Bitcoin Improvement Proposal 110 entered its mandatory-signaling phase at block 961,632 on Saturday, with miners signaling support in just 51 of the preceding 2,016 blocks, or 2.53%, well below the 55% threshold required for early activation, according to the BIP-110 monitor.

Starting at block 961,632, nodes enforcing BIP-110 began rejecting blocks that did not set version bit 4, while ordinary Bitcoin nodes continued accepting both signaling and non-signaling blocks. A minority BIP-110 branch subsequently emerged, but quickly fell behind the dominant chain.

The low signaling rate makes a sustained rival chain unlikely without substantially greater miner participation. With relatively little mining support, a BIP-110 branch could advance slowly or stop producing blocks altogether.

The milestone tests whether supporters can advance a contentious consensus change without broad miner backing, potentially separating enforcing nodes from the dominant chain and escalating a dispute over how Bitcoin’s block space should be used.

BIP-110 seeks temporary limits on Bitcoin data

Written by pseudonymous developer Dathon Ohm, BIP-110 proposes additional consensus restrictions lasting roughly one year.

It would limit most new output scripts to 34 bytes, cap OP_RETURN outputs at 83 bytes, restrict certain data pushes and witness elements to 256 bytes, and temporarily limit several Taproot features. Unspent transaction outputs created before activation would be exempt. 

Supporters said the restrictions would discourage inscriptions and other non-monetary data that increase storage and bandwidth costs for node operators. 

The proposal’s critics, including Strategy Executive Chairman Michael Saylor and Blockstream CEO Adam Back, have argued that the proposal could divide Bitcoin and cause nodes to reject transactions permitted under the network’s existing rules.

Related: Bitcoin nodes running BIP-110 crosses 2% as spam wars heat up

The proposal uses version bit 4 for miner signaling. Its deployment schedule sets blocks 961,632 through 963,647 as a mandatory-signaling window, during which nodes enforcing BIP-110 reject blocks that do not carry the signal.

The specification defines block 963,648 as the beginning of its locked-in state and block 965,664 as the point when its transaction restrictions take effect. 

BIP-110 proponents have also discussed a more extensive fallback. On Aug. 1, Bitcoin developer Chris Guida rebased preliminary code for a proof-of-work change originally written by Bitcoin Knots maintainer Luke Dashjr. 

Guida described the code at the time as a contingency if miners opposed BIP-110, but said no activation date had been set. 

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The Clarity Act has moved closer to a Senate floor vote after Majority Leader John Thune filed a cloture motion. The filing sets up Senate consideration of the digital asset market structure bill after the August recess. Meanwhile, lawmakers continue talks over stablecoin yield rules and ethics provisions before the Senate takes up the legislation.

Clarity Act Advances Toward Senate Vote

Senate Majority Leader John Thune filed the cloture motion early Saturday, August 8, for H.R. 3633. The measure covers the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, which seeks clearer federal rules for digital assets. Therefore, the filing creates a procedural path for the Senate to consider the bill in September.

The move follows Thune’s decision to postpone Senate consideration until lawmakers return from the August recess. However, the cloture filing keeps the legislation positioned for action when the Senate reconvenes. The Senate can now prepare for a floor process after lawmakers complete their recess.

The Clarity Act would establish a federal framework for digital assets and define regulatory responsibilities. It would also provide clearer rules for crypto exchanges and other digital asset businesses. As a result, the bill could reshape how federal agencies oversee parts of the crypto market.

Senate Negotiations Continue Over Key Provisions

The cloture filing does not end negotiations over provisions that remain unresolved within the Clarity Act. Lawmakers continue discussions over rules covering stablecoin yields, which have become a major point of disagreement. Meanwhile, banking groups have pushed for changes to the current language.

The stablecoin yield provision could influence how digital asset companies offer returns through certain products. Banks have raised concerns about the competitive impact of those provisions on traditional financial institutions. Therefore, lawmakers may continue negotiations before the Senate begins its floor debate.

The bill also contains an ethics agreement that lawmakers continue to review during the negotiations. However, reports indicate that the White House has not provided a final position on that proposal. Consequently, lawmakers still face several policy issues before they can secure broad support.

Clarity Act Sets September Legislative Path

The latest procedural move follows several days of uncertainty around the Senate timeline for the legislation. Senate leadership had previously indicated that lawmakers would not vote on the bill before the August recess. Now, the cloture filing places the measure on track for consideration after the Senate returns.

The Senate must still complete its procedural steps before lawmakers can hold a final vote. Moreover, senators need enough support to advance the bill through the chamber and resolve outstanding disagreements. The cloture process therefore marks progress, but it does not guarantee final passage.

