pan

According to Gate market data, the Nikkei 225 index fell by 2.00% during the day; the South Korean KOSPI index touched down at 7100 points, with a daily drop of 2.37%.

According to Jinshi Data, informed sources revealed that SpaceX is expected to advance the acquisition of the artificial intelligence coding startup Cursor 30 days after its company begins the IPO.

On Tuesday local time, U.S. President Trump signed an executive order requiring the federal government and the Federal Reserve to review the existing regulatory framework to promote deeper integration of digital assets and financial technology into traditional financial services and payment systems. The executive order mandates U.S. financial regulators to review current rules within the next three months and identify any "unreasonable barriers" to cooperation between fintech companies and federally regulated financial institutions. Within six months, regulators must also take measures to encourage financial innovation. Among other things, the order specifically requires the Federal Reserve to reassess the eligibility of uninsured deposit institutions and non-bank financial companies for payment accounts and payment services.The document also requests the 12 regional Federal Reserve Banks to study whether they can independently open payment accounts to relevant institutions without relying on the approval of the Federal Reserve Board. Analysts believe this policy may benefit special purpose deposit institutions in Wyoming and similar structures for cryptocurrency companies. Previously, Kraken's Wyoming SPDI had obtained a limited version of "master account" authority from the Kansas Federal Reserve, and other cryptocurrency institutions are also seeking similar qualifications. Reports indicate that the Federal Reserve is currently also studying a more formal "streamlined master account" mechanism and had announced related proposals last December.

According to CoinDesk, after Mastercard abandoned its investment plans, crypto infrastructure company Zerohash is raising a new round of funding at a valuation of over $1.5 billion. Mastercard had previously considered making a strategic investment in the company but later acquired BVNK for $1.8 billion, abandoning the original plan. Zerohash is raising new funds at a valuation higher than the $1.5 billion discussed at the beginning of the year.Founded in 2017, the company provides APIs and embedded development tools for financial institutions and fintech companies, serving over 5 million users across 190 countries. Clients include Morgan Stanley, Interactive Brokers, Stripe, BlackRock's BUIDL fund, Franklin Templeton, and DraftKings. Zerohash completed a $104 million D-2 round of financing at a $1 billion valuation in September 2025, led by Interactive Brokers.

On May 18, U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) stating that the agency has improperly granted national trust charters to at least nine cryptocurrency companies since December 2025. Elizabeth Warren pointed out that the businesses these companies plan to engage in exceed the limited functions allowed by law for national trust banks, essentially attempting to circumvent the fundamental protections and obligations of banking through crypto banking. It is reported that the companies that have received or conditionally approved include Ripple, Circle, Paxos, Fidelity, BitGo, Coinbase, Stripe's subsidiary Bridge, and Crypto.com. The American Bankers Association urged the OCC in February to slow down the approval of related licenses, and Elizabeth Warren warned that this move would weaken consumer protections and pose regulatory arbitrage risks.

Deloitte announced on Tuesday that it has acquired the crypto infrastructure company Blocknative through a talent acquisition-focused merger. According to the announcement, the Blocknative team will "focus on driving Web3 innovation within Deloitte's client ecosystem" in the future. Currently, Blocknative's official website displays the announcement stating that the company "is gradually ceasing operations." Its Blocknative API and Gas Network services will also be gradually shut down, expected to continue running until June 19.Founded in 2018, Blocknative is a blockchain infrastructure company that specializes in real-time mempool monitoring, gas fee prediction, and transaction management. The company provides APIs and related tools for optimizing on-chain transactions; its Gas Network is a decentralized oracle network that provides real-time gas fee data. This move comes at a time when the overall crypto ecosystem is undergoing a wave of consolidation. This is also accompanied by traditional companies like Deloitte increasing their exposure to crypto. Deloitte now provides accounting, auditing, and other corporate services to crypto companies.

According to Bloomberg, Moment is a fintech company founded by former Citadel Securities quantitative traders and researchers. After signing partners such as Edward Jones, LPL Financial, and Hightower Advisors over the past year, the company completed a $78 million funding round, led by Index Ventures, with existing investors Andreessen Horowitz and Avra also participating. Moment primarily helps financial institutions automate fixed income and equity trading technology. The company's previous funding round was in July last year, when it raised $36 million.

