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Polychain Capital founder and CEO Olaf Carlson-Wee announced at the Network State conference that Polychain is leading a new round of financing for Network School, with a valuation of $2 billion. Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), Coinbase, and Balaji himself, among other institutions and individuals, participated in the investment, with the specific financing amount not disclosed.Olaf stated that Polychain's investment strategy does not solely focus on incremental improvements but seeks projects that utilize new business models or technologies to solve problems in different ways. He expressed anticipation for participating in the financing of Network School and mentioned that he has known and collaborated with Balaji for over ten years.

Artificial intelligence company Anthropic is establishing a presidential candidate outreach program, forming an internal team to collaborate with bipartisan presidential candidates on AI issues ahead of the 2028 U.S. election, assisting leadership in developing political strategies and operating political funding projects. The company is hiring a political program manager responsible for establishing and operating related programs for the 2028 election cycle, identifying potential candidates from both parties, providing AI policy education to candidates and their advisors on equal terms, preparing executives for dialogues, and planning party platforms, conventions, and transitions in advance. The position requires over 12 years of experience in campaigns, party committees, or political organizations, along with a record of credible bipartisan collaboration, with a salary ranging from $295,000 to $345,000.Fortune reports that the program is taking shape ahead of the November midterm elections and the company's potential initial public offering, which could be valued at up to $2 trillion. Bruce F. Freed, chairman of the Center for Political Accountability, stated that it is not uncommon for businesses to maintain relationships with presidential campaign teams, but he has not seen such a formal presidential election outreach arrangement. California Democratic Senator Alex Padilla noted that this hiring indicates that cutting-edge model companies are also establishing political operations beyond their products, emphasizing that education and influence are not the same, and urged Anthropic to disclose more details. Katie Harbath, founder and CEO of Anchor Change, believes the unusual aspect is that this role is also responsible for political action committee funding. Anthropic did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

On October 8, the artificial intelligence company Anthropic updated its usage policy, adding prohibitions against election interference, weapon software, and surveillance. TechCrunch reported that the most notable change is the explicit prohibition against users subjecting the model to prolonged verbal abuse.Since the update in August, Claude has been trained to end conversations during ongoing harmful or abusive user interactions, and the new policy explicitly prohibits users from continuing such conversations. The policy states that this update applies only to extreme cases where users repeatedly treat the model cruelly without identifiable purpose, and does not apply to common user dissatisfaction, rebuttals, dark creative themes, or model testing and research.The usage policy also prohibits widespread deceptive activities, such as operating fake accounts or fabricating news organizations with Claude, and in the "Do Not Undermine Democratic Processes" section, it prohibits deceiving voters or disrupting elections. Reports indicate that this change occurred after Anthropic sought collaboration with well-known religious scholars, as the company attempted to persuade them that Claude might be conscious or have a soul in certain cases.

The next phase upgrade of Ethereum, Glamsterdam, was activated on the Sepolia testnet on October 6, completing block finality during the switch without any critical failures. This upgrade consists of the consensus layer Gloas and the execution layer Amsterdam, incorporating a total of 18 EIPs, designed with a gas limit of approximately 200 million, which is about 3.3 times the current mainnet limit of 60 million. The upgrade will not automatically raise the limit but will allow for larger blocks to be produced safely, with validators deciding whether to increase it.Key changes include EIP-7732, which embeds the separation of proposers and builders in the protocol, extending the time for most validators to check transactions from about 4 seconds to about 9 seconds; EIP-7928 requires blocks to include the touched state and updated values, facilitating client data prefetching and parallel validation; EIP-7954 raises the contract code limit from 24 KiB to 64 KiB; EIP-8037 increases the cost of creating new storage slots from 20,000 gas to 97,920 gas, while regular ETH transfers remain at 21,000 gas.The gas limit for the first relevant block on Sepolia was 60 million, reaching 200 million about 11 hours later and maintaining that level. Ethereum Foundation researcher Toni Wahrstätter stated that the speed at which various clients handle gas units has improved compared to before the upgrade, with Geth's execution time for a 40 million gas block reduced from about 115 milliseconds to about 30 milliseconds. The Hoodi testnet is tentatively scheduled for deployment on October 27, with the mainnet target set for the fourth quarter of 2026;

Polkadot officially announced that the stablecoin dotUSD has officially launched on the Polkadot network. This stablecoin does not have a single issuing company or controlling entity, but is managed by the DOT DAO through the OpenGov on-chain governance mechanism.Polkadot stated that the goal of dotUSD is to become a native stablecoin governed by the network itself, thereby reducing reliance on centralized issuing institutions.

South Korean Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Strategy and Finance Lee Hyeong-ryeol stated that in response to the virtual asset taxation policy planned for implementation in 2027, various opinions proposed by the National Assembly, as well as those from experts, industry professionals, and relevant stakeholders, will be widely collected. South Korean lawmaker Kim Sang-hoon questioned that several months before the implementation of the virtual asset taxation, the relevant infrastructure is still not fully developed, including insufficient tracking and verification capabilities for trading records on overseas exchanges, DEX, DeFi, and other platforms.Regarding the expected tax revenue scale from virtual asset taxation, Lee Hyeong-ryeol stated that there are indeed parts that are "difficult to accurately grasp." Since taxation requires obtaining taxpayer declaration data first, further tax estimation can only be conducted after the relevant declaration system is launched next year, and a careful evaluation of the related policies will be carried out.

