US spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) inflows surged last week after months of uneven flows, with investors pouring nearly $2 billion into the products amid a surge in Bitcoin’s price.

Bitcoin ETFs recorded $1.92 billion in net inflows during the week ending Friday, marking their strongest weekly performance in nearly 10 months, according to SoSoValue data.

ETF analyst Nate Geraci said Sunday that spot Ether ETFs also attracted about $700 million. He added that Bitcoin and Ether funds each posted their strongest weekly inflows since October 2025.

The renewed ETF demand came amid Bitcoin jumping more than 20% last week, briefly surging past $79,000 on Friday after starting the week near $63,000, according to CoinGecko.

Bitcoin ETFs remain in the red for 2026

Despite the latest surge, US spot Bitcoin ETFs have recorded about $2.91 billion in net outflows so far in 2026.

The funds saw their heaviest monthly outflows in June at $4.51 billion, following $2.43 billion in withdrawals in May. August has brought $2.38 billion in net inflows through Friday, making it the strongest month for inflows so far this year.

Monthly spot Bitcoin ETF flows since October 2025. Source: SoSoValue

During the last major inflow wave in October 2025, the funds attracted $3.42 billion. The October inflows preceded the Oct. 10 crypto market crash, which triggered the largest liquidation event in the industry’s history, wiping out roughly $19 billion in leveraged positions within 24 hours.

Source: Quinten

Since Oct. 6, when Bitcoin traded near $124,700, its price has plummeted roughly 38%.

BlackRock’s IBIT flashes a “bullish signal”

BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF (IBIT) was responsible for much of last week’s resurgence, attracting about $1.33 billion in net inflows across five consecutive trading days, according to Farside Investors data.

IBIT’s daily inflows rose from $160.2 million on Monday to $503 million on Thursday, before easing to $239.3 million on Friday.

Source: Eric Balchunas

Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas took to X to highlight what he described as a “classic Flipping the Bird pattern” in IBIT’s daily flows, adding that he viewed it as a bullish signal.

Magazine: We are so back! Bitcoin’s 23% rally on US debt policy: Hodler’s Digest

What our eschatologies excuse 

Decentralized lending protocol Term Finance has reportedly suffered a major governance-related theft targeting its vault product, with security firms estimating losses of roughly $8.5 million. The incident centers on Term Meta Vaults—strategy vault contracts designed to allocate and manage assets—where an attacker allegedly gained control of governance and used it to drain funds.

PeckShield said the attacker extracted about 2,843 ETH and 1.68 million USDC. PeckShield’s post valued the ETH at approximately $6.87 million at the time of the reported drain, and stated that the USDC was converted into about 1.68 million DAI. CertiK reported a broadly similar figure, putting the total loss at around $8.5 million.

Key takeaways

• Security firms estimate Term Finance’s vault theft at about $8.5 million, based on reported withdrawals of ETH and stablecoins.
• The attack is described as a governance takeover: the attacker allegedly obtained voting power and passed proposals enabling vault control.
• Term Labs says it has shut down Term Meta Vaults and revoked their DAO governance roles, aiming to stop further deposits while allowing withdrawals.
• Earlier risk controls were already tightened after a prior 2025 oracle incident, but this new event again highlights governance as a critical attack surface.

Estimated losses and what was taken

Multiple blockchain security monitors aligned on the scale of the exploit. According to PeckShield’s alert, the attacker drained approximately 2,843 ETH and 1.68 million USDC from Term’s vault system. PeckShield also indicated that the USDC was traded into roughly 1.68 million DAI.

CertiK’s estimate matched the order of magnitude, placing the combined loss at about $8.5 million. The reported theft was especially significant relative to what Term had deployed in its vaults: DefiLlama data indicates the Term vault product held about $12.45 million prior to the incident, including nearly all of its roughly $8.8 million in Ethereum deposits.

Term Labs freezes vaults, claims core protocol markets were not affected

Term Labs responded by stating it had “irreversibly shut down all Term Meta Vaults” and revoked their DAO governance roles. The company said the move prevents additional deposits, while withdrawals remain open.

In its statement, Term Labs said its investigation so far indicates the underlying Term protocol, along with its direct borrowing and lending markets, were not affected. The team also emphasized that it was still validating the full scope of impact, including whether any additional exposure exists beyond the vault contracts targeted in the incident.

