On Tuesday, an address dormant since April 3, 2014, reactivated to transfer 300 bitcoin—valued at $31.06 million—for the first time in over 11 years. Bitcoin Time Capsule Opens: 2014 Whale Wallet Transfers $31M As bitcoin trades above the $103,000 mark, a number of long-idle coins have stirred back to life amid elevated prices. On May […]
Venture capital firms remain critical to infrastructure development in the Bitcoin ecosystem, despite pushback from some in the community, according to builders speaking at the Token2049 conference in Dubai.Charlie Yechuan Hu, CEO of Bitcoin layer-2 protocol Bitlayer, shared his insights on venture capital (VC) firms in the Bitcoin (BTC) ecosystem.Hu told Cointelegraph that he views many VC firms in the space positively, as they offer support to early ventures that need capital to build infrastructure.“You need developers, you need to open up the whole ecosystem foundation, everything,” Hu said. “You need to pay for the cloud, like AWS or RPCs, all that, servers […] So, we have to have VC on that.“Hu argued against the usual Bitcoiner ethos that argues against outsider capital, saying, “It’s difficult to say, okay, let’s do a fair mint, and then have a very successful, healthy treasury, and you have to pay all this stuff.”“It doesn’t work that way,” he said.Related: StarkWare researchers propose smart contracts for Bitcoin with ColliderVMLightning-only stance sparks debateNot everyone agrees. Mike Jarmuz, a managing partner at Bitcoin venture capital firm Lightning Ventures, told Cointelegraph that Lightning is the only L2 his company has invested in and is interested in. He said, “Anything with a ‘token’ that allows for ‘staking’ and earning some absurd APY interest on your Bitcoin should be avoided.”Jarmuz said that Lightning Network, on the other hand, is growing very quickly and makes Bitcoin transactions instant, nearly free and scalable. Bitcoin Visuals data shows that the Lightning Network has a cumulative capacity across all channels equivalent to almost $452 million at the time of writing. He added:“There is no ‘token’ when using the Lightning network. It’s Bitcoin. That to me is the only real L2, at least as of right now.“Lightning Network capacity chart. Source: Bitcoin VisualsJarmuz said that projects not meeting his criteria are “masquerading as useful” while doing nothing for Bitcoin. He claimed that sidechains like the Liquid Network and newer protocols such as e-cash and federations or Ark “are not widely used” but “are at least interesting.” He recognized that those “do not involve a staked token, promising yield,” with projects that have those features, “just waiting for rug pulls and issues.”“We don’t invest in that area,“ he added.Related: Spar supermarket in Switzerland starts accepting Bitcoin paymentsVCs seen as enablers of Bitcoin growthAccording to Hu, VCs bring liquidity, resources and experience to new startups while opening “up all the institutional ideas and connections.” He said that those were important additions to Bitlayer’s resources as well, noting that “we wouldn’t have that if those people didn’t invest in us.”He also argued that VCs tend to back long-term infrastructure efforts rather than speculative projects like memecoins or non-fungible tokens. That experience was echoed by Walter Maffione, lead engineer at Lightning Network-based decentralized exchange (DEX) Kaleidoswap, who told Cointelegraph that the protocol started as an open-source project and raised a pre-seed investment from Fulgur Ventures and Bitfinex Ventures.“Those funds were used to pay open-source developers and accelerate protocol development, not to build a token or capture governance rights,“ he said.Hu claimed that VCs have contributed significantly to developing layer-2 scalability solutions, wallets, Bitcoin lending and staking protocols. He added:“All of them are VC-backed, including us. And some of them are listed on top exchanges.”Vikash Singh, principal at Bitcoin VC firm Stillmark, told Cointelegraph that when selecting Bitcoin layer-2 protocols to invest in, they consider demonstrated security and robustness, proliferation and adoption of non-speculative use cases and growth of the application layer. Much like Jarmuz, he said that Stillmark believes that proof-of-work is the superior consensus model.Still, unlike Jarmuz, Singh said proof-of-stake or Byzantine fault-tolerant consensus “may be suitable for Bitcoin sidechains and rollups.”Magazine: ‘Bitcoin layer 2s’ aren’t really L2s at all: Here’s why that matters
