News linked to both this project and an event.
Odaily News: South Africa's National Treasury and the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) have released draft rules on cross-border transfers of crypto assets. Farzam Ehsani, co-founder and CEO of crypto exchange VALR, stated that without significant amendments to key provisions, the framework could harm the country's digital asset industry and drive capital offshore. The draft rules allow individual residents to transfer crypto assets abroad within existing foreign exchange limits but restrict corporates from conducting cross-border crypto transactions, while also classifying certain inbound transfers from private, non-custodial self-hosted wallets as unacceptable transfers for local crypto asset service providers (CASPs). Ehsani believes this could push both businesses and retail users toward overseas platforms. Ehsani noted that prohibiting regulated entities from handling legitimate corporate transactions—particularly cross-border stablecoin payments—could drive such activity underground or offshore, ultimately undermining the transaction visibility and monitoring capabilities regulators aim to achieve. South Africa's National Treasury and SARB have opened a public consultation period, with feedback due by September 30.
Odaily News: Tether's Q2 net operating profit was $1.5 billion, primarily derived from interest generated by its U.S. Treasury holdings and repurchase agreements. As of June 30, Tether's reserve buffer stood at $4.11 billion, with assets exceeding liabilities by the same amount. USDT's circulating supply increased by $446 million to $184.6 billion, accounting for over 60% of the global stablecoin market. DeFiLlama data shows the global stablecoin market size is approximately $307 billion, with Tether remaining one of the major holders of U.S. Treasury securities. Asset management firm BlackRock has launched two tokenized money market products aimed at stablecoin issuers to help meet reserve requirements under the U.S. GENIUS Act. One of the funds tokenizes shares of its existing Treasury liquidity strategy on Ethereum, while the other is an institutional-grade money market instrument designed to support multiple chains and automatically reinvest returns.
Odaily News: U.S. July nonfarm payrolls unexpectedly decreased by 23,000, significantly missing market expectations. Although seasonal factors and the fading of the World Cup dividend disrupted the data, this still notably weakens the Federal Reserve's momentum for a September rate hike, shifting market focus to next week's CPI.Despite the "dismal" surface data, the unemployment rate unexpectedly fell to 4.1%. This seemingly contradictory phenomenon is actually attributed to a cumulative 0.7 percentage point decline in the labor force participation rate since the beginning of the year.Analysts are divided in their interpretation of this "terrible" report. Thomas Ryan, Senior Economist at Capital Economics, stated bluntly that although the current weakness has not yet shown up in broader indicators, it is sufficient to prompt Fed officials to reassess the health of the labor market and reduce their willingness to further tighten monetary policy in the near term.In the face of this report, which Adam Crisafulli, founder of Vital Knowledge, called "extremely terrible," the capital markets demonstrated typical contrarian logic. As traders bet that the rate hike process would stop here, U.S. stock futures rose accordingly, and Treasury yields collectively declined. According to data from CME Group's tools, the market-implied probability of a September rate hike has rapidly fallen from 55% on Thursday to 44%.
According to Odaily, Randi Abernethy, Head of Clearing and Group Risk at Bullish, stated that the U.S. Senate's failure to pass the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act (CLARITY Act) does not mean the digital asset market will stop developing; rather, it highlights the necessity of establishing a federal regulatory framework.Abernethy noted that during the Senate's consideration of the CLARITY Act, traditional U.S. financial institutions have continued to accelerate their entry into the on-chain market. JPMorgan Chase has explored tokenized ETF holdings through a production pilot with the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC), and more than 50 institutions (including BlackRock and Goldman Sachs) are also participating in the development of tokenized stock and Treasury bond infrastructure. The current regulatory discussion is no longer just a "crypto industry issue," but one that concerns the future infrastructure of the entire financial system.Abernethy cited the 2008 financial crisis as an example, noting that financial risk spreads along shared infrastructure, and even institutions not directly involved in related assets can be affected. Today, the stablecoin market size has exceeded $100 billion, with a large portion of stablecoin reserves invested in U.S. Treasuries. If a major stablecoin were to face a crisis, it could impact liquidity in traditional financial markets. She stated that supporters of the CLARITY Act believe the bill could establish a unified regulatory framework for the digital asset market, including core investor protection mechanisms such as customer asset segregation, conflict of interest management, capital requirements, and information disclosure. (CoinDesk)
Odaily News: CryptoQuant analyst Darkfost posted on platform X, stating that the cumulative trading volume of the Trump family-linked stablecoin USD1 on Binance has surpassed $50 billion. Data shows that since its launch over a year ago, USD1 has experienced rapid growth in trading scale. The stablecoin was launched by World Liberty Financial in March 2025, a project co-founded with the participation of the Trump family. USD1 is primarily backed by U.S. dollars and short-term U.S. Treasury assets, and adopts an institutional-oriented compliance framework. Currently, the market cap of USD1 has exceeded $4 billion.