The Clarity Act remains a major part of the broader effort to create federal crypto market rules. Its passage could define regulatory roles and establish requirements for digital asset market participants. For now, Senate leaders have placed the legislation on the September agenda while negotiations continue.

The CLARITY Act has moved closer to a Senate floor vote after Majority Leader John Thune filed a cloture motion. The filing sets up Senate consideration of the digital asset market structure bill after the August recess. Meanwhile, lawmakers continue talks over stablecoin yield rules and ethics provisions before the Senate takes up the legislation.

Clarity Act Advances Toward Senate Vote

Senate Majority Leader John Thune filed the cloture motion early Saturday, August 8, for H.R. 3633. The measure covers the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, which seeks clearer federal rules for digital assets. Therefore, the filing creates a procedural path for the Senate to consider the bill in September.

The move follows Thune’s decision to postpone Senate consideration until lawmakers return from the August recess. However, the cloture filing keeps the legislation positioned for action when the Senate reconvenes. The Senate can now prepare for a floor process after lawmakers complete their recess.

The CLARITY Act would establish a federal framework for digital assets and define regulatory responsibilities. It would also provide clearer rules for crypto exchanges and other digital asset businesses. As a result, the bill could reshape how federal agencies oversee parts of the crypto market.

Senate Negotiations Continue Over Key Provisions

The cloture filing does not end negotiations over provisions that remain unresolved within the CLARITY Act. Lawmakers continue discussions over rules covering stablecoin yields, which have become a major point of disagreement. Meanwhile, banking groups have pushed for changes to the current language.

The stablecoin yield provision could influence how digital asset companies offer returns through certain products. Banks have raised concerns about the competitive impact of those provisions on traditional financial institutions. Therefore, lawmakers may continue negotiations before the Senate begins its floor debate.

The bill also contains an ethics agreement that lawmakers continue to review during the negotiations. However, reports indicate that the White House has not provided a final position on that proposal. Consequently, lawmakers still face several policy issues before they can secure broad support.

Clarity Act Sets September Legislative Path

The latest procedural move follows several days of uncertainty around the Senate timeline for the legislation. Senate leadership had previously indicated that lawmakers would not vote on the bill before the August recess. Now, the cloture filing places the measure on track for consideration after the Senate returns.

The Senate must still complete its procedural steps before lawmakers can hold a final vote. Moreover, senators need enough support to advance the bill through the chamber and resolve outstanding disagreements. The cloture process therefore marks progress, but it does not guarantee final passage.

The CLARITY Act remains a major part of the broader effort to create federal crypto market rules. Its passage could define regulatory roles and establish requirements for digital asset market participants. For now, Senate leaders have placed the legislation on the September agenda while negotiations continue.

Bitcoin has reached block 961,632, triggering the long-awaited mandatory signaling period for BIP-110, a controversial proposal designed to temporarily curb non-financial data from being embedded on the network.

The proposal entered the signaling phase at around 19:35 UTC on Saturday, with support from miners seldom exceeding 2.5%, a long way short of the 55% mark required.

Prominent Bitcoin voices such as Strategy chairman Michael Saylor and Blockstream CEO Adam Back have also voiced their opposition to the proposal.

Its supporters, however, are pushing BIP-110 as a user-activated soft fork (UASF), meaning it would rely on node operators, not miners, to force the rule change. Users would update their node software to reject any block from miners that fails to signal support for BIP-110, effectively attempting to coerce miners into line or cut them off entirely.

BIP-110’s proponents maintain there is an historic precedent for this outlook in the 2017 activation of SegWit via BIP-148, which enabled the separation of digital signatures from transaction data and was accepted by users not having the required support from miners.

U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune has filed cloture on a motion to bring the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act—known as the CLARITY Act—to the Senate floor, setting up a pivotal procedural vote tied to the next legislative window. The move comes as lawmakers prepare to return to Washington after the August recess, with the Senate expected to reconvene on Sept. 15.

Under Senate rules, invoking cloture requires a 60-vote threshold, meaning Republicans will need support from Democrats to clear the procedural hurdle. The filing does not automatically translate into final passage; instead, it is designed to advance the bill for consideration and potentially a later vote on the legislation itself.

Key takeaways

• John Thune filed cloture to take up the CLARITY Act, a procedural step requiring 60 votes.
• The Senate is expected to reconvene on Sept. 15, with the vote anticipated shortly after.
• Cloture clears a path for consideration but does not guarantee the bill will ultimately pass.
• Negotiations have stalled over disagreements, including ethics provisions and how stablecoin-related rewards should be regulated.
• Lawmakers are reportedly working on a bipartisan ethics addendum to address concerns tied to the president’s crypto-related financial interests.

