Weekly Recap: Binance’s Massive User Rescue, DOJ’s $15B Bitcoin Seizure

Binance Listing Fee Fight: What’s a Fair Price to List on the Top Crypto Exchange?

How one founder’s viral tweet shook the world’s biggest exchange.

When CJ Hetherington revealed the token listing terms Binance allegedly offered his startup, the crypto world exploded.

In this episode, CJ, founder of prediction market app Limitless, and his investor Nick Tomaino of 1confirmation join Laura to discuss why he went public, how Binance responded, and what the incident reveals about the power dynamics between exchanges and builders.

The conversation tackles how retail gets dumped on, why transparency is the next frontier for crypto, and why both guests agree that the “revolution won’t be centralized.”

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

Now, let’s get into this week’s news! In today’s edition:

• 💸 Binance launches $728M relief plan after flash crash chaos.

• 🚔 DOJ seizes $15B in bitcoin from global scam network.

• 🤑 Tempo raises $500M.

• 🌊 $SEA token is coming.

• 🏦 BlackRock leads Wall Street’s tokenization push.

• ⚖️ SBF claims arrest blocked his crypto testimony.

• 🎯 Nobel Prize bets spark leak investigation.

• ⚙️ Hyperliquid activates HIP-3.

• 💰 Celsius wins $300M settlement from Tether.

• 😆 Fun Bits: Paxos mints $300 trillion by mistake — then deletes it.

Binance Unveils Relief Plan After Flash Crash and Token Depegs

Binance has launched a sweeping compensation effort after a flash crash last week caused several major tokens — including USDe, BNSOL, and WBETH — to lose their pegs and triggered widespread liquidations across the market.

The exchange said it has already paid $283 million to affected Binance Earn users and rolled out a $400 million “Together Initiative” to help traders recover from losses tied to forced liquidations. The plan includes up to $300 million for users who lost over 30% of their portfolios, along with a $100 million loan fund for institutional participants. “When we fall short, we take responsibility—there are no excuses or justifications,” Binance co-founder Yi He said.

Separately, BNB Chain launched a $45 million “Reload Airdrop” to reimburse 160,000 memecoin traders impacted by the crash. Analysts cited internal oracle issues and liquidity strains as factors that intensified the depegs.

DOJ Seizes $15 Billion in Bitcoin From Global “Pig Butchering” Scam Network

The U.S. Department of Justice has seized approximately $15 billion worth of bitcoin tied to a massive “pig butchering” fraud ring operating out of Cambodia, marking the largest cryptocurrency forfeiture in the department’s history.

Federal prosecutors charged 38-year-old Chen Zhi, also known as “Vincent,” with wire fraud and money laundering conspiracy for allegedly overseeing the scheme through his conglomerate, Prince Holding Group. The company is accused of running forced-labor scam compounds that trafficked victims and coerced them into executing crypto investment frauds that targeted users worldwide.

“Prince Group’s investment scams have caused billions of dollars in losses and untold misery to victims around the world,” said Brooklyn U.S. Attorney Joseph Nocella. The Treasury Department simultaneously designated the Prince Group as a transnational criminal organization and sanctioned more than 100 individuals and entities linked to Zhi. The defendant remains at large, while the seized bitcoin (totaling 127,271 BTC) is now in U.S. government custody.

Stripe-Backed Tempo Raises $500 Million to Build Payments Blockchain

Tempo, a blockchain project incubated by Stripe and Paradigm, has raised $500 million in a Series A funding round led by Greenoaks and Thrive Capital, valuing the company at $5 billion. Other investors include Sequoia Capital, Ribbit Capital, and SV Angel, while Stripe and Paradigm did not contribute additional capital in this round.

Tempo is designed as a payments-optimized layer 1 blockchain, built to integrate with fintech infrastructure rather than decentralized finance. Stripe CEO Patrick Collison described it as “the payments-oriented L1, optimized for high-scale, real-world financial applications.”

The raise follows a surge in crypto venture investment, with over $16 billion deployed in Q3 2025. 

Earlier on Friday, Ethereum researcher Dankrad Feist announced his move to Tempo, joining efforts to develop its compliance-focused, high-throughput blockchain for stablecoin and digital payments.

OpenSea to Launch $SEA Token in Early 2026 With 50% Allocated to Community

OpenSea CEO Devin Finzer announced that the NFT marketplace will launch its $SEA token in Q1 2026, marking the platform’s shift from NFT trading to a broader “trade-everything” ecosystem.

According to Finzer, 50% of the total $SEA supply will be allocated to the community, with half distributed through an initial claim for early users and rewards participants. The token will include staking features linked to specific collections and projects, while 50% of OpenSea’s platform revenue at launch will be used to buy back $SEA to bolster its ecosystem.

Finzer said the token launch represents “a spotlight on everything we’re building,” emphasizing that OpenSea aims to unify digital asset trading—from NFTs to tokens and beyond—under a single, seamless platform experience.

