The scarcity of NFL games enhances their event-driven nature, boosting their overall value. Quality and scarcity are essential for building a successful podcast. Embracing constraints can lead to innovative and successful business models.

The post Michael Lewis: The NFL’s scarcity drives fan loyalty, why quality and exclusivity matter in podcasting, and how constraints fuel innovation | Acquired appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Time return on investment is crucial for growth leaders, focusing on maximizing efficiency in marketing efforts. Granular oversight is essential in managing large marketing budgets effectively. Balancing brand and acquisition marketing leads to more successful strategies.

The post Omer Shai: Time return on investment is key for marketing success | 20VC appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Interest rates may return to zero due to current economic conditions. The long-term bond market trend is breaking down, signaling a shift in economic conditions. Asset prices often experience parabolic rallies after a slow upward trend.

The post Alex Gurevich: Interest rates may return to zero, the long-term bond market trend is breaking down, and parabolic rallies follow slow upward trends | Forward Guidance appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Argentina has a significant number of daily crypto users, with about 5 million people engaging with it regularly. Devconnect is the largest Ethereum event ever organized in terms of attendance. The decision to create a world fair format for the event was driven by the need to showcase practical a...

The post Nathan Sexer: Argentina’s crypto boom fuels Ethereum’s biggest event ever | Epicenter appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Freedom is often threatened by fear and greed, which require active management. Confronting the fear of death can lead to a more fulfilling life. Alcohol consumption can lead to brain cell paralysis and death, impacting cognitive abilities.

The post Pavel Durov: Freedom is threatened by fear and greed, confronting mortality enhances life quality, and alcohol consumption harms cognitive abilities | Lex Fridman Podcast appeared first on Crypto Briefing.

Bitcoin Magazine

How Silent.Link Solves SIM-Swap Risks and Roaming Hassles for Traveling Bitcoiners

Silent Link, a Bitcoin native SMS and mobile data company, has quietly grown into an international service provider for privacy-oriented users worldwide, at competitive rates. But how can a young company compete with the mobile data giants?

Born from the Bitcoin industry, the brainchild of cypherpunk thought leaders like Matt Odell, Silent Link is a modern mobile data and SMS company that challenges the complicated and mediocre customer service of phone service providers around the world.

A founding member of Silent Link, who asked not to be named, and thus we will call Bob, told Bitcoin Magazine in an exclusive interview the genesis story of this company that’s solving one of the most common pain points of the international and travel-savvy Bitcoiner, getting data and SMS authentication messages anywhere in the world. The company offers eSIM-only services globally, with no physical sim card support, making it an entirely digital business. Its Bitcoin native design shows up on its pricing, which Bob says has only gone down over time, already dropping 20% in 2026.  

Bitcoin Native and Privacy Focused

Born during the 2020 COVID lockdowns, Bob recalled that he went on a Matt Odell podcast marathon during which he was inspired to run his own BTCPay Server instance. He figured if he could come up with a digital business that earned Bitcoin, he would have a solid way stack sats directly to self-custody.

After setting up the basic payments suite common to many Bitcoin companies, made up of BTCPay servers, an open source stack with Lightning support, full invoicing and accounting back end, Bob realised he now needed a product. It was not long before him, and his growing team realised that providing a modern data and SMS service might just be the perfect product.

Today, Silent Link offers users worldwide data rates competitive with phone service giants, as well as incoming SMS texts often needed for authentication to legacy companies like banks, and many online web platforms. The company does not offer outgoing texts, nor does it support normal phone calls. Bob explained that these are terrible protocols, fully surveilled by governments throughout the world, and his target audience uses more secure and sophisticated messaging apps anyway. 

As such, Silent Link is a privacy-first Bitcoin company. Instead of connecting your phone services to your personal information, which in many countries ends up deeply integrated with the financial system, even showing up in credit scores, Silent Link provides essential services in the digital age, while collecting no personal information from its users. Bob added that “not even the local data carrier knows your phone number”. 

Silent Link eSIMS can be purchased even without giving the company an email. Bob explained that if you have no user information, there’s nothing to hack and there’s no honey pot to go after, adding that so far they have received “zero requests for user information” from governments. Furthermore, it aligns incentives between the company and its users, rather than turning the user’s data into a product to be sold to third parties. According to Bob, the company is also entirely self-funded and profitable, another critical decision that he feels aligns incentives with its users, adding that “you can not serve two masters”.

Users get a special link when they purchase an eSIM, a code that they can back up in a similar way as they would store the 12 words to their Bitcoin wallet, and this simple secret information serves as their key and authentication to their eSIM service. Bob added that this model of authentication nullifies the infamous “sim card swap” attacks, which have led to multi-million dollar hacks in the industry throughout the years. 

