• Unchained Daily
  • Posts
  • Bitcoin Core 30 to Boost OP_RETURN Data Limit, Stirring Debate

Bitcoin Core 30 to Boost OP_RETURN Data Limit, Stirring Debate

Plus, 📜 CLARITY Act advances, 🔐 Ethereum’s weakest link, 🕰️ Franklin tokenizes real-time yield, 🫥 Bitcoin languishes, and more!

Author

Juan Aranovich
June 11, 2025

Hi! In today’s edition:

  • 🧱 Will OP_RETURN boost give BTC bloat?

  • 🏛️ Crypto market bill clears key hurdle

  • 🖥️ Ethereum’s biggest flaw? You

  • 🕰️ Franklin redefines “time is money”

  • 📊 BTC stuck despite billions in inflows

On the podcast:

  • 🎧 Jeff Park: Wholecoiners will rule the future

  • 🎙️ Bits + Bips: Circle hype, ETH whisper rally, Musk vs. Trump

Access up to $1M without selling your Bitcoin

Please also be aware that eligibility and availability restrictions may apply to the Bitcoin-backed loans product. Not currently available for UK residents.

Instant liquidity. No selling. No fees. No early penalties. Backed by your BTC.

By Tikta and Steve Ehrlich

Bitcoin Core 30 Update to Raise Limit on Controversial OP_RETURN

The upcoming Bitcoin Core 30 update, scheduled for release in October, will significantly increase the data limit for the OP_RETURN function — a special operational code that allows users to embed arbitrary data in Bitcoin transactions.

In a statement posted on GitHub, developers said the default OP_RETURN data limit would be increased from the current 80 bytes to nearly 4MB, a change that aligns with Bitcoin’s existing block size limits and which is intended to address issues involving data storage techniques and the unspent transaction output set.

OP_RETURN has long been a point of contention, due mainly to its tension with Bitcoin’s core values of minimalism, decentralization, and resistance to bloat.

Critics argue that removing or significantly increasing the OP_RETURN data limit will encourage more non-financial data to be stored on the blockchain, making it slower. 

Supporters, conversely, contend that an OP_RETURN data increase will enable new use cases and align with the ways in which Bitcoin is actually being used.

U.S. House Agriculture Committee Advances CLARITY Act

The U.S. House Agriculture Committee has advanced a major cryptocurrency market structure bill known as the Digital Asset Market Clarity (CLARITY) Act with strong bipartisan support. 

The committee voted 47-6 on Tuesday in favor of advancing the legislation, which aims to establish a clear regulatory framework for digital assets in the U.S.

Specifically, the bill seeks to clarify the roles of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the Securities and Exchange Commission in overseeing digital asset markets, addressing regulatory gaps and jurisdictional overlaps.

Although the Agriculture Committee has moved the bill forward, the House Financial Services Committee — which shares jurisdiction over crypto activities — is still debating amendments and has not yet voted on it. 

Both committees must advance their respective sections before a unified bill can be sent to the full House for consideration.

The Ethereum Foundation says a half-dozen security issues will challenge the future of its ecosystem, including aspects of its user experience and its social layer.

“A significant burden of security” falls on users of the Ethereum network, the foundation said in its overview report on security issues.

The foundation highlighted issues such as seed phrase storage, blind signing, and compromised web interfaces as the most common problems as users struggle with secure key management, understanding transactions, and avoiding scams.

“UX security and safety was the top issue identified through feedback and consultation with the ecosystem,” it said. “These issues affect users of all kinds, ranging from individuals to large enterprises. While many other areas of Ethereum’s technology stack are immensely secure, today user experience is the weakest link.

“Many users are not equipped to safely manage cryptographic keys,” it said.

The foundation also identified issues such as smart contract security, infrastructure and cloud security, consensus protocol, monitoring and incident response, and risk mitigation efforts and governance.

The foundation’s report additionally drew attention to the community’s concerns about centralization, including stake centralization and offchain asset centralization. 

“Centralization of large amounts of stake can pose risks to Ethereum as a whole if the entities controlling that stake decide to collude,” it said. “This economic centralization creates the potential for social governance capture.”

The report follows last month’s announcement of a security upgrade named the Trillion Dollar Security Initiative, which saw it appoint foundation management team member Josh Stark and protocol security research lead Fredrik Svantes as co-chairs.

Franklin Templeton Unveils Second-by-Second Yield on Benji

Heavyweight asset manager Franklin Templeton on Tuesday launched an intraday yield feature for tokenized assets on its Benji platform. 

The new yield feature enables investors to accrue yield proportional to the exact time they hold a tokenized security — down to the second — even if the asset is transferred before the day’s end.

It also allows yield to be earned on non-banking days, including weekends and holidays, addressing what Franklin Templeton described as a "century-old inefficiency" in traditional finance, in which yield is typically calculated only at the end of the trading day and distributed monthly.

Built with blockchain-integrated infrastructure, Benji supports the trading, management, and administration of token-based investments. 

