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According to The Block, K33 research director Vetle Lunde stated that by the end of the first half of 2026, the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund's indirect Bitcoin exposure through holdings in companies such as Strategy, Metaplanet, MARA, Coinbase, Block, and Tesla has risen to 11,549 BTC, a record high valued at approximately $725 million. This exposure grew by 21.2% in the first half of the year and by 60.5% over the past year, marking the sixth consecutive reporting period of increase.Among these, Strategy accounts for nearly 86% of the fund's indirect Bitcoin exposure, corresponding to approximately 9,914 BTC. As of June 30, the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund held about 1.17% of Strategy's shares, valued at $357.3 million at that time. Metaplanet corresponds to 671 BTC, MARA corresponds to 421 BTC, and Coinbase, Block, and Tesla correspond to 183 BTC, 120 BTC, and 97 BTC, respectively.K33 pointed out that this exposure is likely not the result of the fund actively allocating to Bitcoin, but rather an indirect effect of its broadly diversified investment portfolio. Currently, the related Bitcoin exposure accounts for about 0.03% of the fund's total assets.In addition, the fund has also gained indirect ETH exposure through the Ethereum treasury company BitMine for the first time. As of June 30, it held 6.15 million shares of BitMine, valued at $88.3 million, accounting for about 1.16% of the company's shares; based on BitMine's current ETH holdings, this corresponds to an indirect exposure of approximately 67,340 ETH.

Strategy responded to MSCI's proposed changes to index inclusion standards by stating that digital assets are assets. Index providers should measure the market, not decide which assets companies can hold. MSCI's proposal disconnects it from the positions of regulators, the market, and its own clients. Bitcoin does not need MSCI, and Strategy does not need it either.Previously, global index provider MSCI proposed to add a "non-operating company" screening criterion to its global indices, which could remove companies like Strategy and Metaplanet that primarily hold Bitcoin assets from the relevant indices.

In July, U.S. retail sales recorded a month-on-month decrease of -0.6%, the largest decline since May of last year, and lower than the market expectation of +0.1%.

According to Catcher Predict monitoring, in the market prediction event "Dota 2 Aurora vs Team Yandex International Invitational Group Stage" on Polymarket, the "Aurora" option in the sub-market "Game 2 Winner" has experienced a dramatic fluctuation in win rate, soaring from 42.5% an hour ago to the current 91.5% (a fluctuation of 49%). Please note the impact of related breaking news.

According to the official announcement, Bitget CFD will adjust the leverage and margin tier rules for XAUUSD (gold against the US dollar) and USDCNH (US dollar/offshore RMB) starting from August 15.Among them, when the nominal value of the XAUUSD contract is below $100,000, a maximum leverage of 800 times can be supported; when the nominal value of the USDCNH contract is below $1,000,000, a maximum leverage of 100 times can be supported. For positions exceeding the corresponding range, the platform will adopt a tiered margin calculation method, and the margin rate will be adjusted as the nominal value of the position increases. Users can reasonably allocate their positions according to their asset needs.

According to PR Newswire, Bank Leumi of Israel announced a partnership with Galaxy Digital to provide customers with trading services for digital assets such as Bitcoin starting in 2027, initially supporting Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana. Bank Leumi will also become the first bank in Israel to offer digital asset trading services to its customers.At the same time, Leumi will integrate with Galaxy's digital asset custody infrastructure platform to provide underlying security architecture support for the bank's digital asset services.

Venture capital fund Team8 announced the completion of a new fundraise of $365 million. This round of fundraising includes $265 million for Team8 Capital's third fund, as well as over $100 million for follow-on investments in existing portfolio companies.The new fund will focus on investing in seed and Series A stage AI-native companies, covering areas such as cybersecurity, AI infrastructure, and fintech, with a particular emphasis on infrastructure projects that help businesses deploy AI while ensuring security, governance, and control capabilities. Team8 currently manages assets close to $2 billion.Previously, Team8 has co-invested in several cryptocurrency and AI companies, including cryptocurrency institutional wallet developer Curv, AI compliance platform IVIX, and AI data leak prevention company Jazz.

