Network news
ETHEREUM COMMUNITY DEBATES FOUNDATION’S NEW MANDATE DOCUMENT: The Ethereum Foundation’s new mandate — a comprehensive document released to clarify the organization’s role and principles — sparked a flurry of reactions, with supporters praising it as a long-overdue articulation of blockchain’s ethos and critics saying it reinforces the foundation’s hands-off approach at a time when Ethereum needs to meet its growing leadership needs for leaders. The 38-page document outlines what the foundation described as a constitutional guide to its mission, emphasizing its role as a neutral trustee rather than a centralized authority. The mandate frames the foundation’s job as maintaining Ethereum as a decentralized and resilient infrastructure while supporting the protocol layer and public goods across the ecosystem. The document arrived at a crucial time for Ethereum. The network has matured into one of the world’s largest crypto ecosystems, and the foundation itself has gone through leadership changes and debates about how actively it should manage development. Reactions to X quickly split into two camps. Critics were quick to argue that the mandate was overly philosophical and failed to address Ethereum’s need to compete for real-world adoption — especially as institutional interest in blockchain grows. Dankrad Feist, a former Ethereum Foundation researcher and key contributor to Ethereum’s scaling roadmap, said the document does little to address practical business development issues about how the ecosystem serves real users. Others suggested that the mandate risks reinforcing a status quo in which the foundation has significant soft influence without clearly defined responsibilities. Supporters in the local community welcomed the mandate as an affirmation of the network’s founding principles. Chris Perkins, president and managing partner of crypto investment firm CoinFund, said the document helps clarify the fund’s purpose as a nonprofit steward of the ecosystem. Infrastructure companies in the Ethereum ecosystem also voiced support for the mandate. Nethermind, a company that develops one of blockchain’s core client software implementations, said the document reflects many of the characteristics institutional buyers already look for when evaluating blockchain infrastructure. — Margaux Nijkerk Read more.
WORLD LAUNCHES AGENTKIT: As AI agents increasingly act, act, and act autonomously online—a market that could reach $3 trillion to $5 trillion by 2030—a key question is coming into focus: how to verify that a real person is behind the activity. Sam Altman-backed identity project World (formerly WorldCoin) says it has the solution. On Tuesday, the company rolled out AgentKit, a developer tool that enables AI agents to carry cryptographic proof that they are backed by a unique human using its World ID system. The product works with x402, a protocol developed by Coinbase and Cloudflare that enables “agentic payments” by embedding stablecoin micropayments into the Internet’s communication layer so that AI agents and software can pay each other without human intervention. “Payments are the ‘how’ of agent commerce, but identity is the ‘who,'” said Erik Reppel, head of engineering at Coinbase Developer Platform and founder of x402. “This is a massive step toward a web where agents are seen not just as automated traffic, but as legitimate economic participants.” The move comes as AI agents are rapidly evolving, handling time-consuming and often frustrating tasks from booking reservations to browsing e-commerce marketplaces for the best deals. — Olivier Acuna Read more.
VISA VS. COIN BASE ON AI AGENTS: Your AI just made several payments while you were reading that headline. You approved none of them. Visa processed none of them. And if the crypto industry’s biggest bulls are right, it’s not a mistake – it’s the entire future of the internet economy. Coinbase founder Brian Armstrong believes that soon there will be more AI agents than humans conducting transactions on the Internet. Binance founder Changpeng Zhao went further and predicted that agents will make a million times more payments than people, all in crypto. The posts landed on the same day last week and lit up crypto X. The core argument is structural. AI agents cannot open bank accounts because banks require identity verification that software cannot provide, while a crypto wallet only needs a private key. No KYC, no compliance review, no waiting time – and that asymmetry is what Armstrong pointed to. But the wallet problem is only half the picture. The other half is economics. Agents do not act as humans do. When an AI agent performs a task—such as researching a topic, coordinating a supply chain, building a report—it can call dozens of specialized APIs in a single session. Each call can be worth fractions of a cent, covering GPU compute time, real-time data feeds, web scraping services, or hiring a sub-agent to handle translation. None of these transactions resemble anything that Visa or Mastercard are designed to process. — Shaurya Malwa Read more.
