Invest ideasNews
21 Apr 2026, 10:32
Uzbekistan teases benefits for crypto miners in special economic zone
The government of Uzbekistan is creating a “crypto mining valley” in one of its regions bordering Central Asia’s mining powerhouse, Kazakhstan. Miners will be granted almost a decade-long tax exemption as part of the nation’s push to catch up with neighbors that are already ahead in developing the industry. Bitcoin miners to enjoy benefits in Uzbekistan’s new crypto valley Uzbekistani authorities are establishing a special economic zone called the Besqala Mining Valley in the autonomous Republic of Karakalpakstan. The region is situated in the northwestern part of the country and borders Kazakhstan, which accounted for roughly 13% of the global Bitcoin hashrate not too long ago. The zone has been established with a new decree signed by President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, the government’s portal for legal information announced Tuesday. The income of cryptocurrency miners operating there will be exempt from taxation, according to the Telegram post quoted by the leading Russian-language crypto news outlet Bits.media. The tax preference will be in place until January 1, 2035, according to the document, alongside other benefits for the mining enterprises based in the area. Residents of the valley have been promised unimpeded access to Uzbekistan’s unified power grid, which increasingly relies on renewable energy resources. The rest of the needed electricity for the mining equipment will be supplied by hydrogen power plants built in Karakalpakstan itself. Miners will be authorized to sell the extracted digital assets on both domestic and international crypto trading platforms, the report further detailed. The companies engaged in the Bitcoin-related business activity will be licensed by the National Agency for Prospective Projects ( NAPP ). To obtain resident status, they are required to file an application with the directorate responsible for the Besqala Mining Valley. Will Uzbekistan become Central Asia’s next Bitcoin mining hotspot? The establishment of the special economic zone in Karakalpakstan is linked to Uzbekistan’s renewed efforts to create favorable conditions for the crypto mining sector. In February of this year, the nation issued its first mining permit, thus joining a club of former Soviet Republics in Central Asia where the industry has been gaining a foothold. The authorization was granted to a local company called NexaGrid, which intends to use it to set up its mining facilities in the southwest Bukhara region. At the time, one of its founders noted that the licensing puts an end to months of uncertainty, as reported by Cryptopolitan. The regulatory move came more than two years after the NAPP adopted regulations for the issuing of mining permits. As admitted by one of the agency’s top executives, there were no legal crypto farms registered in the country during that period. Uzbekistan has a lot more to do to come close to the crypto mining leaders of Central Asia, but opportunities to catch up may arise. For example, Kazakhstan, which was once among the world’s top three mining destinations, lost its spot in the chart when its government introduced higher electricity rates for crypto farms. It did that to deal with growing energy deficits caused by the influx of mining firms, sparked by China’s decision to enforce a ban on the activity a few years ago. As a result, Kazakhstan lost some of its appeal for miners. However, Astana lifted some mining restrictions last fall as part of a new strategy to become a Eurasian crypto hub . Citing power shortages, Kyrgyzstan halted all mining on its territory this past winter, although its government later indicated coin minting would resume in the spring as it’s profitable. Competition in the region is likely to accelerate. Uzbekistan’s southern neighbor, Turkmenistan, legalized crypto mining and trading with a law that entered into force in January. Tashkent has been gradually opening the country for digital money. While crypto payments are still prohibited, Uzbekistan announced it’s allowing the use of stablecoins for settlements this year. Your bank is using your money. You’re getting the scraps. Watch our free video on becoming your own bank
20 Apr 2026, 19:26
Alcoa set to sell New York smelter to NYDIG for BTC mining
⚡ Alcoa is nearing a deal to sell its New York smelter to NYDIG for $BTC mining. The Massena East site’s powerful grid connections attract digital asset firms. Continue Reading: Alcoa set to sell New York smelter to NYDIG for BTC mining The post Alcoa set to sell New York smelter to NYDIG for BTC mining appeared first on COINTURK NEWS .
20 Apr 2026, 19:00
Best free cryptocurrency cloud mining apps of 2026: Earn Bitcoin easily on Android and iOS
Cloud mining has become one of the most searched topics in the cryptocurrency field, as more and more users are looking for ways to earn Bitcoin without hardware, electricity costs, or technical complexity. By 2026, free cloud mining platforms will allow people to start mining with just a smartphone, turning crypto mining into a mobile-first Continue reading "Best free cryptocurrency cloud mining apps of 2026: Earn Bitcoin easily on Android and iOS"
20 Apr 2026, 18:10
Tether takes 8.2% stake in Bitcoin mining finance platform Antalpha
The purchase comes as the stablecoin issuer expands its investments across crypto infrastructure and financial services, including in Kaio, also announced today.
