"Senate announces resolution against pardon for SBF" Jul 16, 2026

The US Senate unanimously passed a bipartisan resolution declaring that Sam Bankman-Fried should not receive a presidential pardon or sentence commutation under any circumstances. The resolution was sponsored by Senators Cynthia Lummis and Ruben Gallego and came in direct response to Bankman-Fried's clemency request filed in June 2026. Bankman-Fried was convicted in November 2023 on seven fraud-related charges stemming from the collapse of FTX and was sentenced to 25 years in prison. He continues to claim that FTX and Alameda Research were solvent and blames the destruction of the business on bankruptcy lawyers and incoming management. President Trump had already stated in January 2026 that he had no plans to pardon Bankman-Fried, making the Senate resolution a reinforcement of that position rather than a reversal of any stated intent.

Tether invested $20 million in Argentine neobank UALA as part of a $197 million funding round that valued the company at over $3 billion. UALA serves more than 11 million customers across Argentina, Mexico, and Colombia. The investment continues Tether's strategy of building out regional financial infrastructure across Latin America rather than limiting its footprint to stablecoin issuance.

Ledger launched AgentStack, an open-source toolkit that allows AI agents to read wallet balances, propose transactions, prepare swaps, and draft blockchain operations. Every execution still requires physical approval on a Ledger hardware device, keeping AI agents in a strictly advisory role. Ledger justified the design by citing that 26 percent of agent skills contain at least one vulnerability and that human error accounts for roughly 60 percent of security breaches. Ledger is also extending its hardware security model beyond crypto, adding open PGP support for API keys, AI agent credentials, and logins. The company is reportedly considering an IPO at a valuation above $4 billion.

MoonPay acquired Y Combinator-backed crypto deposit startup Glide in an undisclosed all-equity deal, its sixth acquisition announced in 2026. Glide was founded in 2023 by former Robinhood crypto wallet developers and enables apps to accept deposits for more than 100 tokens across 30 blockchains without requiring users to manually bridge or swap assets. Glide processes more than $100 million in annualized volume and serves over 50 business customers, giving MoonPay a meaningful addition to its payments infrastructure at a point when the company is clearly in an aggressive consolidation phase.

Polygon Labs announced a second round of layoffs in 2026 without disclosing the number of employees affected, as it moves to complete its acquisition of crypto exchange CoinMe. Polygon is repositioning itself from a blockchain-focused organization into a blockchain-enabled payments company, with CoinMe and its earlier acquisition of wallet infrastructure firm Sequence forming what it calls its open money stack. The company is targeting profitability in 2027, and the layoffs appear tied to that cost discipline as much as to the strategic pivot.