The European Central Bank (ECB) and the European Union’s national central banks want crypto platforms to be prevented from using lending, borrowing, staking and other products that offer indirect returns on stablecoin holdings.

“Electronic money is intended to be used for making payments and not as a means of saving,” the European System of Central Banks (ESCB) said in a response to the European Commission’s consultation on reviewing the Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation (MiCA).

In the 57-page response, the group said it “continues to support the prohibition on CASPs paying remuneration on stablecoins,” referring to crypto-asset service providers. The ban, it said, should not be limited to services already governed by MiCA, which began taking effect in June 2024, and should also cover unregulated activities, including crypto lending, borrowing and staking.

The banks said that allowing indirect returns could undermine the distinction between electronic money and bank deposits, as well as distort the level playing field across the EU financial system.

“Maintaining and, where necessary, strengthening the prohibition, covering both direct and indirect forms of remuneration, should be a clear legislative priority,” the ESCB stated.

The European Central Bank (ECB) and EU central banks want to replace mandatory bank-deposit thresholds for stablecoin reserves with new liquidity requirements, arguing that large stablecoin deposits could create liquidity risks for banks.

The European System of Central Banks (ESCB) called for removing rules requiring at least 30% of reserves, or 60% for significant stablecoins, to be held as bank deposits. The proposal came in the ESCB’s response, published Tuesday, to the European Commission’s review of the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA).

Instead of the existing bank-deposit rules, the ESCB backed minimum liquidity thresholds for reserve assets maturing within one and five working days. It separately pointed to overnight reverse repurchase agreements (repos) and short-term sovereign bonds as alternative instruments issuers could use to achieve liquidity.

The new proposal echoes concerns previously raised by the stablecoin industry, including Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino, who has warned since at least 2024 that MiCA’s bank-deposit requirements could create systemic risks for both banks and stablecoin issuers.

EU central banks favor liquidity buckets

The ESCB said the existing requirement “creates a direct link between issuers and credit institutions” and could expose banks to liquidity problems if a stablecoin run forces an issuer to rapidly withdraw deposits.

The central banks cited draft rules published by the European Banking Authority in 2024, requiring significant stablecoins to hold at least 40% of reserves in assets maturing within one working day and 60% within five working days. For non-significant tokens, the thresholds are 20% and 30%, respectively.

Beyond stablecoin reserves, the ESCB also warned of “material challenges” in enforcing MiCA, saying non-compliant crypto companies can still access EU customers.

Tether raised similar bank-risk concerns in 2024

In an October 2024 Cointelegraph interview, Tether CEO Ardoino illustrated the risk with a hypothetical stablecoin holding 10 billion euros in reserves, 6 billion euros of which would have to be kept in bank deposits.

If a bank lent out 90% of those funds, he said, only 600 million euros would remain available, potentially creating a liquidity crunch if the issuer suddenly needed billions to meet redemptions, Ardoino said.

Related: ECB launches Pontes to settle tokenized assets without stablecoins

Flash forward almost two years and the ESCB now points to a similar risk, saying a stablecoin run could force an issuer to rapidly withdraw deposits and create liquidity problems for a bank, particularly if stablecoin reserves account for a significant share of its funding.

The central banks on Tuesday said risks can also flow in the opposite direction, citing the March 2023 collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, which triggered a run on Circle’s USDC stablecoin after Circle disclosed that $3.3 billion of its reserves were held at the bank.

Magazine: MiCA cracks down on USDT in Europe… but no one else cares

One of the first things anyone learns about Bitcoin is that it has a pseudonymous creator — and they’re a billionaire multiple times over.

Nearly 1.1 million BTC is widely attributed to Satoshi Nakamoto, but it’s a number that rests on a forensic trail identifying a mining operation, not a person. The estimate also varies by more than 200,000 Bitcoin depending on how strictly a certain “fingerprint” test is applied.

When 600 BTC mined in 2010 suddenly moved after 16 years, triggering speculation that “Satoshi’s coins” had awoken, that distinction became more important.

The coins came from 12 long-dormant block rewards that had been mined over four days in March 2010 and sat untouched until Sept. 5 this year, when someone controlling the private keys spent them one by one within half an hour.

But that doesn’t mean that the person spending that $46 million in Bitcoin was Satoshi.

The blockchain traces coins, not people

Onchain tracker Whale Alert found no connection between the 600 BTC and the mysterious Bitcoin creator’s stash.

Blockchain research firm Bitquery found that 10 of the 12 blocks didn’t match the distinctive mining pattern that’s come to be associated with Satoshi’s mining operation, known as “Patoshi.”