Governance manipulation allegedly enabled vault control

Monitoring service Defimon said the attacker likely achieved control by cheaply acquiring a majority of a sparsely distributed governance token. Defimon reported that the attacker then used that control to submit proposals that allowed it to seize control of Term’s vaults.

Term has not confirmed how the attacker obtained voting power or which exact governance functions were used. That uncertainty matters for users and integrators because it points to gaps that may extend beyond a single contract bug—especially when governance frameworks can be influenced through token concentration, proposal mechanics, or voting wrappers.

Term’s vault contracts are built using Yearn V3 infrastructure. However, Yearn stated that the exploit relied on a custom governance wrapper and that the attack vector does not apply to standard Yearn vault setups. This distinction is important for builders evaluating whether “Yearn-based” automatically implies “protected by default” governance assumptions.

Why this echoes a prior Term incident

This governance exploit comes after an earlier Term incident in April 2025, when an oracle error is reported to have triggered unintended liquidations totaling about 918 ETH. Term’s subsequent response included recovering about 556 ETH at the time, reducing its final loss to 362 ETH, and reimbursing affected users, according to a postmortem published by Term.

In the wake of that April 2025 episode, Term pledged third-party validation for critical updates and committed to greater governance transparency. The new theft suggests that, regardless of improvements to operational controls and monitoring, governance pathways can still become high-impact targets if attackers can acquire voting influence or exploit proposal execution flows.

At this point, the most actionable questions for stakeholders are whether Term’s remaining vaults and governance arrangements are fully isolated from the compromised mechanics, and how quickly Term can quantify any residual exposure. With the company already disabling Meta Vault deposits and revoking governance roles, attention should turn to the scope of affected contracts, the likelihood of partial recovery, and whether Term’s governance design will undergo further structural changes before the next round of vault operations resumes.

Solana validators and delegators began voting on three network governance proposals on Aug. 23, covering a proposed constitution, faster SOL disinflation and a redesigned transaction fee structure.

Voting on SGP-0001, SGP-0002 and SGP-0003 will remain open until the end of epoch 1023. Solana developers expect the epoch to conclude at approximately 15:30 UTC on Thursday, Aug. 27, although blockchain epoch timing can shift.

The proposals are stake-weighted signaling votes. Approval would establish a mandate to proceed, but the inflation and fee changes would still require technical implementation before becoming active.

Solana Constitution would formalize network decisions

SGP-0001 asks validators and delegators to ratify the Solana Constitution. The document would become the canonical framework for network-level decisions and activate Solana’s on-chain governance system, known as svmgov.

The proposed system allows validators to vote using their active stake. Delegators can normally vote through their validator, but they retain the right to override that decision using their own stake account.

Under the proposed rules, participation must reach one-third of network stake. Approval requires support from two-thirds of participating stake, excluding abstentions from the approval calculation.

An SGP represents a directional decision rather than a complete technical specification. Solana Improvement Documents, or SIMDs, provide the detailed protocol changes that developers review and implement afterward.

Faster disinflation could reduce SOL issuance

SGP-0002 asks the network to support doubling Solana’s annual disinflation rate from 15% to 30%. The proposal would not immediately halve the current inflation rate. Instead, it would accelerate how quickly inflation falls toward the existing 1.5% terminal floor.

The associated SIMD-0550 estimates that the change would shorten the time required to reach the terminal rate from approximately 5.7 years to 2.8 years. It projects around 18.9 million fewer SOL in emissions over six years compared with the current schedule.

Those figures remain projections rather than confirmed supply reductions. The actual result would depend on the activation date and network conditions. The change is also consensus-sensitive because validator rewards affect capitalization and bank hashes.

The vote follows an earlier debate over Solana’s security budget. As previously reported, an 80% inflation reduction proposal failed to secure sufficient approval in March 2025 despite receiving support from 61.39% of participating stake.

Solana fee reform would expand transaction burns

SGP-0003 asks voters to endorse splitting Solana’s base transaction charge into an inclusion fee and a resource fee. The inclusion fee would go to the block leader, while the resource portion would be burned completely.

The accompanying SIMD-0553 proposes a fixed inclusion fee of 2,500 lamports per transaction. The resource fee would vary according to the computational resources requested by each transaction.

Supporters argue that resource-based pricing would make transactions requesting more network capacity pay more. Burning the resource fee would also remove SOL from circulation rather than distributing that portion to validators.

A successful vote would only authorize developers to pursue the model. It would not immediately change fees or SOL burns. Detailed implementation, testing and feature activation would follow through the SIMD process.

What happens after the three Solana votes?

