Aave just lost $10 billion in TVL. It’s time to try something different

A mess of decentralized finance (DeFi) apps we’re absolutely wiped out by a North Korean attack, draining nearly $300 million from the so-called DeFi ecosystem.

In the fallout, over $10 billion (yes, $10,000,000,000) has been withdrawn from Aave, one of the largest DeFi lending protocols. Why? Because its harder to trust DeFi more than ever.

That’s why we work with our friends over at Lygos Finance, a Bitcoin-based lending app using DLCs. It’s DeFi done right, on the only blockchain that matters.

With Lygos Finance, you always know where your Bitcoin is. Hold your keys, no wrapping, no bridging, no rehypothecation. Get competitive rates as low as 10% APR.

Give them an email and tell them Blockspace sent you!

Click the banner to learn more about Lygos!

Michael Saylor is selling bitcoin?

For four years, Michael Saylor's message was simple: never sell your Bitcoin. He repeated it on Bloomberg, on Squawk Box, on stage in Nashville. He published Rule 20: "You do not sell your $BTC." He told one audience to sell their kidneys before parting with a single sat. As recently as February, he told CNBC he expected Strategy "to be buying every quarter forever."

On Tuesday's Q1 2026 earnings call, that doctrine cracked.

"We will probably sell some Bitcoin to fund a dividend, just to inoculate the market, just to send the message that we did it,” Saylor said during the call.

If you read the headlines you would think Saylor is capitulating. Listen to the full call and it’s clear Saylor is saying something different.

Here’s what Saylor actually means.

What Saylor actually said about selling bitcoin

Saylor had a pretty clear message to short sellers during Tuesday’s Q1 Earnings Call: "If you are a short seller and your thesis is the company's got to sell equity in order to fund the dividends, I would like nothing better than to rip your wings off."

Saylor is taking a deliberate shot at a specific bear thesis that Strategy will be forced into dilutive equity issuance to service its preferred stack. Saylor wants that thesis dead. 

The thing is, the bears aren’t crazy. Strategy does, in fact, have a massive annual payou obligation.

TeraWulf posts $34 million in Q1 revenue as AI/HPC lease income offsets bitcoin mining decline

TeraWulf (NASDAQ: WULF) reported first-quarter 2026 revenue of $34 million, roughly flat compared with $34.4 million a year earlier. The quarter included $21 million of AI/HPC lease revenue, a line item that did not exist in the prior-year period, while net loss widened to $427.6 million from $61.4 million - link

IREN partners with NVIDIA on up to 5 GW AI infrastructure buildout

NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) and IREN (NASDAQ: IREN) announced a partnership covering deployment of up to 5 gigawatts of AI infrastructure. The deal is tied to IREN’s AI cloud buildout and its existing data center footprint. Shares of IREN jumped in after-market hours. - link

Core Scientific shares tumble 9% as no new AI/HPC deals materialize: Q1 Earnings

Shares of Bitcoin miner turned AI factory Core Scientific (NASDAQ: CORZ) fell 9% following the company’s earnings call. Investors were likely expecting a new tenant signing at one of CORZ many sites, which the Core Scientific team did not discuss during the earnings call. Core Scientific announced the extension of is Oklahoma site with an additional 440 MW under development. - link

Hut 8 surges 27% on $9.8 billion lease signing with undisclosed tenant

Hut 8 (NASDAQ: HUT) said Wednesday that it signed a 15-year lease for 352 MW of IT capacity at its Beacon Point AI data center campus in Nueces County, Texas, with a base-term contract value of $9.8 billion. First-quarter revenue rose 226% year over year to $71 million. - link

MARA seeks bondholder consent for Long Ridge notes ahead of $1.5 billion acquisition

MARA (NASDAQ: MARA) launched a consent solicitation on Thursday for Long Ridge Energy LLC’s 8.750% Senior Secured Notes due 2032. The solicitation covers $600 million in outstanding notes and is tied to MARA’s pending acquisition of Long Ridge Energy & Power LLC, a deal valued at roughly $1.5 billion. - link

Strategy raises $82 million through MSTR stock sales, keeps bitcoin holdings flat at 818,334 BTC

Strategy (NASDAQ: MSTR) sold 492,210 shares of Class A common stock for $82 million in net proceeds during the week of April 27 to May 3, according to a Form 8-K filed on May 4. The company made no bitcoin purchases during the same period, leaving its holdings unchanged at 818,334 BTC. - link 

MARA, Block, Foundry, and others join Stratum V2 working group

A handful of leaders in the bitcoin mining space have joined a working group to accelerate the Stratum V2, the latest iteration of the open source stratum protocol from Braiins that underpins bitcoin mining pool infrastructure. - link

Aave just lost $10 billion in TVL. It’s time to try something different

A mess of decentralized finance (DeFi) apps we’re absolutely wiped out by a North Korean attack, draining nearly $300 million from the so-called DeFi ecosystem.

In the fallout, over $10 billion (yes, $10,000,000,000) has been withdrawn from Aave, one of the largest DeFi lending protocols. Why? Because its harder to trust DeFi more than ever.

That’s why we work with our friends over at Lygos Finance, a Bitcoin-based lending app using DLCs. It’s DeFi done right, on the only blockchain that matters.

With Lygos Finance, you always know where your Bitcoin is. Hold your keys, no wrapping, no bridging, no rehypothecation. Get competitive rates as low as 10% APR.

Give them an email and tell them Blockspace sent you!

Click the banner to learn more about Lygos!

“Tune in, freak out, get beaten”: Three takeaways from Bitcoin 2026 in Las Vegas

“No sympathy for the devil; keep that in mind. Buy the ticket, take the ride...and if it occasionally gets a little heavier than what you had in mind, well...maybe chalk it up to forced consciousness expansion: Tune in, freak out, get beaten.” – Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

Tune in. Freak out. Get beaten. Thompson could have easily written those lines about anyone who invested in bitcoin in 2025, only to see its value cut in half in a matter of months as 2025 sprang into 2026.

Even so, if you didn’t know there was a bear market, nothing would alert you to the contrary walking the labyrinthian halls of Bitcoin 2026.

The conference definitely drew fewer attendees than last year (I heard from one employee, for instance, that they were expecting ~25,000 this year, whereas 2025 drew 31,000+ according to Nakamoto (NASDAQ: NAKA)’s 2025 10-K).

But the turnout, energy, and engagement from Bitcoin companies was surprisingly resilient given current market conditions. And as I’ll get into below, this was the first Bitcoin Conference with Nakamoto acting as parent company to the combined NAKA/BTC Inc. entity following the February 2026 acquisition, and this combination changed very little about how BTC Inc. ran the conference – and who attended it. 

This was BTC Inc’s seventh conference, and it’s coming at a time of unprecedented flux in Bitcoin’s business landscape as institutions continue to march into the market, while entrenched industries like bitcoin mining are being remodelled almost overnight. 

With that flux in mind, here are my takeaways from Bitcoin 2026.

Same king, same hill

The biggest takeaway, perhaps, is that former BTC Inc. CEO David Bailey didn’t burn as much goodwill with Nakamoto (NASDAQ: NAKA) as many thought.

There was plenty of hemming and hawing among Bitcoin maximalists about boycotting the event because Bailey “rug pulled” or “scammed” investors with NAKA. But if Bitcoiners did boycott it, nobody noticed – except those who didn’t show up.

Or as BTC Inc’s newly minted CEO Brandon Bailey put it on a recent Blockspace Live, “the people that are most upset about the conference are the ones that secretly have FOMO and are staying home.”

Instead, the scene on the ground was indistinguishable from conference’s past: plebs mingling with plebs, industry heads rushing around for back-to-back meetings, and all the corporate logos synonymous with Bitcoin blazoned on the expo floor. 

This is still the conference to go to in Bitcoin, and it looks like they had no trouble securing attendees or sponsors for the event. Business as usual.

So all told, Bailey’s foibles with NAKA did not harm the conference, just like countless maximalist scandals – from Ordinals to Bailey’s endorsements of Trump – did nothing to tarnish it in years past. 

Maybe next time, the dissidents would have more luck with their boycott if they glued themselves to one of the stages like Just Stop Oil protesters.

Galaxy Digital posts $216 million net loss in Q1 as cryptocurrency prices decline

Galaxy Digital reported a $216 million net loss for the first quarter ended March 31, 2026, narrower than the $482 million loss in the same period a year earlier. The company said falling cryptocurrency prices drove the result, with total - link

Luxor expands LuxOS to MicroBT miners, plans $100 million hardware purchase

Bitcoin mining service firm Luxor has expanded its LuxOS firmware to MicroBT’s WhatsMiner machines and signed a term sheet for a strategic investment from MicroBT, alongside a planned $100 million hardware purchase. - link

Canaan, Tether announce mining infrastructure collaboration

Canaan said Tuesday it received a follow-on order from Tether for high-density mining hash board modules designed for immersion-cooled mining systems. The modules will be deployed to a Tether-affiliated mining facility in South America. - link

Strategy sells $255 million of MSTR stock, buys 3,273 bitcoin

Strategy sold 1,451,601 Class A common shares for $255 million in net proceeds and used that capital to buy 3,273 bitcoin during the week of April 20 to April 26, according to an 8-K filed with the SEC on Monday. - link 

Aave just lost $10 billion in TVL. It’s time to try something different

A mess of decentralized finance (DeFi) apps we’re absolutely wiped out by a North Korean attack, draining nearly $300 million from the so-called DeFi ecosystem.

In the fallout, over $10 billion (yes, $10,000,000,000) has been withdrawn from Aave, one of the largest DeFi lending protocols. Why? Because its harder to trust DeFi more than ever.

That’s why we work with our friends over at Lygos Finance, a Bitcoin-based lending app using DLCs. It’s DeFi done right, on the only blockchain that matters.

With Lygos Finance, you always know where your Bitcoin is. Hold your keys, no wrapping, no bridging, no rehypothecation. Get competitive rates as low as 10% APR.

