Crypto World
Coldcard flaw exposed $116M self-custody risk: Gray
The Coldcard seed-generation failure has exposed about $116 million in Bitcoin to theft while renewing questions about how users verify the security of self-custody tools, according to TEXITcoin founder Bobby Gray.
Summary
- Attackers have reportedly drained about 1,816 BTC worth $116 million from more than 5,200 addresses.
- A firmware error left some Coldcard seeds with about 40 bits of entropy instead of 128 bits.
- Gray said users who added independent dice-generated entropy were not affected by the reported attacks.
- Coinkite has released patched firmware, but existing vulnerable seeds require a complete wallet migration.
Bobby Gray, founder of TEXITcoin, told crypto.news that Coldcard users suffered losses because they trusted the hardware wallet to generate secure seed phrases without independently checking the source of randomness.
“Coldcard sat on a broken seed generator for five years, and it still cost people $116 million,” Gray said.
“Some of these wallets were generating seeds with as little as 40 bits of entropy instead of the 128 they promised.”
Gray said the lower entropy turned recovery phrases designed to resist brute-force attacks into targets that determined attackers could search without gaining physical access to the devices.
Coldcard seed flaw weakened wallet security
Coldcard is a Bitcoin-only hardware wallet made by Canadian hardware manufacturer Coinkite. Hardware wallets keep private keys away from internet-connected computers and sign transactions within the device, reducing exposure to malware and online attacks.
Coldcard’s reported failure occurred before the private keys entered secure storage. According to a Coinkite security advisory, a firmware integration error caused affected devices to use a predictable software random-number generator instead of the intended hardware source while creating wallet seeds.
Firmware versions 4.0.1 through 4.1.9 on Coldcard Mk2 and Mk3 devices were affected. The first vulnerable release arrived in March 2021, leaving the error active for more than five years before Coinkite disclosed it on July 30.
Coinkite estimated that seeds created on affected Mk2 and Mk3 devices contained about 40 bits of effective entropy. Vulnerable Mk4, Mk5, and Q devices generated about 72 bits rather than the expected 128 bits, according to the advisory.
A correctly generated 128-bit seed provides an extremely large set of possible combinations. Reducing the effective randomness to 40 bits leaves about one trillion possibilities, a range that specialized computing systems can search when attackers have enough information about the wallet’s seed-generation process.
TRM Labs said the attackers could reconstruct affected private keys without opening, stealing, or modifying the hardware wallets. The blockchain intelligence firm attributed the error to a build configuration introduced with firmware version 4.0.1.
On-chain estimates cited by TRM Labs placed the preliminary loss at about 1,816 BTC, worth approximately $116 million, across more than 5,200 addresses. Four suspected waves began on July 30, though TRM warned that the total could change as investigators confirm victim reports and trace additional addresses.
Gray says self-custody itself did not fail
In an Aug. 6 analysis, Gray described the incident as a failure in the process used to create private keys rather than a compromise of Bitcoin or the physical security components inside Coldcard devices.
No attacker needed to steal a device, obtain its PIN, or install malicious firmware, according to Gray. Once attackers reconstructed a vulnerable seed, they could derive its associated private keys and sign transactions from another system.
“The people who bothered adding their own dice rolls for extra entropy walked away untouched, while the people who just trusted the device to handle it got wiped out,” Gray said.
Coinkite’s advisory supports the distinction involving independent randomness. Users who entered at least 50 fair, private, and independent dice rolls while creating their seed are not considered at risk from the random-number-generator flaw alone. Between 50 and 98 rolls added at least 128 bits of entropy, while 99 or more added about 256 bits, the company said.
Fewer than 50 rolls do not meet Coinkite’s stated exception. Users who cannot remember how many rolls they entered, whether the process was private, or which final seed words they retained were advised to migrate their funds.
Gray argued that the incident should not be treated as evidence that centralized custody is safer in every case. In his view, self-custody requires users to verify how their keys are created instead of relying only on the product’s listed security features.
“Blind trust is what failed here, and self-custody is taking the blame it doesn’t deserve. If you haven’t independently verified your entropy, you don’t actually know what you’re holding, no matter how many security features are stacked around it.”
His TEXITcoin post also separated the event from phishing, malicious firmware, and supply-chain attacks. Gray classified the firmware problem as a severe mistake by a wallet maker rather than evidence that Coinkite designed the product to steal customer funds.
Coldcard losses have changed custody decisions
User behavior has moved in a different direction from Gray’s recommendation. OKX reported record deposits after the incident, as some Bitcoin holders transferred assets from personal wallets to centralized platforms.