Odaily News The U.S. Department of the Treasury released a joint statement on August 4, outlining discussions from the U.S.-UK Financial Regulatory Working Group meeting held in London on July 8. Regulators from both countries expanded collaboration in areas including digital assets, stablecoins, payment modernization, AI, financial stability, capital markets, and cross-border financial cooperation. Participants included finance ministries from both countries, the Bank of England, the Federal Reserve, the UK Financial Conduct Authority, and multiple U.S. financial regulatory agencies. The U.S. side provided updates on the implementation progress of the GENIUS Act for stablecoins and digital asset market structure, while the UK side presented its digital strategy for wholesale financial markets. Both sides support comparable regulatory standards for stablecoins, including cross-border usage, comparable treatment of similar risks, and requirements that stablecoins used as money be backed at least one-to-one by high-quality liquid asset reserves. The U.S. Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation has proposed implementation standards for the GENIUS Act, covering reserves, redemption, capital, liquidity, risk management, custody, and safekeeping. The Bank of England has published draft rules for stablecoins that could reach systemic scale in the UK economy, including a temporary issuance cap of £40 billion per systemic stablecoin, unrestricted use by individuals and businesses, and reserve requirements. The Financial Regulatory Working Group is expected to convene again in early 2027.
Odaily News S&P Global Ratings on Monday awarded BlackRock's new tokenized money market fund, the BlackRock Daily Reinvestment Stablecoin Reserve Vehicle (BRSRV), an "AAAm" rating, its highest principal stability fund rating. The rating is based on investment and counterparty credit quality, maturity structure, and management's ability to maintain a stable net asset value. S&P Global Ratings stated that it found no weaknesses in BlackRock Advisors' management and organization, credit research and analysis, risk management, or compliance. It also noted that the fund's tokenization framework demonstrates operational resilience, employing a permissioned architecture that restricts transactions to whitelisted wallets to mitigate network, smart contract, and blockchain network risks. BRSRV launched Monday as an open-end management investment company, aiming to make its shares eligible as qualifying reserve assets for payment stablecoin issuers under the GENIUS Act. The fund will hold cash, U.S. Treasuries with maturities of 93 days or less, and overnight repurchase agreements collateralized by Treasury instruments, maintaining a weighted average maturity of no more than 60 days and a weighted average life of no more than 120 days. In a separate stablecoin stability assessment summary published Tuesday, S&P Global Ratings stated that six of the 11 stablecoins it covers possess "sufficient" or stronger capacity to maintain their fiat peg. USDT remains at Level 5 "weak," with TUSD and USDe also at Level 5; USDC, EURC, USDG, and USDP are rated Level 2 "strong."
Odaily News, the "Fed Whisperer" Nick Timiraos stated in an article that U.S. Treasury Secretary Bessent's policy reaction function has shifted to being less dovish. His remarks this year suggest that the Federal Reserve should continue to hold interest rates steady. Earlier this year, Bessent cited models indicating that the Fed's interest rate level could be anywhere from over 25 basis points to more than 100 basis points above the neutral rate. Today (August 4), he made two points. First, he defended Warsh's decision last week not to elaborate on any policy reaction function: "I think every meeting should be open, and market participants should judge for themselves... I believe Warsh wants to keep options open to achieve the best outcome."Second, he did put forward a policy reaction function that could be viewed as dovish, arguing that recent shocks should be ignored: "What impact will a rise in short-term interest rates really have? We will wait and see." He raised the question but then responded by pointing out that underlying inflation is "very mild... very steady." "In core inflation, excluding the more energy-affected volatile items, the rest has been very steady. I think this will continue."
: Tyler Williams, a senior official at the U.S. Department of the Treasury responsible for digital asset policy, has departed. He had served as Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent's primary crypto advisor and was involved in shaping the Trump administration's digital asset agenda. Bessent confirmed that Williams' last working day at the Treasury was last Friday. Williams joined the Treasury in early 2025, having previously served as Head of Policy at Galaxy Digital, and is expected to return to the private sector. Williams' departure comes amid a continued stalemate in Congress over the CLARITY Act, a digital asset market structure bill. The legislation has faced obstacles to advancement before lawmakers' August recess due to disagreements over federal ethics provisions for officials.
