They highlighted that stablecoins bring a wide range of benefits, including “reducing the burden of currency exchange for inbound tourists, further improving the efficiency of fund settlement, and improving cash flow for merchants.”
Tourists in Japan primarily use bank cards for payments, but there are spending limits, which can be bypassed with stablecoins, according to a report by Nikkei.
The collaboration is part of a growing wave of stablecoin initiatives in Japan following regulatory changes that have opened the market to broader adoption. Circle has said it would partner with Nomura to develop a USDC-based foreign exchange settlement service for Japanese businesses as early as 2027.
Lawson, one of Japan’s largest convenience store chains, will accept stablecoins at its stores as part of a pilot that starts in August, according to a separate Nikkei report. The retailer plans to begin trials at its Lawson Takanawa Gateway City store in Tokyo with telecom operator KDDI and digital asset wallet provider Hashport, using KDDI’s yen-denominated stablecoin, JPYC, the report said.
This November, the Ethereum community will gather in Mumbai for a more focused and intimate Devcon.
Devcon gathers minds from across Ethereum and beyond: builders, researchers, maintainers, organizers, and anyone curious about the future of open technology. Across four days, you can expect deep conversations, hands-on workshops, and plenty of opportunities to learn from people with different backgrounds, perspectives, and areas of expertise.
And there is more than one way to join us. You can purchase a General Admission ticket, claim an eligible Community discount, or apply through one of our student, youth, or builder discounts. Every ticket includes four-day conference access, catering throughout the event, and Devcon 8 swag.
Check out the information below on all tickets that are available today.
General Admission Tickets 🎟
General Admission is open to everyone, with no application or eligibility requirements. The current sale wave opens today, July 14, with a limited number of tickets available at:
Future waves will open at a higher price:
$599 in ETH
$1,199 in fiat
Date to be announced
If General Admission is your path, securing a ticket early guarantees you the lowest remaining price.
Get your General Admission ticket.
As always, we’re working to make Devcon accessible to the people who build, maintain, and strengthen Ethereum and open-source communities.
Alongside General Admission, a significant number of Devcon 8 tickets are discounted for Indian residents, students, public-goods contributors, core developers, past attendees, and Sanctuary Tech builders.
No application is required for these tickets, but availability is limited and tickets are non-transferable.
India Early Bird: $99 for eligible voucher holders
India Resident: $149
Ethereum Public Goods: $349 (ETH ONLY)
Past POAP Holders: $449
Core Developers: Free
Explore Community ticket eligibility.
Student, Youth & Builder Applications
These tickets are reviewed in rolling batches, so we encourage eligible attendees to apply early.
Indian Students: $25
International Students:49inETHor99 in fiat
Sanctuary Tech Builders:349inETHor499 in fiat
Youth Tickets, ages 3–17: $19
Explore ticket applications.
Looking to get involved with Devcon beyond simply attending?
Bring your community to life through a Community Hub, support the event through the Supporters Program, or apply to take the stage as a speaker.
Community Hubs are back for Devcon 8!
Some of the best parts of Devcon happen beyond the main program. Community Hubs give groups across Ethereum, open source, privacy, and public-interest technology a dedicated space to gather, teach, experiment, and bring diverse voices into the conversation.
Selected Community Hubs will shape their own programming, from workshops and roundtables to onboarding sessions, games, and live discussions. Hubs must be community-led, focused on a clear topic, useful to attendees, and free from branding or project promotion.
Have an idea worth bringing to Mumbai? For more details and steps to apply, check out our Request for Proposals on the Devcon Forum.
Support Devcon 8
The Supporters and Impact Programs are two ways for aligned teams to take part in shaping Devcon 8.
Through the Supporters Program, ecosystem projects can build a meaningful presence at Devcon, showcase what they’re working on, launch something new, connect with users, and demonstrate their commitment to Ethereum. We’re especially looking to support teams whose work aligns with the CROPS principles.
For FOSS projects, public-goods teams, and nonprofits, the Impact Program offers free ways to participate through:
Impact Booths: Free physical booth space at Devcon
Impact Tier: Digital presence across Devcon platforms and a set of tickets
Applications are reviewed on a rolling basis. Questions can be sent to supporters@devcon.org.
