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Rain CEO Farooq Malik said the stablecoin card company is accepting stablecoin payments at more than 100,000 merchant locations, The Block reported. The transactions are being processed through Visa, and Rain plans to offer merchants the option to settle in stablecoins.

Crypto lender Nexo has launched a crypto-backed credit line service in Australia under a regulatory framework, Wu Blockchain reported. Nexo Australia is a member of the Australian Financial Complaints Authority and is also offering the Nexo Booster, yield products including Nexo Grow, and the tiered Wealth Club loyalty program.

Aave founder Stani Kulechov said the UK is moving to treat stablecoins like money rather than subjecting their disposal to capital gains tax. In a post on X, Kulechov said HMRC guidance indicates stablecoin disposals would be excluded from capital gains tax, while interest-like income generated from stablecoins would be taxed as savings income starting in April 2027. Kulechov added the plan remains at the draft stage, but it would remove one headache.

Global XRP exchange-traded products recorded $253.6 million in net inflows in the second quarter, up from $174.8 million in the first quarter, according to a Blockworks analysis. Quarterly net inflows have continued since U.S. spot XRP ETPs launched in November 2025, but XRP fell 19.9% in the second quarter to $1.04, pulling ETP assets under management down 17.1% to $1.99 billion from $2.4 billion. Spot and perpetual futures trading volumes for XRP on centralized exchanges also dropped 53.5% and 44%, respectively. XRP Ledger payment volume totaled 41.07 billion XRP, little changed from a year earlier but down 26.6% from the previous quarter, while total transactions and daily average active addresses fell 6.5% and 10.7%, respectively.

According to CoinGlass data, if BTC falls below $63,524, about $609.17 million in long positions on major centralized exchanges would be liquidated. If BTC rises above $65,504, about $496.33 million in short positions would be liquidated.

Amazon Web Services has officially launched Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Payments, a feature that lets AI agents make autonomous payments in USDC. The service allows agents to pay for paid APIs, MCP, and content usage fees without human intervention, while supporting Coinbase Wallet and Privy wallets under Stripe. Users can fund agent wallets with traditional payment methods such as credit cards or with USDC, then delegate spending authority to the agent. AWS said the system was designed to keep developers’ wallet credentials stored separately rather than exposing them directly to agents, with wallet functions such as transaction signing handled through temporary authentication tokens.

Vietnam is pursuing a pilot program to bring the crypto market into the regulatory fold as it seeks to exit the Financial Action Task Force watchlist, The Business Times reported. Vietnamese authorities are targeting a third-quarter launch for the crypto exchange pilot, with five companies having passed preliminary screening. Authorities plan to select firms that meet capital and security requirements and guide cryptocurrency trading into the formal regulatory system.

Sandisk (SNDK) perpetual futures volume on Binance reached about $6.37 billion, surpassing Bitcoin perpetual futures volume of $5.96 billion. Sandisk perpetual futures currently rank as the highest-volume contract on Binance. Traditional finance-linked assets, including stocks and commodities, are also seeing active trading in Binance’s futures market. Ten of the top 15 futures products by volume are tied to traditional finance assets.

ZetaChain said on its official X account its private AI app Anuma has surpassed 210,000 users. The service lets users retain memory across different AI models while applying privacy features designed to protect user data, and a ZetaChain-based crypto wallet is automatically created when an Anuma account is opened. Anuma added 28,312 new users in July, followed by more than 31,000 new users through Aug. 17, extending its user growth trend. Since launching in February, the app has processed 919,227 AI requests and 20 billion AI tokens, while integrating with 28 major AI models including ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini. ZetaChain added Anuma is also expanding token utility by offering AI credits for locked-up ZETA and pro features for users who lock up 100,000 ZETA. The company emphasized most new Anuma users are first-time crypto users, with network expansion accelerating.

AI agents executed about 14 million payments through the x402 protocol over the past 30 days, Bitcoin.com reported, citing Token Terminal data. Base accounted for the largest share with 7.3 million transactions, followed by Polygon with 5.6 million, while USDC was used for virtually all payments, the outlet said. x402 is an open payment protocol built around HTTP 402, or "Payment Required," allowing AI agents to automatically pay for APIs and digital services. It mainly supports stablecoin-based onchain payments, enabling agents to pay immediately for needed services without separate accounts or subscriptions.

Stablecoin balances held by major centralized exchanges have fallen about 20% to around $64 billion from a peak of roughly $80 billion at the end of 2025, BeInCrypto reported. The report said this points to a decline in sidelined buying power while accelerating liquidity fragmentation and concentration, with the remaining liquidity increasingly flowing to large exchanges. Binance’s share of exchange-held stablecoins rose to 68.5% from the low-60% range at the end of 2025.

SkyBridge Capital founder Anthony Scaramucci said in a CNBC interview Bitcoin will climb back above $100,000 ahead of its next halving, which is expected around April 2028. Scaramucci said the supply reduction effect from the halving would play a role. After the next halving, the block reward will fall to 1.5625 BTC from 3.125 BTC.

