The SEC and Binance.US filed a joint motion today to finish the ongoing legal battle between the two parties. The two entities have been negotiating for several months, but this represents a significant breakthrough.
Still, it may be premature to claim that the legal proceedings are entirely resolved.
In the intervening months, however, the Commission has taken a much softer stance. The two filed a joint motion to pause their battle in February and asked for an extension over a month ago. Today, they requested a permanent end:
The SEC filed a lawsuit against Binance, Binance.US, and founder Changpeng Zhao on June 5, 2023, in the US District Court for the District of Columbia. The complaint included 13 charges, alleging violations of federal securities laws.
The SEC claimed that Binance offered and sold unregistered securities, including BNB and BUSD tokens, investment products like “Simple Earn,” “BNB Vault,” and a staking-as-a-service program.
Also, the Commission asserted that Binance.US misled investors about its market surveillance and controls, citing instances of wash trading that artificially inflated trading volumes. But now, under the current pro-crypto administration, the SEC is dropping these enforcement claims.
“The dismissal of the SEC’s case against Binance is a landmark moment. We’re deeply grateful to Chairman Paul Atkins and the Trump administration for recognizing that innovation can’t thrive under regulation by enforcement. The US is back – leading from the front in the future of blockchain.” – Binance spokesperson told BeInCrypto.
However, this is not the Commission’s only recent attempt to end a Gensler-era legal battle.
For now, the news signals the SEC’s deep commitment to making amends with scrutinized crypto businesses. Due to legal complexities, the dispute may continue to exist, at least on paper, for weeks or months to come.
Pi Network (PI) has been struggling to recover from recent losses. Despite attempts to push past the $0.71 resistance level, the altcoin is currently unable to gain significant upward momentum.
As of now, PI is sitting at $0.63, and its future movements remain uncertain. Investors are growing increasingly skeptical, with the recent mainnet migration roadmap failing to inspire enough confidence to stop outflows from the network.
PI Investors Pull Back
The Chaikin Money Flow (CMF) indicator has shown a sharp downtick in recent days, signaling that investor interest in Pi Network is waning. This negative sentiment is reflected in the substantial amount of money being pulled out of PI.
While the mainnet migration roadmap was expected to boost the altcoin’s appeal, it has not been enough to stop the ongoing outflows. The CMF reflects a broader trend of declining interest as investors pull their funds from the platform in anticipation of further price declines.
Pi Network’s investor sentiment has been notably negative over the past month. Many are questioning the value proposition of the token, particularly given its rapid loss of launch hype. This, combined with ongoing volatility and a lack of clear utility, has led to hesitancy in the market.
Investors are not seeing a compelling reason to hold onto their PI tokens, and this has fueled the continued sell-off.
Furthermore, with Pi Network’s price struggling to stay above the critical $0.61 support level, it is evident that market sentiment remains fragile. Without a significant catalyst, such as a strong use case or promising developments, Pi Network risks further price erosion. The absence of an optimistic outlook is pushing investors away.
Currently, Pi Network’s price stands at $0.63, holding just above the $0.61 support. However, the altcoin appears vulnerable, and there is a real possibility that it will fail to maintain this level. If outflows continue and PI falls below $0.61, it could experience a sharp drop to $0.51, erasing the gains made in April.
This potential drop would extend the losses for Pi Network, and the price may even approach $0.50. The rapid outflows and negative sentiment surrounding PI could lead to a prolonged downtrend if the altcoin cannot recover soon.
However, if Pi Network manages to hold above the $0.61 support, it could push toward the $0.71 resistance level. A breach of this level would signal a recovery and could help the altcoin recover some of its recent losses.
Ethereum (ETH) co-founder Vitalik Buterin has proposed a comprehensive roadmap to enhance user privacy on the blockchain.
The plan envisions creating a world where private transactions are the default, and users can interact across applications without publicly linking their activities.
Buterin shared the roadmap on April 11 on the Ethereum Magicians forum. It outlined practical, incremental improvements to make private transactions and anonymous on-chain interactions more accessible for everyday users without requiring major changes to Ethereum’s core consensus protocol.
“This roadmap can be combined with a longer-term roadmap that makes deeper changes to L1, or privacy-preserving application-specific rollups, or other more complex features,” Buterin stated.
The roadmap addresses four key privacy forms by implementing various short-term and long-term solutions. These are focused on improving on-chain payment privacy, partial anonymization of in-app activity, privacy of on-chain reads, and network-level anonymity.
Firstly, he advocated for integrating privacy tools into wallets. This would enable features like default “shielded balances,” allowing users to keep transactions private. The idea is to enhance privacy without requiring users to switch to a separate privacy-focused wallet.
“This is a major step, and it entails significant convenience sacrifices, but IMO, this is a bullet that we should bite because this is the most practical way to remove public links between all of your activity across different applications,” he said.
Additionally, Buterin proposed making “send-to-self” transactions privacy-preserving by default. According to him, this is necessary for the address-per-application design to function effectively.
He also focused on using Trusted Execution Environments (TEEs) in the short term for RPC privacy. Buterin added that Private Information Retrieval (PIR) could be used in the future.
“If we also add security armoring to RPC nodes (ie. light client support), it becomes practical for a user to trust a much larger set of RPC servers. This reduces metadata leakage,” Buterin remarked.
The roadmap outlined deeper changes for the long term, such as EIP-7701 (account abstraction) and FOCIL (Fork-Choice enforced Inclusion Lists) implementation. This would allow privacy protocols to operate without centralized relays, making them more resilient to censorship. That’s not all. It would also contribute to increased privacy.