Give them an email and tell them Blockspace sent you!

Click the banner to learn more about Lygos!

"We are a part of this community now": How institutions are preparing for Bitcoin's quantum computing threat

Bitcoin’s quantum computing risk is a devilish problem, a technical hydra that has many ugly heads. Not only does Bitcoin’s decentralized governance mean moving toward a solution will be a slower, more deliberate process than other systems that need to upgrade to post-quantum encryption, but there are a host of other unanswered questions that we need to address before we settle on a solution.

Some of those questions include which solution will we choose, what do we do with quantum-vulnerable coins, and – as ever with Bitcoin’s consensus – who gets input into what the “right” solution is?

During an OPNEXT ‘26 panel on how investors and institutions are approaching Bitcoin’s quantum computing risk, representatives from Coinbase, Blackrock, Anchorage Digital, and Tephra Digital made one dynamic clear: they may not yet know what the best solution is, but they plan to be engaged in the decision making process.

“We are a part of this community now, and Bitcoin is a community that is working towards developing these changes. And so it's on all of us to do that. And there's no reason why it shouldn't happen. One thing that is very important here is that we aren't going to wait for some other external change,” Anchorage Head of Product Boaz Avital said during the panel.

Tephra Digital Managing Partner Raghav Chopra said that forging a path to address Bitcoin’s quantum computing risk will require a delicate touch. You should want to “balance decentralization,” he said, in a way that still allows “strong actors that have economic incentives to see [the upgrade] through and make sure that risks are mitigated on the correct timeline.”

“I think that's very important because a lot of these proposals come down to this fundamental question of internalizing the private cost of an upgrade or upgrades,” Chopra said. “Some of the protocol upgrades across blockchains have often adopted that model. And there's a coordination difficulty and there's all the benefits and speed considerations of the open source model. But the leadership continues to be demonstrated by important firms in the space.”

“It's different from before where there weren't private firms that had the capitalization and resources to do the upgrades,” Chopra concluded.

Money and resources are one thing, but time-to-market for an upgrade is another entirely. As many of the panelists pointed out, Taproot took years, and that was fine for a largely esoteric upgrade that wasn’t essential for Bitcoin’s survival. 

But a functioning quantum computer would be an existential threat to Bitcoin and, Avital said “there’s a clear need, a clear demand” for a solution.

And institutions would rather see that solution sooner than later. Unlike open source development, which can often be painstakingly slow and methodical, institutions are used to moving on quicker timelines, said BlackRock managing director Robert Mitchnick. Even if developers are divided on a realistic timeline for when Q-Day comes, Mitchnick said institutions and their investors are going to want to see proaction rather than reaction.

Tether freezes $344 million in USDT with U.S. authorities

Stablecoin giant Tether froze two wallets containing some $344 million in USDT tied to illicit activity, according to a company statement released Thursday. - link

Core Scientific plans $3.3 billion secured notes offering for site construction, debt payments

Core Scientific plans to offer $3.3 billion in senior secured notes due 2031 in a private placement. - link

Crypto scammers may have lured vessel into Straight of Hormuz, Reuters says

Cryptocurrency scammers may be targeting ships looking to slip through the Strait of Hormuz. Greek maritime risk firm MARISKS said unknown actors claiming to represent Iranian authorities contacted vessels stranded west of the waterway, demanding transit fees in Bitcoin or Tether for “clearance,” in an alert sent to clients Monday. - link

Michael Saylor’s Strategy raises $2.5B, buys 34,164 Bitcoin

Strategy (NASDAQ: MSTR) sold roughly $2.5 billion in securities and acquired 34,164 bitcoin during the week of April 13 to April 19. - link 

Hedge funds are getting liquidated. Is your BTC safe?

It’s not just Bitcoin price drying up. Big whales, hedge funds, and lending desks are going under after the notorious 10/10 and 2/5 liquidations.

Counterparty risk is rampant, so its more important than ever to understand who actually controls your Bitcoin. Don’t be the next FTX or Celsius victim.

If you are working with another loan provider, do yourself a favor before its to late and check out Lygos Finance, Blockspace’s preferred non-custodial Bitcoin lender using native Bitcoin smart contracts to protect your stack.

With Lygos, you always know where your Bitcoin is. Hold your keys, no wrapping, no bridging, no rehypothecation. Get competitive rates as low as 10% APR

Click the banner to learn more about Lygos!

Understanding Iran's complicated relationship with bitcoin

Shortly after Iran and the U.S. agreed to a two-week ceasefire, Iranian officials reportedly agreed to let oil tankers pass through the Strait of Hormuz – if the crews pay a toll in bitcoin.

The Financial Times broke the news, quoting Hamid Hosseini of Iran’s Oil, Gas and Petrochemical Products Exporters’ Union.

“Iran needs to monitor what goes in and out of the strait to ensure these two weeks aren’t used for transferring weapons,” Hosseini told FT. “Once the email arrives and Iran completes its assessment, vessels are given a few seconds to pay in bitcoin, ensuring they can’t be traced or confiscated due to sanctions.”

The going rate is $1 per barrel of oil, meaning a supertanker would have to cough up $2 million to pass through. The Financial Times, citing data from Kpler, said that there are some 175 million barrels of crude oil marooned on 187 tankers in the Strait. This would make for a cool $175 million payday for Iran.

Roughly 20% of the world’s oil is shipped through the Strait of Hormuz, per EIA data, which works out to about 7.3 billion barrels annually. So if Iran continues this policy and tankers actually pay, that’s $7.3 billion (or 2% of the country’s GDP) per year in Iran’s coffers.

For the layman who might have trouble picking out Iran on a map, this all very likely puzzling. For Bitcoiners, it might come as less of a shock, but the more in-the-know ones might also remember that Iran temporarily banned bitcoin mining five years ago.

This contradiction – that a nation seemingly hostile to bitcoin would also accept it for export duties in arguably the most salient example of nation state bitcoin adoption yet – exposes a messy truth: Iran, a nation yoked by a theocratic dictatorship, is a bitcoin country.

Morgan Stanley debuts bitcoin ETF amid market decline

Morgan Stanley will debut its own bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) Wednesday on the NYSE Arca exchange under the ticker MSBT. The New York-based firm is set to become the first major Wall Street bank to launch a bitcoin-tracking fund.- link

Bitdeer launches SEALMINER A4 series with sub-10 J/TH efficiency

Bitdeer Technologies Group (NASDAQ: BTDR) announced the launched of its next generation Bitcoin mining series, the SEALMINER A4, on Tuesday. The Singapore-based company stated the new hardware utilizes its proprietary SEAL04 chip, achieving a headline power efficiency of 13.5 J/TH. - link

Strategy acquires 4,871 bitcoin for $329.9 million

Strategy Inc disclosed Monday the acquisition of 4,871 bitcoin for an aggregate purchase price of $329.9 million. - link

Solo bitcoin miner wins $222K payday with “1 in 100,000 chance” luck

Yet another solo bitcoin miner has struck digital gold, winning a bitcoin block with only 70 TH/s of mining power and claiming a payout of 3.128 BTC worth an estimated $222,000. - link 

Hedge funds are getting liquidated. Is your BTC safe?

It’s not just Bitcoin price drying up. Big whales, hedge funds, and lending desks are going under after the notorious 10/10 and 2/5 liquidations.

Counterparty risk is rampant, so its more important than ever to understand who actually controls your Bitcoin. Don’t be the next FTX or Celsius victim.

If you are working with another loan provider, do yourself a favor before its to late and check out Lygos Finance, Blockspace’s preferred non-custodial Bitcoin lender using native Bitcoin smart contracts to protect your stack.

With Lygos, you always know where your Bitcoin is. Hold your keys, no wrapping, no bridging, no rehypothecation. Get competitive rates as low as 10% APR

Click the banner to learn more about Lygos!

How to make your first AI agentic payment with bitcoin

I just had my AI agent call my mother and say that I love her (and remind her that it’s a good time to buy bitcoin).

This wasn’t free, so I gave my agent a Bitcoin wallet and had it pay for the services itself.

And I’m going to show you how you can give your AI agent a Bitcoin wallet to pay for things it wants to do too.

How to make your first BTC agentic payment in 3 steps

We’re going to use Claude Code for this demo. So make sure you have a Claude Pro ($10/mo) subscription and have set up Claude Code.

Step 1:

Open your terminal and add the Lightning Wallet MCP server:

claude mcp add lightning-wallet -- npx lightning-wallet-mcp

Step 2”

Open Claude Code (type “claude” in your terminal)

Type the following:

Register a new Lightning Wallet operator account

It may ask for an email. You’ll want to save the API key & recovery code it gives you.

The Lightning Wallet MCP Server currently funds 100 sats in your account for FREE which is more than enough for a single phone call!

Step 3

Copy and paste the following:

“Use the Lightning wallet to call this L402 API: POST to https://sats4ai.com/api/l402/place-call with body: {"phone_number":"XXXXXXXXXX","message":"This is Claude. I just paid for this phone call with Bitcoin. No account, no API key, no credit card. The future is weird."}

Remember to replace the Xs with the actual phone number!

BOOM! You have now empowered an AI agent to pay to make a phone call on your behalf.

So, what just happened, exactly?

