Radosław Piesiewicz, president of the Polish Olympic Committee, has been arrested and charged with two offenses as prosecutors investigate payments and financial ties connected to the collapsed crypto exchange Zondacrypto.

Poland’s Justice Minister and Prosecutor General Waldemar Żurek confirmed the arrest on Aug. 27, saying Piesiewicz had been taken into custody as part of the Zondacrypto investigation.

Following questioning at the Silesian branch of the National Prosecutor’s Office, Żurek said prosecutors charged Piesiewicz under Articles 230 and 302 of Poland’s criminal code. The allegations concern paid influence and satisfying one group of creditors at the expense of others while insolvency was approaching.

Piesiewicz has not been convicted, and prosecutors have yet to publish a full account of the evidence supporting the charges.

Zondacrypto probe examines withdrawals and alleged influence

According to a report on the charges by Wirtualna Polska, citing TVN24, one allegation concerns money Piesiewicz held on Zondacrypto before the platform stopped processing customer withdrawals.

Investigators suspect that Piesiewicz received information allowing him to remove his entire investment from the exchange while other creditors could not access their funds, the report said. Prosecutors are examining whether the payment gave him preferential treatment as Zondacrypto faced possible insolvency.

The second charge concerns alleged paid influence. Prosecutors suspect that Piesiewicz offered to use his contacts to assist Zondacrypto with problems involving Poland’s Office of Competition and Consumer Protection, according to the report.

Piesiewicz rejected the accusations after leaving the prosecutor’s office, describing himself as a victim of the exchange. He also denied receiving preferential treatment when withdrawing his money, according to Polish media reports.

A separate joint investigation by Wirtualna Polska and TVN24 examined his relationship with former Zondacrypto chief Przemysław Kral. Documents and messages reviewed by the outlets allegedly showed that Kral bought a Patek Philippe Calatrava watch for €40,000 in November 2025, nine days before meeting Piesiewicz at a hotel in Monaco.

The invoice carried Kral’s name and private address, according to the investigation. Piesiewicz later sent messages thanking Kral and saying he was shocked, although the messages did not refer directly to the watch.

Piesiewicz has maintained that the watch was not a gift. He said he paid for it in cash and that Kral only arranged the purchase. Żurek previously said the watch was one of the matters prosecutors planned to examine.

Olympic sponsorship placed Zondacrypto close to Piesiewicz

Piesiewicz and Kral met during sponsorship talks in spring 2025, according to Wirtualna Polska and TVN24. By October, Zondacrypto had become the Polish Olympic Committee’s general sponsor under an agreement running from 2026 through 2028.

The sponsorship also resulted in the Olympic Center in Warsaw being renamed the Zondacrypto Olympic Center of the Polish Olympic Committee. Under another part of the arrangement, Polish athletes who performed well at the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics were expected to receive crypto rewards.

During the sponsorship period, the joint media investigation alleged that Kral provided Piesiewicz with other benefits, including match tickets, travel for people close to him, and hotel arrangements. Prosecutors have not publicly confirmed each of the reported benefits or said which items form part of the formal charges.

In an Aug. 25 statement, the National Prosecutor’s Office said investigators were verifying whether Zondacrypto had provided a financial benefit to Piesiewicz. The same inquiry is examining financing involving foundations, the conservative political conference CPAC, the broadcaster Telewizja Republika, and other individuals or organizations.

Prosecutors said they could not disclose the evidence collected for each part of the case because releasing it could affect witness interviews, searches, and other legal procedures. Officials have been securing physical and digital records while questioning witnesses and people treated as suspects.

Customer losses exceed 350 million zlotys

The case involving Piesiewicz forms one part of a criminal investigation opened by the Regional Prosecutor’s Office in Katowice on April 17. Authorities are examining suspected fraud against Zondacrypto customers and possible money laundering connected to activity dating from 2022.

Prosecutors said customers may have been misled about their ability to buy and store fiat currencies and crypto through the exchange. The inquiry also covers the receipt, storage, and transfer of funds that may have made it harder to identify assets allegedly connected to fraud.

