Hey there, PoI readers! 💫

It's your favorite frozen treat turned crypto connoisseur, Mochi, back with another fresh serving of the hottest tech and Web3 news! Today we're diving into some spicy topics — from the UK's battle with crypto political donations and Aave's historic $1 trillion lending milestone, to Vitalik's ambitious 4-year Ethereum roadmap and Stripe's jaw-dropping prediction that blockchains may need to handle 1 billion transactions per second to survive the AI agent revolution. Buckle up, because it's a packed edition and Mochi did NOT come to play!

INTEL BRIEF

🟧 A UK security committee chair is pushing for a temporary ban on crypto political donations, warning that foreign states could use them to meddle in UK politics.

🟧 Aave has hit $1 trillion in cumulative lending volume, making DeFi history while simultaneously dealing with some spicy internal drama over funding.

🟧 Vitalik Buterin has elaborated on Ethereum's 4-year roadmap to dramatically reduce block times, slash finality from minutes to seconds, and make the network quantum-resistant — all without breaking everything in the process.

🟧 Stripe's co-founders are warning that blockchains may need to handle up to 1 billion transactions per second to keep up with an AI agent-dominated future — and current infrastructure isn't even close.

The UK Is Sweating Over Crypto Donations and Wants Them Gone Before Things Get Messy

UK politics is about as comfortable a combo as pineapple on a full English breakfast — and one very concerned MP is done pretending otherwise.

Matt Western, chair of the UK's Joint Committee on National Security Strategy, fired off a letter to Steve Reed (Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government) urging the government to slap a "temporary moratorium" on crypto political donations. The pause would be included in the upcoming Representation of the People Bill and would only be lifted once the Electoral Commission issues proper statutory guidance. You know, like adults.

Western's concern? Foreign states could speculated to be eyeing crypto's anonymity as a golden ticket to quietly nudge UK political positions — particularly on spicy topics like Ukraine and US/EU relations. As he put it, the value of influencing UK politics is only going to grow as the security environment worsens. Cheerful stuff!

His wishlist doesn't stop there. Western also wants political parties to only use crypto services registered with the FCA, ban donations involving crypto mixers or unknown sources, and require parties to convert crypto to fiat within 48 hours of receiving it. Fast hands, clean books.

This isn't Western's first rodeo on the issue — back in January, he and a group of fellow committee chairs called for a full ban, but that didn't make it into the bill introduced to the House of Commons on February 12th. The bill's second reading is scheduled for March 2nd, so the debate is far from over.

Meanwhile, Reform UK holds the crown as the first UK political party to accept crypto donations, with leader Nigel Farage making the announcement at the Bitcoin 2025 conference in Las Vegas last May. Very Vegas of him.

Western also floated the idea of a dedicated national police force for political finance — because apparently, responsibilities are currently scattered across the Electoral Commission, the Met, MI5, the NCA, Counter-Terror Policing and local forces. That's not a system, that's a group chat with too many members and no one reading the messages.

Matt Western is urging a temporary moratorium on crypto political donations in the UK, citing fears of foreign interference.

He wants donations via crypto mixers or anonymous sources banned, FCA-registered services only, and crypto converted to fiat within 48 hours.

Reform UK (led by Nigel Farage) was the first UK party to accept crypto, making this debate very much alive and kicking ahead of the bill's March 2nd reading.

Aave Just Made DeFi History by Hitting One Trillion Dollars in Lending Volume

In a moment that would make any DeFi degen shed a single proud tear, Aave has officially crossed $1 trillion in cumulative lending volume — a historic first for the entire decentralized finance industry. Not bad for something that started as a quirky idea called ETHLend back in November 2017.

Aave Labs CEO Stani Kulechov took to X to mark the occasion, declaring Aave the "backbone of onchain lending" and painting a vision of a financial system that is "open, global, and unstoppable." Modest? No. Accurate? The numbers say yes.

And speaking of numbers — $27.2 billion in total value locked, $83.3 million in fees over the last 30 days, and nearly four times the fee generation of its closest competitor, Morpho. Aave isn't just winning the DeFi lending race; it's lapping the field.

The protocol's ambitions stretch well beyond crypto native users. Aave Horizon, launched in August, opened an institutional lending market on Ethereum specifically for traditional finance players. VanEck, WisdomTree, and Securitize were among the first to show up to the party — suits and all.

Kulechov has also been thinking very big picture. In February, he suggested DeFi lending could tap into "abundance assets" like solar energy, battery storage, and robotics — sectors he believes could be worth a combined $50 trillion by 2050. That's not a roadmap, that's a manifesto.

Of course, no DeFi success story is complete without a little internal chaos. Aave tokenholders are currently being asked to approve a package worth up to $42.5 million in stablecoins and 75,000 AAVE for Aave Labs. In exchange, Aave Labs would route all revenue from Aave-branded products back to the Aave DAO treasury. Some community members are thrilled. Others, not so much. Classic DAO energy.

Aave has surpassed $1 trillion in cumulative lending volume — a DeFi industry first — with $27.2B TVL and $83.3M in fees over the last 30 days.