Before we explain what’s going on under the hood, a short history lesson…

Fannie Mae to accept crypto-backed mortgages

Fannie Mae is preparing to allow borrowers to use Bitcoin and stablecoins to help secure home loans, according to an exclusive report by The Wall Street Journal on Thursday. - link

MARA jumps 6.4% as company sells $1.1B of Bitcoin, repurchases $1B convertible note to slash debt 30%

Bitcoin miner MARA has sold $1.1 billion worth of Bitcoin to re-pay convertible senior note debt, slashing its overall debt while dropping its Bitcoin HODL to below 50,000 BTC. The news was announced Wednesday in a corporate filing. - link

Cipher Digital climbs 8% on 15-year hyperscaler lease and $200 million loan announcement

Shares of former Bitcoin miner Cipher Digital jumped 8% to $16.18 in early morning trading after the firm announced a new 15-year lease for a data center campus with an investment-grade hyperscale tenant on Wednesday.  - link

Irish police crack code for $35 million Bitcoin stash tied to former drug dealer

Per a Tuesday Press release Tuesday, the Criminal Assets Bureau in cooperation with the Europol’s European Cybercrime claims to have seized “approximately €30 million in cryptocurrency” formerly belonging to Irish drug dealer Clifton Collins. - link 

Tether engages Big Four firm for first complete audit of $184 billion stablecoin reserves, assets

Stablecoin giant Tether has engaged a Big Four accounting firm to conduct a complete independent financial statement audit, according to a company blog post Tuesday. The Big Four firm selected was not disclosed in the post. - link

NYSE partners with Securitize to launch tokenized securities trading platform

The New York Stock Exchange has partnered with Securitize to build a trading platform for tokenized securities per a Wall Street Journal exclusive published Tuesday. - link

Saylor’s Strategy launches $21B common stock, $21B preferred stock offerings

Bitcoin treasury company Strategy filed documents on Monday to authorize $44.1 billion in new at-the-market equity offerings through its MSTR common stock and STRC preferred equity. - link

Hedge funds are getting liquidated. Is your BTC safe?

It’s not just Bitcoin price drying up. Big whales, hedge funds, and lending desks are going under after the notorious 10/10 and 2/5 liquidations.

Counterparty risk is rampant, so its more important than ever to understand who actually controls your Bitcoin. Don’t be the next FTX or Celsius victim.

If you are working with another loan provider, do yourself a favor before its to late and check out Lygos Finance, Blockspace’s preferred non-custodial Bitcoin lender using native Bitcoin smart contracts to protect your stack.

With Lygos, you always know where your Bitcoin is. Hold your keys, no wrapping, no bridging, no rehypothecation. Get competitive rates as low as 10% APR

Click the banner to learn more about Lygos!

Everything you need to know about the BlockFills bankruptcy

Last Sunday, BlockFills – a crypto financial services company that originates crypto-backed loans – filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy via its parent company, Reliz Technology Group Holdings. 

While not exactly a titan of crypto lending, BlockFills was “one of the more quiet behemoths” of the trade, as Lygos Co-founder Francis Corvino put it on a recent Blockspace Podcast. The company claims to have brokered $61 billion in trading volume last year, and its cap table includes investing stalwarts like Susquehanna and CME Ventures, the company’s Chapter 11 filing reveals.

Per the company’s bankruptcy documents, its unsecured creditors have $145 million at stake in the case. These unsecured claims include customer liabilities to Coinmint Co-founder Ahston Soniat ($5.65 million), Bitfarms (NASDAQ: BITF) subsidiary Backbone Hosting Solutions ($4.22 million), and Simple Mining ($3.73 million). They also include a “trades payable” debt of $1.26 million to the Chicago Blackhawks hockey team, ostensibly for unpaid services related to Blackhawks games. (Representatives for the Blackhawks and Bitfarms did not return Blockspace’s request for comment).

The bankruptcy calls to mind the failures of BlockFi and Celsius in 2022. With the toppling of either crypto lender came a chain of cascading insolvencies that would jeopardize many crypto companies, including Core Scientific. 

More than calling these failures to mind, we can actually trace BlockFills’ failure to 2022 and as far back as 2020, shaken by similar tremors that toppled its peers.

So far, it doesn’t seem like BlockFill’s bankruptcy will lead to any systemic contagion within the Bitcoin industry, with Corvino calling the insolvency a “small avalanche” that is “probably going to be an isolated event.”

Still, the case provides a playbook for how old financial wounds can fester and become terminal several years later.

Kraken to pause IPO plans due to ‘market conditions’

CoinDesk reported that cryptocurrency exchange Kraken has put its initial public offering (IPO) plans “on hold” in 2026 due to difficult market conditions. - link

Bitcoin miner HIVE to end Bitcoin mining in Sweden citing “economic viability”

Bitcoin miner HIVE announced Monday its intention to cease Bitcoin mining operations in Sweden, one of its longest running mining facilities, due to onerous regulations. The company plans on converting the sites to Tier III data centers for AI/HPC usage. - link

Cango reports $452 million net loss in 2025 amid pivot to AI infrastructure

Bitcoin miner Cango posted a net loss of $452.8 million for the full year 2025 on Monday amid a strategic transition into AI/HPC infrastructure.  - link

TeraWulf secures $500 million loan for Kentucky AI/HPC data center

Bitcoin miner-turned-AI factory TeraWulf has secured a $500 million loan with Morgan Stanley Senior Funding to finance the construction of a data center in Hawesville, Kentucky, according to a company press release Monday. - link 

Strategy raises $1.57 billion via equity sales to acquire 22,337 bitcoin

The software developer purchased 22,337 bitcoin between March 9 and March 15. The average purchase price for this recent acquisition block was $70,194 per bitcoin. - link

Hedge funds are getting liquidated. Is your BTC safe?

It’s not just Bitcoin price drying up. Big whales, hedge funds, and lending desks are going under after the notorious 10/10 and 2/5 liquidations.

Counterparty risk is rampant, so its more important than ever to understand who actually controls your Bitcoin. Don’t be the next FTX or Celsius victim.

If you are working with another loan provider, do yourself a favor before its to late and check out Lygos Finance, Blockspace’s preferred non-custodial Bitcoin lender using native Bitcoin smart contracts to protect your stack.

With Lygos, you always know where your Bitcoin is. Hold your keys, no wrapping, no bridging, no rehypothecation. Get competitive rates as low as 10% APR

Click the banner to learn more about Lygos!

What the Iran War means for bitcoin miners

We’re two weeks into Operation Epic Fury, the joint U.S.-Israel operation in Iran that has left energy markets reeling.

The war – which identifies as a “military operation,” according to U.S. officials – has resulted in Iranian officials closing the Strait of Hormuz, the Persian Gulf’s primary shipping artery that brings 25% of the world’s oil to market. Oil prices have gone parabolic accordingly. WTI Crude is currently trading at $95/barrel, Brent Crude, $105/barrel, with each respectively up 57% and 53% over the last month. 

This isn’t a politics/macro/finance newsletter, so we’ll spare you the doomer posting. But every professional and every industry in the world right now is probably turning over the same rhetorical question in their heads: “How will this impact my industry?”

For bitcoin miners, parts of this answer are more obvious than others.

Let’s start with the less obvious. 

The best places to mine BTC: Introducing the Bitcoin Mining Ease to Mine Index (EMI)

At first glance, you might think that bitcoin miners would gravitate toward regions with the lowest cost of power. The real equation, though, is more complicated than that.

The Ease to Mine Index is the most comprehensive research of country level attractiveness for deploying and scaling bitcoin mining operations. The index captures a holistic view of the bitcoin mining regulatory environment and operating conditions across 18 countries.

Download the full report to see where each country falls!

Ark Labs closes $5.2M seed round led by Tether to build programmable finance on Bitcoin

Ark Labs has raised $5.2 million in a seed round led by Tether to build programmable finance tools on the Bitcoin network. - link

Bitcoin crosses 20 million BTC milestone, leaving 1 million coins left to mine

Bitcoin crossed the 20 million circulating supply threshold early Tuesday morning, leaving fewer than one million coins remaining to be mined. - link

Foundry to launch compliant Zcash mining pool for institutional miners

Bitcoin mining pool operator Foundry Digital plans to launch an institutional-grade Zcash mining pool this April. - link

Binance founder Changpeng Zhao net worth surpasses Bill Gates: Forbes

Binance founder Changpeng Zhao surpassed Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) co-founder Bill Gates in total net worth as of Wednesday. Forbes estimates Zhao holds $110 billion to Bill Gates’ $108 billion, marking a $47 billion wealth increase over the past year. - link 

Strive raises SATA stock dividend, acquires $50M of Strategy’s STRC

Strive announced Wednesday a 0.25% increase to its preferred stock dividend alongside purchases of Strategy’s STRC preferred stock and bitcoin. - link

Strategy buys $1.28 billion in bitcoin, holdings hit 738,731 BTC

Strategy (NASDAQ: MSTR) acquired 17,994 bitcoin at an average price of $70,946 per coin last week, bringing its total holdings to 738,731 bitcoin as of Sunday. - link

Greenidge Generation restructures debt with new senior notes

Greenidge Generation announced an exchange offer on Wednesday to swap $36.6 million of its outstanding senior notes for new debt, offering an early exchange premium of 45% over the recent volume-weighted average price. - link

Hedge funds are getting liquidated. Is your BTC safe?

It’s not just Bitcoin price drying up. Big whales, hedge funds, and lending desks are going under after the notorious 10/10 and 2/5 liquidations.

Counterparty risk is rampant, so its more important than ever to understand who actually controls your Bitcoin. Don’t be the next FTX or Celsius victim.

If you are working with another loan provider, do yourself a favor before its to late and check out Lygos Finance, Blockspace’s preferred non-custodial Bitcoin lender using native Bitcoin smart contracts to protect your stack.

With Lygos, you always know where your Bitcoin is. Hold your keys, no wrapping, no bridging, no rehypothecation. Get competitive rates as low as 10% APR

Click the banner to learn more about Lygos!

A solo miner signaled for a Bitcoin soft fork. Here’s what that means

A very interesting block was mined on Bitcoin this past week and if you aren’t on twitter or don’t like drama you may have missed its significance.

It was the first block signaling support for BIP 110. More specifically, a bitcoin miner just signaled for a change to Bitcoin in the block, and that might be more interesting than the change itself.

BIP 110 is a proposal that wants to limit arbitrary data on Bitcoin (i.e., ordinals, inscriptions, and other non-monetary transactions). This is the controversial “filter” fork that is being pushed by Ocean Pool employees and pseudonymous laser-eyed Bitcoin profiles on X.

