US pre-market AI stocks stage a broad rebound, with Micron (MU) up 8.3% and SanDisk surging over 10%

According to market sources, the US Democratic Party will target Apple (AAPL.O), Meta Platforms (META.O), and Elon Musk's companies in its investigation.

According to the Financial Times, a senior official from a department under the People's Bank of China (PBC) commented on the halt of Solana's advertising and offline events in Shanghai, saying the central bank has joined forces with local financial regulators, public security, market supervision and other authorities to stop the activities, and will probe the involved entities and individuals in collaboration with relevant departments. The official added that Solana, a major virtual currency issuance platform, its native token Solana is essentially a virtual currency, and it also provides technical support for the issuance and trading of key virtual currencies like USDT. All such businesses are categorized as illegal financial activities as specified in the circular, and the promotion of Solana violates the circular's rules. Virtual currencies at this stage fail to effectively meet requirements for customer due diligence, anti-money laundering and other compliance aspects, and are prone to fueling market speculation. Moving forward, the PBC will work with relevant departments and local governments, targeting domestic virtual currency traders and domestic affiliates of overseas virtual currency issuance and trading platforms, to continue cracking down on domestic virtual currency-related business activities and safeguard economic and financial order.

CryptoQuant certified analyst Darkfost wrote that spot buying demand for Bitcoin has faded rapidly, with sell volumes exceeding buy volumes on major exchanges Binance and Coinbase. He noted that midterm election results amplified volatility amid widespread selling, with Bitcoin falling around 5.5% yesterday, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq dropped approximately 4.3% and 6.3% respectively. Darkfost said this shift differs from late summer trends: at the end of August, the 30-day moving average of the spot net volume balance stood at around $64.8 million on Binance and $64.3 million on Coinbase, with buying pressure persisting into September, pushing Bitcoin from roughly $63,000 to about $85,000; yesterday, the same metric registered approximately -$28 million and -$9.4 million respectively. The shift on Coinbase began in October, when Binance’s spot net volume remained positive. He added that spot selling pressure is weighing on prices, and if Bitcoin fails to hold the $75,000 level, it could pull back to around $70,000 — a key area where major investors’ cost bases are concentrated, which could offer support if defensive capital steps in.

According to Miner Weekly, one of the most telling metrics in this quarter’s financial filings appears in Cipher Mining’s lease disclosures: The company has agreed under a revised lease structure to cover the first $359.3 million in excess costs for the Barber Lake project above the original budget. Beyond that threshold, tenants will split half of the additional costs via extra rent over the 20-year total contract term, with corresponding returns agreed. This figure is a contractual threshold, not the final total project overrun, but it highlights a key question: who bears costs when delivery expenses rise after AI lease signings. Cipher’s management noted both parties were eager to move forward, so the lease was signed before design was fully finalized, leading to more change orders than expected. Modifications such as cooling facilities required additional construction and disrupted other workflows. Other issues included lower-than-expected productivity, delayed equipment deliveries, and idle labor, though equipment price hikes were not the primary driver. The company said future leases will only be signed once design is roughly 30%–60% complete. Riot Platforms also addressed industry cost overruns and its Rockdale project budget, stating that around 70% of the total budget will likely fall under the general contractor’s guaranteed maximum price framework, and it maintains an estimate of $11 million–$12 million per critical IT megawatt. Under the new Corsicana arrangement, tenants procure and own modular deployments; Riot estimates the total cost, including tenant reimbursements and site works, at roughly $6 million per megawatt. Core Scientific, for its part, disclosed outstanding procurement and construction commitments of approximately $4.4 billion. Of that, modifications related to CoreWeave are almost entirely funded by customers, with a cap on the company’s contributions, while AMD and Neocloud expansions lack equivalent protections.

Leading Asia-based digital asset financial services group HashKey Group (3887.HK), which has a global footprint, announced today that its Hong Kong-licensed digital asset trading platform HashKey Exchange has won the "Regulatory Initiative of the Year – Digital Assets" at the Regulation Asia 2026 Awards for Excellence. This marks HashKey Exchange’s first win of the award, and it is the only Hong Kong-licensed digital asset exchange to receive this honor at this year’s edition. Regulation Asia, a professional media and research platform focused on Asia-Pacific banking and financial regulatory trends, has run the Asia Awards for Excellence for nine years. The awards recognize institutions, teams, and service providers that have made outstanding contributions in regulation, risk management, compliance, and financial market infrastructure, and are a highly regarded industry honor in the Asia-Pacific regulatory and compliance sector. HashKey Exchange has long been deeply entrenched in the Asian digital asset market, taking compliance as its core development path and delivering replicable, practical models to support Hong Kong’s development as an international digital asset hub. This award is industry recognition of HashKey Exchange’s long-term investment in regulatory compliance and its practical achievements, and underscores the platform’s important position in the Asian digital asset regulatory ecosystem. Looking ahead, HashKey Exchange will continue to implement its "Asia Interconnected" strategy, expand and strengthen its institutional network, deepen collaboration with regulators, financial institutions, and industry partners across Asia, and drive the healthy, orderly, and sustainable development of the Asian digital asset market.

Beating AI Express, Insight: World Labs, founded by Fei-Fei Li, has launched Frameboy, a tool that lets users control the camera via a keyboard (similar to gaming) to move freely in an AI-generated virtual world. As the camera shifts, cloud GPUs generate corresponding new visuals in real time, reaching a maximum frame rate of 15 FPS. Atlas, released in September this year, can fill in unseen spaces in a single image, supports precise control of camera positions and movement paths, and generates 1440p videos up to one minute long. Frameboy uses a speed-optimized version of Atlas, transforming the prior workflow of pre-planning camera shots and waiting for video generation into real-time roaming that allows users to turn and explore freely at any time. Currently, the public version of Frameboy only supports exploration of official preset scenes. To create a virtual world with their own images, users need to use Viewfinder, which remains in closed beta. The entire system relies on high-performance cloud GPUs; the maximum 15 FPS still causes stutters in actual experience, and operational costs are higher than local rendering.