Former Ethereum Foundation contributors and Ether treasury firms Bitmine and Sharplink have backed a new research and development nonprofit that aims to make Ethereum ready for institutional use.

Sharplink said on Monday that the organization, Ethlabs, was formed to “ready Ethereum for the next phase of institutional adoption,” with the company pitching in with Bitmine, Ethereum co-founder Joe Lubin and other Ethereum contributors on its funding effort.

“As stablecoins, tokenized real-world assets, funds and autonomous AI commerce move on-chain, they are converging on Ethereum as the neutral, credibly permissionless settlement layer for the global economy,” Sharplink said. “Ethlabs exists to ensure the network is ready to absorb that demand at scale.”

The launch comes days after former Ethereum Foundation contributor Trenton Van Epps warned that Ethereum is facing a core development funding crisis and amid an ongoing wave of departures from the Foundation, most recently co-executive director Hsiao-Wei Wang, who left last week.

Source: Ethlabs

Sharplink’s announcement said Ethlabs brings together “technologists who have guided the network through its most consequential upgrades over the past decade. This initiative gives that work a dedicated institutional home with stable, long-term funding.”

Ethlabs was co-founded by five former senior Ethereum Foundation researchers: Ansgar Dietrichs, Barnabé Monnot, Caspar Schwarz-Schilling, Josh Rudolf and Julian Ma.

Related: Ethereum bull David Hoffman explains why he sold his ETH

Lubin said in a statement that Ethereum “is entering its next stage of evolution” and that there should be “a number of steward nodes of Ethereum” that should work to grow the utilization of the blockchain.

“By providing a long-term, independent home to researchers and developers advancing Ethereum’s core technology and values, Ethlabs will be instrumental in preparing the network for the next major wave of adoption,” he added.

Ethereum Foundation crisis deepens 

In May, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin said the Ethereum Foundation’s resources were limited, noting that the organization only held about 0.16% of the total supply of Ether (ETH).

Former EF contributor Trenton Van Epps warned last week that Ethereum risks entering a “slow-burning funding crisis,” amid continued selling of the asset by the Foundation. 

“The EF is intentionally leaving a power vacuum for new structures to step up and influence the direction of Ethereum,” said Ethereum educator David Hoffman. “I think the Ethlabs direction holds the brightest future for Ethereum.”

Ether is trading 65% down from its peak at around $1,700, levels last seen in October 2023 and April 2025, as sentiment remains at crypto winter lows.

Magazine: Bitcoin decouples from tech stocks, Ether eyes ‘selling wave’: Market Moves

Key Takeaways

• Meta Platforms is deploying $900 million into Cred, an Indian fintech company, securing approximately 20% ownership at a $4.5 billion valuation.
• Kunal Shah, Cred’s founder, will take over WhatsApp leadership from Will Cathcart.
• Cathcart remains with Meta, transitioning to develop AI-powered consumer applications.
• WhatsApp surpassed 3 billion monthly active users in 2025, though monetization through advertising and subscriptions remains underdeveloped.
• Analyst consensus rates META as a Strong Buy, with average price targets indicating approximately 45% potential upside to $815.82.

Shares of Meta Platforms dropped approximately 2.7% on Monday following the tech giant’s announcement of a $900 million capital injection into Cred, an Indian fintech platform, coupled with the appointment of Cred’s founder Kunal Shah to lead WhatsApp.

Meta Platforms, Inc., META

The transaction secures Meta approximately 20% ownership in Cred, establishing a post-investment valuation of $4.5 billion. The investment structure includes both fresh capital for growth and secondary purchases from existing stakeholders.

At 47 years old, Shah established Cred in 2018. The platform incentivizes responsible credit card management by rewarding users for timely bill payments, while also offering spending analytics. Currently, the app serves roughly 17 million monthly active users.

