SEC’s Paul Atkins grilled on crypto enforcement pull-back, including with Justin Sun, Tron

The top Democrat on the U.S. House Financial Services Committee demanded the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission explain during a Wednesday hearing what happened with the agency’s enforcement interest in Tron Foundation founder Justin Sun and whether his ties to President Donald Trump have had an influence. Representative Maxine Waters highlighted the U.S….

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Gen Z ‘nihilism’ is fueling a $100 trillion crypto derivatives boom, in response to a broken system

The surge in speculation driving prediction markets and leveraged bets on various sectors isn’t reckless, it’s rational, according to CoinFund managing partner David Pakman. In a presentation during Consensus Hong Kong, Pakman reframed the behavior as “economic nihilism,” a calculated response by Gen Z to structural barriers in wealth building. His case started with housing….

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U.S. DOJ hits Paxful for $4 million in case tied to illegal sex work, money laundering

Paxful Holdings, which pleaded guilty last year to accusations from U.S. authorities that it had fostered illegal prostitution, violated money-laundering laws and knowingly handled criminal proceeds, was sentenced to pay a $4 million penalty, much reduced because of the business’ current ability to pay. The peer-to-peer bitcoin BTC$67,687.47 marketplace that had been popular in Africa…

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BlackRock exec says even a 1% crypto allocation in Asia could unlock $2 trillion in new flows

Even a modest model portfolio allocation to crypto in Asia could drive massive inflows into the market, according to Nicholas Peach, head of APAC iShares at BlackRock. Speaking on a panel at Consensus Hong Kong, Peach said rising institutional acceptance of crypto exchange-traded funds (ETFs) — particularly in Asia — is reshaping expectations for the…

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Hong Kong remains committed to digital assets but feels competition from an ‘aggressive’ UAE

Hong Kong, one of the world’s major financial hubs, has long been committed to cryptocurrency and blockchain technology — but it faces a competitive challenge from the crypto-friendly UAE. This was a fact acknowledged by panelists Joseph Chan, under secretary for financial services and the treasury in Hong Kong, and Johnny Ng, founder of web3…

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Ethena-backed suiUSDe stablecoin goes live on Sui with $10 million yield vault launch

The Ethena-backed eSui Dollar (suiUSDe) has launched on Sui Mainnet, expanding the network’s stablecoin offerings and introducing the network’s first synthetic dollar to onchain trading and yield infrastructure, the Sui Foundation said in a blog post Wednesday. The rollout also brings suiUSDe to DeepBook Margin, where it becomes the first synthetic dollar supported by the…

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Franklin Templeton and SWIFT say the future of banking is 24/7 and natively on-chain

Tokenized money market funds and digital bank deposits are shifting from experimental pilots to early-stage financial infrastructure, executives from Franklin Templeton, SWIFT and Ledger said Wednesday Consensus Hong Kong 2026. “Take traditional, existing financial instruments, make them cheaper, better faster, by putting them natively on chain,” said Franklin Templeton’s Chetan Karkhanis. The asset manager has…

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