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Bitcoin miner MARA Holdings launched the MARA Foundation on Monday to support the health of the Bitcoin network and the communities that rely on it as a tool for financial sovereignty.

The MARA Foundation said it plans to implement measures to “harden Bitcoin against security threats,” including quantum computing, while also expanding access to self-custodial Bitcoin (BTC) and offering a range of educational resources, MARA said after announcing the new foundation at the Bitcoin 2026 conference in Las Vegas on Monday.

It also plans to support the “development of a robust and healthy fee market for Bitcoin transactions,” it said.

“We believe Bitcoin embodies the most powerful tool for financial sovereignty, economic resilience, and human freedom in the world,” the Bitcoin miner said, explaining its commitment to protect the “core properties that make Bitcoin sound, durable money.”

Source: MARA Holdings

MARA’s commitment to Bitcoin comes as corporate Bitcoin miners have expanded into AI and high-performance computing in search of higher-revenue opportunities. Bitcoin hashrate, a measure of the computational power employed by miners to secure the Bitcoin network, has fallen 28.8% since September.

MARA has a $100,000 contribution to send out

The newly formed MARA Foundation is set to start with a $100,000 contribution fund and is asking the public to vote on which of three Bitcoin companies should receive the funds.

The three candidates are the open-source Bitcoin mining platform 256 Foundation, the Latin American Bitcoin education platform Libreria de Satoshi and SafeNet, a Bitcoin-powered, community-operated wireless network serving underprivileged communities.

MARA said one of the foundation’s missions is to enable “financial sovereignty worldwide,” particularly in the “Global South” — mostly Africa and Latin America — where “Bitcoin is being used as a tool to escape financial oppression in jurisdictions affected by hyperinflation, confiscatory policy, and restrictions on financial freedom.”

“We are committed to supporting communities using Bitcoin to expand access to sound money and strengthen local economies,” it added.

MARA also plans to share a range of educational resources with both Bitcoin developers and policymakers.

Over the years, most crypto sectors have seen strong capital inflows, while one has lagged.

Looking at the data, whether it’s Real World Assets (RWA), stablecoins, or emerging AI agents, all have seen major capital rotation, with triple-digit growth in under half a decade. NFTs, however, have struggled, with market cap still far below the $15 billion+ levels seen in the 2021–2022 cycle.

That said, April has started to shift sentiment. As the chart below highlights, total $NFT market capitalization has surged 54% over the past month, bringing the combined market cap of $NFT [Non Fungible Tokens] projects back above the $2 billion level for the first time since early Q1.

Unsurprisingly, traders are split on the market reaction.

On one side, supporters see this as renewed momentum for a sector that’s been underperforming for a while, pointing to it as a sign of renewed capital flowing back into crypto. On the other hand, skeptics are quick to zoom out and compare it to the 2021-2022 cycle, pointing out that the current move still looks relatively muted, even within the 2024-2026 range.

Backing this skepticism, critics point out how concentrated the move is. Most of the gains come from blue-chip collections, especially Bored Apes, rather than a broad-based recovery across the market. Naturally, this raises the question: Are these flows into NFTs a bullish bet or just a temporary boost?

$TON blockchain $NFT volume leads the market

Looking at $NFT trading volume toward the end of the Q1 cycle, calling it a temporary spike might be too early.

From a technical standpoint, there’s a clear divergence forming between major chains like Ethereum [ETH] and Toncoin [$TON], highlighting how uneven $NFT activity has become across ecosystems.

As the chart shows, in March, $TON led $NFT trading volume at $39.8 million, ahead of Ethereum’s $35.9 million, marking a noticeable shift in where $NFT activity concentrates. Breaking it down further, most of $TON’s volume came from Telegram-native NFTs. Telegram Gifts drove $23.09 million (58% of total volume), followed by Telegram Numbers at $11.02 million (27.5%) and Telegram Usernames at $5.28 million (13%).

Against this backdrop, calling the $NFT market spike too concentrated feels a bit overstated.

The logic is simple: Trading volume is shifting away from Ethereum dominance and spreading across other chains, so capital now rotates more broadly instead of staying locked into one network. Technically, this surge in $NFT volume has also moved in line with the broader upside in the total crypto market in March.

Taken together, the current structure therefore looks less like an isolated spike and more like a distributed rotation, with the $NFT market moving back above $2 billion acting as a strong signal of traders stepping in more aggressively. As a result, this positions NFTs as a key signal for tracking capital flows this cycle.

Final Summary

• $NFT market cap rebounded above $2 billion with a 54% monthly surge, signaling renewed trader participation.
• Volume is shifting across chains, suggesting a more distributed $NFT recovery rather than an Ethereum-only spike.

