ChainThink Daily Brief: BitMine Ramps Up ETH Staking, Meta Enables USDC Payouts, WLFI Token Unlock Vote Opens

Top headlines - U.S. war costs tied to Iran could exceed an earlier Pentagon estimate of about $25 billion, as the figure reportedly excluded repairs for damaged U.S. bases in the region. - Fed Chair Jerome Powell said he will remain in his post until the Department of Justice investigation is fully concluded, and will continue serving as a Fed governor after May 15. - The Federal Reserve held rates steady for a third straight meeting, keeping the federal funds target range at 3.5% to 3.75%. Policymakers said activity is expanding at a solid pace, job growth has been broadly weak, unemployment has changed little, and inflation remains elevated partly due to higher global energy prices. The Fed reiterated its commitment to maximum employment and 2% inflation, while citing increased uncertainty from Middle East developments and saying it will assess incoming data, the outlook, and the balance of risks. Industry - BitMine increased its ETH staking position. Onchain Lens reported 111,496 ETH was added about five hours earlier, valued near $253 million, lifting total staked ETH to 4,034,885 (about $9.09 billion). A newly created address also received 20,000 ETH from FalconX roughly two hours earlier (about $44.8 million) and now holds 40,000 ETH (about $90.16 million); the address may be linked to BitMine. - Meta is offering select creators the option to receive payouts in USDC. Creators can withdraw to wallets on Solana or Polygon and link encrypted wallets such as MetaMask and Phantom. Stripe is powering the payment rails and may provide crypto-related tax reporting. Meta said stablecoin payouts carry risks and users are responsible for securing accounts and wallets; in cases of technical issues or special circumstances, Meta may use alternative payout methods. Project highlights - World Liberty Financial opened a seven-day governance vote on unlocking 62,282,252,205 locked WLFI tokens. If approved, the tokens would not enter the market for at least two years. The proposal would convert up to 45.2 billion WLFI held by the founding team, advisors, and partners into a two-year lock followed by three-year linear vesting, and burn up to about 4.5 billion tokens. Roughly 17 billion locked WLFI held by early supporters would convert to a two-year lock followed by two-year linear vesting. Quorum is set at 1 billion WLFI. - RWA tokenization protocol KAIO launched its native token, KAIO, and formed the KAIO Foundation to oversee governance, treasury management, and ecosystem development, in coordination with KAIO Labs. KAIO said it aims to connect traditional finance and DeFi via a compliant, auditable, cross-chain tokenized-asset network. The platform said it has onboarded five institutional-grade funds from managers including BlackRock, Brevan Howard, and Hamilton Lane, with TVL of about $100 million across more than 10 blockchains. Token supply is 10 billion, with 37.5% allocated to community and liquidity incentives. Team and early-investor tokens are subject to vesting and cliffs, with no releases at TGE. The foundation receives 17% to support long-term development. - Hyperliquid said it will push further into prediction markets, aiming to compete with Polymarket and Kalshi via newly introduced "outcome tokens." Disclosed pricing describes a "zero fee to open, fee to close or settle" model across minting, trading, burning, and settlement, plus reduced costs for "aligned quote tokens" via improved market maker rebates and fee discounts. The feature is slated to arrive with the HIP4 upgrade, allowing trading of binary event contracts within the same account and integration with spot and perpetual products. Prediction markets have surpassed $63.5 billion in total trading volume in 2025. Hyperliquid said HIP3 helped its permissionless perpetuals market exceed 35% of platform volume. Event tokens remain on testnet, with no mainnet date announced. - MegaETH said its MEGA token will begin on-chain trading at 18:00 Beijing Time on April 30, followed by off-chain trading at 19:00. Deals and funding - Anthropic is reportedly considering a new funding round that could value the company above $900 billion. Reports said multiple investors have submitted offers worth more than double the company's current valuation, though talks remain early and no offers have been accepted. Anthropic's current valuation is reported at about $350 billion, anchored mainly by Google and Amazon investments, and the company is also considering an IPO as early as October. - AI financial workflow platform Rogo said it raised a $1.6 billion Series D led by Kleiner Perkins, with participation from Sequoia Capital, Thrive Capital, Khosla Ventures, and J.P. Morgan Growth Equity Partners, among others. Rogo said its system is used at leading investment banks, asset managers, and private equity firms for research, modeling, and client communication. Proceeds will be used to deepen integrations, expand onsite engineering and investment banking teams, and accelerate growth in Europe and Asia. Policy and regulation - A South Korean central bank official said the bank will act if needed to stabilize financial markets and is closely watching the Middle East situation. - U.S. Senator Thom Tillis is seeking to move the Clarity Act into the Senate Banking Committee's markup stage as soon as possible, according to crypto journalist Eleanor Terrett. Tillis said "significant consensus" has been reached and he will ask the committee chair to schedule a markup after the congressional recess. He also said stablecoin yield-related text is expected to be released four to five days before markup to allow stakeholder review, and that many banking-sector concerns about yield-related risks have been addressed. Voices - 21Shares CIO Adrian Fritz said Bitcoin could challenge $100,000 this year as institutional participation accelerates. He said spot Bitcoin ETFs have attracted nearly $2 billion in inflows this year across retail, institutional, and hedge-fund strategies, reinforcing Bitcoin's role in institutional allocations even with prices below $80,000. He put Bitcoin's daily trading volume above $50 billion and said liquidity is approaching major tech stocks such as Nvidia, with ETF structure adding primary and secondary market liquidity. Fritz said demand is shifting from speculative to structural, and cited potential support from improved geopolitics, continued inflows, and short covering. He added that altcoins are diverging, with greater focus on fundamentals and cash flow. Corporate - SpaceX IPO documents indicate Elon Musk holds veto power over his own removal: only votes cast through the share class he controls can remove him from SpaceX's board or from an executive role.