Today's top news highlights:

Sources: The International Energy Agency has recommended releasing a total of 400 million barrels of oil from its reserves.

Hong Kong media reports that the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) will issue stablecoin licenses after the Two Sessions, with the first batch numbering fewer than four.

Binance Wallet will exclusively list Unitas Labs (UP) in TGE Phase 44.

Upbit will list its ICP token on the Korean Won, BTC, and USDT markets.

Attorney Chen Zhi, the ringleader of a "pig butchering scam," filed a motion in a U.S. court to dismiss the government's seizure of his Bitcoin.

Circle has issued over 8 billion USDC since early February.

Bitcoin spot ETFs saw a total net inflow of $251 million yesterday, with none of the twelve ETFs experiencing net outflows.

Huawei launches "HarmonyOS version of lobster" Xiaoyi Claw

Regulation & Macro

Hong Kong media reports that the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) will issue stablecoin licenses after the Two Sessions, with the first batch numbering fewer than four.

According to the Hong Kong Economic Journal, the first batch of stablecoin licenses in Hong Kong will be issued after the Two Sessions, with fewer than four companies receiving licenses in the first batch. It is understood that RD Technologies, founded by former Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) Chief Executive Norman Chan, was among the first to participate in the HKMA's stablecoin issuer "sandbox" test and was not among the first to receive a license. The HKMA previously revealed that it received 36 applications for stablecoin licenses in the first round, but emphasized that the number of licenses in the first batch will definitely be limited, with a focus on prudence and stability.

Sources: The International Energy Agency has recommended releasing a total of 400 million barrels of oil from its reserves.

Two sources say the International Energy Agency has recommended releasing a total of 400 million barrels of oil reserves.

Project Updates

Binance Wallet will exclusively list Unitas Labs (UP) in TGE Phase 44.

According to the official announcement, Binance Wallet will exclusively list Unitas Labs (UP) in its 44th TGE offering:

Subscription period: March 13, 2026, from 4 PM to 6 PM (UTC+8);
Eligibility: Eligible users must participate using Binance Alpha Points;
The additional 10,000,000 UP will be used for future events; details will be announced later.

Binance Alpha will list Nebula3 (SN3) today at 16:00, with an airdrop threshold of 241 points.

According to the official announcement, Binance Alpha will launch Nebula3 (SN3) trading on March 11, 2026 at 16:00 (UTC+8). Users with at least 241 Binance Alpha Points can receive an airdrop of 1,000 SN3 tokens on a first-come, first-served basis. If the reward pool is not fully distributed, the points threshold will automatically decrease by 5 every 5 minutes.

Upbit will list its ICP token on the Korean Won, BTC, and USDT markets.

According to an official announcement, South Korean cryptocurrency exchange Upbit will list the ICP token on the Korean Won, BTC, and USDT markets.

Baidu AI Cloud launches DuClaw, a service requiring zero deployment.

According to CLS News Agency, Baidu AI Cloud has launched DuClaw, a zero-deployment service that further simplifies the previous "one-click deployment" model to "zero deployment." Users no longer need to select OpenClaw images to deploy on cloud servers or configure API keys for large model inference services, achieving zero-threshold "shrimp farming." Currently, users can use the service directly through a web interface. Support for mainstream communication applications such as WeChat Work, DingTalk, and Lark will be added later. DuClaw requires no interaction with the cloud console or understanding of technical concepts like images, servers, and API keys; users can directly use the complete OpenClaw service after subscription. DuClaw deeply integrates Baidu's advantageous skills, including search, encyclopedia, and academic search, and fully supports mainstream large models such as DeepSeek, Kimi-K2.5, GLM-5, and MiniMax-M2.5, allowing users to flexibly select and easily complete complex tasks.

Attorney Chen Zhi, the ringleader of a "pig butchering scam," filed a motion in a U.S. court to dismiss the government's seizure of his Bitcoin.

According to Bloomberg, this week, lawyers for Chen Zhi, accused of being the head of a large-scale "pig butchering" scam ring, filed a motion in New York federal court to dismiss the U.S. government's seizure of a batch of Bitcoin related to him. The lawyers argued that the prosecution's allegations that Chen Zhi oversaw the scam park lacked specific evidence and were merely general descriptions of the situation in Cambodia. They also questioned the timeline of the cryptocurrency seizure, stating that the Bitcoin could not possibly be proceeds of fraud or money laundering.