The specific proposal isn’t particularly noteworthy, but the block is very interesting – and how it was created could have some big implications for Bitcoin’s consensus.

The block at height 938903 from Barefoot Mining that signals for BIP 110

How bitcoin miners signal for upgrades

When a bitcoin block is produced, whoever mines it has the option to include arbitrary information in the block header. Satoshi, for example, included the famous “Chancellor on the brink" message in the Genesis Block.

But block headers also have a section called “nVersion” where miners can use a block to say that they will support a soft fork proposal or not. Every time we’ve had a fork in Bitcoin, there has been some period of signalling where miners all use that nVersion field to confirm that they are ready to enforce the new network rules.

In Bitcoin's history, soft fork signaling has always been treated as a pool-level decision; in other words, pools would broadcast signals, not the individual miners themselves. During SegWit activation in 2017, everyone was watching the pools. Which pool was signaling? Which wasn't?

That's because pools control the block templates (i.e., the transactions and other data that are mined and published in a block). The pool operator decides what software to run, what signal it makes with nVersion, and what rules the blocks follow. Individual miners just point their hashrate at the pool and collect their sats.

When it’s successful, this signaling process gives way to what some call a miner-activated softfork, since the miners ultimately convey their willingness or not to adopt a certain upgrade. 

But this time it wasn’t the pool that signalled – it was one of the miners themselves

Kraken receives Federal Reserve master account in cryptocurrency banking first

Kraken has secured a Federal Reserve master account, which establishes the cryptocurrency exchange as the first cryptocurrency bank in the United States to get direct access to the central bank’s payment infrastructure. - link

IREN expands GPU fleet to 150,000, opens $6B equity offering

IREN is expanding its GPU fleet with the purchase of more than 50,000 NVIDIA B300, bringing its total fleet to some 150,000 GPUs, according to a Wednesday press release. - link

Core Scientific secures $1 billion loan from Morgan Stanley amid AI pivot

Core Scientific secured an initial $500 million loan from Morgan Stanley with an option to increase to $1 billion total. - link 

American Bitcoin purchases 3.05 EH/s for Hut 8’s reactivated Drumheller site

American Bitcoin (NASDAQ: ABTC) has purchased 11,298 bitcoin mining ASICs, a hardware acquisition that follows an earnings release where American Bitcoin reported a 22% jump in fourth-quarter revenue to $78.3 million. - link

Strategy acquires $204.1M in bitcoin as it tweaks preferred stock payouts

Strategy acquired 3,015 Bitcoin for $204.1 million during the week of February 23 at an average cost $67,700 per coin. The company also announced changes to its dividend-paying preferred stocks. - link

Riot revenue jumps 71% in 2025 on bitcoin mining growth

Riot posted a 71.8% increase in total annual revenue to $647.4 million in 2025, versus $376.7 million in 2024. Riot’s bitcoin mining operations generated $576.3 million of the total figure compared to $321 million in 2024. For Q4, the miner’s revenue declined 15% quarter-over-quarter to $157 million. - link

Core Scientific 2025 earnings: CORZ revenue falls 38% YoY amid AI transition

Core Scientific brought in $79.8 million in revenue for Q4 and $319 million for the whole of 2025, a respective decline of 16% quarter-over-quarter and 38% year-over-year as the company accelerates its AI services line and pares down its bitcoin mining operations. - link

Hedge funds are getting liquidated. Is your BTC safe?

It’s not just Bitcoin price drying up. Big whales, hedge funds, and lending desks are going under after the notorious 10/10 and 2/5 liquidations.

Counterparty risk is rampant, so its more important than ever to understand who actually controls your Bitcoin. Don’t be the next FTX or Celsius victim.

If you are working with another loan provider, do yourself a favor before its to late and check out Lygos Finance, Blockspace’s preferred non-custodial Bitcoin lender using native Bitcoin smart contracts to protect your stack.

With Lygos, you always know where your Bitcoin is. Hold your keys, no wrapping, no bridging, no rehypothecation. Get competitive rates as low as 10% APR

Click the banner to learn more about Lygos!

Inside the Terraform estate’s lawsuit against Jane Street

The ghost of Terra/Luna – the blockchain and algorithmic stablecoin pair that collapsed in spectacular fashion in mid 2022 – is back to haunt the news cycle.

Todd Snyder, who Delaware’s bankruptcy court appointed to oversee the wind-down of Terra/Luna parent company Terraform, has filed a lawsuit in New York against Jane Street, a quantitative trading firm with a seasoned record in cryptocurrency trading and whose alumni includes Sam Bankman Fried of FTX infamy.

The lawsuit specifically points fingers at Jane Street and one Bryce Pratt, a former Terraform intern and current Jane Street employee. The suit claims Pratt used insider information to make trades in the Terra/Luna market that ultimately led to the death of the UST stablecoin in May 2022.

On May 7, the UST stablecoin dropped below $1 and never fully recovered. Issued on the Terra blockchain, the stablecoin was algorithmic, meaning that it doesn’t have a 1-to-1 backing with dollar instruments like Tether’s USDT or Circle’s USDC. Instead, market incentives and a programmatic relationship with luna, UST’s companion token, attempted to maintain the peg: if UST traded above $1, traders could profit by burning $1 worth of Luna to mint one UST, increasing supply and pushing the price back down; if UST fell below $1, traders could burn one UST to receive $1 worth of Luna, reducing supply and pushing the price back up.

This arbitrage worked until it didn’t, and May 7’s de-pegging eventually shattered market confidence as traders sold UST and sent it into a death spiral.

Snyder’s lawsuit on behalf of Terraform and traders who lost money in the debacle alleges that Jane Street’s trading incited it, and the plaintiff is seeking damages as part of its efforts to recoup money for investors as Snyder liquidates Terraform’s assets.

Nearly four years after the failure of UST and luna, the lawsuit implicates Jane Street in yet another crypto blowup that singed investors. 

And bizarrely, this has led to a number of pet theories that, maybe, Jane Street has actually been behind the current drawdown in bitcoin’s price.

Breaking down the lawsuit against Jane Street: Who is Bryce Pratt?

Pratt worked as an engineering intern at Terraform in the summer of 2021. While there, the lawsuit says, he developed close personal relationships with key Terraform personnel, including Terraform's Head of Research, and was subject to Terraform's Code of Ethics, which explicitly prohibited sharing material non-public information (MNPI) about Luna tokens with outsiders.

By September 2021, Pratt joined Jane Street, and in February 2022, he introduced two Jane Street DeFi trading leads to Terraform's Head of Business Development to “[open] up lines of communication regarding OTC and other forms of investment in Terra,” according to the suit. 

The lawsuit further alleges that Pratt received insider information from Terraform employees, particularly its Head of Research, who the suit claims applied for a job at Jane Street in late March 2022. 

In this heavily redacted section, the lawsuit claims that Pratt emphasized the need for secrecy over these conversations, texting “don’t share pls” to the Head of Research.

-CMH

Jack Dorsey's Block lays off 40% of 10,000 staff

The firm behind Square terminal, Cashapp, Bitkey, Proto and Spiral laid off a staggering amount of its workforce to focus on AI growth (and likely to trim some bloat). XYZ's stock price rallied over 25% in the aftermath - link

Magic Eden to shutter Bitcoin and EVM marketplaces, sunset multi-chain wallet

Magic Eden is sunsetting its Bitcoin and Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) marketplaces, as well as discontinuing support for its multi-chain wallet, sources close to the matter told Blockspace. - link

MARA inks Starwood AI deal, reports $907M in full-year revenue

MARA announced its first major AI deal on Thursday concurrent with its 2025 earnings release, where it reported $907.1 million for full-year revenue. - link 

Local officials greenlight Bitfarms Panther Creek AI data center

Bitfarms received a special exception permit from the Nesquehoning Planning Commission on Monday to prepare its Panther Creek data center complex in Nesquehoning, PA, per a Times News Online report. - link

Bitcoin mining manufacturer Canaan purchases Cipher’s stake in West Texas mining projects

Canaan is deepening its push into U.S. energy infrastructure, acquiring Cipher Mining’s 49% stake in a set of operational West Texas mining projects totaling roughly 4.4 EH/s of hashrate. - link

Tether increases stake in Bitdeer as miner sells entire bitcoin treasury

Tether purchased $42 million worth of Bitdeer (NASDAQ: BTDR) shares last week, increasing its total stake to 20.1% at a time when the miner’s stock fell 18% amid a broader market downturn. Bitdeer liquidated its entire bitcoin treasury on Friday. - link

Hedge funds are getting liquidated. Is your BTC safe?

It’s not just Bitcoin price drying up. Big whales, hedge funds, and lending desks are going under after the notorious 10/10 and 2/5 liquidations.

Counterparty risk is rampant, so its more important than ever to understand who actually controls your Bitcoin. Don’t be the next FTX or Celsius victim.

If you are working with another loan provider, do yourself a favor before its to late and check out Lygos Finance, Blockspace’s preferred non-custodial Bitcoin lender using native Bitcoin smart contracts to protect your stack.

With Lygos, you always know where your Bitcoin is. Hold your keys, no wrapping, no bridging, no rehypothecation. Get competitive rates as low as 10% APR

Click the banner to learn more about Lygos!

The resurrection of Bitcoin's "FIBRE" network

It's been over 12 years since first development, and 6 years since anyone has dusted off the codebase for this legacy Bitcoin project. But its finally back, thanks to a new Bitcoin hub on the Western Coast of the USA called "localhost research."

Dubbed the "Fast Internet Bitcoin Relay Engine (FIBRE)," it helps address Bitcoin's thorny mining centralization tendencies on the protocol level, by offering a method for miners to relay blocks as quickly as possible across the Bitcoin network. The project was first developed in 2014 by OG Bitcoin developer Matt Corallo, before being abandoned in 2020 due to maintenance constraints.

More technically speaking, FIBRE was designed to improve how bitcoin blocks are produced and distributed, plus reduce some toxic behavior incentives for bitcoin miners.

