accelerate

According to The Block, the World project’s foundation, World Foundation, raised $52.5 million through a strategic sale of WLD tokens, with all tokens locked for one year. This round of "initial delivery" was led by Pantera Capital, with participation from Bain Capital Crypto, Eightco Holdings (NASDAQ: ORBS), Selini Capital, Susquehanna Crypto, and others.The foundation stated that the WLD sold this time is only for internal use within the World Network and does not represent equity or revenue rights in Tools for Humanity. The funds will be used to expand the World ID technology aimed at enterprises, individuals, and AI Agents. Currently, World ID has been integrated with platforms such as Zoom, DocuSign, Okta, Vercel, and Tinder, with over 39 million people having joined the network, of which more than 18 million have completed Orb real-person verification. The current price of WLD is approximately $0.37, with a total market capitalization of about $1.31 billion.

The cryptocurrency exchange BitMEX accelerated the delisting of 65 derivative contracts and spot trading pairs in July, far exceeding the 19 that were delisted in the first six months of this year. The platform attributed the delisting to "insufficient trading interest" and stated that this move is related to its decision to close the exchange. Previously, BitMEX announced that it would officially cease operations on September 23, but did not disclose the specific reason for the closure.Restructuring advisor Roshan Dharia stated that the shutdown of BitMEX reflects the structural pressures faced by mid-sized centralized exchanges: liquidity continues to concentrate on leading platforms, while compliance costs are continuously rising. Earlier, the on-chain analysis platform Bubblemaps revealed that 75% of the total supply of BitMEX tokens BMEX (originally intended for employee incentives, ecosystem growth, and long-term reserves) was never allocated as planned, with the only claim occurring in November 2022. After the shutdown announcement, the price of BMEX dropped by approximately 95%.

Former Fox Business reporter Eleanor Terrett stated that the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce (USHCC), which claims to represent millions of Hispanic businesses across the country, sent a letter to Senate leaders this week expressing concerns similar to those of community banks that the Clarity Act could accelerate deposit outflows. The organization believes that the bill will reduce loans to Hispanic small businesses and weaken investments in underserved communities.

According to IT Home, ByteDance announced today the official launch of the Seed STEM Scientist Program, inviting 100 outstanding scholars from the forefront of scientific fields to collaborate on real research problems and promote AI-accelerated scientific discovery.This program is initiated by the Seed Edge research team, providing ample computing resources and competitive salaries. Participation is divided into two categories: scientific advisors and doctoral interns. The first phase of the program is expected to last about 6 months, with the work location in Haidian District, Beijing. The application deadline is September 30, 2026.

The Chinese AI large model company Dark Side of the Moon is accelerating its capitalization process, planning to start the final round of pre-IPO financing negotiations in August, with a target pre-investment valuation of $50 billion. Reports indicate that Dark Side of the Moon expects to complete a round of financing soon, corresponding to a valuation of approximately $31.5 billion. After completing this round of financing, the company will immediately engage in discussions for the next round of financing with potential investors, which may become its last private placement before entering the Hong Kong capital market.Market participants believe that if the financing plan proceeds smoothly, Dark Side of the Moon could initiate the process for a Hong Kong stock listing as early as this year. One of the key driving factors for this valuation increase is the company's recent release of the new generation large model Kimi K3. It is reported that Kimi K3 has a parameter scale of 28 trillion, supporting a context window of millions of tokens, making it one of the largest open-source models in the world by parameter scale. After the model was released, it quickly attracted market attention, prompting the company to adjust its new user subscription arrangements to ensure the user experience for existing customers.As the competition in generative AI enters a phase of comparison in computing power, user scale, and commercialization capabilities, large model companies are accelerating their search for capital support. Dark Side of the Moon's financing plan also reflects the market's ongoing interest in leading AI foundational model companies. However, the $50 billion valuation target also implies higher commercialization requirements. In the future, investors will focus on Dark Side of the Moon's revenue growth, control of computing costs, and whether the Kimi series models can form a stable business model. If the financing and listing plans proceed smoothly, Dark Side of the Moon may become an important case of capitalization for Chinese AI large model companies.

