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

According to a report by The Times, the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has held consultations with multiple trading platforms regarding a potential relaxation of the ban on retail investor access to financial prediction markets implemented in 2019. Previously, the FCA classified prediction contracts linked to financial and certain weather events as binary options, banning their sale to retail investors starting in 2019. However, as UK consumers increasingly turn to overseas platforms such as Kalshi and Polymarket, the regulator is now considering easing the restrictions, though its public stance still supports maintaining the ban.

Beating AI Express: Thore Graepel, a veteran of Google DeepMind’s AlphaGo team, has left the lab to launch a robotics startup. The venture aims to bring "AlphaGo-style reasoning" to the physical world, enabling robots to independently plan and act in uncertain environments. Graepel joined DeepMind in 2015, where he worked on AlphaGo, AlphaZero, and MuZero. He moved to Altos Labs in 2021, then returned to DeepMind’s Post-AGI team in 2025. The startup’s name, funding scale, and co-founders remain undisclosed.

According to official announcements, DBS Bank and Citigroup completed the first cross-border U.S. dollar payment between Singapore and the U.S. on the weekend of September 5 using tokenized deposits on Swift Digital Ledger. DBS noted that the transaction was finalized in just minutes, a massive speedup over the maximum two business days typically required for traditional cross-border payments, eliminating restrictions on businesses imposed by bank operating hours, time zones and weekends to enable all-weather cross-border fund transfers. The deal also marks that DBS and Citi are advancing the application of tokenized currency from the experimental phase to actual payment scenarios. DBS added that its tokenized currency and payment business will continue to expand, with the goal of further improving the efficiency of cross-border payments, liquidity management and foreign exchange risk management.

Since the launch of Robinhood Chain, meme coin trading on the FOMO platform has exhibited a clear "winner-takes-all" dynamic. Of the 375,740 users, approximately 95.2% either incurred losses or generated profits under $100. Data indicates only 229 users have netted over $10,000 in gains, representing roughly 0.06% of the total; an additional 653 users have earned more than $5,000, accounting for about 0.17%.

According to South Korean semiconductor media outlet The Elec, Samsung Electronics is using probe stations from U.S.-based FormFactor and Taiwan’s MPI to test silicon photonic integrated circuit (PIC) wafers, with plans to complete its independent evaluation of PICs within this year. Citing industry insiders, the report notes that both FormFactor and MPI have passed TSMC’s validations for Co-packaged Optics (CPO) and silicon photonics testing equipment. Samsung is leveraging the same testing infrastructure as TSMC to conduct optoelectronic characteristic tests on PIC wafers—including wavelength-domain and frequency-domain assessments—to verify whether optical components achieve the designed optical signal transmission and electro-optic conversion. Previously, Samsung outsourced PIC wafer verification to external institutions like Belgium’s imec; it is now building an in-house testing environment for repeat evaluations. The company also plans to proceed with customer evaluations and has indicated relevant projects will enter mass production starting in the second half of this year. The report adds that Samsung aims to launch silicon photonics foundry services in 2027, offering optical component process technologies, device libraries, and Process Design Kits (PDK). It is also advancing development of optical engines combining Electronic Integrated Circuit (EIC) and PIC, and will expand CPO applications from network switches to products like GPUs and CPUs in the future.

According to official announcements, OKX Wallet Boost’s new X Liquidity campaign is now live. Users can join via OKX Wallet’s Boost portal to provide liquidity for eligible trading pairs, earn LP returns, and participate in the distribution of USDT incentives totaling around $240,000. The campaign runs until September 24 at 15:00 (UTC+8). X Liquidity serves as the entry point for X Layer’s liquidity incentive and staking initiatives, aimed at enhancing on-chain liquidity and trading experiences for RWA, stablecoins, and major crypto assets. This round of the campaign is part of X Layer’s $5 million liquidity incentive program.