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

**Korbit Fined $1.88M, Hit with Warning for AML Violations in South Korea** South Korea’s Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU)—a division of the Financial Services Commission (FSC)—announced on December 31 that cryptocurrency exchange Korbit has received an institutional warning and a 2.73 billion South Korean won (≈$1.88 million) fine for violating anti-money laundering (AML) obligations under the Specific Financial Information Act. The FIU also issued a caution to Korbit’s representative office and a reprimand to its AML reporting officer. The sanctions stem from three key violations uncovered during an on-site inspection held October 16–29, 2024: 1. Roughly 22,000 Customer Due Diligence (CDD) and transaction restriction breaches, including accepting unclear identity documents, allowing transactions with incomplete customer information, and failing to periodically reconfirm customer details. 2. Conducting 19 asset transfer transactions with three unregistered overseas virtu

On December 31, per LookOnChain monitoring data, Arthur Hayes added 4.86 million ENA (worth roughly $986k) and 697,851 ETHFI (worth approximately $485k) to his holdings.

Dec. 31 — The U.S. Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) plans to explore in 2026 whether certain stablecoins qualify as "cash equivalents" and study accounting for cryptocurrency transactions (including wrapped tokens), according to The Wall Street Journal. The move comes amid the Trump administration’s push for crypto policies and the passage of the U.S. Stablecoin Innovation Act (GENIUS Act). Rich Jones, FASB chair, noted these crypto-related projects are already on the agenda. Previously, in 2023, FASB required businesses to account for cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum using fair value accounting—but the rule at that time excluded NFTs and certain stablecoins.

December 31 ElizaOS founder Shaw weighed in on the “quantum computing threat to Bitcoin” on Monday, pushing back against media hype by noting its actualization is far further off than current coverage suggests. For hash functions like SHA-256, Grover’s algorithm only cuts the search space from 2^256 to 2^128—but 2^128 remains unbreakable with foreseeable technology. Shor’s algorithm can theoretically crack RSA/ECDSA encryption, but today’s quantum computers rely mostly on preprocessing or known-factor optimizations, not a full universal implementation of Shor’s algorithm. Cracking Bitcoin (a real-time network) would demand fast, repeated executions. If that were to happen, all encrypted data would be exposed—making Bitcoin the least of our worries. Modern cryptography has always accounted for future computational advances, and quantum acceleration was anticipated and built into designs decades ago. “Next time you see fear-mongering or hype about quantum computing, remember t

**December 31 –** The Dark Side of the Moon (Kimi) has closed its $500 million Series C funding round, led by IDG with a $1.5 billion investment. Existing shareholders including Alibaba, Tencent, and Wang Huiwen have subscribed to additional shares, pushing the company’s post-investment valuation to $4.3 billion. Wang Huiwen has already invested a total of $70 million in the firm, per reports. A source close to the company noted primary market enthusiasm for The Dark Side of the Moon exceeded expectations. On the same day, Yang Zhilin, founder and CEO of The Dark Side of the Moon, issued an internal memo revealing the company holds over 10 billion RMB in cash reserves—an amount comparable to the post-IPO cash holdings of Zhipu and MiniMax. - As of June 2025, Zhipu has $2.55 billion in cash on hand, with an expected IPO raise of ~$3.8 billion. - As of September 2025, MiniMax holds $7.35 billion in cash, targeting an IPO fundraising range of $3.4–$3.8 billion. Sources added,