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  • Jason Sudeikis Makes Cameo at Mumford & Sons Concert to Perform ‘Ted Lasso’ Theme Song

    Jason Sudeikis Makes Cameo at Mumford & Sons Concert to Perform ‘Ted Lasso’ Theme Song

    Jason Sudeikis, star and co-creator of Ted Lasso, made a surprise cameo at Mumford & Sons’ Tuesday night concert in New York City to perform the hit Apple TV show’s theme song.

    Halfway into the show at Madison Square Garden, the camera panned to a surprise guest in the crowd: Sudeikis. He was nodding his head to the music at first and then smiled and ran on stage to finish out the song with the band. The crowd erupted in cheers for the actor and the duet.

    The Ted Lasso theme song was co-written by composer Tom Howe and Mumford & Sons frontman Marcus Mumford, the latter of which also performed the song that plays near the beginning of each episode.

    On Tuesday, Mumford later told the New York crowd to quiet down “or I’m going to stick Ted on you.” He also mentioned that he worked on the music for the Coen Brothers’ 2013 film Inside Llewyn Davis, which starred Oscar Isaac and his wife, Carey Mulligan. Isaac later joined him on stage to perform a song.

    The fourth season of Ted Lasso premiered earlier this month. However, Sudeikis initially intended for the sports comedy-drama to end with 2023’s season three. In a recent cover story for The Hollywood Reporter, the actor opened up about having second thoughts when the last season wrapped, leading to him developing the never-supposed-to-happen fourth season. “I was like, ‘Oh, I don’t know if it’s done,’” he told THR.

    In July, Sudeikis also made a surprise appearance in the first-ever FIFA World Cup Final halftime show, where his Ted Lasso character shared some words of encouragement to co-headliner Justin Bieber before he performed.

  • ‘The Brink of War’ Review: Reagan and Gorbachev Engage in Unengaging Verbal Battle

    ‘The Brink of War’ Review: Reagan and Gorbachev Engage in Unengaging Verbal Battle

    There was a time when talky slabs of recent political history like “The Brink of War,” carried by skilled name actors who aren’t quite stars, were largely the preserve of Emmy-chasing TV networks. Today, with a bit of added Christian-right rhetoric, they’re ready for the big screen, as the growing faith-based film industry expands its palette in terms of subject matter — but not cinematic style, as evidenced by this dutifully drab gray-flannel enterprise from writer-director Michael Russell Gunn.

    The latest from so-called “values-based” distributor Angel Studios comes hot on the heels of their Fourth of July release “Young Washington,” which has drummed up nearly $47 million in theaters, and shares with that Great Man biopic the kind of textbook American patriotism that recalls, well, a certain kind of textbook. The story of how the 1986 Reykjavik Summit between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev paved the way for the next year’s nuclear arms control treaty between the United States and the Soviet Union, it feels veritably designed (right down to its PG rating) to bore kids in history classrooms for generations to come. Adult audiences may be more willing when “The Brink of War” opens wide on Friday, but it’s doubtful they’ll be much more entertained.

    “Young Washington” was stolidly old-fashioned, but still rousing in its gung-ho way. “The Brink of War” is a far dustier, more static affair: Its drama is all in two aging men seated at a table, arguing with each other over two days about nuclear disarmament in a remote Icelandic consulate building. That doesn’t have to be dull, of course, and if you squint a little at the screen, you can just about see the first-rate Broadway play that could emerge from this material — with no casting changes required — if the telling were just a little more tense, and the writing just a little more witty.

    Gunn’s stiff script is attentive to the political dynamics and rhetorical thrust of the talks, and if its repeated emphasis on American honor, freedom and statesmanship makes for a somewhat pious exercise, you can’t deny the narrative stakes are high. The lines of conflict are established early and clearly: Where Gorbachev merely wants to discuss the banning of ballistic missiles, Reagan’s equal emphasis on human rights — in particular, the Soviet Union’s restrictions on Western travel for its citizens — complicates the discussion, while his insistence on pushing the controversial Strategic Defense Initiative continues to be a sticking point for the other side. (No surprise that the film glides over American political opposition to the latter proposal, unambiguously taking Reagan’s side on all fronts.)

