Week 36, August 24–30, 2026 Key cryptocurrencies continued to rise after the explosive surge in mid-to-late August. Investors note that BTC gained 20% over the month on low trading volumes, comparable to those of 2023. In addition, on prediction markets the odds of the bill passing in 2026 fell again. Some regulators have begun drafting rules without Congress. Alongside weak activity in the speculative market, financial firms are building infrastructure together: state banking associations, the central banks of Japan and India, and Korean asset managers. Banks and central banks are building settlement systems themselves. On August 27, 39 state banking associations announced the BankChain alliance. The alliance intends to create a common network for tokenized deposits by 2027. On the same day, Japanese regulators formed a group to develop 24/7 settlement for equities and government bonds, with implementation pushed into the 2030s. Forty regional and online banks are already testing tokenized deposits. India is preparing a pilot issuance of REC bonds worth at least 5 billion rupees ($57 million), to be settled in wholesale digital rupees. The CLARITY Act is stuck — agencies are writing the rules. On August 24, Michael Selig, head of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), warned that if Clarity fails, the agency itself will write the rules. On August 27, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sent crypto custody rule changes to the White House. According to Polymarket, the odds of passage in 2026 fell from 18% to 14%. The House of Lords will review the Bank of England’s stablecoin mandate on September 7 and 9. Crypto assets have become embedded in political fortunes. The group of UAE National Security Adviser Sheikh Tahnoun bin Zayed holds 49% of the banking venture World Liberty Financial and 38% of the structure tied to Donald Trump’s family. The investments followed a U.S.-UAE artificial intelligence agreement. Public Citizen estimates investor losses from Trump crypto projects since 2022 at $4.7 billion. On August 25, the head of Poland’s Zondacrypto, Przemysław Kral, began negotiating with prosecutors for a lighter sentence, offering compromising material on Nawrocki, whose campaign he financed. Capital is coming from asset managers, not industrial bets. Money is flowing into the sector from asset managers, while proprietary industrial projects are being written off. South Korea’s Mirae Asset, after acquiring the Korbit exchange on August 28, announced plans to build a digital asset management business worth 150 trillion won ($109 billion), based on a client base of 1,500 trillion won ($1.1 trillion). Tether has shut down its $120 million mining project in Uruguay: after the change of government, the company stopped paying its bills, state-owned utility UTE cut power to the sites, and staff were laid off. In total, Tether invested more than $2 billion in energy and mining across 15 sites.