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Bybit has returned to a 1:1 backing of client assets and has fully closed the "ether gap" it faced after an unprecedented $1.4 billion hack hit the exchange on February 21, 2025. The exchange has received 446,870 ether (ETH), worth $1.23 billion at current prices, through loans, large deposits, and ether purchases in the past two days. Address activity suggests more than $400 million were purchased through over-the-counter trading, with another $300 million brought directly from exchanges. Nearly $300 million were sought as loans; the rest are from addresses apparently belonging to crypto funds.

UBS AG issued the first ever digital bond by a banking institution globally that will be listed, traded and settled on a regulated digital exchange (an SFR375 million three-year senior unsecured bond). The digital bond has the same instrument structure, legal status and rating as a traditional UBS AG senior unsecured note but will be dual listed at SIX Swiss Exchange where they will settle on the SIX SIS central securities depository (CSD) traditional rails, and SDX Trading where they will settle via the SIX Digital Exchange (SDX) distributed ledger-based central securities depository (CSD) network through atomic settlement technology. Settlement via SDX CSD is instant and automatic and does not require a central clearing counterparty. Investors will have the ability to automatically settle and clear the UBS digital bond on either SDX CSD directly or on SIX SIS via the operational link.

Crypto exchange ZB Exchange has paused user withdrawals, likely in response to a suspected hack that appears to have drained nearly $5 million in tokens from the firm's hot wallet. The multimillion-dollar loss is the latest in a series of security breaches to hit crypto companies this year and the third multimillion-dollar hack reported this week.

"We compare decentralized blockchain-based venues (DEXs) to centralized crypto exchanges (CEXs) by assessing two key aspects of market quality: market liquidity and price efficiency. A comprehensive analysis of transaction costs and deviations from the "triangular" no-arbitrage condition suggests that market liquidity in CEXs and DEXs is similar but DEX prices are less efficient. While the main frictions for DEXs are high exchange fees and the gas cost of transactions stemming from proof-of-work blockchains, the superior price efficiency of CEXs involves significant risks and latency associated with delegated custody. We propose and empirically validate a stylized model of DEX liquidity provision, linking trading volume, exchange fees, and liquidity in equilibrium. Our theory identifies the quantitative conditions for DEXs to overtake CEXs in the future."

The European Central Bank (ECB) is inviting payments experts to participate in technical talks on options for the secure exchange of payment-related data between payer and payee for digital euro transactions. The talks will center around the latest retail payment market innovations that can ensure the secure exchange of end-user data between payment initiation and payment acceptance devices, and the key considerations for a secure exchange of front-end data for the envisaged digital euro use cases, form factors and core and optional services.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is suing Kraken, one of the world's largest crypto exchanges, for illegally operating as a securities exchange without first registering with the regulator. In June, the SEC filed similar lawsuits against Binance and Coinbase, and both are defending against the regulator's claims, as will Kraken. Unique to the Kraken lawsuit are claims that it created a "significant risk" by commingling up to $33 billion in customer crypto with its own corporate assets, quoting Kraken's independent auditor. The SEC listed a number of crypto-assets it deemed to be unregistered securities, which the lawsuit alleges Kraken took a direct role in promoting to the investing public (ADA, AXS, ALGO, ATOM, CHZ, COTI, DASH, FIL, FLOW, ICP, MANA, MATIC, NEAR, OMG, SAND, and SO).

The U.K. Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) will not object to requests from Recognized Investment Exchanges (RIEs) to create a UK listed market segment for crypto-asset-backed Exchange Traded Notes (cETNs). These products will be available for professional investors, such as investment firms and credit institutions authorized or regulated to operate in financial markets only. However, the ban on the sale of cETNs (and crypto derivatives) to retail consumers remains in place. On the same day as the FCA announcement (March 11, 2024) the London Stock Exchange confirmed it will accept applications for the admission of Bitcoin and Ethereum cETNs in Q2 2024. https://www.lse.co.uk/rns/n0224-admission-of-bitcoin-and-ethereum-etns-66tuep2iac04hnc.html

The foreign exchange market is subject to significant credit and settlement risks. While there are risk mitigation mechanisms, about one third of foreign exchange settlements are estimated to take place without them. Ousmène Mandeng writes that the adoption of central bank and other digital currencies can give rise to an entirely new settlement approach, collapsing the foreign exchange life cycle and freeing transactions from credit and settlement risks.

The Philippines is catching up to Japan with a growing number of approved cryptocurrency exchanges. The central bank has green-lighted 10 crypto exchanges so far.

London Derivatives Exchange (LDX), formerly GMEX Exchange, has said it will launch security tokens and digital assets to its trading platform after spending two years developing a crypto trading solution.

Beleaguered Bitfinex may soon issue a proprietary exchange token. The issuance method could be similar to that of other exchange tokens, which were distributed through pre-paid trading fee packages.

Bitfinex has released the official white paper for its $1B exchange token sale, said it will also launch a dedicated platform for projects to raise funds via similar initial exchange offerings.

Certain exchanges that facilitate initial exchange offerings may be breaking U.S. securities laws, a top SEC official said.

Japanese crypto exchange Bitpoint has become the latest exchange to suffer a major loss of funds. Its loss of $32 million-in five cryptocurrencies.

High-frequency trading is becoming commonplace in crypto, too. Placing trading servers physically close to exchanges' matching engines can win an edge on speed. This helps HFT firms make large profits in the legacy markets. Crypto exchanges such as ErisX, Huobi and Gemini are trying to attract large algorithmic traders with colocation offers.

Swiss-based fintech firm Amun AG has released plans to launch a new exchange-traded product (ETP) that will use the Bitwise 10 Select Large Cap Crypto Index as a benchmark. This is the fifth ETP the Swiss SIX Exchange has permitted.

Gotbit inflates trading volumes on obscure cryptocurrency exchanges for a fee and has about 30 token projects as clients. The firm programs bots to trade tokens back and forth with each other, creating the illusion of active markets so the assets can get listed on CoinMarketCap. Its co-founder says exchanges are aware of this manipulation but are not interested in stopping it.

Regulators have made clear that the old way of transacting, where you have pseudonymous transfers-that's not going to scale. Some users may leave compliant exchanges for others that choose not to share personal information, or seek out more decentralized methods of exchange that are harder to police. Such a community will have to remain niche.

The vast majority of the world's cryptocurrency trading volume is in the hands of "lower quality exchanges", while the world's top-rated exchanges control only 5 percent of cryptocurrency trading volume, according to a new report from CryptoCompare.

Regulators and companies are scrambling to address rampant fraud on cryptocurrency exchanges; many services that sort through exchange data are now available.