Welcome to the protocol, the weekly conclusion of Coindesk of the most important stories in the development of cryptocurrency technology. I am Margaux Nijkerk, Tech & Protocols de Coindesk reporter.
In this number:
- OKX cuts the tokens okb supply by 50% with $ 7.6b burns, price surge
- The transaction volume ETH rises in the price rally, the cheapest defi costs
- Armed trade bots $ 1m of crypto users
- Babylon presents Bitcoin vaults without confidence for the BTC Staking protocol
Network news
OKX cuts the tokens supply in half: OKB, the OKX cryptocurrency exchange token, tripled a higher record after the company executed a unique burn of 65.26 million OKB, reducing the supply by more than 50%. Burning tokens of approximately $ 7.6 billion permanently reduces the maximum supply to 21 million, in line with the hard limit coded in Bitcoin. The burn, or sending the tokens to a wallet address that cannot be accessed, was carried out from the OKX reserves and represents one of the largest deflation events in the history of Token of Exchange. The effect of the burn was instantaneous. OKB increased to $ 142 of $ 46 before reducing around $ 102. The negotiation volume shot 13,000% to $ 723 million as merchants tried to capitalize on the supply shock. The strategy reflects that of BNB, the token of the BNB chain, which is associated with the rival exchange binance. That suffers quarterly burns that often precede the short -term manifestations. – Oliver Knight Read more.
Transaction volume eth rise : The volume of transactions of Ethereum has been generally in an ascending trajectory, closing in its historical maximum of 1.9 million transactions in a single day in January 2024. The last increase is to attract the attention of retail merchants and institutional observers, since it reflects a confluence of technical improvements, favorable market feeling and a renewed appetite for the activity of the Chain. According to Etherscan data, daily transactions counts have been constantly higher in recent weeks. Other data show that seven -day averages of daily transactions have already exceeded their previous records. Analysts suggest that this impulse is being fed by a combination of factors: a recent increase in network capacity, the increase in ether prices and a reduction in transaction costs, particularly for decentralized finances (Defi) Stablecoin protocols and transfers. One of the greatest facilitators of the current peak has been a substantial impulse of the capacity in Ethereum’s principal. The Fidelity Digital Assets research team told COINDESK that “Ethereum layer 1 is seeing an increase in transactions largely due to an increase of 50% in the gas limit since March, which allows more transactions to fit each block.” This update has significantly increased yield, allowing a more efficient settlement and reducing congestion. As a result, Stablecoin’s transfer costs have consistently fallen below a dollar, which makes defi payments and pairs payments much more affordable. Fidelity Digital Assets points out that he currently heads the graphics for Eth Burns, which underlines its central role in driving network activity. – Margaux Nijkerk Read more.
Armed trade bots steals $ 1m of cryptography users: According to a new Sentinellabs report. The campaign took advantage of the YouTube videos generated by AI, aged accounts and obfuscated solidity code to avoid the basic user scrutiny and obtain access to cryptographic wallets. The scammers seemed to be using avatars and voices generated by AI to reduce production costs and expand the video content. These tutorials are published in aged YouTube accounts populated with unrelated content and sections of manipulated comments to give the illusion of credibility. In some cases, the videos are not on the list and are probably distributed through Telegram or DMS. In the center of the scam there was an intelligent contract promoted as a profitable arbitration bot. The victims received instructions through YouTube tutorials to implement the contract using Remix, finance it with ETH and call a “start()“Function. Actually, however, the contract encreated the funds to a hidden wallet and controlled by the attackers, using techniques such as the XOR obfuscation (that hides the data by reviewing with another value) and great conversions from decimal to hex (They convert large numbers into direction formats legible by the wallet) To mask the destination address (which makes the recovery of funds more complicated). – Shaurya Malwa Read more.
