News preview:
- Cboe and FTSE Russell to launch new Bitcoin futures product on April 28
- Binance Alpha to List Sign (SIGN) and Haedal Protocol (HAEDAL)
- TOKEN 2049 Dubai Conference will be held from April 30 to May 1, Trump's second son Eric Trump will be invited to attend
- Frax Finance will upgrade to North Star in the early morning of April 30 (UTC+8). Frax Share will be renamed Frax and used as a gas token.
- Hyperliquid plans to adjust the fee system after April 30 and introduce a staking tier system
- Sui (SUI) will unlock approximately 74 million tokens at 8:00 am Beijing time on May 1, accounting for 2.28% of the current circulation and worth approximately US$267 million.
April 28
Policy supervision:
Arizona’s two bitcoin reserve bills will now go to a third reading and possible final vote next Monday, which could become the first state-level bitcoin reserve bills to pass a vote.
Exchange:
Cboe and FTSE Russell to launch new Bitcoin futures product on April 28
According to Cboe Digital, the crypto arm of the Chicago Board Options Exchange (Cboe), it plans to launch a new Bitcoin futures product on April 28, subject to regulatory approval. The futures product launched in cooperation with FTSE Russell will be settled on the last working day of each month. The futures contract is cash-settled and is based on the XBTF index, which reflects 1/10 of the value of the FTSE Bitcoin Index.
Binance Alpha to List Sign (SIGN) on April 28
Binance announced that Binance Alpha will list Sign (SIGN), and trading will be open on April 28, with the specific time to be announced. Earlier, Sign announced the economics of SIGN tokens: 40% is allocated to community incentives, of which 10% will be airdropped during TGE .
Crypto exchange Bybit announced that it will discontinue a range of its Web3 products and services by the end of May in a notice published on April 16. The exchange said the decision is part of a shift in its operational focus as Bybit enters a new phase of growth and innovation.
The services that will be discontinued include Bybit's Cloud Wallet and Keyless Wallet, both of which will be unavailable after May 31, 2025. Users are urged to transfer all assets in these wallets, including tokens, NFTs, and inscription assets, to their Bybit funding accounts or seed phrase wallets before the deadline. Failure to complete the transfer by the deadline may result in access delays and require additional identity verification. In addition, Bybit will shut down several Web3 trading features at the end of May, including its DEX Pro platform, Swap & Bridge service, and the broader NFT marketplace. In addition to these changes, Bybit has also stopped support for several other services, including Inscriptions, NFT Pro, ApeX, Buy Crypto, and its Initial DEX Issuance (ID0) platform on April 8. The company's Web3 Points program will also be discontinued on April 28.
Project dynamics:
BNB Chain announced on the X platform that it has initiated a proposal to update the key parameters of the Lorentz hard fork, involving ValidatorContract, SlashContract and GovernorContract. The voting will end on April 28, and the current approval rate is 100%.
It is reported that the BSC Lorentz mainnet hard fork upgrade will be carried out at 13:05 (UTC+8) on April 29 .
Spain’s Hesperides University Launches Bitcoin Master’s Degree, Starting April 28
The University of the Hespérides in Spain has announced the launch of the first Spanish-language master's program in Bitcoin, which will start on April 28, 2025 and aims to train professionals in the field of Bitcoin with comprehensive technical, economic, legal and philosophical capabilities. The program is taught entirely online, covering the philosophy, history, economics, technology, regulation and commercial applications of Bitcoin, emphasizing its value as a transformative currency network. Partners include BTC Inc, Jan3, BTC Consulting 360, etc., to ensure that the course is closely integrated with industry needs. The program is open to students worldwide and has now completed enrollment.
April 29
Policy supervision:
Kim Sang-hoon, chairman of the policy committee of the ruling People's Power Party of South Korea, said that the legislation of the Basic Law on Digital Assets will be promoted to systematically manage and promote the healthy development of the digital asset market, and to achieve the coordination and unification of investor protection and industrial innovation. He pointed out that due to unclear supervision and excessive restrictions, it is difficult for foreign capital to enter the Korean market, and domestic capital is also accelerating to flow overseas. Kim Sang-hoon said that virtual assets are an important part of the new economy and should be institutionalized. The relevant policies will be officially released by Congressman Park Soo-min on April 29.