As previously reported by crypto.news, OKX Chief Compliance Officer Jonathan Brockmeier said the inflows represented the opposite of the behavior seen after FTX collapsed, when users withdrew assets from exchanges and moved them into self-custody.
Gray rejected the idea that leaving Bitcoin on an exchange resolves the problem. Centralized services control customer keys and can freeze withdrawals, suffer security breaches, or fail financially, he said.
“Running back to an exchange because a device let you down isn’t a solution either, since that’s just handing your risk, and your keys, to someone else to lose instead,” Gray said.
Blockchain investigators have not attributed the theft to one identified group. TRM said differences in transaction construction across the suspected waves could indicate several attackers, while most stolen Bitcoin had initially remained in consolidation addresses.
The firm detected limited laundering activity, including a 64.9 BTC deposit to Wasabi and 200 ETH sent through Tornado Cash on Aug. 4. TRM said the transaction pattern differed from the fast laundering methods often associated with organized state-backed hacking groups.
US investors face a different custody trade-off
For American investors who only want exposure to Bitcoin’s price, U.S.-listed spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds remove the need to generate seeds, update wallet firmware, or maintain physical backups.
Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Eric Balchunas said the Coldcard losses strengthened the case for regulated spot Bitcoin ETFs. A report on ETF custody noted that products such as BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF rely on institutional custodians rather than requiring shareholders to control private keys.
BlackRock’s SEC filing identifies Coinbase Custody as the main custodian for IBIT’s Bitcoin and names Anchorage Digital Bank as another custodian the trust may use. Shareholders own exchange-traded securities, however, and cannot withdraw the underlying Bitcoin to a personal wallet or use it for payments.
Institutional custody also transfers risk instead of removing it. IBIT’s filing lists hacking, employee misconduct, technical failures, and unauthorized transfers among possible sources of loss. The filing also says insurance shared by Coinbase may not cover every potential incident.
Coldcard users must replace vulnerable seeds
Coinkite has released fixed firmware for every affected model, including version 4.2.0 for Mk2 and Mk3 devices, version 5.6.0 for standard Mk4 and Mk5 devices, and version 1.5.0Q for the standard Coldcard Q.
Installing an update only corrects the generation of future seeds. Coinkite said firmware cannot add randomness to an existing recovery phrase because the weakness remains attached to the seed even if a user imports it into another wallet.
Affected users were instructed to install the correct firmware, generate a completely new seed, verify its fingerprint and receiving address, and send a small test transaction before moving the remaining balance. Coinkite advised users to retain the old backup until the transfer reaches the replacement wallet and receives network confirmation.
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Market analyst Jamie Coutts said x402 daily settlement volume is down 93% year-to-date as a late-2025 testing wave died out.
The decline contrasts with growing infrastructure for AI agents, leaving the protocol’s actual payment activity well behind the expectations surrounding the agentic economy.
x402 Activity Remains Far Below Late-2025 Levels
Coutts posted the assessment on August 12, pointing to a Helios Analytics chart tracking x402 settlement volume from October 2025 through July 2026. The data shows heavy activity during the final quarter of 2025, with several daily peaks approaching or passing $800,000 and $1 million.
That activity did not last. Settlement volume fell steeply after December and remained subdued through most of 2026. The chart puts the seven-day average at around $41,800, while the latest provisional daily figure is roughly $28,400.
The wider figure tells a similar story. x402 volume is down 55% over three months and 93% year-to-date. Yet the one-year figure is still 358 times higher, largely because activity was starting from a very low base.
Coutts described the numbers as a “reality check” for claims that the agentic economy is already here. Still, he does not see the current slowdown as permanent. He expects agent activity to begin rising alongside greater use of agent harnesses in the fourth quarter.
His argument rests partly on a recent development involving Cloudflare. On July 1, the company launched its Monetization Gateway, which lets customers charge for pages, APIs, datasets and MCP tools. The service uses x402 for stablecoin settlement and handles usage measurement and settlement at the edge.
Coutts said the system expands Cloudflare’s earlier Pay Per Crawl model. That service focused on charging AI bots, while the new gateway can charge any caller, including people and AI agents.
Infrastructure Is Growing While Usage Catches Up
The muted settlement data comes despite a series of developments aimed at machine-to-machine payments. On July 14, Ripple joined the newly launched x402 Foundation, hosted by the Linux Foundation, as a premier member alongside other crypto firms overseeing the Coinbase-built protocol.
Markus Infranger, senior vice president of RippleX, said “open standards like x402 help lay the foundation for trusted, interoperable machine-to-machine payments.” Ripple said its XRP Ledger already supports x402, meaning agents could transact using XRP or its RLUSD stablecoin, something it had previewed a month earlier with an AI Starter Kit for building autonomous payment apps on the XRPL, built with t54.