In the latest episode of The Bitcoin Layer, host Nik Bhatia invited on-chain analyst James Check—better known as “Checkmate”—to dissect the forces that have carried bitcoin past six figures and to explain why he believes the market still points toward a move to roughly $150,000. From the outset, Check framed his analysis in sweeping macroeconomic terms. Since the 2008 financial crisis, he said, dollar strength has been “a big up-trend” that rewarded foreign investors who benchmark in other currencies, buy dollars, and place those dollars into US equities. But that era, he argued, is giving way to a “sound-money dominance regime”: “My favorite chart is the S&P 500 priced in gold. You get about ten years where equities trounce gold, then ten years where gold trounces equities. Since 2022 that chart flipped in gold’s favor, and for the first time in history we have a mature, trillion-dollar bitcoin sitting right alongside it. We’re watching the rules shift, and it’s not going to happen overnight—it’ll take a decade, maybe longer, to fully play out.” Why $150,000 Is Next For Bitcoin The conversation quickly moved from macro currents to market structure. After the spring sell-off that drove prices from the mid-$90,000s to the mid-$70,000s—an “air pocket” where little historical supply had transacted—bitcoin clawed back the dense supply cluster around $95,000 with surprising ease. Related Reading: Bitcoin Nears All-Time High as $312M BTC Exit Binance Following US-China Trade Deal “People were willing to just sit tight and allow the market to find its level. They’d bought at $100,000, watched it fall to $75,000, bought some more, and now they’re up on the whole stack. That kind of behavior is a real boost of confidence.” Shortly after that consolidation, the market printed a local high near $105,000. For veteran participants, the psychological shift was palpable. “$100,000 was the target for the last decade,” Check said. “Now it’s the floor. Bitcoin has proved it belongs at a trillion-dollar market cap, flipped silver, and feels perfectly natural sitting among the five largest monetary assets on earth.” Check’s quantitative framework hinges on the market-value-to-realized-value (MVRV) ratio, which benchmarks price against the aggregated on-chain cost basis. Translating historical MVRV extremes into forward levels puts the present cycle’s statistical ceiling near $166,000: “If price goes to $166,000, my objective analyst self has to say, ‘We’re two standard deviations above the mean, and we’ve only stayed higher than this five percent of the time.’” That band—roughly $150,000 to $160,000—marks the altitude where he expects the first serious wave of profit-taking. Yet the level remains plausible precisely because it is rooted in realized behavior, not in the supply-halving calendar: “There’s a reason MVRV only gets so high. When people look at their portfolio and see a house sitting there in green numbers, a chunk of them will hit the sell button. You don’t need everyone to sell—just enough to overwhelm new demand.” Derivatives, “Time Pain” And The Halving A maturing derivatives market is central to Check’s thesis. He expects perpetual-swap funding rates to breach 20 percent annualized on a rapid run toward $150,000, inviting basis traders to short futures and collect the premium. Options desks, meanwhile, can harvest fat volatility premia by selling calls. “Big asset managers must hedge. If they can’t lay off a billion-dollar position in options they won’t take the position in the first place. Derivatives aren’t papering over demand—they’re the plumbing that lets real capital scale into the asset.” Related Reading: Bitcoin Price Targets $110,000 All-Time High After Consolidation Trend Ends Those instruments also reshape corrections. Where 2017 pullbacks were 40% plunges that reversed in days, today’s market prefers shallower, longer consolidations—episodes that impose what Check calls time pain. “Depth pain is easy to see—your coins are 30% underwater. Time pain is harder. Three months of chop at the same level will wear investors out, and boredom is a powerful seller.” Perhaps one of the most striking element of the interview was Check’s deliberate break from the four-year, halving-centric cycle model. After studying the August–September 2023 pullback, the mid-2024 range, and the latest sell-off, he concluded that the short-term-holder cost basis now functions less as a binary floor or ceiling and more as a mean-reversion anchor. “People are now using bitcoin to respond to the world rather than us responding to bitcoin. Macro sentiment—not scheduled supply shocks—is steering the big flows.” Treasury