Shah assumes leadership from Will Cathcart, who steered WhatsApp for approximately seven years and oversaw the platform’s user base expansion by more than 100%. Cathcart isn’t departing Meta — instead, he’s pivoting to develop AI-driven consumer products and applications.

Currently based in Bangalore, Shah will relocate to Meta’s Silicon Valley headquarters in Menlo Park.

Strategic Investment Pattern

Meta’s approach of combining major investments with talent acquisition isn’t unprecedented. In 2024, the company invested over $14 billion in Scale AI while bringing aboard its founder, Alexandr Wang, to oversee a newly established AI research division.

Shah was personally recruited by Meta Chief Product Officer Chris Cox, who deliberately sought entrepreneurial talent from markets where WhatsApp maintains strong penetration. Cox characterized Shah as “one of India’s most respected entrepreneurs.”

In communications reported by Bloomberg, CEO Mark Zuckerberg praised Shah as an innovator with “global perspective.”

Monetization Challenges Ahead

WhatsApp achieved the milestone of 3 billion monthly active users in 2025, establishing itself among the planet’s dominant messaging services. However, revenue generation remains nascent.

Advertising initiatives and subscription models — representing significant expansion opportunities for WhatsApp — remain in preliminary phases. Shah’s mandate includes accelerating these revenue channels while simultaneously integrating AI-powered agents throughout the platform.

Meta maintains substantial connections to India. The company previously invested $5.7 billion in Jio Platforms during 2020, acquiring a 10% position. More recently this month, Meta announced plans to lease its inaugural AI data center facility in the country.

Notably, despite the financial commitment, Meta will not occupy a Cred board position and won’t access customer data from the fintech platform.

Shah transitions to full-time employment at Meta while stepping away from operational responsibilities at Cred, though maintaining his shareholder status. Miten Sampat, currently overseeing company strategy, will assume interim CEO responsibilities as Cred’s board pursues eventual public market listing.

Cred completed a $75 million Series G financing round last year, with Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC serving as lead investor.

Wall Street maintains a Strong Buy consensus rating on META stock, with 31 Buy recommendations and 6 Hold ratings issued over the last three months. Analysts project an average price target of $815.82 per share, implying approximately 45% upside potential from present trading levels.

Franklin Templeton has officially closed its acquisition of crypto asset manager 250 Digital, a deal first announced in April that is designed to deepen the firm’s presence in actively managed cryptocurrency strategies.

The transaction brings 250 Digital’s investment team and crypto-focused approaches into a newly formed unit, Franklin Crypto. The division will be led by former 250 Digital executives Christopher Perkins and Seth Ginns, alongside Tony Pecore, Franklin Templeton’s executive for digital assets.

Key takeaways

• Franklin Templeton completed the acquisition of 250 Digital, closing a deal initially disclosed in April.
• The firm has created “Franklin Crypto,” combining 250 Digital’s team and strategies with Franklin Templeton’s institutional platform.
• Franklin Templeton did not reveal the purchase price or other financial terms of the transaction.
• The move follows earlier industry restructuring involving CoinFund’s spinout of liquid strategies into 250 Digital.
• Franklin Templeton’s tokenization initiatives have scaled quickly, with RWA.xyz reporting a multi-fold increase in its tokenized assets over the past year.

A deal built to expand active crypto management

According to the terms described at announcement, Franklin Templeton’s key objective is to strengthen its capability to deliver actively managed cryptocurrency strategies to institutional investors. The new division, Franklin Crypto, is positioned to blend the former 250 Digital team’s portfolio management work with Franklin Templeton’s broader distribution reach.

Franklin Templeton said the integration includes both the investment team and 250 Digital’s cryptocurrency strategies, which will be folded into the newly created structure. While the company did not disclose deal economics, the operational focus is clear: bringing more specialized crypto investing know-how under the umbrella of a larger, globally scaled asset manager.

