Ethena has launched Ethena Pay in beta for 400 early users, bringing USDe payments, Avalanche settlement and annual reward rates of up to 6% to a self-custodial mobile app.

Ethena Pay connects USDe balances with daily payments

Ethena said in a launch announcement that Ethena Pay will begin with an early-access group of 400 users before adding more participants each week. The company plans to increase access throughout September as the app moves beyond its initial beta stage.

Available on iOS, the app combines a self-custodial crypto wallet with bank transfers, fiat on-ramps and a Visa payment card. A user’s dollar balance is held in USDe, Ethena’s synthetic dollar, while Avalanche processes transfers, purchases, and settlement behind the app’s consumer-facing interface.

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Users can receive fiat through assigned International Bank Account Number details or transfer crypto directly to their wallets. In either case, the received balance appears as USDe. Withdrawals sent to external bank accounts can be converted into the recipient’s local currency, according to Ethena.

Payments between Ethena Pay users can also be sent through a username or payment tag instead of a blockchain address. Ethena said transfers between app users carry no fee, while bank transfers denominated in U.S. dollars, euros, and British pounds are also free. Other bank transfers may cost between 0.05% and 0.1%.

The beta is available across 49 countries in Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and Oceania. Ethena Pay’s supported-market list includes countries such as Brazil, Mexico, Australia, Japan, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates, Kenya and South Africa, although individual products remain subject to local eligibility rules.

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Ethena Pay rates depend on membership tier

Ethena Pay divides its balance rewards across Standard, Pro, and VIP tiers. Standard users can receive a total annual rate of up to 5% on eligible balances capped at $5,000.

Pro users can receive up to 6% on a maximum eligible balance of $15,000, while the VIP tier applies the same 6% rate to as much as $50,000. Amounts above each limit continue to receive the prevailing USDe base rate but do not qualify for the added Daily Boost.

Rather than adding a separate 6% payment to USDe’s existing rate, Ethena Pay uses the Daily Boost to bring eligible balances up to the advertised total. If the USDe base rate increases, the boost becomes smaller; if the base rate falls, the boost grows to maintain the applicable tier rate. No boost applies when the base rate exceeds the tier’s stated rate.

Calculated from a user’s time-weighted average daily balance, the boost is normally paid in USDe within 24 hours after the accrual day ends. Ethena Pay requires users to complete at least one qualifying card transaction during each calendar month to receive it.

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Despite the app’s consumer-facing rate display, Ethena Pay’s terms describe the Daily Boost as a discretionary promotional incentive rather than interest, yield or a deposit product. The company also states that the balance and related rewards are not covered by the U.S. Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation or any other government-backed deposit insurance program.

Standard membership is free. Pro access can be obtained by locking $2,000 worth of ENA or referring 10 eligible users, while VIP membership requires $10,000 in locked ENA or 50 referrals, according to launch details reported by The Block.

Ethena’s balance model relies partly on returns generated from the assets supporting USDe. In August, Ethena and FalconX opened a $1 billion facility that uses part of USDe’s backing portfolio to finance secured, overcollateralized loans for institutional borrowers.

According to crypto.news, institutional lending already accounted for $310 million, or 6.9%, of USDe’s backing in early July. The reported portfolio also included roughly $2 billion in decentralized finance lending, about $1.2 billion in liquid stablecoins, and additional exposure to tokenized assets.

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Self-custody leaves recovery with the user

Ethena Pay Ltd., a Malta-registered software company, states that it does not operate as a bank, broker-dealer, investment adviser or money services business. Third-party providers supply the financial services accessible through the app.

Under its self-custodial design, private keys, seed phrases and wallet recovery details stay on the user’s device. Ethena Pay says it cannot access customer assets or restore a wallet when the user loses the credentials needed to enter it.

The Visa Spend Card is issued by Third National, a Puerto Rico-chartered bank, under a Visa license. Signify Holdings, which operates as Rain, manages the card program.

Qualifying purchases earn cashback in AVAX rather than dollars or USDe. Standard users receive 4% on the first $2,500 spent each month, while Pro members earn 4.5% on their first $8,000 and VIP users receive 5% on their first $20,000.

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Rates decline in bands after users cross those spending limits. For example, the Pro rate falls to 2% between $8,000 and $10,000, then to 1% from $10,000 to $12,000, and 0.5% above $12,000. Each lower rate applies only to spending within that band rather than repricing earlier purchases.

Ethena Pay excludes several categories from cashback, including ATM withdrawals, cash advances, gambling, gift cards, account funding, peer-to-peer transfers, and purchases of cryptocurrencies, stablecoins, non-fungible tokens, or securities. Transactions below $1 also receive no cashback.

