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Ethereum consensus layer core contributor Greg posted on the X platform revealing the insider details of the resignation of Ethereum Foundation Executive Director Tomasz Stańczak. He expressed that he was not surprised by this event, as there has long been power struggles within the Ethereum Foundation. The organizational inertia of "this is how the Ethereum Foundation operates" makes reforms difficult to implement. Over the past year, core figure Vitalik Buterin has been mostly absent, leading to issues such as resource inefficiency and project stagnation within the foundation.The internal reforms initially promoted by Tomasz Stańczak were not widely accepted, which may have led to his departure. In fact, he has extensive industry experience, including backgrounds in Nethermind, Flashbots, and venture capital. Although potential conflicts of interest were disclosed in advance, some community members still have doubts about this.Additionally, Tomasz Stańczak sincerely hopes to return to technical development, but he is likely to encounter resistance in the reform process at the Ethereum Foundation, which may force him to leave. In the future, it will be necessary to introduce leaders with real business experience and decision-making power to drive the organization’s effective operation.

According to CoinDesk, a statement from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York revealed that Rui-Siang Lin, the alleged operator of the dark web drug marketplace Incognito Market, was sentenced to 30 years in federal prison on Tuesday. This marks the conclusion of one of the largest cases involving an online drug market since the Silk Road case.U.S. prosecutors stated that the operators of the dark web market Incognito Market used cryptocurrency and anonymous tools to conceal their identities, but investigators ultimately linked them to the platform through domain records and digital footprints. Rui-Siang Lin operated under the online alias "Pharaoh." He pleaded guilty in December 2024 to multiple charges, including conspiracy to commit drug offenses, money laundering, and conspiracy to sell adulterated and falsely labeled drugs. Prosecutors indicated that the platform facilitated over $105 million in illegal drug transactions between October 2020 and March 2024, completing more than 640,000 transactions and serving hundreds of thousands of buyers worldwide.

According to crypto KOL Sea_Bitcoin, 5.91980561 BTC in the donation address of the Bitcoin protocol Atomicals Protocol has been dormant since 2024, and yesterday 1.521212 BTC was transferred out, suspected to be cashed out.The KOL stated, "The Atomicals protocol was once considered the most legitimate and technically ambitious protocol, but later the anonymous author Arthur directly disappeared soft rug, and the BTC donated by the community was not returned. The beautiful blueprint drawn by the project has also not materialized."

CryptoQuant CEO Ki Young Ju posted on the X platform that the current decline in Bitcoin is mainly due to ongoing selling pressure and a lack of new capital. He pointed out that the Realized Cap has recently flattened, indicating that there has been no significant new capital entering the market. In this environment, if the total market cap declines, it typically does not belong to a bull market structure.Ki Young Ju further stated that due to the influence of ETF funds and continuous buying by Strategy, early holders still have significant unrealized profits and have gradually been realizing profits since early last year. Previously, strong capital inflows had supported Bitcoin around the $100,000 mark, but the related incremental capital has clearly weakened now. He believes that Strategy was one of the important driving forces behind this round of price increase, and if Michael Saylor had not significantly reduced his holdings, the market might struggle to replicate the approximately 70% level of deep retracement seen in previous cycles. Overall, the current selling pressure is still ongoing, the market bottom has not yet been clearly defined, but this round of the bear market is more likely to present a wide range of oscillation patterns.

According to Coindesk, former Olympic snowboarder Ryan Wedding has been charged by U.S. authorities with using cryptocurrency for drug trafficking and has been arrested in Mexico and extradited back to the United States.U.S. authorities arrested former Canadian snowboarder Ryan Wedding on Friday and apprehended a drug lord suspected of using cryptocurrency networks to transfer and launder his criminal proceeds. Ryan Wedding was placed on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list for alleged cocaine trafficking and murder. According to the FBI, Ryan Wedding is linked to the Sinaloa drug cartel and was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control in November.

