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

On January 19, Aster officially launched the ASTER Token Strategic Buyback Reserve Mechanism and kicked off automated ASTER token repurchases. Built on the platform’s fifth-phase buyback plan from last month, this mechanism dynamically allocates 20%–40% of daily platform transaction fees toward market repurchases. It maximizes repurchase effectiveness across varying market conditions while continuously reducing ASTER’s circulating supply. The initial repurchase has been automatically executed from the reserve wallet 0x5E4969C41ca9F9831468B98328A370b7AbD5a397, with on-chain verification available.

As of January 19th, per Coinglass data: - If Bitcoin drops below $91,000, cumulative liquidation strength for long positions across major centralized exchanges (CEXs) will reach $383 million. - Conversely, should Bitcoin climb above $94,000, cumulative liquidation strength for short positions on these platforms will hit $517 million. BlockBeats Note: The liquidation chart does not display the exact number of contracts or their precise value being liquidated. The bars represent the relative importance of each liquidation cluster compared to adjacent clusters — this is defined as "strength." In short, the chart shows how intensely the underlying asset’s price will react at a specific level. A taller liquidation bar means the price will face a more severe reaction from a liquidity cascade once that threshold is crossed.

On January 19, OnchainLens data shows a whale’s entire DOGE long position was liquidated during this morning’s market downturn, resulting in a $2.2 million loss. The whale still holds a 15x leveraged ETH long position, with an unrealized loss of roughly $475,000.

On January 19, LookOnChain monitoring data shows a newly generated wallet address (0x81d0) withdrew 10,057 ETH (valued at ~$33.68 million) from Binance and staked it with Lido to mint stETH. Subsequently, the address deposited the stETH into Aave, borrowed 45 million USDT to purchase 13,461 stETH, and redeposited those stETH back into Aave. Currently, its Loan-to-Value (LTV) ratio stands at 1.36.

On January 19th, per monitoring from HyperInsight (link: https://t.me/HyperInsight), during this morning’s market downturn, long positions at the address of crypto whale “Big Brother Whale” Huang Lizheng once again slipped into unrealized losses—totaling $1 million. Previously, the positions had briefly posted an unrealized gain of over $1.3 million. Specific position details are as follows: - 10,400 ETH long (25x leverage), liquidation price $3,102.12, unrealized loss: $260,000 - 333,000 HYPE long (10x leverage), liquidation price $20.39, unrealized loss: $480,000 - 5,200 ZEC long (10x leverage), liquidation price $125.70, unrealized loss: $236,200 - 11 BTC long (40x leverage), unrealized loss: $29,300

January 19 — Per AI Mother’s monitoring, as the crypto market saw a morning dip, the total unrealized gains of the “BTC OG Insider Whale” narrowed to $13.09 million. The address has already paid $7.7 million in funding fees, leaving a net unrealized gain of $5.39 million; it lost more than $35 million in unrealized gains over 90 minutes. Long entry prices for its positions: ETH at $3,161.85, BTC at $91,506.7, SOL at $130.19.