Today's news tips:
1. Musk plans to discuss with Trump about giving $5,000 DOGE dividends to every American taxpayer
2. Binance.US has resumed USD deposits, withdrawals and trading services and will be gradually opened to all users in the next few days
3. Nigeria sues Binance, seeking compensation for $81.5 billion in economic losses and back taxes
4. Montana's "Strategic Bitcoin Reserve" bill passed the committee and entered the House of Representatives voting stage
5. PAIN: User refunds have been completed, and Harold’s token share will be locked for 20 years
6. Kaito AI will open KAITO tokens for redemption at 20:00 on February 20
7. Ethereum Foundation launches Open Intents Framework to promote cross-chain interoperability
8.Coinbase adds tokenbot (CLANKER) to its coin listing roadmap
9. About 86% of traders lost money due to LIBRA, with a cumulative loss of about $251 million
Regulatory/Macro
Musk to discuss with Trump about giving $5,000 DOGE dividends to every U.S. taxpayer
According to Forbes, Musk said on X (original Twitter) that he would consult President Trump on the "DOGE dividend" plan, which proposes using the funds saved by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to issue a $5,000 tax refund to each taxpaying family.
The proposal was put forward by James Fishback, CEO of investment company Azoria, and plans to use 20% of DOGE's target savings of $2 trillion to subsidize about 79 million taxpaying households. As of Monday, DOGE claimed to have saved $55 billion, with funds coming from anti-fraud, contract cancellations, asset sales, government spending cuts, etc. Musk initially responded by saying "I will confirm with the president", but then added that the final decision is in Trump's hands.
According to the Binance.US announcement, the platform has resumed USD deposits, withdrawals and transactions on February 19, 2025, and will gradually open to all eligible users in the next few days.
The restored USD related functions include:
- USD deposits and withdrawals: Users can deposit or withdraw USD through bank accounts (ACH) with zero fees.
- Buy and sell cryptocurrencies using USD: Support bank transfer (ACH) to purchase cryptocurrencies directly.
- USD to Crypto Swap: Instantly convert USD to crypto.
- 10 USD trading pairs have been restored: including BTC/USD, XLM/USD, DOGE/USD, SOL/USD, ETH/USD, ADA/USD, HBAR/USD, SHIB/USD, SUI/USD, BNB/USD. More trading pairs will be added in the future.
- Fixed investment function: supports automatic purchase of cryptocurrencies on a daily, weekly, biweekly or monthly basis.
The exchange had discontinued the (USD) service more than two years ago (February 13, 2023) due to increased scrutiny from regulators.
Franklin Templeton Launches Tokenized U.S. Treasury Fund to European Investors
Franklin Templeton has announced the launch of the first fully tokenized U.S. Treasury fund in Luxembourg, providing European institutional investors with an opportunity to participate.
The fund is based on the Stellar Lumens (XLM) network and has been approved by Luxembourg regulators and is available to institutional investors in Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Liechtenstein, the Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland.
eToro receives Cyprus MiCA license to offer crypto services across the EEA
eToro announced that it has obtained a license under the European Market for Crypto-Assets (MiCA) framework and will be able to provide cryptocurrency trading and custody services in all 30 European Economic Area countries. The license was granted by the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission. MiCA regulations require companies to obtain a Crypto Asset Service Provider (CASP) license, which will come into full effect in December 2023 and establish a unified legal framework for crypto services that applies to the 27 EU member states and non-EU countries such as Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.
The US SEC confirms that it has received 21Shares’ proposal to collateralize an Ethereum ETF
Nate Geraci, president of The ETF Store, tweeted that the U.S. SEC has confirmed receipt of the 19b-4 filing from Cboe, which seeks approval for the staking feature in the 21Shares Core Ethereum ETF.
Nigeria sues Binance, seeking $81.5 billion in economic losses and back taxes
According to Reuters, court documents show that Nigeria has filed a lawsuit seeking to force Binance to pay $79.5 billion in economic losses that it claims were caused by its operations in Nigeria and pay $2 billion in back taxes. Authorities blamed Nigeria's currency woes on Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, and detained two of its executives in 2024 after the cryptocurrency site became the preferred platform for trading the local naira currency.
Montana's Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Bill Passes Committee Review and Enters House Vote Stage
According to Satoshi Action Fund, Montana’s “Strategic Bitcoin Reserve” bill was passed in committee and entered the House of Representatives voting stage.
Earlier news , Montana House Bill No. 429 will authorize the Investment Committee to invest up to $50 million in precious metals, digital assets and stablecoins with an average market value of more than $750 billion in the previous calendar year before July 15, 2025. These funds must be held by qualified custodians or through exchange-traded funds.
