Tempo, a Layer 1 blockchain optimized for payments and incubated by Stripe and Paradigm, officially launched its public testnet on December 9, 2025.
This marks a pivotal step toward its mainnet rollout planned for 2026, enabling developers, businesses, and users to test high-throughput, low-cost stablecoin transactions in a real-world environment.
The network addresses key pain points in existing blockchains, such as network congestion and volatile fees, by offering instant deterministic settlement, predictably low costs, and native stablecoin support.
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Dedicated payment lanes: Reserved blockspace for payments to ensure consistent performance. Stablecoin-native gas: Fees payable in USD-pegged tokens, avoiding volatility from native tokens. Integrated DEX for stable assets: Optimized for tokenized deposits and swaps.
Fast finality and metadata: Instant transaction confirmation with rich payment details. Modern wallet tools: Support for passkey authentication, batch transactions, and scheduled payments.
Tempo has secured partnerships with major players like OpenAI, Shopify, Visa, Deutsche Bank, Mastercard, UBS, Anthropic, and Klarna—the latter of which launched its USD-pegged stablecoin (KlarnaUSD) on the network last month to enable cheaper cross-border payments for its 114 million users.
The project raised $500 million in a Series A round in October 2025 at a $5 billion valuation, led by Thrive Capital and Greenoaks, with participation from Sequoia, Ribbit Capital, and SV Angel. Currently, validators are team-operated, but the network plans to onboard independent ones from partners ahead of full permissionless operation.
This launch positions Tempo in a competitive payments blockchain landscape alongside networks like Solana, Tron, and Circle’s Arc which also focuses on stablecoins and has backing from Visa and BlackRock. Analysts see it as a potential disruptor for high-throughput payment rails, though liquidity and user adoption will be key challenges.
Bitwise’s 10 Crypto Index Fund (BITW) Begins Trading on NYSE Arca
Bitwise Asset Management’s flagship Bitwise 10 Crypto Index Fund (ticker: BITW) received U.S. SEC approval and began trading as an exchange-traded product (ETP) on NYSE Arca, transitioning from its prior over-the-counter (OTC) status as a closed-end trust.
With $1.25 billion in assets under management (AUM) and an eight-year track record since its 2017 inception, BITW becomes the second U.S.-listed crypto index ETP following Grayscale’s multi-asset product, offering diversified, market-cap-weighted exposure to the top 10 cryptocurrencies via a single ticker accessible through traditional brokerage accounts.
The fund tracks the Bitwise 10 Large Cap Crypto Index, which includes only the largest and most fundamentally sound digital assets, rebalanced monthly. Unlike pure market-cap indexes, BITW excludes assets failing qualitative screens (e.g., it avoided Terra’s LUNA in 2022 despite its top-10 ranking due to stability concerns).
This approach lets investors bet on crypto’s growth without picking individual winners, with BTC and ETH as the only consistent holdings since inception. The ETP structure improves liquidity and NAV tracking via in-kind redemptions, though shares trade at market prices and are subject to management fees that gradually reduce crypto holdings over time.
BITW is not registered under the Investment Company Act of 1940, so it lacks some traditional fund protections. Bitwise CEO Hunter Horsley called it a “watershed moment” for crypto, while CIO Matt Hougan emphasized its role in simplifying exposure to “the largest, most successful assets.”
This uplisting follows Bitwise’s successful spot Bitcoin ETF (BITB), which hit $1 billion AUM in under two months in 2024, and aligns with broader institutional crypto adoption amid a maturing market. These developments underscore accelerating mainstream integration of blockchain tech and crypto investments, with Tempo targeting payment infrastructure and BITW broadening accessible diversified exposure.
Beeple’s “Regular Animals” Takes Over Art Basel Miami Beach
Beeple’s latest installation, Regular Animals (2025), has exploded into the cultural zeitgeist during Art Basel Miami Beach (December 3–7, 2025), blending satire, robotics, AI, and NFTs in a way that’s equal parts absurd and incisive.
