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A Bitcoin ATM in Hong Kong.
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Some crypto holders in China and Hong Kong are scrambling to find a way to safeguard their bitcoin and other tokens after China’s central bank published a new document Friday spelling out tougher measures in its wider crypto crackdown, including souped-up systems to monitor crypto-related transactions.

Bitcoin was down as much as 6% and ether sunk as much as 10%, amid a wider sell-off early Friday, as investors digested the news.

“Since the announcement less than two hours ago, I have already received over a dozen messages – email, phone and encrypted app – from Chinese crypto holders looking for solutions on how to access and protect their crypto holdings in foreign exchanges and cold wallets,” David Lesperance, a Toronto-based attorney who specializes in relocating wealthy crypto holders to other countries to save on taxes, told CNBC early Friday.

Lesperance said the move is an attempt to freeze crypto assets so that holders can’t legally do anything with them. “Along with not being able to do anything with an extremely volatile asset, my suspicion is that like with Roosevelt and gold, the Chinese government will ‘offer’ them in the future to convert it to e-yuan at a fixed market price,” he said of President Franklin Roosevelt’s policy around the private ownership of gold, which was later repealed.

“I have been predicting this for a while as part of the Chinese government’s moves to close out all potential competition to the incoming digital yuan,” said Lesperance.

The People’s Bank of China said on its website Friday that all cryptocurrency-related transactions in China are illegal, including services provided by offshore exchanges. Services offering trades, order matching, token issuance and derivatives for virtual currencies are all strictly prohibited, according to the PBOC.

The directive will take aim at over-the-counter platforms like OKEx, which allows users in China to exchange fiat currencies for crypto tokens. An OKEx spokesperson told CNBC the company is looking into the news and will let CNBC know once it has decided on the next steps.

Lesperance claims some of his clients are also worried about their safety.

“They are concerned about themselves personally, as they suspect that the Chinese government is well aware of their prior crypto activities, and they do not want to become the next Jack Ma, like ‘common prosperity’ target,” said Lesperance, who has helped clients to expatriate in order to avoid taxes, amid a rising crypto crackdown in the U.S.

That said, it’s common for the authoritarian state to lash out against digital currencies.

In 2013, the country ordered third-party payment providers to stop using bitcoin. Chinese authorities put a stop to token sales in 2017 and pledged to continue to target crypto exchanges in 2019. And earlier this year, China’s takedown of its crypto mining industry led to half the global bitcoin network going dark for a few months.

“Today’s notice isn’t exactly new, and it isn’t a change in policy,” said Boaz Sobrado, a London-based fintech data analyst.

But this time, the crypto announcement involves 10 agencies, including key departments such as the Supreme People’s Court, the Supreme People’s Procuratorate, and the Ministry of Public Security, in a show of greater unity among the country’s top brass. The State Administration of Foreign Exchange also participated, which could be a sign that enforcement in this space might increase.

Signs of coordination

There are other signs of early government coordination in China. The PBOC document was first announced Sept. 15, and a document banning all crypto mining by China’s National Development and Reform Commission was released Sept. 3. Both were published on official government platforms on Friday, suggesting a collaboration between all participating agencies.

And unlike past government statements that refer to cryptos under the same umbrella language, this document specifically calls out bitcoin, ethereum and tether, as stablecoins begin to enter the lexicon of regulators in China.

Bespoke Growth Partners CEO Mark Peikin thinks that this is the start of widespread, near-term pressure on the price of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies and that “the risks facing Chinese investors will have a significant spillover effect, leading to an immediate risk-off trade in the U.S. crypto market.”

“Chinese investors, many of whom continued to turn a cold shoulder to the Chinese government’s latest and largest crackdown on cryptocurrency trading the last several months, may no longer remain bellicose,” Peikin told CNBC.

“Chinese investors thus far largely skirted the ban by decoupling transactions – using domestic OTC platforms or increasingly of late, offshore outlets, to reach agreement on trade price, and then using banks or fintech platforms to transfer yuan in settlement,” Peikin said.

