OCEAN co-founder Luke Dashjr left the Bitcoin mining pool on Aug. 29 after reaching a mutual separation agreement with its parent company, Mummolin Inc. He resigned as chairman, chief technology officer and director.

Mummolin also repurchased all of Dashjr’s equity, according to a joint statement. Neither party disclosed the value of the repurchase or Dashjr’s former ownership percentage.

OCEAN and Dashjr cite different mining visions

OCEAN and Dashjr attributed the separation to “different visions for the future of Bitcoin mining following the recent protocol developments.” The statement did not identify the developments or explain the areas of disagreement.

The wording therefore does not confirm whether a single Bitcoin protocol proposal caused the split. Dashjr has participated in public debates about transaction policies, mining decentralization and alternative Bitcoin software. Connecting the departure to any particular dispute would require further confirmation from the parties.

Dashjr had already stepped back from his OCEAN responsibilities earlier in August. His permanent departure now removes him from the company’s leadership and ownership structure.

The company did not announce a replacement chairman or chief technology officer. It also provided no details about how Dashjr’s former technical responsibilities will be distributed.

Luke Dashjr will pursue Bitcoin mining through CONVOY

Dashjr plans to create a new venture called CONVOY. The joint statement said the project would continue his mission of decentralizing Bitcoin mining.

No official website, technical documentation or launch schedule was available at publication time. The statement did not explain whether CONVOY will operate a mining pool, develop mining software or pursue another infrastructure model.

Dashjr previously founded Eligius, an early Bitcoin mining pool, before helping launch OCEAN in 2023. OCEAN was designed to give miners greater visibility into block templates and deliver block rewards directly to miners through a non-custodial system.

The new venture suggests Dashjr intends to pursue those decentralization goals independently. However, claims about CONVOY’s architecture, mining policies or commercial model remain unverified until the project publishes further information.

OCEAN will keep its non-custodial pool operating

OCEAN said it will continue serving miners through its transparent, non-custodial mining pool. Its model sends mining rewards directly to participating miners instead of holding payouts in a pool-controlled account.

The company operates through Bitcoin Ocean LLC, a subsidiary of Wyoming-based Mummolin. It raised $6.2 million to develop decentralized mining infrastructure in a 2023 seed round led by Jack Dorsey and other investors.

OCEAN later introduced DATUM, a protocol intended to let individual miners construct their own block templates while still participating in pooled mining. The approach seeks to reduce the control large pool operators exercise over transaction selection.

In April 2025, Tether committed mining hashrate to OCEAN, including capacity from its operations in Africa and other regions. OCEAN has not announced any change to that arrangement following Dashjr’s departure.

What happens next for OCEAN and CONVOY

OCEAN must clarify its leadership structure and technical roadmap after losing its co-founder, chairman and chief technology officer. The company has not announced deadlines for those decisions.

Miners can continue using the pool, according to the joint statement. There was no reported service suspension, custody event or change to its payout system linked to the separation.

CONVOY’s next step will be publishing details about its team, technology and intended services. No launch date or funding information has been confirmed.

The equity repurchase completes Dashjr’s corporate separation from OCEAN. Still, the limited announcement leaves the underlying technical disagreement unresolved. No verified market reaction was directly attributable to the news.

Solana Foundation Vice President of Technology Jacob Creech outlined several upcoming Solana upgrades on Aug. 30. Transaction V1 is scheduled for Sept. 9, while the first stage of a network rent reduction is expected during the week beginning Aug. 31.

Creech also said developers plan to shorten slot times further and target October for Alpenglow. However, these changes follow separate activation processes. Transaction V1 will not automatically reduce slot times or activate Alpenglow.

Transaction V1 raises Solana’s limit to 4,096 bytes

Transaction V1 will raise Solana’s maximum serialized transaction size from 1,232 bytes to 4,096 bytes. The increase is about 3.3 times the existing limit, according to Solana’s official upgrade roadmap.

The larger format could support transactions containing zero-knowledge proofs, complex multisignature instructions and other data-heavy operations. The associated SIMD-0296 proposal also identifies BLS signatures and cross-chain operations as possible uses.

Developers must opt into the V1 format. Existing legacy and version-zero transactions will remain valid. Transaction V1 will not support address lookup tables, meaning applications must decide which format suits each transaction.

The change also requires wallets, application programming interfaces and other infrastructure to handle larger data payloads. The proposal acknowledges possible bandwidth and network fragmentation risks, which makes coordinated testing important before wider adoption.

