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Privacy infrastructure Hinkal announced on October 9, 2026, its participation in the Mastercard Crypto Partner Program. This program connects crypto and blockchain teams, Mastercard teams, and its global payment network, with members including stablecoin issuers, infrastructure providers, fiat exchange service providers, crypto card supporters, and blockchain and blockchain service providers. Mastercard positions it as a way to transform technological capabilities into compliant use cases for global commerce; some members can also access financial institutions within the card issuing and acquiring networks and receive regulatory and compliance support aligned with global standards.Related use cases include cross-border payments and remittances, B2B transactions, fund and settlement flows, stablecoin payments, and card projects that allow users to spend digital assets at regular merchants. Hinkal can provide embeddable privacy capabilities for wallets, payment platforms, and chains, allowing stablecoins to settle in private balances and transfer using zero-knowledge proofs, ensuring that the amount, sender, or receiver is not disclosed during on-chain transfer verification. This capability is already live on Ethereum, Polygon, Solana, TRON, and other major EVM chains, accessible via SDK and API.Existing integrations include Private Send in Polygon Wallet, Hinkal Private Send in the Tether wallet development kit, Turnkey wallets that can enhance privacy features through Hinkal SDK, and Avvio running Hinkal private payments on its own interface.

Telegram has renamed its wallet service "Gram wallet," which was originally available to only a select group of users, to "Money," and has officially launched it to over one billion users across the platform. "Money" is a built-in wallet for the Gram token, supporting storage, transfers, and the purchase of platform gifts and collectible usernames.In addition, the accompanying trading platform "Walt" offers services for over 300 assets, covering tokenized stocks, precious metals, perpetual contracts, and wealth management projects. Users can make instant transfers to the "Money" wallet through "Walt" without incurring network fees. The official also reminds that investing in crypto assets carries corresponding risks.

According to Durov's Code, Telegram is expected to launch a brand new cryptocurrency wallet, Gram Wallet, in the latest release of version 13, which is not yet officially open to users.Meanwhile, the original Wallet service has been renamed to Walt and has moved from the settings menu to the mini-app interface, with existing accounts and assets unaffected.

The Zcash development team plans to add post-quantum signature support to the network in January. Zakura engineer Roman Akhtariev stated in an engineering blog that the team plans to implement post-quantum signature opcodes in Zcash in January. These opcodes will enable Zcash to verify hash-based signatures, thereby resisting quantum computing attacks. The team has not yet confirmed a specific network activation date. This upgrade aims to prevent attackers from using current public keys to reverse-engineer and forge payment authorizations from wallet owners.The initial phase of this upgrade will protect transparent transactions. Zcash has two payment methods: shielded payments hide the sender, receiver, and amount; transparent payments are similar to Bitcoin, where addresses and amounts are visible on the chain. According to CoinDesk, based on ZecStats data, approximately 11.96 million of the 16.98 million issued ZEC are stored in the transparent pool, accounting for about 70%. The January plan primarily targets this public portion. Additionally, Zakura has developed a private query tool that allows wallets to check balances without exposing associated addresses to the server; the experimental version is available in the "Private queries" settings of the Zcash wallet Vizor.Before the release of Zakura's engineering article, Ethereum researcher Justin Drake warned holders on Thursday to prepare for what he called "bunker mode," stating that in the worst-case scenario, AI could find shortcuts to break the mathematical protections of Bitcoin and Ethereum wallets in "months rather than years."

According to security researcher BeakSec, Telegram Desktop previously had a high-risk vulnerability CVE-2026-107181. Attackers could pre-place command files in the group where the victim is located, then induce them to click on links redirected through the browser, using inter-process communication command injection to send local files to a group controlled by the attacker; if the session file is stolen and the user has not set a local password, the account may be taken over.The researcher stated that versions 7.2.8 and earlier are affected, and the vulnerability has been fixed in version 7.2.9 released on September 17.

