Foresight News takes you through this week's hot topics and recommended content:
01 Hackers Strike Consecutively
《KiloEx Stolen $7.5 Million: Is Market Cap Insufficient for Compensation, and Is Decentralized Trust Crisis Erupting Again?》
《ZKsync Stolen $5 Million, Crypto Repeatedly Attacked by Hackers》
02 PancakeSwap Governance Controversy
《CAKE Token Economics 3.0: Does Centralized Governance Defeat DAO?》
03 Powell Maintains Independence
《Powell Clearly "No Bailout", Can Cryptocurrency Wait for Liquidity Feast?》
04 AWS Outage, Binance Service Interrupted
《AWS Outage Leads to Binance Service Interruption, Is Web3 Infrastructure Just a "Makeshift Team"?》
05 Project Investigation
《End of On-chain Snipers? Quick Read of Virtuals Protocol's New Launch Mechanism Genesis》
《Understand Converge in Three Minutes Before Testnet Launch》
《Ethos Network: Reshaping Crypto Reputation System》
06 Industry Observation
《Cryptocurrency Will Save People Eliminated by AI》
《ETH/BTC Exchange Rate Hits Five-Year Low, Is Ethereum Falling from Grace?》
Powell further elaborated on the complex economic landscape in his speech: The growth rate in the first quarter of 2025 is expected to slow down from last year's steady pace. Despite strong car sales, overall consumer spending momentum is insufficient. Businesses' concentrated imports ahead of potential tariffs are anticipated to put pressure on GDP growth, and stagnant labor force growth and government layoffs will also impact the job market. He said: "If the United States becomes a jurisdiction with higher structural risks in the future, this will reduce our attractiveness as a jurisdiction."
Market analysts generally believe that if the tariff suspension can effectively alleviate imported inflationary pressures, the Federal Reserve may delay interest rate cuts in the medium to long term. Conversely, if global trade friction continues to ferment or even escalate, risk assets will be under pressure in the short term, and the Federal Reserve's monetary policy will face a more tricky trade-off - finding a balance between curbing inflation and avoiding excessive economic contraction. Powell candidly admitted, "The pulse we're feeling is higher unemployment rates and higher inflation rates, and our tools can only do one of these two things at a time, so it's a difficult situation for central banks."
04 AWS Outage, Binance Service Interruption
On April 15, Binance announced that the AWS data center network was temporarily interrupted, causing issues with some platform services. Some orders were still successful, while others failed. All services are being gradually restored, and withdrawal functions have been restored. During the comprehensive system recovery, some services may experience delays. Binance was not the only platform affected; platforms like DeBank and Kucoin also announced that due to AWS service interruption, all DeBank services were temporarily unavailable, and their teams are continuously monitoring the situation and will restore access as soon as possible. Recommended reading:
《AWS Outage Causes Binance Service Interruption, Is Web3 Infrastructure Just a "Makeshift Team"?》
[The rest of the translation follows the same professional and accurate approach, maintaining the original structure and meaning while translating into clear, fluent English.]Ethos Protocol ensures the reliability, decentralization, and Sybil attack resistance of its reputation system through a series of innovative mechanisms, combining Social Proof of Stake (Social PoS). Here are its main functions and mechanisms:
Users' Profile can provide transparent and verifiable trust references for communities and other dApps. Users can maintain anonymity or use pseudonyms without exposing their real identities. The Ethos Profile includes a trust center and trust score, integrating data from proofs, endorsements, reviews, and slashing mechanisms. The Profile trust center displays a summary of relevant trust clues from Ethos Protocol or associated wallet on-chain activities, highlighting the most influential Ethos elements, such as large endorsements, notable evaluations, and major financial asset holdings.
Ethos has also launched a reputation market called "Ethos Market". Ethos Market allows users to speculate on the reputation of individuals, companies, DAOs, or even AI entities by buying and selling "trust tickets" and "distrust tickets". Each market is bound to an Ethos Profile (associated with an Ethereum wallet), reflecting the real-time reputation score of the target object.