Why 250 Digital matters—and how CoinFund’s earlier shift set the stage

The acquisition also reflects the evolving shape of specialty crypto investing firms. Earlier coverage from Cointelegraph noted that CoinFund decided earlier this year to spin out its liquid strategies business into 250 Digital as the firm sharpened its emphasis on venture investing.

That restructuring is important context for investors watching who is building where in the crypto asset management ecosystem. It suggests that 250 Digital’s core identity—managing liquid crypto strategies—was intentionally preserved and strengthened, making it a more direct fit for an established traditional asset manager seeking institutional-grade crypto exposure.

From crypto funds to tokenized products: Franklin Templeton’s multi-pronged push

Franklin Templeton’s acquisition arrives amid a broader expansion of its digital asset agenda, stretching beyond standalone crypto investing into tokenized financial products.

In February, Franklin Templeton announced a partnership with Binance that allows institutional investors to use tokenized money market fund shares as collateral for cryptocurrency trading. Under that framework, the tokenized fund shares remained in regulated custody, while their collateral value is reflected within Binance’s trading environment.

In March, the company partnered with Ondo Finance to offer tokenized exchange-traded funds (ETFs) on blockchain networks—an approach aimed at extending the reach of its investment products beyond traditional brokerage channels.

More recently, Franklin Templeton proposed two ETFs intended to reinvest stock dividends into Bitcoin-linked exposure, creating a hybrid strategy that bridges equities cashflows and digital-asset exposure. Earlier reporting from Cointelegraph covered that initiative as part of the firm’s ongoing experimentation with tokenized and crypto-linked investment wrappers.

Tokenization growth underscores the timing

The rationale for pairing a crypto acquisition with a tokenization push becomes more tangible when considering the scale and momentum reported by third-party data. RWA.xyz data shows Franklin Templeton’s tokenized assets have more than tripled over the past year, rising from about $768 million in June 2025 to more than $2.5 billion at the time of reporting.

RWA.xyz also indicates that the wider market for tokenized assets has grown quickly. It reports onchain RWA value increasing from roughly $11.8 billion to $32.2 billion over the same year-long period—evidence that demand for tokenized instruments and rails has been accelerating beyond any single issuer.

For Franklin Templeton, this matters because it places the firm at the intersection of two trends: institutional interest in actively managed crypto exposure and expanding infrastructure for tokenized finance. By adding a dedicated crypto division, the company is effectively attempting to serve investors with both strategy-based crypto allocations and tokenized structures that can sit closer to onchain trading and settlement workflows.

What investors should watch next

With Franklin Crypto now operational, the next key question is how quickly the firm translates the expanded team and strategy into scalable institutional offerings—and whether its crypto investing capabilities will be paired with its growing tokenized product lineup. Investors should also monitor how the unit’s activities evolve alongside ongoing ETF proposals and tokenization partnerships, as those steps can influence liquidity pathways, custody arrangements, and distribution reach.

Fomo, a social trading and token discovery platform, has secured $75 million in a Series B funding round led by Index Ventures. The round values the company at $550 million, with participation from Union Square Ventures and existing investor Benchmark, according to Fomo’s announcement on Monday via its website: https://fomo.family/blog/fomo-series-b.

The deal comes as crypto venture activity continues despite digital asset prices sitting below recent peaks. RootData reported that crypto startups raised $4.1 billion across 147 funding rounds during the second quarter.

Key takeaways

• Fomo raised $75 million in a Series B round led by Index Ventures, valuing the company at $550 million.
• Fomo says it has attracted more than 625,000 traders since launch, generating $4 billion in trading volume and 110 million social interactions.
• The platform claims 68,000 users made their first crypto purchase using Apple Pay, totaling about $25 million in transaction volume.
• Fomo’s core product blends social feeds with multi-chain trading, aiming to eliminate manual bridging and separate wallet management.
• The company is also expanding its product surface, including launching perpetual futures powered by Hyperliquid for users outside the U.S.