Odaily News, July saw the U.S. manufacturing PMI rise to 55.6, the highest since 2022, with both production and employment recovering. However, strong demand and geopolitical inflation concerns have roiled the bond market, with Bank of America warning that the Federal Reserve is facing a credibility test. The hot manufacturing performance, coupled with geopolitical inflation threats, has sent U.S. Treasury markets into sharp turbulence. Long-dated Treasuries have recently faced heavy selling, with yields briefly surging to near two-decade highs.Mark Cabana, Head of U.S. Rates Strategy at Bank of America, commented on this, calling the bond market's violent swings a "textbook inflation credibility shock."Cabana noted that the core driver of the market turmoil is not the data itself, but the Fed's lack of policy communication. He specifically pointed to Fed Chair Kevin Warsh's performance at a recent press conference, arguing that Warsh failed to clearly articulate how the Fed would achieve its 2% inflation target."Standing firm on the inflation target is one thing, but if you don't tell the market the specific path, investors won't buy it," Cabana said bluntly in a Bloomberg TV interview. "The bond market cannot be fooled; it sees through all appearances." (Jin10)
: Asset management giant BlackRock has announced the launch of two tokenized money market products: the BlackRock Select Treasury Based Liquidity Fund (BSTBL) and the BlackRock Daily Reinvestment Stablecoin Reserve Vehicle (BRSRV). BSTBL will offer Ethereum-based tokenized shares of an existing money market fund. These on-chain shares can be transferred between approved wallets, subject to regulatory compliance. BNY Mellon will serve as the transfer agent and tokenization service provider for BSTBL. BRSRV, meanwhile, is a new tokenized money market fund designed for digital-native institutional investors, supporting daily dividend reinvestment and multi-blockchain access, and can be used for a variety of digital asset applications, including stablecoin reserve management. Securitize will serve as the transfer agent and tokenization service provider for this fund.
According to an official media announcement, the South African National Treasury and the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) jointly released the "Draft Manual on Cross-Border Crypto Asset Activities" on August 3, 2026, which is now open for public consultation with a deadline of September 30, 2026. The manual is implemented in conjunction with the previously released "Draft Regulations on Capital Flow Management 2026," aiming to strengthen supervision over cross-border financial activities and prevent risks related to illicit financial flows associated with crypto assets. The manual clarifies the trigger points for cross-border crypto asset transactions—when crypto assets are transferred between a domestic authorized CASP and a foreign CASP, or from a domestic authorized CASP to a non-custodial wallet, it constitutes cross-border capital inflow or outflow and must be reported to the Financial Supervision Department (FinSurv). It is worth noting that at this stage, only individuals are allowed to conduct crypto asset outflow operations through authorized CASPs within the single discretionary allowance or foreign capital allowance; South African entities are temporarily not allowed to conduct related cross-border operations. In addition, the manual currently does not distinguish between different types of crypto assets, nor does it list crypto assets as official South African currency.
According to QCP Group, the US Treasury, via the New York Fed, jointly purchased yen with the Japanese Ministry of Finance last Friday, marking the first US-Japan joint foreign exchange intervention action specifically to support the yen since 1998. Meanwhile, the US 30-year Treasury yield briefly rose to about 5.27%, hitting a new high since 2007, before falling back to 5.24%. QCP pointed out that the transmission path of this intervention to the crypto market mainly unfolds through yen carry trades—rapid yen appreciation may force investors holding yen funding positions to deleverage and buy back yen, subsequently affecting risk assets including BTC and ETH, reenacting the market volatility triggered by carry trade unwinding in August 2024. QCP reminded that current macro monitoring indicators should take the USD/JPY exchange rate, Japan funding costs, and US long-end Treasury yields into consideration; fiscal policy operations are increasingly becoming an important variable affecting the direction of global liquidity.
According to BIT Official Chinese (@BITofficial_CN) analysis, the current crypto market faces dual pressure from the Federal Reserve's hawkish stance and the slowed progress of the CLARITY Act. Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh maintains a hawkish stance; the 2-year US Treasury yield has risen cumulatively by approximately 35 basis points since late January, and the Committee has seen a pattern of 9 votes to maintain interest rates and 3 votes supporting rate hikes. Regarding the CLARITY Act, prediction markets indicate a mere 32% probability of it being signed by the end of 2026, with the legislative window continuing to narrow. Meanwhile, crypto market trading volume has retreated 80% from highs, total market cap has fallen approximately 50%, and USDT and USDC have shown no significant expansion since November 2025, reflecting an overall lack of new USD liquidity in the market. Despite this, Bitcoin remains within the $62,000 to $66,000 range, correcting only about 3% over the past week. It demonstrates stronger resilience compared to most altcoins, reflecting that active position adjustment pressure has been largely released. BIT points out that if Bitcoin subsequently regains $70,000 and drives multiple indicators to turn bullish, it will further confirm that the low point of this cycle has been established.
HTX DeepThink columnist and HTX Research analyst Chloe (@ChloeTalk1) pointed out in her analysis that global risk assets continued to come under pressure this week. Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh attempted to weaken forward guidance (Forward Guidance) for the first time, hoping to make market prices a more direct economic feedback mechanism. However, the market did not interpret the rise in long-term interest rates as a natural tightening of financial conditions, but instead interpreted it as inflation risks resurfacing and a decline in Federal Reserve policy credibility. The 30-year US Treasury yield rose to 5.2%, the US dollar weakened, and US stocks retreated, reflecting that investors are beginning to demand higher risk premiums rather than betting on an improvement in economic fundamentals.
