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Ethereum's Pectra Goes Live |
Ethereum’s Pectra upgrade went live on the Holesky testnet on Monday but failed to finalize in the expected time. Pectra was activated on the Holesky testnet at 21:55 UTC (4:55 p.m. ET), but did not initially finalize according to blockchain data. Finality is the state in which, once a transaction is confirmed and added to a block, it is immutable and cannot be reversed. A testnet is a network that copies a main blockchain (in this case Ethereum), and is used to test upgrades or new code before it goes to the main network. It is not immediately clear why the Pectra upgrade did not finalize on Holesky. Ethereum developers were discussing Monday over the Eth R&D Discord channel what the issue could be. This is not the first time an upgrade has not finalized on an Etheruem test network. In January 2024, when the developers were testing the Dencun upgrade, the hard fork did not initially finalize on the Goerli testnet. The Pectra hard fork combines together 11 major upgrades, or "Ethereum improvement proposals" (EIPs), into one package. At the heart of this is EIP-7702, which is supposed to improve the user-experience of crypto wallets. The proposal, which was scribbled by Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin in just 22 minutes, will allow wallets to have some smart contract capabilities, as part of a broader strategy to bring account abstraction to Ethereum — a concept that makes the usability of wallets a lot less clunky. Another key proposal, EIP-7251, will allow validators to increase the maximum amount they can stake from 32 to 2,048 ETH. The proposal is supposed to ease some of the technicalities that validators who stake ETH face today: Those that stake more than their 32 ETH have to spread that across multiple validators, making the process a bit of a nuisance. By lifting the maximum stake limit and combining those validators, it could speed up the process of setting up new nodes. Holesky is the first of two testnets to run through a simulation of Pectra. The next test is supposed to occur on the Sepolia testnet on Mar. 5. But according to Christine Kim, a Vice President of Research at Galaxy, developers could delay it depending on the scale of today's issue. After Pectra goes live on both testnets, developers will ink in a final date to activate the upgrade on mainnet. |
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Citadel Plans Market Maker |
Market-making firm Citadel Securities is planning to wade deeper into the crypto world, according to a Monday report from Bloomberg. The well-known trading company is looking to provide liquidity on major crypto exchanges including Coinbase, Binance and Crypto.com, the report said. It's setting up offshore teams to keep the new business line outside the U.S. Citadel had previously been reluctant to bring its core service, market making, to crypto, despite its other industry ventures like the institutional trading platform EDX Markets. The about-face is seen as a reaction to President Donald Trump's resetting of the U.S. regulatory stance on crypto. Citadel did not immediately respond to a request for comment. |
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Uranium Hack Assets Seized |
U.S. authorities have seized about $31 million in crypto tied to the 2021 hack of Uranium Finance, according to a Monday X post from the Southern District of New York (SDNY). According to the post, the seizure was the result of a joint effort between SDNY and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) in San Diego. A spokesperson for SDNY did not return CoinDesk’s request for comment before press time, and no further details about the seizure or any related investigation were immediately available. Uranium Finance was essentially a clone of automated market maker (AMM) Uniswap deployed on Binance’s BNB chain (then called Binance Smart Chain). In April 2021, a hacker exploited a bug in Uranium’s pair contracts to steal $50 million in various tokens. At the time of the incident, the Uranium Finance hack was one of the largest monetary exploits in decentralized finance (DeFi) history. After the exploit, the hacker attempted to launder a portion of the funds in a variety of ways, including using crypto mixer Tornado Cash, depositing small amounts of crypto into centralized exchanges, and, according to blockchain sleuth ZachXBT, perhaps through purchasing rare and highly valuable Magic: The Gathering trading cards. Uranium Finance shuttered after the hack, leaving victims without answers or financial restitution. The partial recovery, which comes nearly four years after the initial attack, offers the first glimmer of hope for victims to see some of their money returned. |
OKX, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges, settled with U.S. authorities over failing to obtain a license to operate as a money transmitter, the exchange announced Monday.
Aux Cayes FinTech Co. Ltd., an OKX affiliate, is the specific party that settled with the U.S. Department of Justice, paying over $500 million in penalties and forfeited fees, a press release said. OKX failed to secure a money transmitter license, the exchange said, without detailing which state the license might have been issued from. A DOJ press release said "OKX sought out customers in the United States, including in the Southern District of New York."
A person familiar with the situation told CoinDesk that the settlement resolved allegations of fraudulent and non-compliant activities at the exchange that took place in past years. The DOJ's press release said OKX facilitated more than $5 billion in "suspicious transactions and criminal proceeds," citing Acting U.S. Attorney Matthew Podolsky.
OKcoin, the American division of OKX, also received a subpoena issued by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) on Feb. 24 last year. CoinDesk saw the cover page of the subpoena, which refers to “Certain persons engaged in fraud and other unlawful conduct with respect to digital asset transactions.”
A second person said the CFTC probe into OKcoin relates to last year’s flash crash of the exchange’s native token following the sudden drop in the price of the OKB token on Jan. 23, 2024. OKX told users they would be compensated for losses resulting from the crash.