Series B funds a multi-chain social trading experience

Fomo’s business centers on making crypto trading feel less like technical execution and more like consuming content. The company enables users to trade across multiple blockchains without manually bridging funds or dealing with gas fees themselves—an abstraction it frames as lowering friction for new and returning participants.

In its funding announcement, Fomo also pointed to user traction. Since launching a year ago, the company said it has surpassed 625,000 traders, with $4 billion in trading volume and 110 million social interactions generated on the platform.

For investors and operators watching crypto’s “onboarding” challenge, this matters because social layers can change how users decide what to trade—shifting discovery from charts and listings toward peer activity and repeated patterns. Fomo’s pitch aligns with that direction: users can view what others are trading in real time and replicate those actions without running a separate operational process per chain.

Apple Pay onboarding and “feed-like” trading

Beyond engagement metrics, Fomo highlighted payments as part of its growth story. The company said 68,000 users made their first cryptocurrency purchase on the platform using Apple Pay, representing roughly $25 million in transaction volume.

Crypto research firm Delphi Digital has previously suggested that the product’s social design is helping it attract users by making trading feel more intuitive. In a December X post, Delphi Digital wrote that Fomo’s social features may make trading “more like scrolling a feed than sitting at a terminal.” The firm also claimed that in November, @fomo_family generated more monthly fees than Moonshot—even though Fomo was younger and had lower fees—according to the post shared on X: https://x.com/Delphi_Digital/status/1998483824049795573/photo/1.

While those remarks are not a full market analysis, they provide a useful lens for understanding how Fomo positions itself within a crowded execution-and-discovery landscape: reducing the perceived complexity of trading could be as important as route optimization or additional liquidity.

Copy trading is crowded—Fomo focuses on cross-chain execution

Fomo is not the first exchange-style product to incorporate copy trading and social visibility. The article notes that other platforms offering similar functionality include Binance, Bybit, OKX, Bitget, BingX, MEXC, Gate.io, KuCoin, Phemex and BitMart.

What distinguishes Fomo’s approach, based on the company’s description, is the emphasis on multi-chain execution without manual bridging or separate wallet handling. The promise here is operational simplicity: a user sees activity, then follows it in a way that is designed to work across chains more smoothly than typical self-custody workflows.

That framing becomes more relevant as copy trading strategies increasingly require reliable settlement across heterogeneous networks. Even when social copy features are easy to deploy, the “last mile”—actually executing the trade as users expect—can determine whether followers stay or churn.

Product expansion: referral payments and perpetual futures

Fomo’s funding news also connects to broader product development. On June 11, Fomo launched perpetual futures contracts powered by Hyperliquid for users outside the United States, according to an announcement shared on X by https://x.com/PaulErlanger/status/2065102992278171791.

Separately, on June 2 the company said it had surpassed $2 million in referral fees paid to users, based on a post from https://x.com/fomo/status/2061828121976861056.

Taken together, these moves suggest Fomo is trying to convert social engagement into monetization and stickiness—using both direct trading activity and incentive mechanics to keep users active. For market observers, the key question is whether the platform can maintain its onboarding and social-driven discovery advantages as it adds more financial products, particularly those that tend to increase complexity and risk for end users.

With Fomo’s Series B now in the books, the next things to watch are whether the company can scale its multi-chain execution experience reliably, sustain user growth without relying disproportionately on incentives, and demonstrate that social-driven trading translates into durable trading revenue rather than one-off spikes.

MoneyGram says it has moved from using blockchain rails to actively helping secure a major public network: the remittance firm is now running a validator on Solana. By staking Solana’s native token and processing transaction blocks, MoneyGram will participate directly in the network’s consensus while continuing to explore on-chain infrastructure for payments and treasury operations.

The company also announced that it has joined the Solana Developer Platform, which supports organizations building financial applications on the network. MoneyGram framed the validator step as part of a broader shift that builds on more than five years of integrating digital assets into its business, serving over 60 million customers across nearly 500,000 retail locations worldwide.

