Amazon just tripled its order of Nvidia chips over ‘surging demand’

Amazon is adding another 2 million Nvidia GPU chips to its data centers over the next two years. But this extended partnerships stretches beyond buying more chips.

SEC resurrecting U.S. crypto custody rule the previous administration failed to land

In 2023, the regulator tried to narrowly restrict the places investment advisers could park clients' crypto assets, but the new approach is still shrouded in secrecy.

Aave Opens iOS Early Access, Keeps Android and Web Waitlisted

The savings app supports bank and stablecoin deposits; a July proposal described swaps and foreign exchange as additions planned for 2026.

39 State Banking Groups Form BankChain Alliance for 2027 Blockchain Launch

The industry-owned network is still selecting a technology partner and would support tokenized deposits, stablecoins, smart payments and automated settlement.

Anthropic continues compute-gobbling streak in $45 billion deal with Nscale

The new deal with the infrastructure provider is the latest example of Anthropic's white-hot compute-gobbling streak.

Nvidia tops earnings estimates, guides to $108 billion in revenue next quarter

The tech bellwether reported fiscal second-quarter results after the bell on Wednesday.

Core Lightning Tells Node Operators To Go Offline, With No Patch Published

The CLN team said operators who don’t upgrade should run their nodes --offline, but the fixed binaries aren’t out yet and the details of what they fix are under a two-week embargo.

Google’s Gemini has a branding problem, and so does the rest of AI

Consumer AI apps need to stop making users learn their product architecture.

How do we explain OpenAI’s executive exodus?

Was Greg Brockman the right executive all along?

OpenAI releases its official report on the Hugging Face breach

The report, which spans several discrete cybersecurity compromises, is the most complete accounting of the incident to date.

The inside story on why OpenAI agents hacked Hugging Face

The models responsible for last month’s agent hack of Hugging Face had been inadvertently trained to cheat and to communicate with each other, according to an OpenAI technical report released today. The hack, which a group of agents undertook to find solutions for a cybersecurity test that they were

Unstoppable Skips ICANN Round, Refunds Web3 Domains

Founder Matthew Gould said the cost of taking web3 strings through ICANN was higher than what the company expected to recover in sales, six months after telling customers it would apply for all six of its original extensions.

The Bull Case for Fake World Assets

Fake World Assets has real revenue, a growing ecosystem, and new NFT distribution possibilities.

SEC Crypto Custody Rewrite Enters White House Review

The planned rule would cover advisers and investment companies and clarify digital-asset custody, following the withdrawal of a separate 2023 proposal.

JPMorgan Weighs Stablecoin as Bank Push Accelerates

JPMorgan weighs its own stablecoin as major banks explore a global consortium and thousands of smaller banks launch BankChain Alliance.

Radar makes podcasts searchable — and usable by AI agents

Particle’s new podcast intelligence platform transcribes and analyzes more than 130,000 podcasts, making their conversations searchable on the web and accessible to AI agents through an API and MCP.

Shinhan and Visa team up to test stablecoin issuance and B2B settlements in South Korea

Shinhan Financial Group will use Visa’s platform to test stablecoin issuance, remittance, and redemption while building new AI-powered payment models.

Revolut Starts EURR Rollout With Bridge as Regulated Issuer

Revolut opens EURR to selected customers in three countries; Bridge reported €374 outstanding, compared with €394.5 million of Circle’s EURC.

Crypto Long & Short: Tokenized equities: the model underneath the trade

In this week's Crypto Long & Short, CoinDesk's Joshua DeVos writes that demand for tokenized equities is accelerating fast, from $16 billion to more than $590 billion in perpetual futures in a single year, but that the headline growth hides the question that matters most. Two tokens can trade under

Crypto Long & Short: Where DeFi yield really comes from (and why it broke this spring)

In this week's Crypto Long & Short, CoinDesk's Joshua DeVos writes that demand for tokenized equities is accelerating fast, from $16 billion to more than $590 billion in perpetual futures in a single year, but that the headline growth hides the question that matters most. Two tokens can trade under

Ex-Meta scientists want to bring visual AI to the factory floor

Perceptron offers an AI model that it says can help machines navigate the world while also providing in-depth visual intelligence.

