contract-level exploit and a solver-level data breach may affect remediation timelines, too, because recovery depends not only on stopping the bleeding but also on validating swap states and ensuring incorrect releases do not recur.

Security response and previous incident

Garden said it is working with zeroShadow, Quantstamp, and Blockaid to trace and recover the funds. The protocol expects to restore services shortly, contingent on completing security checks, but it did not provide a specific timetable.

Garden also pointed to its SOC 2 Type II attestation as evidence of security and operational controls, framing the incident as isolated to one solver’s off-chain infrastructure within its network of independent solvers. The company emphasized that its priorities are securing the affected systems, tracing the solver’s funds, and resuming services only after relevant reviews are completed.

The reported event follows an earlier pattern. In October 2025, Garden reported a breach in which an attacker stole about $11.4 million after compromising the operating environment of one of its solvers. Garden said that earlier incident similarly did not compromise its protocol contracts or put user funds at risk.

Taken together, the two episodes suggest that Garden’s risk exposure may be closely tied to the security posture and isolation of third-party solver environments rather than flaws in its HTLC contract code. That shifts where investors and integrators should focus their monitoring: operational security, access controls, and off-chain data integrity across the solver ecosystem.

As Garden continues tracing the funds and validating affected swap records, the key question for users and builders will be whether the investigation confirms a consistent “solver off-chain” failure mode or reveals broader compromise indicators. Readers should watch for Garden’s updated totals, the specific networks and assets involved, and the results of the security checks that will determine when services fully resume.

Triple-A has confirmed that unauthorized access to its treasury wallets resulted in the loss of company-owned digital assets while stating that client funds and payment operations have remained unaffected.

Triple-A said in a statement on Monday that it detected unauthorized access to certain wallets holding its own digital assets on July 25, prompting the company to temporarily place some services into maintenance mode for about three hours while it secured the affected infrastructure and completed additional security checks.

The Singapore-based stablecoin payments company said all services have since been restored and that transactions and settlements are processing normally across all markets. It added that the incident affected only its treasury assets, with the financial impact limited to specific operational accounts that will be fully absorbed through the company’s treasury reserves.

Client assets were not exposed, according to Triple-A, because the company does not provide digital asset custody services on behalf of customers. Instead, it said client funds are held separately in trust accounts maintained with safeguarding institutions that were not affected by the incident.

Triple-A also said it remains well capitalized, can meet all of its liabilities, and continues to operate globally at normal service levels despite the breach.

Company confirms breach after on-chain investigators flagged suspicious activity

The announcement follows reports from blockchain investigators over the weekend that identified unusual transactions involving wallets linked to Triple-A before the company publicly acknowledged the incident.

On-chain investigator Specter initially estimated that more than $9.3 million had been removed from wallets associated with Triple-A before revising the estimate to more than $9.7 million as additional transfers were identified. The investigator later estimated the losses at about $11.8 million, although Triple-A has not disclosed the total amount of digital assets lost.

Blockchain security firm PeckShield also drew attention to the suspicious transactions after Specter’s initial findings.

Before the company released its statement, researchers had not determined whether the affected wallets contained company funds, customer assets, or payment recipient balances. Triple-A’s latest update clarified that only company-owned treasury assets were impacted and that customer funds remained segregated from the affected infrastructure.

The company has also not disclosed how the unauthorized access occurred or whether the incident resulted from compromised credentials, infrastructure weaknesses, or another attack method. As a result, the exact cause of the breach remains under investigation.

Assets reportedly moved across multiple blockchains

Earlier analysis from Specter indicated that the suspicious activity involved wallets operating on Ethereum, Solana, TRON and TON, while some reports also identified transactions on Polygon and Arbitrum.

According to the on-chain findings, the transferred assets were swapped and bridged to Ethereum after leaving the affected wallets. Researchers reported that the receiving address accumulated approximately 5,226.66 ETH, valued at roughly $9.7 million when the activity was first identified.

Neither Triple-A nor investigators have publicly identified the suspected attacker. At the time of the company’s announcement, there was also no confirmation that the assets had been transferred to a cryptocurrency exchange, a mixer or another laundering service after reaching Ethereum.

Triple-A said it is working with internal and external cybersecurity experts, blockchain forensics specialists and relevant authorities, including the Singapore Police Force, to investigate the incident, trace the affected assets and support recovery efforts.

The company did not provide a timeline for completing the investigation or indicate whether any portion of the stolen assets has been frozen or recovered.

Latest incident adds to active year for crypto security breaches

The incident comes as blockchain security researchers continue to report a steady stream of attacks targeting cryptocurrency platforms and decentralized finance protocols throughout 2026.

Last week, decentralized finance protocol Lien Finance disclosed a loss of about 542,144.63 USDC after attackers exploited flaws in its bond validation and pricing logic. Blockchain security firm SlowMist said the exploit allowed unsupported bond tokens to be created and exchanged for real USDC liquidity without consuming the required collateral.

