U.S. CFTC Acting Chairman: Enforcement Division Restructured, Refocused on Combating Fraud

**Jan 19 – The Seoul Customs Office under South Korea’s Customs Service has referred a large-scale illegal foreign exchange case involving virtual assets to prosecutors.** An investigation found the criminal group engaged in illegal forex transactions through domestic and foreign virtual asset accounts over the past four years, totaling approximately 140 billion South Korean won ($95 million). The group collected fees for the activity and allegedly violated the Foreign Exchange Transactions Act. The Customs Office noted the group gathered customer funds via methods like WeChat Pay and Alipay, purchased virtual assets in multiple overseas countries, transferred them to wallets in South Korea, then converted them to Korean won for cash withdrawal. Three people are involved in the case, including a 30-something Chinese man. The group assisted with forex for various purposes—trade payments, duty-free purchases, tuition fees, and funds of unknown origin—provided customers paid a fe

On January 19, per monitoring from HyperInsight (via https://t.me/HyperInsight), the whale address 0xd475…—dubbed the "ZEC Largest Short" holder—partially closed out a segment of its MON short position. The whale reduced its MON short by 23,058,800 tokens, valued at roughly $623,300. Following this move, the whale’s remaining MON short position remains worth approximately $1.8853 million, with a floating profit of about $685,500 (a 109.09% return). Its liquidation price for the MON position is $0.475. This address gained recognition for establishing a massive ZEC short: it began shorting ZEC at $184, once facing a floating loss of $21 million before successfully turning that loss into a profit. Currently, the whale still holds large short positions on both ETH and MON.

**Bitcoin Hashrate Drops Below 1,000 EH/s for First Time Since Mid-September: Analysts Link Slump to AI Demand Growth** As of Jan. 19, Bitcoin’s network hashrate has fallen below 1,000 exahashes per second (EH/s) for the first time since mid-September, with analysts connecting the decline to sustained market interest in artificial intelligence (AI), Cointelegraph reported. Data from Hashrate Index shows the cryptocurrency’s 7-day moving average hashrate currently sits at 993 EH/s, having dipped below the 1,000 EH/s mark last Saturday. The metric is now down nearly 15% from its 7-day average peak of 1,157 EH/s recorded on Oct. 19. In a Monday post on X, Leon Lyu—CEO and founder of mining firm StandardHash—attributed the hashrate drop to Bitcoin miners reallocating computing power to AI services in pursuit of higher profit margins.

On January 19, Hyperinsight (via its Telegram channel @HyperInsight) reports the "Never Short" trader (address 0xe5416) liquidated two ETH long positions today, totaling a $38,000 loss. The address currently holds no open positions and is sitting on the sidelines. ### Notes on American English adaptation: 1. **Conciseness**: Replaced redundant "according to... monitoring" with direct "Hyperinsight (via...) reports" (common in US financial alerts). 2. **Colloquialism**: Used "sitting on the sidelines" (more natural in US casual/financial context than "waiting on the sidelines"). 3. **Clarity**: Added "open positions" (standard for unclosed trades in US markets, avoids ambiguity of "no positions"). 4. **Flow**: Rearranged to lead with key action (liquidation) before context, aligning with US news brevity norms.

On January 19th, per HyperInsight monitoring, trader "Huang Licheng" (wallet address 0x020c...) executed a rug pull on his HYPE long position, offloading 50,000 HYPE tokens valued at approximately $1.21 million. Post-operation, the position still holds roughly $4.78 million in HYPE long positions—but current floating losses stand at $329,000 (a 68.87% drawdown), with a liquidation price of $18.22. The trader previously netted profits from blue-chip NFT trading, but since reactivating this year, he’s faced massive drawdowns starting in October: his account balance has shrunk from over $100 million to the hundred-thousand-dollar range.

January 19: Analysts noted U.S. President Trump’s consideration of tariffs on European countries over the Greenland issue has amplified U.S. policy uncertainty, exerting fresh downward pressure on the dollar. David Forrest, an analyst at Fornow Credit, said Trump’s tariff threats have reignited “sell the U.S.” sentiment. Markets are also watching the “TACO deal” (a reference to Trump’s last-minute reversals) — as the president may use tariff threats as a negotiation tactic — which could provide some support for the dollar. By 2026, with geopolitical risks escalating during Trump’s term, the euro is expected to be one of the biggest losers. Tariffs could worsen the eurozone’s economically unfavorable cyclical factors and further reduce Europe’s pressure on Russia over the Ukraine issue, Xinhua reported.