Demand for tokenized assets has been growing rapidly, with their onchain market capitalization rising nearly 47% so far this year to more than $23 billion.

Three Reasons Bitcoin’s Price Is Stuck, Despite Treasury Firm Surge

Over the past few weeks, the crypto world has been buzzing with announcements from a new breed of publicly traded companies — crypto treasury firms. These businesses exist primarily to raise capital and buy crypto, largely Bitcoin, for their balance sheets. Since the start of April, they’ve collectively raised an estimated $11.3 billion, with the bulk earmarked for Bitcoin.

Hype for crypto’s newest fad is reaching fever pitch, but curiously, the price of bitcoin has struggled to follow suit. The token is just a hair away from its all-time high of $111,814, but over the past month or so, the price has been stuck between $100,000 and $110,000 (as of press time, bitcoin was priced at $109,376).

So, if billions are flowing in, what’s keeping bitcoin pinned down, and when might that change?

The global order is changing — and Bitwise’s Jeff Park says Bitcoin can help everyday investors weather those shifts, while stablecoins can help the U.S. government navigate them.

In part 2 of Jeff Park’s interview with Unchained, Park describes ways that both everyday investors and the U.S. government can use various crypto assets to come out on top as old models and strategies become outdated.

He reveals the three personal stories that led him to develop his radical portfolio theory, puts himself in the shoes of Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, and explains why Japan is the linchpin in the transition to this new world order.

In this episode, we explore:

  • Why Jeff believes the future belongs to wholecoiners

  • The social mission behind owning bitcoin

  • How the U.S. could leverage stablecoins to maintain global dominance

  • Why the new American dream might not involve a house at all

  • And why, in Jeff’s words, we may already be “living in a Bitcoin-only world.”

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pods, Fountain, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform.

Is Circle’s IPO overvalued? Is ETH quietly setting up for a breakout? The panel digs into IPO fever, Bitcoin momentum, and the explosive potential of the crypto market in Q3.

This week on Bits + Bips, the panel tackles the biggest themes driving crypto: Circle’s triumphant IPO, ETH’s institutional tailwinds, and the fast-shrinking Bitcoin supply on exchanges. Plus, what Gemini’s IPO ambitions tell us about the state of exchanges, and whether Ram’s call for a BTC breakout is about to hit.

Also on the docket:

  • Is Circle really worth its sky-high valuation?

  • Why exchange fees are stuck in the 1970s

  • ETH: the quiet trade that might be heating up

Oh, and yes, they talk about the Trump-Musk feud, too 😅

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify,Pods, Fountain, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform.

  • 🚀 Solana’s price rose 5% after a report that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission had requested amendments to spot SOL exchange-traded fund filings, with firms such as Fidelity and Grayscale expected to receive feedback within 30 days.

  • 🇺🇸 Crypto exchange Bullish has confidentially filed for a U.S. IPO with Jefferies as lead underwriter, aiming to ride a wave of renewed crypto optimism fueled by Trump administration policy support and strong market signals such as Circle’s IPO and bitcoin hitting $110,000.

  • 💵 Nasdaq-listed battery tech and electric vehicle service company VivoPower will allocate $100 million in XRP via Flare’s DeFi protocols to earn yield and expand its crypto reserves, while also adopting Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin for treasury use.

  • 🔗 Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal is becoming CEO of the Polygon Foundation, asserting full control and shifting its focus toward the Agglayer and GigaGAS proof-of-stake chains while phasing out zkEVM due to weak strategic alignment.

  • 📚 Ethereum advocate William Mougayar will lead the new Ethereum Market Research Center, a community-driven initiative aimed at increasing institutional understanding through curated research, real-time news, and expert analysis across the Ethereum ecosystem.

  • 📈 The UNI, AAVE, and SKY tokens surged over 20% after SEC Chair Paul Atkins proposed easing restrictions on DeFi, with Ethereum also jumping 8% as optimism spread amid the prospect of potential regulatory exemptions.

  • 🏢 Coinbase reported that 60% of Fortune 500 companies are pursuing blockchain efforts, while small businesses increasingly adopt crypto to tackle financial bottlenecks, and that nearly half of non-users are planning to integrate blockchain within three years.

  • 💼 Investment heavyweight Guggenheim expanded its digital debt product to XRP Ledger with a $10 million investment from Ripple, building on $280 million in Ethereum issuance and exploring stablecoin-based payments via tokenized U.S. Treasury assets.

  • 🤖 Israel-based Hypernative secured $40 million in a series-B round led by Ten Eleven and Ballistic Ventures to scale its artificial intelligence-driven transaction monitoring platform, which has helped secure more than $100 billion across 200 Web3 projects.

  • 💱 Stablecoin startup Noah raised $22 million in seed funding led by LocalGlobe to build a regulated payments network connecting fiat and stablecoins across 70 countries, with ex-Adyen executive Thijn Lamers joining as co-founder and president.

  • 🇺🇸 American Bitcoin, backed by Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr., bought 215 BTC worth nearly $24 million in its first major treasury move, and plans to go public this year through a merger with Gryphon Digital Mining.