Crypto Soda©

From privacy breakthroughs to AI agents and institutional rails, the Ethereum ecosystem keeps shipping. Here are 22 things the ecosystem delivered over the past few weeks. 0/ @gnosis_ and partners introduced The Ethereum Economic Zone (@etheconomiczone), a framework to unify the L1 and L2s into a more composable system with better interoperability. 1/ @aztecnetwork Alpha went live, a feature-complete privacy stack built natively on Ethereum. 2/ @aave V4 was released with a new hub-and-spoke architecture with support for over 20 assets across three initial liquidity hubs. 3/ @PrivacyEthereum released Social Recovery SDK, a wallet recovery model where trusted guardians can help restore access if the owner loses their private key, replacing seed-phrase backups with programmable onchain policy. 4/ Post-quantum wallets launched on @Starknet. A path to quantum resistance without address changes or hard forks. 5/ The @ethereumfndn's Board released the EF Mandate. This document, which was first intended for EF members, reaffirms the promise of Ethereum, and the role of EF within this ecosystem. 6/ Private transfers are live on @Scroll_ZKP. You can now send funds privately onchain, advancing default user protections and confidentiality. 7/ @base introduced Batches Cohort 003. 12 teams were selected from 1,100+ building across AI, DeFi, payments, and prediction markets, pushing forward OnchainApps. 8/ @ethereumfndn launched pq.ethereum (dot) org. Supporting coordination and research in post-quantum cryptography. Two breakthrough papers progressing research on PQ, with input from Ethereum researchers, were also released. 9/ Stablecoins on Ethereum hit a new ATH. Supply surpasses $180B, up 150% in 3 years, with ~60% market share globally, reinforcing Ethereum’s role in stablecoins and DeFi. 10/ @Morpho launched Morpho Agents (beta), allowing users to integrate lending into apps via natural language using AI agents and accelerating the convergence of DeFi and AI. 11/ @thedaofund deployed $1M+ via an Ethereum Security quadratic funding round hosted by @Giveth, funding work to strengthen security across the ecosystem. 12/ Deposit time from L1 to L2s and exchanges can now be as low as 13 seconds due to the new Fast Confirmation Rule (FCR). This new industry standard can be adopted by the ecosystem over the next few months. 13/ @hinkal_protocol launched Hinkal Pay, end-to-end confidential payments where sender, receiver, and amounts remain private. 14/ @peerxyz launched Peer Verify, allowing users to prove their identity, in a privacy-preserving way via ZK proofs. 15/ @ensdomains integrated with PayPal, allowing users to send funds cross-border using ENS names instead of addresses. 16/ @AskVenice shipped verifiable end-to-end encrypted AI, introducing privacy systems that can be externally audited and proven. 17/ @safe released Safenet (beta), a pre-execution security layer for Safe wallets that runs before transactions execute onchain. 18/ @SiloFinance launched Silo V3 for safer lending markets in DeFi. The team rebuilt core assumption behind lending so collateral does not need to be sold to keep markets solvent. 19/ @coinbase announced x402, an initiative to establish the x402 protocol as a universal standard for AI-driven payments, is moving under the Linux Foundation to ensure vendor-neutral, community-governed oversight of the protocol. 20/ @zksync introduced The Cari Network, a new platform to bring tokenized deposits onchain, developed alongside five regional banks and powered by ZKsync’s Prividium. 21/ @EthCC completed their 9th annual event in Cannes with attendees from across the industry. @ETHGlobal hit a milestone with their 300th event following ETHCC, continuing to support builders across the global ecosystem.

CZ says crypto is too transparent and lacks privacy Former Binance CEO, Changpeng Zhao (CZ) (@cz_binance), has raised concerns about the current state of transparency in crypto. In a recent interview with TPBN, CZ argued that blockchain data combined with exchange KYC makes tracking funds extremely easy. According to CZ, most transactions can already be traced with high accuracy. He pointed out that payment flows can reveal sensitive information about individuals. In some cases, even salary structures can be inferred from transaction patterns. This raises concerns for both individuals and companies using crypto payments. Privacy, he suggests, remains an unsolved problem in the industry.

Aztec Alpha Launch x.com/i/broadcasts/1…