According to Gate Ventures' latest weekly report, influenced by the escalation of geopolitical risks and changes in the AI competitive landscape, all three major U.S. stock indices fell last week, energy prices rose significantly, and the trends of safe-haven assets like gold and U.S. Treasuries diverged. The cryptocurrency market continued its structural trend, with Bitcoin and Ethereum rising by 1.5% and 3.6%, respectively, while both spot BTC and ETH ETFs maintained net inflows.In terms of industry development, regulation and real-world applications continued to be the focus this week. Japanese convenience store giant Lawson, in collaboration with Netstars, is advancing a stablecoin payment pilot, further promoting the use of stablecoins in everyday consumption scenarios; South Korea plans to officially incorporate digital assets into its national asset management framework and explore the tokenization of government bonds and state-owned assets, with the construction of RWA infrastructure continuing to accelerate. In Europe, after the transition period of MiCA ended, the total number of licensed institutions increased to 294, although the number of new licenses has slowed down, institutional participation remains strong.In terms of investment and financing, the cryptocurrency industry recorded a total of 16 financing events last week, highly concentrated in the infrastructure sector: among them, Alpaca completed a $135 million financing to enhance tokenized securities and AI financial infrastructure; Flex completed a $70 million financing to further expand its stablecoin cross-border payment network, continuously confirming the capital market's long-term optimism towards digital financial infrastructure. Gate Ventures believes that as the global regulatory framework gradually improves and the integration of traditional finance and blockchain deepens, the digital asset ecosystem is expected to enter a more mature and diverse development stage.

Cryptocurrency analyst Amr Taha pointed out that the dynamics of the Bitcoin holder community have recently shown a clear divergence, with large whales continuously accumulating, while medium-sized wallets are selling off at an increasingly rapid pace. Specifically, wallets holding 1,000 to 10,000 BTC have seen a net increase of approximately 66,700 BTC over the past 60 days, nearing the level of 68,000 BTC reached on June 16.In contrast, wallets holding 100 to 1,000 BTC have a net sell-off of about 77,800 BTC, marking one of the most aggressive selling periods in the current data. Historical data shows that the behavior of wallets holding 100 to 1,000 BTC aligns with significant short-term market turning points. On April 25, this group had a net increase of over 92,000 BTC. About 10 days later, Bitcoin entered a short-term correction, ultimately declining by approximately -29%. Amr Taha believes that the continued accumulation by large holders will reduce the immediately available supply, especially during periods when smaller groups are actively distributing Bitcoin. While group data alone cannot determine future price trends, the current shift in supply towards large wallets may signal positive indications for Bitcoin in the medium term.

According to The Block, Bank of America has appointed Sonali Theisen as the head of its global digital asset platform and Kevin Milsom as the head of AI transformation to drive the development of digital asset and artificial intelligence strategies.Sonali Theisen will be responsible for the design, development, expansion, and governance of the bank's digital asset platform, while continuing to serve as the head of electronic trading and strategic investments for fixed income, foreign exchange, and commodities (FICC) business. Her focus will include promoting the integration of blockchain products into Bank of America's existing financial market infrastructure and collaborating with the digital asset transformation head Adam Dixon to advance tokenized deposits, stablecoins, digital collateral circulation, cryptocurrency trading settlement, and custody services.Kevin Milsom will be responsible for promoting the application of AI in Bank of America's global markets platform. Reports indicate that this move continues the trend of Wall Street financial institutions accelerating their layout in digital assets and AI. Previously, Vanguard had initiated the recruitment of its first head of digital assets, and Morgan Stanley appointed Amy Oldenburg earlier this year to lead digital asset strategy to promote the integration of crypto assets and asset tokenization with traditional financial infrastructure.

According to Cointelegraph, Piero Cipollone, a member of the Executive Board of the European Central Bank (ECB), stated that the large-scale adoption of stablecoins could weaken the retail deposit base of commercial banks and alter the competitive landscape of the traditional banking system. Cipollone pointed out during a speech at the Italian Banking Association in Rome on Friday that digital payments are reshaping the banking industry while increasing Europe’s reliance on non-European payment infrastructures.Banks are currently facing declining payment fee revenues and loss of transaction data due to the development of mobile payment service providers. As payment tools like stablecoins and other digital assets become more widespread, commercial banks may face increased pressure from deposit outflows. Cipollone emphasized that the digital euro will help maintain the status of public money and ensure that banks continue to participate in the payment ecosystem while meeting the evolving financial needs of customers."The digital euro can both maintain the role of public funds and ensure that banks retain an important role in the payment system," Cipollone stated. This Tuesday, the European Central Bank selected 36 payment service providers to participate in a 12-month pilot project for the digital euro, including banks, fintech companies, and payment firms.The pilot program is set to launch in the second half of 2027, aiming to test the feasibility of retail central bank digital currency (CBDC) operating in the eurozone. The European Central Bank has previously stated that if relevant legislation and testing progress smoothly, the digital euro could be officially issued as early as 2029.

