SharpLink (SBET) has raised $76.5 million through an equity offering at $17 per share (12% premium), with an additional $79 million possible via a 90-day premium purchase contract at $17.50 (19% premium). Proceeds will be used to increase ETH per share and expand the company’s Ethereum treasury. — link

Nasdaq-listed DeFi Development Corp. (ticker: DFDV) announced that it has acquired an additional 86,307 SOL at an average price of approximately $110.91 per token, totaling around $16 million. This purchase increases the company’s SOL holdings by nearly 5%, bringing its total to over 2 million tokens, valued at approximately $426 million. — link

According to Bitcoin Laws, Florida State Representative Webster Barnaby has introduced House Bill 183 — the first “Strategic Bitcoin Reserve” proposal of the 2026 legislative session. The bill authorizes the state’s Chief Financial Officer and local governments to allocate up to 10% of public funds to Bitcoin and other digital assets. It also permits the state’s retirement system to make similar investments within a regulatory framework. — link

According to Bloomberg, Ripple Labs is leading a fundraising initiative of at least $1 billion, aiming to establish a new digital asset treasury to accumulate XRP. The funds will be raised through a SPAC (special purpose acquisition company), and Ripple will also contribute a portion of its own XRP to the treasury. — link

South Korea’s largest crypto exchange, Upbit, has announced that it will list ZORA trading pairs against KRW, BTC, and USDT. Zora is a social Web3 platform. Upbit has announced the launch of trading pairs for ZeroBase (ZBT) in KRW, BTC, and USDT. ZBT is a project focused on building a high-performance ZK network. — link — link

Uniswap Labs, the largest DEX on EVM networks, announced that Solana is now supported on Uniswap Web App. This marks the first time Uniswap has enabled trading for tokens on a non-EVM network. — link

On October 16 (ET), spot Bitcoin ETFs saw a total net outflow of $536 million, with none of the twelve ETFs recording net inflows. Spot Ethereum ETFs had a total net outflow of $56.88 million, with only BlackRock’s ETHA posting a net inflow. — link

In response to the incident of “the first DAT company QMMM allegedly running away,” CZ tweeted that all crypto DAT (Digital Asset Treasury) companies should use third-party crypto custodians and have account setup audited by investors. This is a prerequisite for any BNB DAT investment by YZi Labs. — link

Binance data shows Bitcoin down 5.3% at $105,231 and Ethereum down 6.9% at $3,731 in 24 hours. The drop follows reports of bad loans from two U.S. regional banks, sparking fears over banking sector risks and causing bank stocks to fall. Growing worries persist that several major lending institutions hold significant amounts of problematic loans with limited collateral. — link

The Bank of Japan’s Deputy Governor Shinichi Uchida said the central bank will continue raising interest rates if economic and price trends meet expectations. The BOJ raised rates to 0.5% in January, ending its decade-long ultra-loose policy, and may increase to 0.75% by early 2026. Business confidence is improving, but global trade uncertainties remain. — link

French regulators have expanded anti-money laundering (AML) checks on cryptocurrency exchanges, including Binance. The ACPR is carrying out controls on dozens of exchanges, an effort that started late last year. Binance says it is cooperating fully and complying with EU and local regulations. — link

Japan’s three major banks—MUFG, Sumitomo Mitsui, and Mizuho—are collaborating to launch a stablecoin pegged to the Japanese yen and US dollar. This initiative aims to facilitate seamless cross-border settlements, with Mitsubishi Corporation serving as the first application scenario. The three banks collectively have over 300,000 major business partners. — link

YZi Labs announced the launch of the second season of its incubation program, EASY Residency, focusing on global collaboration among entrepreneurs in Web3, AI, and Biotech. This eight-week program will cover areas such as stablecoins and payments, Web3 creator tools, agentic AI, and gene therapy. — link

How the U.S. Government Seized 120,000 BTC From Cambodia’s “Pig-Butchering” Kingpin

The U.S. government seized about 127,000 BTC (over $15 billion) linked to Chen Zhi, leader of Cambodia’s Prince Group, responsible for large-scale crypto scams. The stolen funds were laundered through Bitcoin mining, especially the Lubian pool. Authorities recovered the assets by tracing blockchain transactions and exploiting weaknesses in key generation. This marks the largest crypto forfeiture and shows how blockchain transparency aids law enforcement. Read More — link

Tether has announced the open-source release of its Wallet Development Kit (WDK), a comprehensive toolkit designed to facilitate the creation of secure, self-custodial, cross-chain wallets. The WDK is fully open-source and ecosystem-agnostic, enabling developers to build wallets that operate across various blockchain networks, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Arbitrum, Polygon, TON, and Solana. — link

The Swiss gambling regulator GESPA has filed a criminal complaint against FIFA’s World Cup NFT platform, alleging it offers unlicensed gambling services in Switzerland. The complaint centers on FIFA Collect, which runs NFT-based competitions requiring monetary stakes with cash prizes, involving chance-based outcomes classified as lotteries and sports betting under Swiss law. — link

NFT marketplace OpenSea is pivoting to become a crypto asset aggregation platform following a market crash and large-scale layoffs. The platform now supports trading NFTs, meme coins, other tokens, and operates across 22 blockchains. It uses a non-custodial model and does not enforce traditional KYC procedures. — link

Arthur Hayes’ family office is raising at least $250 million for its first private equity fund focused on medium-sized crypto companies. The fund aims to invest $40 million to $75 million per deal, targeting up to six firms, primarily service providers such as trading infrastructure and analytics platforms. — link

According to Bloomberg, Huobi founder Li Lin is collaborating with Shen Bo (co-founder of Fenbushi Capital), Xiao Feng (CEO of HashKey Group), and Meitu founder Cai Wensheng, among other early Asian Ethereum supporters, to establish a new digital asset trust aiming to accumulate about $1 billion worth of ETH. The group is reportedly in talks to acquire a Nasdaq-listed shell company to facilitate the trust’s structure. — link

According to Fortune, blockchain startup Tempo, backed by Stripe and Paradigm, has raised $500 million in a Series A round at a valuation of approximately $5 billion. The funding was led by Thrive Capital (founded by Joshua Kushner) and Greenoaks, with participation from Sequoia Capital, Ribbit Capital, and SV Angel. Tempo aims to establish U.S. dollar-backed stablecoins as the foundational infrastructure for global payments. — link

Ethereum core developer Dankrad Feist has left the Ethereum Foundation to join Tempo, the Layer-1 project focused on payments infrastructure. — link