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a16z crypto released an analysis report titled "The New Stack of Global Finance: The Stablecoin Edition." The report points out that stablecoins have evolved from niche trading tools into fundamental financial pipelines, giving rise to a new type of "banking as a service" model that is driving the reconstruction of the financial system. The report believes that the transition to on-chain finance has "crossed the point of no return."The report categorizes blockchains into three types: general-purpose chains (such as Solana, Ethereum, and L2), payment-specific chains (such as Stripe's Tempo), and institutional networks (such as Canton). It also notes that the bottlenecks in the banking industry are easing, with a number of crypto-friendly banks actively connecting on-chain infrastructure with traditional fiat systems. The competition for stablecoin issuance has shifted to regulatory positioning, with issuers vying to obtain OCC national trust charters.The report states that payments are the "first act," while credit may be the more important "second act." The large-scale issuance of stablecoins will give rise to a new on-chain credit market, allowing capital to form outside the traditional banking system. The report also emphasizes that stablecoins not only enhance the dominance of the dollar but also provide emerging market users with access channels to the dollar.

According to SoSoValue data, as of 8 AM Eastern Time on April 27, 2026, the total net purchase of Bitcoin by global listed companies (excluding mining companies) for the week was $260 million, a decrease of 89.8% compared to last week.Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) announced an investment of $255 million (a decrease of 90% compared to last week) to purchase 3,273 Bitcoins at a price of $77,906, bringing the total holdings to 818,334 Bitcoins.The Japanese listed company Metaplanet did not purchase any Bitcoin last week.In addition, three other companies purchased Bitcoin last week. The Japanese fashion brand ANAP invested $770,000 on April 21 to increase its holdings by 9.1785 Bitcoins at a price of $84,239.7, bringing the total holdings to 1,431.9716 Bitcoins; the UK Bitcoin company The Smarter Web Company announced an investment of $3.39 million on April 24 to purchase 44 Bitcoins at a price of $77,071, bringing the total holdings to 2,750 Bitcoins; the French Bitcoin company announced an investment of $460,000 on April 27 to purchase 6 Bitcoins at a price of $77,151, bringing the total holdings to 2,943 Bitcoins.Metaplanet has issued zero-interest bonds worth 8 billion yen (approximately $50 million) for the purpose of purchasing Bitcoin.As of the time of writing, the total amount of Bitcoin held by the global listed companies (excluding mining companies) in the statistics is 1,084,909 Bitcoins, an increase of 0.3% compared to last week, with a current market value of approximately $8.434 billion, accounting for 5.4% of the circulating market value of Bitcoin.

Global leading digital asset trading platform Gate released its Q1 2026 report, showing continued steady growth in overall business. According to authoritative institutions such as CoinDesk and CryptoRank, Gate's spot trading volume remains among the top three globally, and its derivatives market share continues to expand, further solidifying its position as a leading trading platform worldwide.In terms of security and compliance, according to the latest reserve report released by the platform, the overall reserve ratio reached 122%, with the BTC reserve ratio as high as 147%, covering nearly 500 types of user assets. Gate's Malta-based company, Gate Technology Ltd, has obtained a Payment Institution (PI) license granted by the Malta Financial Services Authority (MFSA) under the EU's Second Payment Services Directive (PSD2), further consolidating its strategic layout across Europe.As of now, multiple entities under Gate have obtained or completed relevant regulatory registrations, license applications, authorizations, or approvals in jurisdictions such as Malta, Cyprus, the Bahamas, Japan, Australia, and Dubai. While trading business continues to grow, Gate is enhancing its global competitiveness through transparent reserves and compliance qualifications, moving towards a comprehensive digital financial infrastructure.

According to Jinshi reports, Allianz Chief Economic Advisor Mohamed A. El-Erian stated that the price shocks caused by the Middle East war have pushed market expectations toward an environment of "interest rates remaining at higher levels for a longer period," affecting almost all systemically important central banks, with the sole exception being the Bank of Japan. He pointed out that the current situation, accompanied by negative demand shocks from "second-round effects," poses a potential risk of spreading to financial instability, highlighting the uncertainty of the outlook.

