Vitalik Buterin said on Jan. 1 that Ethereum's 2025 roadmap includes zkEVM milestones and PeerDAS deployment, BlockBeats reports. He called for building decentralized apps for a free, open internet rather than pursuing tokenized assets or political meme coins, emphasizing scalable usability and decentralization.

LIGHT (Bitlight) surged from $0.32 at 16:00 Beijing time on Jan. 1 to approximately $2.5 by 18:45, then plunged 77.3% within an hour to a low of $0.5287 before recovering to $0.64, HTX market data show. Over the past 24 hours, LIGHT recorded $32.11 million in liquidations—second only to BTC's $47.85 million—with $12.39 million from long positions and $19.71 million from shorts, Coinglass data show.

Binance Alpha will launch an airdrop for AI Avatar (AIAV) on January 2, the company announced January 1. Eligible users can claim their AIAV allocation using Alpha Points on the Alpha Events page once trading opens.

Bitcoin climbed back above $88,000 on Jan. 1, trading at $88,024, HTX data show. The move marked a recovery above the key psychological level.

Centralized exchanges recorded cumulative net inflows of 11.73万 ETH on January 1, Coinglass data show. Binance led with 11.56万 ETH, followed by Gate at 1423.40 and Gemini at 673.35. OKX posted net outflows of 1.06万 ETH.

Ethereum dropping below $2,900 would trigger an estimated $784 million in cumulative long liquidations on major centralized exchanges, while a break above $3,100 could lead to $923 million in short liquidations, Coinglass data show. BlockBeats reports on Jan. 1 that the liquidation heatmap reflects relative intensity of liquidation clusters rather than exact contract values. Higher liquidation bars indicate stronger potential market reactions driven by liquidity shifts when prices reach those levels.

Centralized exchanges recorded a net outflow of 3,347.33 BTC on Jan. 1, Coinglass data show. Binance led outflows with 2,736.11 BTC, followed by Kraken at 1,439.79 BTC and Gate at 350.26 BTC. Bybit reported the largest inflow at 675.35 BTC.

The UK and more than 40 other countries began enforcing new tax transparency rules for digital assets on January 1 under the OECD's Crypto-Asset Reporting Framework (CARF), the Financial Times reports. Major crypto exchanges must collect full transaction histories for UK users and report trading activity and tax residency information to HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC). The UK is among the first group of 48 countries to apply CARF, and from 2027 HMRC will automatically share related data with EU member states and other participating jurisdictions including Brazil, the Cayman Islands and South Africa. In total, 75 countries have committed to adopt CARF, while the United States plans to implement the rules in 2028 and begin information exchange in 2029.