An internal document circulated to OKX staff in January 2024 highlighted “a new ethics and compliance helpline to provide a confidential and secure space for you to bring up concerns or issues about ethical conduct, policy violations or suspected illegal behavior.”
OKX representatives did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A CFTC spokesperson declined to comment. |
The Takeaway: SEC Should Allow ETP Staking |
By Jennie Levin, Chief Regulatory and Strategy Officer at Figment, and Alison Mangiero, executive director of the Proof of Stake Alliance
For far too long, the U.S. has been falling behind the rest of the world on staking policy. Now, in just the first 30 days of the Trump Administration, staking has been mentioned in Congressional hearings, listed as a top priority by the SEC’s newly created crypto task force and is today the focus of a bipartisan letter from lawmakers challenging the previous SEC’s stance on its inclusion in exchange-traded products (ETPs).
Many in the digital asset sector celebrated when the first spot ether ETFs were approved in September of last year. It was a giant leap forward for the second-largest cryptocurrency, achieving legitimacy in the eyes of U.S. regulators. But there has been one glaring omission within these financial products: the ability to stake the held assets and profit by doing so.
Now a bipartisan group of lawmakers including Senators Cynthia Lummis (R-WY), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Steve Daines (R-Montana), Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.), Thom Tillis (R-NC), Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) and Ron Wyden (D-OR) is leading the way to correct that. In a letter delivered to the Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday, they are challenging the SEC's directive to exclude protocol staking in ETPs, highlighting how this position could undermine both investor protections and the competitiveness of U.S. markets. The SEC’s prohibition on staking within ETPs is based on a faulty understanding of how staking works on proof-of-stake networks like Ethereum. Staking is not an investment product in itself. Rather, it is a fundamental technical requirement for securing and validating transactions on proof-of-stake networks. When token holders stake their assets, they contribute to the network's security, and in doing so earn rewards generated by the protocol itself — not from any centralized authority. The SEC's directive to spot ether ETP issuers to exclude staking raises serious concerns about America's competitive position in global digital asset markets. While the United States hesitates, other major financial centers including Switzerland, Canada, Germany and Australia have embraced staking in their digital asset ETPs, recognizing its integral role in network security and operational stability. Just last month, the U.K. issued a statutory instrument acknowledging that arrangements for qualifying crypto asset staking do not amount to a collective investment scheme, reinforcing its importance in securing and maintaining blockchain networks.
Because staking is essential for securing proof-of-stake networks, it also means that if there were no one staking their ether, then all of the assets within these ETPs would be at risk. This means that, perversely, the SEC has forced American investors into a position where their investments are only protected by assets held in other jurisdictions.
Crucially, the impact of these regulations extends beyond just the Ethereum blockchain, but applies to possible future ETPs of other networks that also use proof-of-stake such as Solana, Avalanche and Polkadot. As the digital asset sector grows, the impact of this misguided regulation will only deepen.
Getting this regulation wrong hurts both American investors and the U.S. economy. Either investors accept domestic products without staking and the associated rewards, limiting their financial returns, or they seek exposure through off-shore alternatives, driving capital offshore and out of U.S. stock exchanges. Without staking, ether ETP holders gradually lose their relative network ownership position due to the inflationary nature of staking rewards. This economic reality makes U.S. products less competitive and less attractive to investors seeking comprehensive exposure to the Ethereum ecosystem. Even more troubling, this outcome appears to contradict the SEC's core mission of investor protection, likely pushing investors toward investment vehicles in other jurisdictions that may not meet the investor protection standards available to investors in the U.S.
The technical risks associated with staking, when managed by sophisticated validators, are minimal and well-understood. The often-cited "slashing risk" — a penalty mechanism for dishonest validation attempts — has affected just 0.001 percent of staked ether to date. This data suggests that the SEC's cautious stance may be disproportionate to the actual risks involved. As we await the SEC's response to the important questions raised by Congress, American investors continue to be at a distinct disadvantage. The path forward requires a balanced approach that recognizes staking for what it is — a technical mechanism for network security — while ensuring there is appropriate oversight when it is offered within regulated investment products.
As the letter rightly points out, while only Congress can create a comprehensive regulatory framework, the SEC has the authority to permit staking in ETPs. Doing so would align with both the agency’s mandate to protect investors and the goal of maintaining U.S. leadership in global financial markets. The bipartisan Congressional letter to SEC Commissioners Uyeda and Peirce endorsing Protocol Staking in Digital Asset ETPs is a significant milestone for investors – both crypto native and institutional. With Uyeda having criticized what he has called the “weaponization” of the SEC’s enforcement functions and crypto advocate Paul Atkins being nominated to take over the role of SEC Chair, we have a rare opportunity to make progress on one of the most common sense issues in the digital asset landscape.
It’s beyond time for the SEC to assume a leadership position when it comes to protocol staking, which powers the digital asset sector. This befits the aspirations of the American economy and the Americans who rely on it. |
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