6 min read · 12 sources

Strategy is back in the game. The Michael Saylor-led firm bought 4,603 BTC for $369.7 million at an average of $80,318 per coin, snapping a two-month pause that had traders guessing. Total holdings now sit at 845,050 BTC - roughly $66.1 billion, or over 4% of bitcoin’s entire supply cap - and the position is finally in the black by about $2.34 billion. The buy was funded through at-the-market stock sales, with proceeds also covering preferred share buybacks and dividends. MSTR is still down 63% from its 2025 peak, but last week’s 6.3% gain suggests the tide may be turning.

A Public Citizen report tallies investor losses across Trump-linked crypto ventures at a minimum of $4.7 billion in 2025, against at least $1.4 billion Trump earned from the same projects.

ICE and tZERO Team Up on Tokenized Securities Infrastructure

Source: theblock.co ↗

NYSE parent Intercontinental Exchange is going deeper into tokenized assets. ICE is partnering with tZERO to build a digital transfer agent program for tokenized securities, with ICE investing in tZERO’s latest funding round and licensing its 103-patent blockchain IP portfolio. That IP covers compliant transfers, smart contracts, and corporate actions - the boring but critical plumbing that makes tokenized equities work. The two firms are also exploring using tZERO’s tokenized assets as collateral at ICE clearing houses. This is a big institutional validation: if the NYSE’s parent is betting on this infrastructure, the “tokenization is just a meme” crowd needs to rethink.

Poseidon2b: A Point-by-Point Defense Against the Skipping Class Attack

Source: ethresear.ch ↗

The hash function wars continue. A researcher has published a detailed rebuttal to the recently released “Skipping Class” algebraic attack on Poseidon2b, arguing the exploit doesn’t apply to the production parameters. The attack targets state widths t=12-24 with a tensor MDS construction; the production instance runs t=4 with a complete external MDS layer, placing it outside the attack’s scope. The best published cryptanalysis of the specific parameters - GF(2^128), x^7 S-box, 8 external and 58 internal rounds - projects attack work at approximately 2^410, well above the 128-bit security target. The researcher backs the claim with pinned source code and executable audits, inviting targeted cryptanalysis of the exact configuration rather than generalized arguments about the Poseidon family. For anyone building on this hash, the defense is reassuring, but the invitation to attack is the real test.

Techtree v0.1: Verifiable Proofs for Agent Skill Claims

Source: x.com ↗

Agent benchmarks are a trust game. Techtree v0.1 from Regents Labs tries to solve it by isolating a single variable - the Skill - across a fixed model, harness, runtime, tools, and budget. Each evaluation run outputs a signed, participant-attested proof bundle that can be verified offline, so you don’t have to rerun someone else’s eval to trust their numbers. The v0.2 roadmap adds “Environment Forge” to convert source evidence like chat logs and traces into qualified verifier environments, with later versions gating receipt access behind x402 payments and feeding forged environments into RL training via prime-rl. The longer-term play is open improvement markets for Skill Climbs and Harness Climbs with onchain reputation for authors. If this works, it turns agent skill development into a credibly neutral marketplace.

B20: The Standard Behind Tokenized Stocks on Base

Source: x.com ↗

Coinbase launched four tokenized equity tokens - NVDAc, METAc, AAPLc, and GOOGLc - on Base for non-US users, built on B20, a Base-native standard for compliant onchain asset issuance. The key innovation is the multiplier system: corporate actions like stock splits and dividends update a single onchain value rather than rewriting ERC-20 balances. That keeps AMM pool reserves unchanged, preserving DeFi liquidity through events that would otherwise break integrations. A shared Policy Registry propagates compliance updates like sanctions blocklists to every asset referencing it, and administrators with the seize role can move tokens from flagged addresses to authorized destinations with onchain memos recorded atomically. The launch generated $10.8M in 24-hour volume and $3.06M in DEX liquidity across ~50 protocols including Aave, Morpho, and Aerodrome. The tokenized public equities sector now totals $2.48B, with Ondo leading at $872.7M.

Strategy's $2.8B Profit: Is Saylor Teeing Up Another Buy?

Strategy’s 840,447 BTC position is finally profitable - roughly $2.8 billion (4.4%) above its $75,653 average cost basis with Bitcoin trading near $79,007. But the firm has started selling modest BTC quantities to fund preferred dividends and share buybacks, a departure from its longstanding “never sell” policy, while also raising $334 million via MSTR stock sales to preserve reserves. Saylor’s Sunday post of a chart captioned “We’re Back” has renewed speculation about an imminent purchase announcement, consistent with his pattern of social media signals preceding Monday morning buys. The turnaround follows a period when holdings were ~$13 billion underwater in July. Fed Chair Kevin Warsh’s inflation-driven rate-hike comments pulled Bitcoin to $76,877 by Friday, keeping the unrealized gain thin relative to the asset’s October peak near $126,000. The “We’re Back” post suggests Saylor sees the current price as a buying opportunity, not a ceiling.

AMM Yield Maximization: When LPs and Arbitrageurs Converge

Source: ethresear.ch ↗

MEV-X researchers and HSE University collaborators have a new framework for understanding AMM profitability. Their research essay introduces “dislocation value” - the total extractable profit when a pool price diverges from the market - and shows that any fee on arbitrage trades reduces total value capture across all six tested architectures, including Uniswap V2/V3, Balancer, and Curve. Pools optimizing fee revenue independently capture roughly 50% of maximum dislocation value, with the remainder split between external arbitrageurs and unrealized losses. At the standard 0.30% fee tier, pool capture falls to 42% on a 1% dislocation scenario. The proposed fix is AMM hooks that execute atomic internal arbitrage post-swap, letting pools charge zero on rebalancing operations while retaining normal retail fees. This architecture converts liquidity providers into active arbitrageurs at the protocol level, redirecting the value leakage currently flowing to external searchers back to the pool.

Investors at Least $4.7B Underwater Across Trump Crypto Ventures

Source: theblock.co ↗

A Public Citizen report tallies investor losses across Trump-linked crypto ventures at a minimum of $4.7 billion in 2025, against at least $1.4 billion Trump earned from the same projects. The TRUMP memecoin drives $3.2 billion of those losses. Roughly 1 million of 1.6 million retail buyers on decentralized exchanges remain underwater after the token fell from a $73.43 peak to approximately $2.73, with wallets from the first two trading days capturing nearly 90% of all retail-side gains. World Liberty Financial contributed $1 billion in additional losses, led by AI Financial Corp’s $1.46 billion WLFI token purchase in August 2025, which left the Nasdaq-listed firm’s stock down 91% to $0.642. Trump Media’s 9,477 BTC position accounts for another $450 million in losses. Trump’s tokens were allocated rather than purchased, and his income flowed through licensing fees - he deployed no capital while retail holders absorbed the drawdown.

Quick Links

Source: threadreaderapp.com ↗

Aerodrome volume increases on tokenized equities - Daily volume on Aerodrome grew roughly 5x in a week, now above $25M/day.

Pushback on “risk-free” agentic credit yields - Claims that agentic payment lending can be both virtually risk-free and yield 20-40% annually are tenuous.

Aave V4 USDC borrow incentives - Aave has activated incentives for USDC borrowers in its V4 Core Hub on Ethereum.

Robinhood Chain and SocialFi convergence - Robinhood Chain’s “Fomo” app has finally cracked SocialFi by letting younger users trade stocks, tokens, and NFTs socially in one place.