The following are the 24-hour long/short ratios for BTC perpetual futures on the world’s three largest crypto futures exchanges by open interest: Overall: 51.63% long, 48.37% short - Binance: 50.28% long, 49.72% short - OKX: 50.84% long, 49.16% short - Bybit: 50.58% long, 49.42% short

A Seoul National University study found that in three past decisions to delay taxation on virtual assets, arguments from experts, industry participants and investors that the system was not ready carried more weight than public opinion favoring the introduction of the tax, according to Digital Asset. The Institute of Korean Political Studies at Seoul National University said in a paper published in the Korean Political Studies journal in June that it analyzed the structure and reasoning behind different policy decisions on four tax-cut measures under the Lee Jae-myung government: the financial investment income tax, the digital asset tax, the inheritance tax and the comprehensive real estate holding tax. The paper said the digital asset tax clearly showed a gap between public opinion and the policy outcome, as most polls favored introducing the tax while the National Assembly decided on a delay. It added that the issue was framed around inadequate tax systems and infrastructure, showing a problem-stream-dominant mechanism that shaped policy trends, unlike the financial investment income tax tied to the stock market. The study said the finding suggests that even under the same political conditions, different policy decision-making mechanisms can operate depending on a policy’s internal characteristics and external factors, and that successful implementation requires a tailored strategy suited to each policy.

Additional key speakers have been unveiled for the main conference of Korea Blockchain Week 2026 with Upbit, one of Asia’s leading digital-asset events. The lineup includes senior figures from government and policy, AI and blockchain, institutional finance and investment, and exchanges, reflecting trends in regulatory formalization for the crypto market, institutional adoption, and AI integration. Featured speakers include Bermuda Prime Minister David Burt, OKX founder and CEO Star Xu, Franklin Templeton Senior Vice President Chetan Karkhanis, who oversees institutional clients for digital assets, World Liberty Financial CEO Zach Witkoff, and 0G co-founder and CEO Michael Heinrich. FactBlock, the Web3 ecosystem builder organizing the event, said it will serve as a venue to discuss the future direction of the crypto market amid a rapidly changing global regulatory environment and growing technology convergence. The event will be held at Seoul’s Walkerhill Hotels & Resorts from Sept. 29 to Oct. 1, with the main conference set to begin on Sept. 30. Upbit will participate as the top-tier presenting partner.

Japan’s Digital Garage has signed a basic agreement with major card issuer JCB and convenience store operator Lawson to conduct a pilot for in-store payments using stablecoins, CoinPost reported. Under the agreement, Digital Garage will run a USDC payment trial at convenience stores for tourists visiting Japan. The company plans to assess payment convenience and point-of-sale integration technology as it moves to build an offline stablecoin payments ecosystem.

The spot CVD chart reflects order book analysis for the BTC/USDT spot trading pair, with the upper section showing a volume heatmap and the lower section showing cumulative volume delta, or CVD. - The volume heatmap in the upper section tracks trading volume at each price level, and the background color becomes brighter when the price stays within a specific range for an extended period or moves sharply. Brighter areas may act as support or resistance. - The CVD indicator in the lower section reflects buy and sell orders by capital size, and the line for each color rises as buy orders increase. The yellow line represents orders between $100 and $1,000, while the brown line represents large orders between $1 million and $10 million.

Avalanche developer Ava Labs has appointed COO Charley Cooper as president, with Cooper set to oversee the company’s day-to-day management and business operations, current President John Wu said. Wu will step down as president and serve as senior advisor, focusing on long-term strategy and Avalanche’s future direction. Interim CFO Lydia Chiu has also been named CFO.

Synthetic dollar protocol Falcon Finance (FF) said it is preparing a token tied to GPU financing as its first product as it pushes ahead with a real-world asset tokenization business in El Salvador. Falcon Finance said high-performance GPUs typically take four to eight months from payment to physical delivery, and a special purpose vehicle will issue the token to raise the funding needed during that period. The computing resources generated by those GPUs have been pre-contracted for purchase by NEAR AI. Falcon Finance plans to make the GPU token freely tradable on Uniswap and other platforms, and to recognize it as collateral for issuing its synthetic stablecoin USDf once sufficient trading volume and liquidity are secured.

U.S. spot Ether ETFs see $71.4M in net inflows for fourth straight session U.S. spot Ether ETFs recorded about $71.4 million in net inflows on Aug. 18, marking a fourth straight trading day of net inflows, according to Farside Investors. - BlackRock ETHA: +$64.7 million - Bitwise ETHW: +$1.4 million - Invesco QETH: +$1.1 million - Grayscale ETHE: +$1.5 million - Grayscale Mini ETH: +$2.7 million

U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs log $189.3M in net inflows for second straight session U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded about $189.3 million in net inflows on Aug. 18, marking a second straight trading day of net inflows, according to Farside Investors. - BlackRock IBIT: +$143.6 million - Fidelity FBTC: +$23.9 million - Bitwise BITB: +$16.1 million - ARK Invest ARKB: +$19.7 million - VanEck HODL: -$16.9 million - Grayscale Mini BTC: +$2.9 million

The following shows estimated liquidation volumes and position ratios for major crypto perpetual futures over the past 24 hours: - BTC: $59.12 million liquidated (93.53% shorts) - ETH: $12.05 million liquidated (66.72% shorts) - SNDK: $15.31 million liquidated (74.56% longs)

An address linked to the Ondo Finance team deposited 13.43 million ONDO to Coinbase, ai_9684xtpa said. Exchange deposits are typically interpreted as being intended for sale. The address is estimated to have sold $29.94 million worth of ONDO over the past 30 days and currently holds about $12.68 million worth of the token.

The dollar-won exchange rate fell below 1,400 won for the first time in about 11 months and was recently trading at 1,398.88 won, down 0.96%.

BounceBit has launched Borobudur, a credit layer backed by Franklin Templeton’s tokenized fund BENJI and CeDeFi strategy positions, according to Wu Blockchain. The structure is designed to let users secure liquidity in BB without interest while keeping their positions intact.