The Ethereum staking protocol Lido DAO officially interprets the NEST (Network Economic Support Tokenomics) mechanism, which binds the protocol's revenue to the value of LDO tokens through an on-chain automated method, achieving continuous LDO buybacks. The aim is to allow LDO holders to more directly share in the protocol's growth profits. This mechanism is supported by the surplus funds of the DAO treasury. When Lido's staking business revenue exceeds the set benchmark, a portion of the excess revenue will be automatically exchanged for LDO through CoW Swap.According to the initial parameters set by Lido DAO, the NEST revenue benchmark is an annualized $40 million (approximately $109,000 daily), with 50% of the excess allocated for LDO buybacks, a daily buyback limit of $50,000, and a cumulative limit of $10 million over 365 days. Buybacks are executed daily using a permissionless on-chain process.In the initial phase of NEST, a "Treasury-only mode" will be adopted, where purchased LDO will go directly into the DAO treasury. In the future, when market conditions are favorable, the DAO can switch to LP mode through on-chain voting, using half of the funds to purchase LDO and converting the other half into wstETH to provide Curve liquidity.

According to monitoring by The Data Nerd, the whale address starting with 0x90B38 transferred approximately 924,000 HYPE to exchanges in the last 11 hours.Among them, 692,807 coins (approximately $39.77 million) were transferred to Coinbase Prime, and 230,936 coins (approximately $13.26 million) were transferred to FalconX, accounting for about two-thirds of its original holdings. It currently still holds 969,595 HYPE (approximately $55.5 million), and the transfer process was smooth, showing no signs of concentrated selling.

Binance has launched a special trading competition for new users. Complete your first trade on Binance Spot or Instant Exchange to win up to 1,000 USDT vouchers. The event runs from August 14, 2026, 20:00 to August 29, 07:59.Eligibility to participate is for new users who register a Binance account and complete identity verification during the event period. Rewards will be distributed based on the total qualified trading volume of spot or instant exchange trades during the event.

According to monitoring by Catcher Predict, in the predicted market Polymarket for the event "LoL: Team WE vs Top Esports - LPL Group Stage," the "Yes" option for the sub-market "Both sides kill Baron" has experienced a dramatic fluctuation in winning probability, soaring from 50% an hour ago to the current 90% (a fluctuation of 40%). Please note the impact of related breaking news.

Binance Alpha announced that it will be the first platform to launch KiiChain (KII) on August 14. Eligible users can go to the Alpha event page to use Binance Alpha points to claim airdrops after the Alpha trading opens. Specific rules and details regarding the quota will be announced separately.

According to on-chain analyst Yu Jin's monitoring, in the last 23 hours, 3.72 million UNI (worth 12.63 million USD) were transferred to exchanges such as Binance, Coinbase, OKX, and Bybit via the market maker Cumberland.The price of UNI dropped from 3.59 USD to 3.22 USD, a decrease of 10%.

BNB Smart Chain (BSC) announced that the Pasteur hard fork will officially launch on the mainnet at 10:30 AM Beijing time on August 25 (02:30 UTC on August 25). Node operators need to upgrade to client version v1.7.7 in advance. This upgrade includes three improvements: BEP-682, BEP-695, and BEP-675, focusing on enhancing cross-chain security, validator governance mechanisms, and network throughput capacity.Among them, BEP-682 will strengthen the cross-chain bridge validation mechanism of the BNB Chain, preventing the risk of permission bypass caused by duplicate calculations of validator signatures, thus improving the security of cross-chain asset transfers. BEP-695 optimizes the validator key rotation mechanism, ensuring that old keys no longer retain management permissions after exiting, while also fixing potential vulnerabilities related to penalties and governance voting. In terms of performance, BEP-675 reduces the time consumption caused by validators repeatedly executing transactions by optimizing the block construction process.In the internal QANet testing environment of the BNB Chain, this solution increased throughput from 1237 TPS to 2324 TPS, while maintaining a block time of 450 milliseconds and a block limit of 100 million Gas, with the average Gas usage per block rising from 46.35 million to 84.15 million.BNB Chain stated that this upgrade is primarily aimed at validators and block builders, intending to provide greater capacity during network peak periods and to promote the throughput expansion goals outlined in the BNB Chain roadmap for the second half of 2026.