South Korean Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Strategy and Finance Lee Hyung-ryul stated that in response to the virtual asset taxation policy planned for implementation in 2027, various opinions proposed by the National Assembly, as well as those from experts, industry professionals, and relevant stakeholders, will be widely collected.South Korean lawmaker Kim Sang-hoon questioned that several months before the implementation of virtual asset taxation, the relevant infrastructure is still not complete, including insufficient tracking and verification capabilities for trading records on overseas exchanges, DEX, DeFi, and other platforms. Regarding the expected tax scale brought by virtual asset taxation, Lee Hyung-ryul stated that there are indeed parts that are "difficult to accurately grasp." Since taxation requires obtaining taxpayer declaration data first, further tax estimation can only be conducted after the relevant declaration system is launched next year, and related policies will be carefully evaluated.

On Thursday during the European trading session, Dow Jones index futures fell by 0.56%, S&P 500 index futures fell by 0.28%, and Nasdaq 100 index futures fell by 0.44%.U.S. Treasury yields rose to multi-year highs, and high oil prices intensified inflation concerns. U.S.-Iran relations are tense, and the Strait of Hormuz is facing threats. The market is focused on speeches from Federal Reserve officials and a new batch of quarterly earnings reports.

Digital Asset co-founder and CEO Yuval Rooz stated at the Token2049 conference in Singapore that the crypto industry should leverage the current regulatory environment to accelerate institutional adoption, believing that the widespread use of blockchain will make it harder for future governments to reverse industry progress. He compared this opportunity to Uber and Airbnb, stating that both companies had established themselves before policymakers effectively restricted them, saying, "By the time people react and decide to legislate against these companies, it will be too late."Rooz indicated that the industry should ensure blockchain is widely used so that no matter what happens in 2028, "there is no turning back." The next U.S. presidential election is scheduled for November 7, 2028, which may bring changes in government and regulatory priorities. This statement comes in the context of the CLARITY Act failing to advance in the Senate procedural vote in September, while the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) have been advancing crypto regulation based on existing authority.In the same Token2049 panel discussion, Binance co-CEO Richard Teng expressed hope that the CLARITY Act could still become law, believing that legislation could prevent regulatory backtracking and encourage institutional entry, calling the possibility of reversing current progress the industry's "greatest fear." Franklin Templeton CEO Jenny Johnson stated that legislation would provide greater certainty, but the industry should not rely on the passage of the CLARITY Act, as the SEC and CFTC are already working to provide regulatory clarity to sustain innovation and institutional adoption.

According to CoinDesk, the Ethereum Glamsterdam upgrade was activated on the Sepolia testnet this Tuesday, increasing the block Gas limit from about 60 million to nearly 200 million, more than tripling the increase.A review of over 25 consecutive test blocks showed that the actual Gas usage was around 52 million to 92 million, accounting for only 26% to 46% of the available limit, with no instances of full capacity. The upgrade also adjusted the Gas consumption method for specific tasks and the costs of storing data, requiring developers to retest applications involving specific Gas cost assumptions. The next public testnet, Hoodi, is tentatively scheduled to launch on October 27, and the activation date for the Ethereum mainnet has yet to be determined.

Edward Lee, who previously worked at Coinbase and Circle, announced that he has joined the prediction market platform Polymarket as the Head of Product, Exchange, responsible for the development of Polymarket US and international on-chain exchange-related products.Edward Lee stated that over the past decade, he has been involved in building the infrastructure of the cryptocurrency industry, and he will now focus on developing products that operate on top of this infrastructure. He believes that every idea should have a price, and every outcome should have a corresponding market, with prediction markets being the starting point in this direction. He also thanked Shayne Coplan and the team for their trust and expressed a welcome to regulated market and DeFi builders, traders, and partners to connect and communicate.

Polymarket's CEO Shayne Coplan stated during a fireside chat at the Token2049 conference in Singapore that cryptocurrency trading is evolving into a game of "irrational exuberance," where traders compete to be the first to find the next hundredfold token. He pointed out that people think they are buying something valuable, but in reality, it is worthless; however, as long as there is a possibility of it rising to 100 times, they want to sell before it goes to zero. Coplan mentioned that some traders can gain considerable wealth through this strategy, but it is essentially a game of "irrational exuberance and hot potato," where rising asset prices will eventually fall back.Coplan indicated that the continuous growth of Polymarket's user base shows that some traders are looking for betting opportunities with more predictable odds, rather than the next skyrocketing cryptocurrency. He explained that trading these markets on Polymarket does not have exponential upside potential, but informed traders will continue to place bets on future events with more predictable odds. According to data from DefiLlama, Polymarket is the second-largest prediction market, with a trading volume of $1.21 billion in the past seven days, while the largest market, Kalshi, had $2.3 billion.The growth of prediction markets has also attracted more attention from U.S. regulators. It was reported that JPMorgan terminated its banking relationship with Polymarket on August 14 due to regulatory concerns but expressed interest in acting as an underwriter if Polymarket seeks to go public.

