The Daily: Nasdaq is investing $100M in Kraken's parent at a $21B valuation, and more

The following article is adapted from The Block’s newsletter, The Daily, which comes out on weekday afternoons.

Happy Thursday! Bitcoin is testing support around $77,000 after a hotter-than-expected PPI print, with 21Shares' Matt Mena eyeing tomorrow's CPI data as the next catalyst for a move in either direction.

In today's newsletter, Nasdaq plans a $100 million investment in Kraken's parent company, Brian Armstrong says bitcoin has bottomed, researchers halve a quantum resource benchmark for attacking Bitcoin, and more.

Meanwhile, Citadel Securities urges the SEC to assert oversight of event contracts tied to public firms.

P.S. Don't forget to check out The Funding, a biweekly rundown of crypto VC trends. It's a great read — and just like The Daily, it's free to subscribe!

Nasdaq to invest $100 million in Kraken parent Payward as firms expand partnership

Nasdaq's venture arm agreed to invest $100 million in Payward, crypto exchange Kraken's parent company, deepening their partnership on tokenized equities and market infrastructure.

• The deal values Payward at $21 billion, per Bloomberg, and will see the firm adopt Nasdaq's market surveillance technology across its crypto, equities, tokenized equities, futures, and options venues.
• The firms are also targeting a second-quarter 2027 launch of Nasdaq Equity Tokens, or NETs, connecting them to Payward's xStocks ecosystem.
• Payward co-CEO Arjun Sethi said onchain settlement removes the wait from the U.S. clearing system, while keeping shareholder rights intact.
• Nasdaq President Tal Cohen said the investment reflects confidence that Payward can help build infrastructure to move capital while preserving trust and transparency.
• The news builds on a partnership the firms began in March to link regulated equity markets with blockchain networks.

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong says bitcoin has bottomed for current cycle, expects uptrend over next two years

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong said he thinks bitcoin has bottomed for this cycle and expects it to trend higher over the next one to two years into the next halving.

• Bitcoin traded near $77,000 Thursday, down 2% on the day and about 39% below its roughly $126,000 record high.
• Armstrong's call follows bitcoin's rebound from the summer lows, with Glassnode noting bitcoin gained 23% over 21 sessions through Sept. 9 while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 stayed broadly flat.
• Armstrong also touted growth beyond bitcoin, citing a 700% year-over-year jump in stablecoin payments on Base and highlighting payments, tokenization, prediction markets, and agentic finance as a key focus for Coinbase into 2027.

Researchers halve quantum resource benchmark for key operation in Bitcoin, Ethereum attack

Researchers cut the estimated resources needed for a key operation in a potential quantum attack on Bitcoin and Ethereum, bringing their circuit down to 1,151 logical qubits and 1.30 million Toffoli gates, according to a technical paper led by Theta Labs CTO Jieyi Long.

• Those figures are multiplied into a single score, with a lower number indicating a more efficient circuit.
• Over roughly two months, submissions to a public challenge brought that score down 86%, from 10.75 billion to 1.496 billion, landing at less than half Google's previously reported benchmark.
• More than 100 people contributed, including developers from the Ethereum Foundation, Eigen Labs, and Trail of Bits, though the authors stressed the process is not an attack itself.
• "Every timeline anyone has quoted you for Q-Day needs to be cut too," StarkWare CEO Eli Ben-Sasson, whose team was also among those involved, told The Block.

MoneyGram launches first stablecoin-backed Visa card in Colombia

86-year-old global payments firm MoneyGram has launched its first stablecoin-backed Visa card, starting in Colombia and built in collaboration with stablecoin infrastructure firm Rain.

• It lets customers hold a stable-dollar balance, spend anywhere Visa is accepted, and pick up local currency at MoneyGram locations, supporting USDC at launch with its own MGUSD stablecoin to follow.
• The card is currently digital-only inside the MoneyGram app, with a physical card and cash-withdrawal option planned for late 2026.
• MoneyGram plans to expand the service across Latin America, extending its stablecoin push beyond money transfers into everyday spending as payment firms lean deeper into stablecoins.

Trezor says third-party security breach led to phishing emails from legitimate domain

Trezor warned that a breach at its third-party email provider let attackers send phishing emails from its official domain, making them harder to spot than typical scams.

• The fake email, titled "Critical Security Alert: STM32 Entropy Vulnerability," urged users to update their wallets over a bogus flaw, with Trezor taking down the domain and investigating.
• The incident follows shortly after a breach at the firm's shipping provider, ShipMonk, last month that exposed data for some 80,000 Trezor customers.

In the next 24 hours

• UK GDP figures are out at 2 a.m. ET on Friday. U.S. CPI inflation data follow at 8:30 a.m. ET.
• Aptos is among the crypto projects set for token unlocks.
• Lagos Blockchain Week and UN Blockchain Week continue. ETHRome 2026 gets underway.

Reader poll

Coinbase's CEO says bitcoin has bottomed for this cycle. Buying it?

YES, BOTTOM'S IN

NO, MORE PAIN AHEAD

One click records your pick. We'll share the result in a later edition.

*64% of respondents in last Thursday's poll said buying tokenized stakes in pro sports teams is not for them following Securitize and Socios' tie-up.

Never miss a beat with The Block's daily digest of the most influential events happening across the digital asset ecosystem.