In October of last year, the U.S. Department of Justice announced the seizure of 127,271 bitcoins controlled by Chen Zhi, at the time valued at approximately $15 billion. Chen Zhi was stripped of his Cambodian citizenship and extradited to China in January of this year. Following U.S. and UK sanctions, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, and other regions have frozen or seized over $1 billion in assets. Human rights organizations point out that after the closure of the fraud operation, thousands of trafficked workers have fled from Sihanoukville and other areas, facing the risk of being re-trafficking.

GoPlus: Beware of top Google search results/ads for Clade Code, as they may be malicious installers.

According to a security alert issued by GoPlus, attackers are delivering malware via Google search ads that is a pixel-perfect clone of the official #Claude Code installation page. This malware steals user passwords, cookies, session tokens, Crypto wallets, credentials, and system information. GoPlus recommends identifying ad icons in search results and carefully verifying subtle differences between the URL and the official website; verifying installation methods through multiple channels such as official documentation, social media, or GitHub repositories; not executing unfamiliar commands directly, but analyzing command line behavior before running them; and installing security plugins to block phishing links, risky signatures, authorizations, and transactions in real time.

Ma Huateng: Another batch of lobster-related products is on its way.

At 2:06 AM today, Tencent Chairman and CEO Ma Huateng shared an article from a WeChat official account announcing the launch of Tencent's full suite of "lobster" products on his WeChat Moments, adding the caption, "Self-developed lobster, local lobster, cloud lobster, enterprise lobster, cloud desktop lobster, secure isolation lobster room, cloud security, knowledge base... and a batch of other products are coming soon."

YZi Labs: Abnormal activity detected with the old X account @binancelabs. Please do not interact with it.

Huawei launches "HarmonyOS version of lobster" Xiaoyi Claw

According to the Science and Technology Innovation Board Daily, Huawei has launched Xiaoyi Claw, based on the HarmonyOS system, currently in beta. The introduction states that Xiaoyi Claw can help users handle tasks such as document editing, creating PPT presentations, and automatically replying to emails, supporting multi-device collaboration and offering several preset personalities. Previously, Huawei's Xiaoyi Open Platform showed that it had added an OpenClaw mode.

Investment and financing news

Nexthop AI raises $500 million in Series B funding, valuing the company at $4.2 billion.

AI infrastructure company Nexthop AI announced the completion of a $500 million oversubscribed Series B funding round, raising its valuation to approximately $4.2 billion. Investors in this round included a16z, Lightspeed, Altimeter Capital, Battery Ventures, Emergent Ventures, Kleiner Perkins, US Innovative Technology Fund (USIT), and WestBridge Capital. The company stated that the funds will be used to accelerate the construction of efficient AI network infrastructure and launch three foundational network platforms. The team currently has over 300 employees.

Opinions & Analysis

Vitalik: Balancing security, decentralization, and privacy in AI agent design still faces challenges.

Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin stated in an article on the X platform that addressing adversarial attacks that AI agents may face while ensuring security, decentralization, and privacy remains challenging. For example, your AI agent might access another party's ENS data, which contains jailbreaking commands, causing the agent to transfer all your cryptocurrency to the other party.

Vitalik believes that requiring manual confirmation for every large transaction is far better than having no confirmation at all, but it's still not perfect. He also suggests that users should be informed of the specific details of the transaction, which is a complex user experience issue.

Analysis: The x402 protocol's average daily transaction volume is only $28,000, indicating that the demand for proxy payments has not yet kept pace with the narrative boom.

Analysis: Seven central banks will announce their interest rate decisions next week, which may trigger volatility in the Bitcoin market.

Vitalik: Gitcoin Grants' deep funding mechanism needs to adapt to the needs of "chaotic times".

Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin posted on the X platform that Gitcoin Grants' "deep funding" continues, and a major funding round was recently completed. Vitalik advised developer Devansh Mehta to continue refining the model (including its prediction market version), but to ensure that design details and funding sources are adapted to the needs of "chaotic times."

