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On October 21, the UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published Consultation Paper 26/36 titled "Guidance on the Regulatory Scope of Cryptoassets," which explains how to determine whether related activities require authorization when the business model involves a certain degree of decentralization.The FCA pointed out that the use of software, smart contracts, distributed ledger technology, distributed governance mechanisms, or other technological arrangements does not, by itself, determine whether there are regulated activities that require authorization. Automation merely describes the manner in which functions are executed and does not determine whether that function constitutes part of a regulated activity. The so-called "true DeFi" is not a statutory concept in the "Regulated Activities Order" or the "Cryptoasset Regulations"; the degree of decentralization is a continuum and does not constitute an independent or separate regulatory framework.At the same time, the FCA also published Guidance Consultation Paper 26/7, which explains how regulated firms should manage DeFi risks, focusing on operational resilience and financial crime risks, and provides examples of measures that firms may consider taking. Both consultation papers will close for comments on November 18, and the FCA plans to publish the final guidance in January 2027. Starting from October 25, 2027, the new regulations will bring new cryptoasset activities under regulatory oversight, and firms wishing to continue related business must submit authorization applications by February 28, 2027.

According to Salus monitoring, the attackers of Drift Protocol transferred 4,600 ETH, worth approximately 11.23 million USD, to Tornado Cash in 46 transactions from another long-dormant wallet between 15:00 and 15:19 Beijing time. This wallet had not made any outgoing transactions for about 202 days and still held 20,285.82 ETH at the time of monitoring.Salus stated that another wallet previously tracked had deposited an additional 6,110 ETH into Tornado Cash on top of the previously disclosed 19,600 ETH, bringing the total deposits of that wallet to 25,710 ETH. The two tracked wallets have cumulatively deposited 30,310 ETH into Tornado Cash.

The Blockchain Association submitted a letter to the SEC regarding the "Regulation of Crypto Assets" proposal, suggesting raising the startup exemption limit to $10 million and the fundraising exemption to $150 million (supporting on-chain transparency as an alternative to audits and excluding airdrops), and establishing a third-party registration safe harbor for existing tokens.The Blockchain Association calls for clear objective decentralization standards for tokens to escape the "investment contract" attribute (such as open source and no unilateral review rights), while strengthening federal regulations' priority jurisdiction over state legislation, supporting 24/7 trading on exchanges and self-custody.

Castle Securities CEO Griffin stated that there is almost certainly a bubble in the AI field, although bubbles are often accompanied by significant technological breakthroughs. Companies are carefully reviewing the bills from Anthropic and OpenAI, and some companies are struggling to derive value from AI.

According to on-chain analyst Yu Jin's monitoring, the hacker who stole $285 million in assets from Drift Protocol at the beginning of April transferred 25,710 ETH, worth $61.24 million, through Tornado 3 hours ago.The hacker had exchanged the stolen assets for 131,564 ETH at an average price of $2,154 in early April, and transferred 24,400 ETH through Tornado in July; the current address still holds 81,454 ETH, worth $194 million.

The American Blockchain Association stated that it has submitted comments on the proposed implementation rules for Section 3 of the GENIUS Act by the U.S. Department of the Treasury. The association recommends clarifying the scope of "digital asset service providers" to exclude self-custody software, validators, and businesses that only trade their own assets; regarding criminal liability for participating in the illegal issuance of stablecoins, it should be based on actual knowledge and substantial assistance coordinated with the issuer.The association also suggested that trading platforms could determine the compliance of foreign stablecoins based on the official issuer list and trading bans, and adjust the criteria for determining user locations in unlicensed agreements.

In an executive order, U.S. President Trump stated that, effective immediately, certain sanctions, restrictions, and tariffs specified in the "Graham Sanctions on Russia and Iran Act" are waived.

As Trump's tariff policy restricts foreign steel supplies, U.S. steel prices have risen to their highest level in over four years, with hot-rolled coil prices increasing by 52%, reaching $1,255 per short ton. This move has boosted the profits of domestic steel producers but raised costs for manufacturers.

According to the Wall Street Journal, sources say that U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo opposes significant cuts to tariffs on automobiles, steel, and aluminum products from Mexico, causing negotiations for the U.S.-Mexico tariff agreement to stall.

According to the official blog of Avalanche, the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) court has announced the adoption of Avalanche blockchain technology to provide globally verifiable digital authenticity certificates for its court orders and hearing records.The system binds encrypted hashes of documents to unique NFT certificates on the Avalanche C-Chain, allowing any institution to verify document authenticity within seconds without contacting the court, while the document content and confidential information are not stored on-chain, maintaining complete privacy.Avalanche's settlement speed is less than one second, and records are non-reversible. In addition, the Telecommunications and Digital Government Regulatory Authority (TDRA) of the UAE is also collaborating with Ava Labs to integrate Avalanche technology into the Digital Vault blockchain layer of the national digital identity platform UAE PASS, which serves over 12.5 million users, further promoting the construction of a credible verification system for government documents on-chain in the UAE.

