ZK News is now The Weekly Ethereum Bulletin! Vol. 1: Kickoff Edition

As mentioned in our recent ZK News Annual Recap, our weekly update of ZK and Ethereum news (formerly known as ZK News) has officially been rebranded as The Weekly Ethereum Bulletin. It serves as a weekly roundup of activity across Ethereum, offering a broader and more comprehensive view of the ecosystem while continuing to highlight key advances in zero-knowledge and applied cryptography. Through this format, we aim to deliver consistent, high-signal coverage of the trends, innovations, and research shaping Ethereum as a foundational platform for the future of global finance, helping readers stay aligned with the most relevant developments across the industry.

As a special case, this inaugural report covers the first two weeks of the year to capture the most important news from the start of 2026.

Key highlights:

• Aligned publishes its 2025 Recap: from ZK verification to a full-stack for Building on Ethereum
• Ethereum L1 advances toward zkEVM proofs as an alternative to re-execution
• The second Blob-Parameter-Only (BPO) fork went live on Ethereum mainnet
• Polygon moves toward becoming a U.S.-regulated payments platform
• Taiko introduces TaikoProofs
• Optimism proposes OP Buyback
• Truebit suffers $26M exploit
• Aave Founder, Stani Kulechov, outlines a long-term vision to take aave beyond DeFi

Aligned publishes its 2025 Recap: from ZK verification to a full-stack for Building on Ethereum

In 2025, Aligned evolved from a focused ZK proof verification layer into a vertically integrated, full-stack platform designed to support builders across the Ethereum ecosystem. The project expanded its roadmap to include proof aggregation, ZK-rollup-as-a-service, wallets, and interoperability, while securing billions in restaked ETH and raising an additional $4.6M through community rounds. Aligned strengthened its open-source commitment, launched real-world demos like ZK Arcade, partnered with projects such as Sovra and Loom Finance, and advanced research in zkVMs and post-quantum security, setting the stage for partner L2 launches in 2026.

Ethereum L1 advances toward zkEVM proofs as an alternative to re-execution

A new technical document details the milestones and sub-projects required for Ethereum L1 to support zkEVM proofs in the attestation workflow. The effort spans execution witnesses, stateless zkEVM guest programs, zkVM standardization, consensus layer integration, prover infrastructure, benchmarking, and security.

The second Blob-Parameter-Only (BPO) fork went live on Ethereum mainnet

This fork is now live as part of Ethereum’s Fusaka upgrade cycle. Instead of waiting for a major annual upgrade, BPO forks adjust specific parameters independently and efficiently. BPO #2 increased blob capacity to scale data availability, raising target blobs from 10 to 14 and max blobs from 15 to 21. These parameter adjustments support more data availability for Layer 2 networks, reduce data costs for rollups, and help keep L2 transaction fees low as network activity grows.

Polygon moves toward becoming a U.S.-regulated payments platform

Polygon announced plans to become a U.S.-regulated onchain payments platform through the acquisition of Coinme and Sequence. Coinme adds licensed fiat on/off ramps across 48 U.S. states and access to 50,000+ retail locations, while Sequence brings embedded wallets and one-click cross-chain payments.

Taiko introduces TaikoProofs

Taiko launched TaikoProofs, a public dashboard offering real-time visibility into zero-knowledge proving across the network. As a based rollup, Taiko relies on ZK proofs for trust-minimized block verification while remaining aligned with Ethereum. The dashboard tracks ZK coverage across batches and proof latency, giving the community direct insight into proving progress and the path toward enforcing 100% ZK coverage at the protocol level.

Optimism proposes OP Buyback

The Optimism Foundation proposed using 50% of Superchain revenue to buy back OP tokens, linking token value to ecosystem growth. Governance will decide whether to burn or redistribute tokens. The plan also grants treasury management powers and goes to a vote on January 22, with a possible February launch.

Truebit suffers $26M exploit

Truebit Protocol suffered a smart contract exploit resulting in the loss of 8,535 ETH (~$26M). The attacker exploited an integer overflow in the Truebit Protocol Purchase contract (deployed in 2021), minting excess TRU tokens and redeeming them for ETH. Following the incident, TRU fell over 99%. Truebit advised users not to interact with the affected contract and stated it is working to trace the stolen funds.

Aave Founder, Stani Kulechov, outlines a long-term vision to take Aave beyond DeFi

Aave is at a strategic crossroads: while DeFi will keep growing, focusing only on crypto-native lending limits long-term potential. The founder calls for a shared vision to expand Aave into new markets such as real-world assets and institutional use cases. Aave V4’s modular architecture is key to this shift, enabling innovation without compromising safety. Future growth should come from scaling the protocol, unlocking new lending models, and enabling independent teams to build on Aave while aligning incentives and sharing value with token holders.

How AAVE will win

Hey everyone, I wanted to share some thoughts on the recent developments in the Aave community and where I believe the Aave Protocol stands today. We’re at a crossroads. Aave has grown within DeFi, and that foundation is critical to our success, but I’m concerned about our future growth trajectory. The existing DeFi market will keep growing, and we will continue to serve it and innovate within it. However, there are much bigger opportunities that we need to pursue simultaneously. I’m also conc…

Aavestani

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