[News Brief] Jul 2, morning | Metaplanet Purchases an Additional 2,823 Bitcoin

Metaplanet Purchases an Additional 2,823 Bitcoin

According to PANews, Japan-listed company Metaplanet disclosed that it purchased an additional 2,823 BTC.

With this purchase, Metaplanet’s total Bitcoin holdings have reached 43,000 BTC.

U.S. Spot Bitcoin ETFs See $295 Million in Net Outflows in One Day

Odaily, citing SoSoValue data, reported that U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded total net outflows of $295 million on July 1, Eastern Time.

The product with the largest net inflow was Grayscale Bitcoin Mini Trust ETF BTC, which saw $36.338 million in inflows in a single day. Its cumulative net inflows stand at $2.398 billion.

It was followed by Morgan Stanley ETF MSBT, which recorded $29.8139 million in net inflows, bringing its cumulative net inflows to $364 million.

Meanwhile, BlackRock’s spot Bitcoin ETF IBIT saw the largest capital outflow, with $219 million leaving the fund in one day. IBIT’s cumulative net inflows stand at $60.034 billion.

The total net assets of spot Bitcoin ETFs amount to $72.46 billion, representing 6.01% of Bitcoin’s total market capitalization. Cumulative net inflows were tallied at $50.858 billion.

Robinhood Launches Public Mainnet of Layer 2 Blockchain ‘Robinhood Chain’

Robinhood has launched the public mainnet of its Layer 2 blockchain, 'Robinhood Chain,' according to Odaily.

With this mainnet launch, Robinhood now supports tokenized stock trading in more than 120 countries. It also unveiled 'Robinhood Earn,' a decentralized lending product based on USDG that offers approximately 7% yield.

Robinhood is expanding beyond its traditional securities brokerage business into cryptocurrency, tokenized assets, and AI-powered trading.

Forward Industries Acquires More Than 500,000 Additional SOL

U.S.-listed company Forward Industries (FWDI) acquired more than 500,000 additional SOL during the recent fiscal quarter, increasing its Solana holdings to approximately 7.55 million SOL, according to PANews citing The Block.

The company said those holdings are worth about $776 million. Forward Industries is considered one of the largest publicly listed corporate holders of Solana and the largest corporate SOL treasury holder.

The company added that it issued 93,642 shares through an at-the-market offering during the quarter and repurchased shares when its stock price traded below net asset value per SOL. The company said its goal is to maximize SOL holdings per share and enhance long-term shareholder value.

Following the news, FWDI shares rose more than 17% intraday, while Solana’s price climbed to around $77.

EU Begins Review and Revision Process on First Day of Full MiCA Implementation

According to CoinDesk, the European Union began the review and revision process on July 1, the first day of full implementation of its crypto-asset regulatory framework, MiCA.

The initial areas under review include stablecoin-related rules and cross-border equivalence mechanisms. MiCA is a regulatory framework designed to unify rules for the issuance, trading, and provision of crypto-asset services within the EU.

Ethereum Foundation Publishes Policy Guide for Governments and Institutions

According to The Block, the Ethereum Foundation’s Global Policy Strategy team has published a new policy guide aimed at governments and institutions.

The foundation described Ethereum as public infrastructure that has operated without interruption since its launch in 2015, supported by a decentralized validator network, multiple independent clients, and a developer ecosystem.

The guide includes examples of public-sector use cases built on Ethereum, including decentralized identity projects in Bhutan and Buenos Aires, as well as a land registry project in India.

The foundation emphasized that policymakers should distinguish between decentralized public blockchains and networks controlled by corporations or foundations.

Ripple Reveals Eight Recent Developments Related to Stablecoin RLUSD

Ripple disclosed eight recent developments involving its stablecoin RLUSD, including progress in payments, exchange listings, and cross-chain infrastructure. Mastercard has expanded RLUSD payment support across eight blockchain networks, including the XRP Ledger.

According to Odaily, Jack McDonald, Ripple’s senior vice president of stablecoins, shared updates on X on June 29 regarding RLUSD’s progress in payments, regional expansion, on-chain liquidity, cross-border payments, multichain support, exchange listings, philanthropy, and the Japanese market.

Ripple expanded RLUSD access in Türkiye through partnerships with Birla, Bitexen, and Bitlo. It also worked with Bitso to enable RLUSD and MXNB to support liquidity and cross-border transactions through the XRP Ledger’s permissioned DEX.

RLUSD has secured multichain support via Wormhole’s native token transfer and entered the Japanese market through SBI VC Trade following approval from Japan’s Financial Services Agency. RLUSD was also listed on exchanges including Gate and FloQ, and integrated with cross-chain infrastructure provider Squid Router.

Ripple also joined Water’s GetBlue campaign as its exclusive digital asset and payments partner.

Binance to Temporarily Suspend INJ Deposits and Withdrawals for Injective Network Upgrade and Hard Fork

According to Odaily, Binance will temporarily suspend deposits and withdrawals for Injective (INJ) starting at 10:00 p.m. KST on July 2 to support the network upgrade and hard fork.

The project team plans to carry out the upgrade and hard fork at block height 172,502,000, which is expected to occur at 11:00 p.m. KST the same day.

Solana Foundation Officially Adopts On-Chain Governance Framework SGP

The Solana Foundation has officially adopted the Solana Governance Proposal (SGP), an on-chain governance framework, according to Odaily.

Under the new system, validators can use SGP to submit, support, and decide on key protocol governance proposals. All proposals are processed on-chain, and voting is conducted based on staking weight and verified through Merkle proofs.

Unlike Solana Improvement Documents (SID), which focus on technical and protocol changes, SGP is intended to formalize ecosystem governance opinions. Validators delegated at least 100,000 SOL may submit proposals, and a proposal must receive support from more than 15% of total network staking to advance to a formal vote.

Venice AI Raises $65 Million in First External Funding Round

According to Odaily, Venice AI founder Erik Voorhees said the company raised $65 million in its first external funding round and was valued at $1 billion.

The round was led by Dragonfly, with participation from North Island Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, Archetype, Liquid 2 Ventures, and Morgan Creek.

Venice AI is a privacy-focused alternative AI chatbot platform launched in May 2024. It aims not to store user conversations on centralized corporate servers.

Voorhees said Venice AI has surpassed 3 million users and achieved profitability in the first quarter. The new capital will be used to expand its platform and APIs for access to both open-source and proprietary AI models.

Annual issuance of Venice AI’s native token VVV has also been reduced to 3 million tokens, which are distributed to holders who stake VVV to support the network.