Solana rent reduction begins with one of five steps

The first rent reduction does not deliver the full 90% target immediately. Solana plans five stages that would eventually lower the rent calculation from 6,960 lamports per byte to 696 lamports per byte.

Solana uses rent-exempt balances to limit uncontrolled state growth. Applications lock SOL when creating accounts that store data. That SOL is generally recoverable when the account closes, meaning rent functions more like a refundable deposit than a recurring network fee.

Lower requirements would reduce the amount of SOL that developers must lock when creating token accounts, program accounts and other onchain state. This could lower entry costs for applications that manage many user accounts.

Agave 4.2 included the necessary code, but Solana placed the changes behind independent feature gates. As crypto.news previously reported, validators can activate the rent, transaction-size and slot-time upgrades separately after testing.

Faster Solana slots follow a separate schedule

Solana has already reduced its target slot time to 350 milliseconds, down from the previous 400-millisecond target. The network plans additional stages at 300, 250 and eventually 200 milliseconds.

Creech did not provide dates for those remaining stages. Each reduction requires a separate feature activation. Network developers can therefore monitor validator performance before proceeding to the next target.

Shorter slots can improve transaction confirmation speed and increase the frequency at which validators produce blocks. They also place greater timing and networking demands on validators. Solana plans to adjust resource limits proportionally during the rollout.

Transaction V1 and reduced slot times are related to Solana’s broader performance roadmap, but they remain technically distinct. Reports describing Sept. 9 as the date for both changes would overstate Creech’s announcement.

Alpenglow remains an October target

Alpenglow is Solana’s proposed consensus redesign. Solana says it aims to reduce transaction finality to approximately 150 milliseconds, compared with the longer confirmation process used by the current consensus system.

The official roadmap lists Alpenglow as “in development,” while Agave 4.3 is expected in October. Creech’s post supports October as the current target, but neither statement confirms a guaranteed mainnet activation date.

Before then, Solana is expected to begin the first rent-reduction stage and activate Transaction V1 on Sept. 9. Further slot reductions will depend on separate validator activations. Alpenglow must also complete testing and secure the required network support.

No verified market movement was directly attributed to Creech’s announcement at publication time.

I contacted Curry and asked him what he thought about the value and opportunities for kindness in what feels like an incredibly hostile world. “Humans are naturally kind, under the right circumstances,” he tells me.

Indeed, according to research across diverse cultural and economic settings, from the U.S. and Canada to Uganda, India, and South Africa, the well-being rewards one experiences from helping others appears deep-rooted in human nature. 

Jonathan Passmore, a psychologist and coach in the U.K., has developed a positive psychology coaching technique called CAKE, which stands for consistent acts of kindness and empathy. I asked him how engaging in CAKE can help teach someone how to spread kindness. “The list of possible actions is limitless,” he says. “I advocate for folks to initially commit to a one-week plan—choosing to engage in one act of kindness per day.” On Monday, for example, you can greet the barista at your local coffee shop by name, and wish them a pleasant day, he offers. On Tuesday, “you could write a handwritten card to a colleague and thank them for something they have done.” Do this for a week, and “one often gets hooked and begins to hold an empathic stance towards most they meet.”

Vietnam has not issued its first crypto exchange license, but five companies have passed an initial assessment under the country’s five-year digital asset market pilot.

To Tran Hoa, deputy standing head of the Digital Asset Trading Market Board under Vietnam’s State Securities Commission, disclosed the progress at the Vietnam RWA Summit 2026, according to an Aug. 30 Vietnam News Agency report.

The authorities did not name the five applicants or confirm when final licensing decisions will be issued. Passing the initial assessment does not authorize any company to operate an exchange.

Vietnam crypto exchange applicants face a $383 million threshold

Vietnam’s Resolution No. 05/2025/NQ-CP requires each exchange applicant to have at least 10 trillion Vietnamese dong, approximately $383 million, in contributed charter capital. Contributions must be made in Vietnamese dong.

At least 65% of that capital must come from institutional shareholders. More than 35% must be contributed by at least two qualifying organizations, including commercial banks, securities companies, fund managers, insurers or technology companies.

Applicants must also obtain an appraisal showing that their technology meets Level 4 information-system security standards. The Ministry of Public Security handles the required security assessment before an exchange can begin operating.

Other licensing requirements cover management qualifications, custody, transaction monitoring, internal controls, conflict management and customer complaints. Applicants must also maintain systems for anti-money laundering and investor-identity verification.

