Galaxy Digital and Sharplink have signed a non-binding agreement to create a $125 million institutional onchain yield fund aimed at deploying Sharplink's ETH-focused capital into DeFi strategies. Galaxy will manage the vehicle and contribute $25 million, while Sharplink will commit $100 million, with allocations intended for liquidity strategies and support of early-stage protocols.

On May 11, Augustus said the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency granted conditional approval to form Augustus Bank, N.A., a proposed clearing bank designed around stablecoin settlement and AI-driven workflows. The firm said it processed billions in volume in 2024 with 10x year-over-year growth and counts Kraken among its clients, while full U.S. dollar clearing would still depend on final charter approval. The announcement lands as lawmakers advance the GENIUS Act and banking groups press regulators to scrutinize crypto-linked charter applications.

Sen. Bernie Moreno said large U.S. banks are pressuring lawmakers ahead of a Senate Banking Committee markup scheduled for Thursday. The dispute followed an American Bankers Association letter warning the proposal could push deposits into payment stablecoins and allow interest-like rewards, prompting pushback from crypto advocates.

Ink Finance and Renegade were hit by separate exploits on May 11 and May 10, losing a combined $349,000 across Polygon and Arbitrum. Ink Finance’s Polygon treasury contract was drained for about $140,000, while Renegade said roughly $209,000 was taken from its legacy V1 Arbitrum deployment and about $190,000 has been returned by a white hat.

Sky Mavis' gaming chain Ronin is set to move from an independent Ethereum sidechain to an OP Stack-based Layer 2 on May 12, with about 10 hours of planned network downtime. Transfers, swaps and smart contract interactions will pause during the window, and onchain actions for games such as Axie Infinity and Pixels are also expected to stop. Ronin says the hard fork will also change RON's tokenomics, reducing annual inflation from above 20% to below 1%.

Circle Internet Group disclosed on May 11, 2026 that it raised $222 million by selling 740 million ARC tokens at $0.30 each, valuing the Arc network at a $3 billion fully diluted valuation. The round was led by Andreessen Horowitz with a $75 million commitment and included Blackrock, Apollo Funds, and Intercontinental Exchange. Circle says Arc is a stablecoin-native L1 that uses USDC for gas fees and is targeting a 2026 mainnet beta.

Aster DEX said on May 11, 2026 that it has added perpetual futures tied to four major Hong Kong-listed stocks, enabling 24/7 long or short trading with up to 3x leverage via a crypto wallet. The exchange described the move as a step toward bridging traditional markets and DeFi, and it also pointed to earlier product and fee updates released around May 7, 2026.

Circle Internet Group raised $222 million by preselling Arc, the native token for its new Arc blockchain, giving the network a $3 billion fully diluted valuation. Andreessen Horowitz led the round with a $75 million check, with participants including BlackRock, Apollo Funds and Intercontinental Exchange. Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire said the company is expanding beyond USDC issuance toward blockchain infrastructure and applications, including tools for AI agents to transact with USDC.