A16z had flagged x402 by name back in December 2025, predicting AI agents would need payments that move at internet speed and calling programmable settlement tools a way to make value transfer “a native network function rather than a separate operational layer.” Almost eight months later, Coutts’ chart shows the anticipated activity has mostly gone quiet.
The post x402 Volume Plunges 93% YTD as Agentic AI Economy Hype Fades appeared first on CryptoPotato.
Circle renewed its push for cirBTC as neutral institutional collateral in an Aug. 12 post, but the product is not a new launch. It has been live on Ethereum since June 8 and had only about 40 tokens outstanding at the time of review, compared with more than 116,000 WBTC and 97,000 cbBTC. cirBTC… Read the full story at The Defiant
Nvidia reports Q2 earnings on August 26, and Wall Street already knows the headline number. Analysts expect about $92 billion in revenue and earnings per share of $2.08, double the year-ago figure.
The report is due in 14 days. Nvidia guided to $91 billion, so a beat is close to assumed. What to expect beyond that is where analysts split.
What Wall Street Expects From Nvidia Q2 Earnings
The call begins at 5 p.m. ET. It covers the quarter that ended July 26. Nvidia set the bar itself in May. It grew to $91 billion, give or take 2%, with gross margin near 75%. Those figures come from the company’s own outlook.
The year-ago quarter makes the math easy. Nvidia earned $1.05 per share on $46.7 billion in revenue. Hitting $92 billion would nearly double the top line.
One caveat on the earnings figure. TipRanks puts consensus at $2.08 from 37 analysts. Zacks, tracked by Nasdaq, shows $2.01 from 11. The gap is small, but it decides what counts as a beat.
Analysts are almost uniformly positive. Of the 37 tracked, 36 rate the stock a Buy and one a Hold. The average target sits near $310, with estimates from $250 to $500.
Crypto traders have their own reason to watch. Nvidia’s November 2025 report lifted Bitcoin above $91,000. AI sentiment now moves both markets.
Nvidia Has Beaten Its Own Guidance for Three Straight Quarters
The beat is expected because it keeps happening. The size of it barely changes.
- Nvidia guided to $54 billion for the October 2025 quarter and delivered $57 billion.
- It guided to $65 billion for January and delivered $68.1 billion.
- They also guided to $78 billion for April and delivered $81.6 billion.
That is a beat of $3 billion, $3.1 billion, then $3.6 billion. Every figure comes from Nvidia’s own quarterly releases.
Bank of America expects $94 billion to $95 billion this time. That is a beat of $3 billion to $4 billion. It sits exactly inside the pattern.
So the surprise would be a small beat, not a large one.
The Growth Rate is the Part Nobody Highlights
Here the picture shifts. Revenue growth from one quarter to the next has run near 20% three times in a row.
Nvidia’s $91 billion revenue guide implies growth of just 11.5%. Even Bank of America’s $95 billion works out to 16%. Both are the slowest pace in more than a year.
The year-on-year number still looks enormous at roughly 97%. That is because the comparison base is small, not because momentum is building.
While none of this means demand is fading, it does explain why a headline beat may not move the stock much.
The Guidance Number to Expect is $108 Billion
Bank of America analyst Vivek Arya models third-quarter guidance of $107 billion to $108 billion. Analysts currently carry roughly $104 billion. Arya keeps a Buy rating and a $350 target.
Goldman Sachs analyst James Schneider holds a Buy rating with a $285 target. He expects meaningful upside to guidance. He also warns that the bar is high after a 12% two-week run.
Goldman’s 2026 and 2027 estimates are 6% and 19% above consensus, respectively. Traders can weigh that against the current Nvidia stock price forecast.
The options market has voted too. Contracts expiring on August 28 imply a 6.75% move, or a range near $209 to $239. The stock traded around $224 on Wednesday after closing at $217.50 the day before.
What Could Go Wrong Between Vera Rubin and Memory Costs
Nvidia moved its Vera Rubin platform into full production on May 31. Shipments start in the fall.
“Agentic AI is a new kind of workload. One prompt can launch a thousand-step journey of reasoning, retrieval, tool use and response generation. Vera Rubin was built for this moment,” Jensen Huang, Nvidia founder and chief executive, in the company’s announcement.
- Memory is the cost problem.
It now accounts for 40% to 50% of the cost to build a system. That share used to be 15% to 20%.
Bank of America still sees margins holding near 73% to 74%. On Rubin racks, the memory hit is about 60 basis points. Larger pod systems could take 500.