According to CoinPost, JCB has reached a partnership with a Circle affiliate, planning to test USDC payments at a store in Tokyo that attracts many foreign tourists within the year and evaluate the promotion to more franchise merchants.The pilot aims to reduce the currency exchange process for tourists and lower payment transaction fees. JCB has previously tested USDC and JPYC offline payments with Digital Garage, Resona Holdings, and others; Japan has also accelerated stablecoin merchant payment trials recently, including Lawson's plan to test JPYC in-store settlements in August.

Gate today announced that Jason Fung has officially joined Gate as the Head of Global Partnerships. He will lead the global cooperation strategy, deepening long-term collaboration with high-quality projects, L1/L2 ecosystems, TradFi institutions, and Web3 partners, enhancing the platform's ecological value and global resource integration capabilities.Jason has over 15 years of industry experience in Web3, fintech, consumer technology, and gaming. He has worked at Sei, ABFinance, TikTok, and Alibaba, and has been involved in founding multiple Web2 and Web3 startup projects, accumulating rich experience in market expansion, ecosystem construction, asset operation, strategic cooperation, and international business development. He graduated from the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto with a Bachelor of Commerce degree.Jason stated, "I am excited to join Gate. The digital asset industry is welcoming more innovation and collaboration opportunities. I look forward to leveraging my experience in Web3, technology, and global cooperation to establish closer connections with global project parties, ecosystem partners, and industry participants, exploring more innovative opportunities and jointly promoting the development of the digital asset field."Jason's addition will further enhance Gate's global cooperation system, promote resource synergy across ecosystems and industries, and work with more partners to explore innovative applications of digital assets, supporting the construction and long-term development of the industry ecosystem.

According to Bloomberg, Nubank's parent company Nu Holdings, a crypto-friendly digital bank in Brazil, has been granted a formal banking license by Mexico's financial regulatory agency Comision Nacional Bancaria y de Valores, allowing it to conduct business such as payroll accounts, checking accounts, higher limit deposits, and more loan products locally.Since entering Mexico in 2019, Nubank has invested billions of dollars, and currently has over 15 million customers, accounting for about 15% of the local adult population. Founder and global CEO David Vélez stated that total investment in Mexico is expected to reach approximately $4.2 billion by 2030. Obtaining a full banking license is expected to help Nubank replace some wholesale financing with low-cost deposits and compete directly with large traditional banks in Mexico as well as fintech institutions like Revolut and Klar.

Websea recently officially announced the launch of a new round of global talent recruitment plan, open to the world for regional leaders, global business, market growth, risk control compliance, technology research and development, user operations, and other core positions. With a highly competitive salary and benefits system and broad career development opportunities, it aims to recruit top talent globally, comprehensively accelerate team building, and reserve core talent for the next stage of business growth and global market expansion.Websea CMO Herbert R. Sim stated: "Globalization has always been the core strategy for Websea's long-term development. The launch of the global talent plan is not only a further expansion of the team size but also a continuous investment in future growth and global market layout. We hope to attract more outstanding talents from around the world to work with Websea to promote product innovation, ecological construction, and global business development, creating a safer, more professional, and more efficient digital asset trading experience for global users."

Based on the x402 open standard, the HTTP native payment infrastructure PayGo officially announced the completion of strategic financing, with investors including United Overseas Bank (UOB), Signum Capital, and Ledger Capital.It is reported that PayGo is natively built on the ENI blockchain, with its core business providing account-free, subscription-free, and API Key-free request-level instant stablecoin (USDT/USDC) payment settlement services using the HTTP 402 "Payment Required" status code for APIs, AI entities, and the machine economy. PAYG is the governance token for the project.

Stablecoin issuer Tether announced a strategic financing round investment of $20 million in the Latin American on-chain financial services platform Mercado Bitcoin to support its development in asset tokenization, payments, credit, capital markets, and compliant digital financial services.Founded in 2013, Mercado Bitcoin has expanded from a digital asset trading platform to a comprehensive on-chain financial infrastructure platform, covering areas such as trading services, tokenized investment products, lending, stablecoin payments, banking infrastructure, and cross-border financial services. The funds from this financing will primarily be used to expand payment infrastructure, increase the scale of tokenized products for institutional and retail investors, develop credit business, advance on-chain capital market construction, seek strategic cooperation opportunities, and promote international expansion.

