Ethena Releases January USDe Asset Custody Attestation

Dragonfly Managing Partner Haseeb Qureshi has warned that the global cybersecurity landscape is facing a hacker wave comparable to the COVID-19 pandemic, with the crypto industry being the first to experience this trend. He argues that because on-chain attacks are the most straightforward way for hackers to generate direct profits, security breaches in crypto protocols can serve as an early warning sign of broader internet security risks. While the number of hacker attacks targeting the crypto sector has surged sharply, the annualized total value of stolen funds remains roughly on par with 2025 levels, indicating a decline in the average loss per attack. Qureshi pointed out that attackers are focusing on small DeFi protocols with weak security safeguards and inadequate maintenance, whereas large crypto protocols have begun leveraging AI tools to bolster their defenses. He predicts that this large-scale attack trend will eventually spread to the traditional internet industry.

Beating AI Express (Dongcha) reports: Bloomberg’s latest report states that DeepSeek has completed its second round of financing worth 100 billion yuan, with Tencent and CATL being among the largest investors. The round was initially targeted to raise 50 billion yuan, but its fundraising goal was raised twice afterward. Despite the financing scale doubling, DeepSeek’s pre-money valuation remains at around 500 billion yuan. At the end of June this year, DeepSeek just closed its first round of financing of approximately 51 billion yuan, with founder Liang Wenfeng contributing around 20 billion yuan personally. Calculated based on the reported scale of this round, the total financing of the two rounds amounts to roughly 150 billion yuan. In this round, new and existing shareholders will each contribute about half of the total planned investment. CATL will add around 10 billion yuan, while Tencent will also continue to invest approximately 10 billion yuan. New investors include Stone Capital, SMIC Holdings, CPE Source Capital, Legend Capital, and Geely, among others. Perfect World announced on October 22 that two funds managed by entities related to Lisi Capital and Shixiang Capital have completed fundraising, with sizes of 7.52 billion yuan and 3.65 billion yuan respectively. Perfect World has subscribed to a total of 150 million yuan, and Century Huatong has previously disclosed its participation in the investment. Both funds participated in DeepSeek’s current financing round, but the specific investment amounts have not been made public. DeepSeek is also preparing for an IPO on China’s STAR Market, planning to submit its listing application as early as the end of this year and aiming to go public in 2027.

According to Bitget market data, Hong Kong stocks have extended losses since opening today. The Hang Seng Index fell 2.7% intraday, breaking below the 23,000-point mark; the Hang Seng Tech Index dropped 4.38%, with the artificial intelligence sector slumping—Days Innovations and Zhipu AI both fell more than 9%.

According to Yonhap News Agency, South Korea's Financial Services Commission Chairman Lee Eoguen told the National Assembly's Administrative Committee during a comprehensive audit that "various factors need to be fully considered" regarding virtual asset taxation set to take effect next year. People Power Party lawmaker Song Eon-seok on the same day questioned whether the tax should be scrapped or delayed, arguing that taxation is being advanced before the nature of digital assets and policy direction are clarified, and that the "Digital Asset Basic Act" should be prioritized for drafting. Lee responded that digital asset-related bills are in the final negotiation stage and will be pushed for discussion as soon as possible. On the taxation front, opinions from all sides are diverse and still being gathered. South Korea's virtual asset tax was introduced in 2020 via an amendment to the Income Tax Act, and has been delayed three times previously. The government is currently proceeding with administrative procedures in line with the January next year implementation schedule, but industry stakeholders and even some ruling party members argue the timing is premature due to unclear standards and insufficient infrastructure.

Hong Kong-listed large language model (LLM) giants MiniMax and Zhipu AI continue to slump: MiniMax fell below its IPO price of HK$165 during intraday trading, while Zhipu AI also extended its decline, with both pulling back over 80% from their all-time highs. On-chain long positions are also under pressure: the former largest long holder of Zhipu AI liquidated their position with losses exceeding $2.7 million, while the current largest long holders of both contracts still hold a combined unrealized loss of around $1.53 million. According to TradingBeats monitoring, the perpetual contracts for MINIMAX and ZHIPU on Hyperliquid are trading at $20.593 and $58.354 respectively. Among them, the current largest long holder of Zhipu AI (wallet address 0xddb8) holds a ZHIPU position valued at approximately $1.7119 million, with an average entry price of $105.091, resulting in an unrealized loss of around $1.3711 million. The current price is about 44.5% lower than its cost basis, and the liquidation price is $34.55. This account opened its position on the evening of July 6. The current largest long holder of MiniMax (wallet address 0xd33c) holds a MINIMAX position valued at around $331,200, with an average entry price of $30.7616, and an unrealized loss of approximately $163,600. The current price is about 33.1% lower than its cost, and the liquidation price is $16.95. The former largest long holder of Zhipu AI (wallet address 0x8b3f) liquidated their position at a loss the day before yesterday. This account had opened a long position worth $4.5445 million, incurring a loss of around $2.7063 million; had they not exited, the loss would have widened further.

According to TradingBeats monitoring, from last night to the present, six whale addresses (each holding over $1 million) on Hyperliquid have been liquidated for a total of roughly $25.911 million, including $18.5024 million in short positions and $7.4086 million in long positions. Both long and short sides saw consecutive liquidations. Trader Aguila Trades was partially liquidated four times today, while another multi-million-dollar short whale retained a large position after multiple rounds of liquidations. Over the past half hour, trader Aguila Trades (0x1f25) has been partially liquidated four times in a row on its BTC long positions, with a total of 21.12 BTC (worth around $1.7612 million) liquidated, resulting in a loss of approximately $25,900. The account currently holds 14.65 BTC long positions, valued at around $1.2144 million, with a liquidation price of $82,695. The largest liquidation in this round stemmed from an account starting with 0x4b62. Last night, this whale’s BTC and ETH short positions were partially liquidated multiple times, with a total of 203.60 BTC and 565.16 ETH liquidated, amounting to around $18.5024 million. The account has continued trading since, and currently holds roughly $29.1877 million in BTC short positions. The remaining four addresses also faced million-dollar-level liquidations one after another. Among them, the account starting with 0x89f had its entire BTC long position of around $2.2222 million liquidated, with no perpetual positions left; the account starting with 0x3f5f had its BTC and ZEC long positions liquidated for around $1.1842 million and $116,900 respectively, while still holding remaining positions. Additionally, the account starting with 0x7c1 had around $1.117 million in BTC long positions liquidated over the past half hour; the account starting with 0x9bb had around $1.0072 million in BTC long positions liquidated over the past hour.