- Then there is the funding question.
Nvidia has put roughly $70 billion into partners, including $30 billion in OpenAI and $10 billion in Anthropic. Critics say that props up its own order book.
Bank of America calls it 15% of the free cash flow it expects across 2026 and 2027. Skeptics are unmoved. The worry feeds the AI bubble debate.
Suppliers point the other way. Supermicro’s record AI backlog showed demand that has not cooled.
What to Watch on August 26
The setup is unusual. Nvidia could beat by $4 billion and still disappoint, because attention has moved to the October quarter.
Investors also want proof that the demand is external. That doubt grew once Nvidia began financing its own customers.
Expect the guidance slide to matter more than the beat. Whether $108 billion appears there may set the tone for months.
The post Nvidia Q2 Earnings in 14 Days: What to Expect from NVDA Stock? appeared first on BeInCrypto.
A new U.S. survey has found that 79% of prediction-market users lost money during the past year, while 51% used borrowed funds to place bets.
Summary
- 79% of users reported losses, including 27% who lost more than $500.
- Among users who borrowed money, 88% reported losses, compared with 69% of non-borrowers.
- 53% joined for income-related reasons, nearly twice the share motivated by entertainment or curiosity.
- The online survey covered 1,000 U.S. adults, with results based on raw, unweighted responses.
Prediction market losses rise among borrowers
BadCredit.org surveyed 1,000 U.S. adults and found that 15% had used a platform such as Kalshi, Polymarket, or PredictIt, placing the consumer findings against a period of rapid trading growth and continued regulatory debate.
Among self-reported users, 79% said they had lost money on prediction markets in the past year. More than one-quarter, or 27%, reported losses above $500, including 9% who lost over $1,000. Only 21% said they had not lost money during the period.
Losses were more common among people who financed their positions with debt. According to the study, 51% of users had funded bets through a credit card, personal loan, or another form of borrowing. Of that group, 88% reported losing money, compared with 69% of users who did not borrow.
Consumer finance expert Erica Sandberg warned that debt adds repayment costs to an already uncertain outcome. Borrowers may owe interest after losing the original amount, increasing the total cost beyond the value placed on the contract.
“Although tempting, borrowing money to place a bet is a universally bad idea,” Sandberg said.
Credit cards and personal loans are meant to finance purchases that borrowers can repay, she added, rather than speculative contracts whose value depends on the result of a future event. Sandberg advised participants to use only cash they can afford to lose without affecting bills or creating debt.
The study measured whether respondents experienced losses during the previous year, but it did not publish platform-level account records or calculate net returns from verified transaction histories. Its results therefore represent participants’ own reports rather than audited trading data.
Income needs are drawing users to prediction markets
Financial motives ranked above entertainment when respondents explained why they began using prediction markets. The survey found that 44% wanted to earn extra income, while another 9% were struggling financially and needed an additional source of money.
Combined, 53% entered for an income-related reason. Entertainment or curiosity attracted 27%, social-media content influenced 10%, and recommendations from friends or relatives brought in 7%. Another 3% said conventional investing felt inaccessible.
Across all surveyed adults, 30% believed prediction markets could realistically improve their financial situation. Men expressed that belief more often than women, at 37% versus 25%.
Usage also showed a gender difference. According to the survey, 24% of men had tried a prediction-market platform, compared with 9% of women. BadCredit.org did not provide account-level data to determine whether bet sizes, contract choices, or returns differed by gender.
The income findings come as prediction markets offer contracts tied to elections, economic releases, cryptocurrency prices, sports, and other events. Participants generally buy contracts priced between $0 and $1, with the value moving according to the market’s estimated probability before settlement.
Separate transaction research has also found that profits can be concentrated among a small number of accounts. In April, crypto.news covered an academic study of 1.72 million Polymarket accounts and about $13.76 billion in volume from 2023 through 2025.
Researchers from London Business School and Yale classified 3.14% of the accounts as skilled winners. Skilled traders and market makers, who together represented less than 3.5% of accounts, captured more than 30% of gains, while 67% of accounts categorized as unlucky or unskilled losers absorbed the platform’s total losses.
Prediction market volume has reached record levels
Consumer losses have drawn attention during a sharp rise in platform activity. Kalshi, Polymarket, and Polymarket US generated a combined $50.59 billion in July trading volume, according to recent market data published on Aug. 3.
The monthly total increased 7.8% from a revised $46.95 billion in June. Kalshi accounted for $37.7 billion, or about 74.5% of the combined figure, while Polymarket US grew 54% to $5 billion.