Once a card payment settles, normally within one to three business days, the dollar value of the reward is converted into AVAX at the rate available when the credit is issued. Ethena Pay warns that its dollar value can rise or fall after reaching the user’s wallet because AVAX remains exposed to market movements.

U.S. users remain outside the Ethena Pay rollout

For U.S. readers, the main restriction is direct access. Ethena Pay is not yet available in the United States, and its card terms exclude U.S. citizens, residents and other U.S. persons even though the issuer is chartered in Puerto Rico.

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The European Union, the United Kingdom, and Canada are also outside the initial release. Ethena has listed those markets for a later rollout, but access will depend on regional requirements and product approvals.

American investors can still obtain indirect public-market exposure to Ethena’s ecosystem through StablecoinX, which trades on Nasdaq under the ticker USDE. The company held approximately 3.03 billion ENA tokens valued at about $275 million when its merger with TLGY Acquisition Corp. closed in June.

Institutional access has developed through a separate channel. In June, BlackRock integrated USDe into Aladdin, its investment and risk-management platform used by institutions overseeing more than $20 trillion in assets. BlackRock’s BUIDL tokenized money-market fund was also selected as the main reserve asset for Ethena’s white-label stablecoin product.

Avalanche handles the app’s settlement activity

Avalanche serves as the exclusive settlement network for Ethena Pay, covering transfers, card-related money movement, and payments, while the blockchain layer remains largely hidden from users.

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The network has already supported card and corporate-payment trials involving stablecoins. In July, Hyundai Card completed a $20,000 transfer between Hyundai Motor’s U.S. and Mexican entities using USDT on Avalanche.

Hyundai Card said the intercompany settlement took about seven minutes, compared with the three to four hours usually required for a conventional bank transfer. The company handled the project’s regulatory reviews, legal and tax assessments, internal controls, and remittance design, while blockchain payments provider Axiym also participated.

Judge Colleen McMahon has dismissed Burwick Law’s claims against Solana Labs, Solana Foundation, and its execs as part of the ongoing Pump Fun lawsuit. 

Yesterday’s court filing revealed McMahon’s orders that either denied or approved Pump Fun’s various motions to dismiss allegations put forward by Burwick Law. 

Racketeering (RICO) allegations that accuse Pump Fun’s parent company, Baton Corporation, and its executives, Noah Bernhard Hugo Tweedale, Alon Cohen, and Dylan Kerler, of wire fraud, illegal gambling, and unlicensed money transmission were upheld.

These two allegations were submitted by plaintiffs Carnahan and Okafor, but RICO claims put forward by the plaintiff Aguilar were dismissed. 

Pump Fun memecoins FRED and GRIFFAIN are not securities 

The judge also dismissed allegations that Pump Fun defendants broke the Securities Act by offering unregistered securities. 

They claim the two memecoins FRED and GRIFFAIN did not entail a “common enterprise” and, as such, do not fulfill the Howey Test. 

Crypto law firm founder Ariel Givner has noted, however, that this ruling does not mean all memecoins aren’t securities. She stressed this ruling only applies when a memecoin does not offer a shared goal of profits rising for everybody. 

Allegations of unjust enrichment were also dismissed from the suit. 

Read more: Iggy Azalea allegedly mis-sold MOTHER, leading to investor losses

Burwick Law hasn’t served 25 unnamed KOLs yet

The judge has also asked Burwick Law to explain why it hasn’t been able to serve 25 key opinion leaders (KOLs) since the lawsuit was filed in January 2025.

It accused the unnamed KOLs of promoting Pum Fun tokens and, in some cases, “concealing both their compensation and their own preexisting positions in the tokens they promoted.”

Burwick Law has until September 10 to explain why these KOL claims “should not be dismissed for failure to identify and serve them.”

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The crypto influencer “Scooter” was named as one of these defendants in a previous filing. They shortly threatened to sue Burwick Law for “potential defamation.”

Solana Labs and Jito Labs were added last year

Burwick Law’s lawsuit added Solana Labs and Solana Foundation over a year ago. 

It claimed the two worked together to avoid US securities laws and extract capital from the US market. 

Read more: Burwick Law chief refuses to comment on Dogshit2 memecoin

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It argued that Solana crypto infrastructure provided “no investor protections, disclosure obligations, or legal accountability” for the memecoin craze and its losses.

Jito Labs was also added alongside Solana Labs as a lawsuit defendant. However, Burwick Law voluntarily dropped Jito Labs months later.

Got a tip? Send us an email securely via Protos Leaks. For more informed news and investigations, follow us on X, Bluesky, and Google News, or subscribe to our YouTube channel.

