Decentralized AI data network Perceptron Network has completed a $6.5 million strategic funding round, with participants including Sigma Capital, Selini Capital, QCP Capital, P2 Ventures, CoinDCX Ventures, Momentum6, DeFi Capital, Walrus Foundation, Aethir, Colosseum, GuruDev Capital, Tempo Finance, NewTribe Capital, Digital Consensus Fund, and CodeCraft Capital. The round will be used to support the launch of Perceptron’s data exploration platform, expand its contributor tools and reward infrastructure, and scale the network to its target of 5 million nodes. Perceptron aims to integrate global data collection into a single contributor network, enabling AI companies and regular contributors to access, verify high-quality datasets, and monetize them. The network is now live and already boasts over 700,000 nodes.

Bitcoin traded largely stable in July, though it fell over 3% on the final day due to the FOMC effect, still notching a 7.51% monthly gain. Looking ahead to August, Bitcoin’s historical August performance since 2013 shows 9 down months and 4 up months across 13 instances. While the average monthly return stands at 1.12%, the median return is only -7.49%. The largest monthly gain occurred in August 2017, when Bitcoin rose 65.32%, while the steepest drop took place in August 2015, with an 18.67% monthly decline.

St. Louis Federal Reserve President Alberto Musalem pointed out that the recent sell-off of U.S. Treasury bonds signals the Federal Reserve must maintain its anti-inflation credibility through effective communication and necessary actions on a daily basis, favoring earlier, small, gradual interest rate hikes rather than large, aggressive moves later.

Robinhood Chain’s launchpad Pons has officially launched its v2 version. According to prior public disclosures, the v2 version features deep integration with Uniswap V4. Besides ETH, tokens issued by the platform can now be directly paired with tokenized stocks.

According to three people familiar with the matter, OpenAI is preparing to launch a new model series tentatively named "Astra", which will feature enhanced capabilities for completing long-cycle tasks. OpenAI founder Sam Altman presented Astra to policymakers and regulators in Washington this week. Reportedly, OpenAI touts that the model enables multiple AI agents to collaborate over extended periods to solve highly complex problems, with applications in projects or advanced mathematical tasks. Astra will be a new category of models for OpenAI, following Sol, Terra, and Luna. It remains unclear when OpenAI plans to release the model. The company has also not yet decided whether to brand Astra as GPT-6 or an add-on to the GPT-5 series, such as GPT-5.7. According to one insider, while the models are already in testing, they are expected to be among the first AI models submitted under a new framework planned by the Trump administration, which requires AI models to be filed with the federal government before public release. The administration has set a self-imposed deadline of the end of this week, aiming to finalize the framework by then. Reportedly, OpenAI also plans to release a report in the near term detailing how it solved 10 previously unsolved mathematical problems, to showcase the capabilities of its most advanced AI. (The Information)

According to data from Citrini, South Korea's DRAM export unit price rose to $91,931 per kilogram in July, hitting a new all-time high.