Real-world asset protocols have grown into DeFi's fifth-largest segment by total value locked, with TVL surpassing $17 billion and Ethereum hosting more than $12 billion of that. Gold-backed tokens such as Tether Gold and Paxos Gold lead the category, while tokenized equities have pushed their market cap beyond $1.2 billion to a new all-time high. RWA tokens have also delivered strong year-to-date gains, supported by standout performers like Keeta Network, Zebec, and Maple Finance.

Users of Perpetual trading platform Lighter report failed withdrawals showing the error "Too many L2 Withdrawals." On-chain explorer data points to a lag between the Prover and Sequencer, with the last committed block #137759880 finalized prior to the December 30, 2025 update. The team has not issued a formal statement, while LIT trades at $2.84.

Binance suspended direct fiat withdrawals to Visa and Mastercard for users in Ukraine, effective December 29. The pause relates to maintenance and partner infrastructure updates as Bifinity UAB ends fiat support by December 31. Deposits via cards and Apple Pay/Google Pay remain available, with SWIFT transfers and P2P trading continuing for fund movement.

On December 24, Trust Wallet's browser extension v2.68 was compromised, enabling attackers to drain about $8.50 million from 2,596 wallets, according to CEO Eowyn Chen. The team reverted to a secure version, launched a documentation-based compensation process, and warned users about phishing attempts while markets saw lower Bitcoin and Ethereum trading activity.

Russia's Ministry of Justice has drafted Criminal Code Article 171.6 to punish unregistered crypto mining, targeting operators outside the Federal Tax Service registry created on November 1, 2024. Penalties range up to 5 years of imprisonment and fines reaching 2.5 million rubles for organized schemes, while individuals above 3.5 million rubles in income face fines up to 1.5 million rubles.

Unleash Protocol suffered a governance-level exploit that allowed an attacker to deploy an unauthorised contract upgrade and withdraw about $3.9 million in user assets. The incident, identified by PeckShieldAlert and later confirmed by the team, affected tokens including WIP, USDC, WETH, stIP, and vIP, with 1,337.1 ETH ultimately funneled into Tornado Cash via Ethereum bridges. Platform operations have been paused while external security specialists investigate how the multi-signature admin controls were bypassed.

In 2025, blockchain investigator ZachXBT identified a Canadian actor known as Haby/Havard who allegedly impersonated Coinbase support and siphoned more than $2 million in crypto via social‑engineering phone calls. He tied on‑chain activity to social media posts, including a Dec. 30, 2024 XRP theft and a Feb. 2025 Bitcoin wallet screenshot showing $237,000, linking multiple victim cases.

Prediction markets are projected to handle $40 billion in transaction volume in 2025, a more than 400% jump from the prior year, and could begin to rival the $300 billion global sports betting industry in 2026. Driven by platforms such as Kalshi and Polymarket, analysts expect these markets to evolve into data and "truth" layers that inform fact-checking, risk management, and broader trading decisions.