But given the PBOC has improved its capabilities to monitor crypto transactions – and the recent order that fintech companies, including the Ant Group, not provide crypto-related services – Peikin said this workaround used by Chinese investors will become a progressively narrow tunnel.

Friday’s statement from the PBOC adds to other news out of China this week, which has roiled crypto markets. A liquidity crisis at property developer Evergrande raised concerns over a growing property bubble in China. That fear rippled across the global economy, sending the price of many cryptocurrencies into the red.

However, not all are convinced this downward pressure on the crypto market will last.

Sobrado thinks the market is overreacting to Friday’s announcement from the PBOC, given that a lot of the exchange volume in China is decentralized and conducted peer-to-peer – increasingly the most telling metric of crypto adoption. While exchanging tokens P2P doesn’t evade regulatory scrutiny, Sobrado said those crypto exchanges are harder to track down.

Lesperance also points out that Friday’s news might actually strengthen the business case for cryptos as an asset class, given they are a hedge against sovereign risk.

Ultimately, the biggest question is whether this latest directive from Beijing has teeth. “The running joke in crypto is that China has banned crypto hundreds of times,” Sobrado said. “I’d be willing to wager people will be trading bitcoin in China a year from now.”

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Close to half of Kalshi user base experienced glitches, delays during Saturday college football games

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Close to half of Kalshi user base experienced glitches, delays during Saturday college football games

The Kalshi logo arranged on a laptop in New York, US, on Monday, Feb. 10, 2025.

Gabby Jones | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Close to half of Kalshi’s user base experienced glitches and delays on Saturday during college football games, a major source of trades, as some said they were temporarily unable to process orders.

In a message sent to a user obtained by CNBC, the predictions market service’s website apologized for any inconvenience and said it was “looking into” the issues traders were experiencing. 

“The Exchange is experiencing temporary delays,” the message read. “Balances and positions may not be accurately reflected at this time.” 

One user shared a screen recording and screenshots with CNBC that showed they were unable to see their balance or bets while the issues persisted.

A number of users on X reported the website was down when they were trying to place bets on college football games, with some saying they had open orders that wouldn’t process. When CNBC visited the website, it wouldn’t load, showing only a green K with a spinning circle around it for more than 20 minutes. The platform later loaded.

“Earlier today, Kalshi experienced minor glitches that temporarily affected some user experiences. No exchange outage occurred, no funds were affected, and the issues are now resolved,” the company said in a statement.

Earlier, a spokesperson denied there was an outage and said the exchange “never stopped functioning properly.” He added that there has been no impact on clearing, advanced trading, or institutional trading.

“There were some glitches and delays on our web and app product, which affected less than half of our user base,” the spokesperson said. 

A little over a week ago, Kalshi announced a $300 million Series D funding round that valued the company at $5 billion, more than double its $2 billion valuation in June after its Series C round. 

The round was co-led by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Sequoia Capital, with participation from Paradigm. Additional backers included Coinbase Ventures, General Catalyst, Spark Capital and CapitalG. 

The company, founded in 2018, rose to prominence by offering bettors the ability to trade on a wide range of real-world events, from football games to who President Donald Trump could pardon this year.

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AI headshots are changing the way job seekers are seen and get hired in tough labor market

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AI headshots are changing the way job seekers are seen and get hired in tough labor market

AI headshots are becoming popular on LinkedIn and in professional portfolios as job seekers look for affordable profile pictures to give them an edge.

Since first impressions happen almost entirely through a screen, a clean, appealing photo is as important as a strong resume. And in a competitive job market, a good headshot can make a big difference. But professional photography has long been a financial barrier for many job applicants with an average starting cost for a professional headshot in the U.S. that can easily run up to hundreds of dollars.

Now job seekers are using fast and inexpensive AI tools to replace costly studio sessions.