    What’s crucially lacking here is a particularly compelling sense of Reagan and Gorbachev as human characters. Jeff Daniels and Jared Harris, respectively, put forward solidly recognizable impressions of the men we knew from televised speeches and newscasts, but aren’t given many notes to play: The leaders’ inner lives are limited to standard-issue exchanges with their wives about professional duty and strain, which don’t vary much in tone from the pithy aphorisms they share with their right-hand men about diplomacy, or lack thereof. Even when religion comes up for discussion, it’s in predictably on-message Angel Studios fashion, as Reagan chides his atheist opponent for “denying [his people] the hereafter.” (“This is worse than propoganda!” protests one of Gorbachev’s aides; irony is not one of the film’s stronger suits.) At one point, Reagan spills some chicken salad sandwich filling on his shirt; it’s about the most unguarded moment we get.

    Reagan also, naturally, gets the leading perspective, as well as the most generous sounding boards in the supporting ensemble: not just his wife Nancy (Hope Davis), who doesn’t travel to Reykjavik but provides repeated counsel over the phone, but his Secretary of State George Shultz (played with an air of gruff, salt-of-the-earth decency by J.K. Simmons), on hand to straighten out Team America’s priorities when the negotiations go awry.

    Though the film’s lens is consistently ennobling — abetted by everything from DP Magdalena Górka’s sober official-portrait lighting to Austin Wintory’s overbearing score — Daniels gets Reagan’s combination of folksy squareness and flintier social conservatism. It’s a more substantial portrayal than Dennis Quaid’s in the tackily propagandistic 2024 biopic “Reagan,” though we’re still left with the impression that, in the ranks of American presidents on screen, the erstwhile movie star remains a less dynamic movie subject.

    Harris, meanwhile, plays Gorbachev as an altogether more aloof, intractable and unknowable figure, which is precisely how the film wants it — though Branka Katić gives the canniest, funniest performance here as his watchful, image-conscious wife Raisa, here placed in a remote PR war with the U.S. First Lady where, yet again, America gets to come out on top. The film could use a few more such colorful secondary strands adjoining the main conflict, though one subplot involving a maybe-romance between two jaded journalists assigned to the summit is oddly framed and abruptly dropped.

    Fairly deliberate for much of its two-hour running time, “The Brink of War” suddenly races toward a denouement in its final quarter-hour — somewhat eliding the fact that the Reykjavik Summit was, at least in the short term, a failure, with the two men’s talks ultimately stalling, and folding it into the clearer success story of the next year’s treaty. As the film’s single most lumpen line of dialogue reminds us at the close: “A journey of a thousand miles doesn’t begin with the most incredible arms deal in history — it begins with a single step.” Gunn’s film, on the other hand, is content to skip a few steps where necessary.

  • Crunchyroll, Sony Nab Makoto Shinkai’s Untitled Next Film for Global Release

    Crunchyroll, Sony Nab Makoto Shinkai’s Untitled Next Film for Global Release

    Sony’s Crunchyroll has snapped up global distribution rights to anime hitmaker Makoto Shinkai‘s much-anticipated next feature.

    The anime streamer will co-distribute the untitled project with Sony Pictures Entertainment across the world excluding Asia — with the exception of India, which is grouped with the Western territories. Crunchyroll said Tuesday that the film’s title, plot details and expected timing are all being kept under wraps for now.

    While exceedingly little about the new feature is known, Shinkai is unmistakably one of anime’s biggest blockbuster names. His breakthrough feature Your Name grossed $358 million worldwide in 2016, a landmark in anime’s international expansion. Weathering With You followed in 2019 with $193 million, and 2022’s Suzume took roughly $323 million. All three features rank high among the top-grossing anime films of all time.

    The new film will follow the same distribution path as Suzume, which was handled jointly by Crunchyroll and Sony Pictures. The film bowed in competition at the Berlin International Film Festival and went on to earn a Golden Globe nomination for best animated feature after earning more than $10 million in U.S. theaters.

