Crypto Vesting

The European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation — better known as MiCA — is now in its critical implementation phase. Designed to unify crypto regulation across all 27 EU member states, MiCA promises clarity, consumer protection and long-term market stability. But as implementation begins, cracks are already showing.

In this week’s episode of Byte-Sized Insight, we explore the key provisions of MiCA now in force, particularly around stablecoins, and why some of the largest players in the market are refusing to comply.

As of January 2025, crypto asset service providers (CASPs) began acquiring licenses to operate legally within the EU. A transitional or “grandfathering” period allows existing firms up to 18 months, depending on the member state, to comply. Still, with deadlines approaching, firms are being forced to act quickly.

Stablecoins at bay

One of MiCA’s earliest and most controversial provisions involves stablecoins. Under the law, no stablecoin can be offered to EU users

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As cryptocurrency gains in popularity and price, some criminals are taking to violent measures to steal funds from high-profile crypto holders.

Jameson Lopp’s GitHub repository, which logs such incidents, has recorded 22 “$5 wrench” attacks on crypto holders in 2025 alone. The moniker comes from the crude and violent methods perpetrators use to compel crypto holders to hand over their bags. 

In many cases, local law enforcement can intervene before anyone is harmed and funds are lost. But there is a growing trend of increasingly violent and successful attacks, some of which have resulted in permanent harm and even death.

The most recent incident in Paris, France compelled the French Ministry of the Interior to hold a meeting to address the rising trend. Here are just seven of the most high-profile attacks this year.

Ledger founder and wife kidnapped, freed

The founder of crypto wallet Ledger, David Balland, and his wife, Amandine Balland, were <a

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Ripple’s legal chief said a US court’s rejection of a proposed XRP settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) does not pose a threat to Ripple’s win.

Judge Analisa Torres of the US District Court for the Southern District of New York rejected a joint Ripple-SEC motion seeking an indicative ruling on their proposed settlement, according to a filing on May 15.

Ripple’s chief legal officer, Stuart Alderoty, said the rejection does not reverse the company’s victory in the case. The company announced the end of the lawsuit on March 19.

Source: Stuart Alderoty

Alderoty stressed that the latest court decision does not change the fact that XRP (XRP) is not a security, adding that the rejection is related to “procedural concerns with the dismissal of Ripple’s cross-appeal.”

Why did the

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Shares of luxury watchmaker Top Win surged more than 60% in premarket trading after the company said it would adopt a Bitcoin accumulation strategy and had changed its name to AsiaStrategy.

In a May 16 announcement, AsiaStrategy said it is partnering with Sora Ventures to adopt a Bitcoin (BTC) treasury strategy. Sora previously partnered with Metaplanet in 2024 to create Japan’s first corporate Bitcoin treasury.

The stock market took immediate notice of the announcement. Top Win stock closed the trading day at $7.50 on May 15, but traded at $12.12 in premarket at the time of writing — a jump of over 60%.

Top Win share price. Source: Google Finance

AsiaStrategy’s luxury watchmaking business will continue alongside its Bitcoin accumulation strategy, rather than a full pivot.

Related: Jim Chanos takes opposing bets

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Why did Fantom reinvent itself as Sonic?

Fantom was one of the pioneers of the directed acyclic graph (DAG) design for distributed ledgers. It featured fast finality and transaction fees of a fraction of a cent. However, Fantom relied on the Ethereum-derived account storage model and the EVM, which led to bloated storage and slow execution times.

To address these bottlenecks and implement numerous other updates, the team behind Fantom rolled out Sonic, a fully independent new blockchain network. A new report by HTX  explores Sonic’s technological background, its new tokenomics model and the innovations it brings to DeFi.  

Download a full version of the report for free here

Sonic’s technical architecture

Sonic runs on the proprietary SonicVM execution engine, which dynamically translates EVM bytecode into a faster internal format for speedier execution. It also

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Ethereum Merge architect Justin Drake told Cointelegraph that it would be cheaper to launch a 51% attack on Bitcoin than on Ethereum.

Drake said it would be “much cheaper to 51% attack Bitcoin” and that it would cost “on the order of $10 billion.”

Drake led work on Ethereum’s proof-of-stake (PoS) implementation and was a principal architect in the Merge (the full PoS transition event). His remarks echo a May 14 X post by Grant Hummer, the co-founder of Ethereum-focused marketing and product company Etherealize.

In the post, Hummer said that Bitcoin “is completely screwed because of its security budget.”

Hummer claimed it would cost $8 billion to run a successful 51% attack, and said a successful attack is “virtually certain” when the cost slips to $2 billion. A 51% attack occurs when a single entity or

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A fake Eric Trump-themed memecoin launched on Solana’s memecoin launchpad Pump.fun, rose more than 6,200% in the past 24 hours, raising red flags among blockchain analysts who warned of a potential rug pull.

A newly-created Eric Trump (ERICTRUMP) memecoin with the token address “jv7d” surpassed $140 million in market capitalization within a day since its launch on May 16, CoinMarketCap data shows.

ERICTRUMP/USD, all-time chart. Source: CoinMarketCap 

The memecoin’s distribution raises significant red flags that point to a rug pull “in the making,” warned blockchain data platform Bubblemaps in a May 16 X post.

Source: Bubblemaps

A rug pull typically refers to the sudden removal of liquidity or mass sell-off by token insiders, often resulting in a steep price collapse that leaves retail holders with worthless tokens.

Looking at Bubblemaps’ token clusters for the 250

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Mainland China, one of the world’s most restrictive countries toward cryptocurrency, may be inching closer to adoption as a locally operating brand announced a Bitcoin reserve strategy.

DDC Enterprise, also known as DayDayCook, a US consumer brand with Hong Kong roots and operations in mainland China, is adopting a Bitcoin (BTC) reserve strategy, CEO Norma Chu announced in a shareholder letter on May 15.

As part of the strategy, DDC has acquired 100 BTC for about $10.4 million and plans to accumulate 5,000 BTC in the next 36 months, with 500 BTC targeted by the end of 2025.

Chu’s Bitcoin reserve announcement came after the firm posted a 33% revenue increase in 2024, with total revenue amounting to 273.3 million Chinese yuan ($37.4 million), according to its Form 20-F filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)

Read More at https://cointelegraph.com/news/china-linked-ddc-bitcoin-reserve-strategy?utm_source=rss_feed&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss_partner_inbound

Update May 16, 11:24 am UTC: This article has been updated to add comments from Ran Goldi, senior vice president of payments and network at Fireblocks.

A report from enterprise-grade digital assets platform Fireblocks shows that 90% of institutional players are using or exploring the use of stablecoins in their operations.

The report, published May 15, surveyed 295 executives across traditional banks, financial institutions, fintech companies and payment gateways. Almost half of the respondents (49%) said they already use stablecoins in payments, while 23% are conducting pilot tests and another 18% are in the planning stage.

Only 10% of institutions surveyed said they were undecided about stablecoin adoption.

“The stablecoin race has become a matter of avoiding obsolescence as customer demand accelerates and use cases mature,” Fireblocks wrote.

Current stablecoin adoption among institutional respondents. Source: FireblocksTraditional banks prioritize cross-border payments for stablecoin use

As traditional cross-border systems are hampered by

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