Now it’s back, operated by localhost, and has some modest upgrades.

So what exactly does FIBRE solve?

First, some Bitcoin 101.

In “vanilla” Bitcoin, when a mining node finds a block, it sends that block to the nodes it’s connected to which then sends the block to the nodes they’re connected to, and so-on. Another mining node sees that block and starts mining on top of it.

But that’s often slow. And with blocks worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, there's a solid recipe for shenanigans: information dislocations, arbitrage, and possibly toxic behavior.

One of these toxic behaviors is “selfish mining:" where a miner uses that time delta to mine on their own blocks. When you have large mining pools, this can create an unfair advantage and more centralization pressure. Selfish mining can lead to a list of issues, including censorship of transactions.

-CMH

MARA closes Exaion deal with 64% stake in French firm

Bitcoin miner MARA (NASDAQ: MARA) closed its $168 million acquisition of French state-owned energy subsidiary Exaion, the first significant AI/HPC deal for the Bitcoin miner.

Nakamoto to acquire Bitcoin Magazine, hedge fund UTXO Management in all-stock deal

The acquisition is an all-stock transaction valued at approximately $107.3 million based on Nakamoto’s February 13 closing price of $0.2951. Under the terms, Nakamoto will issue approximately 363.6 million shares to security holders of the two target companies.

Bitcoin network difficulty surges 14.7% as miners face profitability squeeze

The Bitcoin network’s mining difficulty increased 14.7% Thursday, reversing recent margin relief for Bitcoin miners. The upward adjustment forces operators to consume 14% more electricity to mine the exact same amount of Bitcoin. Hashprice, a measurement of how much revenue Bitcoin miners make, is now below $30 / PH / day, according to Hashrate Index.

Payjoin Foundation receives 501(c)(3) status to fund bitcoin privacy

The designation allows the organization to accept tax-deductible charitable contributions to fund open-source privacy protocols. The foundation maintains a dedicated budget to recruit talent directly for deep technical work. This strategy bypasses the delays of external grant processes the organization termed “Bitcoin Grant Purgatory.”

Harvard’s endowment reduces Bitcoin ETF holdings, opens Ethereum position 

Harvard Management Company reported a reduction in its holdings of the iShares Bitcoin Trust (NASDAQ: IBIT) while simultaneously establishing a new position in BlackRock’s Ethereum-based fund. 

What really happened on 10/10 and 2/5?

In the wake of Bitcoin’s spectacular cascade to $60,000 last week, the Crypto Fear and Greed Index printed a 5. That’s lower than the Terra Luna collapse, lower than the FTX crash, and lower than the 2022 market bottom.

The drawdown liquidated over $2.5 billion in positions in a single day. On-chain data indicates that this was the single largest realized loss event in Bitcoin's entire history.

And YET none of the indicators saw this coming.

Naturally, this raises a few questions, but principal among them: did we just witness a complete collapse of crypto market structure?

Something definitely seems to have “broken,” and we might be able to trace it back to the beginning of the current bear market on October 10, 2025.

Two bitcoin crashes, (maybe) one story

Let’s start with the supposed beginning of the current drawdown, October 10, 2025 (now known as “10/10” in crypto circles), and whether or not something broke in bitcoin’s market structure.

Bitcoin’s crash on October 10 wiped out $19 billion in a matter of hours, as bitcoin dropped 12.5% from its $125,000 all time high. Was this natural market phenomena or is someone specific to blame?

Binance has become a scapegoat for this crash, so much so that Binance co-CEO Richard Teng was defending the exchange at Consensus Hong Kong just today.

Depending on who you ask, there is enough smoke here for people to yell fire. OKX's CEO said Binance's USDe yield campaign created a leverage bomb, and on-chain sleuths found a mystery account that opened $1.1 billion in bitcoin shorts on Hyperliquid right before impact.

Not everyone is convinced of these framings, though.

Wintermute's CEO, for example, said it was just a flash crash on a Friday night with thin trading volume. Binance takes this line as well, and it has set aside a $328 million fund to compensate to its users for incidents on its platform related to USDe index deviation and internal “asset matching degradation” during the crash.

TL;DR: nobody agrees on what happened on 10/10.

Now, flashback to February 5, and the trouble deepens. Bitcoin dropped from $76K to $60K in a harrowing 24 hour period.

The most compelling theory for what’s ailing bitcoin connects the two crashes directly: Hong Kong hedge funds running leveraged IBIT options with yen-borrowed capital got wrecked on 10/10, doubled down, piled into silver – which also blew up – and then the final BTC push finished them off.

Because they traded ETFs (and not spot crypto),this washout didn’t pop up on the crypto world’s radar until it was over. Meanwhile, stablecoins lost $14 billion from December through February and the cash-and-carry yield (Bitcoin basis trade) collapsed from 17% yields to under 5%.

This is the telltale sign that capital wasn’t rotating – it was exiting crypto altogether.

Bitdeer faces lawsuit over Clarington data center plans

Bitdeer is being sued over its plans to build an HPC data center in Clarington, Ohio, as a neighboring tenant on the property alleges that the plans violate its contractual rights to the leased space. - link

French officials tap billionaire Xavier Niel to ease concerns over stalled MARA deal: The Big Whale

French officials have reportedly tapped telecommunications billionaire Xavier Niel to acquire a stake in the Électricité de France (EDF) subsidiary, Exaion, in an attempt to mollify sovereignty concerns over U.S. bitcoin miner MARA (NASDAQ: MARA) taking a controlling stake in the company. - link

Synteq Digital acquires HMTech to expand into GPU services

Bitcoin mining services provider Synteq Digital has acquired ASIC miner repair shop HMTech. The acquisition includes HMTech’s operating business, repair facilities, and two data centers in Texas with a total potential capacity of 30 MW. Synteq paid for the bulk of the acquisition in equity. - link

NFN8 Group files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy

Bitcoin miner NFN8 Group filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of Texas on February 2, according to court documents. The company cited a catastrophic fire at its Crystal City, Texas, facility as the primary catalyst for the restructuring. - link

Enduring Wealth Capital closes $10.5M Cango investment, achieves 49.71% voting power

Bitcoin miner Cango closed a $10.5 million round and secured an additional $65 million in equity commitments on Thursday. The Bitcoin miner will use the capital to fund its expansion into AI/HPC and strengthen its balance sheet. - link

Everything you need to know about Bitcoin in the Epstein Files

The DOJ dropped the largest batch of the Epstein Files yet this week, and they revealed just how many things the notorious pedophile had his tentacles in – and that includes Bitcoin.

Social media was awash with references to prominent Bitcoiners who were either mentioned in Epstein’s emails, took funding from the sex-offender financier, and/or had direct contact with him over the internet or in person.

To get it out of the way: none of these emails necessarily prove any illegal acts by the people mentioned in this article, nor do they implicate them in any nefarious behavior. Further, Epstein’s ties to Bitcoin do not mean that he – or the Deep State! – created or co-opted Bitcoin. Jeffrey Epstein may be a nonce, but that doesn’t mean he has anything to do with Bitcoin’s nonces. 

That said, the emails do show that Epstein invested in early stage Bitcoin companies, and he was in contact with some of the more impactful personas of Bitcoin’s early days.

Why is anyone’s guess, but it probably has a lot to do with Epstein’s attempts to exert influence over anyone and anything of consequence when he was running around unchecked, which includes bleeding edge, far-out new technology.

And with that out of the way, let’s dive into our findings.

Brock Pierce is all over the Epstein Files

Brock Pierce? The former child actor, Mighty Ducks star, and EOS cofounder?

Yes, that Brock Pierce.

The serial crypto entrepreneur and generally-creepy-dude first made contact with Jeffrey Epstein in 2010 by way of Al Seckel, the late illusionist and paramour of Isabel Maxwell, who is the sister of Jeffrey Epstein’s lover-in-chief, Ghislaine Maxwell.

In 2010, Seckel organized the so-called Mindshift Conference on Epstein's Little Saint James island. The conference was one piece of a public relations push to repair Jeffrey Epstein’s reputation following his 2008 conviction in Florida for sexually trafficking a child and soliciting prostitution. 

It was a total dud, so much so that Epstein penned a fake email to Seckel, pretending to relay message from an Epstein Foundation member. But Epstein got his first Bitcoin connection out of it: Brock Pierce, who spoke at the event.

Pierce and Epstein maintained a relationship up until Epstein’s death in 2019. During this time, Pierce enjoyed assignations with some of Epstein’s “girls,” took legal advice from Epstein on how to resolve 5 years of tax evasion, introduced Epstein to Steve Bannon, and served as Epstein’s point of contact for personalities in the Bitcoin space, including the Winklevosses.

(If you want a more thorough rundown of the more salacious and dastardly side of Pierce and Epstein’s relationship, I recommend this article on Protos, which covers some of the above in depth; for our purposes, we’ll be more focused on the nexus of Pierce and Epstein's business relationship and their investments in Bitcoin companies).

A few more bits of interesting trivia unearthed by the Epstein files before we get to the meat of it: Pierce tried to purchase Mt. Gox in May 2013, nine months before it collapsed; and in 2014, Pierce also wanted to tap Larry Summers to “get involved” with USDT issuer Tether – which Brock cofounded in 2014 – perhaps to give legitimacy to the project.

Epstein invested in Coinbase via Pierce’s Blockchain Capital

But most notably, Epstein used Brock Pierce’s Blockchain Capital as a surrogate to invest in Coinbase.

Epstein made this Coinbase investment via Blockchain Capital in December 2014. In November 2014, Pierce notified Epstein that Blockchain Capital was planning to invest in Coinbase’s next round, but that he would “need [Epstein’s] permission to let the founder know who [Epstein is]” but that Epstein’s identity “would not be disclosed beyond that.”

