SSonic Price

"White House Speech Prompt Operator Earns Over $100,000 Using Insider Information on Prediction Markets" U.S. White House staffer Gabriel Perez, a long-time teleprompter operator for former President Donald Trump, has been suspended without pay for using non-public information to profit on prediction markets. As one of the few individuals with advance access to Trump's prepared speech texts, Perez placed bets on specific words or phrases Trump would mention in speeches over a three-month period, earning over $100,000. His activities were flagged by the prediction platform Kalshi, which froze over $90,000 in his account and reported him to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). While Perez avoided criminal charges, he is required to return his profits and cease such trading. This case marks the third major instance of insider trading on prediction markets involving government or corporate insiders, following earlier cases involving a special forces soldier and a Google engineer. The incident highlights the vulnerability of "mention" markets on prediction platforms, where individuals with advance knowledge or even the speakers themselves can easily manipulate outcomes. In response, platforms like Kalshi are tightening rules, now requiring users to disclose their employers to help prevent similar abuses.

Pantera Capital and S&P Dow Jones Indices have launched the S&P Digital Asset Index, a basket of 18 cryptocurrencies focused on fundamental strength. Notably, Bitcoin and XRP are excluded from the initial confirmed assets, which include Ethereum, BNB, Solana, Hyperliquid, and Tron. This selection highlights a potential market shift, prioritizing Layer-1 networks with proven scalability, utility, and sustainable on-chain revenue—reportedly $3 billion annualized in the past six months—over mere market capitalization. Analysts suggest this "fundamental index for crypto" could guide institutional capital toward assets with real economic activity, possibly leading to a significant divergence in the next market cycle where fundamentals, not just price momentum, drive investment.

Claude has introduced a major new feature called "Record a Skill," available for Pro, Max, and Team users. This function, found in the Claude desktop app's CoWork menu, allows users to create reusable AI skills simply by recording their screen and providing voice narration while performing a task. Claude then automatically analyzes the recording and generates a functional Skill. A hands-on test confirmed the feature works seamlessly. Users start recording via the Skills manager, perform their workflow while verbally explaining the steps and logic, and avoid including sensitive information. After recording, Claude processes the content and creates the Skill, which can be saved and later invoked with a slash command (/). This eliminates the need for manual adjustments or writing complex instruction files. The innovation goes beyond mere efficiency. Previously, creating a Skill required writing a detailed SKILL.md file in Markdown—a significant barrier for non-technical users. "Record a Skill" bypasses this by directly capturing both actions and the implicit reasoning shared in the narration. This lowers the barrier to knowledge transfer and automation, addressing a core challenge in corporate knowledge management: the difficulty of getting experts to write and maintain documentation. However, the feature also highlights a shift in the nature of work. A case study from March 2026 showed a freelancer whose five-year client relationship was effectively replaced by a hand-coded Claude Skill automating their content workflow. With the even lower barrier of screen recording, the ability to distill personal expertise into automatable skills accelerates this trend. The "moat" for work is moving from simply knowing how to do a task to mastering tasks that are difficult or impossible to automate.

S&P Dow Jones Indices and Pantera Capital have launched the S&P Pantera Digital Asset Index, a benchmark that excludes Bitcoin and meme coins like XRP. The index adopts a fundamental screening framework inspired by the S&P 500, requiring constituent tokens to demonstrate positive protocol revenue over multiple quarters, verified by on-chain data, and a clear mechanism for distributing value to token holders. This "financial viability" test is cited as the reason for Bitcoin's exclusion, as it does not generate protocol revenue. The index currently includes 18 assets, with Ethereum (ETH), BNB, Solana (SOL), Tron (TRX), and Hyperliquid (HYPE) as its top five holdings. While initially serving as a benchmark, discussions are underway with asset managers to develop associated ETFs and investment products. Pantera argues the index addresses an institutional product gap, offering a way to evaluate crypto assets based on utility and earnings rather than just market capitalization.

Former CFTC Chairman and Circle President Heath Tarbert has consistently advocated for a long-term vision in public, urging patience from investors as Circle’s stock price has fallen significantly from its peak. However, it has been revealed that since Circle’s IPO, Tarbert has continuously sold his CRCL shares through pre-arranged trading plans, cashing out approximately $30 million, without making any public market purchases. This contrast between his public messaging and personal actions has drawn criticism. Tarbert joined Circle in July 2023 as Chief Legal Officer, leveraging his regulatory experience to help guide the company through its IPO and expansion. Despite promoting stablecoins as long-term infrastructure, he established a 10b5-1 trading plan just before Circle went public, leading to substantial stock sales over the following year. In March 2026, he initiated another plan to sell more shares. His career trajectory highlights a pattern of moving between high-level regulatory roles and influential positions in the financial sector. After resigning as CFTC Chairman in early 2021, he joined Citadel Securities as Chief Legal Officer just 27 days later, during a period of intense regulatory scrutiny for the firm. He later joined Circle, aiding its efforts to navigate regulatory challenges for its public listing. While Tarbert's expertise in policy and compliance is valuable to companies like Circle, his actions—advocating long-term confidence while personally divesting—raise questions about the alignment between his public statements and his private financial decisions, leaving investors who followed his advice to bear the market risks.