Stablecoin infrastructure startup Checker announced the completion of an $8 million pre-seed and seed funding round, with participation from Galaxy Ventures, Al Mada Ventures, Framework Ventures, Bitso, Airtm, DFS Lab, Onigiri Capital, SNZ Capital, and Velocity. The project's main business is to help financial institutions launch and scale stablecoins and related products by providing a single API.It is reported that Checker has processed over $3 billion in transaction volume in the past 12 months and plans to use the new funds to expand its network of financial institutions to Brazil, Kenya, Hong Kong, and the United States, while also planning to launch AI agents for customer onboarding, compliance assessments, and treasury operations.

The stablecoin infrastructure startup Checker announced the completion of an $8 million pre-seed and seed funding round, with participation from Galaxy Ventures, Al Mada Ventures, Framework Ventures, Bitso, Airtm, DFS Lab, Onigiri Capital, SNZ Capital, and Velocity.The project's main business is to help financial institutions launch and scale stablecoins and related products by providing a single API. It is reported that Checker has processed over $3 billion in transaction volume in the past 12 months and plans to use the new funds to expand its network of financial institutions to Brazil, Kenya, Hong Kong, and the United States, while also planning to launch AI agents for customer onboarding, compliance assessments, and treasury operations.

According to the official announcement, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has proposed amendments to the rules and forms related to registered offerings, aiming to enhance the efficiency, flexibility, and reduce costs of public fundraising for listed companies, while simplifying the information disclosure framework for listed companies.According to the proposal, more listed companies will be able to conduct shelf offerings, and more companies will be eligible for registration and communication conveniences that were previously only available to "well-known seasoned issuers." Broker-dealers will be able to provide research coverage for more listed companies, and the state securities law registration and qualification requirements for multi-state registered offerings will be excluded at the federal level.Additionally, the proposal suggests raising the threshold for large accelerated filers from $700 million to $2 billion, with the stipulation that companies will not be included in this category based on market capitalization for at least 60 months post-IPO. The public comment period will last for 60 days after publication in the Federal Register.

According to Reuters, Polymarket has partnered with Nasdaq to launch a prediction market for private companies, where users can trade based on valuation, IPO timing, and secondary market valuation.

According to CoinPost, the Financial Services Agency of Japan announced a cabinet order amendment, officially recognizing foreign trust beneficiary rights that are "equivalent" to Japan's electronic settlement system as electronic settlement methods under the Fund Settlement Act. The amendment will take effect on June 1.This revision clarifies: first, it establishes a legal basis for qualified foreign trust-based stablecoins to provide services within Japan; second, it stipulates that electronic settlement method operators should use equivalence with the Japanese system as the eligibility criterion when handling foreign electronic settlement methods. At the same time, relevant foreign trust beneficiary rights will be excluded from the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act's securities and will only be regulated as electronic settlement methods.The Liberal Democratic Party of Japan has officially approved the "AI + Blockchain Finance" proposal, supporting yen stablecoins and tokenized deposits.

Public company Hut 8 announced an agreement with West Feliciana Parish in Louisiana to invest approximately $16 million to expand the local water system capacity in conjunction with the development of its River Bend AI data center campus. This investment includes the construction of new water wells and approximately 8 miles of water supply main, which is expected to be completed in the second half of 2026 and will be transferred to the parish at no cost.The first phase of the River Bend campus represents a multi-billion dollar capital investment, and once fully operational, it is expected to support a total of 268 jobs. The campus will utilize a closed-loop cooling system to reduce the demand on local water resources.

According to Bloomberg, Senator Elizabeth Warren has questioned the decision by financial regulators to allow cryptocurrency companies into the banking system. The Massachusetts Democrat wrote to Jonathan Gould, head of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), pointing out that the regulator has approved at least 9 national trust charters for crypto companies that "seem to be unqualified." Warren stated that these charters "appear to far exceed the narrow scope of activities permitted by law," constituting a "clear violation of the National Bank Act." She questioned whether the OCC adhered to relevant legal provisions during the approval process and requested clarification on the compliance of these cryptocurrency companies in obtaining banking charters.

