Author: NBTC

Limited stablecoin rewards are favored by the White House, and if bankers sign off, they’ll be in the next draft of the crypto market structure bill, according to two people familiar with the negotiation. At a Thursday working session meant to secure common ground on stablecoin rewards between banks and the crypto industry, the White House made it clear that certain rewards programs were going to stay in the next draft of the crypto market structure bill, the people said. Representatives of Wall Street banks that attended the meeting actively worked on that language, and the White House will put…

Binance, one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, has announced its support for the network upgrade and hard fork process on the Shentu ($CTK) network. According to a statement from the exchange, deposit and withdrawal operations for tokens on the Shentu ($CTK) network will be temporarily suspended as of February 25, 2026, at 3:00 PM. This step was taken to protect user experience and manage the technical transition process smoothly. The network upgrade and hard fork are expected to occur at block height 28,124,200, around 4:00 PM on February 25, 2026. Binance stated that it will handle all necessary technical…

In a development reshaping the global financial landscape, investment firm VanEck has disclosed a stunning fact: at least 13 national governments are now actively mining Bitcoin. This revelation, reported by former Bitcoin Magazine editor Pete Rizzo, signals a profound shift in how sovereign states view and interact with the world’s premier cryptocurrency. According to Matthew Sigel, VanEck’s Head of Digital Assets Research, this state-sponsored activity marks a critical evolution from speculative investment to strategic national infrastructure. The implications for monetary policy, energy security, and technological sovereignty are immense, fundamentally altering the Bitcoin network’s geopolitical dynamics. VanEck’s Government Bitcoin Mining Revelation…

Neo SPCC has published NeoFS Node v0.51.1, a follow-up to the v0.51.0 release that shipped earlier this month. The update focuses on new administration and diagnostic tooling, several storage-layer bug fixes, and performance improvements to metabase resynchronization. NeoFS Node v0.51.1 The v0.51.1 release introduces new CLI commands and a storage node observability metric alongside a set of targeted bug fixes and dependency updates. On the tooling side, a new container policy check command allows operators to verify whether a container’s placement policy can be satisfied by the current network map, providing a quick diagnostic for policy misconfiguration. The neofs-adm utility…

For years, crypto markets have operated with a clear gap. DeFi introduced open and transparent trading, while centralized exchanges continued to handle most price discovery. The difference came down to infrastructure. Most blockchains focused on running applications, not high-speed trading. Order books, tight spreads, and real-time hedging demand fast execution and low costs, and that level of performance is now becoming non-negotiable. At these volumes, the pressure on infrastructure becomes obvious. According to DeFiLlama, decentralized perpetual futures markets are now clearing roughly $20–30 billion in daily volume, with monthly volumes regularly approaching the $1 trillion range depending on market conditions.…

BitMine Immersion Technologies, chaired by Wall Street strategist Tom Lee, has added another large chunk of Ethereum to its balance sheet. On February 20, the firm purchased 10,000 $ETH worth about $19.49 million from Kraken. BREAKING:🇺🇸 Tom Lee’s Bitmine has just bought $19,490,000 worth of Ethereum.He is unstoppable !! pic.twitter.com/scedbv0phl — Ash Crypto (@AshCrypto) February 20, 2026 The move comes as Ethereum trades below the $2,000 level. During what many traders see as a soft market phase. Still, BitMine continues to buy aggressively. The latest purchase signals strong long-term conviction from Lee. He has repeatedly argued that Ethereum is entering…

Russians have started inquiring about pension payments using cryptocurrency, the country’s state-run social security fund has admitted. The agency reported this week on the requests for information received throughout the past year, and crypto was among the main topics listed. Russian citizens want to know if they can have a crypto pension People in the Russian Federation are increasingly interested in finding out if getting their pensions paid in cryptocurrency is a viable option. That’s according to Russia’s Pension and Social Insurance Fund (SFR), which took to Telegram on Saturday to share the more unusual inquiries it received in 2025.…

An Australian executive who pleaded guilty to selling sensitive cyber tools to a Russian broker was paid in crypto under contracts promising millions more, placing crypto at the center of a case prosecutors say endangered Five Eyes intelligence capabilities. Prosecutors alleged Peter Williams, an Australian national and U.S. resident, sold eight protected cyber-exploit components, including zero-day capabilities, to a Russia-based broker known to do business with the Russian government. The tools were developed for use by the U.S. intelligence community and shared with Five Eyes partners, a signals intelligence alliance that includes the U.S., the UK, Canada, Australia, and New…

Binance, one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, announced on its official website that it will be removing certain margin trading pairs from its platform. Accordingly, as of February 26th at 09:00, 10 cross margin and 9 isolated margin trading pairs will be delisted. The pairs to be removed from cross margin trading include $POL/$USDC, ALCX/$USDT, SAPIEN/$USDC, $PNUT/$USDC, ARKM/$USDC, BROCCOLI714/$USDC, OPEN/$USDC, $CKB/$USDC, HOLO/$USDC, and $FIL/$BTC. In the isolated margin category, the following trading pairs will be delisted: $POL/$USDC, ALCX/$USDT, SAPIEN/$USDC, $PNUT/$USDC, ARKM/$USDC, OPEN/$USDC, $CKB/$USDC, HOLO/$USDC, and $FIL/$BTC. The delisting decision is believed to have been made as a result of…

Bitcoin miner IREN has made a huge shift in its strategy. Over the past year, the company invested $800 million in artificial intelligence (AI) data center infrastructure. This amount exceeds what IREN spent in three years expanding its Bitcoin mining operations. Analysts and financial reports cited by TheEnergyMag confirm this significant move. LATEST: ⚡ Bitcoin miner IREN deployed $800 million into AI data center infrastructure in one year, exceeding what it spent across three years expanding its $BTC mining operations, according to TheEnergyMag. pic.twitter.com/rHJ42Q0RC6 — CoinMarketCap (@CoinMarketCap) February 13, 2026 Pivot Driven by Declining Mining Margins The decision comes as…