BlackRock, Citi, and Global Banks Accelerate Push Into Tokenized Finance

Major financial institutions are deepening their move into digital assets, with BlackRock leading a new wave of blockchain adoption across Wall Street. 

CEO Larry Fink revealed that the firm is developing its own tokenization technology to convert traditional assets like ETFs and real estate into blockchain-based tokens. “We need to be tokenizing all assets, especially those with multiple levels of intermediaries,” Fink said, describing the effort as key to reducing costs and expanding access to capital markets.

BlackRock already manages the world’s largest Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs—worth $93 billion and $17 billion respectively—and operates its $2.8 billion tokenized BUIDL fund through Securitize. 

Meanwhile, Citibank plans to launch a crypto custody service in 2026, and JPMorgan is preparing to roll out crypto trading operations.

In a parallel initiative, a consortium of major banks including Goldman Sachs, Citi, and Bank of America is exploring a stablecoin-like digital money backed 1:1 by fiat reserves, marking a coordinated effort to integrate blockchain into global payment systems.

Bankman-Fried Claims Arrest Was Meant to Block His Testimony on Crypto Bill

Former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried has resurfaced on social media, alleging that his 2022 arrest was politically motivated and timed to prevent him from testifying before Congress on a major cryptocurrency bill.

Posting through a friend on the social platform Gettr, Bankman-Fried accused the Biden administration’s regulators of targeting him for political reasons. “They had me arrested weeks before the crypto bill I was working on was set for a vote—and the night before I was set to testify before Congress,” he wrote. The post also claimed that then-SEC Chair Gary Gensler “conveniently lost” communications Republicans had requested around the time of his arrest.

The former exchange founder, who is serving a 25-year prison sentence for fraud and misappropriation of funds, has been increasingly vocal ahead of his November 3 appeal hearing. Critics argue his renewed activity is part of a broader campaign to seek clemency from President Trump. Bankman-Fried has not publicly responded to those claims.

Nobel Peace Prize Betting Surge Prompts Investigation Into Possible Leak

Norwegian officials are investigating whether confidential information about this year’s Nobel Peace Prize winner was leaked after a spike in online bets predicted the outcome hours before the official announcement.

Data from the crypto-based prediction platform Polymarket showed that wagers on Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado surged shortly after midnight in Norway, ahead of her selection as the 2025 laureate. One trader, using the handle “dirtycup,” reportedly bet $70,000 on Machado and earned about $30,000 in profit, while three accounts collectively gained around $90,000 from similar bets.

“We take this very seriously,” said Kristian Berg Harpviken, director of the Norwegian Nobel Institute. “It seems we have been prey to a criminal actor who wants to earn money on our information.” 

Officials said they are investigating whether anyone “managed to steal information” from the secretive selection process.

Hyperliquid Activates Upgrade to Enable Decentralized Perpetual Trading

Decentralized exchange Hyperliquid has activated its latest upgrade, HIP-3, aiming to decentralize the perpetual futures market. The new system allows qualified deployers to launch their own perpetual DEXs on HyperCore by staking 500,000 HYPE tokens.

According to project administrators, “HIP-3 will be enabled during this network upgrade. There is no immediate change for users,” but deployers can begin launching new markets “once ready.” The proposal, known as Hyperliquid Improvement Proposal 3, integrates with HyperEVM to support smart contracts and governance, while introducing safeguards like validator slashing and open interest limits to maintain market stability.

Celsius Wins $300 Million Settlement From Tether in Bankruptcy Case

Celsius Network has secured a $299.5 million settlement from stablecoin issuer Tether, ending a year-long legal battle over the liquidation of bitcoin collateral during the lender’s 2022 collapse.

The dispute centered on 39,542 BTC that Tether allegedly liquidated before a required 10-hour notice period expired, a move Celsius claimed worsened its insolvency. Tether maintained the actions were contractually justified, arguing Celsius had failed to meet margin calls.

The settlement—about 7% of Celsius’s original $4.3 billion claim—was approved by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York and confirmed by the Blockchain Recovery Investment Consortium (BRIC), which manages Celsius’s estate. “Tether is pleased to have reached a settlement of all issues related to the Celsius bankruptcy,” said Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino.

Fun Bits: Paxos Mints All the Money—Then Deletes It

In a move that briefly made PayPal the richest company in the universe, Paxos accidentally minted $300 trillion worth of PayPal’s stablecoin PYUSD—that’s trillion, with a T. The glitch, caused by a misplaced decimal, turned what was supposed to be a $300,000 transfer into the digital equivalent of printing all the world’s money… and then some.

“Paxos just minted the entirety of global debt,” quipped analytics firm Arkham, as traders collectively spit out their coffee. The company quickly burned the excess tokens, assuring everyone, “No funds lost, just our dignity.”

It’s not Paxos’ first fat-finger fumble—back in 2023, they paid $500,000 in fees for a $2,000 Bitcoin transaction. Some lessons, it seems, cost a fortune.

These guys took the idea of the trillion-dollar coin a little too literally!

Watch the weekly recap on YouTube!