Artificial intelligence company Anthropic is establishing a presidential candidate outreach program, forming an internal team to collaborate with bipartisan presidential candidates on AI issues ahead of the 2028 U.S. election, assisting leadership in developing political strategies and operating political funding projects. The company is hiring a political program manager responsible for establishing and operating related programs for the 2028 election cycle, identifying potential candidates from both parties, providing AI policy education to candidates and their advisors on equal terms, preparing executives for dialogues, and planning party platforms, conventions, and transitions in advance. The position requires over 12 years of experience in campaigns, party committees, or political organizations, along with a record of credible bipartisan collaboration, with a salary ranging from $295,000 to $345,000.Fortune reports that the program is taking shape ahead of the November midterm elections and the company's potential initial public offering, which could be valued at up to $2 trillion. Bruce F. Freed, chairman of the Center for Political Accountability, stated that it is not uncommon for businesses to maintain relationships with presidential campaign teams, but he has not seen such a formal presidential election outreach arrangement. California Democratic Senator Alex Padilla noted that this hiring indicates that cutting-edge model companies are also establishing political operations beyond their products, emphasizing that education and influence are not the same, and urged Anthropic to disclose more details. Katie Harbath, founder and CEO of Anchor Change, believes the unusual aspect is that this role is also responsible for political action committee funding. Anthropic did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The official account of the AI assistant Claude from the artificial intelligence company Anthropic stated that the application volume for the Claude Startups program has exceeded expectations, and they will suspend the $1000 API credit offer for Claude Team.Claude mentioned that there have been hundreds of thousands of applications for the program, and the team is re-evaluating to cover as many startups as possible. Accounts that have already received the discount can still retain their related rights; accounts that have applied or have been approved but have not yet claimed will enter a review process, and some previously approved accounts will not be able to receive the discount.Claude stated that accepted program members can still use Startup Stack and Applied AI office hours. Users on the Claude Max or Team plan can continue to use their monthly API credits as usual in the Console.

Programmable privacy infrastructure Soda Labs has completed a $3 million seed round financing, led by NextBlock. Over the past two and a half years, Soda Labs has developed a cryptographic privacy solution that combines garbled circuits with multi-party computation (GC-MPC), relying on proven standard cryptography such as AES and SHA256. Its privacy engine runs on standard cloud CPUs without the need for dedicated hardware, enabling applications to achieve privacy computing while maintaining a connection to existing public blockchain infrastructure.

According to an official post from Chainlink, it has launched the institutional financing and collateral management solution Fulcrum, which separates financing agreement management from cash and collateral settlement networks, supports cross-chain repurchase (Repo) and 24/7 collateral movement, and will demonstrate with DTCC at Sibos 2026.Chainlink also stated that 40 new integrations were added in September, covering 24 users including Aave, Coinbase, Paxos, Monad, Tempo, and others.

Bitget held an offline event today to celebrate its eighth anniversary. The head of the Greater China region, Xie Jiayin, reflected on the platform's eight-year development journey, stating that Bitget has gradually expanded from a single cryptocurrency trading platform to a panoramic exchange (UEX) covering diverse scenarios such as stocks, commodities, and AI trading. As of the second quarter, the trading volume of non-cryptocurrency assets accounted for 40%, with approximately 1 in every 4 new users starting their Bitget journey through rToken.Looking towards the next phase, Xie Jiayin stated that Bitget will continue to advance the UEX strategy, expand more diverse assets and trading scenarios, and improve institutional-grade custody and over-the-counter settlement infrastructure to meet the differentiated needs of various types of institutions through diversified custody and settlement models. Institutional services will also continue to be an important strategic direction for Bitget in the next phase.At the event, Bitget simultaneously disclosed the progress of the third batch of rewards for the "Peer Program": a total of $3,495,658 in rewards has been distributed, benefiting 2,277,318 participants. Xie Jiayin expressed that the platform hopes to implement "user first" into concrete actions through product development, service upgrades, and user feedback.

According to official data from Bitget, its "Peer Program" has a real-time accumulated prize pool of 3.49 million USDT. Previous data showed that the first two batches of this program have distributed nearly 2.8 million USDT in rewards to over 1.5 million users.It is reported that this event will last until October 26. During the event, Bitget will continuously establish a user-exclusive prize pool with 30% of the platform's trading fee revenue, and eligible users can participate without registration.