Separate analysis from DefimonAlerts and researcher exvulsec described the attack as a protocol validation and valuation failure rather than a conventional smart contract exploit, while researchers compared parts of the incident with the earlier Drift Protocol attack because both involved weaknesses in asset valuation rather than cryptographic protections.

Researchers tracking decentralized finance attacks have estimated cumulative losses exceeding $630 million during the first seven months of 2026, identifying oracle manipulation, pricing flaws, compromised credentials and bridge validation weaknesses among the most common attack methods recorded this year.

Another major investigation also remained active this week after wallets tied to the $285 million Drift Protocol exploit resumed moving funds following roughly three months of inactivity. On-chain records showed that more than 23,095 ETH, worth about $44.4 million, was transferred into Tornado Cash, making the movement of stolen assets more difficult to trace.

Coinbase chief executive Brian Armstrong said artificial intelligence and crypto are not rival trends.

Instead, he argued that crypto will provide financial infrastructure for autonomous AI agents.

In a July 27 post on X, Armstrong said agents “will eventually transact far more per day than all humans combined.” He presented that outcome as a forecast for payments and other financial actions online.

Armstrong said AI agents cannot use traditional banking services like people or companies. They may need to pay for data, software, computing power and other agents without human approval. He said blockchains and stablecoins can provide fast, programmable and global settlement.

Armstrong frames crypto as AI’s financial layer

Armstrong’s post responded to the idea that crypto companies should abandon blockchain work and move into AI. He rejected that choice. In his view, AI supplies programmable intelligence, while crypto supplies programmable money. He called the combined model “Agentic Finance,” or “AiFi,” and said Coinbase is building products for that market.

The Coinbase chief did not give a date for agents to exceed human transaction counts or estimate payment value. His statement focused on frequency, which could rise if software pays small amounts for every API call, data request or computing task. That model differs from consumer payments, which usually involve fewer and larger purchases.

Coinbase expands its Agentic Finance products

Coinbase has already released several products aimed at autonomous software. In June, it launched Coinbase for Agents, which connects AI systems to user accounts through a command-line interface and Model Context Protocol tools. Users can set limits while agents trade crypto, monitor markets, rebalance portfolios and execute defined financial tasks.

On July 23, Coinbase expanded that service with live market data and plain-language conditional commands. It also added x402 support for Coinbase Business, allowing companies to accept USDC payments initiated by AI agents. A new developer kit lets websites and API providers add x402 payment acceptance with a small amount of code. As crypto.news reported, the rollout covers businesses, users and developers building agent services.

The exchange introduced Agentic.market in April. The marketplace lets agents find and pay for data, search, computing, inference and trading tools. Coinbase calls it a discovery layer for machine commerce because agents can locate services and buy access without a conventional subscription or manually issued API key.

x402, Base and USDC anchor Coinbase’s strategy

Armstrong said Coinbase pioneered the model through x402, Base and USDC. x402 adapts the HTTP 402 “Payment Required” response so a website or API can request payment during an internet interaction. A wallet signs the payment, a facilitator checks it, and the service delivers the requested resource after approval.

Coinbase uses USDC as the main payment asset in many x402 products, while Base provides low-cost blockchain settlement. The protocol also supports other networks and assets. Coinbase’s developer documentation lists support across Base, Solana, Polygon, Arbitrum and World, depending on the payment method and facilitator.

As crypto.news previously reported, Coinbase said AI agents already use x402 to buy data, computing resources and digital services. Related coverage also reported that Coinbase Business customers can now receive USDC directly from agents. These products turn Armstrong’s wider claim into a commercial strategy built around wallets, stablecoins, trading access and payment tools.

Forecast remains unproven as researchers flag risks

Armstrong’s claim remains a prediction. Current totals do not prove that independent AI agents have formed an economy larger than human commerce. A July paper examining x402 activity on Base found highly concentrated transaction counts. Its authors also said some payments were internal or cheap to generate, making headline totals a weak adoption measure.

Separate July research tested 15 x402 facilitators and reported rule violations across every system examined. The researchers described risks involving unpaid services, asset theft, denial of service and gas abuse. They said affected providers, including Coinbase, received the findings and adopted fixes. The papers remain preprints and have not completed peer review.

Regulators are also studying automated finance. Bank of England Deputy Governor Sarah Breeden said in June that existing rules did not account for autonomous agents. She raised the possible use of guardrails, circuit breakers and stronger recovery systems if AI-driven trading or payments create wider problems.

Coinbase continues to position crypto as the payment layer for machine activity. Armstrong’s latest post connects that strategy to a larger claim: agents may become economic actors that hold funds and transact at high frequency. Whether they overtake humans will depend on real usage, security, regulation and demand for paid machine services.