Shape the Conversation at Devcon
Devcon’s programming is shaped by the people willing to share what they are learning, building, and questioning. Speaker applications are open to everyone, with no invite list or speaker bureau. If you have an idea that could help move the conversations around the future of Ethereum forward, we’d love to hear from you.
This year’s program will reach more than 10,000 builders, researchers, designers, and thinkers across nine tracks, from Core Protocol and Applied Cryptography to Privacy, Security, Open Source, Governance, and more.
You can apply with a:
Lightning Talk: 5 minutes + Q&A
Talk: 20 minutes + Q&A
Mixed Format: AMA, fireside chat, or roundtable
Workshop: 60-minute hands-on session
Selected speakers will receive a complimentary Devcon 8 ticket.
Applications close on August 6, 2026, with decisions beginning at the end of August.
Bring your voice to the Devcon 8 stage, apply now.
Find your path, get your ticket, and join us in India. Stay tuned for the next waves of ticket releases, as well as the first news on speakers and programming here on the Blog or on Twitter.
The US Senate is expected to vote soon on a comprehensive bill to establish market structure rules for digital assets, backed by Republican lawmakers, while some Democrats continue to push for ethics provisions.
In a Tuesday press conference, Senators Chris Murphy, Jeff Merkley, and Chris Van Hollen spoke alongside representatives for Americans for Financial Reform and Indivisible and Hollywood actor Ben McKenzie in opposition to the Digital Asset Market Clarity (CLARITY) Act. The lawmakers said that the bill did not address what they called “[Donald] Trump’s crypto corruption,” referring to the US President’s ties to the industry through his memecoin, his family’s World Liberty Financial company and other businesses and investments.
“There is no reason to pass a new regulatory system for crypto if this system does not stop Trump’s corruption of the entire industry,” said Murphy. “This bill is worthless if it protects Trump’s dominance over an industry that he will have more control to regulate. In fact, the bill is in and of itself a fundamental corruption if it gives Trump’s corruption the protection of law.”
Senator Chris Murphy (third from left) addressing the press on Tuesday with Senator Chris Van Hollen (left). Source: Chris Murphy
The CLARITY Act has been under discussion in the US Senate since being passed by the House of Representatives almost a year ago this week as part of the Republicans’ “Crypto Week” agenda, in which the GENIUS stablecoin bill was also signed into law. The bill needs to meet a 60-vote threshold to pass the Senate and return to the House, meaning that some Democrats will need to support the legislation with Republicans’ slim majority in the chamber.
Related: ABA, state banking groups push back on CLARITY Act stablecoin yield provisions
Van Hollen, Murphy and Merkley are not the only Senate Democrats saying they will not support the bill without a clear carveout for ethics following Trump disclosing that he earned $1.4 billion from his crypto ventures in 2025. Senator Elizabeth Warren, an outspoken voice in the chamber against many crypto-related issues, has also called for the legislation to address what she called “brazen financial corruption.”
Despite the pushback from many lawmakers, the CLARITY Act has the support of two law enforcement organizations. The National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives and the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association have backed the crypto bill, saying it would help address digital asset-related crime.
Senate majority leader says vote will happen before August work period
John Thune, majority leader in the US Senate, pledged to hold a vote on the crypto bill before the chamber breaks for a state work period on Aug. 10, according to Bloomberg. The exact timing of the vote was not available on the Senate calendar as of Tuesday.
The CLARITY Act already has support from Trump, who on Monday urged members of the Senate to pass the bill “in honor of” Senator Lindsey Graham, who died over the weekend. The president said that the South Carolina lawmaker had been “a big supporter” of the legislation, but Graham did not appear to have made any public statements directly supporting CLARITY.
The senator’s death left Republicans with a 52-47 majority in the chamber and, with Senator Mitch McConnell still hospitalized as of Tuesday, the party could only have 51 lawmakers present at the time of the potential vote.
Senator Cynthia Lummis, one of CLARITY’s proponents in Congress, said on Monday that lawmakers would release the text of the bill “in the next few days.”
Magazine: Crypto’s CLARITY Act faces partisan fight over ethics on Senate floor
China’s Supreme People’s Procuratorate has published a set of recommendations that would reshape how the country investigates and prosecutes cryptocurrency-related money laundering, including a proposal to treat the use of mixers and privacy coins as evidence of criminal intent.