20 Apr 2026, 17:21
Cango bets on infrastructure to close power gap as EcoHash launches commercial AI inference platform
EcoHash Technology LLC, the dedicated HPC and AI inference subsidiary of Cango Inc. (NYSE: CANG), launched its public digital portal on 13 April 2026, announcing the start of commercial operations. It also unveiled plans to operate a portion of its 50-megawatt (MW) Georgia mining facility as a live proof-of-concept hub for the AI compute industry. What is EcoHash, and why is it entering the market now? Cango (CANG) founded EcoHash in 2025 as part of its goal to convert the company’s global energy infrastructure into a distributed AI compute network. EcoHash’s commercial launch targets AI developers seeking low-latency, near-source compute capacity, and energy-intensive compute operators looking for modular pathways to infrastructure diversification. Cango (CANG) believes the latter is underserved by conventional data center providers. This development is coming at a time when researchers from Goldman Sachs are forecasting that U.S. data center power demand could reach 700 TWh by 2030, and this will be driven predominantly by AI inference workloads. However, the current available supply remains just above 300 TWh, leaving a gap of about 400 TWh even as compute demand steadily increases. This is the commercial rationale EcoHash is built around, and it was pointed out by Cango’s CEO Paul Yu, who calls the “Power Gap” the disconnect between rising AI compute demand and constrained grid capacity. According to Jack Jin, chief technology officer of EcoHash, “EcoHash represents the core vehicle of our strategy to architect a future-ready platform and serve as our next growth engine, now entering a phase of accelerated commercialization.” The subsidiary’s commercial launch follows a period of intensive capital deployment. In April 2026, Cango (CANG) announced the completion of two financing transactions totaling $75 million, a $65 million equity close from board insiders Xin Jin and Chang-Wei Chiu, and a $10 million convertible note from Hong Kong-listed DL Holdings Group Limited (HKEX: 1709). Cango (CANG) also entered a memorandum of understanding with DL Holdings for up to $10 million in further co-investment. Those transactions followed an earlier $305 million boost from the sale of Bitcoin holdings used to retire debt and reset the balance sheet. What is the Georgia facility designed to demonstrate? EcoHash’s launch strategy is backed by the Cango-owned 50MW Georgia mining facility, where the company is dedicating space to operate full-series container models as what it describes as a “living showroom”. The site is engineered to demonstrate real-world performance across varying thermal and power configurations, functioning as a strategic proof-of-concept hub for industry collaborators across the digital infrastructure and mining ecosystem. Cango (CANG) intends for a portion of the Georgia facility to serve as the replicable template for a globally distributed AI compute network, with ambitions to scale the model across high-potential sites both within and beyond its existing mining locations spanning North America, the Middle East, South America, and East Africa. The commercial viability of its plug-and-play modules in Georgia will enable the company to attract global partners into the EcoHash network, operators who can integrate existing infrastructure into the platform instead of building new data centers from scratch. How does the EcoLink platform come into the picture? The operational backbone of EcoHash is the proprietary EcoLink Orchestration Platform, a software layer that unifies and schedules geographically dispersed compute capacity across the network. EcoLink is built to deliver enterprise-grade uptime through intelligent failover, provisioning compute power to meet real-time workload demands. It is the mechanism that transforms a collection of repurposed mining sites into something resembling a conventional hyperscale offering. In his comment, Jin stated that EcoLink is “the central nervous system of our network”, built to enable intelligent, real-time resource allocation connecting decentralized energy assets directly to the demands of large language model inference, generative AI, and a growing range of compute-intensive applications. The result, per Cango (CANG), is elastic, low-latency compute that scales on demand, without the capital expenditure and multi-year lead times associated with building new data center capacity.
