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- $100M World Liberty Investor Linked to Banned Web3Port
$100M World Liberty Investor Linked to Banned Web3Port
Alpha Team
July 17, 2025
Aqua 1 Denies Ties to Banned Firm in $100M Deal
Aqua 1's Major Investment: Aqua 1 Foundation, a UAE-based crypto fund, purchased $100 million worth of tokens from World Liberty Financial, which is backed by former President Donald Trump. This follows a previous $75 million investment by Tron founder Justin Sun into the same project. Independent journalist Jacob Silverman has alleged that Aqua 1 is connected to Web3Port, a Hong Kong market-making firm accused of market manipulation, including dumping millions of MOVE tokens from Movement Labs earlier this year, leading to bans from multiple exchanges. Web3Port was also involved in manipulations with GoPlus and Myshell projects.
Allegations of Identity Link: Silverman claims that Aqua 1 co-founder Dave Lee is actually David Jia Hua Li of Web3Port, based on their shared Chinese-Brazilian backgrounds, NYU graduation, and finance experience. Evidence includes David Li being tagged in LinkedIn posts with Peter Li, a manager at China National Petroleum Corporation, whose account was deactivated after Silverman inquired about Aqua 1. Additionally, Aqua 1's website shares the same AWS server as Web3Port's and BlockRock's, a platform associated with Dave Lee. Silverman wrote: "By all available evidence, Aqua 1 Foundation’s Dave Lee is the David Li of Web3Port. How did a 30-year-old Chinese-Brazilian finance professional working for a Chinese state energy company secure $100 million to buy crypto tokens from the President of the United States’ main crypto firm? And what do he and his colleagues expect in return?"
Denials from Aqua 1: In response, Dave Lee posted on X: "Came across some factually incorrect reporting regarding both myself and Aqua1 today. We’re already in touch with the journalist involved to clarify." Aqua 1 Foundation stated: "We operate independently and have no equity, financial, or operational ties to any unrelated entity. While we remain committed to transparency, certain details are subject to ongoing regulatory and compliance procedures and cannot yet be publicly disclosed." Lee added: "I stepped away from my role at my previous employer earlier this year due to fundamental differences in vision and strategy, and took on a founding role at Aqua 1." The Block has reached out to Aqua 1 for further comments. Read More.
️ On today's Top Picks:
- 🚀 Coinbase Wallet rebrands to Base app, "the everything app."
- ⚖️ US DOJ & CFTC end probes into Polymarket.
- 🪂 Eclipse launches $ES airdrop claim.
- 🔥 Trump denies reports of plans to fire Fed Chair Powell.
Read time: ⏰ 6 minutes
Crypto News
• ⭐️ Aqua 1, a crypto fund that recently bought $100M of World Liberty Financial $WLFI, is allegedly associated with Web3Port; Web3Port was previously accused of market manipulation & banned from multiple exchanges.
• Standard Chartered launches spot Bitcoin $BTC & Ethereum $ETH trading service for institutional clients; first "too big to fail" bank to offer BTC & ETH trading.
• Digital Asset Investment Products saw $3.7B of inflows last week; Bitcoin $BTC $2.7B inflows, Ethereum $ETH $990M inflows, Solana $SOL $93M inflows, Ripple $XRP $104M outflows.
• ⭐️ Coinbase $COIN Wallet rebrands to Base app; features trading, chat, social, payments, & mini-apps into one platform; currently in beta.
• ⭐️ US DOJ & CFTC end probes into Polymarket; investigators were reportedly looking into whether Polymarket was accepting wagers from people in the US.
• World Liberty Financial community passes proposal to make $WLFI tradeable; team to unveil launch plan soon.
Alpha
• Plasma launches testnet; includes PlasmaBFT & EVM execution layer; upcoming releases to introduce zero-fee $USDT transfers, custom gas tokens, & native Bitcoin $BTC bridging.
• Lombard posts, "The future of Bitcoin on-chain. Coming 🔜, 17.07.25," on X; to announce or launch something on July 17th.
