🔔 New Bitcoin Extortion Scheme in the Strait of Hormuz

🚨 Unknown individuals are impersonating Iranian authorities, offering ships safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for payment in Bitcoin or USDT. This warning comes from the Greek maritime risk management company Marksis, as reported by Reuters.

🚫 Experts examined one of the messages sent by the fraudsters to shipping companies. It stated that companies must first provide documents for verification by Iran's security service. After that, they are required to pay a transit fee in cryptocurrency. This, they claim, will allow them to cross the strait "unimpeded at a pre-agreed time," Marksis reported.

➡️ At least one vessel may have fallen victim to this scam. It attempted to exit Hormuz on April 18 but came under fire.

🔒 The Strait of Hormuz remains closed. Earlier this month, Financial Times journalists, citing oil exporters, reported that Iran intends to demand payment in cryptocurrency from shipping companies for passage through the strait. However, there has been no official confirmation of this.

‼️ Later, experts deemed Tehran's plans "practically unfeasible." They pointed to the ongoing sanctions against the country and the transparency of blockchain technology, which could pose problems for registered Western firms.

🪙 Russia Introduces Cryptocurrency Taxation Mechanism

🔔 On April 27, 2026, the Russian government approved amendments to the Tax Code, establishing a clear mechanism for taxing income from cryptocurrency operations. The Ministry of Finance prepared the document, which introduces a new article specifically for digital assets.

💰 Cryptocurrency is officially recognized as property. The tax base arises from the sale, exchange, or other disposal of crypto assets and is calculated as the positive difference between revenue and documented expenses. Expenses include the acquisition cost of the digital currency, fees from exchanges, custodians, brokers, and banks, as well as other related costs.

🔄 Exchanging one cryptocurrency for another is considered a taxable event. The income is determined by the exchange rate at the time of the transaction, and expenses are deducted in the usual manner.

❗️ Tax agents will include brokers, trust managers, and digital custodians. They are required to calculate, withhold, and transfer the personal income tax to the budget. Individuals working without a tax agent must declare their income independently; if their turnover exceeds 600,000 rubles, they must also notify the tax authorities about their ownership of crypto assets.

🚀 Oobit Launches Programmable Visa Corporate Cards for AI Agents to Spend USDT

🆕 Oobit, a startup backed by Tether, has introduced Agent Cards supported by Visa, enabling AI agents to make purchases in USDT without human intervention. The product is currently available to a select group of companies, with plans to expand the list by June 30.

💳 AI agents can utilize Agent Cards for various purposes, including renewing software subscriptions, replenishing advertising budgets, and deploying cloud infrastructure around the clock. Other options include trading cryptocurrencies and stocks. Payments are financed through stablecoins, managed by a single Oobit wallet for storing these "stable coins."

🔍 To set up Agent Cards, companies must undergo KYC verification. The product is compatible with AI agent frameworks from OpenAI, Claude, AutoGen, and LangChain. Each AI agent is issued only one card to ensure clear identification and an audit trail. Spending limits and vendor restrictions are applied at the transaction level to ensure that AI agents operate within their authorized parameters.

🔍 Market Awaits Employment Data and Reports: This Week Will Determine Crypto Asset Dynamics

📌 The week begins with three key events: new employment data from the U.S., reports from major public companies in the sector, and signals from the Federal Reserve (Fed). Each of these could alter interest rate expectations and set the direction for Bitcoin and other assets.

📊 The main event of the week is the U.S. labor market report. The forecast for new jobs in April is around 73,000 compared to 178,000 the previous month. If the figure is weak, the market may intensify expectations for an earlier rate cut, supporting risk assets including cryptocurrencies. Strong data would have the opposite effect, pushing back the rate cut scenario and increasing market pressure.

📈 In addition to payrolls, the market will receive additional signals such as unemployment claims, the services sector activity index, and wage data. Each of these indicators affects inflation expectations and collectively shapes the picture the Fed relies on.

🔔 Concurrently, the market is monitoring corporate earnings. This week, results will be presented by Strategy, Coinbase, MARA, Hut 8, CleanSpark, and Core Scientific. This will allow for an assessment of the mining and exchange segments, particularly focusing on Bitcoin sales by miners.

🛡 Google Chrome's Automatic AI Downloads Raise Security Concerns Among Cryptocurrency Users

🚨 The cryptocurrency community is buzzing over reports that Google's Chrome browser is automatically downloading its AI model, Gemini Nano, in the background without user consent. This has sparked discussions about security and transparency.