The protocol is actively courting banks and fintechs through Aave Horizon, its institutional lending market, with VanEck, WisdomTree & Securitize already on board.

A $42.5M funding proposal for Aave Labs is causing community division, as tokenholders debate how revenue and control should be split between the Labs team and the DAO.

Vitalik Wants Ethereum to Be Faster Simpler and Ready for the Quantum Age

Ethereum is getting a serious makeover — and Vitalik Buterin just dropped the extended director's cut commentary on exactly how it's going to happen.

The Ethereum Foundation's Protocol team released a visual roadmap called "Strawmap", and Buterin followed up on Thursday with deeper context on what it all means. The short version? Ethereum is about to get faster, simpler, and ready to survive quantum computers — all over the next four years, with seven planned forks roughly every six months. First up are Glamsterdam and Hegotá, both confirmed for later this year.

Let's talk speed first. Ethereum's current slot time — the time it takes to produce a new block — sits at a leisurely 12 seconds. The roadmap targets getting that down to as fast as 2 seconds, moving through incremental steps of 8, 6, and 4 seconds along the way. Buterin suggested improvements to how Ethereum nodes communicate with each other could make shorter slots viable with "no security tradeoffs." Music to every impatient degen's ears.

Then there's finality — the point at which a transaction is mathematically locked in forever. Right now that takes around 16 minutes. The goal is to squeeze that down to somewhere between 6 and 16 seconds. Yes, seconds. The plan involves replacing the current confirmation system with something cleaner and, crucially, quantum-resistant.

Buterin described this as a "very invasive set of changes" — which is developer-speak for "this is going to be a lot of work, please be patient." The approach bundles major changes with a switch to post-quantum hash-based signatures, meaning Ethereum's slots could become quantum-resistant before finality is fully upgraded.

In plain English? Even if quantum computers suddenly showed up tomorrow and caused chaos, the chain would keep running — you'd just temporarily lose the finality guarantee. Not ideal, but far better than a full collapse.

Ethereum's "Strawmap" roadmap targets reducing block time from 12 seconds to 2 seconds and finality from ~16 minutes to 6-16 seconds over the next four years.

The upgrade path includes a switch to quantum-resistant, post-quantum hash-based signatures, with slots becoming quantum-safe before finality.

Seven forks are planned every ~6 months, with Glamsterdam and Hegotá already confirmed for later this year.

Stripe Just Told the Blockchain World It Needs to Scale Up or Get Left Behind

Stripe co-founders Patrick and John Collison just handed the entire blockchain industry a to-do list the size of a skyscraper. In their annual letter posted to X, the duo made one thing very clear: if AI agents are going to run the internet's economy, blockchains are going to need a serious glow-up.

Their prediction? Blockchains may need to support anywhere from one million to one billion transactions per second (TPS) to handle the volume of activity AI agents will generate. For context, the current top two blockchains by speed — Internet Computer Protocol and Solana — are processing roughly 1,196 and 1,140 TPS respectively. Their theoretical maximums sit at just 209,708 TPS and 65,000 TPS. So yeah, the gap between "where we are" and "where we need to be" is, to put it scientifically, enormous.

The Collisons weren't just talking theory either. They pointed to a real incident where a memecoin trading frenzy on a major blockchain delayed payouts for a Bridge user by over 12 hours and spiked per-transaction prices by 35x. If that's happening now, imagine the chaos when AI agents are firing off millions of micro-transactions every second.

On the AI side, the Stripe execs outlined five levels of AI agent capability — ranging from completing web forms and descriptive search at the lower end, all the way up to persistence, delegation, and anticipation at the top. Currently, AI agents are believed to be "hovering on the edge" of levels one and two. The fun levels — where your AI agent does your grocery shopping and books your dentist appointment unprompted — are still ahead of us.

The duo stressed that the future of agentic commerce depends on universal interoperability, warning against AI agents being trapped in closed ecosystems. In their words, the goal is agents "zooming down wide-open protocol highways" rather than being "cooped up in walled gardens." Poetic. Slightly chaotic. Very Stripe.

Stripe's co-founders predict blockchains will need to support up to 1 billion TPS as AI agents become the primary drivers of internet transactions — current top chains max out at a fraction of that.

A real-world memecoin frenzy already caused 12-hour payment delays and 35x fee spikes, highlighting just how fragile current infrastructure is under pressure.

AI agents are currently believed to be at levels 1-2 of 5 in capability, with delegation and anticipation (think: autonomous shopping and scheduling) still on the horizon.

And that's a wrap, my wonderful PoI readers! I hope today's edition left you feeling informed, entertained, and maybe just a little bit smarter about the wild world of tech and Web3. Whether you're worried about foreign crypto interference, cheering on Aave's trillion dollar moment, nerding out over Ethereum upgrades, or contemplating what 1 billion TPS even looks like — just know that Mochi's got you covered, every single day.

Stay curious, stay sharp, and keep questioning everything. Until next time, this is Mochi signing off with a virtual fist bump!

P.S. Don't forget to share your thoughts, questions, and favorite crypto puns with us. very voice matters in the PoI community! 📣❤️ Share the newsletter

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