PREDICTION MARKETS AND AI AGENTS: Prediction markets have long held the promise of gathering insights about future events. Increasingly, these signals come not only from humans, but from machines. According to David Minarsch, CEO and co-founder of Valory AG, the team behind the crypto-AI protocol Olas, autonomous AI agents are emerging as powerful tools for trading prediction markets, especially for retail users trying to compete in an increasingly automated environment. Valory builds products at the intersection of blockchain and multi-agent systems (MAS), and its current focus is Olas, formerly known as Autonolas. The protocol is designed as an infrastructure for autonomous software agents that can run services on blockchains, interact with smart contracts, and cooperate with each other while earning crypto rewards. The broader vision is what Minarsch calls an “agent economy.” A decentralized ecosystem where autonomous AI agents perform useful tasks and generate value for their users. One of the most visible experiments in that vision is Polystrat, an artificial intelligence agent launched on the prediction market platform Polymarket in February 2026. The agent acts on behalf of users who own and own it, executing strategies continuously around the clock. “In a nutshell, Polystrat is an autonomous AI agent that trades on Polymarket 24/7 on behalf of its human user,” Minarsch said. The idea is simple: while people sleep, work or lose focus, the agent continues to act. — Will Canny Read more.
In other news
- Mastercard agreed to buy BVNK, a stablecoin infrastructure company, for as much as $1.8 billion as it looks to bolster its use of the digital asset for international payments. By integrating BVNK’s technology, Mastercard aims to connect onchain payments to its global network, enabling use cases such as cross-border transfers, money transfers and business-to-business payments, the company said. BVNK provides the technology to bridge traditional fiat systems with blockchain-based transactions, allowing businesses to move money in seconds across more than 130 countries. Its infrastructure, used by firms including Worldpay, Deel and Flywire, processes $30 billion a year, the British company said in a blog post. BVNK’s capabilities complement Mastercard’s existing card network and expand the ability to move money across both traditional fiat systems and blockchain-based rails, investment banker William Blair said in a note. — Helen Braun Read more.
- Crypto trading firm GSR said it is buying Autonomous and Architech for $57 million and expanding into token advisory and capital markets services. Autonomous will retain its brand and focus on token launch, while Architech will anchor a new entity, GSR Digital Asset Advisory. The group will work together with GSR’s trading, liquidity and asset management businesses. Token launches today often rely on separate firms for structuring, token economics and market making, which can lead to wrong incentives. The firm said GSR’s model combines these services into one platform covering management design, exchange strategy and capital planning. At the same time, many token funds manage large treasuries without formal financial tools. GSR expands into treasury operations and offers support for liquidity planning, risk management and diversification as projects look to move beyond holding their own tokens. — Christian Sandor Read more.
Legislation and policy
- For the first time, the US Securities and Exchange Commission has sought to clearly define different types of cryptoassets and how the regulator will approach them by issuing these new standards together with its sister agency responsible for commodities. The SEC’s interpretive guidance, which does not yet carry the weight of a formal new rule, has been promised by its head, Chairman Paul Atkins, who was appointed by President Donald Trump to promote a pro-crypto agenda. And it was issued in conjunction with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, just days after the two agencies agreed to a formal relationship in which they plan to regulate crypto and other industries as close partners. “After more than a decade of uncertainty, this interpretation will provide market participants with a clear understanding of how the Commission treats cryptoassets under federal securities laws,” Atkins said in a statement. — Jesse Hamilton Read more.
- Phantom, a developer of self-storage crypto wallets that is particularly popular in the Solana ecosystem, secured a no-action letter from the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) that allows it to offer users access to certain regulated derivatives markets without registering as a broker. In a statement, the CFTC’s Market Participants Division said it will not recommend enforcement action against Phantom for failure to register as an introducing broker, provided the firm meets a set of conditions. The exemption applies to Phantom’s software, which acts as a non-custodial interface that connects users directly to CFTC-registered entities, such as futures commission dealers and designated contract markets. Phantom said in a blog post that the letter allows it to integrate access to regulated derivatives and event contracts directly into its app through registered partners, while ensuring that users send orders directly to exchanges. The company emphasized that it does not hold customer funds or broker.— Margaux Nijkerk Read more.
Calendar
- 24.-26. March 2026: Digital Asset Summit, New York City
- March 30-Apr. 2, 2026: EthCC, Cannes
- 15-16 Apr. 2026: Paris Blockchain Week, Paris
- 5.-7. May 2026: Consensus, Miami
- September 29-1. October 2026: Korea Blockchain Week, Seoul
- 7.-8. October 2026: Token2049, Singapore
- 3.-6. November 2026: Devcon, Mumbai
- 15.-17. November 2026: Solana Breakpoint, London
