The airdrop of memcoins covered the cost of pre-ordering the Chapter 2 smartphone from Solana.

An airdrop from two projects - Maneki and Cat in a Dogs World - covered the $450 pre-order cost of the Chapter 2 smartphone from Solana Mobile. SolanaFloor experts reported this.

According to the announcement from these teams, Saga smartphone owners and those who pre-ordered the new Chapter 2 received a total of:

  • 5199 Maneki (MANEKI);

  • 36,700 Cats in a Dogs World (MEW).

As of April 25, 2024, the valuation of these tokens was $459. This is slightly more than the cost of pre-ordering Chapter 2 on the official Solana Mobile website of $450.

 

Binance Founder Changpeng Zhao Sentenced to Four Months in Prison.

A Seattle court sentenced Changpeng Zhao, the founder of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, to four months in prison. 

Zhao had begun the run that led to the discovery of the FTX fraud and pleaded guilty to breaking the law himself. 

The Binance founder was imprisoned for four months for failing to establish adequate anti-money laundering protections. Zhao had pleaded guilty to money laundering violations in November 2023 and had stepped down as Binance CEO. Zhao was personally fined $50 million, while Binance had to pay a staggering $4.3 billion fine. According to judge Richard Jones, Zhao prioritized Binance’s growth and profit over compliance with US laws and regulations. The judge stated that while he did not think Zhao would re-offend, the scale of the crime was notable.

 

L1 blockchain Sui has entered into a partnership with Google Cloud.

L1 blockchain Sui has entered into a partnership with the Google Cloud cloud service. The collaboration aims to solve problems in Web3 using data analysis based on artificial intelligence and Zero-Knowledge Proofs technology, according to a press release.

The report also said that Google Cloud has integrated Sui blockchain data into BigQuery public datasets, “providing analytics tools for developers and opening up the power of decentralized applications (dApps).”

Additionally, as part of the partnership, Sui will use Google Cloud's generative artificial intelligence platform, Vertex AI, to help Web3 developers write code.

The collaboration will also use Sui’s ZkLogin technology, which “provides simple authentication for crypto wallets and dApps on Sui.”

 

Ripple has entered into a partnership with Hong Kong-based Hashkey Group.

On April 30, Ripple announced a partnership with HashKey Group, expanding its collaboration with financial giant SBI Group. The joint venture with HashKey DX, a specialist consulting firm of Tokyo-based HashKey Group, aims to bring XRP Ledger (XRPL) enterprise solutions to the Japanese market. HashKey DX will be bringing supply chain finance solutions to Japan through this partnership, which the company's CEO Brad Garlinghouse highlighted in the post. The supply chain technology will be built on the Ripple blockchain - XRP Ledger. SBI Group companies will be the first Japanese corporates to use this solution for supply chain finance, according to the statement. HashKey Group launched blockchain supply chain solutions in 2019 and is seeing significant adoption in China.

There are currently over 4,000 registered companies, including 23 banks and 4,300 suppliers, with a total trading value of over $7 billion. Ripple's token, XRP, did not respond to the news and traded 1.7% higher on the day.

 

EigenLayer, following the start of the Frenzy resumption, is planning its own EIGEN token.

Eigenlayer, a restaking protocol that has amassed $15.7 billion in deposits, published a token white paper on Monday, confirming plans to create an EIGEN token. According to a blog post written by the Eigen Foundation, the non-profit organization supporting the protocol, the total supply will be approximately 1.67 billion EIGEN tokens, and 45% of them will go to the EigenLayer community.
 

Tesla is investing $10 billion in artificial intelligence training.

According to U.Today, Elon Musk, the innovative entrepreneur and CEO of Tesla, announced significant investments in artificial intelligence (AI), sparking widespread discussion about a potential collaboration with xAI and chatbot Grok AI. Musk is increasingly investing his time, energy and money in the artificial intelligence sector, founding xAI to compete with OpenAI. The Grok chatbot is an artificial intelligence product that is already integrated with social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter. X became a major shareholder of xAI. Musk announced that Tesla plans to invest a staggering $10 billion in artificial intelligence training featuring xAI. This has led to speculation about whether xAI will expand its collaboration with Tesla, such as whether Tesla will acquire a stake in it or partner with Grok in the future. Musk emphasized that any company that does not invest in AI at this level, or does not do so effectively, will not be able to compete with its competitors. Tesla has already spent $1 billion on this effort in the first quarter and has doubled its computing power during this learning curve.

 

The SEC sued Geosun Mining for $5.6 million in fraud.

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed a lawsuit in federal court in Fort Worth, Texas, against Geosyn Mining, accusing it of defrauding investors of $5.6 million and embezzlement of raised funds. According to the SEC complaint, Geosyn Mining CEO Caleb Joseph Ward and former COO Jeremy George McNutt defrauded approximately 64 investors. Between November 2021 and December 2022, Geosyn executives entered into agreements to purchase and run mining equipment on behalf of clients for a fee. The regulator alleges that Geosyn had contracts with low-cost electricity suppliers, but charged customers 40-50% higher costs. Ward and McNutt assured investors that out of 1,400 mining devices, the company was unable to purchase 400 rigs. Moreover, its managers did not put into operation most of the purchased equipment.