According to The Block, bipartisan Senators Thom Tillis (Republican) and Ruben Gallego (Democrat) submitted a new ethics compromise proposal to the White House on Thursday morning local time, attempting to break the deadlock in advancing the Clarity Act cryptocurrency legislation. Currently, there is less than a week left until the Senate recesses on August 7, but the bill still has not obtained the 60 votes required for passage. Democrats insist on adding stricter ethics provisions to constrain the Trump family's crypto interests, including the Meme coins they issued and the World Liberty Financial project in which the family participates, while some Republican senators have objections to the stablecoin interest provisions, worrying that it will divert deposits from traditional banks to the crypto sector. Although the draft leaked last week prohibited public officials and their spouses from issuing digital assets, it did not cover other family members, and included a "sunset clause" expiring in January 2029, which critics believe essentially nullifies the entire ethics provision. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent subsequently blamed the Democrats on X, stating that they "chose political gaming on the verge of a major victory". The Crypto Innovation Committee (CCI) warned that if the bill fails to pass, the US will hand over its global leadership position in the field of crypto regulation.
Odaily News: US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent urged the Senate on Thursday to pass the Clarity Act, stating that the House of Representatives passed the bill over a year ago, and staff from the Senate Banking and Agriculture Committees have since conducted thousands of hours of negotiations on bipartisan amendments. Bessent stated that the bill will enhance consumer protection and anti-money laundering requirements while providing regulatory certainty for digital assets. He also noted that the Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act provision within the Clarity Act will protect decentralized software developers, making it clear that they are not subject to the registration requirements of the Bank Secrecy Act. Bessent criticized Senate Democrats for delaying the vote for political reasons, arguing that the vote will determine whether the United States maintains its global leadership position in digital assets. He concluded his statement by quoting Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto: "If you don't believe me or don't get it, I don't have time to try to convince you, sorry." The Clarity Act aims to establish a federal framework for the US digital asset market and divide the regulatory responsibilities for digital assets between the SEC and the CFTC, with most crypto assets generally falling under CFTC jurisdiction. Senate Majority Leader John Thune recently indicated that the bill is not expected to pass the Senate before the August recess.
According to reporter Eleanor Terrett (@EleanorTerrett), the controversy surrounding the BRCA provisions in the Clarity Act continues to intensify. Two key groups representing prosecutors have submitted amendment proposals to the White House, proposing to remove relevant provisions protecting software developers from criminal prosecution, but the National Sheriffs' Association (@NationalSheriff), which previously publicly opposed the Clarity Act, did not co-sign the proposal. In response, both the White House and the Treasury denied Senator Cortez Masto's claim that "the proposal reflects their position." Crypto Council Executive Director Patrick Witt stated that the proposal is "far from" the government's position, while the Treasury directly pointed out that the wording of the relevant provisions came from Washington lobbyists.
According to the latest seasonal research report from Bank of America Securities, since 1928, the rolling three-month window from August to October has typically been the weakest period for the S&P 500, with a probability of gain of only 55%, an average return of -0.02%, and an average drawdown of 7.35%, the largest among all rolling three-month cycles.The report indicates that over the next three months, the market may lean towards a defensive allocation, with the U.S. dollar, gold, and U.S. Treasury bonds historically outperforming equities. Since 1992, gold has had a 61% probability of rising from August to October, with an average gain of 2.52%. The U.S. dollar tends to strengthen in August against currencies such as the British pound and the Australian dollar. However, BofA emphasizes that seasonal patterns do not necessarily mean U.S. stocks will decline, and long-term market trends will still depend on factors such as corporate earnings, monetary policy, the economic cycle, and valuations. (Jinshi)
According to Bitcoin.com, U.S. Senator Cynthia Lummis is pushing hard for the CLARITY Act to complete Senate voting before Congress adjourns. Section 303 of the bill grants the Treasury Department the authority to impose targeted digital asset sanctions on foreign jurisdictions, while Section 305 allows exchanges to freeze suspicious transactions for up to 180 days. On-chain data shows that North Korea's Lazarus Group stole approximately $643 million in the first half of 2026, accounting for two-thirds of the total global crypto theft during the same period ($972 million), including a $285 million attack on Drift Protocol in April and a $292 million attack on the KelpDAO cross-chain bridge. The group's cumulative theft amount has reached $6.75 billion since 2019. Currently, Galaxy Research has lowered the probability of the CLARITY Act passing within 2026 to 30%. The bill still requires 60 votes to advance, meaning at least 7 Democratic senators need to vote across party lines in support.