Crypto reels from the record US$6.3B Binance hack and fresh breaches, while AI’s market selloffs test the industry’s footing.
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This week in crypto, Binance suspended withdrawals after a US$6.3B hack linked to North Korea, and Blockaid pointed to Ethereum’s EIP-7702 as a possible aid to attackers. Polymarket and Chainalysis disclosed their own incidents, while Tether’s excess reserves nearly doubled to US$7.95B.
In AI, Alphabet lost about US$500B in value as AI summaries cut into search ad revenue, and China’s STAR 50 index fell 40% since June on AI anxiety. Australian senators warned AI scraping could breach the constitution, and OpenAI pledged a Community Safety Report for 2027.
Get up to speed with the latest in Web3 and AI with this week’s Pasar Pulse.
Crypto and Web3
Binance Halts Withdrawals After US$6.3B Hack
Binance suspended deposits and withdrawals after attackers stole US$6.3B, the largest crypto hack on record, with about US$3B frozen. TRM Labs has attributed the attack to North Korea.
Blockaid Links Binance Hack to EIP-7702
Blockaid said compromised signing systems likely enabled the US$6.3B Binance hack, and Ethereum’s EIP-7702 upgrade may have helped attackers bypass checks. CEO Ido Ben-Natan said they could have stolen the funds without it.
Tether Reports US$1.5B Q3 Operating Profit
Tether’s excess reserves nearly doubled to US$7.95B from US$4.1B in June, with US$132.4B in US Treasury holdings. USDT accounts for about 60% of the US$297.3B stablecoin market, per DefiLlama.
ZCG Proposes Redirecting US$46M in ZEC
Zcash Community Grants proposed moving 36,200 ZEC, about US$46M, to future block rewards and tapering funding to 2032. Helius CEO Mert Mumtaz and Gemini’s Tyler Winklevoss criticised the committee’s accountability.
Polymarket Halts Trading After Provider Hack
Polymarket put its platform in cancel-only mode after a major API outage, saying a compromised third-party provider was to blame and that affected users will be made whole. All systems were operational by 7:05 pm UTC.
Chainalysis Discloses Cybersecurity Incident
Chainalysis said some non-sensitive customer data was exposed, with no evidence of unauthorised access to investigation content, credentials or session tokens. It said the incident is unrelated to the Binance theft.
KuCoin Suspends Russia, Belarus Users
KuCoin has suspended all services for users in Russia and Belarus on compliance grounds, offering an ‘orderly exit process’ for withdrawals. Separately, Russia’s central bank approved NAUFOR as a crypto self-regulatory body.
Bitcoin Jumps to US$81,547 on Strong Data
Bitcoin rose to US$81,547 after US Q3 GDP came in at 3.4% against 3.2% expected, with PCE inflation in line at 3.6% year on year. It shrugged off Alphabet’s 12% drop after a Q3 earnings miss.
Artificial Intelligence (AI)
Australian Senators Warn on AI Copyright
Australian senators and the recording industry warn that letting AI firms scrape copyrighted work could breach section 51 of the country’s constitution regarding the ‘just terms’ rule on property acquisition. Constitutional expert Anne Twomey said the concern is ‘potentially’ valid.
China’s STAR 50 Falls 40% on AI Fears
The STAR 50 index has dropped 40% since June, and about US$2.4T has been wiped from Chinese stock markets since May, Bloomberg reports. AI stocks make up over 40% of China and Hong Kong market value, per Goldman Sachs.
Musk Releases AI-Made Odyssey Rival
Elon Musk released a seven-minute AI-generated Odyssey episode made with Grok Imagine and London startup Wonder Studios, reportedly costing tens of thousands of US dollars. Christopher Nolan’s film cost US$250M.
OpenAI Pledges Community Safety Reports
OpenAI will publish its first Community Safety Report in early 2027, covering the second half of 2026, with updates every six months. It is also adding limits on weapons-related information for ChatGPT teen users.
SETI Deploys AI Agents on Telescope Array
At the Allen Telescope Array, AI agents will help to steer the instrument and process data from a single natural-language request, with the system handling 2.4 terabits per second on NVIDIA GPUs. Breakthrough Listen and the SETI Institute lead the effort.
Alphabet Loses US$500B on AI Search Hit
Alphabet’s market value fell from US$3.97T to US$3.46T on Thursday after executives said AI Mode was eating into search ad revenue. Q3 revenue rose 25% to US$127.6B but missed analyst forecasts.
Google Launches Singapore AI Health Push
Google is setting up a Google Research hub in Singapore, and Google.org and DeepMind are contributing US$7M to a health coalition. It is also working with NUHS and NHG Health on clinical and population-health AI tools.`
OpenAI Expands ServiceNow Partnership
OpenAI and ServiceNow will bring more models and agents into ServiceNow products and connect its workflows with ChatGPT and Codex. IT staff will be able to find incidents and update records without leaving ChatGPT.
That’s all for this week’s Pasar Pulse. Want more insights? Stay tuned to our site or subscribe via email!
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