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

Ant Group’s open-source announcement has officially unveiled and open-sourced Ling-3.0-flash-VL, the first native multimodal large model in its Ling series. Derived from the MoE (Mixture of Experts) architecture of Ling-3.0-flash, the model has a total parameter count of 124 billion, with 5.5 billion parameters activated per inference. It natively supports image, text, and video inputs, and features a 256K-token context window. Focused on the theme of “how to complete real-world tasks more reliably and efficiently”, Ling-3.0-flash-VL explores key directions including: Integrating visual capabilities into large models— a common concern is that this will diminish text intelligence, but training practices have yielded the opposite result: native multimodal joint training not only expands application boundaries but also enhances text intelligence. The model introduces a visual feedback mechanism: observing execution results, comparing against targets, identifying discrepancies, and iterating corrections, shifting tasks from one-off “generation” to a closed loop of “observe → act → verify → correct” to boost execution reliability. It also inherits Ling-3.0-flash’s core strength as an efficient execution node in Agent workflows, balancing output quality and operational efficiency within the visual feedback loop, enabling full task completion at lower cost and in shorter time.

Tether froze approximately $39.3 million in USDT across 10 addresses on the Tron network earlier today, with the addresses linked to Xinbi Guarantee. Sources reveal that Xinbi Guarantee is an escrow trading market that emerged on Telegram around 2022. Blockchain analytics firm TRM Labs has previously identified it as one of the largest illegal cryptocurrency markets in Southeast Asia, stating the platform has handled roughly $24.2 billion in total transactions. On-chain tracking platform MistTrack was the first to break the news of the related USDT freeze. This move marks Tether’s further step in on-chain asset freezing measures, targeting addresses deemed connected to high-risk or suspected illegal activities.

Beating AI Express: US and UK lawmakers are simultaneously advancing legislation to ban "superintelligent AI". U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders and Representative Greg Casar have unveiled the "Ban Artificial Superintelligence Act", which would permanently prohibit the development and deployment of superintelligent AI, and suspend work on more advanced AI until a new federal regulatory agency establishes safety rules. Violating individuals face up to 20 years in prison, while companies could even be forced to dissolve. The bill has not yet been formally submitted to Congress and is expected to be introduced in the coming weeks. UK Labour Party MP Alex Sobel has tabled a Superintelligence Bill in the House of Commons. It would not only ban the development and deployment of superintelligent AI capable of undermining the control of human institutions like governments, but also require the government to monitor and restrict systems that could lead to superintelligent AI. Both the U.S. and U.K. proposals call on their governments to push for international agreements to prevent R&D from shifting to other countries to continue. However, neither ban is currently likely to become law. The U.S. proposal runs counter to the current administration’s AI policy direction; the UK government also does not support a full ban, and Sobel’s bill is more of a parliamentary public initiative at present, with very low chances of actual passage.

French investment bank Societe Generale said the 2026 gold bull market is shifting from a phase driven by speculative momentum to a new stage where demand for physical gold, futures and options is converging, with signs of synchronized position-building by different types of capital in the gold market. Societe Generale data shows that net inflows into gold ETFs in August reached 201 tons, marking the third-largest monthly figure in history, second only to February 2009 and March 2020. Meanwhile, the nominal net long position of gold futures held by asset management institutions rose to the second-highest level in history, second only to the level seen in January this year when gold prices broke through $5,400 per ounce. The options market is also sending bullish signals: investors are using put options to hedge short-term risks while continuously building long-dated call option positions, indicating that while the market remains focused on short-term volatility, it still holds an optimistic outlook for gold’s medium- and long-term trend. Societe Generale believes that sustained central bank gold purchases, de-dollarization, geopolitical risks and sovereign debt concerns are lifting the floor for gold prices and weakening the traditional headwind that high real interest rates pose to gold. As gold volatility eases, its appeal to long-term reserve managers has also increased. Regarding Federal Reserve policy, Societe Generale said market expectations for further interest rate hikes have been largely priced in, and gold’s downside risks are gradually narrowing. The bank maintains a "strategically bullish" stance on gold, arguing that factors including persistent inflationary pressures, U.S. tariffs, AI and infrastructure investment, and high fiscal deficits could still provide support for gold prices.

Beating AI News Flash: Doubao Work launches three new features: local Office editing, browser recording and playback, and free switching of task execution environments. Currently, Doubao Work supports synchronous editing of local PPT and Excel files, with Word editing functionality set to roll out later. Additionally, users can switch between different "local computer" instances during task execution without creating a new conversation, and also toggle to the "cloud computer" execution environment at any time to sync tasks to the cloud.

Visa announced it will integrate VisaNet payment settlement data with on-chain lending infrastructure to provide working capital financing for stablecoin payment card projects and fintech firms. The company said over 160 stablecoin-linked card projects are already on its network, with payment transaction volume growing nearly 200% year-over-year. As stablecoin payments surge, demand for working capital among related businesses is rising, but traditional financial institutions typically require companies to have a certain scale and operating history, making it difficult for emerging payment firms to secure financing. Under the new framework, after obtaining customer authorization, Visa can combine settlement receivable data from VisaNet with on-chain transaction records to assess borrowers’ credit performance and automate parts of the settlement financing process. Simply put, stablecoin card projects will in the future use receivables generated from their own payment settlements as the basis for financing. Visa has previously tested this model with decentralized lending platform Credit Coop. Since 2023, the model has supported cumulative financing settlement volume exceeding $2.5 billion, with zero defaults in the financing mechanism, and completed more than 3,000 borrowings and 9,000 repayments on-chain. Visa noted that its current stablecoin settlement volume has reached an annualized scale of over $200 billion, growing roughly 15 times year-over-year. As stablecoin payment scale continues to expand, the company is working to further convert payment data into on-chain financing capabilities.