landscape

According to a research report published by RootData Research, the total trading volume of mainstream cryptocurrency exchanges in the TradFi sector surpassed $1.3 trillion in the first half of 2026, nearly a tenfold increase compared to the entire year of 2025, with TradFi derivatives accounting for over 98%, becoming the core engine driving the explosive growth of the sector.The exchange landscape is shifting from "unipolar concentration" to multipolar competition. Binance, while maintaining a leading position in the TradFi sector with a cumulative share of 68.3%, saw its monthly trading volume share decline from 78.8% at the beginning of the year to 58.2% in August. Meanwhile, second-tier exchanges such as OKX, Gate, and Hyperliquid are rapidly expanding, with market shares of 18.2%, 10.7%, and 9.9% respectively in August.In the core submarket of stock derivatives, entering August, Binance still dominated with an average daily trading volume of $14.927 billion; OKX established an advantage in trading costs with the industry's lowest spread of 0.0091%, achieving a comprehensive score tied for second with Gate. Gate has recently shown independent growth, recording four consecutive months of triple-digit month-on-month growth from May to August, and in mid-August, its ±2% weighted depth ranked first in the industry for 11 consecutive trading days. The competitive logic of the TradFi sector may be shifting from a battle for traffic to a competition across comprehensive dimensions such as position size, market depth, trading costs, and variety coverage.

Uniswap founder Hayden Adams stated that after nine years of DeFi practice, the path for AMM to become the core engine of the global financial market is becoming increasingly clear. He pointed out that tokenization is not only an infrastructure upgrade but also changes who provides liquidity and what is traded in the market. The SEC has approved Nasdaq and the New York Stock Exchange to trade tokenized stocks, and the DTCC also conducted live testing of tokenized trading in July.Adams believes that traditional market makers vertically integrate capital, strategy, execution, settlement, and distribution, which is costly; blockchain disassembles these components, making capital a scarce input. Liquidity providers who already hold relevant assets or are the issuers themselves can bear inventory exposure at zero cost, thereby weakening professional market makers with lower capital costs. An on-chain "related asset pair" model has naturally formed (such as the Ethereum ecosystem pairing with ETH and stablecoins), as correlation reduces inventory risk and deepens liquidity.He cited that there are already 10 tokenized stocks on the Robinhood Chain forming a Uniswap pool with SPY, which has traded approximately $33 million in 12 days, with some trades occurring directly between stocks without touching the dollar. Adams also stated that although Uniswap's cumulative trading volume has reached about $4.6 trillion, AMM is still in its early stages, and there is significant room for improvement in subsequent design and ecosystem.

According to South Korean media NATE, the Korea Regulatory Reform Committee has proposed amendments to the enforcement decree of the Specific Financial Transaction Information Act, excluding minor violations from the qualification restrictions for major shareholders of Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASP).This move has sparked discussions in the market regarding exchange mergers and acquisitions, the entry of new businesses, and the fairness of regulation. The proposal to relax restrictions also involves issues related to the boundaries of the enforcement decree's authority.

According to the WSJ, Robinhood is in talks with the cryptocurrency trading platform Crypto.com to further expand its prediction market business.Insiders revealed that both parties plan to integrate Crypto.com's prediction market business into the Robinhood platform, allowing users to participate in the "yes/no" prediction contracts offered by Crypto.com directly through the Robinhood trading interface.

Recently, market risk appetite has cooled, and high-valuation technology chip sectors are under significant pressure; in contrast, supported by expectations in infrastructure, manufacturing, and cyclical demand, industrial machinery-related assets have shown relative resilience. According to Gate platform data, ARM/USDT (Arm) is currently priced at $284.29, down 1.13% in the last 24 hours; CATG/USDT (Caterpillar) is currently priced at $892.11, up 0.16% in the last 24 hours; GEG/USDT (General Electric) is currently priced at $341.55, down 0.61% in the last 24 hours. In terms of performance, Caterpillar-related trading pairs have slightly strengthened, while Arm and General Electric-related trading pairs have fluctuated downwards, overall still showing a divergent pattern.

According to Gate market data, the South Korean stock market performed actively today, with the beauty stock Manyo Factory reporting $11.60 during trading, an increase of 18.43%; Hanjoo Oil reported $6.88, an increase of 14.72%; IT'S HANBUL reported $7.25, an increase of 13.51%, with several popular South Korean stocks leading the market.Gate has established a 7×24 hour trading service system covering the three core markets of US stocks, Hong Kong stocks, and South Korean stocks, supporting over 10,000 US stocks and ETFs, more than 1,500 Hong Kong stocks, and over 1,000 South Korean stocks, totaling coverage of more than 12,500 stocks and ETF assets globally.Users can participate in global stock investment through Gate's unified account using USDT, supporting fractional share trading starting from a minimum of 0.01 shares, and enjoying stock dividend rights. The platform also supports cross-brokerage transfer of US and Hong Kong stocks, as well as corporate actions such as stock splits and consolidations, further optimizing the stock investment service experience.

According to The Block, influenced by the maturation of the crypto market and the rapid development of emerging technologies, several leading crypto venture capital firms are shifting their investment focus from the pure crypto sector to a broader "frontier technology" track, involving AI, robotics, fintech, and biotechnology.It is reported that Framework Ventures and Haun Ventures have recently raised $400 million and $1 billion funds respectively to support cross-domain layouts; Paradigm is planning to raise up to $1.5 billion for a frontier technology fund; and the former Binance incubator YZi Labs has also ventured into the fields of AI and biotechnology.Industry investors analyze that the core reasons for this strategic shift are the demand for capital deployment brought about by the expansion of fund sizes, the decrease in high-quality pure crypto projects, and the increasing integration of adjacent technologies such as blockchain and AI. Some venture capitalists predict that as cryptocurrencies gradually integrate into a broader technology ecosystem, the exclusive label of "crypto VC" may gradually fade, and the market will ultimately differentiate into large multi-strategy investment funds and a few vertical investors focused on digital assets. However, some institutions like a16z Crypto and Dragonfly still insist on deepening their investment strategies in the pure crypto sector.