News linked to both this project and an event.
Odaily AI Financial (formerly Alt5 Sigma), a publicly listed crypto company linked to the family of U.S. President Donald Trump, has announced it will acquire crypto infrastructure startup Block Street for up to $43 million. Block Street was founded by Matthew Morgan, who currently serves as an advisor to AI Financial and is also its CEO and largest shareholder.According to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the deal was reached last Monday. Block Street was registered in October 2025, but Morgan stated that its business operations had started about 16 months prior.The acquisition has raised market concerns about potential conflicts of interest, as Morgan is both an advisor to AI Financial and the founder of the acquired company. He was briefly nominated for the position of Chief Investment Officer in a previous cooperation deal between AI Financial and World Liberty Financial, but the role was later adjusted to an unpaid advisor position.In August, AI Financial reached an agreement with World Liberty Financial to include approximately $1.5 billion in crypto assets on its balance sheet, in exchange for equity and a board seat. This collaboration also positioned the company as part of the "Trump family crypto ecosystem."In interviews, Morgan has denied that the transaction constitutes self-dealing, stating that Block Street focuses on tokenization and ICO infrastructure capabilities, areas AI Financial is looking to enter. He claimed to have pitched the asset to several other public companies and turned down acquisition offers with higher valuations.However, since establishing ties with the Trump family crypto project, AI Financial's stock price has fallen by over 90%, reflecting ongoing market skepticism toward the "crypto reserve public company" model.This transaction has also reignited controversy over insider transactions and governance structures within public companies. Similar cases have frequently emerged in the crypto industry recently, with multiple listed companies criticized for mixing assets with related-party transactions, raising investor concerns about the risks of conflicts of interest. (Fortune)
According to The Block, Jim Esposito, President of Citadel Securities, stated on Thursday at the Semafor World Economic Forum in Washington, D.C., that the firm is “fully capable” of providing liquidity to prediction markets—but explicitly expressed no interest in sports-event contracts. Instead, he emphasized the value of prediction markets for hedging geopolitical risks, citing the U.S. midterm elections this November as “one of the greatest risks facing investors’ portfolios.” Esposito noted that as platforms like Kalshi and Polymarket continue to grow rapidly, the prediction market is poised for sustained expansion—naturally drawing Citadel Securities into the space. Notably, Zhao Peng, CEO of Citadel Securities, participated last year in Kalshi’s $185 million funding round.
According to a March 2026 report by Forbes journalists Dan Alexander and Kyle Khan-Mullins, Forbes’ latest estimate places Donald Trump’s net worth at approximately $6.5 billion—up roughly $1.4 billion over the past year. This growth stems primarily from four areas: (1) cryptocurrency-related ventures contributed about $1.8 billion in total, including memecoins, World Liberty Financial tokens, and the stablecoin USD1; (2) legal victories eliminated approximately $500 million in debt; (3) overseas licensing operations appreciated by around $400 million, driven by developers across multiple countries rushing to partner with a sitting U.S. president; and (4) golf clubs and resorts—including Mar-a-Lago—saw their combined valuation rise to roughly $1.5 billion. Offsetting this growth was a decline of about $1.3 billion in the valuation of Trump Media, the parent company of Truth Social, which generated only $3.7 million in revenue in 2025 while posting a net loss of $712 million. Forbes notes that, as much of Trump’s second term remains ahead, his wealth may continue to grow.
SimpleChain announced the completion of a $15 million seed funding round, raised privately from family offices and institutional investors. SimpleChain is building an RWA-focused Layer 1 operating system for institutions. Built on Granular Data and native Compliance-as-a-Service (CaaS) technologies, the platform aims to accelerate the development of the Real World Assets (RWA) sector. The official statement notes that further updates will be released in the future. SimpleChain focuses on asset tokenization, on-chain verification, compliance automation, and global liquidity—providing infrastructure support for real-world economic systems. Its core capabilities include a trusted data foundation, a programmable compliance layer, and a high-performance blockchain architecture, enabling institutional-grade RWA issuance and on-chain financialization. SimpleChain seeks to enable seamless global interaction among assets, data, and institutions—replacing traditional intermediaries’ trust with technology, cryptography, and verifiable data.