Estimated customer losses stand at no less than 350 million zlotys, equal to about $94 million. Authorities had received more than 3,600 complaints by June and secured over 100 million zlotys that may later be used to compensate affected customers.

As crypto.news reported in August, Zondacrypto’s website went offline on April 23 after customers reported delayed withdrawals and frozen balances. The exchange-linked ZND token subsequently lost almost all its market value, while available trackers showed no active trading pairs or reported volume.

According to Polish prosecutors, the exchange’s owner said Zondacrypto had lacked access since 2022 to a cold wallet believed to hold about 4,500 Bitcoin. Authorities said customers had not been told about the loss of access.

Kral previously denied that the exchange was insolvent and argued that researchers had examined only its visible hot wallets rather than its offline holdings. No complete wallet list, matching customer liabilities or independently audited proof of reserves was published to verify the claim.

In July, authorities merged the Zondacrypto inquiry with an investigation into the March 2022 disappearance of Sylwester Suszek, who founded BitBay before it was renamed Zondacrypto. Prosecutors said the two cases shared links involving the people and activities under review.

US rules remain separate from Poland’s MiCA dispute

No U.S. agency has announced charges or identified American customer losses in the Zondacrypto case. Any direct exposure for U.S. users, therefore, remains unconfirmed.

For an exchange serving customers in the United States, European registration or authorization does not replace applicable U.S. requirements. FinCEN guidance states that businesses accepting and transmitting convertible virtual currency may need to register as money services businesses and follow anti-money laundering, recordkeeping, and reporting rules, including when the operator is based outside the country.

Zondacrypto’s collapse has also become part of Poland’s dispute over implementing the European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation. President Karol Nawrocki vetoed the crypto bill for a third time in June, arguing that the proposed powers and requirements needed further changes.

The rejected measure would have given Poland’s Financial Supervision Authority licensing, reporting and enforcement powers over crypto service providers. It also included criminal penalties for serious violations involving exchange operations and token issuance.

Poland was among five EU countries with no MiCA licenses recorded as of June 29, while Germany had issued 57 and France 26, according to ESMA register data. ESMA’s central register tracks authorized crypto service providers, crypto-asset white papers and entities identified as noncompliant across the European Union.

Aave V4 deposits have reached a record $806 million after climbing 30% over seven days, while active loans have increased to $206 million.

Aave V4 deposits accelerate past $800 million

Aave’s on-chain dashboard shows that V4 deposits reached $806 million on Aug. 27, extending a rapid rise that began earlier in the month. Deposits passed $500 million on Aug. 19 and exceeded $600 million two days later before adding more than $200 million over the following six days.

Within the total, V4 deposits on Ethereum passed $500 million on Aug. 25. The dashboard divides the capital among several markets with separate collateral rules, borrowing limits, and risk settings instead of placing every asset inside one common lending pool.

Ethereum Core is the largest market, holding $378 million, or about 47% of all V4 deposits. EtherFi Cash on Optimism follows with $257 million, giving the two markets a combined $635 million and nearly 79% of the version’s deposits, based on figures from the dashboard.

Among the remaining markets, Ethereum Global Dollar holds $75 million, and Ethereum Prime accounts for $63 million. Avalanche Core has attracted $18 million, while Ethereum Plus holds another $15 million. Combined, the six listed markets account for the full $806 million reported on the dashboard.

The latest figures have placed V4 well above the $400 million level reported in mid-August. Deposits had stood near $350 million at the start of the month, meaning the value supplied to the system has more than doubled in less than four weeks.

Active loans reach $206 million

Borrowing has risen alongside deposits, with active V4 loans reaching $206 million. EtherFi accounts for $62 million of the total as users deposit wrapped EtherFi staked Ether, known as weETH, as collateral to borrow wrapped Ether.

According to the dashboard, the EtherFi market has reached a utilization rate of 92%. Utilization measures the portion of deposited assets currently being borrowed, making the figure important for both lenders and borrowers. High utilization can increase returns for suppliers, but it can also raise borrowing costs and leave less immediately available liquidity for withdrawals.