📥 According to leaked information, Chrome has downloaded several gigabytes of the Gemini Nano model to devices for use in fraud prevention systems, web page summarization features, and AI-based tools. While Google claims that running AI on devices enhances privacy and security, cryptocurrency users are expressing concerns about the lack of transparency in the process and the absence of explicit user consent.

🚫 Analysts point out that internet browsers have become a primary access point for cryptocurrency wallets, blockchain transactions, and decentralized applications, making browser security a critical component of the crypto ecosystem. Some industry representatives acknowledge that deep AI integration can be beneficial for detecting phishing sites, but they also warn that it could expand the attack surface for browsers.

⚠️ Experts warn that threats such as malicious extensions, fake transaction pages, and wallet hacking attempts may become more sophisticated with the proliferation of AI-based browser systems. It is suggested that in the future, cryptocurrency users may need to protect their browser environments as diligently as they do their hardware wallets.

💰 Strategy Expands Bitcoin Portfolio with 535 BTC Acquisition Amidst Potential Sale Speculations

📈 Strategy has recently bolstered its Bitcoin holdings by acquiring 535 BTC, bringing its total to 818,869 BTC. This move comes after the company's leadership hinted at a possible sale of some crypto assets. Co-founder Michael Saylor announced that the average purchase price was $80,340, which is below the current market rate of $81,153.

💸 This acquisition has placed Strategy's portfolio in a position of unrealized profit amounting to $5.4 billion due to the recent surge in Bitcoin's value. Saylor also mentioned that the return on these investments since January 1, 2026, stands at 9.4%. This marks Strategy's first purchase since late April 2026.

🗣 Previously, during a conference call, Saylor indicated that the company might sell a portion of its Bitcoin holdings to pay dividends on STRC, its floating-rate preferred stock currently yielding 11.5%. CEO Fong Le explained that the firm is willing to deviate from its usual stance if selling Bitcoin can help meet obligations without diluting per-share asset value.

🚀 Three Factors for Ethereum's Price Growth Identified by Major Holder

👤 Joseph Chalom, CEO of SharpLink Gaming, highlighted three key factors that could lead to a significant increase in Ethereum's price. Currently, SharpLink Gaming holds 861,251 ETH valued at $1.89 billion.

📌 During an interview on Cointelegraph's Chain Reaction program, Chalom emphasized that the CLARITY Act, which regulates stablecoin yields and delineates the powers of financial regulators over cryptocurrencies, could greatly benefit Ethereum's growth. Although CLARITY is still a bill, it has already been approved by the U.S. Senate Banking Committee. Chalom believes that CLARITY will clarify cryptocurrency regulation not only in the United States but also globally.

I've traveled extensively in Asia and noticed that Korea, Hong Kong, Tokyo, and Singapore are closely watching the U.S. actions in the digital asset space,

said Chalom.

They don't want to lose their position as the U.S. strives to be a leader in finance.

🔔 TrapDoor malware campaign steals crypto wallet data through fake developer tools

📈 TrapDoor malware has emerged as a new threat to crypto and AI developers after researchers uncovered a supply chain attack designed to steal wallet data, API keys, cloud credentials, and SSH access through poisoned developer packages.

➡️ According to a report published Sunday by developer security platform Socket, the campaign, dubbed “TrapDoor,” was first identified on Friday and has already spread through at least 34 malicious packages and 384 connected versions across multiple software ecosystems. Socket said the attackers have focused on developers working in cryptocurrency, decentralized finance, artificial intelligence, and security infrastructure, where exposed credentials can provide access to wallets, repositories, cloud environments, and internal systems.

📊 vAmong the targeted services are wallets and platforms linked to Coinbase, Binance, MetaMask, Brave, along with blockchain ecosystems tied to Solana, Sui, and Aptos. Ahmad Nassri, chief technology officer at Socket, said the malware also attempts to manipulate AI coding assistants such as Claude and Cursor by injecting hidden prompts into development workflows. Socket’s report stated that the attackers appear to be pushing AI tools into running fake “security scans” that expose secrets and transmit them back to the operators.

⚠️ Strive unveils $4.2B fundraising push to accelerate Bitcoin buys

📌 According to a June 1 X post by Strive chief executive Matthew Cole, the company expects to increase the size of its at-the-market programs tied to ASST and SATA securities by $2.1 billion each. The proposed expansion would add a combined $4.2 billion in new fundraising capacity.

