Vangrid Raises $9M for a Physical AI Data Network
DePIN project Vangrid has raised $9M in new round to build a decentralized spatial-data network that feeds physical AI, backed by HashKey, Animoca Brands, Crypto com Capital, Gate Labs, Borderless and Mapleblock Capital.
👉 theblock.co/post/411022
DePIN project Vangrid has raised $9M in new round to build a decentralized spatial-data network that feeds physical AI, backed by HashKey, Animoca Brands, Crypto com Capital, Gate Labs, Borderless and Mapleblock Capital.
The idea: users capture real-world places on their phones, which get reconstructed into verified onchain 3D models, giving robots, autonomous agents and digital twins a stream of ground-level, continuously updated location data, useful even where GPS does not work, including for defense and government. A token is planned for later in 2026; for now contributors earn bounties for verified captures.
👉 theblock.co/post/411022
Kalshi joined Kaito Studio and launched referral campaign
Kalshi is paying $150 for every new trader referred, with no cap on how much a referrer can earn. For Kalshi, coming amid record prediction-market volumes, it is a cheap, viral growth lever aimed straight at crypto-native audiences.
The no-cap structure is the eye-catching part: it lets power referrers stack rewards without limit, a signal of how aggressively Kalshi wants to scale user acquisition as prediction markets move mainstream.
👉 x.com/KaitoAI/status/2085381003250638904
Kalshi is paying $150 for every new trader referred, with no cap on how much a referrer can earn. For Kalshi, coming amid record prediction-market volumes, it is a cheap, viral growth lever aimed straight at crypto-native audiences.
Kaito Studio is the campaign and distribution arm of Kaito, the crypto attention (InfoFi) platform that rewards creators for mindshare, so plugging Kalshi in turns its user-acquisition push into a rewarded, creator-driven referral engine.
The no-cap structure is the eye-catching part: it lets power referrers stack rewards without limit, a signal of how aggressively Kalshi wants to scale user acquisition as prediction markets move mainstream.
👉 x.com/KaitoAI/status/2085381003250638904
MetaMask Launches an Agent Wallet for AI
Agent Wallet is a self-custodial way for traders and builders to let AI agents execute actions while staying inside rules the user sets.
It is MetaMask's move into a fast-growing race to give autonomous AI a safe way to touch money onchain, alongside efforts like Coinbase's x402 and Cloudflare's agent wallets.
👉 x.com/MetaMask/status/2085365793441685614
Agent Wallet is a self-custodial way for traders and builders to let AI agents execute actions while staying inside rules the user sets.
The pitch is agents that trade while users stay in control: keys and limits live with the user, so an agent can swap, send or interact with contracts only within pre-set guardrails, with no handing over a private key. It ships compatible with a stack of popular agent tools, including OpenClaw, Claude Code, Codex, Hermes, OpenCode and Cursor, so builders can wire crypto actions into agents they already run.
It is MetaMask's move into a fast-growing race to give autonomous AI a safe way to touch money onchain, alongside efforts like Coinbase's x402 and Cloudflare's agent wallets.
👉 x.com/MetaMask/status/2085365793441685614
Robot is only as smart as the AI that runs it, and the tools that train it
We mapped 21 startups building the brains behind the machines: foundation models that give robots a mind (World Labs, Physical Intelligence, Skild AI), the infrastructure that trains and ships them (Foxglove, Voxel51), and the labs & farms already putting them to work (Periodic Labs, Carbon Robotics).
More details 👉 cryptodiffer.com/feed/other/every-robot-needs-a-brain-physical-ai-mapped-part-2
We mapped 21 startups building the brains behind the machines: foundation models that give robots a mind (World Labs, Physical Intelligence, Skild AI), the infrastructure that trains and ships them (Foxglove, Voxel51), and the labs & farms already putting them to work (Periodic Labs, Carbon Robotics).
More details 👉 cryptodiffer.com/feed/other/every-robot-needs-a-brain-physical-ai-mapped-part-2
Hackers Abuse BNB Chain to Spread Malware
Attackers are turning BNB Smart Chain into malware infrastructure, hiding the commands their malware fetches inside smart contracts, where they are far harder to take down than a normal server.