The article, released in the official Procuratorial Daily, was written by two prosecutors from Hunan Province’s Yuhu District and an associate law professor at Xiangtan University.
The authors argue that the decentralized, pseudonymous, and cross-border design of virtual currencies has outpaced China’s legal framework and created a three-part problem: defining the offense, gathering evidence, and recovering stolen assets.
At the center of the debate is a gap between statutes. China’s Anti-Money Laundering Law has dropped restrictions on which predicate offenses qualify, but Article 191 of the Criminal Law still limits money laundering charges to seven categories.
As a result, most crypto cases fall under Article 312, which covers concealing criminal proceeds, a charge the authors describe as a catch-all. They call for wider use of the money laundering statute and a “one case, two checks” principle that would require investigators to look for laundering indicators in every major criminal probe.
Burden shifts in China’s courts
Three proposals stand out. The first, described as blockchain self-authentication, would treat on-chain records from public block explorers as reliable when hash values match, and would preliminarily establish their integrity.
The second would shift the burden of proof: once prosecutors submit a transaction-chain analysis report, the defense would need to disprove it.
The third would allow courts to presume laundering intent from conduct alone. Under that standard, the use of mixers or privacy coins, the sale of large holdings at off-market prices, or high-value transactions through anonymous wallets with no clear source would establish intent unless a defendant offered a reasonable rebuttal.
The authors also address evidence collection, noting that mixers, privacy coins, and decentralized exchanges allow multi-layered splitting and cross-chain transfers that traditional methods struggle to trace.
They propose adaptive rules for electronic data, tiered standards of proof, and clearer authorization for technical measures such as real-time monitoring and traffic analysis, with limits to protect personal information and cybersecurity.
Asset recovery presents a further obstacle. With crypto trading banned in China, authorities hold seized coins without a legal channel to liquidate them.
The paper recommends a national platform to store, value, and dispose of confiscated assets through compliant channels, along with an expert committee that would set values using on-chain data and international exchange prices.
It also urges bilateral and multilateral agreements and a blockchain-based “judicial cooperation chain” to trace and freeze funds moved abroad.
The recommendations carry no legal force, but they signal a possible direction for China’s courts. The proposals arrive as Chinese-language laundering networks processed $16.15 billion in 2025, about 20% of the global total, according to Chainalysis.
In 2024, Chinese prosecutors brought charges against more than 3,000 people in crypto-related laundering cases, a figure that underscores the scale of the challenge.
Tokenized products already exist, though mainly for investing. The most popular category is tokenized money market funds, primarily backed by U.S. Treasuries. The largest, BlackRock’s USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL), debuted in March 2024.
This category now has more than $15 billion of assets under management (AUM), with the broader onchain real-world asset market (excluding stablecoins) surpassing $31 billion in value. Casting a wider net to include assets such as alternative investments and tokenized financial infrastructures, the global asset tokenization market is valued at roughly $2.1 trillion.
According to forecasts by Grand View Research, the sector is projected to hit $24.5 trillion by 2033, with some industry estimates suggesting tokenized markets could reach as much as $88 trillion by 2035.
The key advantage they offer is instant execution around the clock and fractional ownership, which allows traders to buy small portions at any time, with all stages of the transaction — including purchase, sale and final processing — completed immediately.
Faster, cheaper
That’s not the focal point for institutional investors, who are more interested in the properties of the tokenized assets than their ease of trading.
“Generally speaking, they are not asking for tokens,” Lai said. “They are asking for what tokens can do more compared to the existing wrappers they already have.”
A team of former Ethereum Foundation researchers focused on institutional privacy has launched EthSystems, a new for-profit company aimed at building confidentiality infrastructure for financial institutions using Ethereum.
The startup emerged from the Ethereum Foundation, which spent the past year developing privacy technologies for enterprise use cases while engaging with central banks, regulators, global banks and asset managers.
The spinout comes amid one of the biggest organizational shakeups in the Ethereum Foundation in years. Following months of criticism over leadership, strategy and the foundation’s role in supporting Ethereum’s increasingly institutional user base, several teams have recently been spun out into independent organizations.
Among them are EthLabs, a nonprofit focused on advancing Ethereum protocol research and scaling, and Ethereum Institutional, a separate nonprofit designed to coordinate institutional adoption and engagement with large financial firms. Together, the organizations represent an effort to distribute responsibilities previously housed within the foundation across more specialized entities.
