CLARITY Act Markup Nears as Wells Fargo Lifts ETH ETF Stake, Bakkt Pivots to Stablecoins

Crypto News

Attackers slipped malicious code into a Mistral AI software package distributed via PyPI, the widely used Python repository, in a campaign researchers have tied to the broader Shai-Hulud worm targeting developer supply chains. Microsoft Threat Intelligence said the implanted payload executed automatically on Linux machines, pulling down a secondary file masquerading as the Hugging Face Transformers library before harvesting developer credentials, login tokens and API keys. Code segments avoided Russian-language environments and contained logic capable of wiping files on systems geolocated to Israel or Iran. Mistral confirmed exposure tied to a compromised developer device but maintained its core infrastructure remained intact.

Washington also dominated headlines as the Senate Banking Committee prepared for a Thursday mark-up of the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, with Republican sponsors releasing fresh legislative text alongside an unrelated housing pilot called the Build Now Act. Democratic members continue to demand explicit ethics language, a sticking point that could shape bipartisan support on the floor. A separate Skynet study attributed roughly $2.06 billion of the $3.4 billion lost to crypto exploits in 2025 to North Korea-linked operators, calling the state-backed thefts an "industrialized" operation that funnels proceeds toward Pyongyang's nuclear and ballistic missile programs.

LMAX Group rolled out Kiosk, a hosted institutional portal that lets its 600-plus clients deposit digital assets into LMAX Custody and post them as collateral across spot foreign exchange, metals, contracts for difference, perpetual futures and crypto markets. The product bundles WalletConnect support, API credential management, treasury controls and security tooling under one interface. Chief executive David Mercer framed "hyper-efficient collateral" as the foundation of converged capital markets, positioning Kiosk as a compliant on-ramp for traditional desks holding crypto on the balance sheet. The launch echoes earlier moves by the DTCC and Franklin Templeton to bridge tokenized assets with regulated trading workflows on blockchain rails.

FalconX extended its tokenized structured credit facility to the Monad network, an EVM-compatible Layer 1 blockchain built for high-performance financial applications, opening institutional credit vault deposits as collateral inside DeFi protocols such as Morpho. The deployment packages loans originated through FalconX's lending desk into Pareto vault tokens curated by M11 Credit, with AA_FalconXUSDC vault shares now accepted in on-chain lending markets. Real-world asset issuance on public networks has now passed $31 billion, with credit-related products alone accounting for more than $5 billion in distributed value. The vault currently holds about $127 million and ships with automated margin controls, real-time collateral monitoring and on-chain settlement.

Wells Fargo disclosed sharply larger Ether exchange-traded fund positions in its first-quarter 13F, raising holdings in BlackRock's iShares Ethereum Trust by 63.5% to roughly 1.1 million shares and lifting the Bitwise Ethereum ETF stake 37% to more than 257,000 shares. The accumulation arrived as Ether endured back-to-back quarterly declines of 28% and 29%. Bitcoin ETF exposure was more mixed, with IBIT trimmed and BITB and Grayscale's Mini Trust expanded by 24% and 41% respectively. In equities, the bank slashed its Galaxy Digital stake by nearly 97% while substantially boosting its position in Strategy, a clear rotation toward higher-conviction crypto-treasury names.

Bakkt swung to a first-quarter net loss of $11.7 million as crypto services revenue collapsed 77% to $243.6 million, with management citing thinner trading volumes and accelerating the company's pivot toward stablecoin infrastructure and agentic AI payments. The platform closed its acquisition of Distributed Technologies Research on April 30 and signed a memorandum with Zoth targeting $1 billion in annualized stablecoin payment volumes across South Asia, the Middle East and Sub-Saharan Africa. Chief executive Akshay Naheta pointed to the GENIUS Act and CLARITY Act as regulatory tailwinds. Shares ended Monday up 0.71% at $9.92 before sliding 9.14% in Tuesday pre-market trading.

The day's storylines converge on a single arc: digital assets are finishing their institutionalization phase and entering an integration phase. Supply-chain attacks against AI developer toolchains expose the new attack surface for a tokenized economy. Senate mark-ups, North Korean exploit revenue and emerging-jurisdiction licensing races highlight the regulatory recalibration underway. LMAX, FalconX and Bakkt are wiring digital assets directly into collateral, credit and payment rails, while Wells Fargo's filings show that even cautious banks are quietly rotating exposure within a maturing bull market framework. The narrative this cycle is no longer adoption versus rejection — it is operational embedding.