It is a reminder that a public blockchain's censorship-resistance cuts both ways: the same permanence that protects legitimate apps also gives attackers durable, tamper-proof hosting.
👉 x.com/MsftSecIntel/status/2085399393302176075
Attackers are turning BNB Smart Chain into malware infrastructure, hiding the commands their malware fetches inside smart contracts, where they are far harder to take down than a normal server.
Microsoft's threat researchers describe the chain: a victim hits a fake CAPTCHA page that instructs them to paste and run a command in Windows, which installs the malware. From there it reads its next instructions and payloads straight from a BNB Smart Chain smart contract, a technique sometimes called EtherHiding. Because the data lives onchain, defenders cannot simply delete a file or block a server to shut it down.
It is a reminder that a public blockchain's censorship-resistance cuts both ways: the same permanence that protects legitimate apps also gives attackers durable, tamper-proof hosting.
👉 x.com/MsftSecIntel/status/2085399393302176075
Delta-Neutral, Compared: Radiant Prime vs Avant vs Liminal vs Ethena
Basis trading is crypto's quiet yield engine, you earn from funding rates and the spot-futures spread, not from price going up.
Ethena turned it into a $4B+ category. Now a new wave runs the same trade in very different ways: Radiant Prime as an institutional, multi-factor fund (independently verified), plus Avant and Liminal as onchain protocols.
One trade, four builds; and yields that tell a story. Full breakdown.
Basis trading is crypto's quiet yield engine, you earn from funding rates and the spot-futures spread, not from price going up.
Ethena turned it into a $4B+ category. Now a new wave runs the same trade in very different ways: Radiant Prime as an institutional, multi-factor fund (independently verified), plus Avant and Liminal as onchain protocols.
One trade, four builds; and yields that tell a story. Full breakdown.
Stripe’s Bridge Secures EU MiCA Approval to Expand Regulated Stablecoin Payments Across EU
Stripe-owned Bridge has been added to the EU’s MiCA register after receiving regulatory approval in Luxembourg, becoming the 42nd authorized electronic money token (EMT) issuer in the bloc.
Bridge’s infrastructure enables businesses to issue euro-backed stablecoins, create named virtual IBANs, provide euro accounts, and facilitate cross-border payments and settlement through a single integration.
ESMA also added three German institutions to its MiCA register, bringing the total number of authorized CASPs across the EU to 324.
Stripe-owned Bridge has been added to the EU’s MiCA register after receiving regulatory approval in Luxembourg, becoming the 42nd authorized electronic money token (EMT) issuer in the bloc.
The approval follows Bridge securing both a MiCA crypto-asset service provider (CASP) authorization and an Electronic Money Institution (EMI) license from Luxembourg’s CSSF, allowing it to provide regulated services across all 27 EU member states.
Bridge’s infrastructure enables businesses to issue euro-backed stablecoins, create named virtual IBANs, provide euro accounts, and facilitate cross-border payments and settlement through a single integration.
ESMA also added three German institutions to its MiCA register, bringing the total number of authorized CASPs across the EU to 324.
MAJOR UPCOMING EVENTS IN Q3 2026!
A full list of Major Upcoming Events, to be updated
👉 https://cryptodiffer.com/events
A full list of Major Upcoming Events, to be updated
👉 https://cryptodiffer.com/events
Bybit Sues North Korea Over the $1.5B Hack
Bybit has filed suit against North Korea, its Lazarus Group and the Reconnaissance General Bureau over the record $1.5B hack of the exchange, and has already secured a court order freezing stolen assets.
The February 21, 2025 theft of over 400,000 ETH and stETH was the largest hack in crypto history and made up the bulk of the roughly $2B North Korea stole that year, part of an estimated $6.75B Pyongyang-linked crews have taken to date.
👉 coindesk.com/policy/2026/08/07/bybit-sues-north-korea-and-lazarus-group-over-usd1-5-billion-hack-secures-asset-freeze
Bybit has filed suit against North Korea, its Lazarus Group and the Reconnaissance General Bureau over the record $1.5B hack of the exchange, and has already secured a court order freezing stolen assets.
