Author: James Wilson
The United States Department of the Treasury has imposed sanctions on the Karen National Army, a Burmese militia group, accusing it of orchestrating large-scale crypto scams alongside other offences. The sanctions were announced on May 5 in a press release from the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control. The press release revealed that the KNA has been at the center of a complex network of sophisticated digital fraud schemes, including the notorious crypto “pig butchering” scams. In these scams, victims are typically lured online through dating apps and social media, where scammers initiate prolonged, increasingly intimate conversations. Once trust is…
FARTCOIN and VIRTUAL are dominating both smart-money inflows and AI-agent mindshare while both tokens pause to consolidate following their recent 100% breakout rallies within a broader uptrend. According to smart money reporting account Stalkchain, Fartcoin (FARTCOIN) and Virtual (VIRTUAL) are leading in smart money inflows, recording $245,700 and $93,720 respectively over the past 24 hours. AI agent mindshare metrics from cookie.fun also reveal that the two tokens are commanding attention in the sector. FARTCOIN is leading with 10.22% share, while VIRTUAL closely trails at 9.46%, with sentiment for the latter ticking higher. Meanwhile, both tokens have entered a cooling-off phase…
Shardeum has unveiled its mainnet after a testnet phase that attracted more than 1.4 million participants from across the globe, setting a new record for Layer 1 testnet validator nodes. According to the official press release sent to crypto.news, the EVM-based autoscaling network recently launched its mainnet after a month-long delay. Its testnet phase generated more than 171,000 physically-run public validator nodes, the highest number of validator nodes ever recorded on a Layer 1 testnet. The protocol’s mainnet is designed to solve the “scalability trilemma,” which essentially allows global users and developers to maintain decentralization, scalability, and affordability without sacrificing…
Lawyers for Celsius founder Alex Mashinsky argue that prosecutors are stripping him of his humanity to support a harsh sentence disconnected from his true actions. Alex Mashinsky‘s legal team has criticized the U.S. government’s request to sentence the former Celsius Network CEO to at least 20 years in prison, calling it a “death-in-prison sentence” for a non-violent, first-time offender. In a May 5 filing, Mashinsky’s lawyers said the government’s “venom-laced submission recasts this case as one involving a predator with an intent to ‘target’ victims, ‘harm’ them, and ‘steal’ their money.” They argue the Department of Justice ignored Mashinsky’s background…
Bittensor price has recently broken out of a long-standing falling wedge pattern, gaining over 70% in the past month. While bullish momentum has cooled slightly, the uptrend remains intact, with the next target set around $420. Bittensor (TAO) is up over 70% in the past month, currently trading around $369. The Bittensor rally began on April 7, when TAO price bounced off the lower trendline of a long-standing falling wedge pattern near $180, accompanied by a spike in volume. After a brief pullback in mid-April, the rally resumed, fueled by the quiet launch of the Bittensor Liquid Fund by Unsupervised…
Unconfirmed reports are circulating online that Jeffy Yu, founder of the small-cap crypto project Zerebro, may have taken his own life during a livestream on Pump.fun on May 4. The video circulating on X appears to show Yu smoking a cigarette before shooting himself in the neck. While the footage has been widely shared, the authenticity of the video remains unconfirmed at this time. On the day of his alleged death, Yu published a philosophical and technical manifesto introducing the concept of Legacoins—a term he coined to represent a new category of memecoins rooted in permanence, legacy, and symbolic immortality.…
Despite macroeconomic uncertainty, Bitcoin miners are showing confidence in further upside, as stable reserves signal their belief in continued market growth. Bitcoin (BTC) miners have shown no significant signs of capitulation, with on-chain data continuing to signal a bullish outlook, analysts at Bitfinex Alpha wrote in a recent research report. They noted that despite macroeconomic turbulence and a 32% drop from Bitcoin’s all-time high in 2024, miner reserves have remained stable. As of May 5, reserves were at 1,808,674 BTC, showing little fluctuation from December 2024 levels, suggesting a cautious holding strategy, with miners refraining from significant selling. “Given that…
Two long-dormant Bitcoin wallets from the early “Satoshi era” have suddenly become active after more than a decade of silence, moving a combined $325 million worth of Bitcoin just ahead of a major U.S. Federal Reserve interest rate decision. According to blockchain analytics platform Spot On Chain, the first whale transferred 2,343 BTC, valued at approximately $222.2 million, to a new wallet after being inactive for 10.5 years. Historical data shows that this whale originally acquired around 2,187 BTC in July 2013 for just $185,850, an average price of $85 per coin. The second whale re-emerged after more than 11…
IRS veteran Trish Turner has been appointed to lead the agency’s crypto unit, following the exit of two key private-sector hires who helped build the office’s crypto oversight. Trish Turner, a longtime IRS official, has taken over the agency’s crypto unit following the departure of two private-sector executives who played key roles in shaping the office’s crypto enforcement and regulation, Bloomberg Tax has learned, citing a person familiar with the matter. Sulolit “Raj” Mukherjee and Seth Wilks, who co-led the Office of Digital Assets, both left after just over a year with the agency. the report reads, without specifying the…
Crypto staking company, Figment, claims it is on the hunt for acquisition targets in the blockchain and crypto sector. It is currently eyeing $100 million to $200 million deals as crypto mergers spike. According to a recent Bloomberg report, the crypto staking firm is targeting crypto-focused projects that hold a strong regional presence, preferably in Asia or South America. Additionally, the company is also interested in projects that have managed to establish a “dominant” position in major blockchain such as Cosmos (ATOM) or Solana (SOL). At the moment, the company’s acquisition budget ranges somewhere between $100 million and $200 million.…