RaaS #598: Yield-Bearing Stablecoins Cross $13B!

France Cracks Down on Crypto Ransom Attacks, Circle & Tether Control 85% of Stablecoin Market, And Moar!

Sanctum kicks off 2026 with a contrarian bet: while others chase degen superapps, it’s building a yield-focused app to support long-term SOL accumulation. With 2.5% of all SOL staked, it’s also launching a new primitive to unlock earnings across spot and perp venues.

aidotcom is now live in beta with handle reservations open. Once reserved, a personal AI agent will be deployed, and each agent will be backed by a full virtual PC capable of executing tasks end-to-end. From email management and reservations to trip planning, sales outreach, or running your business, the agent can handle anything a human assistant can.

Hyperliquid’s HIP-3 Silver perps are now delivering tighter spreads and better retail execution than CME’s Micro Silver futures. Kyle Samani, former Multicoin Capital co-founder, pushed back, citing governance and compliance concerns, but Jon DBA Crypto’s co-founder rebutted those claims as regulatory fearmongering, defending Hyperliquid’s 24/7 uptime, VC-free bootstrap, and DeFi-first ethos.

Just keep taking screenshots.

Yield-bearing stablecoins are emerging as crypto’s new monetary base, growing from nearly zero to over $13B in about two years. Leaders like sUSDe, sUSDS, BUIDL, USYC, and syrupUSDC are turning yield stables into core collateral, with DeFi lending rails becoming the new banks.

BASED powers the Based ecosystem with a fixed 1B supply. 36% is allocated to early users, NFTs, and partners; 23.64% to future rewards; 20.36% to investors; and 20% to the team, all with long-term vesting. Claims for Genesis begin March 2026, with Season 3 (50M tokens) running through May 4.

Your daily dose of bite-sized crypto news.

1. Goldman Sachs says the market selloff is "not over yet".

2. Binance SAFU Fund has purchased another 4,225 BTC worth about $299.6M.

3. Tether's gold stash tops $23B as buying outpaces nation-states.

4. Circle and Tether own 85% of the stablecoin market.

5. Pudgy Penguins is hosting a Valentine’s pop-up in NYC.

Erebor Bank officially opens with FDIC insurance, $625M committed capital, and a mission to serve AI, defense, and digital asset firms that legacy banks can’t underwrite. Backed by Palmer Luckey and a founding team spanning Oculus to Circle, Erebor offers modern infrastructure such as 24/7 stablecoin settlement, GPU financing, and contract-backed lending for startups.

MEY Real kicks off its first Property Token Offering (PTO), aiming to bring fractional, yield-bearing real estate ownership onchain. Built on Base, the tokens are liquid and tradable, targeting a slice of the $300T real estate market. Whitelist opens at 2 PM UTC.

Weekly outflows slowed to $187M despite continued market pressure, often a sign of sentiment bottoming. Bitcoin saw $264M in outflows, but XRP ($63M), Solana ($8M), and ETH ($5M) drew inflows. ETP volumes hit a record $63.1B, while AUM dropped to $129.8B. European regions (Germany, Switzerland, Brazil) showed pockets of strength.

Backstreet's back, alright!

Top Gainers: PIPPIN, SIREN, VULT, GPS, AXS.

High-signal reads are worth your time, all in one place.

1. Stablecoin yields are under pressure after strategy vault failures and losses in private credit and CLOs. Yet a new wave, led by Neutrl, Re, USDai, Ouroboros, and 3Jane, is restoring confidence via proof-of-solvency, tranche design, and yield primitives.

2. Airdrop farming has quietly become crypto’s most asymmetric opportunity. As markets cool and attention fades, Vikingo argues that now is the time to double down on perp DEX farming, with early adopters on platforms like Hyperliquid, Kinetiq, Pacifica, and Variational positioned for compounding returns.

3. Deel scaled to $1B ARR fully remote, on purpose. In a world where all big companies are functionally remote, Deel argues the future of work isn’t hybrid versus office, it’s hiring for agency, writing things down, and scaling async execution.

4. Perp funding rates have quietly averaged 7–8% APR over the past four years, liquid, uncapped, and largely ignored by retail. This hidden yield stems from a structural long bias in crypto markets: longs consistently pay shorts to keep perp prices near spot.

5. Most payment stacks are built for predictability. WalletConnect Pay doesn’t try to replace them; it fits in. It makes crypto payments behave like any other method: wallet-agnostic, PSP-friendly, and stablecoin-ready. No new dashboards. Just clean integration at scale.

French police arrested six suspects after a failed crypto ransom kidnapping involving a magistrate and her mother. The victims escaped after 30 hours without paying. The case adds to a growing wave of crypto‑linked abductions in France, prompting government concern over rising “wrench attacks” targeting industry figures and their families.

Bitcoin’s cryptography isn’t at risk from quantum computing today. CoinShares estimates millions of qubits would be required to pose a threat, far beyond current capabilities. Around 1.7M BTC sit in legacy addresses, but even in a worst-case attack, only about 10K BTC may be compromised. Most modern addresses remain safe.

That’s all for today!