The case, filed in the US District Court for the District of Columbia, won a preliminary injunction freezing the identified stolen digital assets while the litigation continues. It is a rare, direct legal move against a nation-state hacking operation. CEO Ben Zhou framed it plainly: 'Our focus has never changed: protect our users first, recover what we can, and make sure the people behind these attacks are held accountable.'
The February 21, 2025 theft of over 400,000 ETH and stETH was the largest hack in crypto history and made up the bulk of the roughly $2B North Korea stole that year, part of an estimated $6.75B Pyongyang-linked crews have taken to date.
👉 coindesk.com/policy/2026/08/07/bybit-sues-north-korea-and-lazarus-group-over-usd1-5-billion-hack-secures-asset-freeze
World Liberty Received $100M Investment From a Laundering Suspect
A UAE-based fund tied to Guren 'Bobby' Zhou, a businessman under an active UK money-laundering investigation, bought $100M of World Liberty Financial (WLFI) governance tokens, the New York Times reported.
Zhou has not been charged and his trial is set for 2028. World Liberty says it complies with all regulations, and the source of the funds remains undetermined.
👉 theblock.co/post/411221
A UAE-based fund tied to Guren 'Bobby' Zhou, a businessman under an active UK money-laundering investigation, bought $100M of World Liberty Financial (WLFI) governance tokens, the New York Times reported.
The purchases, $20M in January and $80M in June 2025, flowed into the Trump family crypto venture, which has routed roughly $75M to Trump and his sons through DT Marks DEFI LLC. Zhou, once a failed British flooring retailer, relocated to Abu Dhabi in 2024.
Zhou has not been charged and his trial is set for 2028. World Liberty says it complies with all regulations, and the source of the funds remains undetermined.
👉 theblock.co/post/411221
Source Foundry Raises $400M to Take On ASML
Stealth chip startup Source Foundry has raised a fresh $400M at a $5B valuation, led by Leopold Aschenbrenner's Situational Awareness, taking the fund's total bet on the company to $500M.
The timing is striking. Aschenbrenner wired the $400M just days after his hedge fund reportedly lost nearly two-thirds of its assets, one of the year's most catastrophic blowups.
👉 x.com/anissagardizy8/status/2085856908855185588
Stealth chip startup Source Foundry has raised a fresh $400M at a $5B valuation, led by Leopold Aschenbrenner's Situational Awareness, taking the fund's total bet on the company to $500M.
The year-old startup, also backed by Sequoia, is redesigning the tooling and manufacturing steps that sit upstream of chip fabs to suit AI workloads. Its target: ASML, the Dutch giant whose extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography machines are essential for printing the world's most advanced AI chips.
The timing is striking. Aschenbrenner wired the $400M just days after his hedge fund reportedly lost nearly two-thirds of its assets, one of the year's most catastrophic blowups.
👉 x.com/anissagardizy8/status/2085856908855185588
Multipli Opens the MULT Community Sale on Sonar
Multipli has opened the community sale for MULT, its native ecosystem token, on SONAR (Echo's onchain sale platform). Access is reserved first for the community that built Multipli.
Multipli is a multichain RWA yield protocol that has raised about $21.5M from Pantera, Sequoia, Elevation Capital and Spartan Group.
👉 x.com/multiplifi/status/2085767485995819404
Multipli has opened the community sale for MULT, its native ecosystem token, on SONAR (Echo's onchain sale platform). Access is reserved first for the community that built Multipli.
Timeline: Pre-Open runs Aug 7 to 14, Commitment Aug 14 to 21, and Settlement Aug 21 to 26 (all 13:00 UTC). KYC and KYB are required, payments in USDC or USDT, with priority for ORBs and reward holders. Pricing and FDV are not public yet, set to be revealed when Commitment opens on Aug 14.
Multipli is a multichain RWA yield protocol that has raised about $21.5M from Pantera, Sequoia, Elevation Capital and Spartan Group.
👉 x.com/multiplifi/status/2085767485995819404
MARA Sold 23,093 BTC for ~$1.6B Across H1 2026
MARA Holdings (formerly Marathon Digital) sold 23,093 BTC for about $1.6B over the first half of 2026, the bulk of it (20,880 BTC) in Q1 and another 2,213 BTC in Q2, per its Q2 results.