According to a report by Bitcoin Suisse, Hyperliquid recorded an annual revenue of $820 million in the past year, ranking fourth in global perpetual contract trading volume, becoming one of the few decentralized platforms that can compete with centralized exchanges. In the field of decentralized perpetual contracts, Hyperliquid held a 41% share of open interest and over 30% of total trading volume in 2025.Additionally, the platform launched over 120 new markets linked to RWA in less than six months, covering off-chain instruments such as tokenized stocks and commodities, averaging about five new markets launched each week. Bitcoin Suisse pointed out that Hyperliquid's order book design and native blockchain architecture are its key differentiating advantages, and the introduction of HyperEVM along with a capital-efficient trading mechanism will support its further expansion, setting a new benchmark for decentralized trading platforms.

After launching on KuCoin and LBank, Staynex is further advancing its exchange layout, and its native token $STAY will be listed on MEXC today at 19:00 (UTC+8). This is not just a listing; it opens up a broader market coverage.$STAY is an AI travel token, fundamentally based on real travel application scenarios. Staynex integrates AI + Web3-driven travel planning, hotel discovery, membership benefits, and token rewards into a single ecosystem. The underlying structure is driven by Web3, while the user experience prioritizes AI.In terms of the token model, the total supply of $STAY is fixed at 100 billion tokens, with an initial circulation of only 3% at TGE. The project adopts a distribution mechanism with no VC, no private placement, and zero team unlocks, giving the token stronger market attributes from the moment it is launched. At the application level, Staynex builds an AI + Web3 ecosystem centered around real travel consumption. Holding $STAY unlocks tiered membership benefits, including travel discounts, staking rewards, and lifestyle benefits such as airport lounges. Additionally, the platform will use 20% of its revenue for token buybacks, linking platform growth with token value.The listing on MEXC continues Staynex's active acceleration of global expansion, including the acquisition of the European Web3 travel platform Sleap and the introduction of over 40 ecological partners. As the product continues to iterate and more exchange listing plans are advanced, $STAY is gradually building an application path that connects digital assets with real consumption scenarios.

KuCoin announced the launch of KuCard in Australia, allowing users to use cryptocurrency assets for daily consumption at merchants worldwide that accept Mastercard, with payment options through Apple Pay and Google Pay. The service initially supports 37 USDC trading pairs, covering mainstream digital assets such as BTC, ETH, and USDT, with real-time conversion to fiat currency during the settlement process. KuCoin stated that this move is an important step in enhancing compliance and transparency in the cryptocurrency payment experience, and it is the latest progress in promoting the real-world application of cryptocurrency assets after completing its registration with AUSTRAC as a digital currency exchange (DCE).

According to official news, the Gate WCTC S8 Global Trading Competition officially started on April 23 at 16:00:00 (UTC+8) and will last until May 20 at 15:59:59 (UTC+8). The pre-heating phase had already attracted over 5,500 teams, and with the official launch of the competition, global traders have fully entered the practical phase to compete for annual trading honors.It is reported that the total prize pool for this event reaches 8,000,000 USDT, covering various trading categories including spot, ETF, flash exchange, contracts, and TradFi, and has set up three core competition tracks: team competition, individual competition, and 1v1 king PK. Among them, the first half of the team competition has already started, focusing on a dual-dimensional competition based on trading volume and profit, unlocking a prize pool of 1,800,000 USDT; the individual competition and PK competition are also ongoing, sharing rewards of 2,000,000 USDT and 1,600,000 USDT respectively, with an overall upgrade in the competition system that balances competitiveness and participation.In addition, during the competition period, blind box treasure chests, live draw events, and multiple bonus activities will be launched simultaneously, continuously releasing incentive benefits. As the competition enters the official competitive phase, the trading feast aiming for a prize pool of tens of millions has fully kicked off.It is reported that Gate Live will start the official live broadcast on April 22 at 20:00 (UTC+8), hosted by the official host Jesse, along with guest Eden and several KOLs, focusing on the team mechanism, gameplay rules, and competition strategies of this WCTC, while discussing the current market situation. This live broadcast will also include an interactive lottery segment, with prizes including an iPhone 17 Pro and $1000 contract position experience vouchers. Users can participate in the interaction in the live broadcast room and have the opportunity to join a team or participate in the competition through the host's channel.