EthSystems said it plans to commercialize work it began inside the foundation, including confidential stablecoin transfers, private bond issuance, cross-chain settlement systems and open-source protocol specifications.
The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission threw itself in between Michigan courts and prediction market firm Kalshi on Tuesday, issuing an order to disallow the company from meeting a local court demand that it cancel previous customer transactions.
The CFTC move amplifies its legal fight with state governments and courts over what its chairman argues is its unbreakable and exclusive regulatory authority over trading at Kalshi, which it regulates as a designated contract market (DCM).
“The commission will not allow states or state courts to bully registered entities into violating the Commodity Exchange Act and CFTC regulations,” said CFTC Chairman Mike Selig in a statement alongside his agency’s order. Selig has embraced prediction markets and promised to institute friendly regulations, and he’s also vigorously defended his agency’s authority to regulate them in a way that negates state powers.
The CFTC has sued a number of states that have sought to halt or penalize event contract businesses as illegal gambling. The agency noted Tuesday that Michigan is the first state to attempt to interfere in transaction activity directly.
The United States and the United Kingdom have laid out a plan to make it easier for tokenized financial products to move between their markets, signaling that both governments want blockchain-based finance to become a bigger part of mainstream capital markets.
Released Tuesday by the U.S. Department of the Treasury and HM Treasury, the recommendations from the Transatlantic Taskforce for Markets of the Future focus on reducing regulatory friction that could slow the growth of tokenized securities, stablecoins and other digital assets operating across both countries.
The report sets out 10 recommendations covering digital assets and traditional capital markets.
On the digital asset side, governments propose creating an industry-led working group to test cross-border tokenization projects, coordinate the regulation of tokenized securities, and support the development of cross-border stablecoins. They also want to review global banking standards for cryptoassets and build policy frameworks that allow stablecoins, tokenized bank deposits and other forms of digital money to coexist.
The two governments also issued a joint statement backing cross-border stablecoin activity, stating that the private sector will play a central role in developing digital money and payment systems.
Releasing at Comic-Con San Diego 2026, the highly anticipated comic book trilogy tells the official origin of Pax Pengu and Polly, revealing how the beloved pair’s journey began while laying the narrative foundation for the future of the Pudgy Penguins entertainment universe.
For the first time, the creative team behind the series reveals how they spent nearly a year building the story of the Pudgy Penguins universe: from developing its mythology and expanding its world-building dynamics to creating the narrative foundation for future adventures and entertainment.
With “Adventures of Pax Pengu & Polly”, Pudgy Penguins opens the first chapter of a much bigger story. Debuting at San Diego Comic-Con 2026, the company’s first-ever comic book trilogy reveals the official origin story of Pax Pengu, Polly, and The Berg, establishing the electric mythology that will shape the future of the Pudgy Penguins universe.
For half a decade, millions of fans have followed Pax Pengu and Polly across social media (@pudgypenguins), explored their adventures in the online game Pudgy World, collected them as plush companions (pudgypenguins.com), and embraced them as the emotional soul of the Pudgy Penguins universe. Yet despite their global popularity, one story has never been told: where they came from, how they first met, and the extraordinary journey that led them to The Berg.
A scene from Adventures of Pax Pengu & Polly capturing the moment Pax Pengu and Polly meet for the very first time. Image Credit: Pudgy Penguins
“What started as a comic book quickly became something much bigger for us. Every great entertainment franchise begins with characters people genuinely care about. This story finally gives fans the chance to discover who Paxton Pengu and Polly really are, how they found each other, and the world that shaped them. More importantly, it creates the foundation we can continue building on for decades to come,” said Peter Lobanov, Co-Founder and Chief Creative Officer of Pudgy Penguins.
The trilogy follows Pax’s search for answers after receiving a mysterious letter about his missing family, leading him to Polly and The Berg. Across three volumes, the pair uncover dangerous secrets, confront a growing conflict between penguins and bears, and ultimately fight to protect the community they come to call home.