The company also posted a $611M Q2 net loss on revenue of $174.9M, down 27%, as Bitcoin weighed on results.
👉 crypto.news/mara-bitcoin-holdings-fall-29-as-q2-loss-hits-611m
MARA Holdings (formerly Marathon Digital) sold 23,093 BTC for about $1.6B over the first half of 2026, the bulk of it (20,880 BTC) in Q1 and another 2,213 BTC in Q2, per its Q2 results.
The sales cap a treasury-policy shift from strict HODL to opportunistic selling. Proceeds funded operations, debt repurchases and a pivot into AI and data-center infrastructure. MARA's Bitcoin stash is now 35,577 BTC (about $2.1B), down 29% year over year, with roughly 9,270 BTC pledged as collateral.
The company also posted a $611M Q2 net loss on revenue of $174.9M, down 27%, as Bitcoin weighed on results.
👉 crypto.news/mara-bitcoin-holdings-fall-29-as-q2-loss-hits-611m
Coinsbuy Wallets Drained for ~$7.9M on TRON and Ethereum
Wallets tied to crypto payment provider Coinsbuy were drained of roughly $7.9M in an exploit spanning both TRON and Ethereum on Aug 9, according to security firm Specter and flagged by PeckShield.
Coinsbuy has not yet published a technical postmortem or named the attack vector; its last release notes predate the incident.
👉 x.com/PeckShieldAlert/status/2086607420785402044
Wallets tied to crypto payment provider Coinsbuy were drained of roughly $7.9M in an exploit spanning both TRON and Ethereum on Aug 9, according to security firm Specter and flagged by PeckShield.
The attacker is now converting the stolen funds into Monero (XMR) to bury the trail. Coinsbuy says it froze a six-figure sum with help from ChangeNOW and briefly paused deposits and withdrawals, both since resumed. GoPlus Security assessed the breach as consistent with a hot-wallet private-key or admin-access compromise.
Coinsbuy has not yet published a technical postmortem or named the attack vector; its last release notes predate the incident.
👉 x.com/PeckShieldAlert/status/2086607420785402044
Strategy Sold 1,638 BTC (~$105M) at a Loss
Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) sold 1,638 BTC for about $104.7M at an average of $63,957, below its $75,419 cost basis, a rare sale for Michael Saylor's firm.
Strategy still holds 842,138 BTC and remains a net buyer for the full year, having accumulated roughly 175,000 BTC across 2026.
👉 x.com/Strategy/status/2086785569044959739?s=20
Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) sold 1,638 BTC for about $104.7M at an average of $63,957, below its $75,419 cost basis, a rare sale for Michael Saylor's firm.
The proceeds went to capital management, roughly $52M toward STRC preferred-stock dividends and about $81M of preferred-share buybacks, not a shift in Bitcoin conviction. It caps Strategy's first stretch as a short-term net seller: just 37 BTC added over two months, then 1,638 offloaded in a week.
Strategy still holds 842,138 BTC and remains a net buyer for the full year, having accumulated roughly 175,000 BTC across 2026.
👉 x.com/Strategy/status/2086785569044959739?s=20
On-Chain Travel Stack: Who's Still Standing
Between 2017 and 2022, dozens of crypto projects promised to move travel on-chain — flights for Bitcoin, hotel rooms as NFTs, Booking com cut out of the loop. Barely one in four is still alive.
Full graveyard 👉 cryptodiffer.com/feed/other/the-on-chain-travel-graveyard
Between 2017 and 2022, dozens of crypto projects promised to move travel on-chain — flights for Bitcoin, hotel rooms as NFTs, Booking com cut out of the loop. Barely one in four is still alive.
The other three in four didn't make it, and their stories are the real lesson: a $19M raise that shipped almost nothing, dead project domains that are online casinos today, and two separate teams who wrote the same obituary six years apart people came to invest, not to travel. We tracked every one that died.
Full graveyard 👉 cryptodiffer.com/feed/other/the-on-chain-travel-graveyard
Two Prediction Market Apps Shut Down Today
Two prediction market startups announced shutdowns today: Fireplace, a pro trading terminal aggregating Polymarket, and Trepa, a precision-guessing prediction game.