🌐 Cole stated that the decision follows rising liquidity and investor demand for both securities. He also said Strive plans to release an updated balance sheet before U.S. markets open on Tuesday. The announcement comes days after the company disclosed another large Bitcoin acquisition. In an 8-K filing submitted on May 26, Strive reported buying 1,109 BTC between May 19 and May 22 for approximately $85.4 million. The filing showed an average purchase price of roughly $76,988 per coin.

❓ Following that transaction, Strive’s Bitcoin holdings increased to 16,500 BTC. Data cited in the filing placed the company ahead of Coinbase, which holds 16,492 BTC, and Riot Platforms, which holds 15,680 BTC.

🔔 OKX adds Magnificent 7 stocks and commodities to European X Perps offering

📌 OKX has expanded its X-Perps offering in Europe with 13 new markets, adding futures linked to major U.S. technology stocks, commodities, and stock indices after reporting a 447% rise in X-Perps trading volume since May 1.

⚠️ According to a press release shared with cryptonews, retail users across Europe can now trade perpetual futures tied to Apple, Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia and Tesla, alongside Gold, Silver, WTI Crude Oil and Brent Crude Oil. The exchange has also introduced SPY and QQQ X-Perps, providing price exposure to the S&P 500 and Nasdaq-100 through a regulated platform available to European customers.

➡️ Set to expand further, the product lineup will include a SpaceX-linked X-Perp on June 12 following the company’s IPO, according to the exchange. All contracts are available around the clock and support leverage of up to 10x. Erald Ghoos, CEO of OKX Europe, said European investors closely follow earnings reports, central bank decisions, commodity prices and geopolitical developments but have lacked practical ways to react immediately through a single platform.

🔔 MARA reportedly buys 1,000 Bitcoin after Q1 sales

📈 The purchase was valued at about $66.7 million, based on the reported price level at the time of the transfer. Meanwhile, the miner has not issued a direct statement confirming the transaction. For that reason, the purchase remains an on-chain analytics claim. Still, the report drew attention because it followed a large sale period earlier this year.

➡️ MARA’s first-quarter filing showed that the company sold about 20,880 BTC during the three months ended March 31, 2026. The sales generated about $1.5 billion at an average price of $70,137 per Bitcoin. The company said it used the sales to fund operations, support growth plans, and manage liquidity. MARA also changed its digital asset policy in 2026, allowing it to sell Bitcoin held on its balance sheet. Before that change, its policy focused on selling newly mined Bitcoin.

⚠️ In addition, part of the Q1 sales funded a $1 billion repurchase of MARA’s 0.00% convertible senior notes due in 2030 and 2031. The company sold 15,133 BTC between March 4 and March 25 for about $1.1 billion to support that transaction.

🔔 Kalshi restricts Indian users after regulatory pressure on prediction markets

❗️ The revised document includes 55 restricted jurisdictions and now names India among the countries whose residents are barred from using the platform. The move comes nearly a month after Indian authorities blocked access to Polymarket and warned virtual private network providers against facilitating access to prediction market websites.

➡️ India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology issued an advisory on April 25 directing internet service providers and VPN operators to prevent access to what it described as illegal and blocked online betting and prediction market platforms. Polymarket was among the platforms targeted under the order.

⚠️ At the time, people familiar with the matter told local media that authorities could take similar action against Kalshi, although the platform remained accessible in India following the advisory.
Indian authorities have classified prediction market platforms under the Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Act 2025 as online money gaming services. Under the framework, platforms that allow users to stake real money on uncertain outcomes can fall within prohibited betting activity regardless of how operators describe their services.

📌 Pi Network’s pivot: from mobile mining to infrastructure for AI and identity

⚠️ On Pi2Day, Pi Network stopped talking about mobile mining and started talking about infrastructure, launching tools to sell its compute, identity, and verification to the outside world. It is a real strategic pivot toward the AI era. Whether it fixes Pi’s actual problem, a token down 96% with no demand, is the harder question.

🌐 On June 28, 2026, Pi Network used its annual Pi2Day celebration to make a statement about what it wants to become, and for once the statement was not about mining. The project that grew famous as a mobile app letting tens of millions of people tap a button each day to earn tokens launched three products, SoloHost, Pi Sign-in, and PiVerify, and framed them as a deliberate pivot: from a mining-centric community toward an infrastructure provider for the artificial-intelligence era, offering compute, identity, and verification services to the outside world.

📊 The pitch was explicit. Rather than relying only on growth inside its own walled ecosystem, Pi would begin selling its genuine assets, a verified user base of more than 18 million people, a network of hundreds of thousands of user-run nodes, and a hybrid human-verification system, to external developers and businesses.

