Blockchain sleuth ZachXBT alleges Axiom employee conducted insider trading

Community Information

AXIOM EMPLOYEE ACCUSED OF ALLEGEDLY INSIDER TRAINING BY ZACHXBT: Blockchain sleuth ZachXBT mentioned a senior worker at onchain buying and selling platform Axiom Change allegedly abused inner entry to person information to trace non-public wallets and doubtlessly commerce memecoins utilizing inside data. In a thread posted to X, ZachXBT mentioned Broox Bauer, a New York-based senior enterprise growth worker at Axiom, used inner dashboards to lookup delicate person data — together with linked pockets addresses — and shared that information with a small group that mapped trades of outstanding crypto influencers. Axiom, based in 2024 by Mist and Cal and a member of Y Combinator’s Winter 2025 cohort, has generated greater than $390 million in income up to now, based on the investigator. ZachXBT mentioned he was retained to analyze allegations that inner instruments had been being misused. He didn’t say who retained him. In audio clips shared within the thread, an individual mentioned to be Bauer allegedly claims he can observe “any Axiom person” by referral code, pockets tackle or UID and “discover out something to do with that individual.” In the identical recording, he describes initially researching 10–20 wallets and progressively growing exercise “so it doesn’t look that suspicious.” — Oliver Knight Learn extra.

EF ‘STRAWMAP’ ROADMAP RELEASED: Ethereum Basis revealed a roadmap that reads prefer it’s constructing for the subsequent decade, not surviving the present quarter. The doc, referred to as the “strawmap” and launched Wednesday by EF researcher Justin Drake, lays out a plan for seven exhausting forks by 2029. Onerous forks are network-wide software program upgrades that each node should implement or get left behind, making them the highest-stakes kind of change Ethereum could make. The plan is organized round 5 targets described as “north stars.” These embrace a quicker layer 1 with transaction finality in seconds; dramatically larger layer-1 throughput able to round 10,000 transactions per second (known as “gigagas” scale); Layer-2 networks reaching “teragas” ranges of throughput, or roughly 10 million TPS; post-quantum cryptography and built-in privateness by shielded ETH transfers. — Shaurya Malwa Learn extra.

ROBINHOOD CHAIN TESTNET UPDATE: Robinhood’s (HOOD) testnet logged 4 million transactions within the first week its testnet chain went dwell, the funding platform’s CEO Vlad Tenev mentioned on X. The Robinhood Chain, which focuses on tokenization and buying and selling, comes as centralized exchanges want to construct their very own blockchain infrastructure even because the broader Ethereum ecosystem debates its future. “Builders are already constructing on our L2, designed for tokenized actual world property and onchain monetary providers,” Tenev wrote. Testnets are risk-free environments for builders to check code and experimental options earlier than the mainnet goes dwell. The 2 phases of a community’s growth could be in comparison with a flight simulator and a business flight. The Robinhood Chain’s testnet has arrived in opposition to the backdrop of a bigger reckoning within the Ethereum world. Earlier this month, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin declared that the protocol’s long-held layer-2 (L2) rollup-centric roadmap “not is sensible,” arguing that many rollups have fallen in need of full decentralization and that Ethereum’s base layer is scaling quicker than anticipated. — Margaux Nijkerk Learn extra.

OPENAI DIPS ITS TOES INTO SMART CONTRACTS: OpenAI is stepping deeper into crypto safety with the debut of EVMbench, a testing framework designed to measure how properly synthetic intelligence can perceive and doubtlessly safe sensible contracts on Ethereum and related blockchains. Good contracts, the self-executing code deployed on blockchains like Ethereum, underpin decentralized exchanges, lending protocols and a variety of onchain monetary purposes. As a result of these contracts are sometimes immutable as soon as deployed, vulnerabilities could be critical. EVMbench is OpenAI’s try to see whether or not trendy AI programs are as much as the duty of serving to stop these points. In-built collaboration with crypto funding agency Paradigm, the benchmark attracts on real-world sensible contract vulnerabilities already uncovered by audits and safety competitions. The system measures efficiency throughout three core skills: figuring out safety bugs, exploiting these bugs in a managed atmosphere and fixing the weak code with out breaking the contracts. OpenAI says the objective is to determine a transparent customary for evaluating AI programs in blockchain safety, particularly as decentralized finance continues to safe billions of {dollars} in person funds. The stakes for sensible contracts are solely rising. — Margaux Nijkerk Learn extra.