The 10 trillion dong requirement is charter capital, not an additional investment fee paid to the government. Vietnam has not said whether all five preliminary applicants have already secured the full amount.

New crypto penalties take effect September 1

Decree No. 284/2026/ND-CP takes effect on Sept. 1 and will remain applicable while Resolution 05 governs the crypto market pilot. The decree establishes penalties for unlicensed services, improper issuance, weak customer checks and anti-money laundering failures.

Organizations providing crypto services or advertising an exchange without a license face fines of between 180 million and 200 million dong. Authorities can also order the removal of websites, software and trading systems involved in violations.

Licensed service providers face fines for failing to separate customer assets, monitor transactions or protect account information. Failure to verify customers can attract organizational fines ranging from 50 million to 70 million dong.

The decree generally states organizational fine levels. Individuals committing the same violation ordinarily face half the stated amount. The maximum penalty is 200 million dong for an organization and 100 million dong for an individual.

Domestic traders do not face immediate platform fines

Article 9 sets an organizational fine of 30 million to 50 million dong for domestic investors trading outside a Ministry of Finance-licensed provider. The general half-rate provision indicates an individual could face between 15 million and 25 million dong.

However, that penalty does not automatically begin on Sept. 1. Article 7 of Resolution 05 states that domestic investors become subject to the licensed-platform requirement six months after the first crypto asset service provider receives approval.

Because Vietnam has not licensed any provider, the six-month transition clock has not started. Domestic investors therefore will not be fined from Sept. 1 solely for continuing to use an overseas or otherwise unlicensed platform, according to experts cited by VNA.

Other violations covered by Decree 284 can still become enforceable on Sept. 1. These include operating or advertising an unauthorized platform, improper token issuance and certain failures involving customer data or anti-money laundering controls.

The first license will start Vietnam’s six-month countdown

Vietnam introduced the pilot through Resolution 05 on Sept. 9, 2025. As crypto.news previously reported, the five-year regulated crypto market pilot created rules for issuance, custody, trading and licensed service providers.

The framework initially permits locally issued crypto assets to be offered only to foreign investors. Eligible tokens must be backed by real-world assets and cannot represent securities or fiat currencies under the pilot.

Vietnam previously indicated that only a limited number of exchanges would receive licenses. The report that five companies passed the first assessment does not confirm that each will ultimately receive approval.

The next event is the Ministry of Finance’s first license. That decision will start the six-month period after which domestic investors must route covered crypto trading through licensed Vietnamese providers.

No licensing deadline has been announced. Investors will need to watch official Ministry of Finance and State Securities Commission notices rather than treating preliminary assessments as operating authorization.

Russia’s largest bank, Sber, plans to expand its crypto-backed lending to accept Tether’s USDt stablecoin and Ether as collateral alongside Bitcoin, according to a senior executive.

Sber will adapt its existing products and gradually expand its offerings as Russia’s new crypto law takes effect, Deputy Chairman Anatoly Popov said, according to a Friday TASS report. The bank plans to add the assets as collateral after the Bank of Russia permits them for public trading, he said.

The plans come as Russia rolls out a regulated crypto market under a law signed by president Vladimir Putin on Aug. 4, with core provisions taking effect Sept. 1.

The law gives the Bank of Russia authority to determine which crypto assets can trade on regulated exchanges. The central bank proposed Bitcoin, Ether and USDT for regulated exchange trading on Aug. 11, saying they met requirements including market capitalization, trading volume and at least five years of price history on overseas markets.

Sber has taken a more cautious view of the digital ruble, Russia’s central bank digital currency (CBDC), ahead of its wider rollout on Sept. 1. Sber’s chief financial officer Taras Skvortsov reportedly said that the bank sees little evidence of broad demand for the CBDC.

“I don’t see any clear interest in this instrument, apart from the central bank’s,” Skvortsov said, adding that neither retail nor corporate clients nor financial institutions are actively pushing for the CBDC.

Related: Stablecoins not credible for payments at scale, BIS chief says

Ripple has named Academy Award winner and Water.org co-founder Matt Damon as a keynote speaker for Swell 2026, scheduled for Oct. 27–29 at The Shed in New York City.

The official Swell website lists Damon among the keynote speakers alongside Bullish Chairman and CEO Tom Farley. Ripple has not yet published the topic, timing or format of Damon’s appearance.

Swell’s latest announcement also added four speakers: Aviva Senior Investment Director Alastair Sewell, Susquehanna Crypto CEO Chase Lax, Water.org CEO and co-founder Gary White, and PEAK6 co-founder Jenny Just.