The Cardano Foundation announced that the programmable token standard CIP-0113 has officially launched on the Cardano mainnet, allowing issuers of regulated assets such as stablecoins, tokenized funds, and bonds to directly embed compliance rules such as KYC, anti-money laundering, sanctions screening, asset freezing and confiscation, and transfer restrictions into the tokens, which will be executed by the Cardano ledger during each transfer, minting, and burning.This standard does not require a hard fork, and the tokens remain native assets of Cardano, with issuers able to update the rule modules according to regulatory changes.

ChainCatcher live report from the OKX NOW Global Product and Ecosystem Conference (Singapore), where Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin delivered a keynote speech. He stated that AI is both the biggest opportunity and the biggest risk for the current industry development.He believes that the industry is moving beyond the narrative of "blockchain + programmable value," with new features such as "programmable data" realized through zero-knowledge proofs (ZKP) emerging.Vitalik expects that privacy protocols on Ethereum will rapidly mature, and within the next two years, most people are likely to use these technologies in an "unperceived" manner.

According to official data from Bitget, the second batch of rewards for its "Peer Program" has been completed. So far, the platform has distributed a total of 2,786,953 USDT rewards to 1,529,978 users.This event will last until October 26, and users can participate without registration. During this period, Bitget will continue to set up a user-exclusive prize pool with 30% of the platform's trading fee revenue, offering trading rewards, asset rewards, and VIP exclusive rights to different user groups.

According to official data from Bitget, the Bitget Peer-to-Peer program has distributed its first batch of rewards, granting a total of 1,907,455 USDT to 763,543 users within 3 days.It is reported that this event will last until October 26. During this period, Bitget will continue to establish a user-exclusive prize pool with 30% of the platform's trading fee revenue, offering trading rewards, asset rewards, and VIP exclusive rights to different user groups.

R25 today announced that its core product R25 Studio, based on the 2 architecture, has officially launched public testing. R25 Studio is dedicated to realizing the vision of "everyone can become an asset manager," fully opening up the capabilities for the establishment, operation, and distribution of institutional-level funds. By abstracting cumbersome legal documents, backend systems, and compliance processes into configurable smart contracts, R25 Studio has successfully compressed the fund establishment cycle from several months to just 10 minutes.The platform revolves around Build, Manage, Earn, and Distribute, covering Vault creation, subscription and redemption, investment management, fee earning, and distribution; asset managers can autonomously set investment parameters, management fees, and performance fee rates on-chain without building complex fund structures from scratch, generate exclusive Vault Tokens/Shares, and list the Vault on channels such as Dapp and Topnod. The platform also provides performance data such as NAV, APY, cumulative returns, and maximum drawdown, helping asset managers monitor strategy performance in real-time.Previously, in Phase 1, Axil launched a private credit Vault on R25 and successfully surpassed $130 million in TVL, validating the reliability of this infrastructure. The registration channel for the first batch of managers is now open.

The Wallet in Telegram has been renamed to Walt and will continue to provide services such as trading, investment, yield products, multi-chain assets, and cross-chain transfers.Walt plans to further launch crypto cards and AI-driven conversational trading features, with existing users not needing to migrate their funds or accounts.

According to The Block, the prediction market platform Kalshi will terminate its trading volume incentive program, effective no earlier than October 13. This information comes from documents submitted by Kalshi to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).The program pays rewards to traders from a reward pool based on their share of qualified trading volume, aimed at enhancing liquidity. Kalshi is an event contract trading platform regulated by the CFTC.

SpaceX's new generation spacecraft "Starship" experienced an engine failure during its 14th unmanned test flight, which may impact NASA's timeline for crewed lunar landing missions. Starship is one of the two spacecraft selected by NASA for its bid, with plans to carry out crewed lunar missions in 2028.Although multiple objectives were achieved during the test mission launched in Texas, a propulsion system failure led to an early termination of the mission.