According to Jinshi.com, Trump said: I have signed an executive order to make the United States a leader in artificial intelligence and end the previous government’s “crusade” against Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies, marking the advent of a new era of digital assets.
Financing
Packaged asset startup Universal completes $9 million financing, led by a16z
Universal has completed a $9 million round of financing led by a16z. Universal aims to enhance asset access for developers and end users by enabling all types of crypto assets to be traded on crypto trading networks through deep liquidity. Since the launch of Universal Protocol, more than $800 million of uAssets have been traded.
Fluent Labs Completes $8 Million Funding, Led by Polychain Capital
Blockchain developer Fluent Labs announced that it has completed an $8 million financing led by Polychain Capital to build its Ethereum Layer 2 hybrid execution network. The financing also received support from Primitive, dao5, Symbolic Capital and other institutions, and investors include well-known angel investors such as Balaji Srinivasan and Mustafa Al-Bassam. Fluent plans to use this funding to expand its core engineering team and support the construction of its ecosystem and test network infrastructure.
Fluent aims to help developers seamlessly build applications across multiple blockchain ecosystems by integrating WebAssembly (Wasm), Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), and Solana Virtual Machine (SVM) applications into a unified execution environment.
Stablecoin liquidity provider Mansa completes $10 million seed round of financing, led by Tether
According to TechCrunch, stablecoin liquidity provider Mansa announced the completion of a $10 million seed round of financing, led by Tether. This round of financing included equity and debt financing. Tether contributed $3 million in equity financing. The new funds will support the company's expansion into Latin America and Southeast Asia, where liquidity challenges also limit cross-border transactions.
AI
Musk: Grok 3 will be free for all users in the short term
xAI tweeted that Grok 3 is now free (until the server crashes). X Premium+ and SuperGrok users will have more access to Grok 3, and will also have early access to advanced features such as voice mode. In response, Musk said that Grok 3 will be free for all users in a short period of time.
According to previous news , Grok 3 is now available to all Premium+ subscribers.
Project News
OKX will launch KAITO (Kaito) spot trading pair
According to the OKX announcement, the platform will launch KAITO (Kaito), the specific schedule is as follows:
- Deposit opening time: February 19, 2025 18:00 (UTC+8)
- Call auction time: 20:00 - 21:00, February 20, 2025 (UTC+8)
- KAITO/USDT spot trading opening: February 20, 2025 21:00 (UTC+8)
- Withdrawal opening time: February 21, 2025 10:00 (UTC+8)
Kaito AI is building an AI-powered InfoFi Network that enables markets to more efficiently reallocate attention and capital while rewarding all participants.
Kaito AI will open KAITO token claims at 20:00 on February 20
Kaito AI, an AI-based cryptocurrency data analysis platform, will open KAITO claims at 20:00 (UTC+8) on February 20 (Thursday). The token economic model will be released before the claim opens. KAITO token trading will be officially launched at 21:00 (UTC+8) on February 20.
Plasma announces support for Tether’s seamless cross-chain stablecoin USD₮0
According to the official announcement of Plasma, USD₮0 will be supported on the first day of the launch of the Plasma mainnet, enabling Plasma to seamlessly connect with the $141 billion USD₮ on multiple blockchains such as Ethereum, Tron, TON, Arbitrum, etc. USD₮0 is the core infrastructure of Tether stablecoin, which aims to provide cross-chain deployment and secure transfer solutions to achieve zero-fee transfers.
Phemex hackers transferred some funds to mixers such as Tornado Cash
According to The Block, on-chain data shows that the stolen funds from last month’s Phemex breach are being moved. The hacker (or more likely a group of hackers) has begun to split some of the ill-gotten gains into new addresses and transfer the tokens to Tornado Cash.
According to a report published by Swiss blockchain analysis firm Global Ledger, the hacker first transferred more than 2,080 ETH (worth about $6 million) to 14 new addresses. Less than 4,000 ETH remained in the main Ethereum wallet associated with the attack.
As with the initial hack of the Singapore exchange, the transfers appear to have been coordinated by a group of people with extensive on-chain experience, involving multiple hops and interacting with multiple different protocols and platforms. For example, a newly created wallet received 601.34 ETH in five separate transactions, and then consolidated those funds into another new address on the cross-chain token bridge Across Protocol. The funds were further obfuscated when sent to a second Across address.
In addition to direct transfers to Tornado Cash and eXch mixers to anonymize funds, hackers sometimes used platforms such as Wintermute, DLN Trade Protocol, and THORChain to exchange assets.
Global Legder noted that while a small amount of funds also flowed to platforms such as OKX and CoinEx (possibly to be cashed out), most fund transfers used on-chain tools such as Bitget’s bridge service and the ChangeNOW wallet.