Hyperliquid Gets Pumpfun Support, Energy Perps Push

Pumpfun adds HyperEVM trading as HPC pushes U.S. energy perps and AQA v2 begins generating USDC yield for HYPE buybacks.

Bill Gates wants to see a robot tax and ‘Human Reserved’ jobs to mitigate harms from AI

Gates is mostly in the Responsible AI camp, but there are a few ideas in here we hadn't heard before.

Orchestration is the new challenge for CX in the age of AI agents

Presented by Tata Communications Enterprises are deploying AI agents, voice AI, and automation across messaging, voice, and digital channels faster than the architecture meant to support it. Most of that deployment has involved attaching conversational AI to legacy systems never built for it, says G

Surprise: Z.ai is the AI lab behind the mysterious Ox Alpha model

Z.ai confirms it is behind Ox Alpha, the mysterious open AI model topping benchmarks and leaderboards, and its weights are set to be released soon.

Roman Storm Retrial Delayed to April 2027

Roman Storm’s retrial moves to April 2027 as a judge weighs throwing out his conviction and questions grow over Chainalysis’s role.

Ethereum developers propose first step to protect ETH staking from quantum attacks

A draft proposal would allow validators to deposit with quantum-resistant keys, then permanently stop accepting the format the network runs on today.

Robot brain builders are pushing out of their GPT-2 era

Robot bodies are waiting for their AI brains to catch up.

QueryStory wants you to believe what AI is telling you

The startup came out of stealth with $6 million in seed funding and a plan to use LLMs and cybersecurity know-how to make AI queries coherent.

The evidence doesn't support the banks' case against stablecoin rewards

Arga is building a better way to train enterprise AI agents

Arga has raised $10 million in a seed funding round that was led by General Catalyst, with participation from Box Group, Emergence, Gradient and SV Angel.

The Download: the Kids issue arrives, and Bill Gates reveals his AI fears

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. Introducing: the Kids issue If the desire to limit kids’ use of technology was once a subcurrent, it has become a raging flood. Countries around

Hearing tech startup Legato emerges from stealth with $12M and a peek at its AI hearing glasses

The glasses, called Legato Frames, integrate the company’s patented hearing-assistance technology into the arms of eyewear frames.

Dallas Fed warns tokenized deposits could strip $700 billion from U.S. banks' lending capacity

Programmable deposits and AI agents may enable instantaneous, automated bank switching for higher yields, driving up bank funding costs.

ECB claims digital euro will offer 'maximum level of privacy' amid surveillance fears

Central bank officials say the Eurosystem will be structurally unable to link users to purchases, but civil society groups remain skeptical.

The 3 catalysts that could define bitcoin's next move

Your day-ahead look for Aug. 26, 2026

Runable hits $21M to bet AI agents can go from building businesses to growing them

Runable says 60%–70% of its 1 trillion-plus token usage in the last 90 days came from paying customers.

Bitcoin takes a breather after adding 23% in 7 days as ETF demand holds steady

The price of bitcoin fell to $79,000 on Wednesday after gaining 23% in seven days as August ETF inflows climbed above $3 billion.

Strategy cuts net leverage to near zero as cash nearly matches convertible debt

The bitcoin treasury company has built nearly four years of preferred-dividend coverage while continuing to repurchase STRC below par.

Euro stablecoins get a mainstream push as Revolut begins rolling out EURR in Europe

Revolut said the stablecoin’s rollout will start with a select group of customers within Denmark, Poland, and Portugal.

Japan targets early 2030s launch for blockchain-based stock and bond settlement system

Japan's regulators are racing to modernize national settlement systems to prevent institutional investors and foreign capital from fleeing to overseas markets.

AI models flub these intelligence tests. Can you fare any better?