Illia Polosukhin, co-founder of NEAR Protocol, stated in a live interview at the Digital Asset Summit 2026 held in Singapore that as near.com continues to expand its on-chain services, users no longer need centralized exchanges for "a large amount" of crypto activities. He mentioned that near.com is "almost ready" and has a "large roadmap for continuously adding features," including bank withdrawals, transaction records for tax purposes, and selective disclosure for confidential transactions. He also shared his experience using centralized exchanges, stating that despite knowing the company's CEO, one of his accounts was still deleted.near.com integrates cross-chain spot trading, tokenized stocks, wealth management products, and perpetual contracts into a single interface. Polosukhin indicated that most of the infrastructure for NEAR Intents has been migrated to confidential sharding, keeping transaction activities private, and users can disclose individual transactions when needed. He mentioned that near.com has a lot of fiat-related features coming soon and referenced the collaboration between NEAR and Monerium, allowing users to convert euros in their bank accounts to EURe via IBAN. The ultimate goal of NEAR Intents is to handle "any asset to any asset," such as USD to EUR, SGD to HKD.Regarding tokenized stocks, near.com completed integration with Ondo Finance in September, allowing users to convert euros into tokenized NVIDIA stocks, with NEAR planning to add more stocks from global markets.

On Wednesday, the European Union law enforcement agency Europol released two reports urging the industry and policymakers to proactively address the threats posed by quantum computing. One report, titled "Quantum Computing and Cryptocurrency," written by Europol's European Cybercrime Centre, points out that cryptocurrency wallets are "the main exposure point for quantum threats." Wallets rely on private keys for authorized transactions and public keys for verification; a sufficiently powerful quantum computer could derive the private key from an exposed public key, allowing attackers to access funds without authorization, a moment often referred to as Q-Day. The report states that the hash functions used to link blocks and support mining are fundamentally resistant to quantum attacks.The report believes that cryptocurrency will not collapse due to quantum computing but recommends adopting "proactive defenses," including a phased transition to quantum-resistant cryptography and improving wallet security and key management. Wallets with public keys exposed on-chain cannot be remedied afterward, and the report states that the only solution is to migrate in advance. Glassnode estimated in May this year that 6.04 million BTC (30.2% of the issued supply) have exposed public keys. Upgrading Bitcoin also comes with costs: NIST standardized post-quantum signatures are 10 to 120 times larger than the ECDSA signatures currently used in Bitcoin, which could lead to block space overload and increased transaction fees. The report cites a 2024 study estimating that migrating all unspent transaction outputs would require at least 76 days of cumulative downtime.The second report, "Collect First, Decrypt Later," was completed in collaboration with Carlos III University of Madrid in Spain. It studies the behavior of attackers who collect encrypted data today and decrypt it in the future, finding risks in protocols such as TLS, SSH, and OpenPGP.

Regarding the announcement "Polygon is not dead" released by Polygon's official Twitter, which is suspected to mock the shutdown of Abstract, Polygon founder Sandeep responded that the dissemination effect of the related content "did not meet expectations," and some people attributed a completely different meaning to it. The Polygon marketing team was self-deprecating, as Polygon's fundamentals are still growing, and there was no intention to imply anything about Abstract's shutdown.Sandeep added that he was also confused when he first saw the content and emphasized that he has great respect for Abstract founder Luca Netz and his team. Since Polygon itself had also terminated the zkEVM project, he empathizes with the pain and would not mock the other party, wishing Luca and the Pudgy Penguins team all the best.

Hyperliquid Policy Center CEO Jake Chervinsky stated at the Digital Asset Summit 2026 Asia in Singapore that "every exchange," including CME Group and Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), will adopt public chain infrastructure in the next decade to remain competitive. He emphasized that Hyperliquid is not an exchange but an infrastructure available for different participants, comparing it to Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana, arguing that there is no reason for public chains to register as exchanges.Chervinsky mentioned that Hyperliquid does not intend to compete with Kalshi, Coinbase, Robinhood, and CME, but rather exists on the next layer of the tech stack, which these institutions can use to improve their products. He anticipates that in ten years, whether it is crypto-native exchanges like Kraken and Coinbase or traditional exchanges like ICE and CME, they will need to integrate this technology to compete. He also pointed out that, aside from regulated perpetual contracts, on-chain markets need to come under U.S. regulatory oversight, which he expects to happen "in the near future."This statement comes in the context of Payward announcing in September plans to deploy a licensed perpetual contract market on Hyperliquid for U.S. customers, with Bitnomial, regulated by the CFTC, responsible for creation and clearing. Previously, Trump announced that the CFTC would compliantly introduce Hyperliquid to the U.S.

Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan stated at Token2049 that they are exploring an on-chain asset linked to the Polymarket economy that also has true programmatic utility, which he referred to as "the way stocks should be."Shayne Coplan also emphasized very cautiously that this is not investment advice.