    Shinkai, 53, has released a feature roughly every three years — Your Name in 2016, Weathering With You in 2019, Suzume in 2022 — and anticipation has been building among anime fandom over the past four years about what his next work might be. The director broke his silence in a New Year’s social media message in January, writing that he would finally be able to share concrete details about his next film sometime this year.

    For Crunchyroll, the deal extends a theatrical run that has made the Sony-owned company the dominant Western distributor of Japanese animation — it claims 12 of the 20 top-grossing anime releases in U.S. history, including Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle, last year’s global phenomenon.

  • Another OpenAI Exec Quits in Leadership Shake-Up as AI Giant Eyes IPO

    Another OpenAI Exec Quits in Leadership Shake-Up as AI Giant Eyes IPO

    In brief

    • Brad Lightcap is leaving OpenAI after eight years.
    • His departure follows several recent exits across the company’s leadership, ethics, and safety teams.
    • OpenAI confidentially filed for a potential IPO in June but has not committed to going public.

    Longtime OpenAI executive Brad Lightcap announced Tuesday that he is leaving the AI developer after eight years to start a new venture. It’s the latest among a string of departures at the AI behemoth, leaving observers to wonder what to make of the moves as OpenAI preps for an IPO.

    In a post on X, Lightcap said starting something new was “bittersweet,” calling his years building the company the honor of his life.

    “Through it all, I’m proud of how we’ve maintained our focus on people,” he wrote. “It always amazes me how quickly the world has adopted our tools and rallied behind our mission. I hope we will continue to earn their trust.”

    Lightcap joined OpenAI in 2018 and spent four years as its chief operating officer. He helped build the company’s finance, legal, personnel, corporate security, government relations, and partnership teams as it grew from a research lab into a major AI developer.

    “Sitting here today, mission success feels within sight,” Lightcap wrote. “It has been the honor of my life to help bring us to this point.”

    Lightcap’s exit follows several leadership changes at OpenAI in 2026.

    Bill Peebles, Kevin Weil, and Srinivas Narayanan announced their departures in April, followed by product and business chief Fidji Simo, who stepped down in July to focus on recovering from a chronic illness.

    AI ethics lead Chloé Bakalar also left in July and reportedly has not been replaced. Bakalar’s departure followed those of safety systems chief Johannes Heidecke and chief futurist Joshua Achiam that same month.

    The news comes as OpenAI prepares to enter the public markets.

    In June, OpenAI confidentially filed for a potential IPO but has not said when or if it plans to proceed. On Myriad, a prediction market developed by Decrypt’s parent company Dastan, the market currently believes it’s more likely rival company Anthropic IPOs before OpenAI at nearly 85% odds.

    Nevertheless, the expected public offering for Sam Altman’s OpenAI has made its recent executive turnover a focus of speculation on social media.

    “It is just not that typical to have so many executives depart before their long awaited IPO,” Partner at asset management firm ParaFi Jeff Park wrote on X. “Unless…”

    Whatever the reason, Lightcap expressed gratitude to his colleagues and said he would remain available to support them after his departure.

    “I am deeply grateful to have had the opportunity to work with all of you, and to so many of you for the support through the years,” he wrote. “The old OpenAI meme that “the real AGI is the friends you made along the way” really rings true for me.”

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  • Jenna Ortega ‘Would Go All Day’ Without Food or Water as a Child Star to Make Sure She Wasn’t ‘In the Way of Anybody’

    Jenna Ortega ‘Would Go All Day’ Without Food or Water as a Child Star to Make Sure She Wasn’t ‘In the Way of Anybody’

    Jenna Ortega recently told Esquire that, as a child actor, she would go entire days without asking for food or water to make sure she was not “in the way of anybody.”

    “I really had it going for me as a child ‘cause I can’t think of one mistake I made,” Ortega said. “Is that a terrible thing to say? I feel like I make mistakes now all the time, but as a child, I was so grateful and so excited to be there that my game face was on.”

    Part of putting on that game face, Ortega explained, was not asking for anything on set.

    “I wasn’t asking for a sip of water,” she recalled. “I would go all day without eating, drinking, whatever, because I wanted so badly to not be in the way of anybody.”