Polymarket’s international venue recorded $7.9 billion, down 26% from June. Combined activity across its U.S. and international operations reached $12.9 billion.
The figures represent taker notional volume, not customer deposits, platform revenue, or trader losses. Because one contract can change hands several times before settlement, the same capital may contribute to volume repeatedly.
World Cup contracts supplied a large share of summer activity. Chainalysis estimated that about 400,000 wallets generated $5.7 billion during the five-week tournament and that World Cup markets accounted for roughly 63% of prediction-market activity over that period.
Open interest across Kalshi and the two Polymarket venues fell from around $2 billion near the start of July to about $1.2 billion by month-end as tournament positions closed or settled. The decline occurred even as monthly turnover reached a record.
US regulators are examining customer protection
Prediction markets in the United States sit between federal derivatives oversight and state gambling rules. Kalshi operates as a Commodity Futures Trading Commission-designated contract market, while QCX, which operates Polymarket US, also appears on the CFTC’s list of designated markets.
Federal registration has not ended disputes over sports contracts. Several states maintain that products tied to games resemble conventional wagers and require local gambling licenses, while the platforms argue that the Commodity Exchange Act places their event contracts under federal supervision.
In July, the U.S. House Agriculture Committee scheduled a hearing focused on customer protection and market integrity as gaming groups pressed Congress to restrict sports-based contracts. As reported at the time, representatives of the American Gaming Association and Indian Gaming Association argued that some prediction products perform the same economic function as sports bets.
CFTC officials have also told regulated platforms to avoid presenting contracts through American-style gambling odds, which use formats such as +150 or -200. The agency reminded operators that event contracts remain subject to derivatives laws and that marketing, listings, and solicitations cannot use deceptive practices.
State litigation continues alongside federal scrutiny. Courts in different jurisdictions have reached conflicting early decisions on whether commodities law prevents states from applying gambling rules, leaving access and product availability dependent partly on where a user lives.
BadCredit.org conducted its survey through an online panel and used raw, unweighted responses. Questions about borrowing, losses, and motivations went only to respondents who said they had used a prediction market. The organization calculated a margin of error of about ±3.1 percentage points for the full sample and approximately ±8 percentage points for findings drawn from the user subgroup.
The Intercept and the Freedom of the Press Foundation filed a Truth API lawsuit against President Donald Trump on Wednesday. The case asks a federal judge to decide whether the president can sell early access to his own official statements.
The complaint, filed in the Southern District of New York, says presidential posts are government information. If that holds, no paying customer can own a bigger share of them than any other American.
A $100,000 Paywall on the President’s Posts
Truth Social’s parent, Trump Media & Technology Group, switched on the Truth API on August 1. The product feeds posts from the platform’s top accounts to paying clients within milliseconds. Trump’s account is the main draw.
Markets often move when he posts. Subscribers, mostly high-frequency trading firms, pay $60,000 to $100,000 a month for that head start. More than 10 firms have signed up, and the feed has already earned over $1 million.
That figure matters. Trump Media booked a $238.1 million net loss in the second quarter on revenue of just $1.7 million. At more than $1 million a month, the feed could soon out-earn the rest of the business.
Trump is the company’s largest shareholder through a trust. According to the complaint, his stake was once worth $4 billion and has since sunk to around $1 billion.
Inside the Truth API Lawsuit
The plaintiffs, backed by the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), lean on two constitutional guarantees.
Under the First Amendment, they argue, journalists and the public hold an equal right to official information. Selling a head start breaks that right.
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The Fifth Amendment claim targets the price itself. Charging “unreasonable sums” for equal access undermines equal protection, the complaint says. It calls the product an “out-and-out plan of extortion.”
“Every American is entitled to equal access to the president’s public statements. Individuals who pay $100,000 to the president’s personal company do not have any greater entitlement to those public statements,” CREW chief counsel Nikhel Sus made that argument in the filing announcement.
The suit reaches into the White House itself. It also names Trump aide Natalie Harp, Deputy Chief of Staff Daniel Scavino, and the Executive Office of the President. None of the defendants had responded publicly by publication.
Regulators Have Killed This Model Before
Washington saw this coming. On July 28, Senators Adam Schiff and Elizabeth Warren demanded an SEC investigation, writing to Chair Paul Atkins days before the feed launched. Their letter listed stocks Trump had promoted on Truth Social this year, including Citigroup, Palantir, and Coinbase.
History offers Trump Media a warning. In 2013, Thomson Reuters sold select clients a two-second head start on consumer sentiment data for $6,025 a month.
New York’s attorney general pushed back, and the program died. A year later, Business Wire cut its direct feeds to high-speed traders under similar pressure.