Research firm Bernstein released a report stating that as the demand for AI data centers explodes, Bitcoin mining companies are becoming important participants in large-scale computing infrastructure, with a positive outlook on the future performance of miners such as IREN, Riot Platforms, CleanSpark, and Core Scientific.The report points out that major cloud providers, AI cloud service providers, and chip companies have announced over $90 billion in AI infrastructure collaborations, involving approximately 3.7 GW of power capacity. Bernstein states that "Follow the Gigawatts" is becoming the core of competition in AI infrastructure, and the large-scale power resources controlled by mining companies hold strategic value.Analysts have given IREN, Riot, CleanSpark, and Core Scientific an "outperform" rating, with a target price of $100 for IREN, indicating about a 98% upside potential from the current stock price; CleanSpark has a target price of $24, corresponding to about a 78% upside potential.The report states that Bitcoin mining companies currently control over 27 GW of planned power capacity, and in some areas of the United States, the new 1 GW power connection cycle may take up to 50 months, making existing mining sites important locations for the expansion of AI data centers.Bernstein also mentioned several AI collaboration cases, including IREN planning a 5 GW AI computing park based on NVIDIA's AI Factory architecture, and Riot reaching a collaboration with AMD for an AI data center of up to 200 MW.However, analysts also warned that the industry still faces challenges such as environmental reviews, grid capacity, and regulatory approvals. Additionally, if mining companies overly shift their computing resources towards AI, they may miss out on future gains during the Bitcoin bull market cycle.

On May 19, the Financial Services Agency of Japan announced the revised Cabinet Office Ordinance related to electronic payment methods and transaction operators, clearly including trust beneficiary rights established under foreign laws that are equivalent to the Japanese system within the scope of electronic payment methods under Japan's Fund Settlement Act, providing a legal basis for the compliant circulation of trust-type stablecoins issued by specific foreign entities within Japan. The new regulations will take effect on June 1, 2026, and also clarify that the relevant foreign trust beneficiary rights are not considered securities under the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act.

According to PRNewswire, Nasdaq-listed Bitcoin treasury company Hyperscale Data stated that as of May 17, 2026, it and its wholly-owned subsidiary Sentinum jointly hold 692.4093 bitcoins with Ault Capital Group.Based on the closing price of Bitcoin on that day of $77,429, the total value of the aforementioned holdings is approximately $53.6 million. As of the end of that week, neither Sentinum nor Ault Capital Group had increased their Bitcoin holdings in the public market. The company also stated that it plans to gradually invest cash allocated for the digital asset reserve strategy into Bitcoin purchases in the future.

According to the Korea Economic Daily, South Korea's seventh-largest pension relief company Bumo Sarang invested 59.5 billion won of operating funds last year into the Ethereum-themed stock Bitmine's daily double return leveraged ETF, incurring a loss of 49.3 billion won (approximately 32.73 million USD).A comprehensive review of the 2025 audit reports of 75 pension relief companies shows that 42.7% of the companies have total assets below the advance payments that should be made to clients, meaning that if all clients were to terminate their contracts simultaneously, the companies would be unable to refund the full amount.

According to CoinPost, the "Next Generation AI and On-Chain Finance Concept Project Group" of the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan has released a proposal that suggests combining AI with blockchain to automate decision-making, financing, and asset management, operating around the clock, and lists finance as the "18th growth investment area."Specific measures in the proposal include: promoting the tokenization of current accounts at the Bank of Japan (including wholesale CBDC), completing the argument organization within the year; the three major banks jointly issuing stablecoins, aiming to launch practical operations before March next year; and promoting the on-chain tokenization of real assets (RWA) such as accounts receivable and real estate.On the international cooperation front, the proposal suggests establishing an "AI and On-Chain Finance Asia Policy Dialogue Framework" and advancing cross-border settlements using yen-denominated stablecoins, building a "Global SC Corridor Concept."

According to Jinshi reports, S&P Global Market Intelligence economist Harumi Taguchi stated that the Bank of Japan may raise the policy interest rate from the current 0.75% to 1% in July, and again in December and 2027, bringing the policy interest rate to 1.5%. Taguchi pointed out that rising oil prices and a weak yen may exacerbate concerns about inflation, prompting the Bank of Japan to further increase interest rates.