Trove token quickly collapsed after being listed for trading today, dropping over 95% within ten minutes of opening, with FDV falling from about $20 million to less than $1 million. The project originally planned to issue on Hyperliquid and raise over $11.5 million through an ICO, with an initial target of $2.5 million, but suddenly shifted to issuing tokens on Solana before the TGE.The project team previously admitted to a "mistake," stating that the withdrawal of liquidity partners led to the change in plans, but they did not refund the excess funds raised, nor has there been any substantial progress on refunds or audits. ZachXBT exposed details of the Trove fraud, showing that the ICO funds directly flowed into gambling accounts at casinos and Polymarket. It is reported that the team spent heavily to hire a large number of KOLs for promotion, but did not disclose this.According to previous news from ChainCatcher, Trove will shift from Hyperliquid to Solana development, with TROVE dropping 97% at launch.

According to DL News, a South Korean drug lord born in the 2000s, who used cryptocurrency for money laundering and drug trafficking, was sentenced to 20 years in prison and fined $4.2 million by the Ulsan District Court.Three of his accomplices received prison terms ranging from 30 months to three years. The court found that the drug lord operated multiple drug sales channels through the Telegram chat application since March 2020, primarily selling drugs smuggled from Vietnam. His gang used international courier services to smuggle drugs and distributed them through "dead drops" (hiding drugs in public places and notifying buyers to collect them). Transaction payments and distribution commissions were completed using cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, while laundering drug money involved approximately $4 million.

According to community reports, the trading bot project Polycule based on Polymarket is suspected of a rug pull. The Polycule team stated last Thursday that they had suffered a hacker attack, affecting $230,000 of user funds. The bot is currently offline, and patching and auditing work will be completed before the weekend.However, as of the latest post, users affected by the Polycule attack are still unable to withdraw their funds, and the team has not provided any updates on the incident, raising suspicions of a rug pull.

According to GMGN monitoring, the third most traded meme coin on the Solana chain, HNUT, is suspected to have undergone a rug pull, plunging from a high of $0.07 in the past 2 hours, with a short-term drop of over 99%, now trading at less than $0.0003.This morning, news reported that the price of the meme coin HNUT on the Solana chain experienced extreme volatility, surging over 700% within 24 hours, with a market cap peaking at $70.94 million, briefly ranking third on the 24-hour trading list. However, the token has raised alerts from some on-chain monitoring platforms, including Crypto Scope, indicating that its liquidity activity and on-chain data patterns are abnormal, posing a rug risk, and advising investors to remain vigilant.

According to GMGN monitoring, the price of the Meme coin HNUT on the Solana chain has experienced significant fluctuations today, with a 24-hour increase of 703%, currently reported at $0.055, and its market capitalization has surged to approximately $55.03 million, ranking it 11th by market cap and 3rd on the 24-hour trading volume list.The trading volume of this token in the past 24 hours is about $5.5 million, with the number of holding addresses exceeding 10,000. HNUT originated from humorous images and texts about "Holly The Squirrel" on social media. However, several on-chain monitoring platforms, including Crypto Scope, have pointed out that its liquidity activity and on-chain data patterns are abnormal, indicating a potential RUG risk, and reminding investors to remain vigilant.Meme coin trading is highly volatile, largely relying on market sentiment and conceptual speculation, lacking actual value or use cases, and investors should be aware of the risks.

Moonrock Capital founder Simon Dedic posted on X commenting on Circle's acquisition of Axelar, stating: "Another acquisition, another RUG. Circle acquires Axelar but explicitly excludes the foundation and AXL tokens, which is simply a criminal act. Even if it doesn't violate the law, it goes against ethics. If you are a founder looking to issue tokens: treat them like equity or get lost."Previously, Circle announced the acquisition of Axelar's initial development team, Interop Labs, but Axelar Network, Axelar Foundation, and AXL tokens are not included in this acquisition.

Base co-founder Jesse yesterday faced strong criticism from the community for promoting the notorious Soulja Boy's RUG token and investing funds to support it on social media. ZachXBT questioned, "Why give SouljaBoy a platform to scam new users?"ZachXBT disclosed back in April 2023 that "Soulja Boy is one of the most brazen promoters in the crypto community. In my research, I found that he has participated in 73 promotions and 16 NFT project launches, a significant portion of which are scams."Jesse has also promoted various MEME coins, such as the "Base is for everyone" incident (which surged to a market cap of 20 million and then plummeted by 90%) and his personal token jesse (which the community refers to as the most failed fair launch in Base's history). The tokens he promotes often come with short-term speculative hype, but their long-term performance and investment returns are unstable.