• Relay launches Relay Vaults; deposit into a vault to earn yield.
• Camp partners with StoryChain to launch The Never Ending Story, a live AI-native storytelling & IP co-creation experience; mint your own on Rarible FUN.
• Anoma launches testnet; designed as an educational experience for users; invite code required to participate.
• Irys extends Genesis Hunt campaign until July 29th; complete quests to earn Irys Genesis NFT whitelist.
• Boundless launches Mainnet Beta; complete onchain & social tasks to get whitelisted for the Boundless token sale plus bonus token rewards.
Airdrops
• Airdrops, Checkers, & Points by Olimpio.
• ⭐️ Eclipse launches $ES airdrop claim; Eclipse users are potentially eligible; claim ends on August 15th.
• Optimism launches SuperStacks $OP claim; claim ends July 2026.
• Binance launches Caldera $ERA HODLer Airdrop; $BNB Simple Earn and/or On-Chain Yield product subscribers between July 1st & July 5th are eligible.
• ZyFAI launches $ZFI rewards for early adopters; active community members, Kaito Yappers, & contributors are potentially eligible.
• ICYMI Weekly Airdrop Recap (July 5) by Earndrop.
Finance News
• US inflation rises to 2.7% in June, higher than expectations of 2.6%, up from 2.4% in May.
• ⭐️ US President Trump denies reports that he is planning to fire Federal Reserve Chair Powell; Trump has been critical of Powell for not lowering interest rates.
• US Director of Federal Housing Finance says a source confirmed Federal Reserve Chair Powell is considering resigning.
• Mara Holdings $MARA leads $20M equity round in Two Prime, an SEC-registered investment advisor and institutional lender.
• Ark Invest $ARKB $ARKW sells ~$8.7M of its spot Bitcoin $BTC ETF; also sells ~$13.3M of Coinbase $COIN shares.
• SharpLink Gaming $SBET buys an additional ~74,656 Ethereum $ETH for ~$213M at ~$2,852 per ETH; now holds ~280,706 ETH worth ~$947M.
• Windtree Therapeutics $WINT to launch a $BNB crypto treasury strategy with $60M investment led by Build & Build Corp; up to $140M in additional subscriptions.
• SRM Entertainment $SRM rebrands to Tron Inc $TRON; to trade as TRON beginning on July 17th; currently holds ~365M TRX worth ~$113M.
Security and Exploits
• BigONE exploited for ~$27M due to supply chain attack; team to cover losses; team working with SlowMist to investigate.
• Arcadia exploited for ~$3.6M; advises users to revoke permissions for its smart contracts; to open bounty that rewards 10% of recovered funds.
• Google releases Chrome security update patching six vulnerabilities; includes one zero-day being actively exploited in the wild.
Token Unlocks
• Arbitrum $ARB / ~$40M / July 16th
• deBridge $DBR / ~$13M / July 17th
• UXLINK $UXLINK / ~$14M / July 17th
• ZKsync $ZK / ~$10M / July 17th
• Solv $SOLV / ~$11M / July 17th
• ApeCoin $APE / ~$10M / July 17th
• Trump $TRUMP / ~$885M / July 18th
Sourced from Tokenomist
Funding
• Dakota raises $12.5M in Series A funding led by CoinFund.
• Function raises $10M in Seed funding led by Galaxy.
• PlaysOut raises an undisclosed amount in Strategic funding led by OKX Ventures.
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| PROTOCOL | ASSETS | APY |
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 StakeDAO (Ethereum) | USDCUSDF | 36.27% |
 Merkl (Ethereum) | KPDUSDC | 35.00% |
 Convex Finance (Ethereum) | USDCUSDF | 33.95% |
 Aerodrome Slipstream (Base) | EURCUSDC | 31.11% |
 Uniswap V3 (Ethereum) | USDTUSDF | 27.90% |
 Kai Finance (Sui) | USDT | 22.24% |
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That’s it for today’s edition! See you soon.
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