Exchange:
Binance Alpha to List Haedal Protocol (HAEDAL) on April 29
Binance announced that its platform Binance Alpha will launch Haedal Protocol (HAEDAL) for the first time, and trading will start on April 29, with the specific time to be announced. Earlier news, Sui Ecological Liquidity Staking Protocol HaedalProtocol completed its seed round of financing, with participation from Hashed, Animoca Ventures and others .
Ouyi will delist five spot trading pairs including KISHU and MAX on April 29
KISHU, MAX, MILO, MXC, SSWP and their USDT trading pairs will be officially offline from 16:00 to 18:00 Beijing time on April 29. The deposit function has been closed on April 22, and withdrawals will be terminated on July 29. The KISHU on-chain dividend will be distributed for the last time on April 25, and users need to handle related assets in a timely manner.
Developer Activities:
Meta to hold developer conference LlamaCon on April 29
April 30
Macroeconomics:
20:30: U.S. labor cost index quarterly rate in the first quarter, initial value of real GDP annualized quarterly rate in the first quarter, initial value of real personal consumption expenditure quarterly rate in the first quarter, initial value of core PCE price index annualized quarterly rate in the first quarter
22:00: US PCE price data for March, personal spending monthly rate for March, existing home sales index monthly rate for March
Exchange:
Nigerian court postpones Binance tax evasion case hearing to April 30
The Nigerian court postponed the tax evasion case against Binance until April 30 to allow the tax authorities to respond to the legal motion filed by Binance. The Nigerian Federal Taxation Authority accused Binance of failing to pay corporate income tax and fines for 2022 and 2023, with a total claim of more than US$79 billion . Binance questioned the legality of the court's delivery of legal documents via email, saying that its headquarters is in the Cayman Islands and it has no entity in Nigeria.
Project dynamics:
OpenAI: GPT-4 will be retired on April 30 and completely replaced by 4o
OpenAI stated on its website that from April 30, GPT-4 will be "completely replaced" by GPT-4o, but GPT-4 will continue to be available through the API. OpenAI said, "In face-to-face evaluations, it (4o) continues to surpass GPT-4 in writing, coding, STEM, etc." According to the US media The Verge on the 10th, OpenAI will unveil a series of new AI models next week, including GPT-4.1, which will be an improved version of the 4o multimodal model. OpenAI will also launch smaller GPT-4.1 mini and nano versions, as well as the o3 "inference" model and a new inference model called o4-mini.
Decentralized stablecoin protocol Frax Finance announced that it will upgrade North Star at noon PST on April 29 (expected to be early morning April 30 Beijing time). With this upgrade, Frax Share (FXS) will be renamed Frax and become Fraxtal's gas token, replacing frxETH. It will also serve as the only commodity token used to ensure security in the ecosystem. FXS held on Fraxtal will be automatically converted to FRAX at a 1:1 ratio, and FXS held on Ethereum must be bridged to Fraxtal for conversion on or after April 29.
X2Y2 will shut down its NFT marketplace on April 30, but smart contracts will continue to operate
According to the official announcement of X2Y2, after a three-year journey with a transaction volume of US$5.6 billion, X2Y2 will officially close its NFT market on April 30, 2025. X2Y2 co-founder @tp_x2y2 said that although the platform will be closed, the relevant smart contracts will continue to run.
Terraform Labs: Cryptocurrency loss claims portal has been opened, the deadline is April 30
Terraform Labs' crypto asset loss claims portal will be open on March 31, 2025. Creditors can submit eligible crypto asset loss claims at http://claims.terra.money . When submitting, they need to provide supporting documents such as wallet address/read-only API key and fill in the complete claim form. The deadline for claim submission is April 30, 2025, 23:59 (EST). Late submissions will not be accepted.
Hyperliquid plans to adjust the fee system after April 30 and introduce a staking tier system
Hyperliquid announced that it will adjust the fee system on or after April 30, 2025, and introduce staking tiers (StakingTiers). Under the new rules, users who stake HYPE tokens can enjoy lower transaction fees, up to a 40% discount. In addition, the spot and contract markets will adopt independent fee systems, and the weight will be doubled when calculating spot trading volume to improve the fairness of fee calculations. After the adjustment, the default rate has increased, the contract Taker rate has increased from 0.035% to 0.045%, and the spot Taker rate has doubled from 0.035% to 0.07%. Hyperliquid said the move is aimed at increasing protocol revenue and enhancing the practicality of HYPE.
