GPT-5 goes live — and it’s free
OpenAI’s new flagship model is faster, more accurate and dramatically less prone to hallucinations than GPT-4o. It can scaffold complete websites, games and mobile apps from a single prompt, asks clarifying questions and excels at senior-level coding tasks. Every ChatGPT account receives access at no extra cost.
UAE rolls out a single crypto licence
The Securities & Commodities Authority approved “passporting” rules: any permit issued by Dubai’s VARA is now valid across all seven emirates. Start-ups no longer need separate approvals for Abu Dhabi or Sharjah, slashing launch times and compliance costs. Analysts expect a new wave of exchanges and custodians to choose the UAE as an operational hub.
MetaMask USD: ConsenSys & Stripe move into stablecoins
ConsenSys announced MetaMask USD (MMUSD), a dollar-pegged stablecoin issued via Stripe Treasury. Users will mint and swap the token inside MetaMask; card top-ups and cash-outs run through Stripe’s payment rails. Monthly audit reports are promised, with initial support for Ethereum, Base and Polygon.
PancakeSwap lists tokenised stocks
BNB Chain’s flagship DEX launched synthetic tokens for Apple (AAPL), Amazon (AMZN) and Tesla (TSLA). Each token is backed 1:1 by underlying shares held with a US broker. Trades clear like any BNB swap (0.25 % fee, no KYC), and dividends arrive in stablecoins. The move blurs the line between CeFi equities and DeFi liquidity pools.
AWS adds TON to its Public Blockchain Datasets
Amazon Web Services published a full TON snapshot inside its Public Datasets programme. Developers can query the blockchain with Athena, S3 or Redshift without running their own nodes—useful for analytics dashboards, indexers and Telegram mini-app back-ends.
Arkham uncovers a $14.5 B bitcoin heist no one noticed
Arkham Intelligence traced a December 2020 breach of Chinese-Iranian mining pool LuBian: hackers siphoned 127 426 BTC (then $3.5 B, now $14.5 B) in 24 hours, exploiting a weak private-key algorithm. LuBian begged for the funds back via OP_RETURN messages yet never disclosed the loss. The coins remain untouched, making the thief the 13th-largest BTC holder.
El Salvador green-lights “Bitcoin-only” banks
New legislation lets banks offer deposit, loan and payment services denominated entirely in BTC. Reserves can be held in bitcoin or USDT. The Bukele administration hopes to boost crypto capital inflows and slash remittance fees for Salvadorans abroad.
