Brian Quintenz has emerged as a strong contender for the position of chairman of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), and cryptocurrency regulation may usher in major changes under the leadership of President-elect Trump. According to people familiar with the matter, Quintenz has been interviewed for the position, and the president-elect's team has completed interviews for the position of chairman of the regulatory agency and is expected to announce the candidate in the next few days.

Bitcoin mining company Riot Platforms has successfully completed a $525 million senior note offering, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on December 11. The notes, due in 2030, carry an interest rate of 0.75% and were issued privately to institutional investors. The terms of the notes provide that investors have the right to convert them into Riot common stock starting in 2029, and may also convert them earlier under certain conditions set out in the terms of the offering. The proceeds will be used primarily to advance the company's Bitcoin acquisition strategy and further expand its holdings.

The floor price of Pudgy Penguins has exceeded $100,000, setting a new record high. The floor price of Pudgy Penguins is now 26.98 ETH, equivalent to $103,144, with a 7-day increase of 86.9%.

The CEO of Bank of New York Mellon said that tokenization is a major trend in the financial market, and anything new (in terms of crypto assets) needs to be tested in actual practice.

An advertisement for a crypto fund appeared on the Alipay page: Each person is limited to purchasing 1,000 yuan per day

Vancouver, Canada, has passed a policy that could bring Bitcoin into its city finances — a policy that was partly influenced by the return of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump. On Wednesday, Vancouver City Council passed a motion to become a “Bitcoin-friendly city” and explore Bitcoin’s applications in the municipal sphere.

Stablecoin-driven financial platform KAST has completed a $10 million seed round of financing, led by Peak XV and HongShan. Peak XV and HongShan are reportedly Indian and Chinese investment companies that spun off from investment giant Sequoia last year. Partners from DST Global and Goodwater Capital also participated in this round of investment. The company plans to launch savings products and expand remittance services while continuing to focus on stablecoin-based infrastructure.

Blockchain startup Commonware has raised $9 million in a round led by Haun Ventures and Dragonfly Capital, with participation from a number of well-known cryptocurrency developers, including Smokey the Bera of BeraChain, Zaki Manian of Cosmos, Sreeram Kannan of EigenLayer, Dan Romero of Farcaster, and Mert Mumtaz of Helius.

Robinhood Markets released its operating data for November 2024. As of the end of November, the total number of funded customers of the trading platform was 24.8 million (an increase of approximately 420,000 from October 2024 and an increase of approximately 1.5 million from the same period last year); the assets under management were US$195 billion (an increase of 22% month-on-month and 106% year-on-year). The notional trading volume of stocks reached US$147.1 billion (an increase of 16% month-on-month and 178% year-on-year). The trading volume of option contracts reached 155.5 million (a decrease of 2% month-on-month and an increase of 63% year-on-year). The notional trading volume of cryptocurrencies reached US$35.2 billion (an increase of more than 500% month-on-month and more than 700% year-on-year). As of the end of November, the financing balance was US$6.8 billion, the total cash collection balance was US$26.5 billion, and the total income from securities lending was US$23 million.

Thomas Peterffy, the billionaire founder of retail brokerage Interactive Brokers Group Inc., said investors should own a certain amount of bitcoin, but limit their holdings, despite its volatility. "I recommend that people put 2% to 3% of their net worth into bitcoin," he said. "We wouldn't allow anyone to put more than 10% of their assets into bitcoin, for example, because I think that would be very dangerous." He said he was "a little scared" because of the cryptocurrency's price fluctuations. "It doesn't have any underlying value. The only value it has is the same as a paper dollar, which is worthless. I think anyone who doesn't have bitcoin should own some, but not too much."

Peanut the Squirrel (PNUT) has been added to the Coinbase Asset Roadmap. PNUT is the SPL token on the Solana network.

Perena solves the problem of stablecoin ecosystem fragmentation and reduces the capital requirements for new stablecoin issuance through its product Numéraire (a multi-token extension of Stableswap without CLMM management). The protocol allows users to mint stablecoins, earn returns on tokenized real-world assets, and achieve customized risk-return configurations using a layered collateralized debt position system.

Apple released an update for iPhone, iPad and Mac software on Wednesday, which includes Siri with ChatGPT. The feature is based on OpenAI's GPT-4o model and can be used without an OpenAI account. Users need to have an iPhone 15 or above to enable Apple Intelligence and can apply for experience qualifications in the system settings.