And the two remaining blocks only showed weak matches that could occur by chance according to Bitquery researcher Gaurav Agrawal.

Related: Bitcoin treasury firms can outperform BTC… but is the risk worth taking?

The rewards were mined by a single machine however, and whoever spent them this month controlled the private keys, but as Agrawal points out:

“What the chain cannot say is whether the hand in 2026 belongs to the person who ran the machine in 2010.”

It’s a mystery that’s likely to remain unsolved since private keys can be inherited, sold, stolen, or recovered from an old drive found in a secondhand store. Agrawal notes that “the chain only records that someone had it.”

The spending transactions used modern wallet software, which the 2010 client could not have produced, so “at the very least, the keys were loaded into something new.”

The Patoshi pattern behind the fortune

If the blockchain can’t tell us who owned those OG coins, how do we know the 1.1 million BTC actually belonged to Satoshi? Circumstantial evidence is the best evidence we have.

In 2013, researcher Sergio Demian Lerner identified a distinctive fingerprint in Bitcoin’s earliest blocks, suggesting one miner operated a machine differently from the other miners on the network that could be traced across thousands of blocks.

Lerner estimated that the miner had amassed around 1.1 million BTC, and more than a decade later, he still stands by his calculations.

Sergio Dermian Lerner identified the Patoshi pattern. Source: Bitslong

“It is accurate,” he tells Magazine, “with a disclaimer that the evidence is circumstantial; there is no math proof or direct witness.”

He says the case for connecting Patoshi to Satoshi goes beyond the mining fingerprint, however, since several early Bitcoin users, including Hal Finney, Dustin D. Trammell, Nicholas Bohm and Mike Hearn, received transfers that exhibited the Patoshi pattern:

“All those transfers were made from coinbases in the Patoshi pattern: that provides compelling reasons that Patoshi and Satoshi are the same person, although not proof.”

Lerner also says the miner appears to have been using specialized mining software rather than the standard client, which was likely created before Bitcoin launched. That makes it “highly improbable” that another miner developed a working specialized setup in the few hours between the Bitcoin v0.1 announcement and the mining of the first block. He says:

“Whoever was mining the Patoshi pattern started right at the earliest beginning.”

Bitquery rebuilt the fortune from scratch

13 years after Lerner identified Patoshi, Bitquery rebuilt the fingerprint from raw blocks, grading 54,316 blocks from Bitcoin’s early era and following every coin through Sept. 1, 2026.

Their “highest grade” reconstruction agrees with the public Patoshi list on 99.2% of blocks, and the firm also found zero exceptions in a timestamp-ordering test across 5,836 adjacent block pairs.

“I don’t know of a stronger test for this,” Agrawal says.

Bitquery’s estimate of the total fortune. Source: Bitquery.io

But the analysis casts some doubt around the famous 1.1 million BTC figure itself, since the number Bitquery found varies depending on how strictly the pattern is applied.

Related: Is Bitcoin too volatile to risk your retirement on?

“Run strictly, the fingerprint covers just under 0.9 million BTC,” Agrawal says, with the “most generous reading” at around 1.17 million.

That isn’t to say Bitquery disproves Lerner’s estimate, but it shows how the size of the Patoshi stash depends on how the mining pattern is applied.

“The published estimates of 1.0 to 1.13 million sit inside that range, so we did not move the number,” Agrawal says.

What links Satoshi to the 1.1M BTC

Agrawal says the claim that “Satoshi owns 1.1 million BTC” is really three claims stacked on top of each other.

“Satoshi Nakamoto” is the largest BTC holder. Source: Arkham

The claim that the coins came from one machine is supported by strong evidence. The claim that the machine belonged to Satoshi is circumstantial, and the claim that the keys still remain under his control can’t be proved simply because the coins have never moved.

Bitquery also discovered a 2010 transaction that it could not find reported “in any published study.”

On May 17, 2010, 600 BTC from early mining rewards moved in two transactions about an hour apart. The first, at 22:04 UTC, spent 10 block rewards worth 500 BTC, and the second, at 23:07 UTC, spent another two block rewards worth 100 BTC.

Those coins had been mined at different points throughout 2009, including rewards from near the beginning, and end, of Bitcoin’s first year.

“It matters, I think,” Agrawal says, “because it is the clearest moment where the chain itself, and not a statistical pattern, says these blocks belong together.” He says that is “as close as the chain gets” to confirming that blocks from all over 2009 sat in one wallet, “which is what the pattern claims for the whole set.”