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A fake Claude desktop application is reportedly being used to distribute RevStealer, a Windows malware strain built to steal crypto, password and browser data.

According to a Monday report by cybersecurity company Morphisec, RevStealer was previously distributed through GitHub repositories and game-cheat-themed sites but the most notable is a fake “Claude Opus 5 Free Desktop” project that impersonates AI developer Anthropic and promises free access to Claude.

The researchers noted that the malware is designed to leave few traces and searches browser databases, cookies, password-manager records, VPN and remote-access settings, messaging data, screenshots and selected documents. RevStealer also targets over 50 cryptocurrency wallets.

The malware checks whether the machine looks like a real user device before unlocking its malicious payload, looking at available memory, the number of processor cores, hostname, username and graphics hardware. It also monitors for the debugging delays typical of malware analysis environment.

If RevStealer detects anything out of the ordinary, it does not move on to the next stages of infection and malicious activity. If the system passes those checks, the payload is decrypted, stored under a random name and covertly executed.

The report follows the discovery by Russian cybersecurity company Kaspersky of a new malware framework targeting cryptocurrency investors called OkoBot, which can harvest crypto wallet files, browser data and user credentials, inject malicious extensions and capture wallet application windows to steal assets.

Related: Microsoft warns users of ‘Crypto Clipper’ malware spread via USB drives

Cointelegraph is committed to independent, transparent journalism. This news article is produced in accordance with Cointelegraph’s Editorial Policy and aims to provide accurate and timely information. Readers are encouraged to verify information independently.

• KuCoin adds UTA support to its institutional lending program.
• New API clients face a lower 30-day volume requirement of 10M USDT.
• Eligible institutions can borrow up to 3M USDT across key products.

KuCoin has upgraded its Institutional Interest-Free Lending Program by integrating support for its Unified Trading Account (UTA), as the crypto platform looks to streamline capital management for institutional clients.

The upgrade reduces the qualifying external 30-day trading-volume requirement for newly registered API clients from 30 million USDT to 10 million USDT.

Eligible clients can also access 0% interest for the first two months without a trading-volume requirement.

Under the upgraded program, eligible institutional clients can borrow up to 3 million USDT.

Borrowed funds can be used across Spot, Margin, and Futures trading, while borrowing is available in USDT, USDC, Bitcoin, and Ethereum.

KuCoin integrates lending with unified accounts

The integration is designed to reduce capital fragmentation between separate trading accounts.

KuCoin said institutions operating across multiple products and strategies can face higher costs and operational friction when capital is divided between accounts.

UTA provides eligible users with a single account structure for managing capital across supported trading products.

With institutional lending integrated into the framework, borrowed funds can be deployed across Spot, Margin and Futures without requiring transfers between separate trading accounts.

The setup is intended to bring financing closer to execution and allow professional trading teams to deploy collateral and capital more efficiently.

KuCoin said the upgraded infrastructure is focused on how institutions access, manage, and deploy digital assets across different trading strategies.

Lending program expands from targeted credit

KuCoin introduced targeted interest-free credit in 2024, initially offering eligible API traders and quantitative teams access to up to 500,000 USDT alongside benefits including fee support, enhanced connectivity, higher API limits and technical assistance.

In 2025, the borrowing limit increased to 3 million USDT.

The program also added support for multiple borrowing assets and allowed clients to combine funds from sub-accounts as margin across eligible products.

The 2026 upgrade represents the latest stage of the program’s development, moving beyond targeted credit support toward a more integrated institutional capital infrastructure, according to the company.

The latest changes also lower the entry requirement for newly registered API clients, potentially expanding access to the lending program.

KuCoin highlights capital efficiency for institutions

Alison Qin, Head of KuCoin Institutional & VIP, said professional market participants require flexible and capital-efficient access to liquidity.

She added that institutional lending infrastructure needs to combine financing at scale with tailored terms and competitive pricing to support sophisticated trading strategies.

Qin said integrating lending with UTA brings capital closer to the accounts and products used for those strategies, while helping clients maintain control over execution and risk.

The company said the upgrade forms part of its broader product development strategy, connecting financing, account infrastructure and execution for institutional users participating in the digital asset market.

Founded in 2017, KuCoin said it serves more than 45 million users across more than 200 countries and regions.

The platform provides access to more than 1,500 digital assets and said it has built a compliance framework that includes AUSTRAC registration in Australia, a MiCA license in Europe, and regulatory progress in other markets.

 

Solana price held above the key $100 level on Sept. 1 after its late-August rally stalled near $110, with weakening trend strength pointing to consolidation before the next major move.