Adoption And The Confidence Machine When tracking corporate treasuries, ETFs, and other large holders, Check zooms out to a 30-day change in realized cap—the cleanest view of net dollar inflows. Even March-April ETF outflows, he noted, were nearly matched by falling CME open interest, implying “mechanical cash-and-carry unwinds rather than lost conviction.” Closing the conversation, he returned to first principles: “Markets are a big confidence machine. The dollar cycle, the gold-equity rotation, the cost of hedging—all of that feeds straight into bitcoin order books, option smiles, and on-chain ledgers. The only real question is: what’s the fair macro premium for digital sound money?” For James Check, the chart already sketches an answer: somewhere around $150,000, the confidence machine will stage its next major test. At press time, BTC traded at $102,573. Featured image created with DALL.E, chart from TradingView.com
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Bitcoin trades at $103,581 today with a total market capitalization of $2.057 trillion and a 24-hour trade volume of $35.91 billion. The cryptocurrency experienced an intraday price range of $101,109 to $104,293, signaling elevated activity within a tight but volatile band. Bitcoin The 1-hour BTC/USD chart highlights a distinct intraday pullback followed by a sharp […]
Hi. Is there a way to gather historical data from the block chain? Large institutions sell data but it's above my price range. submitted by /u/Individual_Praline38 [link] [comments]
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Last week saw another batch of new money flowing into crypto funds. As reported by CoinShares, investment products attracted over $880 million over the course of seven days. That brings year-to-date inflows to $6.7 billion. Prices have been trending upward, with Bitcoin temporarily reaching $105,000 and Ethereum being traded above $2,600. Investors are appearing to be stepping in while the opportunity is still hot. Related Reading: Bitcoin’s $104,000 Peak Sparks High-Stakes Short Positions – Details Weekly Inflows Indicate Continued Demand According to the latest data, $882 million poured into crypto products last week. That is the fourth consecutive week of inflows. It might not rattle the broader markets, but it indicates money continues to flow in. Managers have gathered $6.7 billion in net new cash so far this year. In plain language, that’s a steady stream of new capital flowing towards these funds. Bitcoin Dominates The Inflows Bitcoin funds saw $867 million of those inflows. A big chunk of that went into US-listed ETFs. Since January 2024, those Bitcoin ETFs have gathered nearly $63 billion. They just passed their all-time high of $61.6 billion set back in February. In contrast, Ethereum products only took in $1.5 million last week. That gap shows where most investors still feel safest. Sui And Other Altcoins Catch Some Attention Some of the smaller coins were in the limelight. Sui attracted $11.7 million in just one week, surpassing Solana and Ethereum during that span. Its year-to-date figure so far stands at $84 million, narrowly over Solana’s $76 million. XRP, for its part, posted $1.4 million of weekly inflows, taking its YTD at $258 million. XRP’s assets under management are currently at $1.35 billion. Other altcoins showed only small moves, which tells us money is picking spots rather than spreading out. Source: CoinShares Regional Flows Favor The US The United States dominated all regions with $840 million of last week’s total. Germany accounted for a little over $44 million and Australia $10 million. Conversely, Sweden experienced the largest outflows at $12 million. Hong Kong lost $8 million and Canada $4.3 million. Those numbers highlight just how much the US market—led by heavy hitters such as BlackRock—is still in charge. Related Reading: Bitcoin’s Grip Loosens: Market Expert Says Dominance Has Hit Its Ceiling BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin ETF was the best performer, bringing in over $1 billion last week. That was partially offset by $257 million in outflows from providers like Grayscale and Bitwise. Overall, it appears that one provider’s large gain can be equaled by several others’ losses. Behind the flows are broader trends in money and policy. Global M2 money supply continues to expand, adding more cash to the system. Meanwhile, concerns about slow US growth and high inflation are pushing some investors into crypto as a hedge, or alternative store of value. Featured image from Gemini Imagen, chart from TradingView
