TheStreet Roundtable

How Elon Musk became important for crypto (2:59)
Elon Musk‘s net worth stands at $894.9 billion as of August 18, 2026, according to the Forbes Real-Time Billionaires ranking, after rising approximately $30 billion in a single 24-hour period.
Most people cannot intuitively grasp what $894.9 billion actually means. Converting it into Bitcoin and gold makes the scale immediate.
The Bitcoin calculation
Bitcoin is trading around $64,135 per coin today. At that price, Musk’s entire fortune could buy approximately 13.95 million Bitcoin, roughly 66.4% of the total 21 million coins that will ever exist.
Bitcoin price at press time. Source: Decibel
To put that in context: Strategy, the world’s largest corporate Bitcoin holder, has accumulated 840,447 BTC over six years of aggressive purchasing.
Musk could buy approximately 16 Strategy-sized positions with his net worth.
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Bitcoin’s total market capitalization stands at approximately $1.29 trillion to $1.30 trillion today, meaning Musk’s fortune represents roughly 69% of the entire Bitcoin network’s value.
He could not physically buy that much. A purchase of that scale would drive Bitcoin’s price into territory no model has ever mapped.
But the theoretical calculation reveals something precise: one person’s wealth, converted entirely into Bitcoin, would give them control of two-thirds of the asset’s fixed supply, an asset whose entire design philosophy is built around making that concentration impossible.
The gold calculation
Gold is trading at about $4,394 per ounce today. Musk’s $894.9 billion could purchase approximately 203.7 million ounces, equivalent to roughly 6,333 metric tonnes.
For reference, the United States holds approximately 8,133 metric tonnes in official reserves, the largest national gold holding in the world.
Musk could theoretically acquire a position equal to 77.9% of the entire US Government gold reserve.
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Total gold ever mined in human history amounts to approximately 212,582 tonnes. His fortune could acquire roughly 3% of all the gold ever extracted from the earth.
At the peak prices
At Bitcoin’s all-time high of $126,000, reached in October 2025, Musk’s $894.9 billion would have bought approximately 7.1 million BTC, or 33.8% of total supply.
At gold’s all-time high of $5,602 per ounce in January, 2026, the same fortune would have purchased approximately 159.7 million ounces, equivalent to 4,969 metric tonnes.
The numbers do not tell you which asset is better. They tell you what one human being’s wealth looks like when measured against the scarcest things on earth.
In Bitcoin’s case, even the world’s richest person cannot own all of it. That is the point.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. Cryptocurrency investments are highly volatile and risky. Always conduct your own research before making any investment decisions.
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CertiK’s Jason Jiang says every crypto hack can be stopped (4:46)
Three incidents. Fifteen days. A crypto hardware wallet. A crypto hardware device manufacturer. A regulated crypto broker.
The crypto industry has absorbed three separate security failures since Aug. 3, and nobody has put the full picture together in one place.
Here is the complete breakdown.
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Attack 1: Coldcard
The first and most damaging incident hit Coldcard, the Canadian hardware wallet made by Coinkite that millions of Bitcoin holders trusted as their most secure storage option.
A five-year-old firmware bug from a March 2021 update silently weakened seed generation, cutting possible seed values to roughly 4 billion, small enough for attackers to reproduce remotely from publicly available data like device serial numbers.
The result: 1,367 BTC worth approximately $89 million drained from 4,585 wallets across three attack waves in 72 hours. Physical possession of the device was never required.
Attack 2: Trezor
Ten days later, hardware wallet manufacturer Trezor disclosed that a data breach at its third-party logistics partner ShipMonk had exposed customer order information.
According to Trezor’s statement, 11,742 customers had their names, email addresses, phone numbers, and shipping addresses leaked. A further 1,947 customers had partial data exposed.
No crypto was stolen, but the leaked physical addresses create a direct risk of targeted physical attacks.
Physical attacks on crypto holders have risen 33 percent in the first half of 2026, with approximately 52 such incidents recorded globally, according to security firm CertiK.
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Attack 3: Bits of Gold
The most recent incident hit Bits of Gold, Israel’s largest regulated cryptocurrency broker. An active exploit of Metabase analytics software, identified as CVE-2026-72898, gave attackers unauthorized access to a supporting data system, potentially exposing the personal information of up to 250,000 customers.
Names, bank account details, and national ID numbers may have been compromised. Customer funds and digital assets were not touched.
Bits of Gold has since blocked the affected system, notified the Capital Market Authority and the National Cyber Directorate, and retained a cybersecurity incident-response firm.
Israeli retail giant Paz temporarily halted Bitcoin purchases on its Yellow convenience store app as a precautionary measure.
The pattern
Three attacks. Three different entry points, firmware, logistics partner, analytics software.
None of them required breaking Bitcoin’s cryptography or accessing a blockchain. All three exploited the infrastructure around the wallet rather than the wallet itself.
That is the full picture. The weakest link in crypto security is not the blockchain. It is every third-party system that touches it.
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Understanding Ripple, XRP and XRPL (3:17)
The Bank of America Corporation (NYSE: BAC) is the world’s second-largest bank by market capitalization.