Ripple Swell 2026 adds finance and nonprofit leaders

The expanded lineup places executives from investment management, crypto trading, financial technology and nonprofit finance within the same program. Ripple describes Swell as a conference examining connections between traditional finance and the onchain economy.

Other listed speakers include Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse, President Monica Long and CTO Emeritus David Schwartz. External participants include Robinhood crypto executive Johann Kerbrat, BNY Global Head of Markets Laide Majiyagbe and Intercontinental Exchange Vice President Michael Blaugrund.

Former Reserve Bank of India Governor Raghuram Rajan is also listed. The lineup extends beyond crypto-native companies to include banks, asset managers, exchange operators, academics and development organizations.

Ripple has not released the complete session schedule. More speakers are expected to be announced, but the event website does not provide a deadline for completing the lineup.

Matt Damon’s appearance connects to Water.org

Damon co-founded Water.org with Gary White. The nonprofit works with local financial institutions to provide affordable financing for household water and sanitation systems.

Ripple joined Water.org’s Get Blue campaign in June as its exclusive digital asset and payments partner. As crypto.news reported, RLUSD is being used to move funding to microfinance partners serving communities across emerging markets.

That existing relationship gives Damon’s participation a direct connection to Ripple’s humanitarian payments work. However, neither Ripple nor Water.org has confirmed that his keynote will focus on RLUSD, charitable payments or the Get Blue initiative.

Ripple previously said Water.org and other nonprofits were testing its payments infrastructure and stablecoin. The company described the technology as a way to improve the speed and transparency of cross-border aid transfers. Those performance claims come from Ripple and participating organizations rather than an independent assessment of every transfer.

Swell and XRPL Apex become one conference

Ripple will combine Swell and XRPL Apex into one event for the first time in 2026. Swell has traditionally focused on institutional finance, payments and policy, while Apex has served developers and researchers working on the XRP Ledger.

The combined conference is planned around more than 50 sessions across three stages. Ripple expects over 75 speakers and more than 1,500 attendees, according to the event website. These are organizer projections and may change before October.

Program topics include payments, stablecoins, tokenization, crypto markets, exchange-traded funds, decentralized finance, artificial intelligence, privacy, quantum computing and XRP utility.

In related coverage, the combined Swell and XRPL Apex conference was identified as a major October event for the wider Ripple and XRP Ledger ecosystem. Conference announcements alone do not establish future demand for XRP or other Ripple-related products.

Registration closes before the October event

Swell 2026 will take place at The Shed, a cultural center at 545 West 30th Street in Manhattan’s Hudson Yards. Standard registration is listed at $1,200 through Oct. 5.

The final registration period runs from Oct. 6 through Oct. 20, with tickets priced at $1,500. Ripple has separate application routes for journalists, speakers, partners and hackathon participants.

The organizers are also planning an institutional summit and a hackathon within the wider conference program. Detailed schedules for those components remain pending.

The next confirmed steps are additional speaker announcements and publication of the complete agenda. Damon’s precise keynote subject and the sessions assigned to the four newly announced speakers have not yet been disclosed.

Coinbase will suspend trading for Badger DAO and Storj on Sept. 28, 2026, following its latest review of assets listed on the U.S. cryptocurrency exchange.

Trading will end at approximately 2 p.m. ET across Coinbase.com Simple and Advanced Trade, Coinbase Exchange and Coinbase Prime, according to the exchange’s Aug. 28 announcement.

Coinbase said it regularly reviews supported assets to determine whether they continue meeting its listing standards. The exchange did not disclose which technical, legal, compliance or market criteria prompted its decision concerning BADGER and STORJ.

Coinbase puts BADGER and STORJ in limit-only mode

Coinbase has moved the BADGER and STORJ order books into limit-only mode ahead of the suspension. Customers can place and cancel limit orders, while transactions may still execute when matching orders become available.

Limit-only mode prevents traders from submitting market orders. It gives customers more control over their requested prices during the transition, although an order may remain unfilled when sufficient liquidity is unavailable.

The restrictions apply to Coinbase’s retail, professional and institutional trading services. After the Sept. 28 deadline, customers will no longer be able to buy or sell either token through the affected Coinbase platforms.

Coinbase did not announce any automatic conversion program for remaining balances. This differs from its earlier handling of DAI, when eligible customer balances were scheduled for conversion into USDS after trading ended.