More From AlexaBlockchain
That story became Adventures of Pax Pengu & Polly. But before a single page was illustrated, Pudgy Penguins’ writer Vivian Lin and illustrator Afiq Salam spent nearly a year developing the franchise’s first official long-form narrative. Drawing from years of established characters, locations, and community lore, they carefully wove the existing universe into a cohesive mythology while introducing new plotlines, relationships, and world-building dynamics designed to support deeper storytelling. Rather than reinventing the world fans already loved, they connected its familiar pieces into an official canon that finally reveals the missing chapters of Pengu and Polly’s journey while laying the foundation for the future of the Pudgy Penguins universe.
Development art from “Adventures of Pax Pengu & Polly” comic book. Image 1. Image Credit: Pudgy Penguins
For author Vivian Lin, the challenge wasn’t simply writing an origin story. It was creating a world that could support every story still to come.
“We weren’t writing a comic for one moment. We were creating the history that every future story could build from. Every location, every relationship, and every new character had to feel like it had always existed while leaving room for the universe to continue growing,” said Vivian Lin, writer of Adventures of Pax Pengu & Polly.
Only after the collaboration on the storyline was complete did the artwork begin. Every page is illustrated by hand, with no AI-generated artwork. Artist Afiq Salam brings the story to life using his self-taught manga-inspired drawing style chosen for its cinematic pacing and emotional storytelling. The result places readers right alongside Pengu and Polly as they journey across Antarctica, discover The Berg, and uncover the mystery that changes their lives forever. For Salam, painting that journey became deeply personal. As he illustrated Pengu’s search for answers about his missing family, he found himself drawing from his own experiences with familial loss, transforming one of the trilogy’s most emotional moments into something deeply personal.
“As I was drawing Pengu’s search for his family, I found myself thinking about my own experiences with loss. There were moments where I had to stop because the story felt so real. That’s when I realized these weren’t just cute characters anymore. They had hopes, fears, history, and deep emotions that readers will connect with,” said Afiq Salam, illustrator of Adventures of Pax Pengu & Polly.
Development art from “Adventures of Pax Pengu & Polly” comic book image 2. Image Credit: Pudgy Penguins
The trilogy (each individual comic book is priced at $9.99) and The Berg Omnibus, a premium hardcover collector’s edition limited to just 1000 copies ($49.99), will debut exclusively for sale at San Diego Comic-Con (booth #2846) on July 23rd to 26th, where fans can meet Pax Pengu and Polly, have comics signed by the creative team, and purchase exclusive collectibles debuting at Comic-Con before hitting retailers nationwide and live on Pudgypenguins.com.
A look inside“Adventures of Pax Pengu Polly” comic book. Image 3. Image Credit: Pudgy Penguins
The above article “A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Year-Long Creative Journey Behind “Adventures of Pax Pengu & Polly”” was first published on AlexaBlockchain. Read the complete article here: https://alexablockchain.com/creative-journey-behind-adventures-of-pax-pengu-polly/
Read Also: This is the First U.S.-Chartered Depository Bank to Offer Stablecoin Invoicing
Disclaimer: The information provided on AlexaBlockchain is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. Read complete disclaimer here.
The lack of Wikipedia coverage is a more acute concern in an era where more users get their information from AI tools like ChatGPT. The report cites data from the AI tracking site Profound, which shows that 7.8% of links to sources on ChatGPT go to Wikipedia, compared to 1.8% and 1.1% to Reddit and Forbes, respectively, in second and third place.
(Profound/Chainstory)
The report also cites data from Trakkr, which shows that Wikipedia accounted for 36% of the top-10 citation links on ChatGPT and 25% of the top 100.
(Trakkr/Chainstory)
Contrary to popular belief, not everyone can create a Wikipedia page. The domain for doing so involves passing through tiers of protection and moderation views, according to Chainstory’s report. Volunteer reviewer’s must check prospective new articles against a number of factors, such as notability, verifiability and reliable sources.
Even when an article clears the process, it can still be deleted by administrators or via a 7-day community vote, which cannot be appealed.
Not helping matters for crypto projects is Wikipedia’s guidelines for crypto-centric news organizations (including CoinDesk), which describe them as “overwhelmingly enthusiastic about cryptocurrencies” and “generally unreliable.”
Mainstream news outlets that cover crypto, such as Reuters and Bloomberg, are regarded as reliable, the report said,but they are less likely to explore niche areas of the industry, such as liquid staking and perpetual exchanges.