Those sellers were private data vendors, and they charged a fraction of Truth API’s price. This time, the product is the sitting president’s own voice, and the seller is his own company.
A judge, rather than a regulator, may now decide whether official speech can carry a price tag.
The post Who Owns the President’s Tweets? A Federal Lawsuit Wants an Answer appeared first on BeInCrypto.
Phillip Atiba Solomon, professor at Yale University and co-founder of the Center for Policing Equity, says that comprehensive policy should not leave key questions unanswered, such as: “What are the consequences if you disobey those rules?”
“A piece of legislation without an enforcement mechanism is a polite request,” he tells TIME.
The policy does require “Field Responsible Officials” to provide operational training to their agents “at least yearly,” focusing on their handling of recordings, privacy compliance, procedures for redacting and sharing data, and civil rights considerations.
But knowing how to use the cameras is different from establishing how useful they actually are in the field.
How effective are body cameras in law enforcement?
Schneider says there is a presiding belief that the presence of body cameras will influence what transpires between civilians and law enforcement officers. Specifically, there is an assumption that they serve as a deterrent.
Chainlink has picked up pace after spending much of the month moving between roughly $8.1 and $8.5. The token is currently trading at $8.75, after increasing by roughly 4% in the last 24 hours. The latest jump pushed its monthly gains to around 10%.
Traders are now waiting for a breakout to confirm the developing bullish structure.
Closing In on a Major Breakout
According to CryptoPatel’s latest analysis, LINK is nearing a major move and could reach targets as high as $100. The market watcher said the asset is trading in a bullish order flow, which is one of the strongest long-term accumulation zones on the chart.
As such, a confirmed higher-timeframe close above $10.87 could open the way toward $25, $50, and $100. A higher-timeframe close below $4.761, however, would invalidate the setup. Holding above $10.87 would also turn the structure decisively bullish.
TheBoss also echoed a similar view and said that LINK is “approaching a decisive point.” The trader explained that the weekly chart has spent months building a base above the long-term support zone. The descending trendline is now pressing into the current structure. Compared with the previous analysis, the setup has matured significantly, and the price appears to be closer to a potential trendline breakout.
The trader highlighted RSI, MACD, and ADX as important indicators for momentum. A clean break above the descending trendline would strengthen the structure. Losing macro support would invalidate it.
LINK also drew attention from Standard Chartered, which sees strong long-term potential if tokenization growth accelerates. The bank has set a $200 price target for the asset by the end of 2030.
Exchange Outflows, Whale Moves and Network Growth
Exchange balances took a hit last week after 1.26 million LINK tokens were pulled out in a single day, which could ease immediate selling pressure. The move comes amid several developments across institutional and crypto networks. For instance, the DTCC listed Chainlink among its technology providers for tokenized US securities trades, while CCIP expanded its support across institutional and crypto networks, such as Canton and Robinhood Chain.
Whale activity has also increased. The network recorded 246 separate transactions worth more than $100,000 in 24 hours, which happens to be its highest daily level in five months. Wallets holding between 100,000 and 10 million LINK hold 466.31 million tokens, equal to 46.57% of the total supply. The activity of these holders has historically tracked the asset’s price fairly closely.
The post Chainlink (LINK) Could Be Heading for $100, But This Level Stands in the Way appeared first on CryptoPotato.
BitMart’s missing proof-of-reserves report and withdrawal complaints from two crypto projects have raised fresh questions about how customer assets are held during the exchange’s wind-down.
Summary
- Arch Lending’s CTO called for independently verifiable custody before platforms face withdrawal pressure.
- OpenGradient and Scandic Coin have reported inaccessible or delayed BitMart withdrawals.
- BitMart has denied misusing customer funds but has not disclosed verified reserves and liabilities.
- Trading will stop on Aug. 26, ahead of the platform’s planned closure in January 2027.
BitMart concerns expose verification problem
Arch Lending co-founder and CTO Himanshu Sahay said questions about withdrawals and exchange closures expose the difference between assurances offered by a platform and financial information that customers can independently check.
“Whenever questions arise around withdrawal processing or exchange wind-downs, it points to a structural gap across digital asset markets: the difference between platform-level statements and independent verification,” Sahay said in a statement to crypto.news.
Customers often have no real-time method for establishing whether an exchange holds their assets in segregated accounts or combines them with funds used for other operations, according to the executive. Uncertainty increases when withdrawals slow because customers must rely on the same company processing their requests for information about its financial condition.
Sahay said the crypto industry already has tools that can reduce such uncertainty, including third-party custodians, reserve attestations, and strict asset segregation. Their value depends on whether customers can use them to verify solvency claims before operational problems emerge.