Key takeaways

• MoneyGram is operating a Solana validator, staking SOL and processing transaction blocks as part of its network participation.
• The move follows MoneyGram’s May launch of MGUSD, a US dollar stablecoin issued on Stellar and distributed through the MoneyGram app.
• MoneyGram’s Solana validator effort signals deeper operational commitment beyond remittance settlement, including treasury and product development use cases.
• The validator push aligns with wider stablecoin adoption in cross-border payments, with other remittance firms expanding Solana-based USD products.
• Investors and builders should watch how these firms balance network participation with stablecoin issuance across different chains.

MoneyGram becomes a Solana validator

MoneyGram’s validator operations place the firm in a role usually reserved for network participants who help validate and order transactions. According to the company, it stakes SOL as part of this process and processes Solana transaction blocks, meaning it is not only using blockchain infrastructure but actively contributing to the network’s throughput and security.

MoneyGram also said it has joined the Solana Developer Platform. While the program is designed for companies building financial services on Solana, MoneyGram’s participation suggests it wants to remain close to the application layer—not just settle transfers on-chain. For traders and developers, this matters because it typically reduces friction when launching or iterating payment flows that depend on reliable on-chain execution.

In parallel, MoneyGram stated that it uses blockchain infrastructure and stablecoins across its treasury, product development, and payments operations. That breadth of use indicates the validator step is meant to support multiple internal workflows rather than serving as a single isolated experiment.

MGUSD and the chain-by-chain stablecoin strategy

The Solana validator news comes after MoneyGram’s May announcement of MGUSD, a US dollar stablecoin on the Stellar network. MGUSD allows users to hold digital-dollar balances, transfer internationally, and convert into local currencies through the MoneyGram app.

Read together, the two developments point to a multi-chain approach to stablecoin deployment. MoneyGram is using Stellar for its dollar token product while now using Solana for validator participation and network-facing support. That does not automatically imply customers will move MGUSD on Solana, but it does show the company is testing how different public networks can fit different parts of its stack.

The operational question for the market is where MoneyGram’s blockchain activity will concentrate next: whether stablecoin issuance expands to more chains, whether validator operations scale further, or whether on-chain settlement improves time-to-finality and reduces funding friction in specific corridors.

Why this timing fits the remittance stablecoin push

MoneyGram’s validator launch arrives during a broader shift in the remittance industry toward stablecoins and blockchain networks for international transfers. One high-profile example is Western Union, which rolled out its dollar-backed stablecoin USDPT on Solana in May.

Western Union said the token launched first in Bolivia and the Philippines, with expectations to expand to more than 40 countries in 2026. At Bitso’s stablecoin conference in Mexico City last week, the company’s vice president of Digital Assets, Malcolm Clarke, described the stablecoin as a potential lever for changing how remittance transactions are funded and settled across its global network.

Clarke cited that Western Union processes more than $100 billion in annual transaction volume, estimating that prefunding needs, idle capital, and banking fees consume between 6% and 9% of that flow. He argued that using stablecoins for settlement—and earning returns from reserves backing those stablecoins—could translate into profit margins around 2% to 3%.

While those are company estimates rather than independent audited figures, the underlying logic is consistent with how stablecoin settlement can alter traditional payment economics: reduce the need to lock capital before transfers execute and streamline settlement timing. For participants in crypto markets, this is also a reminder that demand for stablecoin liquidity is increasingly tied to real-world operational constraints, not only speculation.

Data points from Bitso and growing momentum beyond Latin America

Market interest is reflected in adoption metrics as well. According to Bitso’s Stablecoin Landscape in Latin America report for the first half of 2026, stablecoin transaction volumes among the exchange’s institutional clients rose 81% year on year. Bitso attributed the growth to liquidity management, cross-border payments, and treasury operations—categories that map closely to the use cases MoneyGram described for stablecoins and blockchain infrastructure.