A recent crypto.news report on Aave’s debt concentration found that Ether staking and restaking tokens, including weETH, rsETH and wstETH, made up about 66.2% of collateral among the protocol’s largest leveraged positions. WeETH alone accounted for roughly 42%, while WETH represented about 73% of the debt held by that group.

The report also found that 9% of positions carried roughly half of Aave’s total debt. Average health factors for the group stood near 1.06, while debt-to-equity ratios were close to 10.7 times, according to the analysis. A health factor below 1 can trigger an automatic liquidation under Aave’s rules.

Such figures cover Aave’s lending system beyond the new V4 markets and therefore should not be treated as a direct measure of V4 risk. Still, they provide context for the 92% utilization recorded in the EtherFi market, where weETH collateral supports borrowing in the closely related WETH asset.

WeETH leads Aave V4’s deposit mix

WeETH is also the largest individual asset supplied to V4, with deposits of $97 million. The Global Dollar stablecoin, or USDG, ranks second at $90 million, followed by WETH and USDC at $81 million each.

Liquid staking and yield-bearing assets account for several other large positions. LiquidETH holds $77 million, while liquidUSD accounts for $58 million. Wrapped Bitcoin deposits have reached $54 million, giving users another crypto asset that can be deployed under V4’s market-specific collateral settings.

The seven named assets together represent $538 million, or about two-thirds of all V4 deposits. Other supported tokens make up the remainder of the $806 million total.

V4’s structure separates its markets into liquidity hubs and specialized spokes. Hubs manage supplied capital and accounting, while spokes set the terms for individual borrowing markets, including which collateral can be used and how much users can borrow.

The design differs from Aave V3, where each market generally operates as its own pool. V3 still holds approximately $31 billion in deposits, nearly 38 times the amount recorded in V4. The comparison shows that most Aave capital remains in the older system even as deposits move into the new version.

During the Aave V4 launch in April, the protocol presented the hub-and-spoke model as a way to create lending markets with tailored risk controls without dividing liquidity across entirely separate pools. Supported uses included fixed-rate loans, tokenized real-world asset collateral, and structured credit.

Aave’s DAO had previously approved $25 million in stablecoin funding and 75,000 AAVE tokens for protocol development. The funding framework established V4 as the system’s long-term technical base while directing revenue from specified Aave Labs products to the DAO treasury.

Avalanche adds a U.S. Treasury lending route

Outside Ethereum and Optimism, Avalanche Core accounts for $18 million of current V4 deposits. Aave launched V4 on Avalanche in July, making the network its first V4 deployment beyond Ethereum.

As reported in July, Aave said the Avalanche rollout would support lending markets backed by tokenized real-world assets. Planned collateral included tokenized U.S. Treasuries, money market funds, private credit and corporate bonds.

The planned Treasury-backed markets provide a direct connection to U.S. financial assets, although on-chain access does not by itself determine whether a product can legally be offered to U.S. investors. Any access rules would depend on the issuer, the structure of the tokenized instrument, and the regulations applying to its distribution.

Avalanche’s deployment also sits alongside an effort to reduce support for markets with little activity. In July, an Aave governance proposal targeted six deployments and dozens of low-use reserves covering about $98.1 million in supplied assets and $15.6 million in debt.

The proposal called for retiring deployments on Sonic, Scroll, zkSync, Metis, Soneium and Aptos while removing 50 low-adoption reserves and 21 matured Pendle principal tokens from other markets. Under the proposed process, Aave would first freeze affected reserves and cut their supply and borrowing caps before gradually reducing the remaining positions.

Mirae Asset is looking to turn its control of South Korean crypto exchange Digital X into a large-scale digital asset platform, targeting 150 trillion won (about $109 billion) in business value, according to The Korea Times.

The plan builds on Mirae Asset Consulting’s acquisition of a controlling 97.15% stake in Korbit last July—an effort the report describes as the first time a South Korean financial group affiliate has taken control of a domestic crypto exchange. After the takeover, Korbit was rebranded as Digital X.