    Ortega added, “Maybe that was my mistake, was not actually looking after myself.”

    Before she was “Wednesday,” Ortega got her break headlining the Disney Channel series “Stuck in the Middle.” That show debuted in 2016, and Ortega was only 13 years old. Her other early TV credits include “Richie Rich,” “Jane the Virgin,” “You” and “Elena of Avalor.”

    When asked for her take on the stigmas surrounding child stars, Ortega quipped, “Is it wrong to say that a lot of them are true? And do with that what you will.” She later explained that “the motivation” behind her career was sparked very young when she first told her parents she wanted to be an actor.

    “I was 7 years old when I said I wanted to do this,” Ortega said. “My parents laughed at me when I told them that I wanted to do it, and then that was kind of the root of everything. The motivation. And I never really stopped, because I’m very stubborn. And then I never questioned it.”

  • Connecticut Judge Says Kalshi Sports Contracts Were Never Swaps

    Connecticut Judge Says Kalshi Sports Contracts Were Never Swaps

    Not Swaps, and Not Preempted Even If They Were

    U.S. District Judge Vernon D. Oliver’s ruling rests on a threshold point rather than preemption: for the CFTC’s exclusive jurisdiction to attach, a contract must be a swap traded on a designated contract market. Oliver held it is the judiciary’s role, not the agency’s, to decide what counts as a swap, rejecting Kalshi’s argument that any such challenge must be brought against the CFTC itself.

    On the statute, Oliver read “the occurrence, nonoccurrence, or the extent of the occurrence of an event” to concern whether an event happens and to what degree, not its outcomes. He adopted the reasoning of the District of Nevada in a case brought by a Crypto.com-owned exchange – which found that dictionaries treat “event” as meaning “outcome” only in an archaic sense. A boxing match can occur, not occur, or run three rounds; who wins is an outcome of the event, not a separate event. Oliver expressly declined to decide whether contracts on whether a game reaches overtime or a series reaches a seventh game would fare differently, since neither was in the record.

    His second ground was the requirement that the event be associated with a potential financial, economic, or commercial consequence. That connection must be embedded in the event itself, Oliver held, not created by endorsement contracts, bonus provisions, side wagers, or other downstream arrangements made by independent actors. A sporting event has consequences built in through ticket sales, broadcast rights, and advertising; who wins it does not. He also noted Kalshi’s own concession in earlier litigation before the D.C. Circuit that contracts on games are unlikely to serve any commercial or hedging interest.

    Between 80% and 90% of the contracts listed on Kalshi’s exchange were sports-event contracts, responsible for a similar portion of company revenue. The CFTC has not subjected a single one to review under the special rule, let alone prohibited any. Kalshi was valued at roughly $11 billion at February’s hearing and has about 24,000 Connecticut users.

    Oliver reached preemption anyway and rejected it on both theories. The special rule at § 7a-2(c)(5)(C), which lets the CFTC bar contracts involving gaming or activity unlawful under state law, reflects an intent to preserve state authority rather than displace it. Federal impartial-access rules bar discriminatory access criteria; they do not require a DCM to offer contracts nationwide. And he was unwilling to read Dodd-Frank as handing exclusive authority over sports betting to a financial regulator with no history in the field, noting that Congress has never appropriated funds to the CFTC for that purpose.

    Kalshi also lost on irreparable harm. Its asserted injuries were largely monetary, and to a significant extent self-inflicted, given that it kept listing the contracts through repeated regulatory warnings and adverse rulings. Because Kalshi is already building geofencing for other states, Oliver found Connecticut compliance unlikely to add much cost. He noted Kalshi has issued no warnings to users while advertising itself as the first app for legal sports betting in all 50 states.

    The crypto exposure runs through a separate five-page order. Coinbase Financial Markets began offering Kalshi’s contracts through its platform in January 2026 as a futures commission merchant rather than a DCM, and Connecticut never directed any enforcement at it. Oliver denied the motion “largely in line with” the Kalshi order and attached that opinion as an exhibit. Connecticut’s December sweep had also named Robinhood Derivatives and Crypto.com: DCP announced all three orders on Dec. 3, with Gaming Director Kris Gilman saying a prediction market wager is not an investment, and Commissioner Bryan T. Cafferelli saying the platforms would violate other state laws even if licensed, including by taking wagers from people under 21.