Validators and delegators can vote for, against or abstain before epoch 1023 ends. Votes are weighted using active stake recorded during the governance snapshot.

If a proposal reaches quorum and the required approval threshold, its outcome becomes a network mandate. SGP-0001 would ratify the governance framework, while SGP-0002 and SGP-0003 would guide work on their related technical specifications.

SOL traded near $94.27 on Aug. 24, up approximately 1.8% over 24 hours and about 25% over seven days. The broader cryptocurrency rally contributed to the weekly move, and available market data does not establish that governance voting caused the increase.

Final vote totals will determine whether Solana proceeds with all three proposals, accepts only part of the package or leaves the existing inflation and fee structures unchanged.

A cryptocurrency wallet attributed to market maker Wintermute carried approximately $190.77 million in short positions on Hyperliquid on Aug. 24, according to a snapshot published by blockchain analytics account Onchain Lens.

The reported exposure included a $10.19 million XRP short, making XRP the fifth-largest bearish position in the account at the time. The wallet’s overall short exposure had increased by approximately $44.58 million from an earlier $146.19 million snapshot.

The positions are verifiable through public derivatives data, but their attribution to Wintermute relies on third-party wallet labels and transaction analysis. Wintermute has not publicly confirmed that it controlled the wallet or disclosed the purpose of the positions.

Wintermute-linked shorts reached $190.77 million

Ethereum represented the wallet’s largest short position at $53.02 million. Bitcoin followed at $30.66 million, while Solana accounted for $22.62 million.

The account also held an $11.43 million HYPE short and the $10.19 million XRP position. Onchain Lens reported a combined unrealized loss of approximately $5.85 million when it captured the figures.

An earlier snapshot showed $160.03 million in total open positions, comprising $146.19 million in shorts and $13.85 million in longs. The account had earned approximately $2.14 million in funding while carrying an unrealized loss of $3.66 million.

Onchain Lens also reported lifetime profits of $203.55 million for the address. Historical profitability does not establish that the current positions will succeed, especially because perpetual contract values and liquidation levels move continuously.

XRP short follows a 47% weekly price rally

XRP traded near $1.47 on Aug. 24 after gaining approximately 47% over seven days. The crypto moved between $1.46 and $1.54 over the latest 24-hour period, with trading volume near $4.85 billion.

As previously reported, Treasury buybacks and marketwide liquidations helped XRP gain 47%. The rally also coincided with rising leverage on major derivatives exchanges.

The $10.19 million short represented approximately 0.28% of the $3.61 billion in XRP open interest cited at the time. It was therefore large for one publicly tracked account but small relative to the broader derivatives market.

Reported Binance and OKX positioning leaned toward long exposure. Binance’s general account long-to-short ratio stood near 2.57, while the equivalent OKX ratio was approximately 2.08. Those readings count accounts rather than the dollar value of positions, so they do not provide a complete measure of market direction.

Around $21.42 million in XRP derivatives positions were liquidated during the preceding 24 hours. Long liquidations accounted for approximately $12.47 million, compared with $8.95 million from shorts.

A short position does not confirm a bearish forecast

A large short position can represent a directional bet that prices will fall. However, market makers also use perpetual futures to hedge spot inventory, options exposure, client transactions and positions held on other exchanges.

Wintermute operates across centralized and decentralized venues. The firm could therefore hold offsetting spot, futures or options exposure that is not visible through this single Hyperliquid address.

Transfers to Binance also do not prove that assets were sold. Exchange deposits may precede selling, but they can also support collateral management, market making, internal transfers or settlement.

The wallet attribution requires similar caution. Public researchers and an independent analytical repository have connected the address to Wintermute’s Hyperliquid activity, but that identification is not equivalent to a company statement.

What happens next for XRP and the tracked wallet?

The first test for XRP is whether it can hold the $1.44 to $1.46 region after its weekly surge. Resistance remains around the recent $1.54 high, followed by the psychological $1.60 level.

A move above those levels could increase losses for uncovered short positions. A decline below recent support could instead benefit bearish exposure and place additional pressure on heavily leveraged longs.

The wallet also requires continued monitoring because its positions can change quickly. At retrieval, a HypurrScan explorer page no longer displayed an active perpetual position value.

This could mean the positions changed after Onchain Lens captured its snapshot, or that the explorer did not expose the relevant account structure. The $190.77 million figure should therefore be treated as a timestamped observation rather than the wallet’s guaranteed current exposure.