Puzzles and games have been central to AI development since the very beginning. Just as we humans like to test our smarts with crosswords or logic puzzles, developers can test how far models have advanced with a gaming gauntlet. The term “machine learning” was popularized in a 1959 article by the IB

Raised on AI

When my oldest child was born, I immediately set up Gmail and Twitter accounts in her name. I broadly announced her birth online and proceeded to plaster her photo across all sorts of platforms. In short, I began creating her digital footprint long before she could stand on her own two feet.  F

Live updates: Zcash pulls back 8% as its Grayscale ETF goes live, capping a 60% rally

The privacy coin's spot ETF began NYSE trading Tuesday, which was one of the catalysts behind its surge to an eight-year high. Now traders are selling the news, with leverage stacked into the move.

A massive $6.4 billion bitcoin options expiry on Friday could amplify volatility

Friday’s expiry follows bitcoin’s surge from $62,000 to $80,000, leaving market makers with increased exposure to manage around several key strike prices.

Bill Gates says we’ve passed AI’s danger thresholds. Now what?

It’s a glorious day in Kirkland, Washington, an affluent Seattle suburb on the eastern shore of Lake Washington. The temperature is in the mid-80s, and the sky is incapable of being any more blue. The view from the Gates Ventures conference room overlooks the Carillon Point Marina, where a flotilla

Wall Street is making it easier for bitcoin whales to ditch self-custody: report

ETF issuers are lowering the barrier for bitcoin whales to trade self-custody for ETF shares.

XRP’s 44% rally brings leverage back, raising risk of sharper pullback

CryptoQuant data show XRP’s estimated leverage ratio on Binance at its highest since January, with long accounts outnumbering shorts as futures volume runs more than five times spot trading.

Crypto greed gauge hits highest since just before October’s $19 billion wipeout

The Fear & Greed Index reached 74 on Tuesday after sitting at 27 less than two weeks ago, showing how quickly traders have gone from caution to chasing risk.

Bitcoin holds $79,000, ether, solana slip as traders bank a week of gains

Every major token fell over 24 hours except HYPE, though bitcoin holds a 23% weekly gain and XRP almost 45%.

India’s Ringg gets backing from Peak XV as it pushes voice AI past the phone call

Ringg has raised $10 million from Peak XV as a part of its Series A extension.

Robotics startup Generalist reaches $3B valuation, sources say

The $200 million extension comes just months after the physical AI startup reached a $2 billion valuation.

OpenAI loses a top data center exec, as stream of high-profile departures continues

Before Malone left, OpenAI had already reshuffled its infrastructure org, shifting his reporting line away from President Greg Brockman and putting Vice President Sachin Katti in charge of the group.

Stripe didn’t really buy OpenRouter because of the ‘singularity’

What does a payments giant want with a startup that routes prompts between different AI models? Stripe says it's because of "the singularity" but it's really for a far more real and powerful reason.

Bitcoin briefly hits $70,000 for the first time since June. Here is why

The largest crypto asset rose more than 7% on Wednesday after several catalysts sent crypto-related assets higher.

OpenAI seeks to one-up Anthropic with new customer privacy protections

A competition is developing between OpenAI and Anthropic over who can provide the best privacy protections for enterprise customer data.

Cognition CEO denies report that SpaceX tried to acquire the startup

SpaceX was reportedly in talks to buy AI coding startup Cognition. SpaceX has already acquired Cursor as it races to catch up to rivals like OpenAI and Anthropic in enterprise AI.

HYPE jumps 11% as Trump says CFTC is working to bring Hyperliquid to U.S.

During a White House meeting Wednesday, President Donald Trump said CFTC Chair Mike Selig is working to bring the perpetual futures platform into the U.S. under federal rules.

Trump pushes Congress to move on Clarity Act during White House crypto event

The CEOs from companies across several tech-forward sectors met with the president in advance of this week's first Innovation Advisory Committee at the CFTC.

The Debasement Trade Returns

Bitcoin’s breakout revives the debasement trade as Treasury buybacks, AI spending and Japan fuel bets on looser policy ahead.