The Wall Street bank recently revealed that it boosted its holdings in cryptocurrencies like XRP, Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and Solana (SOL) and trimmed its holdings in crypto companies like Strategy (Nasdaq: MSTR) and American Bitcoin Corp. (Nasdaq: ABTC) last quarter.
According to the 13F filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Bank of America holds $94 million in net exposure in Bitcoin, Ether, and XRP through exchange-traded funds (ETFs).
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XRP
With a market cap of $62.7 billion, XRP is the sixth-largest cryptocurrency.
The Bank of America boosted its XRP holdings in the second quarter of 2026. The banking giant holds 13,260 shares of the Volatility Shares XRP ETF (Nasdaq ticker: XRPI).
Bitcoin
With a market cap of $1.3 trillion, Bitcoin is the largest cryptocurrency.
The bank boosted its holdings in BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF (Nasdaq: IBIT) to 1.72 million shares in the last quarter from 972,590 shares in the earlier quarter. In short, the bank raised its IBIT holdings by 77% in the quarter.
The bank also holds stakes in Bitwise Bitcoin ETF (NYSE Arca: BITB), Grayscale Bitcoin Trust ETF (NYSE Arca: GBTC), Grayscale Bitcoin Mini Trust ETF (NYSE Arca: BTC), Fidelity Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (CBOE: FBTC), VanEck Bitcoin ETF (CBOE: HODL), and Direxion Daily Bitcoin Bull 2X ETF (NYSE Arca: BTCU).
Solana
With a market cap of $44.9 billion, Solana is the seventh-largest cryptocurrency.
The bank has fully exited its Solana holdings in the last quarter. It has sold the 10,296 shares of Volatility Shares Solana ETF (Nasdaq: SOLZ) from its portfolio.
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Strategy
Led by billionaire entrepreneur Michael Saylor, Strategy (Nasdaq: MSTR) is the world’s leading Bitcoin treasury company which holds 840,447 BTC.
The firm held 1.17 million MSTR shares worth approximately $102 million last quarter, down from 3.96 million stocks in the previous quarter.
American Bitcoin
American Bitcoin (Nasdaq: ABTC) is an American Bitcoin mining and treasury management company which was founded in Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. in March 2025.
The bank sold all 85,508 shares in the Trump family-linked American Bitcoin.
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Bitcoin NFTs (3:53)
Bitcoin is facing a convergence of selling pressure that crypto analyst Ali Martinez says warrants a serious warning.
In a detailed eight-part thread on X, Martinez laid out a coordinated picture of supply hitting the market from multiple major sources at the same time, and identified the specific price level that determines what happens next.
Three major sellers, all active at once
The data Martinez presented covers the past ten days. Bitcoin miners, often viewed as long-term holders who sell only when necessary, have offloaded 1,648 BTC worth approximately $106 million following Bitcoin’s recent move toward $64,600.
ETFs compounded that pressure last week with net outflows of 6,195 BTC, roughly $398 million leaving the spot Bitcoin ETF market in a single week.
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Strategy added to the picture too. Earlier, the Michael Saylor-led company has sold 3,338 BTC over the past few weeks, worth more than $214 million, to fund dividend payments on its preferred securities.
Together, Martinez said, these three sources represent a simultaneous supply event that the market is currently absorbing under difficult conditions.
$1.59 billion in potential sell-side liquidity
Where that supply is going matters as much as who is selling. Exchange balances have increased by 24,700 BTC over the past ten days, equivalent to approximately $1.59 billion in Bitcoin now sitting on exchanges in a position where it can be sold.
Coins moving to exchanges don’t always sell immediately, but the buildup represents meaningful overhead pressure on price.
US demand is not stepping in to absorb it. The Coinbase Premium Index has remained negative since May 8 and currently sits near -0.0743, signaling that Bitcoin is trading cheaper on Coinbase than on Binance, a persistent indicator of weak or outright negative US institutional buying pressure.
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The level that decides the next move
Martinez identified a critical support zone between $63,111 and $61,849 as the line the market needs to defend. More than 2 million BTC were previously transacted in that range, giving it structural significance as a potential floor.
If that zone holds amid the current selling pressure, he said Bitcoin may resume its advance.
If it breaks, the next major downside target sits near $54,276, a level that would represent a meaningful extension of the current drawdown and bring the Bitcoin Investor Price floor Martinez has previously identified near $48,300 back into active conversation.
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iBit BTC (2:29)
BlackRock has revisited its investment case for Bitcoin after one of the asset’s sharpest drawdowns of the current cycle, asking whether the assumptions behind institutional adoption still hold.
The Aug. 17 report, titled Re-Underwriting Bitcoin: Still a Portfolio Diversifier, comes as Bitcoin trades near $64,700, far below the record levels reached in October 2025.
Rather than treating the decline as evidence that Bitcoin’s investment thesis has broken down, BlackRock examined how the asset behaved through the selloff and what that means for portfolio construction.
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Can Bitcoin still earn a place in portfolios?
Bitcoin has fallen roughly 50% from its October 2025 high, according to BlackRock, which attributed much of the decline to crypto-market deleveraging and changing investor flows rather than a fundamental deterioration in Bitcoin’s long-term case.