Procedural push puts the CLARITY Act back on the calendar

According to the U.S. Senate Daily Press, the Majority Leader’s office confirmed that Thune filed cloture on the motion to bring the CLARITY Act to the Senate floor for consideration. The Senate Daily Press is tied to the daily publication of official Senate floor scheduling and related procedural matters, making it a direct channel for confirming when actions like cloture are submitted.

Cloture matters because it addresses debate length and related parliamentary tactics. With 60 votes required to invoke cloture, the bill’s fate in the chamber hinges on whether enough senators across party lines agree the legislation should move forward for lawmakers to debate and vote on substance.

Thune’s filing effectively repositions the CLARITY Act for action after negotiations failed to produce a deal before the August recess. Lawmakers now have additional time leading up to the September session—when procedural momentum can become substantive momentum, if the outstanding policy issues can be resolved.

Why the bill is politically and structurally significant

The CLARITY Act is widely described as a landmark effort to create a more uniform federal framework for how digital assets are categorized and overseen. The bill’s core aim is to establish a federal market structure for digital assets and clarify how regulators should apply existing securities and commodities laws.

In particular, the legislation is positioned to delineate when particular crypto assets fall under the jurisdiction of the Securities and Exchange Commission versus the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. That clarity is a major concern for market participants because regulatory ambiguity can complicate product development, market access, and compliance strategies.

While the procedural step now puts the bill back into focus, the filing also underscores that the legislative path is still conditional. Even if senators clear cloture, the CLARITY Act could still face further obstacles in a later floor vote depending on whether negotiators can bridge remaining disagreements.

The sticking points: ethics rules and stablecoin-related provisions

The road to a compromise has been complicated by disputes over multiple elements, including ethics provisions and rules governing stablecoin rewards. The ethics question has been particularly difficult, according to reporting referenced in the original coverage: lawmakers have been unable to settle on proposed restrictions that would limit government officials—and their families—from issuing or profiting from digital assets while in office.

These provisions are more than technical language. Ethics rules can become a defining political battleground because they shape how lawmakers manage perceived conflicts of interest, especially in a sector where public officials may hold or interact with crypto investments.

Beyond ethics, stablecoin rewards have also reportedly been a source of friction. While the specific policy details are not laid out in the available text, the inclusion of stablecoin-related reward rules indicates that negotiators have to align on how certain yield or incentivization mechanics should be treated under U.S. oversight.

Until those issues are resolved, the CLARITY Act’s movement in the Senate may be best understood as a procedural advance—an effort to keep negotiations alive rather than a guarantee that consensus is close.

Reported attempt to break the ethics impasse

To address the ethics impasse, lawmakers have reportedly been working on a bipartisan addendum. Earlier coverage from Cointelegraph referenced a proposal aimed at addressing Democratic concerns about President Donald Trump’s crypto-related financial interests, with Bloomberg reporting that the approach would require the president to divest from certain crypto-related businesses.

The rationale for such an addendum is straightforward: rather than relying solely on broad restrictions on officials and their families, negotiators may seek a targeted solution tied to the president’s holdings. The shift matters because it could alter the negotiation dynamics between parties—potentially allowing the ethics language to become more politically acceptable while still addressing conflict-of-interest concerns.

However, the existence of a proposed ethics framework does not itself confirm that the final language will be agreed upon or adopted. The next procedural vote will signal whether enough senators believe the bill is worth taking up despite remaining uncertainties, and it may also pressure negotiators to finalize language quickly enough to avoid further delays.

What to watch after Sept. 15

With the Senate expected to reconvene on Sept. 15 and the cloture vote anticipated soon after, the immediate question is whether Democrats will provide the additional votes needed to reach the 60 threshold. If they do, lawmakers can proceed to debate substance—but readers should still watch for how ethics and stablecoin-reward provisions evolve, since those items have been central to the breakdown in earlier negotiations.

Demand for US spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) accelerated sharply over the past week, according to Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas. The renewed inflow momentum arrives after months of uneven participation, rekindling a key question for market watchers: whether institutional appetite is broadening again—or whether this is a temporary swing in investor behavior.

At the same time, the discussion around custody remains unsettled after a high-profile Coldcard hardware wallet incident in which attackers reportedly stole about $116 million in Bitcoin. The security breach has renewed attention on the trade-offs between self-custody and regulated products like spot ETFs.