How Maple Finance Became the #2 Crypto Lender Behind Tether — Sid Powell Explains

Sid Powell, CEO and co-founder of Maple Finance, joins Chris Storaker on the Converge Podcast

Base App Unveils Hyperliquid-Powered Perps

Base App users can now trade perps with up to 50x leverage via Hyperliquid.

AI was supposed to win people over by now — it hasn’t

As AI becomes harder to avoid, consumers are growing more wary of the technology — and Silicon Valley is discovering that widespread adoption doesn’t necessarily lead to acceptance.

Google launches new study tools for students across Search and Gemini

The launch of the new study features marks Google's latest effort to make Gemini the AI assistant that students turn to when learning and studying, as it continues to compete with companies like OpenAI.

Researchers complain that OpenAI revoked their access to limited cyber program

Multiple cybersecurity researchers said they suddenly lost access to OpenAI’s Trusted Access for Cyber (TAC) program, which offers models with fewer guardrails for vetted users.

Crypto campaign fund Fairshake faces $2 million setback in Florida primaries

In a race that drew criticism to crypto's leading political action committee for featuring fake headlines in ads, Fairshake's expensive effort fell short.

Nethermind Drops LayerZero Verifier Role, Joins Chainlink

Another major LayerZero verifier just defected to Chainlink.

SEC Proposes "Regulation Crypto Assets" Framework

The SEC just proposed rules that would let crypto startups raise up to $75M without full registration.

Meet the startup helping Wall Street put a price on AI compute

The AI buildout shows no signs of slowing. And with hundreds of billions of dollars a year going into data centers and GPUs, compute has become the single biggest cost for anyone building AI products. But for all that spending, there still isn’t a straightforward w

Bitcoin Tops $68,000 as Short Liquidations Hit $1.7 Billion

Ether gained 9% and total crypto market value rose 5.1% after the U.S. Treasury said it would at least double the size of its long-dated bond buybacks. Short positions accounted for 91% of the day's liquidations.

Bitcoin surges above $68,000, liquidating $1.4 billion shorts as Treasury buybacks boost risk appetite

BTC rose about 6% while ether, solana and crypto stocks climbed after the Treasury doubled the size of its bond buybacks.

TerraPower’s nuclear reactor has a secret weapon for powering AI data centers

TerraPower's nuclear power plant possesses a strategic advantage over competitors, especially when chasing after data center deals.

Bitcoin nears key technical breakout that could propel prices to $76,000

Bitcoin is close to forming a pattern that analysts say could signal prices rising to as high as $76,000.

Coinbase, Circle and Bullish jump as Clarity Act proponents express optimism about bill

COIN and BLSH rose about 8% and CRCL gained nearly 10% ahead of a key procedural vote scheduled for Sept. 15.

Amazon makes its AI-powered Alexa+ free on Fire TV, no Prime required

Amazon is making its AI-powered Alexa+ assistant free on all compatible Fire TV devices in the U.S., automatically upgrading users whether or not they subscribe to Prime.

AI could supercharge crypto but there’s a catch, Fidelity Digital Assets says

AI agents could boost crypto activity, but much of the value may bypass blockchains and their tokens.

Crypto Long & Short: Where DeFi yield really comes from (and why it broke this spring)

In this week's Crypto Long & Short, Solstice Finance's David Plisek argues that most of the money lost in DeFi this spring wasn't taken by hackers but by yield strategies that quietly stopped working. Looking at April's $13 billion drawdown, he shows that a headline yield number reveals almost nothi

HSBC, Standard Chartered execute first live banking transaction on Swift’s 24/7 ledger

The cross-border transaction is Swift’s first in a pilot project as it tests settlement in its push to remain relevant as stablecoins and tokenized deposits become widely used worldwide.

HSBC and Standard Chartered Complete First Live Transaction on Swift Blockchain Ledger

Swift’s ledger matched and netted obligations recorded on the banks’ separate platforms, but final settlement still ran through existing systems.