Solana price momentum weakens above $100

According to data from crypto.news, Solana (SOL) price was trading near $102.30 at the time of writing, down about 0.7% on the daily chart but still above the psychological $100 level. The token began the seven-day period near $102.17, climbed to $110.04 on Aug. 27, and then gave back most of that advance.

SOL remained up slightly for the week despite the pullback. Its ability to outperform several other large-cap cryptocurrencies followed Charles Schwab’s plan to add SOL trading alongside Avalanche and Chainlink.

The announcement helped SOL gain more than 9% in 24 hours as trading volume increased. However, the broader crypto market was also rising at the time, making it difficult to assign the full rally to the Schwab development.

Solana’s daily chart shows that the advance carried the price through the $100 Murrey Math resistance level before sellers appeared around $110. The subsequent decline has brought SOL back toward the breakout area, turning $100 into the market’s immediate test.

A daily close above that level would preserve the breakout structure. Losing it would suggest that the late-August move failed to establish a durable higher trading range.

Technical indicators point to consolidation

The 4-hour chart shows SOL trading below the Bollinger Bands’ middle line at $103.88. That level now acts as the first short-term barrier for buyers.

The upper Bollinger Band stands at $106.60, close to the daily Murrey Math resistance at $106.25. The overlap makes the $106.25–$106.60 region the most important nearby resistance zone.

A sustained move through that area could allow SOL to challenge $110 again. Beyond the recent high, the daily chart places the next resistance at $112.50, while $118.75 marks a higher reversal zone.

Momentum has weakened as the price contracts. The 4-hour Average Directional Index has dropped to 17.47 after rising above 70 during the breakout. An ADX reading below 20 normally reflects a market without a strong directional trend, increasing the chance of sideways trading.

The Bollinger Bands are also beginning to narrow after expanding sharply during the rally. Price is sitting close to the lower band at $101.16, leaving buyers little room to defend before the market tests $100.

Daily Chaikin Money Flow remains positive at 0.27, however. The reading shows that buying pressure has not disappeared despite the retreat from $110. Positive capital flow supports the case for consolidation above $100 rather than an immediate reversal of the entire August advance.

Liquidation heatmap places SOL between two liquidity zones

The one-week CoinGlass liquidation heatmap identifies a large concentration of leveraged positions near $100. The level has remained the brightest liquidity cluster below the current price, making it a possible short-term target if selling continues.

SOL already approached that zone during its Aug. 31 decline before recovering toward $103. A return to $100 could trigger another round of long liquidations, particularly if the price breaks below the level with rising volume.

Liquidity also appears above the market between approximately $108 and $110. The concentration coincides with the recent high and could attract the price if buyers reclaim the Bollinger midpoint and $106.60 resistance.

Smaller clusters are visible around $104–$106, meaning a recovery may encounter resistance before reaching the larger liquidity pool. The resulting setup leaves SOL between two competing targets: downside liquidity around $100 and short-liquidation exposure near $108–$110.

A confirmed break below $100 would place $93.75 in focus on the daily Murrey Math chart. The next major support stands at $87.50, although the token would first need to lose its current breakout structure for either level to become an immediate target.

Solana analysts track a wider breakout structure

Crypto analyst Batman said in an Aug. 31 post that SOL had broken out of a major accumulation structure. His chart identifies the $83–$85 region as the key long-term retest zone and presents a possible path toward $150 if that support holds.

The $150 projection remains a conditional, longer-term target rather than an immediate price objective. SOL would first need to reclaim the $106.25–$110 resistance region and establish a higher high above $112.50.

Solana’s price also received support from the network’s Double Disinflation proposal. Validators approved the measure with about 67% support, narrowly clearing the required two-thirds threshold. The change doubles the annual disinflation rate from 15% to 30% while retaining the network’s 1.5% long-term inflation target.

US investment products provide another source of demand. Spot Solana exchange-traded funds had recorded $1.22 billion in cumulative net inflows by late August, including their strongest daily intake of 2026.

BREAKING: Solana ETF cumulative inflows hit a record $1.22B. $33.5M came in Monday alone.

The biggest single day of 2026, capping five straight days of inflows. pic.twitter.com/0iaIbV6Tdd

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— Solana (@solana) August 25, 2026

For the short-term outlook, $100 remains the dividing line. Holding it would leave room for another test of $106.25 and $110, while a daily close below it would weaken the breakout and expose $93.75. Falling ADX readings suggest that SOL may first spend time consolidating between those levels before choosing its next direction.

Disclosure: This article does not represent investment advice. The content and materials featured on this page are for educational purposes only.

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