The investigation into Binance could intensify regulatory scrutiny on crypto 
exchanges, impacting global compliance standards and market trust.
The post US senator probes Binance over alleged Iran and Russia sanctions 
violations appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

US senator probes Binance over alleged Iran and Russia sanctions violations

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth met with Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei at the 
Pentagon on Tuesday as the Department of Defense pressed Anthropic to remove 
restrictions on its Claude artificial intelligence (AI) system or face 
possible penalties. Military AI Governance Tested in High-Stakes Pentagon 
Meeting The Feb. 24 meeting followed weeks of tension over Anthropic’s usage 
[…]

Report: Anthropic’s Claude AI Faces Uncertain Future in Classified Pentagon Systems

Anthropic alleges Chinese AI companies DeepSeek, Moonshot and MiniMax made 
24,000 accounts and 16 million Claude exchanges to scrape its AI bot for 
training.

Anthropic says it’s been targeted in massive distillation attacks

Former CoinRoutes CEO Dave Weisberger argued in an X post on February 23 that 
Bitcoin’s early-2026 hashrate rebound is more than a mining-cycle recovery and 
may be a lagging signal of a broader price move ahead. His core thesis is that 
sovereign-linked mining activity is starting to play for Bitcoin the same 
structural role central bank gold buying played for gold before its breakout. 
Weisberger frames the comparison through the recent gold cycle, where he says 
sovereign accumulation preceded price discovery by years. In his telling, the 
key signal was not ETF demand or retail flows, but central banks steadily 
adding reserves as geopolitical fragmentation and fiat-risk concerns rose. 
“The result? A parabolic gold rally that few saw coming in real time,” he 
wrote. “Gold has surged to record highs well north of $5,000/oz in this cycle, 
leaving the ‘it’s just inflation’ crowd scrambling. The buying came first. The 
price discovery followed later.” Related Reading: Another $438M In Crypto 
Longs Gone As Bitcoin, Altcoins Pull Back Why Bitcoin&#8217;s Hashrate Recovery Is 
Signalling The Next Rally Applying that framework to Bitcoin, Weisberger 
points to what he describes as a “textbook V-shaped recovery” in network 
hashrate in early 2026. After a sharp pullback of roughly 15% to 20% from 
prior peaks, he says computational power rebounded from below 900 EH/s to 
above 1 ZH/s, accompanied by one of the largest absolute difficulty increases 
on record, at nearly 15%. For Weisberger, that recovery is not just a post- 
stress normalization after winter curtailments, regional shutdowns, and post- 
halving margin compression. He argues it reflects a different class of miner 
stepping in. “This isn’t random noise. It is the direct footprint of sovereign 
mining stepping in where private miners hesitated,” he wrote. A central part 
of the post is Weisberger’s claim that at least 13 nation-states are now 
mining Bitcoin at a governmental or state-linked level (backed by VanEck 
research). He cites Bhutan, the UAE, and El Salvador, and also names Russia, 
Iran, and Ethiopia as countries deploying energy assets into mining. “These 
are not retail or even corporate miners chasing daily hashprice,” he wrote. 
“These are governments converting stranded or strategic energy into a 
portable, verifiable, seizure-resistant reserve asset. They mine for policy 
reasons: revenue without printing more local currency, network security in 
which they hold a direct stake, and positioning in a world where financial 
sovereignty matters.” Related Reading: Bitcoin COT Data: Smart Money Goes Net 
Long With ‘Urgency’ Weisberger argues sovereign miners operate with different 
constraints than private miners: longer time horizons, different cost of 
capital, and less need to sell output into market weakness. In that framework, 
sovereign mining becomes a mechanism for absorbing newly issued BTC directly 
into long-term holdings, reducing sell-side pressure while also strengthening 
network security. Weisberger explicitly describes hashrate recovery as a 
lagged, not coincident, indicator, because sovereign mining expansion requires 
hardware procurement, energy contracts, infrastructure buildout, and policy 
approvals. Those processes move slowly, often during periods when price action 
appears flat or corrective. He argues that this sequence can change market 
structure before price reflects it: stronger security, tighter issuance flow, 
and broader validation of Bitcoin as a reserve asset rather than a purely 
speculative vehicle. His conclusion is blunt: “The hashrate recovery isn’t 
just technical resilience. It is a sovereign signal flashing bright. 
Governments are voting with energy infrastructure and balance sheets.” At 
press time, BTC traded at $63,209. Featured image created with DALL.E, chart 
from TradingView.com

Bitcoin Hashrate Recovery Signals Next Rally, Expert Says

Bitwise’s acquisition of Chorus One expands the company’s staking capabilities 
to more than 30 blockchains, including Solana, Hyperliquid, Monad, Avalanche 
and Sui.

Cryptocurrency price in USD