According to CoinGlass data, the price of gold tokens is fluctuating upwards, with gold contracts XAUT_USDT and PAXG_USDT both breaking above $4700. Currently, XAUT is quoted at $4,682.15, and PAXG is quoted at $4,687.79. Although there has been a short-term pullback, the overall price remains in a high range, and market attention continues to increase.In addition, in terms of the spot market for gold (PAXG), Gate ranks among the top with a 24-hour trading volume of approximately $1.8846 million, with an increase of up to 99.87%, ranking first.Currently, Gate has fully deepened its TradFi layout, with the spot sector supporting trading in stocks and metals, and the contract sector covering diversified assets such as gold, silver, foreign exchange, and commodities. With a flexible USDT settlement mechanism and leverage of up to 100 times, Gate continues to assist global investors in achieving cross-market, round-the-clock asset allocation and risk management.

According to Jinshi reports, based on the latest data from the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT), as conflicts continue in the Middle East, the share of the US dollar in international transactions rose to a record 51.1% in March, up from 49.2% the previous month, marking the highest share since 2023. The trading share of the euro is about 21%, followed by the British pound and the Japanese yen.

ChainCatcher reported live that Li Baiwei, Partner at HashKey Tokenisation, John Cahill, Chief Operating Officer of Galaxy Digital Asia, Abdelhamid Bizid, Managing Director of BlackRock, and Min Lin, Managing Director and Head of Global Business Development at Ondo Finance, attended the HK Web3 Feastival roundtable to share insights on "From Wall Street to Blockchain: The Practical Logic and Future Landscape of Global RWA Issuance."The attendees generally agreed that the core value of RWA and asset tokenization is no longer just an innovative narrative at the conceptual level, but a realistic path for upgrading financial market infrastructure. John Cahill stated that blockchain is essentially a superior "underlying pipeline" for financial markets, and in the long run, the ultimate goal of financial markets will be "tokenization of everything"; what truly needs attention is not whether tokenization will happen, but whether market participants have already begun preparing for this endgame.Abdelhamid Bizid pointed out that from the perspective of traditional asset management institutions, the current tokenized products primarily serve clients who do not wish to move funds out of the on-chain ecosystem but want to achieve stable returns and compliant asset allocation tools. BlackRock has seen a clear demand for on-chain yield products and will continue to launch more new products. However, he also emphasized that the real bottleneck in the industry at this stage is not technology, but rather institutional adoption, demand validation, liquidity depth, regulatory clarity, and non-technical barriers such as costs and taxation.Min Lin, drawing from Ondo's practice, stated that the key to tokenized stocks is not just moving U.S. stocks onto the blockchain, but transforming stocks that are originally static in brokerage accounts into programmable financial instruments that can serve as collateral, margin, and lending assets in DeFi, further unlocking capital efficiency. He mentioned that the main demand currently observed by Ondo still comes from retail and crypto-native funds in regions like Asia, Southeast Asia, and Latin America, which find it difficult to directly access the U.S. stock market. This indicates that tokenized stocks at this stage are more like "global asset access tools" rather than mainstream trading venues for institutional funds.

ChainCatcher live report, HashKey RWA CEO Anna Liu delivered a keynote speech at the 2026 Hong Kong Web3 Carnival. She introduced that Hashkey Chain has deployed 11 tokenized products, with the total value of on-chain RWA assets reaching 2 billion Hong Kong dollars. The exchange has launched seven tokenized products, including Hong Kong's first tokenized gold ETF.She addressed the four major challenges of RWA: first, the authenticity of underlying assets; blockchain cannot guarantee the authenticity of data before it is on-chain, and the oracle problem is a core issue; second, the lack of a commercial closed loop; many projects go on-chain just for the sake of going on-chain, and new value must be created that traditional methods cannot achieve; third, the liquidity dilemma; even compliant STO exchanges in the U.S. often have daily trading volumes of only a few tens of thousands of dollars, requiring high-quality assets, licensed distribution channels, and secondary market infrastructure to be in place simultaneously; fourth, the complexity of cross-border compliance, suggesting that resource planning should be included from day one.She proposed that asset tokenization should first ask three questions: Can it be done? Is it suitable? Why tokenize? She cited data indicating that in the first quarter of this year, the global tokenized RWA market size has approached 30 billion dollars, growing over 260% in the past year, with the IMF characterizing it this month as "a fundamental restructuring of the financial architecture."

According to data from DefiLlama, Gate's 24-hour net capital inflow exceeded $175 million, ranking among the top three centralized exchanges globally.