Bitcoin reached an all-time high above $126,000 in October 2025 before a sharp deleveraging event later that month helped trigger a prolonged downturn. It was trading around $64,779 on Tuesday, down roughly 26% year-to-date and about 49% from its peak.
Bitcoin price at press time. Source: Decibel
BlackRock said the selloff underscored Bitcoin’s “dual personality.” The report highlighted how Bitcoin can move alongside risk assets when investors are deleveraging, but behave differently during periods of geopolitical stress. The firm argued that heightened correlations with traditional markets have historically been episodic rather than structural.
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BlackRock said its updated 10-year analysis supports keeping Bitcoin exposure relatively small.
“A modest 1–2% allocation to bitcoin would have improved risk-adjusted returns in a traditional 60/40 portfolio,” the firm said.
BlackRock puts earlier Bitcoin thesis through stress test
The conclusions build on BlackRock’s September 2025 research, when the firm argued that Bitcoin did not fit neatly into traditional “risk-on” or “risk-off” frameworks because its return drivers differed from those of stocks and other conventional risk assets.
The difference now is that BlackRock has tested that thesis against a major drawdown.
Its latest research places greater emphasis on Bitcoin’s changing correlations and on portfolio sizing after the selloff.
BlackRock also has direct exposure to growing institutional demand through its iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF (IBIT), launched in January 2024. IBIT had about $48 billion in net assets as of Aug. 17 despite a 26.5% year-to-date decline.
For financial advisers and institutional allocators, BlackRock’s updated analysis effectively shifts the discussion from whether Bitcoin is volatile to whether a small allocation can improve portfolio outcomes despite that volatility.
The firm’s answer remains that a measured allocation can serve as a long-term strategic diversifier.
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Why Bitcoin is filling the wealth gap for Gen Z (2:27)
A Bitcoin address that had sat completely untouched since the network’s early days has suddenly come to life.
According to blockchain-tracking firm Galaxy Research, the wallet held 8.54 BTC and moved the entire balance on Aug. 16, its first activity in more than 15 years.
The coins were originally received on June 13, 2011, when Bitcoin traded around $14 each, and stayed frozen for roughly 15.1 years before being swept out in a single transaction recorded in block 962,770. At today’s price, near $64,664, the holdings are worth about $538,000.
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Galaxy Research put the wallet’s realized gain at roughly 461,981% over its original cost.
Bitcoin’s price is not a payout here, the figure simply reflects how far the coins have appreciated since 2011.
Bitcoin price at press time. Source: Decibel
Why an old wallet moving draws attention
Movements like this stand out because so few holders from Bitcoin’s earliest years still control their coins, or the private keys needed to access them.
Wallets untouched this long are often presumed lost, so when one stirs, analysts watch closely for signs an early adopter may be preparing to sell.
One tool they rely on is Coin Days Destroyed, a metric that measures how much “age” a coin builds up for each day it sits unmoved.
A single transfer from a 2011 wallet erases thousands of those accumulated days at once, flagging that a long-dormant balance has changed hands, even when the owner’s motive stays hidden.
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Part of a growing pattern
Importantly, a wallet moving does not necessarily mean a sale is coming.
The address shared by Galaxy Research carried no public identity, leaving the owner’s intentions unknown. Coins are often shifted for reasons like upgrading security or changing custody.
The reactivation is far from a one-off. Over the past two years, dormant wallets stirring back to life has become something of a trend, with several old addresses, some holding millions of dollars in Bitcoin, moving funds after a decade or more of silence.
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kraken responds to michael saylor (1:56)
Michael Saylor has spent six years telling the world to buy Bitcoin. In a recent investor Q&A, he said something that sounded like the opposite, and meant every word of it.
“If your time horizon is less than four months, you probably should own a money market,” Saylor told investors directly.
"If you want a good return in four months to four years, you're probably a credit investor. If you're holding the equity, you need a minimum time horizon of four years. Ideally seven to ten."
Saylor was even more direct when asked about investors trying to predict Bitcoin’s short-term price moves.
“If you’re a short-term price predictor, you’re a trader, I don’t really have much useful wisdom for you,” Saylor said.
"My advice is: don't invest in Bitcoin unless you're going to hold it for more than four years. Ideally, hold it for 10 years."
This was not a retreat from his Bitcoin conviction. It was the clearest explanation he has given of who Bitcoin is actually for, and who it is not.
The four year rule
Saylor’s framework is straightforward. He divides investors into three categories based on time horizon and risk tolerance.
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Short-term money, anything under four months, belongs in money markets or stable instruments. Medium-term capital, four months to four years, belongs in credit instruments like STRC, which pays a yield and carries less volatility than Bitcoin itself.
Long-term capital, four years and beyond, is where Bitcoin and MSTR equity belong.
His reasoning for the four-year minimum is anchored in Bitcoin’s cycle.
“When we look at Bitcoin, we look at the 200-week simple moving average. That gives you the four-year cycle view,” he said during the interaction.
MSTR, being amplified Bitcoin exposure, is even more volatile, and requires an even longer lens to judge accurately.
The shareholder who lost 73%
The most human moment in the Q&A came from a shareholder named Rob, who disclosed he had invested $73,000 each for three children into MSTR, now worth $20,000 each.