“When I was at Yale, it was $200 for a 15-minute session for students,” said Melanie Fan, head of growth at Plush, an AI-powered online search platform for personalized shopping. “It was really expensive. The process of getting the pictures back, rendering them, looking at which ones I looked the best in, and then sending it back to the photographer for edit.”

This frustration has fueled the explosion of AI headshot tools like InstaHeadshots, PhotoPacksAI, HeadshotPro and Aragon AI, services that promise a professional image in minutes starting at under $50. Users simply upload selfies, pick a background, and receive dozens and no photographer is needed.

“After I changed my LinkedIn photo, the amount of inbound I’ve been getting from companies has skyrocketed,” Fan said. “Three to four times more messages from companies.”

Design company Canva recently launched its own AI headshot feature, with the goal of offering users a quick way to create realistic headshots and still be able to retouch or restyle them.

According to a recent Canva job market research report, 88% of job seekers believe a polished digital presence influences hiring decisions, which is up 45% from the year before. This is in line with the general uptick in use of AI as part of the application and hiring process, with 90% of hiring managers saying they have used AI to help with the hiring process, and 96% of job seekers who used AI in the application process saying they received callbacks.

Danny Wu, Canva’s head of AI products, said the goal wasn’t to replace real photography, but to make high quality imagery attainable to everyone no matter the budget or location. Once a user uploads an image, Canva can use AI for adjusting or changing the background, placing something in a different place, and for styling. “This is just a more accessible way to get professional and unique headshots,” Wu said.

Risks and questions about authenticity among HR recruiters

Anyone with a phone can get a LinkedIn-ready headshot, but the technology’s rapid adoption has created new questions about ethics and trust. Many candidates fear looking fake or deceptive and recruiters are on the lookout for AI-generated portraits that look overly smooth or stylized, saying authenticity matters the most.

“It is perceived as risky to use an AI headshot,” said Sam DeMase, ZipRecruiter career expert. “While recruiters accept them, a bad AI-generated headshot will put off most recruiters,” DeMase said. “A poorly done AI-generated headshot is easily recognized, reads as inauthentic, and can hurt the candidate’s chances of being selected.”

However, recruiters are struggling to tell if a headshot is AI produced, and the technology will only get better. “It’s becoming more and more difficult to tell whether a headshot has been enhanced or generated by AI,” DeMase added.

Chris Bora, founder and principal AI architect of Bora Labs and a former Meta engineer, said he built his own headshot generator, Nova Headshot, after being disappointed by existing options. “Some made me look taller and skinnier,” Bora said. “The other ones, they made me look lighter, so it wasn’t really me,” he said. “You don’t need to spend thousands to look professional anymore. You just need a tool that makes you look like yourself on your best day. With Nova, it takes less than ten minutes,” Bora said.

Amber Collins, an AI headshot user, said she still feels uneasy about it, especially since not every app gets it right. “There are a lot of bad apps out there,” Collins said. “Seven fingers, half a necklace, and the rest of it is gone from your neck. I feel guilty using AI. There’s a stigma. I’d 100% prefer to get actual get headshots done,” Collins said.

But ultimately, she says, the benefits outweighed the risks. “In this economy, you have to be mindful of where you’re going to put your money. I don’t need to have my face out there excessively, but having a couple of really good, solid, professional looking headshots is worth it to me,” Collins said.

Wu said the goal for job applicants seeking a headshot should be to use Canva’s tool to balance realism and creativity without losing their identity.

The tension between tech innovation and accessibility on the one hand, and authenticity on the other, will remain.

A LinkedIn spokesperson told CNBC what while the platform does allow the use of tools, including AI, to enhance or create profile photos, “the photo must reflect your likeness.”

“Profile photos that don’t comply with our user agreement or professional community policies may be removed,” the LinkedIn spokesperson said.

DeMase noted that many job candidates remain hesitant to use an AI headshot. “A headshot is one of the few places you can inject humanity into the job search,” he said.

But with job seekers now able to provide the appearance they had access to the same studio lighting, camera, and editing team as the pros, the trend is unlikely to stop.

