The popular AI framework Virtuals Protocol will host an in-person meet-up in Hong Kong on Friday, January 17.

According to monitoring data from TradingBeats (formerly Hyperinsight), as of press time, roughly 2.5658 million HYPE tokens held by large stakers (each holding at least 100,000 HYPE) are in the staking withdrawal queue over the next six days, worth approximately $208 million at current prices. Of this amount, addresses linked to the protocol contract, Trade.xyz, and Hyperliquid Labs still make up the majority. Separately, four large external addresses hold a combined 551,100 HYPE, valued at $44.69 million, which will sequentially complete their 7-day waiting period and move back to spot accounts: - 0x023a (Auros Global): ~101,000 HYPE, expected to be credited on the evening of August 31, worth ~$8.19 million; - 0x251f: ~135,100 HYPE, expected to be credited on the evening of September 3, worth ~$10.96 million; - 0xc288: ~115,000 HYPE, expected to be credited on September 4, worth ~$9.33 million; - 0xe867 ("Million HYPE Staking Whale"): ~200,000 HYPE, expected to be credited on September 6, worth ~$16.22 million. These four addresses account for about 21.5% of the total large-scale inflows over the next six days. The remaining ~2.0147 million HYPE primarily involve addresses related to stakedHYPE, Kinetiq, Trade.xyz, and Hyperliquid Labs, with a single-day peak of ~1.34 million HYPE on September 5 (including 1.05 million from large stakers).

According to Bitget market data, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Tech Index turned positive in the afternoon, with MINIMAX-W (00100.HK) rallying more than 17% and Zhipu (02513.HK) rising over 5%.

In response to recent market turmoil, an HTX spokesperson issued a statement asserting the platform is "as stable as ever". Tracing the history of the crypto industry, HTX – a veteran exchange with 13 years of steady operation – has weathered multiple rounds of bull and bear market cycles. The official pointed out that dozens of rumors targeting the platform and Justin Sun over the past two years have ultimately been debunked, reminding investors to remain rational amid intense commercial competition.

Beating AI Express (Dongcha) – According to the latest internal news, ByteDance recently held a briefing on Doubao shares, raising the price from $14.85 in June to $17.02, a 14.6% increase over two months. Meanwhile, some employees can adjust their compensation structure by converting a portion of their total cash package into Doubao shares, with conversion limits varying by individual. The report notes that some L2 and L3 employees have a maximum allocation ratio of 20%, while some L3 and L4 employees can reach 25% or 30%. ByteDance also increased Doubao share grants, with some employees receiving additional allocations of around 5% of their total compensation package. This policy does not cover all staff, applying mainly to teams working on Seed’s pre-training, multimodal, Vision Language Model (VLM) and other large models, as well as the main Doubao App under Flow. Some teams closely tied to Seed and the Doubao base, such as Ark, may also receive Doubao shares. Doubao shares are an internal virtual equity incentive designed by ByteDance for its AI business. The first repurchase price was $13.08 in April, rising to $14.85 in June. In May, some Seed employees were already given the option to convert their year-end bonuses into Doubao shares. With the further opening of total cash package conversion this time, employees can allocate more of their income directly to the Doubao business. Calculated from the April price of $13.08, Doubao shares have risen by 30.1% cumulatively so far. In the same period from April to June, Doubao shares increased by 13.5%, while ByteDance Group options only rose by around 2.6%.

Serenity published a post stating that OpenAI is stockpiling tens of thousands of Apple Mac mini and Mac Studio units for reinforcement learning tasks. Anthropic, meanwhile, is renting Apple Mac minis from Amazon to carry out similar AI work. Serenity quipped that Apple appears to have "accidentally become a major winner of the AI boom without taking any direct action". Additionally, on August 27, Anthropic partnered with Raspberry Pi to launch a new model hardware standard. No information has yet emerged indicating that either Anthropic or OpenAI is purchasing Raspberry Pi devices for similar tasks.

According to the New York Post, 20-year-old Barron Trump currently leads a reclusive life under tight security. The report states that Barron recently completed his sophomore year at New York University and spent this summer primarily residing with his mother Melania Trump in Bedminster, New Jersey. Citing sources, the outlet says Barron "rarely goes out" and tends to avoid public settings. Donald Trump has faced at least three assassination threats or attempted attacks since July 2024; recently, Iranian hardliners released a threat video targeting Barron and offered a $10 million bounty for his whereabouts. The New York Post notes Barron was also affected by the 2025 assassination of Charlie Kirk. Meanwhile, he has started engaging in business activities, including launching a herbal energy drink business with a high school friend and investing in cryptocurrency.