ChainCatcher reported live that Adeniyi Abiodun, co-founder and Chief Product Officer of Mysten Labs, delivered a keynote speech at the 2026 Hong Kong Web3 Carnival. He stated that the core team members come from Facebook and were responsible for launching the global payment network Libra, aiming to make fund transfers as simple as sending messages. He announced that Sui will be the first high-speed public blockchain to achieve zero transaction fees for transfers across the network, regardless of the transfer amount ranging from $0.0005 to $1 billion, covering all stablecoins such as USDC, USDT, and Sui Dollar.In terms of privacy, Sui will provide bank-grade on-chain privacy, utilizing advanced cryptography to ensure that transaction history and balances are not visible to third parties, while fully compliant with regulatory requirements. Regarding yields, he introduced the Sui Dollar launched in collaboration with Stripe, which generates approximately 3.5% returns that will be directly reinvested into the network ecosystem and users, rather than flowing to intermediaries.He also announced the launch of the Bitcoin DeFi protocol Hashi aimed at institutions, allowing sovereign wealth funds, hedge funds, and ETF holders to deploy Bitcoin into DeFi for yields without triggering taxable events, supported by legal opinions from top U.S. law firm Fenwick & West. Additionally, Sui's on-chain deep order book DeepBook supports large transactions with extremely low slippage for instant on-chain exchanges between assets such as BTC, gold, USD, and EUR.In the AI agent economy, he pointed out that Stripe estimates a need for processing capacity of 1 billion transactions per second in the future, while Sui employs a horizontally scalable architecture similar to that of Google Search and Facebook infrastructure, capable of scaling on demand to millions or even tens of millions of TPS. The full-stack atomic composability provided by Sui is its core differentiated advantage, allowing agents to execute multiple cross-application transactions simultaneously and settle them in one go, which cannot be achieved on AWS, Google, or any existing Web3 platform. He also announced a partnership with RedotPay, enabling users to spend Sui Dollars at over 130 million merchants worldwide and positioning Sui as an alternative to SWIFT.

According to SoSoValue data, as of 8 AM Eastern Time on April 20, 2026, the total net purchase of Bitcoin by publicly listed companies worldwide (excluding mining companies) for the week was $2.542 billion, an increase of 154.2% compared to last week.Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) announced an investment of $2.54 billion (an increase of 154% compared to last week) to purchase 34,164 Bitcoins at a price of $74,395, bringing the total holdings to 815,061 Bitcoins.The Japanese listed company Metaplanet did not purchase Bitcoin last week.In addition, four other companies purchased Bitcoin last week. The American asset management company Strive announced on April 15 that it bought 27 Bitcoins, bringing its total holdings to 13,768 Bitcoins, without disclosing the specific purchase amount; the Japanese fashion brand ANAP invested $410,000 on April 16 to increase its holdings by 5.07 Bitcoins at a price of $81,607.50, bringing its total holdings to 1,422.1041 Bitcoins; the British Bitcoin company The Smarter Web Company announced on April 14 that it invested $800,000 to purchase 11 Bitcoins at a price of $72,702, bringing its total holdings to 2,706 Bitcoins; the French Bitcoin company announced on April 20 that it invested $920,000 to purchase 12 Bitcoins at a price of $72,102.50, bringing its total holdings to 2,937 Bitcoins.As of the time of writing, the total amount of Bitcoin held by the publicly listed companies included in the statistics (excluding mining companies) is 1,081,576 Bitcoins, an increase of 3.28% compared to last week, with a current market value of approximately $8.165 billion, accounting for 5.4% of the circulating market value of Bitcoin.

Pablo Hernandez de Cos, General Manager of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), stated that global coordination on stablecoin regulation is crucial to prevent severe market fragmentation; otherwise, regulatory differences across jurisdictions could lead to regulatory arbitrage.He pointed out that stablecoins are typically pegged to the US dollar at a 1:1 ratio, which could undermine monetary and fiscal policy, trigger pressures in financial markets, and hinder efforts to combat illegal financing. Currently, the two major stablecoins issued by Tether and Circle account for about 85% of the global circulation of stablecoins, which is approximately $315 billion. He also mentioned that these two types of stablecoins are closer to securities rather than currencies in terms of redemption friction and operate more like ETFs.