“This isn’t a new issue, but a recurring one that resurfaces whenever a platform faces operational stress.”
BitMart stated in May that it was preparing a proof-of-reserves report after earlier complaints about account restrictions and withdrawal access. The exchange said it would release the report once security and risk-control matters had been addressed, but it did not provide a date.
No comprehensive report had been published as of Aug. 12. BitMart has also not released independently verified data covering both its assets and liabilities, leaving outside parties unable to establish whether the exchange holds enough liquid assets to meet all customer obligations.
Withdrawal complaints add pressure on BitMart
OpenGradient co-founder Matthew Wang alleged on Aug. 10 that his project’s market-making team could not withdraw balances held on BitMart. Wang accused the exchange of insolvency and questioned why it had encouraged token holders to lock assets shortly before announcing its closure.
“Our MM has our balances stuck on BitMart exchange that we can’t get out,” Wang said.
Wang did not disclose the amount or composition of the assets held by the market maker. His insolvency accusation has not been independently verified, and no confirmed evidence currently establishes that BitMart’s liabilities exceed its available assets.
Scandic Coin separately said that withdrawal requests covering approximately 21,898 USDT, 926,635 SNC, and another 256 USDT remained unprocessed after being submitted on July 26. The project stopped short of declaring BitMart insolvent and instead asked the exchange for verifiable evidence that it had enough liquidity to complete customer withdrawals.
The complaints were detailed in an Aug. 10 report on frozen withdrawals, which found that BitMart had not directly answered OpenGradient’s allegation at the time of publication.
BitMart maintains that withdrawals remain available. Under its procedures, requests may face checks involving customer identity, login devices, IP addresses, transaction history, destination wallets, and the source of funds.
Sanctions screening, Travel Rule requirements, and network conditions may also affect processing times, according to the company. BitMart warns that submitting a request does not mean the review has finished or that the transaction has been broadcast to a blockchain.
For customers, the absence of a transaction hash means there is no on-chain evidence showing that their assets have left the exchange. BitMart tells users to follow the status through their account history and avoid filing duplicate requests or support tickets.
Asset segregation must precede a crisis
Sahay said regulated third-party custody can reduce dependence on statements from an exchange because customer collateral remains separate from the company’s operating balance sheet.
“Maintaining collateral with qualified, regulated custodians completely separate from operating balance sheets is what ensures customers never have to rely on trust alone.”
According to Sahay, companies cannot obtain the full benefit of asset segregation by adopting it after withdrawals stall or concerns about liquidity have already surfaced. Custody arrangements need to be built into the platform’s structure from the beginning, with evidence showing where assets reside and how they are protected.
Proof of reserves can provide a snapshot of assets controlled by a platform, but such a report does not establish solvency by itself. A complete assessment also requires information about liabilities owed to customers, lenders, market makers, and other counterparties.
Reserve reports can present other limitations because they usually cover a specific point in time and may exclude certain assets or obligations. Customers also need a way to confirm that their individual balances were included in the review, while auditors must establish that the company controls the disclosed wallets.
Comparable concerns have surfaced at other centralized exchanges. In June, on-chain investigator ZachXBT said AscendEX users had reported withdrawals pending for days or weeks and questioned whether publicly identified hot wallets contained enough large-cap assets.
The resulting AscendEX liquidity concerns could not be confirmed from labeled addresses alone because an exchange may hold funds in undisclosed cold wallets or with external custodians. The episode still showed how limited wallet visibility can prevent customers from evaluating an exchange during withdrawal pressure.
Sahay expects independently verifiable third-party custody to become a basic requirement as institutional and retail participation develops. Platforms that can show where customer assets are held and how they are separated from operating funds will be able to answer such questions with evidence rather than internal assurances, he said.
BitMart will end trading on Aug. 26
BitMart began winding down its global trading platform on July 26, citing its operating conditions, the market environment, and its future strategy. The exchange stopped accepting new registrations and began suspending cryptocurrency and fiat deposits from 01:30 UTC.
Spot markets stopped taking new orders, while futures accounts entered reduce-only mode. BitMart also began discontinuing copy trading, grid trading, API trading, and other automated services.
BMX, the exchange’s platform token, fell approximately 63% during the first 24 hours following the announcement, according to the earlier BitMart shutdown report. CoinGecko data cited at the time placed BMX near $0.164 with around $6.1 million in daily trading volume.
All spot, futures, and other trading services are scheduled to end at 01:00 UTC on Aug. 26. BitMart may settle any futures positions left open at the cutoff using the relevant mark price, index price, or settlement rules.
