Institutions plan to reduce costs for Bitcoin whales moving into ETFs; BlackRock reportedly lowers the in-kind conversion threshold for its IBIT Bitcoin ETF to $1 million.

According to on-chain data, since August 23, BTC long positions have remained at a relatively stable level. Following the price rise, the overall market has shown a neutral consolidation trend. Meanwhile, BTC short positions have continued to decline since August 17, indicating that some short funds are still continuously exiting the market. Analysts believe that current long positions in the market have not increased significantly, and future trends will still depend on whether the short covering trend persists. Earlier, analysts stated that Bitcoin would need to meet three conditions to trigger a full-scale rally: Hyperliquid whales turning bullish, Bitfinex whales completing BTC long position accumulation, and the disappearance of negative South Korean kimchi premium and negative Coinbase premium. Currently, Bitfinex whales have finished building their BTC long positions, and both the negative kimchi premium and negative Coinbase premium have vanished, meaning two of the three conditions have been fulfilled. The core focus of the market going forward will be whether Hyperliquid whales shift to a bullish stance; once this signal emerges, it could act as a catalyst for Bitcoin to launch a new round of upward movement.

Beating AI News Flash: Anthropic has ordered all employees at its San Francisco office to work remotely on Monday and Tuesday. The decision follows an advance warning from security contractor Allied Universal that its security guards may stage a strike. To avoid having no on-site security, Anthropic opted to keep staff away from the office. However, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), which represents the guards, said it has not issued any strike notice for this week, nor has a strike authorization vote been held. The two sides have indeed been negotiating a new contract since April, with the union demanding higher wages, improved medical benefits, and additional security training. Anthropic’s caution is driven by real recent incidents: In April this year, a man followed an employee into Anthropic’s lobby and claimed an executive would be killed; the same month, someone threatened an employee’s family members, and in June, another individual threatened to bring a handgun to the company over a refund issue. Last week, the San Francisco Police Department received a 911 call reporting that an Anthropic user threatened the company’s CEO and vowed to bring an AR-15 rifle to its office at 500 Howard St. to harm employees working there.

HashKey On-Chain, a blockchain infrastructure service provider under HashKey Holding Limited (HK3887), has entered into a strategic brand partnership with Conflux Network. The two parties will deepen collaboration across multiple dimensions including public chain node verification, infrastructure construction, and cross-chain technology cooperation. Guided by the principles of equality, mutual benefit, and joint technological development, this partnership marks the full integration and joint deployment of the two ecosystems in the Web3 infrastructure sector. Led by HashKey Cloud, the collaboration focuses on infrastructure business. After completing relevant evaluations, HashKey Cloud will participate in Conflux Network operations as a verification node or infrastructure provider. Technically, the two sides plan to deepen collaboration in areas such as monitoring and alerting, security protection, shared risk control strategies, and ecosystem incentives, co-building a high-standard operation and maintenance system. Additionally, subject to meeting technical compliance and industry standards, the two sides plan to explore cross-chain compatibility, cross-chain ecosystem applications, and scenario implementation in the future. Disclaimer: This announcement is provided solely for technical and informational purposes regarding the collaboration between HSK Chain and Conflux, and does not constitute any investment advice, offer, solicitation, recommendation, endorsement, or guarantee of any kind. References to the collaboration are limited to the scope disclosed and do not imply any joint venture, agency, or fiduciary relationship unless otherwise agreed in writing.

Counterpoint Research’s latest data shows that Apple’s iPhone 17 was the best-selling smartphone globally in Q2 2026, holding a 6% share of total global smartphone shipments. The iPhone 17 Pro Max and iPhone 17 Pro respectively ranked second and third on the list. Apple and Samsung each took five spots in the global top 10 best-selling smartphones, with the top 10 models collectively accounting for 26% of total global smartphone sales, a 2% year-over-year increase. The base iPhone 17 remained the best-selling smartphone this quarter; its major upgrades narrowed the gap with Pro models, strongly supporting its sales. Apple’s stock closed down 0.14% on Tuesday, and fell 0.23% in after-hours trading, with its market capitalization standing at $4.52 trillion. For Samsung Electronics, two Galaxy S series models made the top 10. The Galaxy S26 Ultra became Samsung’s best-selling model this quarter, rising five positions from its predecessor. It was also the best-selling Android device this quarter, marking the first time an ultra-high-end Android device led Android sales in the second quarter.

According to official announcements, on-chain structured products infrastructure City Protocol announced the completion of its seed and Pre-A funding rounds, raising a total of $11 million. Investors include Dragonfly, Jump Crypto, CMT Digital, Stratified Capital, Adaverse, Mirana, and others. City Protocol is dedicated to bringing structured products on-chain, providing an integrated infrastructure for the issuance, operation, and access of structured products through its tokenization layer, vault layer, and issuance & operation layer. Its flagship product is on-chain structured products platform Venzo, which currently has 4 strategy vaults live, with a total value locked (TVL) of $40 million, covering strategies previously targeted at institutional and professional investors, including quantitative hedging, cross-exchange arbitrage, and private credit. Venzo will also launch thematic vaults soon, divided into two categories: persona tracking and sector themes, with smart contracts executing the purchase and adjustment of a basket of assets directly in users' wallets per transparent public rules.

Crypto entrepreneur Huang Licheng, known as "Brother Ma Ji", responded in a post that recent media reports from Taiwan, China claimed his investment portfolio had surged 84 times in returns, but the news is "fake". Earlier reports said Brother Ma Ji seized last week’s one-sided rally in the crypto market, rolling over his long position from around $150,000 to roughly $11.15 million, recouping approximately $11 million in total. He had incurred a cumulative loss of about $35 million from long positions on ETH over the past 10 months; after this round of gains, his historical loss narrowed to roughly $24 million. On-chain data previously also showed his cumulative historical losses remained in the tens of millions of dollars.