So we know whoever controlled those keys had access to block rewards mined across 2009, but we don’t know who was behind them.

Unlike the May 2010 transaction, the 600 BTC that moved this September don’t belong to the Patoshi miner, and there’s no new evidence connecting them to “Satoshi’s” stash. As Agrawal says, “nothing in the math settles it, so we will never be sure.”

Related: 10 of the greatest unsolved crypto mysteries

Quick Read

• Apple (AAPL) trades near its 52-week high at $336, with a base case projecting a $5,000 stake grows to $7,705 by 2031.

• Apple’s most recent quarter delivered $109 billion in revenue, up 16%, with EPS surging 29% year over year.

• Risks include DRAM costs management called a ‘100-year flood,’ a stretched P/E of 39, and Siri AI blocked across the EU.

• Just released. Our analysts combed the entire stock market and named the ten best stocks to buy right now, and Apple didn’t make the cut. Enter your email to see the names that beat AAPL. The report is free. Enter your email and see if any of your stocks made the cut.

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) is trading at $336.13, sitting near a 52-week high of $344.27 after a run powered by the iPhone 17 cycle, a reimagined Siri AI, and record Services revenue.

For an investor putting $5,000 to work today, the question is straightforward: what could that stake become five years out, in fiscal 2031, if Apple keeps compounding the way the market currently expects?

Base Case: What $5,000 Could Become by 2031

Under the base case, a $5,000 Apple stake could be worth about $7,705 by September 20, 2031, a total return of 54.1%, or roughly 9.03% annualized. The per-share target behind that number is $517.97. The forecast carries a high confidence rating (0.9) and a buy recommendation.

For context, an investor who put $5,000 into Apple five years ago at $142.47 would already be sitting on about $11,796, a 135.92% gain. The forward model, understandably, is more modest.

Bull, Base, and Bear Scenarios for a $5,000 Stake

The bull case implies 13.43% annualized returns, while the bear path grinds out just 2.13% a year. Wall Street’s 12-month consensus target is $328.22, drawn from 6 strong buys, 19 buys, 14 holds, 3 sells, and 2 strong sells. Bullish sentiment stands at 57 against 11 bearish.

Free Report, Just Released

Advertisement

Why Didn’t AAPL Make The Top 10 List?

24/7 Wall St has helped investors make money for over two decades, and our top analysts just finished ranking the definitive Top 10 Stocks To Buy Now. Not the ten biggest companies. Not the ten everyone is arguing about. The ten best stocks to buy right now.

And AAPL didn’t make the cut!

The report is free, and you can see why we think each stock is a top investment today.

Advertisement

Enter Your Email and See the Ten →

Why the Model Sees Upside

Earnings acceleration is real. Apple’s most recent quarter delivered $109.4 billion in revenue, up 16%, with diluted EPS of $2.02, up 29%. iPhone climbed 22% and Mac rose 29%. Quarterly earnings growth of 28.7% year over year is a big reason the model’s 247Factor rates earnings acceleration as “Strong.”

Story Continues

Kakao Pay and KakaoBank, two major financial players in South Korea’s Kakao ecosystem, have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with crypto custody and infrastructure provider Fireblocks. The partnership is designed to explore digital asset use cases, including stablecoins, through proof-of-concept testing focused on infrastructure requirements specific to the South Korean market.

According to the announcement, the companies will work together to evaluate digital asset infrastructure that can meet local expectations around regulation, security, and service delivery. Fireblocks said it already provides infrastructure to more than 2,500 institutions, including over 100 banks, highlighting that the collaboration is likely aimed at bringing proven enterprise-grade tooling into Kakao’s domestic financial offerings.

Key takeaways

• Kakao Pay and KakaoBank are partnering with Fireblocks to run stablecoin and digital-asset infrastructure proof-of-concepts tailored to South Korea.
• The MoU focuses on regulatory, security, and service requirements rather than announcing any near-term product launch or deployment schedule.
• Fireblocks’ enterprise footprint—spanning over 2,500 institutions and more than 100 banks—positions it as an infrastructure partner for regulated finance use cases.
• The deal adds momentum to a broader wave of stablecoin experiments in South Korea, including won-denominated pilots by other financial firms.
• This comes after Kakao Group pursued stablecoin-related work with Circle, signaling continued institutional interest in onchain payments.

Why Kakao’s MoU matters for onchain finance in South Korea

For investors and builders, the most important detail in deals like this is often not a promised product timeline, but the direction of travel. Kakao Pay and KakaoBank are already positioned at the intersection of consumer payments and banking services in South Korea. By teaming up with an established crypto infrastructure provider, they are signaling that stablecoins—and the infrastructure required to support them—are moving from isolated trials toward more structured enterprise evaluation.