According to the Industrial and Commercial Times, due to the soaring prices of key components such as memory and SSDs, the cost pressure for configuring high-capacity storage in mainstream laptops has greatly increased. Cost-effective mainland Chinese memory and storage components are gradually penetrating the PC supply chain, with brands such as Lenovo, ASUS, MSI, Gigabyte, Acer, and even the American brand Apple accelerating the certification, introduction, or platform tuning of related products.The report pointed out that Lenovo has expanded its use of mainland components this year, and recently flagship laptop models equipped with Yangtze Memory Technologies (YMTC) SSDs have appeared on North American cross-border e-commerce platforms. The American brand Apple is also reported to be negotiating with the U.S. government to procure Changxin Memory Technologies (CXMT) memory to cope with the rising prices. In terms of Taiwanese board manufacturers, MSI recently announced that it is the first to complete the verification and tuning of Changxin Memory DDR5 chips on the AMD platform at DDR5-8000+, while Gigabyte has also adopted Changxin Memory chips in some motherboard models. ASUS and Acer have introduced memory modules from mainland manufacturers such as BIWIN through their own brand memory certification or OEM models.Industry analysts believe that although the short-term imbalance in supply and demand for storage has prompted non-mainland brands to accelerate related certifications, due to the limited production capacity of mainland manufacturers, brand Taiwanese manufacturers still emphasize that Korean original manufacturers with long-term contracts remain the main supply partners at present.

According to reports from Jiemian News, Kingsoft Cloud will accelerate the construction of GPU computing clusters in the second half of the year to meet the explosive growth in computing power demand from major clients. Among them, Xiaomi's demand for Kingsoft Cloud's GPU computing power has upgraded from a ten-thousand-card cluster, with the related budget significantly increasing from nearly 4 billion yuan to over 10 billion yuan. In addition, Alibaba's large model team has signed a 5-year computing power leasing contract with Kingsoft Cloud, involving more than 3,000 eight-card GPU servers. Based on the contracted price, the annualized revenue after full delivery will exceed 4 billion yuan.To meet the surging customer demand, Kingsoft Cloud's capital expenditure plan for 2026 has been raised to 15 billion yuan, with an annual revenue target of 12.5 billion to 13.5 billion yuan. It is reported that due to tight upstream supply, Kingsoft Cloud is currently only accepting long-term contracts from clients for 3 to 5 years, and some orders are facing delivery delays. Due to concerns about the risk of impairment of high-level card assets, Kingsoft Cloud is currently pausing aggressive hardware expansion, anticipating that the prices of computing hardware may reach a turning point for decline in the third quarter of this year.

The growth of Gate options users and the accumulation of positions have shown significant improvement. Data shows that the number of new users in June increased by 34.7% compared to the same period in May; the trading volume of new users increased by 34.2%; and the average total position increased by 95.1%, indicating that options products are continuously improving in user conversion, trading participation, and capital accumulation.To further lower the threshold for options trading, Gate's simplified options have officially launched. Users do not need to manually filter complex options chains; they only need to determine whether BTC/ETH will rise or fall, input the target price and expiration date, and the system will automatically recommend matching contracts and bring them to the order page with one click, helping new users complete options trading with a lower barrier.With the launch of simplified options, Gate options are expected to further enhance the conversion efficiency for newcomers, encouraging more users to move from basic judgments of "bullish or bearish" into more flexible options trading and risk management scenarios.

According to the "2026 Anti-Fraud Report" jointly released by Bitget and SlowMist, as digital finance continues to expand into stocks, tokenized assets, and AI tools, cross-asset trading is gradually becoming an important trend for users participating in the market. The proportion of users engaging in cross-asset allocation has increased from less than 1% in mid-2025 to over 10% in May 2026.The report points out that fraudulent methods are evolving from single attacks to complex attack chains, integrating AI-generated content, deepfakes, voice cloning, and multi-channel social engineering. From July 2025 to June 2026, Bitget's security system intercepted over 150 million malicious requests, identified more than 13,000 high-risk malicious IPs, and assisted users in recovering approximately $32.3 million related to security incidents and fraudulent activities.Bitget CEO Gracy Chen stated that this year marks the third Anti-Fraud Month event, and Bitget will continue to launch security education content, risk identification guides, and industry collaboration activities to help users enhance their ability to identify and protect against AI fraud, phishing attacks, and multi-asset scenario scams.