Buterin’s roadmap has generated substantial traction from the community, with many expressing optimism. The Ethereum ecosystem has long been calling for improvements in user privacy, and this new plan seems to resonate with those concerns.
“Vitalik’s finally giving privacy the attention it deserves, this roadmap looks like a solid step toward making Ethereum more user-friendly without messing with consensus,” an analyst posted.
Nonetheless, not all feedback was unequivocally positive. Some in the community remain cautious about the potential challenges involved in implementing such ambitious changes.
“Vitalik’s roadmap is solid but execution risk is high. Adopting zk tech is key if they want real privacy without bloating L1,” another analyst cautioned.
The proposal comes as the Ethereum ecosystem prepares for the Pectra upgrade. While Pectra focuses on performance and usability, Buterin’s privacy roadmap complements these efforts by addressing a critical user need. If executed, these changes could position Ethereum as a more privacy-conscious blockchain, potentially driving greater adoption as the network evolves.
In 2025, AI agents became the newest obsession for crypto market participants. They were integrated into decentralized finance (DeFi), gaming, infrastructure, and even DAO governance, touted as the next evolution of Web3 intelligence.
With this in mind, BeInCrypto contacted OORT CEO Dr. Max Li for his perspective on whether these autonomous, machine-learning-driven software acting on behalf of users could reshape crypto. Li had some interesting insights, but warned that real-world adoption, security, and regulation are the biggest hurdles ahead.
The AI Agent Gold Rush: Disruption or Distraction?
Data from the AI Agents Directory indicates an average monthly increase of 33% in the number of AI agents.
However, despite the growing interest, Web3-based artificial intelligence solutions still account for a minimal fraction (3%) of the overall AI agent ecosystem.
According to Dr. Max Li, founder and CEO of decentralized cloud network OORT, the space is moving faster than its infrastructure can handle, pointing to models like ElizaOS (formerly ai16z).
Yet, in his opinion, the broader playing field is not ready. He says the core infrastructure, from decentralized storage to tokenized agent marketplaces, is still under construction.
The Real Bottleneck? Security, Not Speed
While scalability is often seen as crypto’s weakness, Max Li says security and compliance are bigger threats. This is especially true when tokenizing AI outputs like computing, decision-making, or real-time data.
Dr. Li added that tokenized AI raises difficult questions. Who owns the data that the agents generate? How can decentralized systems comply with global data laws like GDPR? And what happens when AI agents interact with sensitive personal or financial information on-chain?
“These may already be more significant barriers than scalability,” Dr. Li warned.
The OORT executive emphasized that without clear custodianship or compliance frameworks, the risks extend beyond crypto to regulators, investors, and end-users.
Enterprise Adoption Isn’t Coming Anytime Soon
The industry often claims AI agents will bring real-world industries on-chain. However, Dr. Li says it is still a fantasy, particularly in the public blockchain.
He explained that while enterprises like Walmart could benefit from AI for internal operations, there is little incentive to tokenize those agents. Traditional firms want efficiency and control, not decentralized tokens wrapped around their core systems.
“Most enterprises would prefer to keep that data within their own secured servers rather than exposing it on a public, decentralized network,” he said.
While private chains may offer a bridge, Max Li says the idea of tokenized agents powering real-world logistics or finance is, for now, a crypto-native dream.
A Market Fueled by Hype
AI agent tokens have exploded in 2025. Riding the momentum of both AI and crypto, they have attracted massive capital inflows. However, Dr. Li parallels the dot-com bubble, concluding that while innovation is real, the market is overheated.
Based on this, he does not believe the current rally is sustainable: “It’s fair to say there’s a bubble forming here.”
This sentiment echoes Binance founder Changpeng Zhao (CZ), who recently warned that most AI token projects launch too early.
“Too many AI agent developers focus too much on their token and not enough on the agent’s usefulness. I recommend making a really good agent first,” wrote CZ in a post.
Zhao argued that only a tiny fraction of AI agents, say 0.05%, actually need tokens at this stage. Similarly, Hitesh Malviya, an analyst and popular figure on X, recently echoed this sentiment in a post.
“If you look outside the crypto echo chamber, you’ll find that we do have a solid ecosystem of free and better AI agents—and they don’t have tokens, nor might they ever need one. So, what we’re trading in the name of agents is nothing but memes—a value we created out of thin air, like we always do,” Hitesh observed.
Regulatory Turbulence Ahead
Perhaps the most underappreciated risk in the AI agent boom is regulation. The intersection of open AI systems, tokenized data, and borderless blockchains is a minefield for compliance.
Dr. Li warned of contradictions yet to be resolved: How can decentralized AI be transparent and private? Who is liable when agents act autonomously but cause financial losses?
“In the short term, regulatory intervention will likely create additional hurdles for innovation,” he concluded.
This is especially true where there is no global consensus. Until jurisdictions align on KYC (know-your-customer), AML (anti-money laundering) laws, and data governance, institutional adoption will remain cautious, if not frozen.
While the rise of AI agents is real, their integration into tokenized crypto ecosystems is still a high-risk, high-ambiguity frontier. Infrastructure remains fragile. Legal frameworks are missing, and real-world adoption is still speculative at best.
Dr. Max Li’s view is clear: crypto must shift its focus from hype to functionality—from token-first to agent-first design.
Only then will the next leap in AI-powered decentralization become more than just a market cycle.