Customers have been asked to close trading positions, cancel pending orders, and redeem eligible balances held in Earn, staking, lending, and other products. The company recommends submitting withdrawal requests before 05:00 UTC on Aug. 26.
Requests submitted after that time will enter a separate processing procedure. BitMart said affected customers would receive instructions about additional documents and withdrawal steps through official announcements or direct account notifications.
Founder Sheldon Xia denied on Aug. 8 that BitMart had disappeared, planned to avoid its obligations, or misappropriated customer assets. Xia said the core team was conducting an asset inventory, consolidating funds, and maintaining the systems required for the closure.
The founder also said BitMart was considering court involvement and third-party auditors as part of a transparent review. He did not provide a publication date or explain whether the proposed report would cover customer liabilities alongside reserve assets.
BitMart plans to cease trading-platform operations at 15:59 UTC on Jan. 31, 2027. The exchange said customers would retain account access for a specified period afterward to review historical records and submit withdrawals under the procedures then in effect.
For U.S. residents, BitMart stopped accepting new registrations in May 2022, although the company said some older accounts could remain linked to American users. A July 23 notice instructed affected customers to close positions, cancel orders, redeem balances from earning products, and withdraw their assets by 23:59 UTC on Aug. 8.
BitMart said U.S.-linked accounts could face additional restrictions after the deadline, while pending withdrawals may require identity records, proof of address, source-of-funds documents, or evidence that the customer controls the receiving wallet.
Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, the largest in the world, revealed on Wednesday that it holds a 0.05% stake in SpaceX worth just over $1.2 billion. The position had never been made public before.
The disclosure arrived with a record first-half profit of 1.75 trillion Norwegian kroner, or roughly $184.9 billion. It also places the fund inside both of Elon Musk’s listed companies.
A Record Half Built on Chips
Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM), which runs the fund, reported a 9.4% return for the first six months of 2026. The fund closed in June at 22,683 billion kroner, near $2.3 trillion.
Equities carried almost all of it. Stocks returned 13.0% while fixed income added 0.9%, and shares made up 72.1% of the portfolio at the end of June.
The path there was uneven. Equity holdings dropped 2.6% in the first quarter, then rebounded 15.98% in the second as chipmakers rallied.
CEO Nicolai Tangen summed up the driver as “chips, chips, chips, chips” while presenting a chart of top performers featuring Samsung, SK Hynix’s US listing, TSMC, ASML, Intel, and Nvidia. NBIM’s 1.3% stake in Nvidia alone is worth $61.8 billion.
An Awkward Seat in Musk’s Empire
The SpaceX position is small next to that. What makes it interesting is who owns it.
NBIM voted against Musk’s $56 billion Tesla compensation award in 2024, then rejected his trillion-dollar package at the carmaker’s late 2025 shareholder meeting. The fund cited dilution and key person risk both times.
Musk did not take the first vote well, judging by a text message later released under Norway’s freedom of information law.
“When I ask you for a favor, which I very rarely do, and you decline, then you should not ask me for one until you’ve done something above nothing to make amends. Friends are as friends do,” Reuters reported.
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Despite that, the fund now owns roughly 1% of Tesla, worth about $15.7 billion, plus the new SpaceX slice.
Deputy CEO Trond Grande declined to discuss individual positions when asked how the SpaceX weighting had changed.
“We were roughly index rate in the first half, and that’s been the case over the summer as well.”
That answer matters. It suggests the fund did not pick SpaceX. It owns what the index hands it, which ties Musk’s governance fights to Norwegian capital indefinitely.
A Volatile Asset for a Cautious Owner
SpaceX has been in a rough hold since June. The stock listed at $150 against a $135 offer price, peaked near $225, then sank below $107 by late July.
It reclaimed its IPO price on Monday and traded above $148 on Wednesday, up around 10% on the day and just shy of its listing price. Other large holders, including Ontario Teachers’ SpaceX bet, have ridden the same swings.
Tangen shrugged at the volatility, noting the fund owns 7,000 companies that move in both directions daily.
That calm sits oddly beside his own warning a day earlier, when he said the fund could lose its entire value and called that outcome “fairly likely” in current conditions.
Crypto investors have reason to watch. The fund holds no Bitcoin directly, but its indirect BTC exposure through equity stakes climbed 83% between mid-2024 and mid-2025.
A passive giant that keeps buying whatever the index adds does not choose its risks. It absorbs them, and so do the assets that trade alongside it.
The post World’s Largest Sovereign Wealth Fund Bought $1.2 Billion in SpaceX Stock appeared first on BeInCrypto.
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