Author: NBTC

$BNB Chain has introduced a new privacy feature for its ecosystem. On February 23, the network confirmed that zERC20 has officially launched zBN. It is a privacy-preserving version of $BNB. The tool allows users to hide sender details, receiver information, balances and transaction history while still using $BNB normally. zBNB by @zERC20io is now live, enabling privacy-preserving transfers for the $BNB Chain ecosystem!With zBNB, users can keep transaction histories and account balances private when sending, holding and using assets on $BNB Chain.Note: This post is for informational purposes only… https://t.co/q3Is0BL2Oo — $BNB Chain (@BNBCHAIN) February 23, 2026 The update was…

BGD Labs, a core technical contributor to the decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol Aave, has announced it will end its collaboration with the Aave DAO after approximately four years of development and infrastructure work. The company will cease its active role in the project when the current service agreement expires on April 1. In a statement released at the forum today, BGD Labs stated that it had informed the community in advance to ensure a smooth transition process. The firm will continue its existing responsibilities throughout the contract period, including Aave v3, Umbrella, chain expansions, new asset integration, and security work.…

Ethereum continues to trade sideways as uncertainty weighs on the broader crypto market. The altcoin king has struggled to regain decisive bullish momentum. While the current structure suggests potential bottom formation, large holders appear to be making aggressive moves. Ethereum Whales Selling Has Not Stopped Ethereum whales have demonstrated erratic behavior in recent sessions. Sharp accumulation phases have been followed by equally aggressive distribution. This volatility signals uncertainty among high-capital participants. Over the past two weeks, addresses holding between 100,000 and 1 million $ETH have sold approximately 1.43 million $ETH. At current valuations, that equals roughly $2.7 billion. Such large-scale…

With $763.5 million in cryptocurrency funding spread across six projects, the first full week of 2026 got off to a great start thanks to Rain’s $250 million Series C round. Summary Rain led the week with a $250M Series C, valuing the stablecoin firm at $1.95B. BlackOpal and Tres Finance together added $330M via funding and M&A activity. Bitcoin infrastructure projects like Babylon and ZenChain also secured new capital. According to Cryptofundraising data, the following summarizes this week’s cryptocurrency funding activity: Rain Raised $250 million in a Series C round Fully diluted valuation of $1.95 billion Rain is a blockchain-based…

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse said he now sees a 90% chance that the long-debated Clarity Act will pass by the end of April, signaling growing confidence inside the crypto industry that U.S. lawmakers may finally deliver long-sought regulatory certainty. Speaking on Fox Business, Garlinghouse said momentum has accelerated following renewed engagement from lawmakers and the White House. He described recent meetings in Washington that included leaders from both crypto and traditional banking, suggesting political appetite to move legislation forward has strengthened after months of delays. The Clarity Act is designed to define which digital assets fall under securities laws and…

Binance, one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, has released its 39th Proof of Reserves (PoR) report, based on a snapshot from February 1st. The report highlighted the monthly changes in user assets. According to the data, users’ total Bitcoin ($BTC) holdings on the platform have reached approximately 639,000 $BTC. This figure represents a 0.41% increase compared to the previous snapshot on January 1st. A net increase of approximately 2,614 $BTC was recorded in $BTC balances. Ethereum ($ETH) also saw a decline. Users’ total $ETH holdings were reported at approximately 4.18 million $ETH, a 3.74% decrease compared to the previous…

Bitcoin’s mining difficulty decreased by 11.16% to approximately 125.86 trillion at the most recent retarget boundary around block 935,424. That marks the largest negative adjustment since the 2021 China mining ban, the sixth consecutive downward retarget, and the tenth largest negative adjustment in Bitcoin’s history. However, difficulty adjustments are lagging indicators, as they reflect what occurred over the previous 2,016 blocks rather than what’s happening now. The real question is whether the machines that went dark are coming back, or whether this retarget marks the start of a deeper miner shakeout. The most useful forward signal is the next adjustment.…

The combination of blockchain and artificial intelligence is widely regarded as the next major evolution in digital commerce. However, the inability of automated agents to conduct transactions autonomously has so far made large-scale adoption difficult to achieve. To address this problem, Xyber has formed a significant alliance with Base, the Ethereum Layer-2 Network launched by Coinbase for Base to be the key location of AI agents. The partnership aims to provide the infrastructure (money) to support AI agents through the use of Xyber’s specialized marketplace. Building the Financial Infrastructure for Autonomous Agents As artificial intelligence agents are changing from straightforward…

FXRP supply tops 100M, ~70% deployed in XRPFi DeFi via staking, lending, vaults. Summary Nearly 100M $XRP bridged as FXRP, with ~70% actively deployed in DeFi. Firelight holds about 21% of FXRP staked, while Upshift vaults scaled from ~$6M to ~$25M capacity. Lending via Kinetic and Morpho saw roughly $39M and $8M in early borrowing, deepening onchain liquidity. Flare’s bid to become the execution layer for “XRPFi” just cleared a hard milestone: nearly 100 million $XRP has now been bridged to the network as FXRP, with close to 70% of that capital actively deployed in DeFi rather than sitting idle.…

Ethereum’s new roadmap lands in a market that is less interested in vision and more interested in evidence. That is the core tension behind the Ethereum Foundation’s Protocol Priorities Update for 2026, which breaks the network’s next phase into three tracks, including Scale, Improve UX, and Harden the L1. The roadmap is technical, but the market question is not. Investors want to know whether these priorities can help $ETH recover in this bear market, and whether they can do so by changing risk and economics rather than just developer sentiment. That is why the Foundation’s framing matters. It is not…