Saylor’s response was measured but unapologetic.
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"Bitcoin was at an all-time high about a year ago. When Bitcoin is down 50%, we will be down 75%. When Bitcoin is in a bull market, we expect to outperform Bitcoin," Saylor said.
He acknowledged the pain directly. “I have more than 19 million shares of equity. I feel your pain.”
The message throughout was consistent. Strategy is not a trading vehicle. It is not a dividend play.
It is a long-duration bet on Bitcoin’s outperformance, and anyone who cannot hold for four years minimum should not be holding MSTR at all.
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The Risks of Quantum Computing (2:16)
BTQ Technologies, a company building security tools for the coming era of quantum computing, has added a notable name to its U.S. team.
The company said Dr. Michael Grace has joined to help develop, secure, and commercialize its Quantum Compute-in-Memory architecture, or QCIM, a chip design meant to protect data against future quantum-powered attacks.
Grace arrives with a deep background in product security. According to BTQ, he previously led Samsung Mobile’s Knox Security Team, where he helped shape the security behind products including Samsung Knox, Samsung Pay, and Samsung Pass.
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He later served as Director of Product Security at Mojo Vision, overseeing security for its smart contact lens platform. His work has centered on trusted computing and on protecting small, highly connected devices.
Why the timing matters
His appointment comes as BTQ moves QCIM from a design concept toward real-world use. The technology is built to run cryptographic operations, the mathematical processes that keep data private, directly inside a chip’s memory, which the company says cuts latency, power use, and data movement.
BTQ is developing the chip for devices like internet-connected sensors, AI hardware, and industrial systems.
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CEO and Chairman Olivier Roussy Newton said Grace’s experience will matter more as the architecture moves “from core architecture into broader system integration and commercial evaluation,” pointing to the practical challenge of balancing security, performance, and reliability at once.
The hire follows a recent technical milestone. BTQ said it validated the QCIM core within a TSMC 28-nanometre design environment, confirming the architecture works across several post-quantum cryptography standards set by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology.
Grace, for his part, said security architecture “has to work as part of the complete system, not just in isolation,” adding that he was drawn to QCIM as cryptographic needs evolve.
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HIVE's Frank Holmes says governments will print away every crisis. That's your $3-a-day case for Bitcoin (6:26)
On its fiscal first-quarter 2027 earnings call on Aug. 17, HIVE Digital Technologies (Nasdaq: HIVE) used the spotlight to press a single message: the company is no longer just a Bitcoin miner.
President and CEO Aydin Kilic told analysts the company’s GPU cloud business had reached “critical mass,” a claim anchored by a newly announced contract and backed by a detailed pitch for why HIVE’s stock deserves a higher valuation.
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Kilic said a new five-year agreement, signed with an unnamed investment-grade enterprise customer, is worth approximately $350 million in total contract value and covers 2,016 of Nvidia’s GB300 chips, adding about $70 million in annual recurring revenue.
That deal lifted HIVE’s contracted GPU cloud revenue to about $180 million, closing in on its $200 million year-end target. GPU cloud, also called high-performance computing, refers to renting out powerful chips that companies use to train and run AI models.
The segment made up roughly 10% of revenue in the quarter, with Bitcoin mining still driving the other 90%.
Management framed the shift as a re-rating story. Kilic noted that HIVE has signed about $600 million in total GPU cloud contracts this year against a market value near $800 million, arguing “the stock should be due to re-rate.”
He walked analysts through sum-of-the-parts math pointing to a far larger valuation as the AI buildout scales across sites in Canada, Sweden, and Paraguay.
Kilic added that a separate colocation lease at HIVE’s Boden, Sweden, site, which the company hopes to finalize by the end of September, would push contracted HPC revenue to roughly $225 million, ahead of its year-end goal.
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Addressing the loss and the tax cloud
The call also tackled the figure that stood out in the report: a $142.9 million quarterly net loss.
Kilic and Chief Financial Officer Darcy Daubaras both stressed the loss was driven by non-cash items, chiefly $53.7 million in depreciation and an $84.7 million provision tied to a long-running Swedish VAT dispute over imported mining equipment.
Asked how HIVE intends to fund that liability, Kilic was blunt: “We do not plan to pay.” He said the company will keep appealing, having already paid about $50 million in tax through normal operations. Daubaras pointed instead to the operating picture, citing a return to positive adjusted EBITDA of $13.4 million and a cash position that grew to $208 million from about $23 million three months earlier.
What analysts pressed on
During the Q&A, analysts zeroed in on the economics behind the AI push. Kilic said a typical GPU cluster costs about $185 million, with roughly 20% paid upfront and the rest financed, and that the chips pay for themselves in about three years, leaving the remainder of each contract as free cash flow.
On Bitcoin mining, he said hashprice appears to have found a floor just above $30, and described the mining business as a steady cash generator while most growth capital flows into AI.
Asked about demand, Kilic said HIVE is seeing interest that extends “very far past” its current targets.
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‘Crypto must earn trust’: Crystal Intelligence CEO on scams and security (5:25)
If you are downloading pirated copies of Christopher Nolan’s Hollywood film “The Odyssey” (2026), there is a high chance that you might end up with your funds getting lost.
