arch

The U.S. Producer Price Index (PPI) for September will be released at 20:30 Beijing time on October 15. Oxford Economics expects the September PPI to rise by 0.6% month-on-month, higher than the market expectation of 0.5% and August's 0.4%. In August, U.S. diesel prices increased by 24% month-on-month and 77% year-on-year. According to the American Automobile Association, the retail price of diesel reached a historic high of $6.528 per gallon on September 22.As of Wednesday, the U.S. retail price of diesel remained at $6.30 per gallon, over 70% higher than the same period last year. Analysts say that diesel is an important input for road freight, rail transport, and agricultural production. Rising prices will first push up production and transportation costs for businesses, and then gradually transmit through fuel surcharges, transportation contracts, and retail pricing, with cost pass-through potentially lagging. The Trump administration has temporarily relaxed some restrictions on agricultural fuel use and stated that Russia will supply diesel to the global market. Industry insiders believe these measures are unlikely to resolve refining capacity and finished oil supply bottlenecks in the short term.

Galaxy Research released a research report on October 15, categorizing decision markets and impact markets as conditional markets. These two types of conditional trading settle only when specific outcomes occur, and decision markets also settle on clear and binding results. Unlike prediction markets, conditional markets are not limited to binary, all-or-nothing structures; they trade real assets and their prices rather than synthetic probability contracts, with the byproduct being the impact of events on asset values rather than occurrence probabilities. The agency referred to prediction markets as the zero version of event-driven finance, with a large number of experiments emerging over the past 18 months, and new infrastructure pushing it beyond prediction markets.The ownership token-based issuance platform Umia, aimed at EVM-compatible chains, launched in September, expanding decision markets from being primarily limited to Solana, where MetaDAO was the first to scale binary pass or fail markets, to multi-outcome markets that can price proposal parameters. A deposit of stablecoins or DAO tokens can simultaneously convert into positions covering each outcome, with only winning market trades ultimately settling. Currently, 22 DAO treasuries fully governed by decision markets hold a total of $50.5 million, with MetaDAO accounting for 21 of them and 78% of the assets; the stablecoin portion is $35.8 million, with MetaDAO holding 82%. The fundraising for the market-governed DAO issuance platform by MetaDAO was approximately 11 months prior to this research report. Umia extends the issuable chains to Solana or EVM, which together account for about 92% of TVL by chain type.

Galaxy Digital Research Director Alex Thorn stated that over half of the BTC supply is located in addresses of unknown ownership. Despite the trend of institutionalization and centralized holdings in recent years, there is still a massive (possibly even the majority of) amount of Bitcoin being self-custodied by individuals.

NVIDIA has committed to investing $250 million over the next five years to promote research in agent safety and security in the UK. The company stated that it will provide $50 million in computing resources support for agent safety research in the UK each year.

On October 13, chip company Qualcomm announced in San Diego that a jury found Arm in violation of the long-standing architecture license agreement (ALA) with Qualcomm, failing to fulfill related commitments and deliberately disrupting Qualcomm's business.Qualcomm stated that, combined with the previous court victory, this outcome further indicates Arm's intention to harm Qualcomm and its ecosystem. Qualcomm called this result a victory for innovation and competition and will continue to develop and deliver semiconductor products, including the Oryon CPU.

Palantir's Chief Technology Officer Shyam Sankar stated in an interview on CBS News' "Face the Nation" that many AI researchers have started smoking to demonstrate their confidence in AI to other researchers. He quoted the attitude of such researchers saying, "I truly believe in AI; it will cure cancer, so I’m showing you that I’m all in." Sankar did not name any specific researcher nor cite survey data; this statement was made in passing when host Margaret Brennan pressed him on why he was so focused on the topic.In the interview, Sankar referred to effective altruism as a "millennial-style doomsday cult" and mentioned FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried as the most well-known representative of the movement. He also cited Pascal's idea that everyone has a "God-shaped hole" in their heart, claiming that some researchers are trying to fill this hole with a machine god called AGI.Medical data contrasts with this claim. The U.S. CDC states that smoking causes about one-third of cancer deaths in the U.S., and cigarette smoke contains at least 69 known carcinogenic chemicals, with smokers being about 25 times more likely to develop lung cancer than non-smokers. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei stated in August that the promise of AI curing cancer is "more of a cliché than inspiring," and that only a true cure for cancer can win public trust. CBS polling shows that 50% of Americans believe the problems created by AI outweigh the problems it solves, and 45% want the government to limit the use and development of AI.