The scope is also telling: the agreement centers on proof-of-concept testing for infrastructure suited to local regulatory, security, and service requirements. That emphasis aligns with the reality that stablecoin deployments in mainstream finance depend on more than token mechanics. Institutions typically need secure custody, robust operational controls, and infrastructure that can integrate with existing systems while complying with domestic standards.

Enterprise infrastructure focus: what Fireblocks brings

Fireblocks is a known name in institutional crypto infrastructure, with the company stating it serves more than 2,500 institutions, including over 100 banks. While the MoU does not disclose specific technical architecture in the announcement, that enterprise scale suggests Kakao’s goal is likely to pressure-test how Fireblocks’ infrastructure can support compliant operations for digital assets—particularly stablecoins.

From an editorial standpoint, this matters because stablecoin experimentation has increasingly turned into an infrastructure conversation. The successful path to production often hinges on operational safety and integration capabilities: how assets are managed, how transactions are authorized, and how systems remain resilient under real-world usage and scrutiny.

Part of a broader stablecoin push across Kakao and South Korea

This new MoU follows earlier activity within the Kakao ecosystem. In July, Kakao Group signed a separate memorandum of understanding with stablecoin issuer Circle to explore blockchain-based payment infrastructure and related digital asset technology. That collaboration included evaluating opportunities around won-denominated stablecoins and associated services, according to earlier coverage from Cointelegraph: Kakao Circle won stablecoin payment infrastructure.

More broadly, Kakao Pay and KakaoBank are not acting alone. Cointelegraph previously reported that several South Korean financial and technology firms have been evaluating stablecoin opportunities as the country works on its regulatory framework for digital assets. One reference in that direction is Cointelegraph’s coverage of South Korea’s efforts to consolidate crypto law and related policy shifts: South Korea consolidated crypto law, tax repeal.

Stablecoin trials already underway: won-denominated experiments

The Kakao-Fireblocks agreement arrives amid an ongoing series of stablecoin pilots and proofs of concept in South Korea. In May, Cointelegraph reported that KB Financial Group completed a won-denominated stablecoin pilot covering issuance, offline merchant payments, and cross-border remittances: KB Financial Group stablecoin pilot.

In July, Cointelegraph also detailed how fintech company Toss partnered with Optimism and Sunnyside Labs on a proof of concept for won-based stablecoin payment infrastructure: Toss partners on won-stablecoin PoC. While each effort may differ in approach and partner stack, the common thread is the move toward practical payment rail testing, not just token issuance experimentation.

What changes with the Kakao announcement is the nature of the institutions involved. A combination of a major mobile payments service (Kakao Pay) and one of South Korea’s largest internet-only banks (KakaoBank) suggests a stronger pathway to scaling stablecoin use into consumer-facing workflows—if the proof-of-concept results support that direction. The MoU’s lack of a launch date also indicates the work is likely still in an assessment phase, where risk controls and regulatory fit will determine whether anything progresses beyond testing.

For readers tracking the sector, the competitive dynamic is worth noting. South Korea’s stablecoin efforts appear to be accelerating across multiple institutions, and each new partnership can influence how quickly the market gains confidence in infrastructure readiness—especially around security and compliance. As framework details develop, firms that can demonstrate operational reliability in PoCs will be better positioned when the window for wider adoption opens.

Next, the market will watch for concrete outcomes from Kakao Pay and KakaoBank’s proof-of-concept work—whether they publish results, narrow down specific stablecoin use cases, or expand testing into more operationally complex payment scenarios. Until then, the biggest uncertainty remains timing and scope: the agreement signals commitment, but the path from MoU to live deployments will likely depend on regulatory interpretation and the proof-of-concept findings.

Binance has invested $100 million in Circle Internet Group while entering a new five year commercial agreement that will pay the crypto exchange to promote USDC across its platform.

According to a securities filing cited in reports published Tuesday, Circle issued Binance 1.24 million Class A common shares at $80.84 each through a private placement that closed Sept. 17, bringing the transaction value to roughly $100 million.

The purchase was completed alongside new commercial terms between the companies covering the distribution and promotion of USDC. Circle agreed to pay Binance monthly incentive fees based on the amount of USDC held through its Modular Smart Contract Wallet infrastructure, while Binance agreed to carry out promotional activities tied to the stablecoin.