Withdrawals remain available after trading ends

Customers will retain access to their BADGER and STORJ balances. Coinbase said users will continue to have the ability to withdraw both assets, and it did not announce a withdrawal deadline.

A trading suspension therefore does not mean that Coinbase has frozen the tokens. Customers can leave supported balances on the platform or transfer them to compatible external wallets. Anyone transferring funds must verify the receiving address and supported blockchain before approving an irreversible transaction.

BADGER is the governance token associated with Badger DAO, a decentralized finance project focused on bringing Bitcoin-linked assets into DeFi. STORJ serves as a payment token within the Storj decentralized cloud-storage ecosystem.

The loss of Coinbase trading could reduce access to both tokens for customers who rely on the exchange. Other centralized and decentralized markets may continue supporting them, subject to regional restrictions and the platforms’ own listing decisions.

BADGER falls as Coinbase prepares trading suspension

BADGER traded near $0.37 on Aug. 30, down approximately 4% over 24 hours. The token moved within an intraday range of about $0.365 to $0.385. The timing followed Coinbase’s announcement, but the price change cannot be attributed solely to the suspension without further evidence.

STORJ traded near $0.074 during the same reporting period. Available market data did not show a comparably clear announcement-linked move, making a direct market-reaction conclusion difficult.

Delistings can reduce liquidity and widen spreads when a large exchange accounts for a material share of trading. However, Coinbase did not publish volume or liquidity figures showing its share of the global BADGER and STORJ markets.

The exchange says its monitoring process considers onchain and offchain signals. Material changes to a project or Coinbase’s understanding of an asset can trigger further review, according to the company’s listing policy.

September brings three Coinbase token suspensions

BADGER and STORJ are not Coinbase’s only scheduled September suspensions. The exchange previously announced that IoTeX trading would end on Sept. 23 at approximately 2 p.m. ET.

Coinbase also suspended five tokens earlier in August. As crypto.news reported, withdrawals remained open after trading ended for IDEX, LRC, OMNI, PIRATE and FIS.

Customers holding BADGER or STORJ now have until Sept. 28 to complete trades through Coinbase, subject to the limit-only restrictions. The exchange has not announced an appeal process, reconsideration period or further review deadline.

The next confirmed step is the suspension across all named Coinbase trading services. Withdrawals are expected to continue afterward unless Coinbase publishes a separate update.

Real Trump Coins denied launching or authorizing the Solana-based Trump Digital GOLD token on Aug. 29 after promotional posts appeared on its X account and associated website.

The Trump-linked merchandise business blamed “third-party bad actors” for the promotion. It also said it was working with authorities to investigate the incident. No named law enforcement agency has publicly confirmed an investigation.

“Trump Coins has not authorized and will not launch, promote, or authorize any digital token,” the company said on X.

The denial followed a rapid token collapse and large sales from a concentrated group of wallets. However, neither blockchain analysts nor authorities have publicly identified the people who created GOLD or controlled the wallets.

GOLD token appeared across linked online channels

The @realtrumpcoins1 X account posted GOLD’s Solana contract address shortly after the token was created on Aug. 29. The post directed traders to RealTrumpCoins.com, where the token also appeared.

The involvement of both channels created confusion over whether the launch was authorized. The promotional X posts were later deleted, while the account began directing users to TrumpCoins.com.

Earlier posts from the same account had directed merchandise customers to RealTrumpCoins.com as recently as Aug. 25. The older domain reportedly continued showing the GOLD promotion after the company issued its denial.

The account is associated with licensed Trump-themed physical merchandise, including commemorative coins. That connection does not establish that GOLD was approved by Donald Trump, his family or the Trump Organization.

Trump’s verified accounts did not publicly promote GOLD. The token is also separate from Official Trump, the Solana memecoin Trump promoted through his verified social media profiles in January 2025.

GOLD loses 99% after concentrated wallet sales

GOLD briefly reached an estimated market capitalization of $66 million following the promotional post. It later fell to approximately $700,000, representing a decline of almost 99%.

Onchain researcher EmberCN reported that connected wallets sold 824.54 million GOLD tokens, equal to 82.45% of the supply. The wallets received approximately 9,784.6 SOL, worth about $1.01 million at the time.

The token’s market value reportedly fell from roughly $55 million to $1 million within 30 seconds as the wallets sold. The concentration left the market with limited capacity to absorb the available supply.

A separate Lookonchain analysis identified 15 wallets described as team-linked. It estimated that those wallets sold tokens for about $330,000 and earned approximately $312,000.