Key takeaways

• Mirae Asset aims to grow Digital X into a broad digital asset business worth 150 trillion won, focused on crypto, stablecoins, real-world assets, and security tokens.
• The strategy follows Mirae Asset Consulting’s July acquisition of a 97.15% stake in Korbit for a total 141.4 billion won, with the exchange later renamed Digital X.
• Digital X has started waiving trading fees for won-denominated assets, with the zero-fee period planned through Aug. 24, 2027.
• The initiative comes despite Korbit—Digital X’s predecessor—having only about 0.5% of South Korea’s crypto trading market in 2025, per the country’s Fair Trade Commission.

From Korbit control to Digital X’s expansion blueprint

Digital X’s projected growth is anchored in what The Korea Times says will be a multi-pronged digital asset lineup. The report states Digital X will focus on cryptocurrencies, stablecoins, real-world assets (RWAs), and security token offerings (STOs).

Beyond tokenized financial products, the outlet also reports that the exchange is considering tokenizing physical assets such as gold, silver, and—more unusually—electricity. If pursued, that would position Digital X at the intersection of tokenization narratives and tangible-asset markets, where product design, custody, and regulatory treatment tend to be complex.

Why Mirae Asset’s stake matters for South Korea’s exchange landscape

According to The Korea Times, Mirae Asset Consulting completed its purchase of the 97.15% stake in Korbit in July for a cumulative 141.4 billion won. The deal effectively gave a major financial group affiliate control of a domestic exchange—something the report highlights as a first in South Korea.

That matters because it suggests the market may be shifting from niche crypto venues to exchange models backed by large financial institutions. Such a transition typically brings new priorities—risk management frameworks, institutional-grade product standards, and distribution through broader financial services—though the exact implementation details were not provided in the report.

For context, Korbit’s scale was modest before the rebrand. The Korea Times notes that despite being founded in 2013, Korbit represented just 0.5% of South Korea’s crypto trading market in 2025, citing the country’s Fair Trade Commission. That creates an immediate tension for the new strategy: Mirae Asset’s large target implies a substantial expansion in both users and product depth beyond the exchange’s prior market share.

Fee waivers and the push to widen won-denominated activity

Digital X has already begun changing its trading economics. As reported in the original coverage, on Monday the exchange started waiving trading fees across all won-denominated assets, with the policy scheduled to last through Aug. 24, 2027.

On its face, fee reduction is a competitive lever: it can lower trading costs for active users and improve liquidity during periods when exchanges often compete on price. However, investors and traders typically watch for follow-on effects—such as whether volumes rise enough to offset reduced revenue per trade, and whether the firm’s broader tokenization and stablecoin roadmap receives a corresponding ramp-up in product availability.

Digital X’s stated fee change is tied to its won-denominated markets, and readers can review the exchange’s trading fee information via its own site: https://korbit.co.kr/info/fee/?tab=trade.

Leadership messaging: “Mirae Asset 3.0” and a platform approach

In the lead-up to its expansion, Mirae Asset founder and chairman Park Hyeon-joo reportedly discussed the initiative at an employee event in Seoul on Wednesday. The Korea Times says Park positioned Digital X as a core component of “Mirae Asset 3.0.”

That framing is significant because it indicates the project is not being treated solely as an operational acquisition; it is being pitched as part of a wider corporate evolution. Still, the report does not spell out how Digital X will integrate with other Mirae Asset businesses or what governance and risk controls will be applied as the platform adds stablecoins, RWAs, and security tokens.

Next, market participants should watch how Digital X converts its long-term ambition—tokenizing assets and supporting STOs—into concrete regulatory and product milestones, while also tracking whether the multi-year fee waiver meaningfully boosts trading activity in won-denominated markets. The scale of the 150 trillion won target sets a high bar, and the critical question will be whether the exchange can grow beyond its earlier market share while sustaining a viable revenue model.

Genius Group has proposed raising capital through perpetual preferred securities to build an $827 million Bitcoin treasury and an $800 million AI portfolio within a $2 billion total-asset target for fiscal 2031.

Genius Group turns to preferred capital

Genius Group said on Aug. 27 that it intends to use its $1.2 billion shelf registration to issue publicly registered perpetual preferred securities, placing the financing method at the center of its five-year treasury plan.

