BTC Completes Fourth Halving at a Block Height of 840,000 | Cryptocurrency Trends

1. Mainstream Exchange Trends:

• OKX Web3 Wallet opens a Runes marketplace.

2. Cryptocurrency Trends:

• Bitcoin completes fourth halving at a block height of 840,000, reducing the block reward to 3.125 BTC.
• Runes protocol officially launches on Bitcoin, leading to a surge in Bitcoin network fees.
• As of April 18, USDC circulation has increased by $900 million in the past week.
• Injective announces the INJ 3.0 governance proposal, aiming for major upgrades to its tokenomics.
• TON: (i) Telegram wallet introduces 5 upgrades, including the ability for users to transfer USDT for free to their Telegram contacts. (ii) Tether partners with the TON Foundation to send encrypted payments via Telegram.
• Friend.tech announces on X (formerly Twitter) that its audit for V2 has been completed, and the V2 release is scheduled for April 29.
• Jupiter's second round of LFG Launchpad voting has ended, with the LST protocol Sanctum receiving 64% of the votes.
• Z Kasino is accused of owing funds and defrauding users, and has allegedly deleting withdrawal information from its website, preventing users from withdrawing their funds. Additionally, ZKasino bridged users' deposits of about 10,000 ETH intended for mining to a multi-signature address, and then deposited them into Lido.
• Mocaverse, Animoca Brands’ Web3 project, announces details of its MOCA token sale and plans to raise $5 million in funding.

3. Financing Trends:

• SatScreener, a Rune analytics infrastructure protocol, raises $500,000 in a funding round led by Sora Ventures.
• INK, a Bitcoin NFT project, raises $10 million in a funding round led by CaesarEon.
• Only1, a Solana social platform, raises $1.3 million in a strategic funding round, bringing the total funds raised to $4.8 million. The funding round was led by Newman Group.

4. Regulatory Trends:

• The IRS releases a draft of its tax forms for reporting digital asset transactions, which is applicable for tax filings in 2025.