BNB Chain Launches $45M Relief Airdrop for Memecoin Traders

Hi! In today’s edition:

• 🪙 BNB Chain drops $45M to help memecoin traders recover

• 😬 BitForex CEO caught in Hyperliquid drama fires back

• 🏛️ Wall Street finally warms to crypto with Citi & JPM

• 🪪 Bhutan brings national IDs to Ethereum

• 🎧 Bits + Bips: What crypto learned from the $19B wipeout

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BNB Chain Launches $45 Million ‘Reload Airdrop’ for Memecoin Traders

Binance's BNB Chain has launched a $45 million "Reload Airdrop" to compensate memecoin traders who suffered significant losses during the market crash that resulted in over $19 billion in liquidations.

The airdrop targets over 160,000 eligible addresses that traded memecoins on the BNB Chain network during the turbulence. However, distribution of BNB tokens will be random among these qualifying users.

The average estimated compensation per eligible user is around $281 in BNB tokens.

The initiative is the Binance ecosystem's largest user relief effort to date, aimed at supporting one of its most active community segments despite the recent market downturn.

Former BitForex CEO and Alleged Hyperliquid Whale Denies Insider Trading

An alleged Hyperliquid whale, identified as former BitForex CEO Garrett Jin, has denied any ties to President Donald Trump or insider trading as suggested by pseudonymous onchain sleuth “Eye” on X. 

Eye asserted that Jin orchestrated a trade that netted him over $150 million in profit, also sharing his professional background and a picture of Jin in his post on X. 

Binance co-founder Changpeng Zhao (CZ) commented that he was “not sure” of the validity of these claims, adding that he hoped “someone can cross check.”

“Thanks for sharing my personal and private information. To clarify, I have no connection with the Trump family or Donald Trump — this isn’t insider trading,” wrote Jin in an X post. 

Zhao’s call for someone to verify those claims came through in the form of a reply from blockchain sleuth ZachXBT, who noted that the only direct connection between Jin’s wallets and the whale entity was a 40,000 USDT transfer.

“Everything else in this post is unconfirmed theories. It seems more likely to be a friend of Jin,” said ZachXBT. 

Citibank, JPMorgan Plan to Expand Crypto Offerings

Wall Street banking giants Citibank and JPMorgan are exploring new ways to offer their clients crypto exposure.

Citibank plans to launch crypto asset custody services in 2026, Citi’s global head of partnerships and innovation Biswarup Chatterjee told CNBC that the upcoming custody service would involve Citi holding native crypto tokens. 

The new service was reportedly in the works for the last two to three years, with Citi exploring an in-house developed technology solution for custody as well as potential partnerships with third-parties.

JPMorgan is also making moves in the digital asset space, although the firm is ruling out offering crypto custody directly

JPMorgan’s global head of markets and digital assets, Scott Lucas, told CNBC in a separate interview that the firm plans to roll out crypto trading services.

These developments come amid heightened institutional interest in crypto, which has seen the heads of major banks reassess their positions on crypto. 

BlackRock CEO Larry Fink walked back his 2017 comments on Bitcoin being an “index of money laundering” in a Sunday CBS interview. 

“But you know, the markets teach you, you have to always relook at your assumptions. There is a role for crypto in the same way there is a role for gold, that is, it’s an alternative,” said Fink. 

Bhutan Migrates National Digital Identity to Ethereum

The Kingdom of Bhutan is migrating its National Digital Identity (NDI) system to the Ethereum blockchain from Polygon.

The migration will allow nearly 800,000 residents to verify their identities and access government services, with all resident credentials expected to be completed by the first quarter of 2026.

Bhutan is the first country to base its national ID on a public blockchain, aiming to reduce reliance on centralized databases which are vulnerable to hacking and data breaches. It began running the NDI project on Polygon in Aug. 2024.

“It’s deeply inspiring to see a nation commit to empowering its citizens with self-sovereign identity,” said Ethereum Foundation President Aya Miyaguchi.

Both Miyaguchi and Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin joined Bhutan’s Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay, and Crown Prince Jigme Namgyel Wangchuk at the launch ceremony. 

Bits + Bips: Crypto Had Its Reset. Will It Go to New Highs Now?

The crash exposed crypto’s weakest links. Now the question is: will it recover?

Crypto just went through its biggest crash.

In the wake of “Black Friday,” when $19 billion in positions were wiped out in hours, Bits + Bips hosts Steve Ehrlich and Ram Ahluwalia are joined by Carlos Guzman of GSR and YQ of AltLayer to dissect what really happened.

Was it a coordinated attack exploiting Binance’s oracles? A failure of market structure? Or simply too much leverage waiting for a trigger? Or some combination of the three? The group breaks down how liquidity vanished, why hedges failed, how this flash crash echoed the worst moments of traditional markets, and why the industry urgently needs reform before it happens again.

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

 🫠Black Friday analyses continue… 

We’re LIVE today at 12pm ET as Guy Young joins Laura to discuss Ethena and USDe oracle design and risk management. Don’t miss it—catch it on YouTube, X, PumpFun, or Twitch! 📺

• 🗳️ MetaDAO’s community rejected a $6 million token sale to two venture capital firms at a 30% discount, a move that would have diluted holders by up to 8%, choosing to preserve its treasury runway and push back against what members saw as an overly generous deal.

• 📉 Hyperliquid’s CEO accused major centralized exchanges like Binance of underreporting liquidations during last week’s historic $19 billion crash, warning that their data methods could hide the true scale of losses during market chaos.

• 🕵️‍♂️ Crypto crime research group SEAL launched a new reporting system for phishing sites that uses “TLS attestations” to let ethical hackers prove they saw the same malicious pages as victims, bypassing common anti-bot tricks used by scammers.

• 🌀 Privacy tech group 0xbow launched a Tornado Cash tool that lets users prove their funds aren’t tied to criminal activity through zero-knowledge proofs, offering anonymity without shielding hackers as over 16,000 illicit addresses remain blacklisted.

• 💳 WazirX secured Singapore High Court approval for its debt restructuring plan backed by nearly 96% of creditors, clearing the way to reopen within 10 business days after a $234 million hack left 6.6 million users locked out for over a year.

• 📈 Ethereum’s stablecoin usage reached record levels with over 1 million unique weekly senders, reflecting rapid global adoption in countries with currency instability and expanding use in apps like lending, prediction markets, and asset trading.

• 🏛️ California’s governor signed SB 822, making the state the first to ensure unclaimed crypto remains in its original form rather than being forcibly sold, protecting users from unwanted taxable events and bringing legal clarity to dormant accounts.

• 📉 Tokyo-listed Metaplanet saw its market value sink below the worth of its 30,000 bitcoin holdings after its stock tumbled over 70% since June, signaling waning investor enthusiasm for companies built around large crypto treasuries.

• 🐋 BitMine Technologies bought over 200,000 ETH worth about $828 million during last week’s market dip, pushing its holdings past 3 million tokens—around 2.5% of total supply—bringing it closer to its goal of controlling 5% of all ETH.

• 🐲 China Renaissance began talks to raise $600 million to build a BNB token treasury company in the U.S., teaming up with Binance co-founder Changpeng Zhao’s family office as corporate hoarding of crypto tokens becomes a growing trend.

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