Bitdefender, a popular cybersecurity technology company, revealed on Aug. 6 that there are fake downloaded copies of “The Odyssey” already spreading the Lumma Stealer malware, targeting crypto wallets, passwords, browser sessions, and cookies.
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Bad actors spread the malware as 1080p WEBRip and Blu-ray copies of the movie, such as:
the odyssey 2160phd (2026) engsubs eztv.exe
the odyssey 2026 1080p h264-djt.exe
the odyssey 2026 1080p webrip-lama.exe
These downloads are Windows executables designed to infect the victim instead of play a video and torrent trackers are full of this type of malware, said Bitdefender.
Lumma Stealer or LummaC2 is a Russian-developed information-stealing malware that has become popular among cybercriminals by promising quick results and ease of use.
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Once executed, the malware can harvest crypto wallets, browser passwords, authentication cookies, saved payment information, remote desktop credentials, and other sensitive information.
Bitdefender said the “The Odyssey” episode surrounding the malware to steal crypto wallets isn’t unheard of.
In 2025, researchers documented a similar campaign abusing fake downloads of “Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning” (2025), where attackers distributed the Lumma Stealer malware through torrent websites using files disguised as movie releases.
In short, hackers actively target those looking to download a pirated copy of blockbuster movies and plant malware to hack their crypto wallets and steal digital assets.
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U.S. Capitol Police Officers arrest Women’s March members as they stage “Abolish ICE” die-in and banner drop at Hart Senate Office Building on August 05, 2026 in Washington, DC.
Getty Images
The United States government is at the center of a lawsuit over an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) contract rivalry as two popular blockchain analytics firms battle it out to win the contract.
TRM Labs and Chainalysis are both blockchain intelligence companies. They analyze cryptocurrency transactions and blockchain activity to help governments, financial institutions, and law enforcement agencies understand where funds are moving.
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The government recently awarded the ICE contract to TRM Labs. The contract, valued at approximately $94.6 million, covers forensic software and support services for Homeland Security Task Force investigations and runs from July 1, 2026, through June 30, 2027.
In response, TRM Labs’ competitor Chainalysis Government Solutions sued the U.S. Court of Federal Claims on July 27 and argued the ICE’s decision to award the contract to TRM was “arbitrary, capricious, and unreasonable.”
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The court allowed Chainalysis to keep the complaint under seal on July 31 because it keeps the blockchain firm’s confidential and proprietary information and trade secrets.
Both the blockchain analytics firms offer tools to government agencies to trace crypto transactions.
The court has scheduled responses from the U.S. government and TRM Labs for Aug. 21 and oral argument for Sept. 2.
TheStreet Roundtable reached out to the ICE, TRM Labs, and Chainalysis for comments on the lawsuit and the first two bodies did not send any response by the time of publishing this report. We will update the report whenever we receive a response.
Chainalysis said it is unable to comment on the development.
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Explained: What is Bitcoin mining? (6:23)
JPMorgan Chase has raised its price target on Riot Platforms (Nasdaq: RIOT), a Bitcoin miner increasingly moving into AI infrastructure, to $22 from $20, while keeping its Overweight rating.
The bank said in an Aug. 17 research note that Riot is “building momentum,” pointing to a recently signed lease with AI company, Anthropic, at what it called “attractive economics.”
JPMorgan added that Riot’s separate lease with chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) remains on track. Riot shares climbed following the note
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A bigger vote of confidence from Morgan Stanley
JPMorgan isn’t alone in turning more positive. On Aug. 13, Morgan Stanley raised its own Riot target sharply, to $43 from $36, also keeping an Overweight rating.
That figure sits more than 100% above where the stock recently traded, though price targets reflect analyst estimates rather than guaranteed outcomes.
The optimism traces back to Aug. 11, when Riot announced a $9 billion, 20-year compute agreement with Anthropic, confirmed by CNBC’s David Faber.
The deal leases 191 megawatts at Riot’s Rockdale, Texas campus, giving Anthropic access to scarce, grid-connected power as demand for AI computing surges. It effectively repositions Riot from a bitcoin miner into an AI infrastructure landlord.
The agreement is expected to generate $9.1 billion in revenue over 20 years, rising to roughly $16.1 billion if extended by two additional five-year terms. Combined with the AMD lease, Compass Point analyst Michael Donovan noted Riot now runs a two-tenant campus carrying $9.8 billion in contracted data center revenue.
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Why miners are being valued differently
Bitcoin mining stocks were once seen mainly as a leveraged bet on Bitcoin’s price.
But as AI demand grows and crypto prices stay under pressure, investors increasingly value miners like Riot for their power capacity, data centers, and energy contracts, treating them as owners of digital infrastructure rather than simply producers of Bitcoin.
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Elon Musk's Tesla doesn't sell Bitcoin (1:42)
On Apr. 1, 2021, Elon Musk posted four words that changed Dogecoin’s trajectory permanently. “SpaceX is going to put a literal Dogecoin on the literal moon.” Most people assumed it was an April Fool’s joke.
CNBC space reporter said he had no doubt Musk would actually do it. Musk confirmed it was real, and Dogecoin surged 32% within minutes.