According to the official announcement, Gate has officially launched SOL and XRP event contracts, simultaneously opening multi-cycle rise and fall trading channels. Users can log into the Gate App or the official website and enter the event contract section in the contract area to participate.Event contracts focus on rise and fall prediction trading, requiring no complex parameters such as leverage or margin, making the operational threshold low. The product covers four types of short cycles: 5 minutes, 15 minutes, 1 hour, and 4 hours, currently supporting four major cryptocurrencies: BTC, ETH, SOL, and XRP. Users only need to predict the rise and fall of the asset during the corresponding period, choose to place a bullish or bearish order, and the system will automatically settle at the end of the cycle. Positions can also be closed early for flexible profit-taking and loss-cutting.

According to reports from South Korean media, SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won received a salary of 1.75 billion won in the first half of this year.According to the Financial Supervisory Service, SK Corporation disclosed this information in its semi-annual report released that day. The chairman's salary level in the first half of this year is the same as the same period last year, and he did not receive any bonuses apart from his salary. The chairman's younger brother, SK Group Vice Chairman Chey Jae-won, received a salary of 1.5 billion won during the same period. SK Corporation President Chang Yong-ho received a total of 1.8 billion won, including 1 billion won in salary and 800 million won in bonuses.In addition, SK Supex Pursuit Council Chairman Yoon Bong-yong was disclosed to have received a total of 7.715 billion won, which includes 500 million won in salary, 800 million won in bonuses, and 6.415 billion won in compensation from 12,103 performance stock units (PSUs) granted three years ago. SK Hynix's sales from Nvidia in the first half of this year exceeded 17 trillion won, accounting for about 13% of the company's total sales.The average salary of SK Hynix employees reached 144 million won (approximately $104,000) in the first half of this year, an increase of 23% year-on-year. SK Hynix significantly increased its capital expenditures and research and development (R&D) investments in the first half of this year. Cash expenditures for acquiring tangible assets exceeded 18 trillion won, an increase of over 70% year-on-year. The number of small shareholders of SK Hynix has grown more than fivefold in a year, surpassing 3.46 million.

The Ukrainian government stated that the remaining Black Sea ports in the Greater Odessa region are essentially closed due to Russian airstrikes, and its planned agricultural exports may be halved, posing a risk to global food supply.

Famous trader Killa posted that Bitcoin is continuing to decline, and the key now is whether it can maintain the current range and stay above $60,000. He believes that if BTC can still fluctuate above $60,000, a temporary low may form near the current price area.On the other hand, if BTC breaks below $60,000 and loses the current range, the possibility of further declines for the remainder of August will significantly increase. If it drops below $60,000 from the current position, it may further decline to below $57,000. Conversely, if BTC can maintain its structure and regain a foothold above $61,000 to $62,000, he expects Bitcoin may rebound back into the range for the remainder of August.

Binance announced that, in response to recent changes in regulatory requirements, to continuously comply with relevant regulations and ensure the safety of user assets, Binance will no longer process transactions involving certain cryptocurrency service providers/platforms starting from the following dates: effective August 7, including Shelbit, Aban Tether Exchange; effective August 13, including A7 Nigeria, A7 Africa, PilotFinance; effective August 23, including Rapira, Aifory Pro, ABCeX, WhiteBird, NoOnecrypto, Tradex, Monease, BitPapa, Exnode, Exnode Pay, HTX (Huobi Global SA), EXMO, and other platforms.Binance reminds users to avoid transferring or receiving assets directly or indirectly to the aforementioned entities, or engaging in other transactions with them, as such transactions may require additional compliance review, during which wallets may be restricted, and related activities may involve violations of Binance's Terms of Use.A spokesperson for Huobi HTX responded that the platform is committed to maintaining high standards of compliance, transparency, and user protection, and will continue to collaborate with regulatory agencies to support the sustainable development of the cryptocurrency ecosystem.

A giant whale placed a limit short sale order of approximately $203 million on the tokenized aerospace company SpaceX stock SPCX, with a price range of $141.93 to $142.9, betting on a price decline of the token.At the beginning of August, the two-day trading volume of SPCX on the tokenized trading platform Gate reached about $700 million, with a single-day transaction of $332 million on August 4, as the market traded around the 911.5 million shares that were unlocked on August 6. After the unlocking, SPCX rose by 6.1%, closing at $114.92.Documents from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) show that Elon Musk holds a 48.4% beneficial interest in SpaceX, corresponding to over 6.4 billion shares, valued at over $900 billion at current prices; the related Class B shares give him over 82% of the total voting rights in SpaceX.