The two estimates appear to cover different wallet groups or transaction periods. Neither researcher identified the real-world owners behind the addresses. Blockchain activity can connect funding and trading patterns, but it cannot establish identity or criminal responsibility by itself.

As crypto.news reported before the denial, some wallets acquired GOLD before the account published its contract address. That timing raised questions about whether traders had advance knowledge of the promotion.

Denial leaves control of the account unexplained

Real Trump Coins said “bad actors” were responsible but did not explain how they gained access to both the X account and website. It also did not state when it detected the activity or when it regained control.

The business has not disclosed whether the incident involved stolen credentials, compromised administrators or unauthorized access to domain infrastructure. It has also not identified the organization handling its reported investigation.

Therefore, the denial confirms the company’s position but does not resolve who controlled the promotional channels. It also does not establish whether the token developers coordinated with anyone who had access to those channels.

No regulator has publicly accused Real Trump Coins, Donald Trump or the Trump Organization of participating in the GOLD launch. Likewise, no official finding has classified the incident as fraud or a rug pull.

Authorities could examine promotion and wallet activity

The SEC’s February 2025 staff statement said transactions involving meme coins fitting its description generally do not constitute securities transactions. That staff position is not legally binding.

The statement also said fraudulent conduct involving meme coins can still lead to action under other federal or state laws. Authorities could examine false promotion, unauthorized account access, wire fraud or other conduct depending on the evidence.

The SEC’s investor guidance warns that promoters may create culture-themed tokens, generate demand through social media and sell before the attention ends.

What happens next depends on whether Real Trump Coins identifies the authorities it contacted and provides technical evidence of a compromise. Investigators would also need records from the website, X account, token deployer and exchanges that received the sold SOL.

Stablecoins do not yet credibly function as a payment method at scale, Bank for International Settlements General Manager Pablo Hernández de Cos said on Aug. 28 at the Federal Reserve’s Jackson Hole symposium.

In his official BIS speech, de Cos argued that tokenized bank deposits provide a stronger route to programmable payments. They remain within the existing banking system and settle through central bank money.

“Tokenised deposits offer a more direct path to harness tokenisation while preserving the monetary system’s foundations,” de Cos said.

However, he did not call for a complete ban on stablecoins. He said stablecoins and tokenized deposits could coexist if regulators defined their roles and imposed appropriate safeguards. Under his preferred model, tokenized deposits would handle most daily and wholesale payments. Stablecoins would serve narrower functions, including decentralized lending.

The speech came one day after the BIS-linked Financial Stability Institute published a study comparing stablecoin regulations in the United States, European Union, United Kingdom, Hong Kong and Singapore. The report found wide differences in which entities may issue stablecoins and which additional activities they may conduct.

Stablecoins struggle to meet three features of money

De Cos assessed stablecoins against three characteristics he considers central to a functioning monetary system: singleness, interoperability and financial integrity.Singleness means different forms of money denominated in the same currency remain redeemable at equal value. A dollar held in one regulated bank should have the same value as a dollar held in another bank.

Stablecoins do not always meet this condition in secondary markets. A user holding USDT may need to sell it before buying USDC when a recipient accepts only the latter. Either token can trade above or below one dollar during stress, meaning the exchange may not occur at par.

By contrast, tokenized deposits remain liabilities of regulated commercial banks. Transfers can debit one customer’s bank balance and credit another while the banks settle through central bank accounts. De Cos argued that this arrangement preserves the connection to central bank money.

Interoperability presents another challenge. Stablecoins operate across several blockchains and scaling networks. Moving the same token between chains often requires bridges, centralized intermediaries or wrapped assets. Each method introduces operational, custody or smart-contract risks.

Tokenized deposits also face interoperability problems. Most current projects operate through permissioned networks that do not communicate freely with other platforms. De Cos acknowledged that no multi-bank, cross-border tokenized deposit system currently operates at full commercial scale.

Financial integrity formed his third concern. Public blockchains allow users to hold and transfer assets without relying on a regulated custodian. This structure can make anti-money laundering and counterterrorist financing controls harder to apply consistently.

That concern does not mean every self-custody transaction is illicit. It means regulators cannot always identify the parties as easily as they can within a bank account system. De Cos said policymakers still need to determine how AML rules should apply to peer-to-peer transfers while protecting privacy.

The BIS chief had already warned that dollar-backed tokens could create financial stability risks if they grow without traditional banking safeguards.

Stablecoin growth creates opposing economic effects

Stablecoin adoption could increase demand for short-term government debt. Issuers commonly hold Treasury bills and other liquid assets to back their circulating tokens.