The formal announcement followed on May 9, 2021, when SpaceX confirmed it had accepted Dogecoin as payment for the DOGE-1 mission, a 40-kilogram CubeSat designed to collect lunar-spatial intelligence data, becoming the first space mission in history funded entirely by a cryptocurrency.
Five years, four months, and multiple delays later, that satellite finally launches on Sep. 14, 2026 — 28 days from now.
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What $1,000 invested at the announcement is worth today
Two entry points define the investor experience around DOGE-1.
Anyone who bought Dogecoin on the day of Musk’s original tweet on Apr. 1, 2021, at approximately $0.058 per coin got 17,241 DOGE for $1,000.
At today’s price of $0.070, that position is worth approximately $1,207, a gain of 20.7%.
But only if they bought before the 32% surge that followed within minutes of the tweet and held through five years of volatility, two bear markets, and consecutive launch delays.
Anyone who bought around May 9, 2021, the day of the formal SpaceX announcement, at approximately $0.44 per coin got 2,273 DOGE for $1,000. At today’s $0.070, that position is worth approximately $159, a loss of 84%.
The difference between a 20.7% gain and an 84% loss comes down to 38 days and a 32% price surge.
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What the launch could do next
History offers one data point. The 2021 announcement triggered a 30% surge. The token reached close to $0.60 during that rally before correcting sharply.
A second catalyst, an actual launch rather than just an announcement, could produce a similar reaction. Or a sell-the-news collapse. Both outcomes have historical precedent in crypto.
There are currently two US-listed spot ETFs tied to DOGE: REX-Osprey’s DOJE and 21Shares’ TDOG, which gives institutional investors regulated access to any launch-driven rally.
The announcement gave early buyers 20.7% over five years. The formal confirmation cost late buyers 84%.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. Cryptocurrency investments are highly volatile and risky. Always conduct your own research before making any investment decisions.
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A girl holds the hand of a remote-controlled robot by Unitree Robotics while visiting the Unitree Robotics Embodied Intelligence Experience Center in the Jing’ an district in Shanghai on August 17, 2026.
Getty Images
Hangzhou Yushu Technology Co., doing business as Unitree Robotics, is a robotics company based in Hangzhou, China.
Founded by Wang Xingxing in August 2016, Unitree initially specialized in quadruped robots and began producing humanoid robots in 2024.
As Unitree prepares to make its initial public offering (IPO) in the Shanghai market, the Chinese robot maker is going to offer shares at 150.80 yuan ($22.37) a piece and is seeking to raise approximately $9 billion.
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Hyperliquid traders bet big on pre-IPO Unitree perpetuals
Ahead of the Unitree Robotics’ public market debut, crypto traders on Hyperliquid have priced the robot maker four times its valuation.
Hyperliquid is a decentralized crypto exchange that is built to primarily trade high-leverage perpetual futures. The exchange lets traders speculate on commodities, equities, and private-company valuations through blockchain-based markets.
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While Hyperliquid traders can’t be identified by name, their blockchain wallet addresses are public. This is exactly why they are called “mysterious traders” because though nobody knows their names, their trades can be tracked on-chain.
Note that pre-IPO perpetuals on Hyperliquid don’t provide ownership in the underlying company, and positions cannot be converted into actual shares.
Though Unitree is going to offer shares at $22.37 a piece, Hyperliquid traders are trading pre-IPO perpetual contracts on Hyperliquid for $97 at the time of writing. It translates into a valuation of approximately $40 billion.
Unitree-USDC, Source: Hyperliquid
It means Hyperliquid traders are betting on a fourfold upside ahead of Unitree’s IPO.
The fourfold upside means Unitree can have a blockbuster public debut in the Shanghai market.
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Mark Cuban offers blunt response to Coinbase CEO (2:22)
Over the weekend, the Dallas Mavericks owner and Cost Plus Drugs founder, Mark Cuban, made a surprising prediction with one short comment.
He declared that “chips as an asset class will be the new crypto.”
Cuban was referring to high-end semiconductor chips, particularly the GPUs powering artificial intelligence systems. These components have become critical infrastructure for training and running large AI models.
Demand has outstripped supply in recent years, turning what was once viewed as ordinary hardware into a scarce and highly sought-after resource.
From hardware to investable asset
Traditionally, computer chips were treated as depreciating equipment that lost value over time. The AI boom has challenged that view.
Companies and data centers now compete aggressively for advanced processors, and secondary markets for used or allocated chips have begun to emerge.
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Cuban’s comparison suggests he sees this scarcity and utility creating the kind of speculative frenzy once reserved for cryptocurrencies.
The timing of the remark added to its impact. Crypto markets have faced mixed sentiment in recent months, and many traders are looking for the next narrative that could attract large inflows.
Cuban’s track record as an early tech investor and his past comments on Bitcoin and Ethereum give the statement extra weight in both traditional and digital asset circles.
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Mixed reaction from the crypto crowd
Not everyone welcomed the prediction. Some Bitcoin advocates pushed back, arguing that chips lack the fixed supply, transparent issuance rules, and decentralized nature that define cryptocurrencies.
Others treated the comment as a sign that attention is shifting away from digital assets toward physical technology tied to AI growth.