On-chain data company CryptoQuant researcher Rei Researcher pointed out in a report released on Monday that as the Bitcoin supply on exchanges continues to shrink, the price of Bitcoin may see an upward trend. The report shows that the Bitcoin held by exchanges has decreased from 2.8 million in February to 2.67 million. The recent price of Bitcoin is around $83,485, remaining stable over the past 24 hours but rising 8% over the past 30 days, following the best-performing quarter in years.The report states, "If buying demand continues to improve while exchange supply remains low, Bitcoin could benefit from a supply-demand imbalance, creating favorable conditions for a longer-term upward trend." The report adds, "More importantly, Bitcoin has rebounded from its lows in recent weeks, while exchange reserves continue to decline. This is a notable development, indicating that even as the market recovers, the supply available for trading is still decreasing." The report also notes that investors may be transferring Bitcoin out of exchanges and into cold wallets.In the first half of 2026, Bitcoin traded below $65,000 for most of the time. After reaching an all-time high of $126,080 in October 2025, the cryptocurrency has been in a bear market for most of this year. However, the situation changed in August when the U.S. Treasury doubled the scale of liquidity support repurchase operations, weakening the dollar while boosting non-yielding assets like Bitcoin. Analysts say that the so-called "devaluation trade" has heated up again, benefiting Bitcoin as it did in 2024 and 2025. Currently, the price of Bitcoin is still over 30% lower than its historical record.

On October 13, as the stock tokenization sector continues to heat up, Feixiaohao, relying on its background as a publicly listed company in the U.S., is collaborating with exchanges to promote stock tokenization services and build the Feixiaohao DAT ecosystem. From structural design, asset custody, on-chain issuance to trading circulation, Feixiaohao aims to bring traditional stocks into the Web3 world.On the user side, Feixiaohao AI makes analysis as simple as chatting. Users can ask questions in natural language and receive multi-dimensional interpretations of tokenized stocks regarding fundamentals, information, and market sentiment, making it easier to understand and participate in this emerging market.

According to K33 Research, the U.S. government transferred approximately 17,733 BTC to Coinbase Prime this week, including 12,267 BTC related to the Bitfinex hacking incident. After the transfer, the government's marked holdings decreased from 324,527 BTC to 306,795 BTC. If we include unmarked suspected government wallets, the total amount of BTC transferred to Coinbase Prime is about 21,500 BTC.Analysis suggests that this transfer is likely a custody operation rather than a sale—Coinbase Prime has been the custodian for the U.S. Marshals Service since 2024. The cryptocurrencies related to Bitfinex are still in the claims process, and the Department of Justice has requested that victims be compensated in BTC; the ban on the strategic Bitcoin reserve only covers cryptocurrencies that have been fully confiscated. Additionally, about 1,200 BTC from FTX and HashFlare were transferred simultaneously, which may be paid to victims in cash through compensation channels.It is noteworthy that approximately 15,000 BTC related to Bitfinex claims were transferred within two days, which may indicate that the distribution plan or related rulings are progressing.

According to the latest weekly report from Binance Research, since August 31, the yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury has risen by 47 basis points, of which 43 basis points came from an increase in real yields, while the inflation breakeven rate only rose by 4 basis points. The 10-year real yield once reached 2.95%, the highest since 2008.The weekly report also pointed out that since the interest rate hike in September, BTC has risen by 9.3%, ETH by 2.7%, and Layer 2, RWA, and AI tokens have increased by approximately 32%, 29%, and 29%, respectively, while meme and payment tokens have performed relatively poorly.Binance Research stated that the current high real interest rates still exert a suppressive effect on a wide range of risk assets, and future attention should focus on CPI, long-term U.S. Treasury yields, and BTC ETF fund flows.

10x Research published that Bitcoin option prices have fallen to a five-year low, with near-month implied volatility at 33.5%, more than 4 percentage points lower than actual volatility, indicating that option pricing is relatively cheap. In the past week, the skew of Bitcoin options has decreased by nearly 3 percentage points, with traders focusing on buying put options expiring in October with strike prices of $78,000 and $80,000, with single large trades reaching up to $204 million.10x Research believes this indicates that investors overall still hold long positions while hedging downside risks through options, rather than fully turning bearish. In contrast, the Ethereum options market shows different signals. Its largest corporate buyer has indicated that it will stop buying in the coming weeks, with options trading primarily dominated by sellers of call options, and implied volatility higher than actual volatility.

Grayscale's Research Director Zach Pandl stated in his column The Stack on October 8 that the rising demand for AI is due to decreasing usage costs and technology's ability to perform tasks more autonomously, thereby increasing the demand for computing power and the physical infrastructure that supports AI. Lower costs can unleash more AI activities, and the low-cost competition of open-source weight models is driving down token prices, making cheaper intelligence economically viable for more applications and automated workflows.The article cites that Anthropic's latest Sonnet model claims to reduce the cost of each task by up to 30%; OpenAI's always-on agent dots, launched on September 29, can work towards user goals around the clock, potentially significantly increasing the demand for computing power. Pandl compares that chatbots primarily answer questions, while agents execute multi-step processes to achieve goals, with tasks like preparing for client meetings potentially consuming 5 to 50 times the tokens of a single chat interaction, and always-on agents may extend processing beyond a single conversation.Pandl cites Goldman Sachs' prediction that by 2030, token consumption could increase 24 times, primarily driven by agents; even with improved efficiency, if usage grows faster, the total demand for computing power may still rise. He points out that digital activities still rely on physical infrastructure that requires time to deliver, such as electricity, data centers, and GPUs, and cheaper AI can coexist with tight computing power supply, mentioning that CoreWeave recently signed new contracts at higher computing power prices. His conclusion is that cheaper intelligence and stronger agents may expand use cases and usage enough to offset efficiency gains, thereby supporting the demand for scarce computing power and benefiting its owners.