The U.S. Treasury Department has noted that the GENIUS Act requires permitted payment stablecoins to maintain one-for-one reserves. Eligible assets include cash, deposits, repurchase agreements and Treasury securities with remaining maturities of 93 days or less.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has argued that stablecoin growth could strengthen international demand for dollars and U.S. government debt. When the GENIUS Act became law in July 2025, Bessent called stablecoins “a revolution in digital finance” that could generate additional Treasury demand.

De Cos accepted that stablecoins could lower government borrowing costs, particularly when demand comes from outside the United States. Foreign stablecoin users can create additional demand for Treasury bills rather than merely replacing existing domestic buyers.

However, he said the effect could work against private borrowers. If households move money from bank deposits into stablecoins, banks may lose a relatively stable and inexpensive source of funding.

Issuers could return part of that money to banks as wholesale deposits. Yet wholesale funding tends to be more concentrated and sensitive to interest rates. Banks could respond by raising loan prices or holding more liquid assets.Smaller lenders could face greater pressure because they rely more heavily on customer deposits. Higher funding costs could then reach households and small businesses through more expensive credit.

The reserve structure also creates possible contagion channels. A wave of stablecoin redemptions could force an issuer to sell Treasury bills or withdraw large bank deposits. Such movements could place pressure on short-term funding markets during periods of stress.

These outcomes remain scenarios rather than confirmed forecasts. De Cos cited BIS modeling that found a modest overall economic effect, with the result depending on reserve composition, government debt and whether stablecoin demand originates domestically or abroad.

Five markets apply different stablecoin rules

The Financial Stability Institute study examined regulatory frameworks in five major markets. It found that all five generally limit issuers to functions such as issuance, redemption and reserve management.

The frameworks differ over lending, staking, proprietary trading and custody. The United States and Singapore take relatively restrictive approaches toward specialized non-bank issuers.

Under the U.S. GENIUS Act, activities such as lending, staking, proprietary trading and custody of third-party crypto assets generally fall outside a payment stablecoin issuer’s core permissions. Separate entities or regulatory approvals may still support some related services.

The European Union, United Kingdom and Hong Kong allow certain additional activities when issuers obtain separate authorization, regulatory consent or other required permissions. Banks may also operate under broader prudential frameworks than specialized issuers.

The study identified a potential group-level gap. Restrictions generally apply to the legal entity issuing the stablecoin, not every company within its corporate group.

A related affiliate could therefore conduct activities that the issuer cannot perform directly. Banks already face consolidated supervision designed to capture risks across their groups. Non-bank stablecoin businesses may not face an equivalent system in every jurisdiction.

The FSI authors said regulators may need to extend group-level oversight to larger non-bank issuers. The publication states that its conclusions represent the authors’ views and do not necessarily reflect the position of the BIS or its member central banks.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Treasury continues implementing the GENIUS Act. In April, it proposed AML and sanctions rules that would treat permitted payment stablecoin issuers as financial institutions under the Bank Secrecy Act.

The proposal would require issuers to maintain systems for blocking, freezing or rejecting transactions when legally required.

Tokenized deposits still face practical barriers

Tokenized deposits are digital representations of commercial bank deposits recorded on programmable infrastructure. They remain claims against banks rather than claims against separate stablecoin issuers.

Their main advantage is institutional. Banks already operate within capital, liquidity, resolution, supervision and customer-protection frameworks. Settlement through central bank money can also preserve equal value between deposits at different institutions.

Still, tokenized deposits have not solved every technical problem. Separate bank networks can become closed systems with trapped liquidity. Smaller institutions may struggle with implementation costs and network effects that favor larger banks.

Continuous operation also brings risk. Round-the-clock transfers could accelerate deposit withdrawals during a crisis. Banks and central banks may need new liquidity arrangements capable of responding outside traditional operating hours.

Legal questions remain around settlement finality, smart-contract enforcement and correcting mistaken transactions. Tokenized systems must also operate alongside existing banking infrastructure during any long transition.

The BIS is testing these ideas through Project Agorá, which brings together seven central banks and more than 40 private financial institutions. The project has tested cross-border settlement using tokenized commercial bank money and central bank reserves.

As crypto.news reported, the project moved from prototype work toward real-value testing in 2026. However, those trials do not establish that tokenized deposits are ready to replace existing payment networks.

De Cos’s position therefore presents tokenized deposits as the stronger institutional model, not a finished global product. Stablecoins already have wider public-blockchain distribution, while tokenized deposits retain a closer connection to regulated money.