The exhibit, housed in the fair’s new Zero10 digital art section, features a pack of Boston Dynamics-inspired robot dogs outfitted with hyper-realistic silicone heads modeled after tech titans like Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jeff Bezos, alongside art icons such as Pablo Picasso, Andy Warhol, and Beeple himself (Mike Winkelmann).
These mechanical “animals” roam a pen-like enclosure, snapping photos of visitors with onboard cameras, processing the images via AI to reinterpret them in the style of their head’s persona, a Picasso-filtered crowd shot from the Picasso-bot, and then “pooping” out the results as physical prints—complete with QR codes for claiming linked NFTs.
It’s a literal manifestation of how algorithms “digest” and regurgitate our reality, critiquing the unchecked influence of Big Tech on perception and culture. Beeple described it to The Art Newspaper as a warning: “We are not ready for the future.”
The Viral Mainstream Media Storm
What started as a VIP preview buzz on December 3 quickly snowballed into a full-blown media frenzy. By the fair’s public opening, crowds were nonstop, with visitors filming the dogs’ antics—roaming, lounging, and “defecating” art—leading to viral videos that racked up millions of views across platforms.
Mainstream outlets piled on, framing it as a cyberpunk fever dream that captures 2025’s AI anxieties: Fox Business highlighted the “poop photos” of billionaire heads, noting the installation’s sold-out status and tying it to Beeple’s NFT legacy.
CNN ran an exclusive interview with Beeple, emphasizing the exhibit’s dystopian edge and how the dogs’ three-year photo-logging lifespan stored on blockchain adds a finite, almost poignant obsolescence.
The Art Newspaper and ARTnews called it a “stir” and “satire-dystopia-slapstick hybrid,” drawing huge lines and positioning Beeple as the fair’s pulse amid broader fears of automation.
Decrypt dubbed it “mega-viral,” with social clips exploding and coverage from tech, art, and culture pubs making it Basel’s top draw— “Few works have sparked wonder like Regular Animals.”
PetaPixel and USA Today focused on the bizarre mechanics: dogs ranking “interesting” shots and AI-stylizing them before output, with over 1,000 prints distributed many as free souvenirs.
Even international wires like AFP captured the flock of visitors gawking at the Musk-Zuck-Bezos bots, amplifying the global reach. Beeple fans and crypto communities hailed it as a “brilliant concept” blending physical and digital, with 176 free pieces now trading at ~$39k equivalent.
This isn’t Beeple’s first rodeo with disruption—his 2021 Everydays: The First 5000 Days NFT sold for $69.3M at Christie’s, igniting the boom—but Regular Animals feels like a post-crash evolution. The robots themselves? Editioned at $100k each and sold out in the first hour, per Art Basel reps.
The NFT Collection
256 Supply at 10.9 ETH FloorTying the physical spectacle to the blockchain, Regular Animals minted a limited-edition NFT series: 256 generative tokens, each redeemable via those QR-coded prints not all prints qualify—it’s a “lucky finder” mechanic.
These NFTs capture the dogs’ “memories”—blockchain-logged photo archives and AI outputs—turning audience interactions into ownable, evolving art. Post-fair, the secondary market ignited: Floor price: 10.9 ETH ~$34,300 at current ETH pricing around $3,150, settling after an opening-weekend surge.
One claimed NFT flipped for 10 ETH ($30,300) within hours, per X chatter and reports. Volume is still ramping, but the collection’s already outpacing many blue-chips in hype, with 80 more drops teased.
This floor reflects renewed NFT vigor—sales volumes up 78% YTD per some analytics, driven by accessible entry points—while nodding to Beeple’s enduring pull. It’s not just collectibles; they’re dynamic proofs of the exhibit’s chaos, where viewers unwittingly co-create.
In a year of AI ethics debates and tech overlord scrutiny, Regular Animals lands like a gut-punch punchline: Algorithms as pets that shit culture back at us, owned by the same moguls who code them. Beeple told Art Plugged it’s about power imbalances—”Zuck and Musk tweak reality without a vote.”
Proof that digital-physical hybrids can bridge galleries and memes, potentially reigniting 2021’s mania without the hangover. As one X post put it: “Beeple won Art Basel.” If you’re hunting those NFTs, check OpenSea or Foundation—floors can shift fast.