20 Apr 2026, 17:19
Market Brief: DeFi Is Cooked? The Market Is Asking The Wrong Question
Summary DeFi came under fresh pressure after the KelpDAO exploit triggered a sharp shock across Aave and revived fears around contagion, bad debt, and operational risk. Yet the fallout was not one-dimensional. Aave was not directly hacked, yet it still suffered a severe liquidity shock after the rsETH incident. That alone shows how DeFi’s biggest vulnerabilities now extend well beyond contract code. AI could improve DeFi security from here. Anthropic said Claude Mythos Preview has flagged 1000+ high-severity vulnerabilities in recent weeks, including issues affecting every major operating system and web browser. DeFi came under fresh pressure after the KelpDAO exploit triggered a sharp shock across Aave ( AAVE-USD ) and revived fears around contagion, bad debt, and operational risk. Yet the fallout was not one-dimensional. Capital fled the most exposed pools, but some demand rotated elsewhere. We break down what the Aave and Drift ( DRIFT-USD ) episodes actually revealed, where liquidity moved next, and what this means for DeFi’s next phase. The latest panic around Aave has revived a familiar claim that DeFi is broken. But the more useful question is whether the market is finally repricing risks it tolerated for too long. Aave was not directly hacked, yet it still suffered a severe liquidity shock after the rsETH incident. That alone shows how DeFi’s biggest vulnerabilities now extend well beyond contract code. Aave Was Not Hacked, but It Was Hit by Contagion What happened to Aave matters because it was not a direct protocol breach. After attackers drained about $291 million from KelpDAO-linked infrastructure, the compromised rsETH was routed into DeFi lending rails and used to borrow large amounts of WETH. That pushed key Aave pools into acute stress, with users struggling to withdraw and markets moving quickly to freeze rsETH exposure. In other words, the event was less about Aave’s own code failing and more about Aave inheriting risk from an asset whose security assumptions sat outside its own control. It showed how a weakness in one part of the stack can become a balance sheet problem somewhere else. Once confidence in a collateral asset breaks, liquidity conditions can deteriorate much faster than governance can react. The market was not only pricing the immediate exploit. It was pricing the possibility that external assets, bridge configurations, and cross-protocol dependencies can force a major lending venue into a confidence crisis without ever touching its core contracts. DeFi Risk Is No Longer Just Code Aave and Drift matter for different reasons. Aave showed how risk can spread across protocols through collateral and market structure. Drift showed how large losses can also come from operational weakness, permissions, and human error. Taken together, the message is clear: DeFi risk no longer begins and ends with contract code. Drift itself made that point clearly. The roughly $286 million exploit exposed weaknesses in execution, permissions, and operational control. The April attack wave made the point even clearer. In the two weeks after Drift, at least a dozen crypto entities were hit again, including Hyperbridge, Rhea Finance, and Grinex, pushing total losses for the period above $600 million. Another warning came from Ethereum ( ETH-USD ). A six-month security effort backed by the Ethereum Foundation said it identified around 100 suspected DPRK-linked operatives across 53 Web3 projects. That is why Drift should not be read as an isolated event. The bigger message is that DeFi’s threat surface now includes infiltration, identity fraud, and organizational compromise alongside contract exploits. DeFi Flows Show Both Flight and Rotation The flows show two things at once. First, this was not just an Aave shock. DeFi TVL fell about 8% over 24 hours, wiping out roughly $85 billion, showing that the market’s first response was broad risk reduction across the sector. Part of the capital clearly left DeFi rather than staying inside the system. Second, the outflows were not uniform. Aave came under clear pressure, but part of the lending demand rotated quickly into Spark. Spark’s ETH deposit rate briefly spiked to 130% and then remained unusually elevated, offering a direct signal that capital and borrow demand were shifting. At the same time, the redistribution was only partial. Broader DeFi TVL still contracted sharply, and other major lending protocols such as Morpho and Sky (SKY-USD) also saw meaningful outflows, showing that this was not a clean one-to-one migration across the sector. Source: defillama This was not only a capital flight event but also a repricing of trust. Money first left the most exposed pools, then began to separate weaker protocols from those that still retained market trust. DeFi did not see a uniform exit. It saw both deleveraging and selective reallocation. AI and the Next Security Upgrade AI could improve DeFi security from here. Anthropic said Claude Mythos Preview has flagged 1000+ high-severity vulnerabilities in recent weeks, including issues affecting every major operating system and web browser. If systems with that level of capability are applied to deep DeFi audits, exploit simulation, and continuous code review, crypto security could see a meaningful upgrade. But AI will not end the arms race. The same tools that help defenders find weaknesses faster can also lower the cost of exploit research for attackers. AI is more likely to raise the baseline of security work than to remove security risk. For DeFi, that means better tooling alone is not enough. Stronger collateral standards, cleaner isolation, tighter operational control, and more disciplined trust assumptions still matter most. DeFi is not dying. It is being forced to mature. Disclaimer: The information provided herein does not constitute investment advice, financial advice, trading advice, or any other sort of advice, and should not be treated as such. All content set out below is for informational purposes only. Original Post Editor's Note: The summary bullets for this article were chosen by Seeking Alpha editors.
