This Week:
-This Week’s Hemi Yield Opportunities
-Need to Know DeFi Ecosystem Shifts
-This Week in Hemi: Protocol Updates and More
-Community Spotlight
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Pure BTC-based Yield Opportunities | ||||||||||||
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Senate Punts CLARITY Act To September
The Senate left for its August recess without voting on the CLARITY Act, the market-structure bill that would divide crypto oversight between the SEC and CFTC, pushing the vote to September. Majority Leader John Thune said he'd get it "queued up first thing when we come back," but the delay exposes two sticking points: an ethics amendment from Sens. Ruben Gallego and Thom Tillis that would bar public officials and their spouses from issuing digital assets and force divestment from crypto businesses, which could paradoxically let President Trump defer millions in taxes. With midterm season about to dominate the calendar, the September window is narrow.
Ethereum's Staking-Yield Fight Boils Over
A proposal to rein in Ethereum's staking rewards has set off a fight between core researchers and the DeFi businesses built on that yield. EIP-8363 ("Tapered Issuance Burn"), from Ethereum Foundation researcher Justin Drake and EthCC's Jérôme de Tychey, would progressively burn a larger share of validator rewards as the staking ratio climbs, driving issuance yield toward zero as staking approaches ~50% of supply, phased over roughly 18 months. Critics say that guts ETH's edge: SharpLink CEO Joseph Chalom warns it would raise capital costs, "drive collateral and activity elsewhere," and erase the "natively productive" advantage ETH holds over Bitcoin, while Ether.fi's Mike Silagadze argues it disadvantages smaller stakers. Against that backdrop, Ether.fi (~$3.55B in deposits) split its flagship weETH token; weETH now carries plain staking rewards while a new weETHs token isolates the higher-yield, higher-risk restaking exposure, letting holders opt in rather than get both by default.
Trump Media Ends CRO Treasury Deal
Trump Media, the parent of Truth Social, and Crypto.com are ending two partnerships, the companies said Friday. The headline casualty is Trump Media Group CRO Strategy, Inc., a Yorkville-backed venture pitched last year as the first and largest publicly traded CRO treasury company. The entity is being dissolved entirely. Crypto.com cited "prevailing market conditions and shifting business and stakeholder priorities," and interim Trump Media CEO Kevin McGurn framed it as market saturation rather than a regulatory problem, noting the digital-asset-treasury space had gotten crowded and that staking assets mattered less to Crypto.com's strategy. The two are also scrapping plans to build prediction markets directly into Truth Social, replacing that with a lighter marketing arrangement; the America First / Truth Social ETFs continue operating.
Team Strategy & Partnerships
The team spent much of the week in in-person strategy sessions, focused on rollout plans for the ZK vaults powering hBitVM and the Bitcoin Tunnel, including partner and capital-provider conversations around bringing Bitcoin onto the system once the vaults are live.
Oxygen, op-reth Migration, and ZK Market
Work continued on the op-reth migration, Oxygen integration, and ZK provability, alongside cleanup on the ZK Market and ZK Miner (with code review and bug fixes underway ahead of a planned open-source release). Dave, Hemi's open-source backup tool, was confirmed working as intended, with a blog write-up on the way.
Upcoming Incentivized Testing
A key outcome from the strategy session: an incentivized testing plan for the ZK Market / ZK Miner system, targeted for testnet in the next three to four weeks. It will start small and expand based on interest, beginning with participants running ZK miners.
HAIRgames: Season 6 Wraps, Season 7 Begins
Season 6 of HAIRgames has come to a close after a hard-fought battle for the leaderboard. Thank you to everyone who took part. Prizes for Season 6 winners will be distributed by the Hemi team within roughly 10 days.
But if you're itching to compete in the next session of games, fret not! Season 7 is already live with a new title, Max Fruit Slicer, where you can slice, dice, and combo your way up the leaderboard. In this game, speed, precision, and reflexes decide your standing. The prize pool is 30,000 $HEMI, split across the top 15 players. Final standings are set by a random snapshot (announced once taken), so every second counts from the start. NFT holders (Hemi FIRE Hatchlings and Hemi 1st Anniversary) keep their 1.25x score multiplier. Play at: game.hairtoken.xyz/dashboard.
Prize breakdown (top 15):
1st 6,000 2nd 4,000 3rd 3,000 4th 2,400 5th 2,200
6th 2,000 7th 1,700 8th 1,500 9th 1,300 10th 1,200
11th 1,000 12th 900 13th 800 14th 600 15th 400
Total: 30,000 $HEMI
Midweek with Max covers ongoing engineering, community, and marketing updates.
Join Hemi’s Discord to send questions for Max ahead of next week’s AMA.
Protocol Engineering Office Hours are now streaming on X, YouTube, and LinkedIn, every other Wednesday at 8:00 AM PDT, 11:00 AM EDT, and 15:00 UTC. Next week's session is set for Wednesday, August 12th.
Hemi's Marketing Director, Jeremy Nation, explores Vetro's platform with its CTO and Co-Founder Akash Patel.
