1. Ethereum Foundation Launches Post‑Quantum Research Challenge With $1M Prize Pool link
The Ethereum Foundation has launched the Better Codes Open Challenge to advance post‑quantum Ethereum research. Participants may leverage AI agents, toolchains and prompts to explore mathematical optimization schemes for hash‑based SNARKs. Submissions will be verified via Lean 4 formal proofs, with opportunities to claim the Ethereum Foundation’s $1 million Proximity Prize. The project is jointly supported by ZK Security, EigenLabs and Yukon Research.
2. WLFI Sets Up Trust Entity; Mack McCain to Serve as Chief Trust Officer Concurrently link
Trump‑family‑affiliated project WLFI announced the promotion of former General Counsel Mack McCain to Chief Legal Officer (CLO) and Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) of WLFI and all its affiliated entities. He will also serve as Chief Trust Officer of the in‑formation World Liberty Trust Co., N.A. Mack McCain previously served as Chief of Staff to the Chief Legal and Compliance Officer and Deputy General Counsel for Regulatory Affairs at Robinhood, General Counsel at Arta Finance, and held senior legal positions at Charles Schwab and Scottrade. In his new roles, he will oversee legal strategy, management and governance across the entire WLFI ecosystem, and lead the trust and fiduciary governance‑framework operations of World Liberty Trust Company under the supervision of the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC).
In addition, World Liberty Financial (WLFI) has launched its first batch of USD1‑denominated RWA perpetual‑contract markets. Aster DEX has gone live with trading pairs including SPCXUSD1, CLUSD1, XAUUSD1, SNDKUSD1 and SKHYNIXUSD1. WLFI stated it will provide liquidity support for these markets via 250 million WLFI tokens and $12.5 million worth of USD1. This launch covers RWA assets such as gold, crude oil and global equities, with more USD1‑denominated RWA perpetual‑contract markets to be added later.
3. Arbitrum Activates ArbOS 61 on Aug 20, Optional Compliance Filter Available for Appchains link
Following Arbitrum governance approval, the ArbOS 61 “Elara” upgrade has been activated. It adds optional protocol‑level transaction filtering, priority‑fee support and alternative data‑availability interfaces for dedicated chains, and raises the Stylus contract code‑size limit from 24 KB to 96 KB. Compliance filtering is disabled by default; dedicated‑chain owners select compliance service providers and enable the feature manually, and Arbitrum One and Nova have not adopted it for the time being. Priority‑fee functionality for Arbitrum One still requires a separate DAO vote, while the base‑fee management range is adjusted to 0.01‑0.10 gwei.
4. Optimism‑Funded Casts Key Vote To Reallocate 546.9M OP From User Airdrops to Ecosystem Strategic Fund link
Test in Prod, the core development team funded by Optimism, cast a critical supporting vote of 8.486 million OP approximately 17 minutes before the voting deadline, lifting the approval rate from 45.77% to 61.84%. The highly controversial governance proposal ultimately passed with 17.974 million affirmative votes versus 10.931 million negative votes. The proposal reallocates 546.9 million OP originally earmarked for user airdrops into the strategic ecosystem fund managed by the Optimism Foundation to advance OP Mainnet as well as enterprise‑level partnerships and growth. The Optimism Foundation holds that broad‑scale user airdrops no longer align with its institutional‑oriented strategy. While entities and researchers including L2BEAT and Polynya raised objections over insufficient transparent oversight and ambiguous value for token holders, Test in Prod argued that enterprise‑expansion bids demand fund reserves and confidentiality to compete in the market.
5. Linera Unveils New Product Around LNRA Token Sale, Aims to Become the Next Hyperliquid link
Layer‑1 blockchain Linera published an announcement unveiling a new round of products tied to the LNRA token sale, explicitly setting the goal of “becoming the next Hyperliquid”. Linera features real‑time prediction markets built on its Microchain architecture, where markets can launch and settle within one minute. Founded by Mathieu Baudet, a former researcher for Meta’s Libra/Diem project, the project currently has a core team of merely five members. Linera stated that LNRA will serve as the network’s native token, with full sale details to be disclosed at a later date.
Sponsored by FinTax
6. Dark‑Pool Prop AMM Hits $100M Daily Volume on Ethereum for the First Time link
Dark‑pool Prop AMM daily trading volume has surpassed $100 million for the first time on the Ethereum network, accounting for approximately 10% of Ethereum’s spot DEX trading volume, with FermiSwap and Metric capturing the majority of market share.
7. Uniswap Fee Switch Brings No Harm to LPs; LP‑Trader‑Protocol Triple‑Win Achieved link
Uniswap’s fee switch has not yielded adverse effects; instead, it has delivered a triple‑win outcome for LPs, traders and the protocol. Nearly one month has passed since the full launch of protocol fees on Uniswap V4. LP TVL has remained virtually unchanged, even on the Base network amid competition from Aerodrome. Comparable results have been observed for Uniswap V3 on Ethereum, with sustained improvements in price impact for trading pairs between native assets and stablecoins, as well as between stablecoins.
Uniswap co‑founder Hayden Adams stated that substantial asset‑trading activity exists on Uniswap. There are 8 pools with monthly trading volume above $1 billion, 57 above $100 million, 284 above $10 million, 1,039 above $1 million, 2,419 above $100,000, and 4,324 above $10,000. The above figures only count pools with highly reliable price data, and actual volumes may be higher.
8. Gnosis Chain Passes GIP‑153, Transitioning From Sovereign L1 to Ethereum L2 link
Gnosis Chain, the long‑established public Layer‑1 blockchain, has formally passed GIP‑153, the governance proposal for its transformation from a sovereign standalone L1 into a highly Ethereum‑aligned L2. On the eve of the voting deadline, multiple official‑affiliated addresses including Gnosis co‑founder Stefan George cast concentrated affirmative votes, successfully meeting the quorum requirement. Co‑initiated by Gnosis founder tw_tter and core team members, the proposal intends for Gnosis Chain to shed the security shortcomings and inflation‑driven subsidy drawbacks inherent to traditional PoS L1 networks, directly inherit security from Ethereum validators, and become the first Ethereum L2 to realize synchronous composability.
9. Arthur Hayes Returns To Lead Flop Labs; Large‑Scale Airdrop Expected in Q4 2026 link
Arthur Hayes announced he is “coming out of retirement” to lead Flop Labs. According to Hayes, Flop Network targets the AI‑agent economy, and its native token FLOP will act as the payment asset for AI agents to acquire computing resources and other services, adopting a no‑presale, no‑VC, 100% fair‑launch model. The project plans a large‑scale airdrop in Q4 2026 and will activate its genesis block in Q1 2027. FLOP will be used by AI agents to obtain computing resources and relevant in‑network services.
10. Harmony Confirms Full‑Network Rollback; Over 109,000 User Transactions Permanently Discarded link
Harmony unveiled its rollback plan for the exploit incident, restoring the states of Shard 0 and Shard 1 to 23:25:37 UTC on August 11 to completely eliminate the 2.385 trillion illicitly minted ONE tokens by the attacker. The exploit once drove ONE down by more than 30%. Harmony stated that since the counterfeit ONE tokens had circulated across exchanges, DEXes, cross‑chain bridges and staking addresses, targeted burns, blacklists or selective transaction recoveries risked harming unrelated funds. A fixed‑window rollback is therefore deemed the lowest‑risk solution.
Follow us
Twitter: https://twitter.com/WuBlockchain
Telegram: https://t.me/wublockchainenglish