The biggest blockchain upgrades still to come in 2026

From Ethereum’s Glamsterdam to Solana’s Alpenglow, 2026’s most important developments are protocol upgrades, not price charts.

UK payments blueprint outlines tokenized payments for ‘multi-money ecosystem’

UK regulators published an update to a national retail payments blueprint, calling for infrastructure support for…

Aave brings V3 lending and GHO stablecoin to Monad

Aave launched its V3 lending protocol on Monad with 12 supported assets as the network commits…

Standard Chartered, Circle bring USDC minting onto banking rails

Standard Chartered and Circle launch bank-led USDC minting and redemption for institutions, starting in Dubai’s DIFC…

Solana Foundation launches framework for protocol-level governance

The Solana Foundation launched a framework for protocol-level governance, enabling validators with at least 100,000 delegated…

SBI Crypto shuts Bitcoin mining pool after five-year run

SBI Crypto will shut down its Bitcoin mining pool on July 31 after more than five…

OFAC sanctions 134 ISIS-K crypto wallet addresses as Tether freezes funds

OFAC added 134 crypto wallet addresses linked to ISIS-K to its sanctions list, including 131 Tron…

Yield-bearing stablecoin slowdown ends three-year run for crypto-native products

Yield-bearing stablecoin supply fell 15% in Q2 as sUSDe and sUSDS contracted, while Treasury-backed products including…

Taiko reopens bridge after $1.7M exploit, says users made whole

Taiko restored bridge transfers after replenishing asset backing and completing security fixes following an 11-day network…

Metaplanet buys 2,823 BTC, surpasses 43,000 in Bitcoin holdings

Metaplanet bought 2,823 Bitcoin during the second quarter, reducing its average acquisition cost to $106,500 per…

OpenAI weighs 5% US government stake amid Trump talks: FT

OpenAI has reportedly discussed giving the US government a 5% equity stake in early Trump administration…

Robinhood links with dYdX Labs to launch new DEX Arcus

The crypto protocol dYdX has rebranded as Arcus and is joining Robinhood’s new blockchain to bring…