Stablecoin activity is also spreading into other regions. The article highlights Africa’s payments ecosystem in particular, noting that Ripple acquired a stake in cross-border payments provider Flutterwave, which operates in 35 countries. Flutterwave said it plans to integrate Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin, Ripple Payments, and the XRP Ledger into its payment network.

Taken together, these developments suggest stablecoins are becoming a mainstream tool for payments firms across multiple geographies—sometimes coupled with local distribution, sometimes aligned with broader network partnerships. However, the fragmented nature of adoption across different chains also means interoperability and liquidity sourcing remain practical constraints that companies must solve as volumes scale.

What to watch next for MoneyGram and the networks

MoneyGram’s move to run a Solana validator and its prior MGUSD launch on Stellar underline a key trend: major payment companies are experimenting with blockchain infrastructure where it fits their operational needs, rather than committing to a single network for everything. The next questions for the market are whether MoneyGram expands on-chain products beyond MGUSD, how it evaluates the impact of validator participation on settlement operations, and which networks it prioritizes as stablecoin usage grows.

SpaceX stock has fallen more than 10% in early U.S. trading after analysts initiated coverage without assigning a price target, adding to investor concerns about the company’s valuation following its record-breaking market debut.

According to a June 22 report from Barron’s, analysts at KeyBanc began coverage of SpaceX with a “Sector Weight” rating while declining to provide a target price for the stock.

The brokerage firm said SpaceX is likely to remain the dominant force in the space launch industry for years, but argued that much of the company’s future growth may already be reflected in its current valuation.

“SpaceX possesses significant disruptive growth avenues, though we believe this is reflected in current valuation and risk/reward appears balanced, in our view.”

SPCX shares traded around $165.63 at the time of writing, extending losses after one of the most successful public offerings in market history.

The pullback has drawn attention because it follows a sharp post-listing surge that helped push SpaceX’s valuation to levels that some analysts consider difficult to justify.

Analysts point to valuation concerns despite growth outlook

In its coverage note, KeyBanc identified Starlink as one of SpaceX’s most important revenue engines and said advances in artificial intelligence could support future expansion. Even so, the firm maintained a cautious position, citing what it described as a balanced risk-reward profile at current prices.

Similar concerns have emerged elsewhere. As previously reported by crypto.news, analysts at Morningstar estimated a fair value of $63 per share and argued that SpaceX stock may be trading above levels supported by fundamentals.

The debate over valuation comes only weeks after the company’s blockbuster public debut generated enormous wealth for shareholders. Earlier reporting by crypto.news noted that the IPO pushed Elon Musk’s net worth above $1 trillion while creating a new group of billionaires among early investors, executives, and institutional backers tied to the company.

Investor attention has increasingly shifted from the scale of the listing toward whether the business can deliver enough growth to support its market capitalization.

Bond sale adds another layer to investor focus

While analysts weighed valuation questions, SpaceX also entered the debt market for the first time.

Barron’s also reported that the company is issuing senior unsecured notes as part of its first bond offering. The report stated that SpaceX currently holds approximately $100.8 billion in cash and intends to use proceeds from the sale primarily to repay bridge financing, with additional funds allocated for general corporate purposes.

The debt offering arrives shortly after the company’s June 12 IPO, which reportedly raised over $85 billion after underwriters exercised the greenshoe option.

Recent reports have also suggested that SpaceX could pursue significantly larger fundraising plans. Last week, reports indicated that the company was exploring a bond raise worth as much as $20 billion, highlighting continued demand from investors seeking exposure to Elon Musk’s space and artificial intelligence businesses.

With analysts split between long-term confidence in SpaceX’s market position and concerns over its valuation, traders are now assessing whether the stock’s latest decline represents a temporary reset after an extraordinary rally or the beginning of a longer adjustment period.