    Oliver’s order counted 14 suits Kalshi has filed against states, with federal courts split and every state court to rule so far ruling against it. He cited KalshiEX LLC v. Cox, decided in Utah on Aug. 4, and went further than Minnesota’s judge, who blocked that state’s ban while treating a World Cup winner contract as likely a swap. Massachusetts, Nevada, and Michigan state courts have all ordered geofencing; Kalshi pledged to implement it in Nevada by Aug. 12 and faces the same date in Michigan.

    A Kalshi spokesperson told Sports Betting Dime (a Sportradar subsidiary) the company respectfully disagrees with the decision and is considering all legal options. Oliver ordered the parties to file their Rule 26(f) report by Aug. 24, with Connecticut’s response to the complaint due Aug. 31.

  • WGA Slams David Ellison’s Plan to Pull Paramount From California: ‘This Type of Behavior Is Precisely Why the Merger Should Be Blocked’

    WGA Slams David Ellison’s Plan to Pull Paramount From California: ‘This Type of Behavior Is Precisely Why the Merger Should Be Blocked’

    The Writers Guild of America has fired back at Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison after he threatened to start pulling Paramount out of California on Oct. 1 if California AG Rob Bonta refused to come to the bargaining table and settle the antitrust suit to stop the studio’s acquisition of Warner Bros.

    “By threatening to leave the state because it doesn’t want the government to enforce the law, Paramount further proves the danger of its outsized power over the industry and what that will mean for writers and the creative community,” the WGA told Variety in a statement. “This type of behavior is precisely why the merger should be blocked.”

    The WGA, along with Bonta and his coalition of 12 states, is suing to block the $110 billion Paramount-Warner Bros. merger. Filed jointly with the WGA West and East branches, the guild’s suit claims the merger violates antitrust law and would inflict irreparable harm on industry scribes.

    The AG’s lawsuit claims the transaction violates the Clayton Act by diminishing competition in three key markets: wide-release theatrical distribution, “top-grossing” theatrical distribution and basic cable licensing. Bonta, in response to the news that Paramount may split town, wrote on X Tuesday, “In a span of weeks, Paramount agreed to halt the merger until a court decision or until June 2027, asked for a November trial, and is now back with another attempt to blackmail the state into letting an illegal deal through. Paramount has lost the plot as it continues to lose in court. It didn’t work the first time — on the eve of our July lawsuit — and it won’t work this time.”

    Oct. 1 is the day when Paramount will begin paying Warner Bros. shareholders a $7 billion ticking fee for every day that passes without a closed deal. The AG’s lawsuit is set to go to trial on March 2, 2027. If no settlement is reached, Paramount would be on the hook for over $1 billion to WBD shareholders by the end of the trial.

    Ellison wrote in a recent New York Times op-ed that he believes the reason the states are opposed to a combined Paramount-Warner Bros. is not because of industry consolidation, but because Ellison would have control over CNN if the two studios were allowed to merge. During the acquisition process Ellison has made no secret that he is a friend of President Donald Trump, a longtime critic of the network. The turbulence behind the scenes at CBS News and its marquee program, “60 Minutes,” has also stoked fear that CNN may be mismanaged under Ellison’s control.

    “Great news organizations like CNN and CBS News are here to tell it straight down the middle,” Ellison wrote. “That requires newsrooms that reflect the whole world, not one side of it. And it requires independence. Our journalists will continue to answer to the facts and to all the people they serve — not to any party or cause. These were founding principles for both CNN and CBS News, for legends like Ted Turner and Edward R. Murrow, and it is exactly that kind of independence that has always fueled the greatness of ‘60 Minutes.’”

  • Spritehood NFTs raise $1.28M on Robinhood Chain

    Spritehood NFTs raise $1.28M on Robinhood Chain

    Spritehood has sold 42,956 paid NFTs on Robinhood Chain in about 53 minutes, generating nearly $1.28 million for Pudgy Penguins co-founder Cole Villemain.