Developer Activities:
Alliance announced that it will hold the MVP Hackathon in San Francisco with Base. The champion project can directly advance to the Alliance accelerator ALL15 batch and have the opportunity to receive up to $500,000 in investment funds from Alliance and Coinbase Ventures (subject to specific terms). The application deadline is April 30, and the topics cover encryption, AI, robotics and cutting-edge technology.
Applications for the sixth Ethereum Protocol Scholarship are now open, with a deadline of April 30
The sixth Ethereum Protocol Fellowship (EPF) is now open for application, with a deadline of April 30. This EPF will be held from June to November 2025, with two offline events at EthCC in France and Devconnect in Argentina. The program is aimed at experienced software engineers, providing mentor guidance and stipend support, aiming to promote the development of Ethereum protocols, including consensus, client development, testing, etc.
Conference Activities:
Token unlocking:
Optimism (OP) will unlock approximately 31.34 million tokens at 8:00 am Beijing time on April 30, accounting for 1.89% of the current circulation, with a value of approximately US$25.7 million.
Kamino (KMNO) will unlock approximately 229 million tokens at 8:00 pm Beijing time on April 30, accounting for 16.98% of the current circulation and worth approximately US$14.5 million.
Gunz (GUN) will unlock approximately 83.33 million tokens at 10:00 pm Beijing time on April 30, accounting for 13.79% of the current circulation and worth approximately US$5 million.
Renzo (REZ) will unlock approximately 527 million tokens at 7:00 pm Beijing time on April 30, accounting for 19.57% of the current circulation and worth approximately US$7.4 million.
May 1
Exchange:
Coinbase International plans to launch ZORA perpetual contract trading on May 1
Coinbase International Station announced on the X platform that Coinbase International Station and Coinbase Advanced will add support for ZORA perpetual contracts. The ZORA-PERP market is expected to open at or after 17:30 Beijing time on May 1.
Bitget will launch an upgraded liquidity incentive plan on May 1
Bitget will officially launch the newly upgraded "Liquidity Incentive Plan" on May 1. The plan aims to further improve the liquidity and transaction efficiency of spot and contracts by optimizing the rate structure and incentive mechanism.
The new version of the plan introduces a new tiered system, bringing a more competitive rate incentive structure: the highest Maker rebate in the spot market can reach -0.012%, and the highest rebate in the contract market is -0.005%; the lowest Taker fee is 0.020% (spot) and 0.025% (contract). In addition, mainstream perpetual contract trading pairs such as BTCUSDT and ETHUSDT are included in the Maker negative fee range for the first time. Currently, there are about 130 contract currencies that are subject to this policy, and it will continue to expand in the future based on liquidity performance. New teams can submit historical transaction data to apply for initial level upgrades, and be the first to enjoy premium rates and higher API frequency limit support.
Crypto exchange eXch announced it will shut down on May 1 amid money laundering allegations
Crypto exchange eXch has announced that it will cease operations on May 1. It was previously reported that the platform was used to launder some of the stolen funds from the Bybit exchange. In an announcement on April 17, eXch said that the majority of its management team voted to "cease operations and exit" in response to allegations that the North Korean hacker group Lazarus Group laundered approximately $35 million in funds through the platform - funds derived from the $1.4 billion hack of Bybit. The exchange said it had become the target of a "transatlantic joint law enforcement operation" that aims to shut down its operations and possibly bring criminal charges.
Project dynamics:
PsyFi will shut down all services, including PsyLend and Vaults, on May 1
According to official news from PsyFi, the provider of financial instrument products in the Solana ecosystem, PsyFi (including PsyLend and Vaults) will shut down all front-end and back-end services and stop platform support on May 1, 2025. The platform has now entered a withdrawal-only mode, and the official reminds users to complete the withdrawal of funds before this date to ensure the safety of their assets. In addition, PsyFi stated that it may share the contract address and IDL in the future so that users with needs can interact directly with smart contracts.