A recent survey found that headshot use among job seekers is the highest within the Gen Z and millennial generations. And while recruiters may say they still prefer real photos, AI headshots are becoming harder to spot, and less likely to even be reviewed by humans in the first stages of the application process. A recent study from the HR trade group SHRM found that 66% of human resource professionals are using AI to generate their job descriptions, and 44% are using the technology to review or screen applicant resumes.

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Proxy advisor ISS recommends Tesla shareholders oppose Elon Musk $1 trillion pay plan

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Proxy advisor ISS recommends Tesla shareholders oppose Elon Musk  trillion pay plan

Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX and Tesla, attends the Viva Technology conference at the Porte de Versailles exhibition center in Paris on June 16, 2023.

Gonzalo Fuentes | Reuters

Top proxy advisor Institutional Shareholder Services is recommending that Tesla investors vote against a pay plan for CEO Elon Musk that would grant him nearly $1 trillion more in stock.

The “mega performance equity award” to Musk, designed to retain the CEO long-term, “has an astronomical grant value conditioned upon far-reaching performance targets that, if achieved, would create enormous value for shareholders,” ISS wrote on Friday.

Tesla’s 2025 annual shareholder meeting and proxy vote is scheduled for Nov. 5. The company is scheduled to report third-quarter results on Wednesday.

ISS said that while some shareholders may support the pay plan, “there are unmitigated concerns surrounding the special award’s magnitude and design.”

Musk’s plan, if approved, would be the largest ever awarded to a public company CEO. It could could net Musk up to an additional 12% stake in Tesla, should the company hit a market cap of $8.5 trillion and achieve other goals.

Tesla disagreed with the ISS recommendations.

In a post on X, which is owned by Musk, the automaker accused ISS of missing “fundamental points of investing and governance,” and complained that the advisors had previously “recommended against compensation that shareholders have voted on twice before (and that Elon has already earned), as well as the 2025 CEO Performance Award (where Elon receives nothing unless shareholders win big).”

The company urged shareholders to vote with the board’s recommendations on all proposals on the 2025 proxy.

ISS previously advised investors to reject a “ratification” of Musk’s 2018 CEO pay package, which was worth an estimated $56 billion at the time.

The Delaware Court of Chancery ruled early last year that the 2018 pay plan had been improperly granted by the Tesla board and must be rescinded. The ruling said Tesla hid crucial details from shareholders that they were entitled to before voting, and that Musk had controlled the board.

Musk has appealed that court’s decision to the Delaware State Supreme Court, with opening arguments in the appeal heard by a panel of judges this week.

Representatives for ISS declined to comment beyond the report.

ISS, along with Glass Lewis and smaller peers, can influence how shareholders decide to cast their votes at annual elections. Musk accused ISS and Glass Lewis in 2023 of effectively controlling the stock market because of their influence with passive or index funds in some matters. He also baselessly compared ISS to a terrorist organization.

Musk will be able to vote his own shares in the vote concerning his future pay. He holds at least 13.5% of Tesla’s voting power, according to the most recent available disclosures on his stake. Those holdings alone could be enough to secure approval for the nearly $1 trillion pay package.

In September, Musk added to his ownership of Tesla stock buying another $1 billion worth of shares.

Among other ISS recommendations, the firm also suggested that shareholders should vote against giving Tesla’s board authorization to invest in xAI, the AI company that Musk started in March 2023 but only disclosed publicly in July that year. Tesla has sold tens of millions of dollars worth of its Megapack battery energy storage systems to xAI.

ISS also recommended against voting to reinstate Tesla board member Ira Ehrenpreis, a longstanding and close friend of Musk.

In May, Tesla changed its corporate bylaws to limit shareholders’ ability to sue for a breach of fiduciary duties so that only a shareholder that owns at least 3% of the company’s stock can bring what’s called a “derivative” action. Ehrenpreis presided over Tesla’s governance committee at the time that change was made without a shareholder vote.

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