Circle said the $80.84 share price represented a discount to the company’s market value before the transaction. Binance faces restrictions on disposing of the shares under the agreement, limiting its ability to sell, transfer or hedge the position until the earlier of two years or certain circumstances in which Binance terminates the related commercial arrangements.

Binance retains voting rights attached to the shares during the restriction period.

Binance and Circle extend USDC deal for five years

The latest agreement replaces earlier commercial arrangements between Circle and Binance dating to November 2024 and August 2025.

Circle disclosed in its annual filing that the November 2024 agreement included a $60.3 million one time upfront payment to Binance and monthly incentive fees calculated using USDC balances held on the exchange and in its treasury, subject to minimum balance requirements. The treasury portion of that arrangement carried a two year term.

An expanded agreement signed in August 2025 covered USDC held through Circle’s Modular Smart Contract Wallet infrastructure. Circle agreed under those terms to make monthly incentive payments based on qualifying balances, while the arrangement carried a four year term with specified early termination provisions.

The companies have now replaced those arrangements with the five year agreement accompanying Binance’s equity purchase. Either party can terminate the new partnership before the full term if specified events occur, though the termination thresholds and related figures have not been publicly disclosed.

Circle subsidiaries entered into the commercial agreements, with the equity transaction closing immediately afterward.

The 1.24 million shares were issued through an unregistered private placement. As a result, Binance cannot freely resell the securities unless they are subsequently registered or the transaction qualifies for an exemption from registration requirements.

USDC ties between Binance and Circle have grown since 2024

Binance and Circle have been expanding their relationship since announcing a strategic USDC partnership in December 2024.

As crypto.news previously reported, the initial partnership was designed to make USDC available across more Binance products and services, including trading, savings and payments. Binance said at the time that it planned to use USDC in its own corporate treasury operations.

Their cooperation later extended beyond the stablecoin’s conventional use as a dollar pegged trading asset.

In July 2025, Binance began accepting Circle’s USYC as off exchange collateral for institutional derivatives trading. The arrangement allowed institutional customers to use the tokenized Treasury product as collateral while retaining its yield generating characteristics.

USYC was integrated through Binance’s triparty banking partners and custody infrastructure, while Circle said the asset could be converted into USDC when liquidity was required. Circle planned native issuance of USYC on BNB Chain as part of the integration.

Binance has continued adding infrastructure around Circle products. The exchange completed its integration of USDC deposits on Circle’s Arc network on Sept. 16, according to a Binance announcement.

Circle has expanded USDC distribution through major platforms

Circle’s agreement with Binance sits alongside other distribution arrangements through which the company pays partners connected to USDC circulation.

In August, Circle renewed its USDC agreement with Coinbase for another three years through 2029 on existing terms. Circle reported $73.3 billion of USDC in circulation at the end of the second quarter, up 19% from the same period a year earlier, while Coinbase held 30% of the circulating supply on its platform.

Circle generated $701 million in second quarter revenue and reserve income, an increase of 7% from the previous year, according to the August earnings report. The company said it planned to reinvest capital in products, distribution partnerships and other strategic opportunities instead of introducing quarterly dividends.

Distribution efforts have extended outside crypto exchanges. Circle signed a principal partnership with Chelsea Football Club in August, putting USDC branding on Chelsea shirts for the men’s, women’s and academy teams during the 2026/27 season.

The company has pursued payment infrastructure partnerships at the same time. Nium joined Circle Payments Network as a global payout partner earlier this year, connecting USDC based settlement with local currency payouts through bank accounts, wallets and cards across more than 190 countries and 100 currencies.

Binance has increased the role of USDC across its platform

Binance’s use of USDC has changed considerably since the exchange removed several USDC trading pairs in 2022 as part of an effort to concentrate stablecoin liquidity.

The exchange began bringing USDC pairs back in December 2023 and later expanded their availability across spot markets. Binance subsequently converted assets held in its Secure Asset Fund for Users into USDC and increased the stablecoin’s role across trading products.

Regulatory changes in Europe produced another expansion. Binance moved to remove non MiCA compliant stablecoin spot pairs for European Economic Area users in March 2025 while continuing support for compliant assets including USDC and EURI. The exchange offered zero fee trading on selected pairs and rewards tied to USDC or EURI as users moved away from affected stablecoins.

More recently, Binance has used USDC in products extending into traditional financial assets. The exchange launched tokenized U.S. equities in June, with the first batch of bStocks including Circle shares alongside Nvidia, Tesla, Micron and Sandisk.

The products are backed 1:1 by underlying securities and can be moved into self custody wallets or used in supported decentralized finance applications. Eligible users can convert the tokenized positions back into direct stock positions under the service’s terms.