He points out that the deep funding model currently possesses two advantages: it reflects the principle of meritocracy, avoiding excessive egalitarianism; and it can benefit from artificial intelligence while maintaining human dominance. However, in terms of adapting to the needs of a "chaotic era," the mechanism still bears a distinct "stable era" character—that is, attempting to build a large-scale instrument embodying principles of justice and gain unanimous societal consensus in funding it. Vitalik believes it is necessary to consider how to make this mechanism function in a world that no longer operates in this way.

Arthur Hayes: I will not increase my Bitcoin holdings until the Federal Reserve resumes printing money.

BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes stated that given the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, he will not invest in Bitcoin, choosing instead to wait and see until the Federal Reserve begins easing monetary policy and printing money to support its war machine. Hayes pointed out that while some believe "war is good for Bitcoin," a more accurate statement is "money printing is good for Bitcoin." He expressed uncertainty about whether Bitcoin has bottomed out, warning that continued geopolitical tensions could lead to a massive sell-off in both the stock market and Bitcoin, potentially pushing prices below $60,000 and triggering a chain reaction of liquidations. Although Hayes previously predicted Bitcoin would reach $250,000 by 2026, he emphasized that he would not invest even a single dollar at this point.

Important data

GMGN is suspected of settling nearly two months' worth of transaction fee revenue, involving $18.24 million.

According to on-chain analyst @ai_9684xtpa, GMGN appears to be settling its transaction fee revenue from the past two months. In the past four hours, address 0x38d…23866 deposited 20,900 BNB, 2,356 ETH, and 100,000 USDC into Pionex, totaling $18.24 million. The source of these funds is the GMGN Fees address.

Forbes: Trump's net worth increased by $1.4 billion in one year, mainly due to his cryptocurrency transactions.

According to Forbes' latest list of the world's billionaires, Trump's net worth is now $6.5 billion, an increase of $1.4 billion from a year ago. He ranks 645th out of 3,428 billionaires globally, up from 700th in 2025. Trump's increased net worth is largely attributed to his cryptocurrency trading. In the past year, he netted approximately $550 million by selling cryptocurrency tokens issued by World Liberty Financial, a crypto company he and his family founded in September 2024.

Zhao Changpeng responded to Forbes' report that his wealth surpassed Bill Gates': Inaccurate, and unimportant.

A major whale increased its short position in crude oil to $24.6 million, becoming the largest short seller of crude oil on the blockchain.

Whale 0x17c3 continues to increase its short position in crude oil, currently holding 292,980 xyz:CL (US$24.6 million) short positions, becoming the largest short seller of crude oil on the chain, with a liquidation price of US$110.01.

The largest single liquidation across the entire network in the past 24 hours occurred in Brent crude oil, with a BrentOIL long position suffering liquidation of over $6 million.

According to HyperInsight monitoring, the largest single liquidation across the entire network in the past 24 hours occurred on the Hyperliquid platform, involving Brent crude oil. An address holding a long position experienced multiple large liquidations during the oil price decline, totaling over $6 million.

The first liquidation occurred after the price of Brentoil fell below $89, with a single transaction size of $3.32 million. Subsequently, as the price further declined to below $87, the address triggered another liquidation, this time for $3.13 million. This series of liquidations made it the largest single liquidation event on the entire network in nearly 24 hours.

Circle has issued over 8 billion USDC since early February.

According to Arkham's monitoring, Circle has issued over 8 billion USDC since the beginning of February and added them to the circulating supply.

Bitcoin spot ETFs saw a total net inflow of $251 million yesterday, with none of the twelve ETFs experiencing net outflows.

The Bitcoin spot ETF with the largest single-day net inflow yesterday was BlackRock ETF IBIT, with a net inflow of $186 million; followed by Fidelity ETF FBTC, with a net inflow of $33.5356 million.

Ethereum spot ETFs saw a total net inflow of $12.5859 million yesterday, with none of the nine ETFs experiencing net outflows.

Fidelity cuts fees on its Canadian Bitcoin ETF to 32 bps to compete with BlackRock

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