The Securities and Exchange Commission declared the shelf registration effective on July 18, 2025. Such a registration allows the NYSE American-listed company to offer securities over time, but it does not represent SEC approval of the securities or their investment merits.

Under the preliminary proposal, Genius Group would seek $12.5 million in its first preferred securities offering. The company expects the instruments to be non-convertible and to carry a variable dividend paid monthly.

Funds from the sale would be allocated among the Bitcoin treasury, the AI treasury, and a U.S. dollar reserve equal to approximately 18 months of preferred dividend payments. Genius Group did not disclose how much of the initial proceeds each party would receive.

Discussions have begun with investment banks that have experience in preferred securities and digital asset treasury financing. However, the final issue price, dividend rate, offering size, exchange listing, and sale date have not been decided.

Any offering would require separate materials filed with or furnished to the SEC. The structure will also depend on board approval, applicable securities laws, regulatory requirements, and market conditions, according to the announcement.

Shareholders provided some of the required corporate authority at Genius Group’s annual meeting in July. About 97.58% of votes supported giving the board authority to issue preferred shares, while 99.54% approved a mandate allowing the company to repurchase up to 20% of its ordinary shares.

The $2B target covers total assets

Rather than placing $2 billion entirely into Bitcoin and AI investments, Genius Group has set separate fiscal 2031 targets of $827 million for its Bitcoin treasury and $800 million for its AI portfolio.

Operating businesses, cash, and other holdings would account for the remaining assets under the $2 billion plan. The company currently reports net assets of $106.6 million, following a 57% year-over-year increase announced on Aug. 13.

Genius Group calculated its net asset value at $0.62 per ordinary share. With GNS closing at $0.18 on Aug. 26, the company said its stock was trading at approximately 0.29 times book value, compared with what it described as a 2.60-times average for the U.S. education sector.

Management has forecast that net asset value could reach between $2 and $4 per share over five years if the company executes its financing, asset-purchase, and share-buyback plans. The projection also depends on market conditions and the performance of Bitcoin and its AI investments.

Chief executive Roger James Hamilton described perpetual preferred capital as a way to fund treasury purchases without issuing more ordinary shares.

“Every dollar of preferred capital deployed into our Bitcoin and AI Treasury that generates returns above the preferred dividend rate flows directly to our ordinary shareholders’ net asset value.”

Returns above the dividend cost could add to the assets attributable to ordinary investors. If the acquired assets lose value or earn less than the dividend rate, however, the preferred payment obligations would remain senior to ordinary shareholder distributions.

Genius Group identified Bitcoin price volatility, changes in private technology company valuations, financing costs, and capital availability among the factors that could cause actual results to differ from its forecasts.

Strategy provides the financing model

For its proposed securities, Genius Group has taken Strategy’s Bitcoin financing program as its main reference. The company said Strategy has raised more than $16 billion through four perpetual preferred stock series since introducing STRK in January 2025.

The preferred securities have no fixed maturity and do not require repayment on a set date. Their dividends and senior claims still create costs that treasury assets must cover before any excess return reaches ordinary shareholders.

Investor demand has emerged for some of the products. In May, Strategy’s STRC security recorded $1.53 billion in daily trading volume, crypto.news reported, drawing attention to the use of dividend-paying stock to fund corporate Bitcoin holdings.

Market prices can also depart from the issue or liquidation value. STRC fell to an intraday low of $82.50 on June 18 before closing near $88.59, well below the approximately $100 level around which the security was designed to trade.

Strategy later used Bitcoin sales to support the preferred program. An Aug. 10 SEC filing showed that the company sold 1,690 BTC for $108.6 million between Aug. 3 and Aug. 9, using the proceeds to repurchase about 1.15 million STRC shares.

A subsequent filing showed Strategy spent $132.2 million on additional STRC repurchases and $52.4 million on related dividends during the following week. It also placed $149.1 million into its U.S. dollar reserve, bringing the cash pool to $4.8 billion.