The institutional settlement network Lynq, aimed at the digital asset market, and the stablecoin clearinghouse The Better Money Company (TBMC) announced the completion of a real-time proof of concept, demonstrating that institutional settlements can be completed in minutes. This proof of concept is part of the first phase of collaboration between the two parties, utilizing a pre-funded process to complete stablecoin settlements on Lynq.In the proof of concept, TBMC converted assets deposited by clients on Lynq into RLUSD, with settlements completed in minutes. The validation used real production accounts and real institutional counterparties, bypassing traditional banking windows during the settlement process. Interest continued to accrue on the assets during the settlement holding period, calculated using Tassat's Yield in Transit feature, determining accrued interest based on the duration of asset holdings.TBMC founder and CEO Sam Broner stated: "For stablecoins to become meaningful institutional infrastructure, they need to enter real settlement processes; this validation shows that stablecoin fragmentation can be handled through on-chain collateral transfer without relying on credit and traditional banking settlements for connection." Lynq CEO Jerald David remarked: "Institutions are not lacking in capital; what they lack is the ability to move funds to the right place in the right form when needed; this validation was intentionally kept small in scale, but it shows that digital dollars can settle between institutions in minutes, without substituting speed with credit convenience." Lynq stated that the platform's native stablecoin support is currently targeted for the end of 2026.

According to The Block, KB Kookmin Card has signed a memorandum of understanding with Japan's SBI Holdings to test AI agent-based identity verification and explore cross-border cryptocurrency payments.The two parties will study ways for Japanese tourists to pay Korean merchants using cryptocurrency assets, including stablecoins. KB Kookmin Card is a credit card company under KB Financial Group, and SBI Holdings is a Japanese financial holding group.

According to South Korean media Dailian, the Digital Asset Exchange Alliance (DAXA) has released the "2026 Digital Asset Policy Compilation." Professor Zhao Zaiyu from Hanyang University pointed out that since the ICO ban in 2017, domestic cryptocurrency projects in South Korea have continuously moved their issuance entities and business foundations overseas due to regulatory gaps. The token issuance of Klaytn is handled by a Singaporean entity, and Wemade's WEMIX is also issued by a Singaporean entity. Subsequently, Metabora moved to Dubai, and NeoFin relocated its foundation to Abu Dhabi, with the trend of industry outflow continuing to intensify.Experts indicate that the core obstacles are the regulatory gaps between domestic and foreign issuers and the difficulties in opening corporate bank accounts. They emphasize that "what Korea needs is not looser regulations, but clearer rules," calling for the Digital Asset Basic Law to clarify the licensing standards for issuance, custody, verification, and other business activities, and to establish special procedures for the return of core functions from overseas to the domestic market.

Starknet published an article introducing the Quantum Secure Bitcoin solution (QSB), stating that StarkWare researchers have verified a quantum secure locking mechanism on the Bitcoin mainnet that does not require a soft fork, new opcodes, or modifications to consensus rules. The first QSB output was completed on August 26, 2026, in Bitcoin mainnet block 964,199, with related GPU computing costs dropping from approximately $320 to about $50.QSB constructs the locking mechanism through hash calculations, but each transaction still requires significant computation, and assets transferred into this solution still need to undergo traditional transactions that are subject to quantum risks. This transaction does not comply with the default relay rules of Bitcoin Core, and currently, there are no accompanying wallets, address formats, or recovery processes. StarkWare stated that QSB is an emergency research solution, and a long-term solution will still need to introduce post-quantum signature mechanisms through a soft fork. The comprehensive quantum security of Starknet also depends on the progress of Ethereum's underlying upgrades.

According to NADA NEWS, the Financial Services Agency (FSA) of Japan has requested financial institutions, including cryptocurrency exchanges, to promptly stop using images of documents such as driver's licenses for identity verification (KYC) and to switch to a new verification method that reads integrated circuit (IC) chip information through smart devices.

Hong Kong Cyberport personnel clearly stated to RootData that, after internal verification, Cyberport is not an investor in Metafyed and does not hold any equity in the company.According to RootData, Metafyed is a blockchain-based real-world asset (RWA) tokenization platform, involved in private credit and project financing. The project previously disclosed completing a $5.5 million financing round and stated in the financing press release that it received "incubation and support" from Hong Kong Cyberport, Draper, and the Stellar Development Foundation.RootData marked this financing as "questionable" in March of this year. RootData reminds users to pay attention to the risks associated with the project, to prudently assess the relevant financing information, and welcomes users to provide verifiable information and correction leads to jointly supervise the platform's data quality, enhancing the accuracy and reliability of the data.

On October 8, 2026, the Spanish government approved Royal Decree No. 813/2026, tightening anti-money laundering regulations. According to the new rules, all transactions at cryptocurrency ATMs within Spain must undergo reliable identity verification, whereas previously some small-value transactions at physical terminals did not require comprehensive identity verification.Operators will be granted an 18-month transition period to deploy advanced electronic identity verification systems.

The Federal Reserve meeting minutes show that several officials indicated that the possibility of further increasing tariffs poses a risk of rising inflation.