What happens next?

Regulators must now turn broad principles into detailed operational requirements. In the United States, agencies are continuing to implement reserve, licensing, sanctions and AML provisions under the GENIUS Act.

Other jurisdictions will continue applying their own frameworks. Differences between the five markets could encourage issuers to choose structures or locations with broader permissions.

The FSI study suggests that regulators will pay closer attention to entire corporate groups, especially when non-bank affiliates provide lending, staking, trading or custody services around an issuer.

For central banks, the next step involves expanding tokenized settlement experiments while developing common technical and legal standards. Stablecoins are unlikely to disappear from this process. De Cos instead expects them to occupy specialized roles under rules that support redemption, transparency and financial integrity.

FAQs

Sberbank plans to expand its crypto-backed lending business by accepting Bitcoin, Ethereum and Tether’s USDT as collateral, Deputy Chairman Anatoly Popov told TASS on Aug. 28.

However, the proposal remains conditional. Popov said the Russian bank would only add ETH and USDT after the Bank of Russia permits their public circulation. Sberbank has not announced a launch date, loan terms or eligible customer groups.

“We plan to accept not only Bitcoin but also Ethereum and the stablecoin Tether as collateral,” Popov said. He added that the expansion would begin only “after the Central Bank, of course, allows them for public circulation.”

Sberbank will adapt loans to Russia’s crypto rules

Popov said Sberbank had prepared for the regulatory change and already had practical experience handling cryptocurrency. The bank intends to modify its existing products once every part of the new framework becomes effective.

The statement expands Sberbank’s previous interest in issuing ruble-denominated loans secured by cryptocurrency. Popov said in December 2025 that the bank was assessing crypto-backed lending and working with regulators on the required infrastructure.

Sberbank later completed a pilot Bitcoin-backed loan involving Russian mining company Intelion Data. The borrower pledged mined cryptocurrency as collateral. That transaction gave the bank experience in custody, collateral monitoring and enforcement procedures.

The new statement does not mean customers can immediately pledge ETH or USDT. Sberbank must wait for the Bank of Russia to determine which assets can circulate through regulated intermediaries and qualify for use in banking products.

Russia’s crypto framework starts September 1

Russia’s wider cryptocurrency framework takes effect on Sept. 1, 2026. According to the Bank of Russia, the rules create a regulated market involving banks, brokers, asset managers, crypto exchanges and digital depositories.

Both qualified and non-qualified investors will be able to conduct crypto transactions through approved intermediaries. However, retail access will remain restricted.

Non-qualified investors must pass a knowledge test. They may then purchase up to 300,000 rubles in eligible cryptocurrencies annually through each intermediary. Qualified investors must also pass testing but can access a wider group of assets without the same monetary limit.

Foreign stablecoins will generally face the same requirements as other cryptocurrencies. This provision could cover USDT, although the central bank must still determine which assets satisfy its circulation standards.

The framework does not legalize cryptocurrency as a domestic payment method. Payments for goods and services in Russia remain prohibited. Exporters and importers may use cryptocurrency for cross-border settlements under the applicable rules.

Sberbank builds trading and custody infrastructure

Sberbank is also preparing infrastructure for regulated cryptocurrency trading and custody. The bank aims to launch a digital depository by Dec. 1, 2026, as crypto.news reported.

The planned system would record customer ownership, manage wallets and support deposits, withdrawals and settlements. Sberbank has not yet confirmed which cryptocurrencies the platform will support or disclosed its fees and withdrawal limits.

The bank already operates within Russia’s digital financial asset market. It joined the Bank of Russia’s register of approved information system operators in 2022 and has since issued tokenized financial products through its platform.

Sberbank’s plans also remain separate from public blockchain lending protocols. The bank would issue conventional loans and hold cryptocurrency as collateral within a regulated custody structure. It has not announced any integration with decentralized lending platforms.

Regulatory approval will determine the launch

The Bank of Russia must now complete supporting standards covering eligible assets, custody, accounting and customer protection. These rules will determine whether Sberbank can use ETH and USDT as loan collateral.

Market participants have until July 1, 2027, to obtain the necessary licenses and align their operations with the framework. Sberbank’s Dec. 1 infrastructure target falls within that transition period.

Until the regulator approves the assets and Sberbank publishes commercial terms, the expanded collateral offering remains a plan rather than an available product. The bank must also explain how it will value volatile collateral, handle margin requirements and respond when asset prices fall.