Industry insiders caution that Ethereum could fade by 2030 unless urgency returns, prompting the Ethereum Foundation to pivot toward faster iteration from early 2025. Leadership changes, including Tomasz Stańczak and Hsiao-Wei Wang as Executive Directors, accompany performance-focused upgrades and a proposed "Beam Chain" to address scaling and fragmentation.

US lawmakers are pushing toward federal crypto rules, but negotiators say the treatment of stablecoin yield is the main sticking point. The debate escalated in mid-August after the Bank Policy Institute warned that permissive designs could shift up to $6.6 trillion of deposits into stablecoins. The House has advanced the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act as the Senate crafts a parallel package.

After the Federal Reserve delivered a quarter-point rate cut, Ethereum extended its advance above $3,300 and began outperforming Bitcoin near $92,000 as traders rotated into higher-duration assets. On-chain and derivatives data indicate the move has been driven by spot buying, with large holders accumulating nearly 1 million ETH and mainnet fees dropping below 300 ETH per day, the weakest revenue level since 2017, according to market data providers.

Security researchers captured North Korean operatives in real time after deploying a honeypot workstation that mimicked a developer environment. The operatives, linked to the Lazarus Group's Famous Chollima division, used legitimate AI hiring tools and cloud services to establish trusted insider access rather than exploit code vulnerabilities. The operation revealed systematic use of job-automation software, VPN masking, and persistent remote-access protocols to bypass corporate security measures.

Strategy, which holds 650,000 BTC, is considering Bitcoin lending services that may provide inventory to hedge funds shorting its reserves. CEO Phong Le confirmed discussions with banks on Dec. 2, shifting the firm from passive custody to active credit operations. The move introduces counterparty risk and could compress the company's stock premium to net asset value.

PIPPIN, a Solana-based memecoin from an early 2024 AI experiment, has surged 556% over 30 days while the broader Solana memecoin sector faces declining liquidity. Blockchain data identified 50 synchronized wallets that purchased $19 million in PIPPIN, funded through HTX exchange. The token recorded over $3.19 billion in derivatives volume on December 1.

XRP spot exchange-traded funds attracted approximately $756 million in net inflows across eleven consecutive trading sessions since their November 13 launch. The four active products now hold about 0.6% of the token's total market capitalization. During the same period, XRP declined roughly 20% and traded near $2.03, according to market data.

Cardano has introduced a community proposal to allocate 70 million ADA tokens, approximately $30 million, toward integrating tier-one stablecoins, custody providers, bridges, oracles, and institutional analytics platforms. The initiative is backed by Input Output, EMURGO, the Cardano Foundation, Intersect, and the Midnight Foundation. The proposal aims to establish core DeFi infrastructure ahead of 2026, targeting expansion of the network's stablecoin base from $40 million into the low-hundreds-of-millions range.

Ripple's RLUSD stablecoin has reached $1.26 billion in total supply, with $1.03 billion or 82% deployed on Ethereum and $235 million on the XRP Ledger. The distribution reflects Ethereum's mature DeFi infrastructure and deep liquidity pools compared to XRPL's emerging ecosystem. Weekly transfer volume on Ethereum now averages approximately $1.0 billion, up from $66 million at the start of the year, according to Token Terminal.