    Spritehood $NFT sale reached $1.28 million

    The Defiant reported that Villemain launched Spritehood on Aug. 11 after previously being removed from the founding team of Pudgy Penguins, with the paid portion of the sale selling out in less than one hour.

    On-chain analyst 0xlaplaced calculated that the mint generated about $1.2829 million, or approximately 684.28 $ETH, based on the price of Ether during the sale. The final total came in well above an earlier estimate of roughly $755,000 that circulated before the mint had finished.

    According to the analyst’s transaction review, buyers minted 37,430 NFTs for $17 each, producing $636,310 in proceeds. A second group of 5,526 NFTs sold for $117 each, adding another $646,542.

    Combined, the two paid tiers generated $1,282,852 from 42,956 tokens. The deploying address had already distributed 1,488 NFTs at no charge through 20 zero-price transactions before the public sale, taking the full reported supply to 44,444 items.

    Although the available figures show how many tokens moved at each price, the supplied report did not identify what determined whether a buyer paid $17 or $117. It also did not provide details about any benefits, future access, or other features attached to the collection.

    Unverified code limits review of Spritehood’s mint

    Spritehood’s contract appears with an “unverified” label on Robinhood Chain’s Blockscout explorer, according to The Defiant. An unverified contract can still operate and record transactions on-chain, but its human-readable source code has not been matched publicly with the deployed bytecode through the explorer.

    Without that verification, buyers cannot use Blockscout to inspect the complete source code governing Spritehood’s pricing and distribution process. The label does not establish that the contract is malicious or faulty, though it reduces the information available for independent review through the explorer.

    The reported mint figures instead come from an analysis of completed blockchain transactions. Since every paid tier can be calculated separately, the on-chain totals explain why the final proceeds exceeded the figure shared while the sale was still underway.

    No information in the supplied report indicates that Robinhood organized, promoted or endorsed the Spritehood launch. Robinhood describes its network as a permissionless Ethereum Layer 2, meaning independent developers can deploy applications and tokens without each project representing an official Robinhood product.

    Robinhood Chain has attracted speculative assets

    Spritehood arrived about six weeks after Robinhood opened its Layer 2 network to the public. As crypto.news reported in July, Robinhood Chain launched as an Arbitrum-based Ethereum scaling network designed for tokenized stocks and decentralized finance applications.

    The mainnet debuted with integrations involving infrastructure providers, including Alchemy, BitGo, and Chainlink. Robinhood also introduced Stock Tokens for eligible users outside the United States, while decentralized exchanges and lending applications supplied on-chain trading functions.

    Despite its stated focus on financial assets, permissionless deployment has allowed unrelated tokens and speculative projects to enter the network. A July network review found that memecoin trading had become a major source of early activity, even though Robinhood built the chain around tokenized equities and real-world assets.

    The network’s early activity also produced a gap between trading volume and available liquidity. Another July analysis found $570 million in launch-week trading volume against $21.68 million in liquidity, with incentive-backed decentralized finance deposits and speculative tokens driving much of the activity.

    More recent figures cited by Bitmine Chairman Tom Lee placed Robinhood Chain’s cumulative decentralized exchange volume near $9 billion. Lee said the chain could expose Robinhood’s 27 million customers to Ethereum-based services, although the figure represented the company’s funded customer base rather than confirmed users of the blockchain.

    $ETH functions as Robinhood Chain’s native gas token, while network transactions settle through Ethereum. Buyers therefore need $ETH to pay transaction fees when directly using applications deployed on the chain, including $NFT contracts such as Spritehood.

    Pudgy Penguins history follows Villemain’s new mint

    Villemain, also known online as ColeThereum, helped create Pudgy Penguins with three other founders in 2021. The original collection contained 8,888 penguin profile-picture NFTs and sold out shortly after launch.

    An earlier Pudgy Penguins history published by crypto.news said the initial mint priced the NFTs at about $90 each and generated more than $800,000. The collection later became one of the most recognized projects from the $NFT market’s 2021 expansion.