Ethereum Foundation launches Open Intents Framework to promote cross-chain interoperability
The Ethereum Foundation announced the launch of the Open Intents Framework, a modular, open source framework for building and deploying intent-based product experiences. Instead of building an intent infrastructure from scratch, developers can easily customize and deploy intent-based protocols using a set of modular abstractions, including solvers and composable smart contracts. The framework is designed to promote cross-chain interoperability, support more than 30 teams to jointly promote, simplify the process of any chain delivering intent to users, and improve cross-chain user experience. The framework addresses key components such as solutions and settlements in a modular way, providing flexibility and allowing developers to choose the most appropriate parts based on their needs without relying on a single supplier.
Coinbase adds tokenbot (CLANKER) to its coin listing roadmap
According to the official announcement, Coinbase added tokenbot (CLANKER) to the coin listing roadmap.
PAIN: User refunds have been completed, Harold's token share will be locked for 20 years
Solana chain meme coin PAIN tweeted that, as the project had promised, 80% of the 185,976 SOL raised had been successfully refunded, and all funds sent after block 318346069 (the end of PAINSALE) had also been refunded. Harold's token share will be locked for 20 years and unlocked in 2045. According to token economics, the total supply of PAIN is 10 million, of which 50% is allocated to Harold himself, 20% for pre-sale, 15% for liquidity, 10% will be allocated to the community, and 5% to collaborators.
According to previous news , PAIN stated that 80% of refunds and airdrops will be automatically distributed to eligible wallets, and users do not need to apply manually.
Bithumb to List KAITO in Korean Won Market
According to an official announcement, South Korean crypto exchange Bithumb will launch KAITO in the Korean won market.
Binance Wealth Management will remove some dual-currency investment trading pairs
According to the official announcement, based on the recent review results, Binance will remove the following dual-currency investment trading pairs at 14:00 on February 21, 2025 (Eastern Time Zone 8):
- ALGO: ALGO/USDT, ALGO/USDC
- ATOM: ATOM/USDT, ATOM/FDUSD, ATOM/USDC
Please note: After the removal, users will not be able to subscribe to these trading pairs; existing subscriptions will not be affected and will be settled normally when they expire.
OKX will launch KAITO leveraged trading, perpetual contracts and simple coin earning
According to the official announcement, OKX will officially launch the KAITOUSDT perpetual contract on the web, App and API at 10:00 pm (UTC+8) on February 20, 2025, and will launch KAITO's leveraged trading and simple coin earning at 12:10 noon (UTC+8) on February 21, 2025.
The premium of a new contract is relatively unstable when it is launched. To avoid unreasonable funding charges, the upper limit of the funding rate will be 0.5% before 00:00 (UTC+8) on February 21, 2025. After 00:00 (UTC+8) on February 21, 2025, the upper limit of the funding rate will be adjusted back to the normal 1.5% [the actual funding charge time for this period will be 4:00 (UTC+8) on February 21, 2025]. If the price of this contract deviates, the funding rate will be adjusted according to market conditions.
zkLend announced a compensation plan, deposits in unaffected pools are expected to receive a full fund return, deposits in affected pools will receive a partial fund return and zkLend will restore the pool's claim position, and the withdrawal process is expected to begin within 2 weeks after the recovery claim portal is reviewed. Repayment will be paid in full by the available liquidity in each unaffected pool. If an unaffected pool is short (due to relatively high utilization), it will be supplemented by the remaining liquidity in other unaffected pools to make up for the shortfall. All accumulated surpluses of unaffected pools will be liquidated and distributed proportionally to each affected pool, and partial repayments will be made proportionally based on the remaining liquidity of each pool plus such redistributed (socialized) surplus.
zkLend said that after the team's donation, the total funding gap was reduced to approximately US$9,013,101.72323417.
Binance Futures will add 50 new U-margined perpetual contracts
According to the official announcement, Binance Futures will add the following U-margined perpetual contracts at 08:00 (UTC) on February 20, 2025:
1MBABYDOGEUSDT, ACHUSDT, ACTUSDT, AGLDUSDT, ALPACAUSDT, ANIMEUSDT, API3USDT, ARKUSDT, AUCTIONUSDT, B3USDT, BAKEUSDT, BANUSDT, BERAUSDT, BIOUSDT, BSWUSDT, COWUSDT, EIGENUSDT, ETHFIUSDT, GLMUSDT, GOATUSDT, GPSUSDT, HEIUSDT, IOUSDT, IPUSDT, KASUSDT, LAYERU SDT, LISTAUDT, MELANIAUSDT, MOODENGUSDT, PEOPLEUSDT, PIPPINUSDT, PNUTUSDT, POLUSDT, RENDERUSDT, RPLUSDT, SHELLUSDT, SPELLUSD T, SUSDT, SWELLUSDT, SYNUSDT, TAOUSDT, THEUSDT, TROYUSDT, TSTUSDT, USTCUSDT, USUALUSDT, UXLINKUSDT, VINEUSDT, VVVUSDT, XVSUSDT.