Epstein responded,” yes ok,” committing $3 million to the round via Blockchain Capital’s Crypto Currency Partners II, LLC (not to be confused with Crypto Currency Partners II, LP, Blockchain Capital’s public facing fund that invested $200,000 into Coinbase during the same round, per a 2015 investor deck). 

France stalls MARA acquisition of EDF data arm over sovereignty concerns: Bloomberg

The French government has intervened in the planned acquisition of EDF’s data arm by MARA (NASDAQ: MARA) to request a deeper review of the transaction, according to a Bloomberg report. The publication said French authorities asked EDF (Électricité de France) for a more detailed review of options regarding the sale of its unit. Previously, the French Treasury green lit the deal, but the latest intervention puts that approval on pause. - link

Tether invests $100 million in Anchorage Digital

Tether has invested $100 million in crypto bank Anchorage Digital, according to a Thursday press release. The strategic equity investment builds upon an existing partnership where Anchorage serves as the issuer for USA₮, Tether’s compliance-focused stablecoin. - link

Endeavor condemns Mawson poison pill defense amid takeover battle

Endeavor Investor Group issued a statement Wednesday condemning Mawson Infrastructure Group’s (NASDAQ: MIGI) adoption of a stockholder rights plan as a move to protect management at the expense of shareholders. On Monday, Mawson adopted the limited-duration stockholder rights agreement to prevent a takeover without a control premium. - link

Cipher Mining prices $2 billion note offering for Texas data center expansion

Cipher Mining (NASDAQ: CIFR) announced the pricing of $2.0 billion in senior secured notes to fund the completion of its industrial-scale data center in Wink, Texas according to a company press release on Wednesday. - link

TeraWulf surges 10% after 1.5 GW Hawesville, Morgantown acquisitions

Bitcoin miner-turned-AI factory TeraWulf (NASDAQ: WULF) is acquiring two brownfield industrial sites in Hawesville, Kentucky, and Charles County, Maryland, which could expand its gross load capacity by approximately 1.5 GW. - link

Bitcoin difficulty projected to drop 15% as hashprice hits all-time low

Bitcoin is bracing for a historic bitcoin mining difficulty decrease as bitcoin miners are powering down operations at the fastest rate since China’s bitcoin mining ban in 2021. The drop comes as bitcoin plummets below $80,000, driving bitcoin’s hashprice to an all-time low. - link

Cryptography researchers publish witness encryption scheme emulating covenants on Bitcoin

Cryptography research firm allocinit has published the white paper for Bitcoin PIPEs v2, a major update to its scheme that enables covenants and zero-knowledge proofs on Bitcoin without requiring any changes to the protocol’s consensus rules. - link

Is Microsoft to blame for yesterday’s market carnage?

Bitcoin and bitcoin mining stocks were hammered Thursday, but they didn’t suffer alone. 

The entire market – from equities to commodities, and even precious metals – took a good drubbing. 

The moves were sudden and violent, with trillions in value wiped in a matter of hours.

Here’s a score card of the day’s losses:

• Bitcoin: $82,595 (-6.3%)

• IREN: $59.84 (-4.9%)

• MARA: $9.86 (-4.9%)

• HUT: $61.53 (-4.8%)

• Gold: $5,214/oz (-6.3%)

• Silver: $110.53/oz (-9%)

• Nasdaq: 23,685.12 (-0.72%)

The drawdown was eerily reminiscent of the COVID flash-crash in March 2020 – everything fell off a cliff at once, as though something “broke” within the system of global liquidity.

Of course, this fueled speculation on Fintwit (yes, we’re still calling it that – Xtwit just doesn’t sound right) about the nature of the mass liquidation event and what it means.

The most lucid breakdown I could find comes from one of my favorite anonymous macro analysts, EndGame Macro, who points to Magnificent 7’s eldest company as the source of the trouble.

Of course, I’m talking about Microsoft, which lost a spectacular 10% or roughly $350 billion following its Q2FY earnings despite beating expectations. 

Why did Microsoft suffer a historic sell off – the worst since March 16, 2020 – despite the earnings beat, and why did that matter for the wider market?

Well, as EndGame Macro points out, a few key components of Microsoft's revenue (personal computing, gaming services via Xbox, Windows OEM) all declined year-over-year, pointing to softening consumer spending.

But more importantly, Microsoft’s CAPEX ballooned to $29.9 billion in Q2, roughly doubling from the prior year.

Further, its cost of revenue increased 19% and its OPEX by 5%, so its margins are getting squeezed – so much so, that the estimate for Microsoft’s Q3 operating margin are now below prior expectations to 45%. 

With all of this, investors are starting to ask, ‘Will earnings fail to meet expectations set by 2025’s CAPEX boom?’

Or, as EndGame Macro put it: “The takeaway wasn’t ‘AI is failing.’ It was that AI is absorbing capital faster than [it is] producing margins, at least in the near term.”

But why does this matter for the rest of the market? Well, Microsoft rests at the intersection of the universe of blue-chip, indexed stocks and the high-growth, high-risk ones.

“For a stock that anchors indices and risk models, that [margin] shift mattered,” EndGame Macro argues.

With such a torrent of sell pressure hitting it, Microsoft was dislodged as an anchor for the wider market and put pressure on the Nasdaq and S&P 500 accordingly. This led, EndGame Macro explains, to a deleveraging event that began with equities and spilled into gold, silver, and bitcoin.

“The synchronized timing matters. Nasdaq down 2.5%, S&P down 1.2%, gold and silver collapsing..all within the same window tells you this wasn’t asset specific news. There was no Fed headline. No geopolitical escalation. The system simply hit a leverage threshold…It was a balance sheet reset.”

If we take this analysis at face value, a logical question might be: if one Mag 7 stock can produce this much fear and damage in the market, what happens if more of them spook investors with thinning margins?

Microsoft, then, could be the canary in the coal mine for how the AI trade unwinds, and with earnings season in full swing, expect more volatility as the market digests earnings. 

And as ever, bitcoin might have something to offer for divining the market’s future here, as well; if bitcoin pukes even more from here, I would be willing to bet my bottom dollar that stocks won’t be too far behind.

French Treasury approves MARA’s acquisition of Exaion, EDF non-compete: The Big Whale

The French Treasury has authorized MARA’s 64% controlling stake in Exaion, the data center arm of France’s national electric company, Électricité de France (EDF), as first reported by French market intelligence provider The Big Whale. The approval also did not challenge a non-compete clause in MARA’s contract with Exaion, which prevents the EDF from engaging in any HPC, AI, and bitcoin mining operations for two years after the deal’s close. - link

Bitcoin hashrate drops 8% as US miners curtail during Winter Storm Fern

As Winter Storm Fern wracked middle America over the weekend, bitcoin miners in the PJM and TVA regions curtailed operations to support the grid as the arctic front left more than 1 million customers without power. Evidencing the scale of bitcoin mining curtailment in the U.S., Bitcoin’s hashrate has dropped roughly 8% since the storm swept the midwest and southeast. - link

Nvidia invests $2B in CoreWeave for strategic hardware agreement

Nvidia has invested $2 billion into AI factory CoreWeave, according to a CoreWeave press release, as part of a larger sales agreement between the two firms. - link

Tether holds $24 billion in gold as purchases rival central banks: Bloomberg

Stablecoin issuer Tether accumulated some 140 tons of gold valued at roughly $24 billion, establishing the stablecoin issuer as one of the largest holders of bullion worldwide, according to a Bloomberg interview published Wednesday. - link

Representative Dale Strong buys IREN ahead of major energy act

Representative Dale Strong (R-AL) disclosed purchases of IREN shares on Wednesday. He purchased the shares on January 23, shortly before President Trump signed into law H.R. 6938, a piece of energy legislation marketed as “unleashing energy dominance.” - link

No, investors aren't selling bitcoin because of quantum computing FUD

Earlier this month, investment bank Jefferies made headlines announcing the reduction of its exposure to bitcoin due to perceived quantum computing risk. 

Pundits on the issue made several victory laps, noting that capital allocators indeed care about the potentially fatal risk to bitcoin.  

However, while some investors may be reallocating, I would push back on the idea that this is currently a broad trend.

Moreover, when I see a claim like Charles Capriole’s “Quantum Discount,” I have reason to suspect some (not all) are manufacturing a narrative.

Charles Capriole’s “Quantum Discount” chart attributes BTC price decline vs S&P to quantum | Source: Charles Capriole

I do believe that investors have started scoping the risk, but outside of a few anecdotes and the Jefferies headline, I strongly doubt that this has had any effect on confidence in bitcoin, yet.

As I see it, the argument is as follows:

1. If investors were pricing quantum risk correctly, they would need deep technical understanding or close communication with experts who do.

2. Deep technical understanding would lead to accurate pricing of other technical risks to Bitcoin.

3. I do not believe those other technical risks are accurately priced in. I would wager most investors are unaware of them.

4. Therefore, quantum risk is likely not accurately priced in either.

Just to get it out of the way: it’s fair to criticize perceived nonchalance from leading Bitcoin developers. And further, investors should take quantum risk seriously, and selling bitcoin is the logical way for inventors to derisk from quantum computing exposure.

I’m just not convinced that they’re selling today.

BitGo Goes Public at $18 Per Share

Crypto custodian BitGo priced its IPO at $18, raising $212.8 million and valuing the company at over $2.1 billion. The firm will trade under ticker BTGO on the NYSE, marking 2026's first major crypto-related public listing. - link

Ledger seeks US IPO at $4 billion valuation: Financial Times

French hardware wallet designer Ledger is tapping investment banks for an initial public offering (IPO) in the United States that could value the business at more than $4 billion, according to reporting from the Financial Times. - link

Strategy Crosses 700,000 BTC After $2.13B Purchase

Strategy acquired 22,305 bitcoin for $2.13 billion, pushing its total holdings to 709,715 BTC. The company funded the purchase through a mix of common and preferred stock sales, paying an average of $95,284 per coin. - link

FIBRE Network Returns with v30.0 Release

The Bitcoin FIBRE (Fast Internet Bitcoin Relay Engine) network is being revived with a new released based on Bitcoin Core v30.0. Originally created by developer Matt Corallo to minimize block propagation times across the network, FIBRE is getting a fresh update after years of dormancy. - link

Blockspace acquires Bitcoin Layers to integrate bitcoin assets intelligence

New York, Jan. 19, 2026 – Blockspace Media, a bitcoin trade publication at the intersection of markets, compute, and tech, has acquired Bitcoin Layers, an independent data provider for metrics on Bitcoin’s layer 2 (L2) ecosystem. - link

A conversation with Bitcoin Core's newest maintainer

Bitcoin Core has a new maintainer. If you aren’t immersed in dev circles like most of us, or don’t know what that means, this article is for you.

