Coinbase Research: Bitcoin Breaks Key Support, Market Possibly in Early Stage of Long-term Downtrend

Cross-chain yield protocol BounceBit has released a security incident notice, stating its blockchain network suffered a protocol-level vulnerability attack from 21:02 UTC on August 19 to 01:54 UTC on August 20. Attackers exploited an authorization flaw in Evmos’ underlying architecture to transfer BB tokens from 9 mainnet accounts without account owners’ authorization. Per the notice, the attackers moved approximately 286.5 million BB via 14 transactions. The incident is limited to BounceBit Chain itself, with no involvement of private key leaks, signature forgery, wallet, hardware device, or exchange account security issues. BounceBit’s CeDeFi Strategy, Promo Vaults, Prime, and RWA products were all unaffected. BounceBit noted the vulnerability stemmed from an authorization validation flaw in Evmos’ protocol-native module. When the attacker called the relevant module via a smart contract, they bypassed the security check that should verify the fund source account’s authorization, allowing them to designate any account as the fund source. After the incident, BounceBit Chain stopped block production at block height 20,702,857. The team decided not to perform a chain upgrade, instead permanently shutting down BounceBit Chain and reissuing BB as a BNB Chain-based BEP-20 token. The new BB supply will be based on an on-chain snapshot taken before the first abnormal transfer (block height 20,697,260). The 286,543,148 BB tokens transferred by attackers will not be included in new balances. Users do not need to submit applications or migrate wallets; the official will automatically distribute new BB to corresponding BNB Chain addresses.

Crypto analyst Rekt Capital has released a technical chart analysis of Bitcoin, noting that the leading cryptocurrency is facing resistance from a macro downtrend line that aligns with the 21-month Exponential Moving Average (EMA). According to Rekt Capital, if Bitcoin stalls at this resistance zone, it could find support at the 50-month EMA (marked in purple). Overall, Bitcoin needs to re-establish these two macro EMAs as new support levels and break through the macro downtrend line to confirm the start of a new bull market. Rekt Capital is a veteran crypto technical analyst boasting 560,000 followers on X.

Crypto KOL Ansem bought over $21,000 worth of the Robinhood chain-based meme coin Artificial Inu on pump.fun early this morning, sparking a wave of market hype. As of press time, per GMGN data, Artificial Inu’s market cap briefly topped $20 million, hitting an all-time high. However, due to recent weak liquidity on the Robinhood chain, the token’s 24-hour trading volume is only $530. BlockBeats reminds users that KOL-led trades carry high uncertainty, and investors should exercise caution.

Solana perpetual contract trading platform GMTrade tweeted a public proposal to soft-acquire Flash Trade, which had previously announced it might cease operations. GMTrade also plans to airdrop GT points to FAF token holders and liquidity providers, with the specific snapshot time pending. The firm stated that while the acquisition is not the team’s ideal exit method, it is a more stable outcome and clear follow-up path for the community under current circumstances. Earlier, Flash Trade had said it would gradually wind down operations if a suitable acquirer was not found. Since then, Flash Trade has been seeking to sell its tech stack, brand, and intellectual property, with proceeds to be distributed to FAF holders proportionally to their holdings.

According to Caixin, Star Bridge Capital (SBCFX) has suffered an abnormal liquidation incident in London Gold trading. After the incident, the platform’s Hong Kong office is now deserted, leaving some investors facing huge losses. Multiple investors revealed that their automated London Gold (XAUUSD) derivative trades on Star Bridge Capital encountered extreme abnormal activity on the evening of August 19: the system automatically generated massive reverse short orders in just 1 to 3 seconds, followed by a rapid rise in international gold prices, leading to collective account liquidations—some accounts were wiped out entirely, while others even showed negative balances. London Gold liquidation refers to the trading risk where, due to a position direction opposite to gold price movement and leverage amplifying losses, an investor’s account available margin is exhausted and falls below the maintenance margin ratio, resulting in forced liquidation by the platform and total loss of principal. Affected investors estimate the incident involves approximately 2,000 to 3,000 people, including a large number of mainland Chinese investors. Currently, some investors have filed reports with Hong Kong police, demanding the platform refund 70% of their principal in accordance with its previously promised rule of “maximum loss of 30%”. Some investors noted that Star Bridge Capital offered up to 500x leverage, and some funds were deposited via USDT stablecoins, which has increased the difficulty of tracking the funds. Public information shows that Star Bridge Capital’s business scope covers foreign exchange, commodities, indices, cryptocurrencies, etc., and it publicly claims to be a licensed and compliant international trading platform. (Caixin)

Bitcoin treasury firm BSTR Holdings announced it has reached an agreement with Cantor Equity Partners to terminate the business combination agreement signed on July 16, 2025. The termination stems from persistent valuation pressure on Bitcoin and listed Bitcoin treasury companies amid the current market environment, which has created capital market mismatches and limited the amplifying effect of financing instruments such as convertible bonds and perpetual preferred stocks in Bitcoin treasury strategies. BSTR stated it will continue to advance its institutional-grade Bitcoin asset management business once the market environment stabilizes. (Businesswire)