Key takeaways

• Bloomberg’s Eric Balchunas said spot Bitcoin ETFs drew about $1 billion in net inflows for the week, the strongest since April.
• Balchunas described the rebound as the third-best weekly performance since last October—an era he called Bitcoin’s “silent IPO.”
• A Coldcard security exploit linked to vulnerable firmware has put self-custody concerns back in focus.
• Balchunas suggested the hack could help drive some investors toward spot ETFs, though he cautioned that the link is not proven.

Spot Bitcoin ETF inflows rebound after a patchy stretch

Balchunas posted that US spot Bitcoin ETFs took in roughly $1 billion in net inflows over the week ending Saturday. He said the result was the strongest weekly showing since April and ranked as the third-best week since last October, when he referred to Bitcoin’s “silent IPO.”

The “silent IPO” framing comes from investor Jordi Visser, who popularized the idea in November. In Visser’s view, early Bitcoin holders were gradually selling into expanding demand from ETFs and other institutional channels. The effect, under the theory, was enough additional supply to keep Bitcoin comparatively constrained even as new capital continued to enter via regulated vehicles.

That context matters for interpreting this week’s improvement. The source notes that ETF flows had deteriorated in earlier periods of stronger demand, making the recent rebound more noticeable. For traders and portfolio managers, consistent ETF inflows tend to be easier to track and model than broader, decentralized participation, so a return to stronger weekly demand can quickly change sentiment around the near-term positioning of institutions.

Coldcard hack refreshes the custody debate

The ETF story is unfolding alongside a major security incident involving Coldcard, a Bitcoin hardware wallet developed by Coinkite. The exploit reportedly resulted in about $116 million worth of Bitcoin being stolen, with the attack tied to a flaw in how affected devices generated wallet keys. According to the earlier coverage referenced in the source, attackers were able to compromise funds held in wallets created using vulnerable firmware.

On Friday, Balchunas argued that the Coldcard incident could ultimately strengthen the case for spot Bitcoin ETFs—particularly for investors who prefer not to manage the technical responsibilities that come with self-custody. He pointed to the observed surge in ETF inflows following the hack as a possible connection.

In his comments, Balchunas explicitly acknowledged the limitations of drawing conclusions from timing alone. “Correlation does not imply causation,” he said, but added that, over the long term, he can’t imagine there aren’t some investors who migrate from cold storage to ETFs.

For market participants, this is a meaningful mechanism to watch: a single security incident can influence risk perception across the broader custody ecosystem. Even when the affected devices are limited to specific conditions, the reputational impact can push some users toward a custody model backed by regulated intermediaries—especially those evaluating whether the operational burden of holding Bitcoin directly is worth the benefits.

What to watch next: whether inflows persist and custody concerns evolve

Even with this week’s strong ETF numbers, the key question is durability. Balchunas’ “silent IPO” concept suggests that ETF demand and investor selling behavior can interact in ways that keep price action subdued relative to capital inflows. The rebound in net flows therefore doesn’t automatically resolve the larger balance between new institutional purchases and supply from earlier holders—but it does reintroduce a tailwind to demand that was less pronounced in earlier weeks.

Separately, the Coldcard episode raises a second uncertainty: whether the custody shift Balchunas hinted at becomes visible in sustained ETF inflow patterns, or remains anecdotal. Investors watching the next cycle of weekly flows may want to compare whether inflows continue to strengthen over multiple reporting periods, and whether risk communication around hardware wallets changes in response to the incident.

Until regulators clarify broader standards and until the market sees how persistent the post-hack behavior proves to be, the combination of improving ETF demand and renewed custody concerns will likely remain a central driver of how Bitcoin’s institutional narrative develops.

Going forward, readers should track whether the next several weeks of spot Bitcoin ETF flows match this week’s strength—and whether custody-related headlines translate into measurable, sustained shifts in investor allocation between self-custody and regulated products.

Russian consumers’ demand for hardware crypto wallets more than doubled in the first half of 2026, according to data from two major retailers, as the country prepares to introduce new crypto rules.

Retailer M.Video said unit sales on its marketplace rose 107% in the second quarter from the first quarter, while sales by value increased 92%. The retailer did not disclose the number of devices sold.

Wildberries, another Russian retailer, also recorded higher demand. Unit sales rose 84% in the first half from a year earlier, RIA Novosti reported, citing RWB, the marketplace’s parent company. Sales value increased 60% over the period.

The comparisons cover different periods: M.Video measured Q2 against Q1, while Wildberries compared H1 with the same period of 2025. Neither company released unit totals.

Hardware wallets keep the private keys needed to control crypto on a dedicated device, instead of an internet-connected service, helping reduce exposure risk.

Russian law does not ban non-custodial wallets or treat them as illegal, lawyers told RBC. It does, however, bar withdrawals from Russian digital depositories to personal wallets, though a transition period runs until July 1, 2027.