Plasma, the company behind the first stablecoin-native neobank and the infrastructure powering it, today announced the appointment of Zaheer Ebtikar as Chief Strategy Officer. The appointment reinforces Plasma's commitment to making stablecoins practical for everyday use worldwide, beginning with the launch of its stablecoin-native neobank, Plasma One.

Bitget, the world's largest Universal Exchange (UEX), announced a strategic product partnership with MuleRun, an industry-leading self-evolving AI Agent, to launch a personal AI-powered trading assistant that brings institutional-grade market signals to everyday investors through natural language.

Bitget Wallet, the everyday finance app, has expanded its QR payment capabilities across Asia-Pacific, allowing users to pay from a self-custodial wallet by scanning supported local merchant QR codes across one of the world's most established QR payment regions. The rollout positions Bitget Wallet as the first self-custodial wallet to offer crypto QR payments at APAC scale, serving both local spending and cross-border travel use cases.

Creating a new market for small business credit and marking a milestone for real-world asset adoption on institutional blockchain infrastructure NEWITY, a financial technology company transforming how small businesses access capital, today announced it has selected the Canton Network to support on-chain distribution of small business credit, creating one of the first dedicated on-chain markets for small business loans.

Episode Six will serve as a key processing partner for Rain's credit, debit, and prepaid card programs across networks and geographies

Franklin Templeton, a global investment leader, today announced a plan to acquire 250 Digital, an active cryptocurrency investment management firm led by financial industry veterans Christopher Perkins and Seth Ginns of CoinFund Management LLC. The acquisition would include the 250 Digital investment team and all liquid cryptocurrency strategies previously run by CoinFund. Franklin Templeton will invest in the strategies as part of the agreement.

IAMTN, the international trade association representing the global cross-border payments industry, today announced a strategic move to integrate digital assets into its core operations and membership roadmap. Reflecting the growing convergence of traditional finance and decentralised finance (DeFi), IAMTN has entered a forward-thinking partnership with the French-based fintech firm Next Generation NGPES.

Apex Group Ltd. (“Apex Group”), a leading global financial services provider, plans to expand its digital asset servicing capabilities through a new collaboration between the European Depositary Bank (“EDB”), an Apex Group company, and Zodia Custody, the institution-first digital assets platform with shareholders and investors including Standard Chartered, Northern Trust, SBI Holdings, National Australia Bank, and Emirates NBD.

OKX, the blockchain technology and trading company serving more than 120 million people globally, today announced the launch of Aave on X Layer, OKX's Ethereum-compatible Layer 2 network. The deployment marks a significant expansion of X Layer's DeFi ecosystem, giving OKX Wallet users and DeFi-native participants access to battle-tested, institutional-grade lending infrastructure directly onchain.

Relm has received its full Virtual Asset Service Provider (VASP) license from Dubai’s Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA)

Nium launched its stablecoin card issuance platform enabling companies holding stablecoins to issue spending cards on the Visa and Mastercard networks

COINPAYMENTS, a global leader in cryptocurrency payment processing, today announces a partnership with OSL Group (863.HK), Asia’s leading stablecoin trading and payment platform, as part of its strategic expansion in the region.

BNP Paribas' exchange offering already provides access to a wide range of investment products: stocks, bonds, ETFs, SCPIs, and structured products. To meet the interest of certain investors in the crypto-asset market, the bank is expanding its offering to 6 new ETNs that can be accessed through a securities account and in an autonomous manner. These crypto-asset-backed products are now available for subscription under the MIFID2 regulation, which ensures investor protection.

Coinbase has integrated Chainlink to bring its premium exchange data underpinning billions in trading activity onchain

Interactive Brokers (Nasdaq: IBKR), an automated global broker, today announced that clients can transfer their existing holdings in supported cryptocurrencies to their Interactive Brokers-linked crypto account, enabling them to trade crypto at lower costs while gaining access to global investment markets – all without selling their digital assets upfront.