06 Industry Observation
After Trump's return to the White House, his series of controversial policies seem crazy, but they reflect a deeper social scar - the decline of America's Rust Belt. Once the industrial heartland, it has decayed due to global division of labor and technological changes, with factory closures and worker unemployment, with anger and dissatisfaction erupting through votes. This local backwardness is not an isolated case. The dividend distribution of global trade division comes at a cost. Trump wants to overturn this system and shake off this increasingly heavy trade burden. However, the solution to this problem is not found in tariff barriers or negotiation tables, but at the intersection of technological revolution - AI and Web3. Recommended reading:
《Cryptocurrency Will Save the Useless People Destroyed by AI》
With its decentralized, borderless, and efficient characteristics, cryptocurrency is the best tool for implementing UBI. Compared to the traditional financial system, cryptocurrency is highly compatible with UBI in terms of technical architecture and concept.
Unique Advantages of Cryptocurrency
Borderless: Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum are not restricted by national boundaries and can directly reach individuals anywhere in the world. In contrast, bank account coverage is less than 50% in many developing countries.
Low Cost: Cryptocurrency transfer costs are far lower than cross-border bank remittances. For example, Solana's transaction fee is as low as $0.0001, while traditional bank cross-border transfers can be as high as $10.
Transparency: The public ledger of blockchain ensures transparent fund allocation, reducing corruption and erosion by intermediaries.
Flexibility: Smart contracts (such as ERC-20 tokens on Ethereum) can achieve automated UBI distribution. For example, setting a fixed token distribution to a specific wallet address monthly without manual intervention.
Energy Efficiency: Although Bitcoin's PoW mechanism is energy-intensive, Ethereum's PoS transition and emerging Layer 2 solutions (like Arbitrum and Optimism) have significantly reduced energy consumption, outperforming traditional bank data centers.
On April 14, the ETH/BTC exchange rate fell to 0.01924, continuing to create a new low since January 2020. As a mainstream asset in the previous bull market, Ethereum's performance in this cycle has caused many investors to be dissatisfied. Facing Bitcoin's strong performance in this cycle, Ethereum seems to be experiencing a dual test of confidence and value. Some community members also said: "Although OM plummeted 90% today, its performance this year is still better than ETH." In the past week, some whales on the chain have also been restless. This article will sort out on-chain and exchange data over the past week to provide a comprehensive view of token trading. Recommended reading:
《ETH/BTC Exchange Rate Creates a Five-Year Low, Is Ethereum Being Sent to the Cold Palace?》
In the past week, some whales have been "pouring" into the market. According to Arkham data, an OG address group that initially purchased 100,000 ETH in 2015 has accumulated sales of 4,180 ETH on Kraken since April, worth about $7.05 million. Another 0x62A address sold 4,482 ETH at an average price of $1,572 on April 12, worth $7.05 million. Such price declines have triggered many on-chain liquidations, such as a whale who reduced 35,881 ETH at an average price of $1,562 on April 10, sold off leverage, and then sold the remaining 2,000 ETH at $1,575, currently holding 688 ETH.
In a market environment where Bitcoin is the "Beta" of US stocks, Bitcoin's total market cap percentage is gradually exceeding 60%, reaching 62.46% today, indicating a clear "Bitcoin season" characteristic with high fund concentration, and altcoins performing overall weaker than Bitcoin. Additionally, the crypto fear and greed index remains in the "panic zone", reflecting investors' preference for "risk-averse" needs, with Bitcoin becoming the target. Moreover, in the future strategic reserve plans of the United States, most state proposals only include Bitcoin in the reference range, which further promotes Bitcoin's status as the mainstream crypto asset. If the ETH/BTC exchange rate falls below 0.018 in Q2 2025, it may trigger more leveraged position liquidations, further suppressing the price.