⚠️ Bitcoin price stalls below $64K as Fed hopes meet oil risks and bearish divergence

🔔 Bitcoin has held above $63,000 after last week’s macro-driven rebound, but traders are now weighing expectations of Federal Reserve rate cuts against rising geopolitical tensions and mounting technical resistance. According to data from cryptonews, Bitcoin price traded around $63,100 on Tuesday after briefly testing the $64,000 region again, leaving the market caught between bullish macro expectations and a growing list of near-term risks.

🔖 Recent gains have also coincided with renewed ETF demand. U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded two straight sessions of net inflows after weeks of persistent withdrawals, offering the first sign that institutional investors are cautiously returning to the market following June’s record $4.5 billion in net outflows. The daily chart shows Bitcoin rebounding strongly from the $58,000 area but failing to reclaim the key horizontal resistance near $65,000. Price remains below the 50-day moving average around $65,800, while the 200-day moving average continues to cap the longer-term trend.

📊 However, the Chaikin Money Flow has climbed back above zero, suggesting fresh capital has started returning after weeks of persistent selling. The MACD also remains in bullish territory, although upward momentum has slowed as price approaches resistance.

📌 SBI picks Solana: What Japan’s tokenization pivot means for SOL

➡️ On July 13, one of Japan’s largest financial conglomerates rewired its blockchain strategy in a single press release. SBI Holdings announced that the Solana Foundation will take an equity stake in SBI R3 Japan, the joint venture it shares with Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group, and that the entity will be renamed SBI Solana Global.

📣 The new company’s mandate reads like a full-stack blueprint for moving Japanese finance onto a public blockchain: yen stablecoin issuance and distribution, tokenization of corporate bonds, commercial paper, funds, and real estate, cross-border settlement rails, institutional on-chain services, and payment infrastructure for AI agents. For Solana, it is the deepest institutional embrace the network has received in Asia. For SBI, a company that spent nearly a decade as Ripple’s most committed champion in the region, it is a pivot loaded with signal. The question the market spent July 14 arguing about is which signal: validation of Solana as institutional infrastructure, or a reminder of how much distance separates a memorandum from a market.

⚠️ The price answered with a shrug. SOL traded near $76 as the announcement circulated, slipping roughly 3.5 percent in line with a broader risk-off session, its market capitalization holding above $44 billion. That muted reaction is itself the story.

📌 Aztec v5 brings private smart contracts to Ethereum in alpha launch

➡️ Aztec has launched the alpha version of its v5 execution layer, introducing a programmable privacy framework that allows Ethereum applications to process both public and private state within the same layer-2 environment. The new architecture allows developers to build decentralized applications that combine confidential user data with public blockchain state while relying on zero-knowledge proofs to verify transactions without exposing sensitive information.

🔖 Unlike Ethereum’s base layer, where every validator processes and stores transaction inputs, outputs, and execution data to reach consensus, Aztec’s execution layer moves private computation to the user’s device. Instead of revealing transaction details to the network, the system generates cryptographic proofs locally before submitting them for verification on-chain, reducing the amount of visible transaction data while preserving Ethereum’s security guarantees.

⭐️ At the center of the release is a client-side zero-knowledge execution engine integrated with Noir, Aztec’s domain-specific programming language for private smart contracts. Rather than executing confidential transactions across every network node like the Ethereum Virtual Machine, the system performs private computations on user hardware before generating recursive Succinct Non-Interactive Arguments of Knowledge, or SNARKs.

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📌 Ethereum price slips below $1,900 as long liquidations surge

📣 Ethereum price fell 5% from $1,973 to $1,873 on July 28 after another rejection below $2,000 triggered forced selling and pushed ETH into a key technical support zone. According to data from cryptonews, Ethereum price traded near $1,875 at the time of writing, down from an intraday high close to $1,973. The decline erased most of the gains from the previous session, when ETH reached its highest level since early June.

📊 Selling intensified after buyers failed to push the price through the $1,975–$2,000 resistance range. The rejection trapped traders who had opened leveraged long positions in anticipation of a breakout above the psychological threshold. ETH subsequently moved below $1,900, activating stop-loss orders and forcing position closures. The price reached approximately $1,873 before stabilizing around the lower end of the daily range.

🔖 Despite the decline, Ethereum remains above its early July low near $1,560. The token has gained roughly 20% from that level, meaning the wider recovery has weakened but has not yet been invalidated. Derivatives positioning appears to have increased the speed of the decline. Bullish traders had built exposure as Ethereum approached $2,000, leaving the market vulnerable when spot demand failed to sustain the move.