The twin closures point to a shakeout in prediction market tooling, even as venues like Polymarket keep drawing heavy volume.
👉 x.com/fireplacegg/status/2086770360930734102
Two prediction market startups announced shutdowns today: Fireplace, a pro trading terminal aggregating Polymarket, and Trepa, a precision-guessing prediction game.
Trepa blamed a lack of product-market fit for its accuracy-based format, while Fireplace is winding down its Polymarket trading terminal. Both broke the news through their own channels.
The twin closures point to a shakeout in prediction market tooling, even as venues like Polymarket keep drawing heavy volume.
👉 x.com/fireplacegg/status/2086770360930734102
Treasuries & ETFs Board. Crypto Accumulation and Capital Flows
After weeks of persistent selling, Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs returned to positive net flows, while corporate treasury adoption continued with new Bitcoin, Ethereum and Solana allocations by public companies.
Corporate Treasuries
• Strive acquired 147 BTC, increasing its holdings to 20,167 BTC.
• BitMine purchased 7,391 ETH (~$14.2M), bringing its total holdings to 5.81M ETH.
• Strategy sold 1,690 BTC and raised $653.1M, increasing its USD reserve to $4.65B.
• MARA disclosed selling 23,093 BTC for $1.63B in H1 2026, ending June with 35,577 BTC.
ETF Flows
BTC ETFs: +$865M
ETH ETFs: +$244M
After weeks of persistent selling, Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs returned to positive net flows, while corporate treasury adoption continued with new Bitcoin, Ethereum and Solana allocations by public companies.
Corporate Treasuries
• Strive acquired 147 BTC, increasing its holdings to 20,167 BTC.
• BitMine purchased 7,391 ETH (~$14.2M), bringing its total holdings to 5.81M ETH.
• Strategy sold 1,690 BTC and raised $653.1M, increasing its USD reserve to $4.65B.
• MARA disclosed selling 23,093 BTC for $1.63B in H1 2026, ending June with 35,577 BTC.
ETF Flows
BTC ETFs: +$865M
ETH ETFs: +$244M
Vitalik Reworks Ethereum's Roadmap Priorities
Vitalik Buterin overlaid his 2023 Ethereum roadmap onto the current plan, reshuffling and reprioritizing items rather than starting from scratch.
The refresh signals where Ethereum's long-term research focus is heading, even as much of the 2023 plan still stands.
👉 x.com/VitalikButerin/status/2086824673556467938
Vitalik Buterin overlaid his 2023 Ethereum roadmap onto the current plan, reshuffling and reprioritizing items rather than starting from scratch.
Quantum safety moves up the list, joining native rollups, strong default privacy, and AI-accelerated formal verification as headline priorities. Several original targets were deprioritized or replaced with what Vitalik called superior constructions.
The refresh signals where Ethereum's long-term research focus is heading, even as much of the 2023 plan still stands.
👉 x.com/VitalikButerin/status/2086824673556467938
Moonshot AI’s Road to IPO. From a $300M Startup to a $50B Giant
Moonshot AI, the team behind Kimi, is one of the loudest AI stories out of China right now. Kimi K2 runs a trillion parameters and tops open-weight coding benchmarks, and the newer K3 pulled so much demand that the team had to pause new paid signups.
That traction turned into a fundraising machine. ARR roughly tripled to about $300M this year, and the company is reportedly eyeing a Hong Kong listing, backed by Alibaba, Tencent and HongShan.
You can already trade the story before the bell. Pre-IPO perps are live 24/7 on Bitget, Bybit and MEXC. Full breakdown in the card.
Moonshot AI, the team behind Kimi, is one of the loudest AI stories out of China right now. Kimi K2 runs a trillion parameters and tops open-weight coding benchmarks, and the newer K3 pulled so much demand that the team had to pause new paid signups.
That traction turned into a fundraising machine. ARR roughly tripled to about $300M this year, and the company is reportedly eyeing a Hong Kong listing, backed by Alibaba, Tencent and HongShan.
You can already trade the story before the bell. Pre-IPO perps are live 24/7 on Bitget, Bybit and MEXC. Full breakdown in the card.