Security researcher @cyberscrilla discovered that a fake Ledger website and application appeared at the top of Google search results, aiming to trick users into revealing their 24-word recovery phrase. Reportedly, Google data shows that the website had over 1 million visits in the past 30 days.Previously, cybersecurity company Zscaler found in a September investigation that malicious Google ads were impersonating Ledger and redirecting users to a fake wallet verification page. Currently, Ledger is investigating a suspected wallet theft case involving Southeast Asian dealer CryptoBilis, with an estimated amount of $86 million involved.

The Malaysian hardware wallet distributor CryptoBilis has been revealed to have changed ownership during the investigation into a suspected supply chain attack on Ledger devices. Newly disclosed company records show that an individual named Jiaming, with a registered address in Heilongjiang Province, China, has held 100% of the company's shares since August 3.The former co-founder of CryptoBilis confirmed that the company was acquired in March of this year, and the original shareholders subsequently withdrew from all operational, management, and administrative positions. The founding team has been unable to understand the actual operations of the company after the handover, only continuing to assist with some activity coordination, and stated that they are no longer part of the company, urging the current management to handle the matter transparently.As the change in ownership was exposed, CryptoBilis has come under scrutiny for its alleged involvement in the supply chain attack on Ledger hardware wallets, with related devices reportedly implanted with hidden modules capable of stealing recovery phrases. There is currently no conclusive evidence linking the change in ownership to the wallet theft incident. CryptoBilis has temporarily suspended sales and shipments of all brand hardware wallets at its stores and online channels in Malaysia, the Philippines, and Indonesia, and has closed offline stores until further notice.

TruGolf Holdings (TRUG), a publicly traded company on NASDAQ, announced that it has completed the acquisition of the Canadian asset tokenization company Polymath Research Inc. Polymath is a company focused on institutional-grade asset tokenization and is also the developer of the Layer 1 blockchain Polymesh, which is aimed at regulated assets. After the acquisition, Polymath will operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary of TruGolf, while TruGolf will continue to retain its original businesses such as golf simulators and the E6 platform, forming two business lines: golf technology and blockchain infrastructure.As of December 31, 2025, Polymath has issued tokenized assets worth over $132 million for more than 65 active issuers and has over 50 ecosystem partners. The two parties also plan to launch a device leasing tokenization and franchise rights fragmentation holding project in the first quarter of 2027. In addition, TruGolf received approximately $2.95 million in net proceeds from the exercise of B-round preferred stock warrants related to this transaction.

Fidelity Digital Assets Vice President Chris Kuiper stated, "The bear market may not be over." He believes that the rebound since August could either be the starting point of a new rally or just a bounce within the bear market, "an upward price movement does not guarantee the end of the bear market"; according to a four-year cycle, November is a key window to observe (the last bear market bottom was in November 2022), but he also emphasized that historical cycles have never precisely repeated, and BTC may decline again, potentially setting a new low in November or later.A more positive signal is that during the period from June to mid-August, the volatility of digital assets rapidly increased after being low, resembling the end of previous bear markets, which may indicate that selling pressure is nearing exhaustion, while stablecoin transfers, RWA, and institutional participation continue to grow during the same period.

The head of research at OpenAI issued a statement in response to an open letter from three former employees, Jasmine, Mikita, and Tomek. The company stated that after a thorough investigation, the three violated clear policies regarding the handling of sensitive information; serious breaches of trust discovered during the internal investigation exceeded the scope disclosed in the open letter, leading to the termination of their employment last week, a decision that will be upheld.OpenAI emphasized that this decision is not aimed at those who raise safety concerns or express opinions publicly. The company stated that there are intense and critical safety and research discussions internally every day, and it encourages questioning; it maintains a tolerance for good-faith mistakes and will not fire employees for raising concerns.Regarding the safety issues mentioned in the open letter, OpenAI stated that it is finalizing contracts with third-party security assessment organizations, with details expected to be announced in the coming weeks, and it is committed to including external evaluators in its safety work. The company recognizes that maintaining the monitorability of cutting-edge models requires collective investment from the entire industry, stating that this area has long been a focus of its research and will continue to receive significant resources.

The White House announced a comprehensive research plan with a total scale exceeding 6 billion dollars, covering artificial intelligence, quantum computing, biological research, and talent development. The funding and resources come from the government, enterprises, universities, and charitable organizations. Eleven technology companies have committed to providing AI tools and computing power worth 2.4 billion dollars for the Genesis Project.Specific commitments include 1 billion dollars from NVIDIA, 500 million dollars from AMD, 200 million dollars from OpenAI, and 150 million dollars each from Anthropic and Google. These resources will support over 15 federal agencies in conducting research.The Genesis Project will launch in 2025 and aims to utilize AI, supercomputers, and government research data to accelerate research in fields such as energy, healthcare, and aerospace. Related arrangements also include the previously announced 1.8 billion dollar virtual biology program, as well as the 1 billion dollar investment in research computing power and talent development pledged by the government, enterprises, and universities in Georgia.