Project Progress

Nexus closed its testnet on March 17 and entered the mainnet phase directly, supporting DeFi applications, financial institutions, and AI systems. The testnet attracted 2.6 million participants and processed 58 million transactions, achieving a 1000x improvement in throughput.

Gate News, on March 18, Starknet mainnet will begin a planned upgrade starting at 17:10 (UTC+8) today, with an estimated downtime of approximately 12 minutes. Starknet stated that this upgrade is part of its move toward further decentralization, which will transfer the block hash calculation of Starknet blocks to decentralized Apollo nodes.

Gate News: On March 18, Starknet officially posted on X stating that its mainnet will temporarily shut down starting at 9:10 AM UTC today for a scheduled upgrade.

Anuma, in the ZetaChain ecosystem, has launched Anuma Friends, an AI phone number feature that allows users to interact with AI assistants via SMS without downloading apps or internet access. Services include Anuma and Coco, with subscription fees of $5.99/month.

Harry Howard AI recently completed testing of its prediction market product, attracting 8,518 participants and generating 26,423 transactions. The platform secured $3 million in seed funding in 2025, is currently advancing private fundraising efforts, and plans to launch a token.

Stacks Labs has successfully implemented the SIP-034 upgrade, enhancing network processing efficiency for DeFi applications by up to 30 times by resolving critical bottlenecks. This update allows selective reset of resource limits, enabling more transactions per block, particularly benefiting complex DeFi use cases. While STX tokenomics remain unchanged, the upgrade may boost long-term network activity.

The CFTC issued a "no-action" letter to Phantom Technologies, allowing it to connect users to regulated futures markets without registering as a broker. This decision promotes transparency for non-custodial wallet developers and may guide future regulations.

Starchild platform launched the Skills Hub feature on March 18, enabling users to browse and install community skills, support custom skill publishing, integrate mainstream crypto data sources, and achieve modular workflow sharing. Currently available in beta version with free trial.

Privacy-first wallet Shield, built on privacy blockchain Aleo, launched its iOS version on March 18, allowing users to use it on iPhone with support for private transfers, stablecoins, and cross-chain swaps, while employing zero-knowledge proof technology to protect transaction privacy.

Pi Network has launched the "Security Circle Activation Protocol," aimed at enhancing network resilience and trustworthiness, and promoting integration toward DeFi and Web3. The new protocol introduces a decentralized governance layer, strengthens transaction validation and participant identity verification, and provides a framework for institutional participation. The community is optimistic about rumors of well-known institutions joining, but caution should be exercised pending official confirmation. This technical upgrade is viewed as an important step in driving Pi Coin toward a mature financial ecosystem.

Five major U.S. regional banks have announced the launch of Cari Network, a blockchain payment platform leveraging ZKsync technology to enable real-time settlement while maintaining FDIC insurance protection. Unlike stablecoins, this platform records tokenized deposits directly on bank balance sheets in compliance with regulatory requirements. Facing competitive and regulatory pressures, banks chose to take action before 2026 to capture first-mover advantage. The core strengths lie in legal structure and safeguard mechanisms, but the platform also faces challenges in interoperability and market competition.

The head of the Plasma engineering team stated that Plasma One has entered the private testing phase, aimed at enhancing the usability and user experience of crypto products and building services similar to a new type of digital bank. The team plans to accelerate iteration and open up early access.

Gate News reports that on March 18, xStocks announced on the X platform that its points system, xPoints, now has query functionality enabled. Users can automatically accumulate points through three methods: holding tokenized stocks in their wallet, establishing positions in the lending market, and providing liquidity to decentralized exchanges (DEX). xStocks stated that it will announce more partnership information in the coming weeks.

Gate News, on March 18, LayerZero announced the integration of Cardano, connecting the Cardano ecosystem with over 160 blockchains including Ethereum, Solana, and Aptos. In this deployment, LayerZero's omnichain fungible token (OFT) standard supports over 700 existing tokens natively extending to Cardano. Developers and users can access the aforementioned assets and applications across chains.

Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin has proposed a new fast finality rule that guarantees Ethereum transactions become irreversible within 12 seconds, aiming to improve the current mechanism that requires 6.4 minutes for final confirmation. This proposal relies on the majority of validator nodes being honest and network latency being below 3 seconds. If these conditions hold, it could effectively enhance user experience.

Gate News, on March 18, NFT project Doodles launched an AI creation platform at makedoodles.ai. The platform supports users uploading images and generating artwork in Doodles style through AI technology.

Circle announced the appointment of Microsoft executive Kirk Koenigsbauer as a board member, enhancing its governance and risk management capabilities. Koenigsbauer's Microsoft background will help Circle navigate compliance and security challenges as it transitions from a startup to a mature public company, and will strengthen market confidence in USDC and its ability to expand into traditional enterprises.

Tether has launched a new AI training framework that allows for fine-tuning large language models on consumer devices such as smartphones and non-Nvidia GPUs. By utilizing Microsoft’s BitNet architecture and LoRA techniques, it provides substantial reductions in memory usage and computational costs, supporting a variety of chipsets. This development is in line with the trend of cryptocurrency companies expanding into AI and computing infrastructure.

Aster, a DEX for derivatives backed by Changpeng Zhao's family office, has launched its mainnet with a private Layer 1 blockchain. It aims to improve DeFi transparency while enabling high performance and private transactions, leveraging zero-knowledge technology.

Cryptocurrency governance tool Tally announced its closure on March 17 after operating for over five years. Tally had provided governance infrastructure for multiple Ethereum protocols, handling over $1 billion in transactions. The shutdown was attributed to poor market timing and failure to fulfill token promises, reflecting the commercialization challenges of DAO governance tools. Despite these challenges, the DAO concept continues to evolve, with future development potentially shifting toward diversified infrastructure construction.