Babylon presents Bitcoin vaults without trust: Bitcoin Babylon project took another step to offer a decentralized finance (Defi) Experience in its participation protocol of $ 5 billion similar to that seen in other parts of the cryptographic world. The last development is the introduction of vaults without trust, designed to allow BTC holders to deposit their tokens without trusting a centralized entity, as described in a new white book shared with Coindesk. In defi ecosystems, trust vaults are a form of storage or administration of digital assets that eliminates the need for users to trust a central authority or intermediary. Instead, systems use intelligent contracts to guarantee security and enforce the rules of the vault. Babylon says that its vaults will allow Bitcoin to be used as a guarantee in defi applications, such as loans and stable issuance, as well as the participation provided by its protocol. Users can also obtain performance in their BTC holdings by betting it to support the operation of the stake test networks. Then they receive rewards paid in Baby, Babylon’s native file. Development is part of the broader movement to use the enormous value held in Bitcoin to boost the defi activity in other blockchains. – Jamie Crawley Read more.
In other news
- Sensient, an artificial intelligence company based in New York, has introduced The Grid, an open source network designed to build and monetize artificial general intelligence (AGI) systems. The company says that the platform aims to provide a decentralized alternative to the closed markets of companies such as OpenAi. Developers can connect their AI agents, models or tools and obtain tokens -based rewards, with use rates and subscriptions available as optional monetization routes. At the time of its debut, the grid houses more than 40 AI agents, 50 data sources and more than 10 models, covered by web2 and web3. These include tools such as napkin, a generative graphic engine, a search startup, as well as agents connected to Blockchain deployed on base, polygon, referee and others. Users can access these through the sensitive chat, an interface to discover and combine workflow agents capable of handling tasks such as calendar coordination, coding generation and data visualization. – Oliver Knight Read more.
- Stripe has appointed Matt Huang, co -founder and managing partner of the Risk capital firm of Crypto Paradigm, as executive director of his next Tempo Blockchain. Huang, who already sits on the Stripe board, will retain his position in Paradigm. That is according to Fortune, citing familiar sources with the project. The movement is aligned with a growing trend of developing blockchains centered on stablecoin. These include plasma, which recently attracted more than $ 373 million in a sale of excess token and a blockchain stable centered on the tap. Francisco Rodrigues Read more.
Regulatory and political
- The founder of Terraft Labs, Do Kwon, declared himself guilty of conspiracy to commit fraud and fraud to the cable in Manhattan on Tuesday morning, three years after the dramatic collapse of $ 60 billion of the Ecosystem of Terra/Luna Stablecoin. The 33 -year -old South Korean citizen arrived at the court with wives and a Canarian yellow prison monkey, a metal chain around his waist. He admitted that “he participated in a scheme to disappoint and, in fact, defrauded” Terrausd Stablecoin buyers. According to charges in the original accusation, which included seven other positions, such as the fraud of basic values and products, Kwon faced a maximum sentence of 135 years in prison if he is declared guilty for all aspects. Kwon’s guilt agreement with the Government reduces its maximum sentence to 25 years, 20 for the position of cable fraud, and five for the fraud conspiracy charge, which the judge can order that it be delivered consecutively or simultaneously, but the prosecutors will request a maximum of 12 years. After fulfilling half of his prayer in the US, Kwon will be eligible to request the rest of his sentence in his southern native Korea. – Nikhilesh de Y Cheyenne Ligon Read more.
- The cryptographic advisor of President Donald Trump, Bo Hines, left after only months at work, and the next in the row, his attachment, Patrick Witt, will apparently be guiding the political priorities of the industry in Washington, since he still looks for regulations throughout the industry and the institution of a federal crypto stockpile. Witt shares a remarkably similar story with HIES, both former football stars who played in Yale before looking for law titles and falling short in seat offers in Congress. Witt had a brief season as a free agent field for the New Orleans Saints after leading the Yale Bulldogs team that Hines later played as an open receiver. Both former athletes linked their political careers closely with Trump in recent years, and Witt will now be the main link of the Trump White House industry, according to his social media profile in X that refers to the title he left behind. Jesse Hamilton Read more.
Calendar
- September 22-28: Korea Bloquchain Week, Seoul
- October 1: Token2049, Singapore
- October 13-15: Digital Asset Summit, London
- October 16-17: Blockchain European Convention, Barcelona
- November 17-22: Devconnect, Buenos Aires
- December 11-13: Solana Breakpoint, Abu Dhabi
- February 10-12, 2026: Consensus, Hong Kong
- May 5, 2026: Consensus, Miami