On January 8th, Bitcoin developer sedited — also known as TheCharlatan — became Bitcoin Core's sixth maintainer, the first new addition since May 2023. He joins fellow maintainers Michael Ford, Ava Chow, Gloria Zhao, Ryan Ofsky, and Hennadii Stepanov.

If that’s news to you, you probably need some memory jogging on what that even means. So I’m here to help explain GitHub to you.

Luckily, I caught up with sedited to discuss how he got here, what he’s focused on, and what comes next for the Bitcoin Core project. 

And you may find it shocking, but what he’s working on gets at the heart of a lot of the drama surrounding Bitcoin Core over the past year. It may even set the stage for some of the main Bitcoin narrative arcs over the coming decade.

Bitcoin’s new maintainer is focused on clarifying consensus 

We asked sedited if he'd been trying to become a maintainer (it's not exactly a job you apply for). 

“It has not been a goal of mine since contributing to Bitcoin. I guess the work I've been doing puts me in a position that made me a candidate, just because it was touching some places of the code,” he told Blockspace.

That code is called “libbitcoinkernel” – a project to extract Bitcoin Core's consensus rules into a standalone library.

“Consensus rules are the logic that determines whether a transaction or block is valid,” he continued. “They're what makes Bitcoin, Bitcoin.”

Surprisingly, due to the complexity of the code it’s actually quite difficult to define what lines of code are critical for Bitcoin consensus and which lines of code are just functions of the client. It’s been a longtime project to separate the consensus-only code from the rest of Core.

“The kernel project isolates this code so other software can use it directly rather than reimplementing it from scratch,” sedited said. 

"We can now actually, for the first time, clearly define what belongs to the consensus code and what doesn't. We have a clear boundary of what actually belongs to it and what is kind of adjacent to it. That's nice from a philosophical standpoint—these are the rules, and as long as you follow them, you should be fine."

Correction January 16, 2026 at 10:30am ET: Marco Falke was originally listed as one of the current Bitcoin Core maintainers, however he resigned in 2023. Michael Ford is one of the current six maintainers.

ERCOT approves 830 MW expansion at Galaxy’s Helios site

The Electricity Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) has approved a 830 MW expansion at Galaxy Digital’s Helios site following a large load interconnection study by the company, per a Galaxy press release. - link

BitMine invests $200 million into YouTuber MrBeast

Ethereum treasury and staking company BitMine (NYSE: BMNR) announced Thursday a $200 million equity investment in Beast Industries – the media company of famed YouTuber MrBeast – alongside an updated corporate strategy to acquire 5% of the Ethereum network supply. - link

BitGo seeks IPO at $1.96 billion valuation

BitGo launched a roadshow for an initial public offering on the NYSE, seeking to raise $201 million at a valuation of up to $1.96 billion.  - link 

CleanSpark to acquire Texas land for 600 MW AI data center

CleanSpark (NASDAQ: CLSK) signed a definitive agreement Wednesday to acquire 447 acres in Brazoria County, Texas, to develop an AI data center campus. - link

Strategy acquires $1.2 billion in bitcoin, increases treasury to 687,410 BTC

Strategy (NASDAQ: MSTR) purchased 13,627 bitcoins for approximately $1.25 billion in cash between January 5 and January 11, 2026. - link

Finance butts heads with physics as data center delay worries loom

In our 2026 predictions, I lobbed the point that 2026 will likely see multiple AI/HPC data center delays. Supply chain snags, raw material/component shortages, and export controls could converge in such a way that this becomes endemic to the data center sector. A number of capital allocators have touched on this, including Sequoia, who wrote a clear-eyed analysis of some of the supply chain risks facing builds in the new year. - link

OUR TAKE: In Q4 2025, silver went parabolic as the market confronted a deficit of physical supply. Silver is a critical component for busbars, semiconductors, and other data center components.

This was probably the first “oh s***” moment — at least for the lay investor — of the material shortage that data center operators are facing (or maybe they noticed the skyrocketing price of memory first, as we noted in a prior letter).

And let’s not forget reports in Q4 2025 that data centers have been buying jet engines to skip interconnection queues and speed up their time to market.

There’s barely enough power to go around, and increasingly, there’s barely enough of anything to feed the machine.

A number of other headwinds converging against the sector:

• China has instituted export controls on a laundry list of critical minerals, including gallium (used in PSUs, networking gear), germanium (fiber optics), graphite (lithium ion batteries, heat spreaders), tungsten/molybdenum (semiconductors), silver (busbars, semiconductors, switch gears) — you get the point.

• Fiber optic cables — the most critical networking component for HPC data centers — are in increasingly shorter supply, with one producer saying consumers may soon see dotcom-era lead times (~1 year, vs a 2-3 months normally).

• Last year, Samsung — among others — started allocating resources away from SSD hardware (for retail computing needs) toward high-bandwidth memory (HBM) hardware for data centers. Now, Samsung is sounding the alarm that — surprise! — there’s not enough memory for Joe Blow or Data Center Don.

The list goes on, but we’ll stop there.

The threat of these shortages is just starting to creep into the Overton Window. But how dire are they?

2025 earnings season is coming up, so any delays in data center buildouts will tell us if the creep has become a pounce.

If I were a banking analyst cleared for Q&A with your favorite neocloud/powershell AI play, I would ask if the company has critical material inventories secured for their near-term buildouts.

You can throw money at a problem, but you can’t fight physics.

-CMH

Zcash core developers resign en masse 

The entire Electric Coin Company team behind Zcash resigned collectively, citing untenable conditions created by the board of the nonprofit, Bootstrap, in a dispute over mission and governance. The developers immediately formed a new for-profit startup called cashZ, reaffirming their commitment to scaling Zcash technology while arguing nonprofits cannot achieve mass adoption. - link

OUR TAKE: So, let me get this straight: a privacy coin has a company behind it, and that company has a physical street address, and the developers quit because they didn’t like how the board was acting?

Yes that’s simplifying it, but the Bitcoin maxi in me comes out whenever I see self-described competing blockchains to Bitcoin that have “governance” problems.

Let me take a few more pot shots: Can you actually build unstoppable money when your development team reports to a 501c3 board?

Even Zooko, the Zcash guy (and cofounder) isn’t siding with his own former company, the Electric Coin Company.

Former ECC CEO Josh Swihart says “we’re starting a new company to keep building ‘unstoppable money’” but conspicuously hasn’t announced whether that’s Zcash, although it’s implied it is not.

ZEC immediately dropped ~15% on the announcement to $395.

Okay now some whitepilling. If Zcash is unstoppable money, then the core development team mass resigning shouldn’t affect it long term.

I must also point out that Zcash does have a long history of cryptographic innovations, such as the famous trusted setup ceremony and, more recently, Halo 2 zk-SNARK implementation.

I’m a sucker for privacy coin narratives, so I enjoyed the resurgence of privacy-pilled users on the timeline. No doubt many will move on once the hype fades, but events like these tend to activate a new cohort of privacy activists.

Hope the Zcash KOLs are going to be fine (they always are).

-CBS

MSCI retains Strategy in indices, keeps door open for other bitcoin treasuries

MSCI announced on Tuesday that it will not exclude bitcoin treasury companies from its global indices. The decision allows Strategy (NASDAQ: MSTR) to maintain its position in the benchmark equity indices, while also keeping the door open for other bitcoin treasury companies that meet requirements. - link

Florida lawmaker files bill to establish strategic bitcoin reserve

Florida House Member John Snyder filed a bill on Tuesday to create a state-managed bitcoin reserve framed as a bulwark against inflation. House Bill 1039 proposes the Florida Strategic Cryptocurrency Reserve as a special fund held separately from the State Treasury. - link

Hut 8 awaits zoning approval for $5B data center project in Illinois 

Hut 8 (NASDAQ: HUT) is awaiting zoning approval for a 500 MW data center in Logan County, Illinois, estimating it will spend anywhere from $4 to $5 billion on the proposed project. - link 

Cipher Mining taps bitcoin veterans to lead policy, strategic AI initiatives

Cipher Mining (NASDAQ: CIFR) appointed Lee Bratcher as head of policy and government affairs and Drew Armstrong as head of strategic initiatives on Tuesday. - link

Blockspace’s 2026 predictions

AI data center builds will be saddled with delays in 2026

2024 and 2025’s AI CAPEX boon has been sown. 2026 will be the year for reaping. And I anticipate that a number of data center builds, from AI-expanding bitcoin miners, big tech firms, and neoclouds alike, will fall short come harvest season. This is not a unique call, nor is it a hard one to make. But a macro cocktail of energy constraints, logistics bottlenecks, and raw material deficits will doubtless stupefy build outs from even the most competent firms. China’s export controls on silver, following earlier controls on other critical minerals, only exacerbate existing issues — and what if they clamp down even more?

Metals outperform yet again

Silver and gold outperformed every other major asset this year, giving bitcoiners little ammo to lob at their gold bug family members over Christmas dinner. The boomer rocks are making a comeback as central banks hoard gold amid failing confidence in U.S. Treasuries — not to mention the fact that a 1 GW data center requires 0.5-1.5 metric tones of silver. As many macro analysts have pointed out, we appear to not only be entering a new monetary regime where gold plays a competing role with the dollar as a neutral settlement option, but industrial use is setting a new floor price for silver and other metals. China’s export controls will aggravate the supply deficits, so we expect 2026 to be another great year for the boomer rocks.