In Different Information

• Meta, the U.S. tech big helmed by Fb creator Mark Zuckerberg, goals to enter the stablecoin area later this yr, pending profitable integration with a third-party agency to facilitate funds utilizing the dollar-pegged token know-how, based on three folks aware of the plans. The tech big, which owns Fb, WhatsApp and Instagram and has greater than 3 billion customers, desires to start its stablecoin integration early within the second half of this yr, mentioned one of many folks, who spoke on situation of anonymity as a result of the plans aren’t public. Meta is planning to combine a vendor to assist administer stablecoin-backed funds and implement a brand new pockets, the individual mentioned. A second individual mentioned that Meta has despatched out a request for product (RFP) to third-party companies and talked about Stripe as a probable candidate for piloting the stablecoin. Introducing stablecoins would let Meta open fee rails to its large person base whereas bypassing costly conventional banking charges, and doubtlessly place it as a worldwide chief in “social commerce” and cross-border remittances. — Ian Allison Learn extra.
• American Bitcoin (ABTC), the bitcoin mining firm backed by the household of President Donald Trump, mentioned it misplaced $59 million within the fourth quarter because the plummeting value of the most important cryptocurrency eroded the worth of its holdings. The corporate, which went public in September, lower than a month earlier than the most important cryptocurrency hit a document excessive, is pursuing a twin technique of mining and purchases, with roughly one-third of its $BTC coming from mining operations. The remainder comes from open-market purchases and strategic transactions, funded largely by promoting inventory. The corporate, which is 20% owned by Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr, generated $150.5 million by an at-the-market inventory providing in the course of the quarter. The capital allowed it to spice up its per-share bitcoin publicity by practically 50%. It now holds greater than 6,000 $BTC, it mentioned. In the course of the quarter, it mined bitcoin at a 53% gross margin, suggesting manufacturing prices had been considerably beneath spot costs at the same time as the worth of the cryptocurrency fell. Income rose 22% from the third quarter. — Francesco Rodrigues & James Van Straten Learn extra.

Regulatory and Coverage

• The Indiana state legislature approved public retirement and financial savings plans to realize publicity to digital property and spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs), whereas affirming residents’ entry to crypto investments. Governor Mike Braun is anticipated to signal HB 1042 into legislation throughout the subsequent 10 days. Indiana joins not less than seven different states, together with Wyoming, Wisconsin, Michigan and Arizona, which have moved to combine crypto-linked merchandise into public funding frameworks. Nearly half of the state governments within the U.S. are both on a path towards placing a few of their cash into crypto or have already got, with a lot of this pattern creating since President Donald Trump directed his administration to determine a Bitcoin Strategic Reserve. — Olivier Acuna Learn extra.
• The U.S. Treasury Division sanctioned a Russian firm, Operation Zero, and the people behind it, together with Sergey Sergeyevich Zelenyuk, after accusing them of shopping for stolen cyber instruments for thousands and thousands in cryptocurrency and reselling these applied sciences, which had been created for U.S. authorities use. The instruments had been mentioned to be initially stolen by an Australian nationwide, Peter Williams, who as soon as labored on the protection contractor that made the national-security targeted software program “for the unique use of the U.S. authorities and choose allies.” Williams pleaded responsible final yr to promoting commerce secrets and techniques. “Treasury will proceed to work alongside the remainder of the Trump Administration to guard delicate American mental property and safeguard our nationwide safety,” mentioned Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent in a press release. Zelenyuk and the others are mentioned to be the primary folks to be sanctioned underneath the Defending American Mental Property Act. — Jesse Hamilton Learn extra.

Calendar

• Mar. 24-26, 2026: Digital Asset Summit, New York Metropolis
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