For U.S. investors, Genius Group’s final prospectus will determine the economic and legal terms of the proposed security. Until those documents are available, its dividend rate, liquidation preference, call provisions, exchange access, and possible tax treatment remain unconfirmed.

Bitcoin purchases are scheduled to restart

Before developing the dual-treasury plan, Genius Group pursued a Bitcoin-first policy under which it intended to hold at least 90% of its reserves in BTC.

The company adopted the policy in November 2024 and planned an initial $120 million purchase program. By January 2025, it held 420 BTC after buying another $5 million at an average price of $95,912 per coin. Holdings later reached a peak of 440 BTC.

A U.S. court order disrupted the program in early 2025 by restricting the company from selling shares, raising funds or buying Bitcoin during a legal dispute tied to its asset purchase agreement with Fatbrain AI. Genius Group reduced its Bitcoin holdings while seeking relief from the restrictions.

After the order was lifted, the company resumed purchases in June 2025 and increased its balance to 100 BTC. Management also restored a target of accumulating 1,000 BTC.

Liquidity needs later forced another change. Genius Group sold its remaining Bitcoin during the first quarter of 2026 and used the funds as part of the repayment of $8.5 million in debt.

Before the final sale, the company reported holding 84 BTC valued at approximately $5.7 million in March. Its April 1 operating update said it would rebuild the treasury when management considered market conditions more favorable.

Under the latest timetable, Bitcoin purchases are expected to restart in the fourth quarter of 2026. The company has not disclosed the size or price of its first planned acquisition.

Genius Group established the second part of its treasury in May 2026, when the board authorized an AI portfolio with an initial investment plan of up to $100 million. The company made its first allocation in June through funds providing exposure to private companies, including OpenAI, Anthropic, Anduril, and Databricks.

SpaceX held the largest look-through weighting at 13.5% of the AI portfolio, according to the company. Genius Group said its portfolio also contained exposure to xAI, Figure AI, Replit, and other companies involved in AI models, robotics, and infrastructure.

Zcash could emerge as a meaningful challenger to Bitcoin’s dominance among digital assets as the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence puts a premium on financial privacy and fuels concerns over AI-powered surveillance, according to Grayscale. 

In a new research report, Grayscale head of research Zach Pandl said Zcash (ZEC) has “second mover advantages” that could help it challenge Bitcoin’s (BTC) entrenched network effects, something previous alternatives such as Litecoin (LTC) have failed to achieve.

Central to Pandl’s argument is financial privacy. Zcash can shield transaction information, which Grayscale argues could become increasingly valuable as AI systems become better at analyzing financial activity at scale.

The report comes after ZEC’s roughly 19-fold increase over the past year. Despite those gains, Zcash remains valued at less than 1% of Bitcoin’s market capitalization, a disparity Grayscale sees as evidence of further upside if Zcash can capture market share.

Pandl acknowledged that Bitcoin’s liquidity and entrenched network remain powerful defenses of its dominant position. Grayscale also warned that Zcash remains a high-risk investment and that any further gains could be volatile and uneven.

Zcash could be valued at more than $4,000 if its market capitalization reached 5% of Bitcoin’s. Source: Grayscale

Related: Zcash’s Ironwood upgrade faces possible delay over infrastructure readiness

Zcash ecosystem attracts institutional capital

Interest in the Zcash ecosystem is broadening alongside ZEC’s strong price performance. As Cointelegraph recently reported, Nasdaq-listed privacy technology company Cypherpunk Technologies expanded its Zcash exposure by acquiring a mining fleet from Winklevoss Capital in a $33.33 million equity-based transaction.

The operation is already online across US facilities, producing about 4.2 GSol/s of Equihash hashrate, or roughly 18% of the Zcash network’s total computing power. Cypherpunk said the deal made its mining arm the network’s largest active fleet.

Related: Strategy’s $66B Bitcoin machine hinges on capital markets, not BTC price: Report

This article is produced in accordance with Cointelegraph’s Editorial Policy and is intended for informational purposes only. It does not constitute investment advice or recommendations. All investments and trades carry risk; readers are encouraged to conduct independent research.