Cuban did not expand on the post or outline a specific investment thesis. Still, the simplicity of the message has kept it circulating.
For many watching the intersection of AI, hardware, and alternative assets, the billionaire’s latest call has become the conversation of the moment.
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Tesla Bull Ross Gerber has a hot take on gold rival (1:57)
Ross Gerber is asking questions about Bitcoin that most holders would rather not answer right now, and doing it while making clear he isn’t heading for the exit himself.
The Gerber Kawasaki CEO and wealth manager posted on X questioning Bitcoin’s practical utility in a world where its use cases remain largely theoretical for most people.
The post drew attention not just for the critique but for the pointed comparison he drew at the end.
Gold still works better in most places
Gerber’s central argument is about usability. Despite years of promises from Bitcoin advocates about payments, financial inclusion, and a new monetary system, he said gold remains more practically accessible for most people in most places.
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“Probably easier to use gold than bitcoin in most places still despite the endless promises of its use cases,” Gerber wrote in the post.
“What have these people built of value, stable coins? Really? So what’s the point of having a monetary system that can’t really be used,” he wrote, dismissing the most cited example of crypto’s real-world utility as insufficient justification for the broader monetary vision Bitcoin’s supporters have been selling.
His question is a version of one that critics have raised for years: if Bitcoin is meant to be a usable monetary system, why is it still so difficult to use as one?
“I haven’t sold any Bitcoin, unlike Saylor”
The sharpest line in Gerber's post wasn't about gold. It was the closing shot at Michael Saylor. "I'm just asking some questions aloud, nor have I sold any Bitcoin, unlike Saylor," he wrote.
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The comparison is deliberate. Saylor, an American billionaire entrepreneur and executive chairman of Strategy Inc. (formerly MicroStrategy), has positioned himself as Bitcoin’s most committed institutional advocate while Strategy has sold Bitcoin multiple times this year to fund dividend payments on its preferred securities.
Gerber, who holds Bitcoin but has been publicly skeptical of aspects of the asset’s narrative, is drawing a contrast between his own inaction and Saylor’s, suggesting the loudest voice in the room isn’t necessarily the most committed holder.
Gerber’s post arrives as gold breaks out and Bitcoin breaks down simultaneously, exactly the dynamic Peter Schiff flagged this week in his rotation argument.
Gold up sharply, Bitcoin struggling, and now a Bitcoin holder publicly questioning the asset’s utility without selling it’s the kind of moment that generates more heat than usual because the market backdrop makes the critique harder to dismiss.
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With BlackRock ETF, Wall Street Meets Bitcoin (2:16)
Billionaire investor Paul Tudor Jones‘ macro hedge fund Tudor Investment boosted its stake in BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF (Nasdaq: IBIT) last quarter after a year of selling.
Launched in January 2024, BlackRock’s IBIT is the largest spot Bitcoin ETF in the U.S. It is the best-known Wall Street financial instrument for Bitcoin exposure.
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As per the 13F filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Aug. 14, the fund held 688,529 IBIT shares worth approximately $22.9 million as of June 30.
The fund cut its reported IBIT-linked call options from 998,000 underlying shares to 148,000 by around 85%but kept its put position steady.
While the macro fund held 579,083 IBIT shares at the end of March, it held 688,529 shares by the end of June. So, it has boosted its stake by 109,446 IBIT shares.
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At its peak in late 2024, the fund held more than 8 million IBIT shares worth $427 million back then.
Billionaire investor Paul Tudor Jones first backed Bitcoin in May 2020, revealing he put 1%-2% of his assets in the leading cryptocurrency.
He has referred to Bitcoin as “unequivocally the best inflation hedge that there is” and argued that every portfolio should have an allocation to Bitcoin, gold, and stocks.
BTC/USD, Source: Decibel
Bitcoin hit the all-time high (ATH) of $126,080 on Oct. 6, 2025. It is currently trading 50% lower than the peak at $$62,833 at press time.

GENIUS Act (2:39)
The U.S. Treasury Department is moving ahead with its work to implement the GENIUS Act, opening another stage in the creation of a federal framework for payment stablecoins.
The department is seeking public input on proposed rules as regulators work to turn the legislation into a functioning regulatory system.
The move gives stablecoin companies, financial institutions and other industry participants an opportunity to weigh in before the rules are finalized.
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What the GENIUS Act does
The Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins Act, better known as the GENIUS Act, establishes the first federal framework specifically designed to regulate payment stablecoins in the United States.
President Donald Trump signed the legislation into law in July 2025. The law is designed to establish rules around stablecoin issuers while addressing consumer protection, financial stability and illicit-finance risks.
Among other provisions, the framework requires payment stablecoins to be backed by reserves and establishes requirements for permitted issuers.
It also gives smaller issuers the option of operating under state regulatory regimes when those systems are substantially similar to the federal framework.
Treasury has already issued proposals covering parts of the law, including state-level regulation and anti-money-laundering and sanctions requirements.
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Bessent highlights the bigger goal
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the administration is moving quickly to implement the framework and welcomed feedback from stakeholders.
“POTUS and Congress delivered the GENIUS Act, establishing a landmark framework and clear rules of the road for payment stablecoins, and Treasury is moving quickly to implement that framework,” Bessent wrote on X.