According to monitoring by onchainschool.pro, the PIGGY token is suspected of a Rug Pull. In the past 10 minutes, nearly 4 million dollars worth of PIGTY was newly minted and immediately sold into the market. The token price plummeted by 90% in an instant.

According to Elobservador, Tether Holdings Ltd. has confirmed to the Ministry of Labor and Social Security of Uruguay (MTSS) that it will cease operations in Uruguay and lay off 30 out of 38 employees. Since entering Uruguay, Tether has planned to invest $500 million, including building three data processing centers in Florida and Tacuarembó, which are expected to consume 165 megawatts of power; it also plans to construct a wind and solar power generation park with a capacity of 300 megawatts. Of the total investment, over $100 million has been secured, with an additional $50 million allocated for infrastructure development, which will be owned by the Uruguayan Electric Company (UTE) and the national interconnected system.The company warned that under current conditions, the continuation of the project is economically unfeasible. The 31.5 kV transmission contract model adopted in Florida and the increased costs have raised operational expenses, although Tether has repeatedly requested more competitive electricity pricing since November 2023. In the proposed alternative, the company suggested switching to a 150 kV transmission fee and modifying the electricity procurement contract, which could bring economic benefits to the Uruguayan Electric Company and avoid unnecessary projects.

The U.S. Department of the Treasury announced sanctions against former Canadian Olympic athlete Ryan James Wedding and his drug trafficking organization. Wedding is accused of leading an international drug trafficking network, with these sanctions involving 9 individuals and 9 entities being added to the Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) list.Notably, the sanctions list includes multiple cryptocurrency addresses, involving various blockchain networks such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain, Tron, and Solana.The sanctioned individuals include several suspects from Mexico, Italy, the United Kingdom, and Canada, while the related entities span multiple industries, including jewelry manufacturing, private security, fuel wholesale, and motorcycle sales.

According to CoinDesk, MARA Holdings CEO Fred Thiel stated that the Bitcoin mining industry is entering a difficult period, with increasing competition, rising energy demands, and shrinking profits. He noted that Bitcoin mining is a zero-sum game, where increased hash power raises mining difficulty and energy costs, compressing profit margins.The industry is becoming increasingly brutal, and only mining companies that secure low-cost, reliable energy or adopt new business models will survive. Many mining companies are turning to artificial intelligence or high-performance computing infrastructure, while some are being pushed out of the market by participants deploying their own hardware at low costs. Thiel warned that after the next Bitcoin halving in 2028, the survival environment for mining companies will be even harsher, with block rewards dropping to just above 1.5 Bitcoins. Unless transaction fees rise or coin prices soar, the mining economy will struggle to sustain itself.The design philosophy of Bitcoin is that transaction fees will eventually replace block subsidies, but this has not happened. Currently, transaction fees are generally low, and although there have been brief spikes, they cannot replace block subsidies. In this environment, small mining companies are under immense pressure. Large mining companies are adapting by controlling energy sources and investing in AI-specific infrastructure, while more streamlined mining companies may be forced to shut down.Thiel expects the market to self-regulate, stating, "By 2028, mining companies will either become power producers, be acquired by power producers, or collaborate with power producers."

According to GlobeNewswire, cryptocurrency platform Exodus Movement, Inc. (NYSE American: EXOD) announced today the acquisition of Uruguayan payment facilitator Grateful. This acquisition aims to enhance Exodus's merchant service capabilities in Latin America, particularly for stablecoin-based payment solutions.Grateful specializes in providing digital payment services for small businesses and freelancers, featuring low fees, instant access to funds, and balance yield capabilities. The company offers a complete suite of merchant tools, including a merchant dashboard, wallet-to-wallet payments, and QR code-based point-of-sale functionality.Exodus plans to seamlessly integrate Grateful's technology into its existing multi-chain wallet, supporting major blockchains such as Polygon, Optimism, Base, Arbitrum, and Solana. Exodus will hold a earnings call today at 8:30 AM Eastern Time, during which it will discuss the acquisition in detail.