Hashrate grows at slowest pace in years as bitcoin miners stay in purgatory

Bitcoin’s hashrate grew 32% in 2025, a respectable increase. But this figure would have been higher if bitcoin didn’t underperform, and — perhaps more importantly — if the largest miners in the U.S. didn’t turn their full attention to AI. The AI bandwagon is still on the parade, so we don’t anticipate this changing anytime soon. Plus, if bitcoin slogs along under $100k or capitulates from here, then we won’t be surprised if Bitcoin’s hashrate experiences even less growth in 2026 than 2021, the year of the China Mining Ban where hashrate expanded a piddling 23%.

-CMH

Goldman, JPMorgan, others launch bitcoin lending and it is wildly successful

The strongest product market fit for crypto right now (that isn’t stablecoins) is settlement and collateral. Bitcoin is absolutely the best collateral, crypto’s “pristine” asset. 2026 will be the year, if 2025 wasn’t already, of tradfi really embracing this collateral. As Larry Fink often points out, Blackrock’s bitcoin ETF launch was the most successful ETF in the history of the firm — so too will bitcoin lending be viewed in retrospect. I’m personally partial to bitcoin lending that is more on-chain, but this will be an extremely competitive and lucrative market for both custodial and non-custodial solutions.

90% of users on the internet cannot discern AI generated content from human by the end of the year

It is almost already the case today, but it will be indisputable by the end of this year. Even if a person is told “you are looking at two images, one of them is AI” the supermajority of people will not be able to discern which is real. People will get calls from loved ones in distress and will not be able to tell that it’s an AI scamming them. We will flounder for effective solutions in the short term.

Prediction Markets have a “FiveThirtyEight” moment

Prediction markets become the preferred “true” polling method for elections, sports, and culture wars (it already is for the chronically-online, but the normies are coming). Just as FiveThirtyEight transformed election polling and discourse into data-heavy insights that the average person could understand, so too will the average person “fact check” news and public opinion on Polymarket. I expect by the end of the year we will also see more than 1 major exploitation of a market (think several days of a leading story on the national news), most likely around the U.S. mid-term elections.

-CBS

TeraWulf joint venture finalizes $1.3B secured financing for Texas AI campus

TeraWulf’s joint venture, Flash Compute, has completed a $1.3 billion senior secured notes offering to finance a new AI data center campus in Abernathy, Texas. - link

Strategy buys 1,229 bitcoin funded by $108.8M MSTR issuance

Strategy acquired 1,229 bitcoin at an average price of $88,568 for $108.8 million between December 22 and December 28, funding the buy with proceeds from MSTR sales. - link

Semler Scientific chairman urges investors to approve Strive merger ahead of Jan 13 meeting

Semler Scientific Chairman Eric Semler encouraged shareholders Monday to vote for the proposed merger with Strive ahead of a January 13, 2026 special meeting to approve the business combination. - link

Riot Platforms opens $500M equity offering following bullish forecast

The new $500 million facility replaces a previous equity sale agreement established on August 9, 2024. Riot terminated that prior agreement effective Tuesday. Under the terms of the agreement, Riot retains discretion over the timing and volume of sales. - link

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The 2025 Hashies: Introducing Blockspace’s annual award show

Without further adieu, here are the winners of the 2025 Hashies. Tune in to the latest Mining Pod for the full award show (or watch here!).

Most ascendant CEO

WINNER FOR MINING: Daniel Roberts

IREN was one of the most exciting bitcoin mining stocks to watch this year, earning it a top spot alongside TeraWulf, Hut 8, and Cipher as one of the leaders in the AI-expansion race among miners. Unlike its peers, IREN is going full-bore into a neocloud model, while peers have opted for a powershell approach. For this trailblazing, we’re awarding Daniel Roberts with the most ascendant CEO.

RUNNERS UP: Tyler Page, Paul Prager, Asher Genoot

WINNER FOR CRYPTO: Shayne Coplan

One year ago, in the wake of the 2024 elections in which Polymarket traders embarrassed pollsters once again, the FBI raided Shayne Coplan’s apartment. The FBI alleged that Polymarket – which was not registered with the CFTC at the time – knowingly admitted U.S.-users onto its platform. But the raid really seemed like thinly-veiled intimidation theatre. Fast forward to 2025, and now Polymarket is registered with the CFTC for U.S. users. One of the better comeback stories in crypto, so Polymarket’s comeback-kid CEO, Shayne Coplan, takes this award.

RUNNER UP: Jeff Yan 

Best crashout

WINNER: Luke Dashjr 

It could never be any other way. Bitcoiners love to parrot the phrase, “Slay your heroes,” but that’s easier said than done when that hero is one of the most prolific and respected developers in Bitcoin history. Until this year, that is. Luke Dashjr entered 2025 crusading against ordinals/inscriptions, until, going one too many times unto the breach, he fell on his sword. For all his past contributions, Luke Dashjr’s 2025 track record will be tarnished by his pushing for a filter softfork that few want (and is technically unsound), all while libeling anyone who disagreed with him as – well, we’ll use the euphemism Epstein affiliate. For this spiral into mudslinging and substituting technical arguments for moral ones, Luke Dashjr takes this Hashy.

RUNNER UP: Mike Brock

Most rekt investment

MOST REKT CRYPTO: Celebrity Memecoins 

This could have easily been “all memecoins,” but the celebrity ones in particular had a terrible year. Beginning as it did with TRUMP and MELANIA coin (on Trump’s inauguration, nonetheless), these coins burned whitehot in January, and were quickly snuffed out. Everyone from Iggy Azalea to Kanye West either launched or promised to launch a memecoin – a sure sign of the top for crypto’s most honest – if absurd – investment thesis.

MOST REKT EQUITY: Bitcoin treasuries / DATs

This was an easy one. Bitcoin treasury companies were l'investissement de l'année entering the year. Now, their stock charts look like ICO pump-and-dumps. Turns out that selling equity, accumulating debt, and buying bitcoin isn’t really a great business model.

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Strategy buys 1,229 bitcoin funded by $108.8M MSTR issuance

Strategy (NASDAQ: MSTR) acquired 1,229 bitcoin at an average price of $88,568 for $108.8 million between December 22 and December 28, funding the buy with proceeds from MSTR sales. - link

Stone Ridge reports $3B profit in 2025, 50% annualized return for founding investors

Stone Ridge Holdings Group reported $3 billion in 2025 trading profits and a 50% annualized return for founding investors since 2012, according to the company’s annual investor letter. - link

TeraWulf joint venture finalizes $1.3B secured financing for Texas AI campus 

TeraWulf’s (NASDAQ: WULF) joint venture, Flash Compute, has completed a $1.3 billion senior secured notes offering to finance a new AI data center campus in Abernathy, Texas. The 7.25% notes are 2030 and were issued at par value. Flash Compute is a subsidiary majority-owned by TeraWulf with a 49.9% stake held by Fluidstack - link 

2025 “vibe rankings” for bitcoin mining stocks

ICYMI, check out our 2025 year-en vibe rankings for public bitcoin miners. Read on, or catch the full pod with our rankings on YouTube. - link

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Bitcoin mining stocks vibe rankings: 2025 year-end edition

To start, the first metric on our rubric was simple: is a miner expanding into AI/HPC, and if they are, how far have they progressed? Do they have deals signed? Are those wading into the waters (but without a swimming buddy yet) in a place to do so with the sites they currently operate?

From here, it was pretty easy to decide which miners would be at the top of the rankings, and which ones below.

Where it got tricky, though, was deciding just how high some of the AI-expansion leaders should go. And inversely, how much we should discount miners who have small AI footprints, are (ostensibly) hunting AI tenants to sign a deal, or who have huge MW footprints without much to show for expansion.

The latter point is important, because a miner’s hashrate and MW size might look good on paper, but with peers inking fingerlicking deals in a market with juicier margins, companies with too much mining exposure are falling out of investor favor.

There’s plenty of room for disagreement on these rankings (and we certainly butted heads on the podcast!), but directionally, we stand by our tier list.

Are you nodding along or pursing your lips in disgust? Let us know what you think the rankings should be by creating your own rankings. Share it on X and tag @blockspace!

All of that said, here are the rankings. Please direct all tomato tossing or bouquet brandishing to intern@blockspace.media.

Will’s Tier List

Colin’s Tier List

Charlie’s Tier List

Disclosure for newsletter and podcast: Colin holds CIFR; Charlie holds CIFR and IREN; and Will holds CIFR, IREN, BITF, CLSK and GLXY. Blockspace did not include CleanSpark and Galaxy Digital on this list due to conflicts of interest related to sponsorships and other contracts.

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TeraWulf secures zoning approval for NY data center

TeraWulf (NASDAQ: WULF) secured a critical regulatory approval on Monday night when officials in Lansing, New York, voted to classify its Lake Cayuga site for permitted industrial use. The decision resolves a zoning dispute that previously stalled the company’s plans to convert a former coal plant into a data center.  - link

Bitcoin hashrate drop may signal bottom as treasury firms buy the dip: VanEck

Bitcoin miner-turned-AI factory Hut 8 announced Tuesday a new partnership with artificial intelligence company Anthropic and compute provider Fluidstack to develop large-scale AI data center infrastructure in the United States, beginning with a 245 megawatt project in Louisiana. - link

Brink hires independent auditor to review Bitcoin Core

Bitcoin development incubator Brink bank rolled an audit of the Bitcoin Core codebase by Quarkslab, and Bitcoin Core passed the audit with Quarkslab finding no serious bugs or vulnerabilities. The first ever independent audit of the code that underpins the majority of the network sets a new standard, “mark[ing] a milestone in the development history of Bitcoin,” as Bitcoin Magazine’s Technical Editor Shinobi writes in his coverage. - link