Bitcoin fraud claims led to a federal prison sentence for Sze Man Yu Inos. The case highlights how personal trust and false investment promises can expose older victims to major losses.

Key Takeaways:

• Inos received prison time after prosecutors described false bitcoin investment claims.
• Saipan victims faced wider financial harm as the scheme expanded geographically.
• Federal prosecutors framed the case as a warning about affinity fraud.

Bitcoin Fraud Sentence Shows Elder Victim Losses

A fraud scheme built on false bitcoin investment claims and personal trust ended April 23, 2026, with a 71-month federal prison sentence for Sze Man Yu Inos, also known as Yuki. Prosecutors said Inos targeted older women, gained their confidence, and used false claims about wealth, business success, and investing to obtain money.

Inos, 30, was sentenced by Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona in the U.S. District Court for the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory, after a wire fraud conviction. The court also ordered three years of supervised release, 100 hours of community service, $769,355.67 in restitution, and a mandatory $200 special assessment. A separate criminal forfeiture money judgment was entered for $684,848.34. Prosecutors said Inos approached older women in Saipan and Guam from November 2020 through January 2022. She claimed she came from a wealthy family in China, owned multiple businesses, and had made money through bitcoin investing.

U.S. Attorney Shawn N. Anderson warned:

“Criminals engaged in affinity fraud prey on our willingness to trust others.”

Prosecutors said she used expensive meals, gifts, and personal stories to build trust before asking for money. The scheme later reached additional victims in Washington and California.

Federal Prosecutors Detail Trust-Based Investment Scheme

The case centered on relationships that prosecutors said were used to create financial access. Inos befriended older women, described personal problems that were not real, and made victims feel emotionally important to her. She often told them, “You are like my mom.” After gaining confidence, prosecutors said she requested money and solicited bitcoin investments based on false pretenses. The conduct did not stop after she left the Marianas, according to prosecutors. The FBI also said Inos forged a federal judge’s signature to facilitate her schemes. FBI Honolulu Special Agent in Charge David Porter said her actions showed contempt for both the victims and the rule of law.

The sentence leaves Inos facing prison time, supervision, community service, and major financial penalties connected to the losses. Anderson said she targeted older women across multiple jurisdictions and continued her scams while the case was pending. Porter said the conduct caused financial harm across several states and affected dozens of innocent victims. The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Garth R. Backe for the District of the Northern Mariana Islands. Prosecutors framed the case as a warning about how personal trust can be used to support false investment claims.

Quack AI, an artificial intelligence (AI-Powered) blockchain protocol acting as a universal governance layer for Web3, has disclosed its strategic partnership with Mantle, a high-performance, modular Ethereum Layer 2(L2) scaling solution for lower fees and high-speed transactions. The basic purpose of this collaboration is to facilitate fast, secure, and institution-ready seamless gasless stablecoin payments.

Basically, Quack AI is introducing its Q402 payment infrastructure into the Mantle ecosystem to build gasless stablecoin payment rails. This is actually for enhancing stablecoin payments speed, ease, and more institution-friendly. With Q402, users can easily transfer USDC/USDT, sign transactions with just one signature, and prevent holding $MNT for gas. Quack AI has released this news through its official social media X account.

Mantle and Quack AI Redefine Stablecoin Infrastructure with Gasless Settlement

This combination removes the penalty of gas fee as a hurdle for $MNT balance; no wallet migration, and gas top-ups are needed for making every single transaction. This alliance further offers a sign-to-pay feature for existing wallets like MetaMask or OKX Wallet, which work instantly. Moreover, traditional wallet addresses remain usable with a simpler payment execution experience.

Both platforms have a unified aim, which is to improve the stablecoin payment infrastructure with gasless settlement. For this purpose, Mantle facilitates sub-second block times, Ethereum-level security alignment, and higher throughput. The reason behind the creation of Mantle is to build it for stablecoin infrastructure, real-world assets (RWAs), institutional liquidity, and Traditional Finance (TradFi) compatible settlement systems.

Redefining Cross-Border Payments with Advanced Blockchain Technology

Quack AI and Mantle are entirely built on advanced technology and actively utilize AI with perfection, and are trying to satisfy users at any cost. This move is remarkable and is now admired by users around the world. This movement plays an important role in the seamless transactions of cryptocurrencies and stablecoin payments. This will also be good for cross-border payments. These platforms are laying the basis of an advanced future for future generations.

Moreover, they have advanced technology to protect the security of payments with highly regulated systems. Because users are very conscious about their assets’ security and always demand a secure system for protection. On the other hand, their collaborative initiative ensures regulatory compliance, stablecoin issuer trust matters, gasless UX depends on backend sponsors, and adoption relies on the merchant.