Viewpoint
Vitalik talks about Ethereum positioning, Rollup expansion, centralized sequencer and future roadmap
According to Vitalik Buterin's response on warpcast, he believes that Ethereum is both a decentralized currency like Bitcoin and can become a "world computer", and emphasizes that decentralization and anti-censorship capabilities are the core of Ethereum's long-term value.
Regarding the Rollup expansion route, Vitalik said that Ethereum currently adopts the L1+L2 hybrid model, but it still needs to define which transactions are suitable for L1 and which are suitable for L2. He warned that "putting everything on L2" may weaken ETH's value storage and transaction medium status, and it will also be difficult to cope with the needs of cross-L2 operations.
Regarding the centralized sequencer, Vitalik believes that it has advantages such as preventing preemption, providing instant confirmation and reducing the difficulty of application on-chain, but there are still problems of anti-censorship and decentralization. Therefore, he supports solutions based on forced inclusion and ZK/Optimistic mechanisms to balance efficiency and decentralization.
Regarding Ethereum 3.0, Vitalik clarified that there is no concept of ETH 3.0 at present, but the optimization of L1 (increasing Gas Limit, Stateless Verification, enhancing cross-L2 interoperability and Blob expansion) is still in progress. He pointed out that the problem of insufficient L2 payment of L1 transaction fees should not be viewed in the short term, and it is expected that as the Blob target is increased from 3 to 128, the L1 fee contributed by L2 may reach 256,000 ETH per year.
Musk: "DOGE dividends" will not cause inflation
According to Jinshi, Trump said he was considering sending part of the money saved by Musk's cost-cutting plan directly to Americans. James Fishback, co-founder of investment firm Azoria, suggested on social media earlier this week that the federal government issue tax rebate checks based on the amount saved by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). He suggested that Trump should work with Congress to establish a "DOGE dividend" or tax rebate check backed by $400 billion in funds, which is equivalent to 20% of the $2 trillion DOGE savings target.
It is reported that Musk's team is working to implement substantial budget cuts and layoffs in federal agencies. Musk said that "DOGE dividends" will not cause inflation because the funds come entirely from spending cuts and the beneficiaries are mostly taxpayers with a tendency to save. His goal of cutting federal spending by $2 trillion is the "ideal result."
Vitalik: Ethereum’s priority should be to improve interoperability between L2
Vitalik Buterin said in an AMA event that the priority of Ethereum should be to improve the interoperability between L2s, because there are not too many Stakeholders and everyone has common interests, so the process will be much simpler. Then it can be expanded to do more cross-encryption interoperability, even from cryptocurrency to fiat currency.
Important data
Pump.fun deposited 65,122 SOL to Kraken about 3 hours ago, worth about 10.97 million US dollars
According to Onchain Lens, 3 hours ago, Pump.fun deposited 65,122 SOL worth $10.97 million to Kraken. So far this year, a total of 1,235,043 SOL worth $247.52 million has been transferred. Overall, Pump.fun has made a profit of 2,930,093 SOL, currently worth $495.36 million.
Trump's crypto project WLFI bought 200 million WLFI and about 548,000 SEI
According to Onchain Lens monitoring, a multi-signature wallet created by Trump's crypto project World Liberty Finance (WLFI) has withdrawn 10 million USDC from Coinbase to purchase 200 million WLFI. They also spent 125,000 USDC to purchase 547,990 SEI at an average price of $0.228.
According to Bloomberg, research firm Nansen said that about 86% of traders lost money after investing in LIBRA, which was "supported" by Argentine President Javier Milei. The company analyzed the winners and losers of Libra tokens in a report, which said that the cumulative losses of Libra tokens were estimated at US$251 million, while a few profitable traders made a total profit of US$180 million.
“We see very strong on-chain evidence that a group of ‘insiders’ unilaterally profited from participating retail investors,” Nansen researcher Nicolai Sondergaard wrote in a report analyzing more than 15,000 crypto wallets with gains or losses of more than $1,000.
Addresses associated with the PAIN team sold $2.53 million worth of tokens in the past 7 hours
According to @ai_9684xtpa, the PAIN team-related addresses have sold tokens worth $2.53 million in the past 7 hours. The address DjTrV...1a24a sold 107,212 PAIN at an average price of $23.66. The source of funds can be traced back to the team's pre-sale related address, not the 20% coin holding address of the airdrop. The tokens were transferred three times before shipment.
