Welcome to the Hedera Overview, providing a suite of updates for Hedera enthusiasts, users, developers and curious-minded web3 users about all that’s happening in the ecosystem.
In this edition, we cover Hedera's formal draft spec for CLPR, its bridgeless cross-ledger protocol; Hedera Council's newest partners, WISeKey and SpaceDev; and Hedera's expanding footprint across payments, developer tooling, and finance.
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The Ecosystem Insights
HBAR token price: $0.076 (+14.8%)
Market cap: $3.31B (+14.93%)
Total value locked (TVL): $29.3M (+36.1%)
Transactions per second: 5.09 (+27.57%)
The percentages and metrics are calculated from its change over a 14-day time frame, unless noted otherwise.
Hedera Highlights
#️⃣ What's happening: Hedera has published HIP-1535, the formal draft specification for CLPR ("Clipper"), a Cross Ledger Protocol that lets a Hiero network pass messages to another blockchain using pluggable, ledger-specific verifier contracts and cryptographic state proofs.
CLPR accomplishes this without any intermediaries: validator sets, custodians, or wrapped-asset bridges, which all represent individual vulnerabilities. Historically, intermediaries have been the weak link in cross-chain transfers, but CLPR aims to instill as much trust in its Cross Ledger Protocol as users would have in the ledgers at either side of the transaction.
With Hiero’s underlying ABFT consensus, users can transact instantly across chains, with mathematically final consensus timestamps. This is a major advancement from previous interledger mechanisms that cannot guarantee trust for cross-ledger transactions.
The draft still has open questions to resolve, including bond sizing and wire-format encoding, before it can move toward production.
#️⃣ Why it matters: CLPR was first unveiled at HederaCon in May as Hashgraph's answer to liquidity fragmentation, where assets and data cannot move freely between chains. The specification defines how CLPR will operate so the Hiero community can analyze it and suggest improvements.
Interoperability, as opposed to traditional validator-based bridges, is a massive stepping stone for the future of the industry. CLPR is positioned to promote trust and incentivize adoption among institutions that are wary of previously exploited tech.
#️⃣The bigger picture: Bridge hacks have resulted in total losses of more than $2.8 billion since 2022, roughly 40% of all capital stolen in web3.
Initially, Hedera will use CLPR to connect its private HashSphere enterprise networks to the public Hedera network. This would let investors move capital between private and public markets without having to route it through a custodian or centralized exchange.
If HIP-1535 clears review, it will become a key pillar in Hedera’s enterprise offering and add another layer that differentiates it from other chains seeking to attract institutional users.
A chart worth checking out
Monthly active addresses on Hedera surged in August, climbing 15% to 33,644. The growth reversed a three-month-long contraction, bringing the number of active addresses on the network to the highest point since May.
Source: Token Terminal
Unpacking the hash
Hedera Council added Swiss cybersecurity firm WISeKey as a Strategic Partner, and Uruguay-based SpaceDev as a Community Partner.
WISeKey, a global expert in cybersecurity, digital identity and IoT solutions became Hedera’s fourth strategic partner. Through the partnership, WISeKey and Hedera aim to lay foundations for machines to authenticate, exchange value and transact autonomously at global scale
SpaceDev’s new role as Community Partner expands Hedera’s community in Latin America, leveraging SpaceDev’s expertise in digital product delivery.
Canary’s HBAR ETF had a strong showing in August, posting total inflow of $2.6 million over the past 30 days, up 157.3% from $1 million 30 days earlier. August 25 was the ETF’s best day since early July, recording $863,976 in inflows.
Ecosystem players
Hedera announced the winners of its x402 bounty, in which developers competed by building agentic payments solutions using the agentic protocol on Hedera for a chance to win one of five $1,000 prizes.
Winning projects ranged from metered compute rental and a gas-free "spend-cap" agent payment scheme, to an idle-AI-subscription marketplace, a multi-party supply-chain settlement tool, and a pay-by-the-minute VPN.
Hedera partnered with ETHGlobal to offer $15,000 in prizes during ETHGlobal’s upcoming online hackathon.
Hedera was named as a finalist in the 2026 US Fintech Awards in the Web3 and Digital Assets categories.
Hedera released update v0.76.1 on testnet. The upgrade focuses on bug fixes and improving node communication. A mainnet release date has yet to be set.
Until next time!
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This information is for entertainment purposes only. It should not be considered financial advice, nor should it be used to make investment decisions. Cryptocurrencies are high risk and you should consult a financial professional before making any financial decisions. Make sure you do your own research.