    Pudgy Penguins holders voted Villemain out of the founding team in January 2022. The removal followed community allegations that he had misused project funds and failed to deliver on parts of the project’s roadmap.

    The claims remained allegations, and the supplied report said Villemain was not prosecuted over them. Entrepreneur Luca Netz later acquired control of the Pudgy Penguins brand in April 2022 for 750 $ETH, taking over its leadership after the original team’s removal.

    Under its new ownership, the project expanded beyond blockchain collectibles into physical toys, licensing deals, and the PENGU token. Pudgy Penguins has also continued to register periods of high secondary-market activity, including a 247% weekly sales increase to $9.3 million in July 2025.

    What the Spritehood sale means for US buyers

    Robinhood is a U.S.-listed brokerage, but use of its public blockchain does not mean an $NFT carries Robinhood’s approval or the protections attached to a brokerage account. The company’s official disclosures describe Robinhood Chain as a permissionless and separate blockchain from its regulated financial services.

    For U.S. buyers, the tax treatment of $NFT purchases also differs from buying assets inside a standard brokerage account. The Internal Revenue Service treats digital assets as property, and its guidance requires taxpayers to report taxable gains or losses when cryptocurrency is sold, exchanged or used to acquire property, including an $NFT.

    Paying for a Spritehood $NFT with $ETH may therefore create a taxable disposal for a U.S. buyer if the Ether changed in value between acquisition and use. Any later sale of the $NFT may produce another reportable gain or loss based on the difference between its cost basis and sale proceeds.

    Federal securities treatment depends on the economic facts surrounding an offering rather than the $NFT label alone. In 2023, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged Impact Theory over an $NFT offering that raised about $30 million, while Stoner Cats 2 agreed to settle charges tied to an $8 million $NFT sale.

    Neither the supplied report nor the cited on-chain review said a U.S. regulator had examined Spritehood or alleged that its NFTs were securities. The report also did not identify any passive-income rights, revenue-sharing terms, or promises of returns attached to the collection.

  • XRP bridge drained for $200,000 after software mistook fake deposits for real ones

    XRP bridge drained for $200,000 after software mistook fake deposits for real ones

    According to tx, the bridge’s software registered transactions as deposits even though they never delivered $XRP to the bridge. That gave the attacker bridged $XRP on the tx chain without the real $XRP that was supposed to back it. Those unbacked tokens then went back through the bridge, and the attacker withdrew real $XRP from the reserve.

    How a missing check let an attacker withdraw $XRP that was never deposited. (Shaurya Malwa/CoinDesk)

    The drain began at 19:16 UTC. Each payout was authorized by 17 of the bridge’s 28 relayers, a majority signing off exactly as designed, because the bridge’s own records told them the deposits were real.

    Relayers are programs that watch both blockchains and approve transfers when the bridge’s records say a withdrawal is owed.

    The specific failure sat one layer down, however, as the relayer code processed payments carrying the bridge’s memo without first verifying the destination address.

    tx confirmed the deposit-detection flaw in an update, saying the attacker exploited software that incorrectly recognized transactions that delivered no $XRP to the reserve.

    An update on the XRPL bridge incident.

    On August 9, the tx XRPL bridge was exploited and $XRP was drained from the bridge’s reserve wallet on the $XRP Ledger. The bridge has been halted, the vulnerability has been identified, and all potential remedies are being evaluated. This…

    — tx (@txEcosystem) August 11, 2026

    The project added it has identified and fixed the vulnerable code, engaged blockchain forensics specialists and filed a complaint with the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center. It has not said how affected holders will be made whole.

    Meanwhile, the stolen $XRP did not stay put. Onchain tracking shows most of it moved onward within hours through several other addresses.

  • Trump says secret plane switch ‘up to the Secret Service’

    Trump says secret plane switch ‘up to the Secret Service’

    US President Donald Trump says the decision to make a plane switch in Turkiye after the NATO summit was made by the Secret Service. The Washington Post revealed Trump boarded Air Force One, but used a catering truck to move to another aircraft due to an alleged Iranian threat.

    Published On 12 Aug 2026