He said the rules could provide businesses with greater regulatory certainty while helping the U.S. dollar maintain its position as the world’s reserve currency.
Bessent also said the administration wants to “keep America the crypto capital of the world.”
For the stablecoin industry, the rulemaking represents another step toward clearer U.S. regulation after years of uncertainty.
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Exclusive: Peter Schiff says the Fed 'never should have stopped hiking' (5:00)
Peter Schiff has been making the gold versus Bitcoin argument for years. Early Monday on X, he framed it as something more immediate, a rotation that is playing out in real time, right now, in the price action of both assets simultaneously.
"Gold and silver appear to be breaking out just as Bitcoin is breaking down," Schiff wrote on X. "That is not a coincidence."
The rotation argument
Schiff’s thesis has always been that Bitcoin and gold are competing for the same pool of capital, investors seeking an alternative to fiat currencies whose purchasing power erodes over time through inflation and monetary expansion.
His latest post adds a new layer to that argument. He isn’t just saying gold is better than Bitcoin.
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He’s saying investors who previously chose Bitcoin as their fiat alternative are now choosing gold instead.
"Some now seek an alternative to digital fiat, since it's been losing purchasing power for over five years," he wrote, framing Bitcoin itself as a form of currency debasement rather than a hedge against it.
The data behind the claim
The timing of Schiff’s post isn’t arbitrary. Gold has been on a sustained run in recent weeks, gaining over 10 percent in the past ten days according to macro analyst Robin Brooks.
He recently made a similar observation that gold’s strength and Bitcoin’s weakness were diverging rather than moving together.
Bitcoin, meanwhile, has been navigating one of its most difficult stretches, down almost more than 40 percent from its all-time high, with apparent demand negative for over 200 consecutive days and institutional ETF flows in persistent outflow territory.
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Earlier this month, Schiff noted that a “peace-inspired mega-rally” has lifted many risk assets, including mining stocks, yet Bitcoin has barely participated. He argued that once the current correction spreads beyond tech, Bitcoin is likely to face “a much bigger selloff.”
Where this leaves investors
Schiff’s framing will be contested by Bitcoin advocates who argue the two assets are not substitutes and that Bitcoin’s weakness reflects a cyclical bear market rather than a structural failure.
Cathie Wood, Anthony Scaramucci, and Mike Novogratz have all maintained long-term price targets well above current levels in recent months.
But the simultaneous breakout in gold and breakdown in Bitcoin gives Schiff’s rotation argument more visual evidence than he has had at any point in recent years.
Whether it’s a temporary divergence or something more structural is the question the market will spend the rest of the year answering.
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HIVE's Frank Holmes says governments will print away every crisis. That's your $3-a-day case for Bitcoin (6:26)
HIVE Digital Technologies (Nasdaq: HIVE) shares rose about 13% in premarket trading on Aug. 17 after the Bitcoin mining and AI company announced a major new AI infrastructure contract, extending a rally that began with last week’s earnings.
HIVE Digital, founded in 2017, mines bitcoin with renewable energy and runs a growing AI computing business through its subsidiary BUZZ HPC.
The company said BUZZ HPC has signed a five-year GPU cloud services agreement with an unnamed “investment-grade enterprise customer.”
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What the deal is worth
The contract carries a total value of about $350 million over five years and adds roughly $70 million in annualized recurring revenue, HIVE said.
That lifts BUZZ HPC’s total annualized revenue to about $180 million, a meaningful step toward the roughly $200 million year-end target the company reaffirmed in last week’s earnings report.
HIVE stock price at press time. Source: Yahoo
Under the agreement, BUZZ HPC will build a dedicated AI cluster of 2,016 NVIDIA Blackwell Ultra GPUs at a facility in Merritt, British Columbia, powered entirely by renewable hydroelectric energy.
The system is expected to go live in the fourth quarter of this year, at which point HIVE said its daily AI and high-performance computing revenue would reach about $500,000.
Executive chairman Frank Holmes tied the contract to HIVE’s broader model. “What excites me most is the synergy between our two businesses,” he said, explaining that whether HIVE deploys mining chips or AI GPUs, its core expertise stays the same: securing renewable energy and converting it into valuable computing power.
He said the company has the potential to bring more than 120,000 GPUs online over the next two years.
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How the economics work
HIVE expects to spend about $185 million deploying the cluster and will receive an upfront deposit of roughly $35 million, about 10% of the contract’s value, from the customer.
President and CEO Aydin Kilic said the five-year term and the deposit “support an attractive economic and return profile,” adding that HIVE is using proceeds from a June 2026 convertible bond and debt financing to fund the GPUs.
Building on a mixed quarter
The deal follows HIVE’s fiscal first-quarter results, released last week, in which revenue jumped about 74% year over year to $79.1 million on strong bitcoin mining and AI growth.
That quarter also carried a $142.9 million net loss, driven largely by a one-time, non-cash charge tied to a contested tax assessment in Sweden.
The new contract adds to the AI-focused growth story management has been emphasizing, as HIVE positions itself as a provider of what it calls sovereign AI cloud infrastructure for Canada and beyond.
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