Nethermind head: plans to remove Ethereum pre-merger history in new version 1.3.1 on May 1
Marek Moraczyński, head of Ethereum client Nethermind, posted on the X platform that more than 80% of Ethereum full node disk space is currently occupied by historical records. In the new version 1.3.1, Nethermind is ready to remove pre-merger historical records through ERA files, and all teams agree to perform relevant operations on May 1. If all blocks and all receipts are removed and only the data required to verify the latest block is retained, the full node capacity will be less than 200 GB.
Prague-based crypto venture capital firm RockawayX announced the completion of its second early-stage fund raising of $125 million. The fund closed in the first quarter of this year and will mainly invest in Solana ecosystem startups. The firm, which invested in the unlaunched Solana in 2018, currently manages assets of approximately $2 billion, has offices in Prague, Dubai and London, and two-thirds of its 45 employees are engineers. RockawayX CEO Victor Fischer said that two-thirds of the new fund will be used for seed round investments, and the rest will be allocated to liquid assets.
Although the amount of crypto venture capital in the US market fell by 22% in the first quarter, RockawayX's fund return in 2021 has exceeded 5 times, mainly benefiting from early investments in Solana, market maker Wintermute and lending protocol Morpho Labs. The institution has invested in more than 15 Solana ecosystem projects and will jointly launch the accelerator center "Solana City" in Dubai with the Solana Foundation and development company Helius Labs on May 1.
Crypto investment platform Bake will close its Singapore market and services from May 1
Crypto investment platform Bake will shut down its Singapore market and services from May 1. Bake has set April 30, 2025 as the last date for all users to withdraw digital assets. Officials recommend that all users process their funds before the deadline to avoid any additional administrative processes and potential fees.
Token unlocking:
Sui (SUI) will unlock approximately 74 million tokens at 8:00 am Beijing time on May 1, accounting for 2.28% of the current circulation and worth approximately US$267 million.
ZetaChain (ZETA) will unlock approximately 44.26 million tokens at 8:00 am Beijing time on May 1, accounting for 5.67% of the current circulation and worth approximately US$11.3 million.
DYDX (DYDX) will unlock approximately 8.33 million tokens at 8:00 am Beijing time on May 1, accounting for 1.09% of the current circulation and worth approximately US$5.4 million.
May 2
Macroeconomics:
U.S. April seasonally adjusted non-farm payrolls and unemployment rate will be announced at 20:30
Exchange:
Binance will delist ALPACA, PDA, VIB and WING on May 2
According to Binance's announcement, as they no longer meet the platform's review standards, Binance will stop all spot trading pairs of ALPACA, PDA, VIB and WING tokens and remove them from the shelves at 11:00 (Beijing time) on May 2, 2025. The official emphasized that the decision was based on multiple evaluation indicators such as project team activity, trading liquidity, network security, and community transparency.
Project News:
CoinList to Launch Fleek (FLK) Token Sale on May 2
Fleek, an AI agent and virtual influence platform, will launch the $FLK token sale at 1:00 a.m. Beijing time on May 2. The total number of tokens is 100 million, of which 6,666,700 will be open this time, with a FDV of $75 million and a selling price of $0.75. Fleek is known as the "Shopify of AI" and supports developers, creators and brands to build and monetize AI agents and virtual people on its platform. The project has received support from Eliza (formerly ai16z), Venice AI, etc. This sale is not open to the United States, Canada, China, the United Kingdom and other regions.
Token unlocking:
Omni Network (OMNI) will unlock approximately 15.98 million tokens at 7:00 pm Beijing time on May 2, accounting for 83.51% of the current circulation, with a value of approximately US$42.2 million.
Ethena (ENA) will unlock approximately 40.63 million tokens at 3:00 pm Beijing time on May 2, accounting for 0.73% of the current circulation and worth approximately US$14.2 million.
May 3
Token unlocking:
Memecoin (MEME) will unlock about 3.45 billion tokens at 3:30 pm Beijing time on May 3, accounting for 7.90% of the current circulation and worth about US$7.4 million.
May 4
None
Specific time to be determined
OKX CEO: OKX will launch a payment wallet next week
OKX CEO Star posted on the X platform that OKX will launch a new OKX payment wallet next week, aiming to promote the adoption of cryptocurrency to the billion-user level.