Maya Protocol Exploit Drains $1.7 Million From Shared Liquidity

Founder Aaluxx said he would ‘work to fix and recover in full,’ while routing service LeoDex reported that Maya had activated a global halt.

Cantor opens Kalshi prediction markets to thousands of institutional clients

The investment bank will help its roughly 3,000 institutional clients execute large block trades in event contracts.

Gnosis Chain to Abandon Its Validator Set and Settle to Ethereum

GnosisDAO approved a strategic shift from standalone Layer 1 to an Ethereum-settled rollup, unlocking about 350,000 GNO and ending treasury-funded staking rewards.

VentureBeat names Rob Strechay as its first Lead Analyst, expanding its enterprise AI research push

Rob Strechay, until recently managing director and principal analyst at theCUBE Research, has joined VentureBeat as our first Lead Analyst and a founding analyst of VentureBeat Research. His arrival is the next step in a deliberate move at VentureBeat toward deeper specialization: analysis built for

Calendly throws its hat into meeting note-taker circus

Calendly is also releasing a meeting scheduling assistant called Callie

Strengthen the Clarity Act

The American Bankers Association seeks to strengthen the Clarity Act, not kill it, argues Rob Nichols, president and CEO of the ABA.

Beyond crypto funding rates: Ethena diversifies USDe backing with $1 billion FalconX facility

The warehouse facility gives Ethena another source of returns for the assets backing USDe while channeling onchain capital into overcollateralized institutional loans.

Bitcoin is flashing 8 of 12 capitulation signals, but bottom's not yet in, says Van Eck

Similar setups have historically produced below-average 90-day and 180-day bitcoin returns, said the asset manager.

The Download: AI’s self-improvement problem, and what’s driving the heat

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. AI’s recursive self-improvement might not come so quickly after all The AI industry’s boldest promise right now is that AI will soon improve itself, w

A year after losing $1.46 billion, Bybit says AI helped it save $700 million

The exchange that lost $1.46 billion to North Korean hackers is the first large centralized firm to put numbers on a claim bitcoin developers have been making all month.

AI isn’t close to curing cancer. This startup says it knows what it will take.

It's the data, stupid.

China triples its e-CNY network in 2026 as 8 more banks join the CBDC push this week

The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) added 20 new operators this year across two rounds of expansions, including eight additions this week.

Fed decision making comes into focus as bitcoin holds steady, bond yields surge

Your day-ahead look for Aug. 19, 2026

Bitcoin stuck in a six-week range as global bond yields hit highest levels for decades

BTC volatility has dropped to multi-year lows as surging Treasury yields rattle equities and traders await the Fed's July meeting minutes for clues on the interest-rate path.

Ethereum Institutional Closes Ecosystem Funding Round With +100 Backers

Ethereum Institutional locks in +100 ecosystem backers to accelerate institutional Ethereum adoption.

The Ethereum Foundation Welcomes Its Newest Board Member

The Ethereum Foundation adds privacy and security advocate pcaversaccio to its board.

Sportsbooks Are Building the Prediction Markets They Once Fought

Sportsbooks are using federal exchanges to offer sports contracts in states where their own books are banned.

Is Strategy's Bitcoin Machine Breaking Down?

Strategy's structure runs on Bitcoin, MSTR common stock, and STRC preferred, and right now all three are weakening at once.

Fairshake's $5.5M Powers Boafo to Maryland Primary Win

Fairshake spent $5.5M backing Maryland Democrat Adrian Boafo's primary win, marking another win for the industry's top PAC.

Kalshi Sues Illinois Over Prediction Market Law

Kalshi is suing Illinois over its new prediction market licensing law, arguing federal CFTC jurisdiction preempts the state's licensing law.

Kraken's Ink Moves to Optimism's Fully Managed Stack

Ink is upgrading to OP Enterprise Fully Managed, letting Optimism run its infrastructure while the Ink Foundation focuses on ecosystem growth.