Roaming and Travel Automated

Further polishing the user experience, clearly designed to serve an audience that travels often and is sensitive to cybersecurity risks, Silent Linkautomates and hides roaming-related decisions when users move from one country to another, be it for travel or otherwise. Bob says users can expect the same phone number to work in most countries, without having to worry about getting a local temporary sim card, having to buy roaming access, getting overcharged, or having to talk to customer service to make a special purchase at all. Silent Linksimply connects to data providers in the local network and draws from the balance on the user accounts, minimising friction and staying competitive on price. 

According to Bob, Silent Link can get around state firewalls, including the Chinese firewall, and users report they can use WhatsApp from Dubai, which has restrictions on Voice over IP (VoIP) protocols. The eSIM model actually has a lot to do with this censorship resistance quality unlocked by Silent Link.

Data sharing hotspot features are not throttled either, essential for perpetual travellers and those Bitcoiners hopping from conference to conference around the globe as they work online.

This post How Silent.Link Solves SIM-Swap Risks and Roaming Hassles for Traveling Bitcoiners first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Juan Galt.

Bitcoin Magazine

Coinbase (COIN) Surges 18%, Strategy (MSTR) Jumps 10% as Crypto Stocks Jump 

U.S. markets saw a rotation into risk assets today and crypto-linked stocks, like Coinbase and Strategy, led some of the brightest gains of the day’s session. Even as broader indexes such as the Dow and S&P 500 traded mixed on inflation and economic data, digital-asset exposure helped certain high-beta names outperform.

Coinbase (COIN) was among the standout performers. COIN surged more than 18% on the day, finishing well ahead of most traditional technology stocks as traders “bought the dip” in crypto exposure. 

The daily gain came despite a difficult earnings backdrop: Coinbase reported a $666.7 million Q4 2025 loss, its first in several quarters, driven by lower trading revenue as crypto volumes sagged. 

Long-term revenue lines like subscription and services — particularly stablecoin revenue — showed strength, helping cushion sentiment.

Over the last couple of months, Coinbase shares have slid as the broader crypto market weakened and analysts grew more cautious. 

Monness Crespi & Hardt downgraded $COIN from buy to neutral, setting a $120 price target and warning of downside risk tied to softer market conditions. 

The stock has struggled in early 2026, falling roughly 34% year-to-date as Bitcoin dropped about 30% in the past month and altcoins posted even steeper losses. Lower crypto prices have reduced trading volumes, squeezing one of Coinbase’s main revenue drivers. 

Meanwhile, CEO Brian Armstrong sold more than 1.5 million shares worth about $545 million, calling it a diversification move. 

Strategy’s (MSTR) strong day

Strategy (MSTR) also posted notable upside on the day, with shares rising around 10% in line with a rebound in Bitcoin prices. Strategy shares have swung dramatically alongside bitcoin’s price, falling hard during the broader crypto sell-off before rebounding later into the week as markets stabilized. 

Despite the turbulence, Strategy is staying committed to adding to its bitcoin treasury. The firm disclosed another purchase of more than 1,100 BTC this week, spending roughly $90 million at an average price near the high-$70,000 range. 

Strategy also announced its latest earnings results, which reflected the risks of its bitcoin-heavy balance sheet. 

The company posted a multi-billion dollar quarterly loss, largely tied to mark-to-market declines on its bitcoin holdings, underscoring how price downturns can heavily impact reported financial performance even as the firm maintains a long-term holding posture.

Executive Chairman Michael Saylor continued to publicly defend the strategy, reiterating that the company does not intend to sell bitcoin through downturns and arguing that Strategy is positioned to withstand extended volatility in Bitcoin’s price. 

Other crypto-related stocks saw gains as well today, with Circle (CRCL) climbing roughly 7% and Galaxy Digital (GLXY) rising 6.5%, continuing the sector’s upward momentum.

This post Coinbase (COIN) Surges 18%, Strategy (MSTR) Jumps 10% as Crypto Stocks Jump  first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin Magazine

White House Executive Director: Trillions Are Waiting To Enter Bitcoin And Crypto, Working Hard on Market Structure Bill

Patrick Witt, Executive Director of the President’s Council of Advisors for Digital Assets, discussed the ongoing push for the crypto legislation and the federal government’s management of Bitcoin during a Yahoo Finance interview earlier today, stressing the need for regulatory clarity and institutional engagement.

Witt explained that the House passed its version of the Clarity Act last year, and the Senate is drafting its own amendments. 

Sections of the bill addressing the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) have cleared the Agriculture Committee, while portions covering the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) remain in the Senate Banking Committee. A markup scheduled for January was postponed, and Witt said discussions are underway to resolve outstanding issues. 

“We are taking it so seriously,” he noted, emphasizing the need for compromise on concerns such as stablecoin yields and deposit flight.

“We’ve taken it so seriously,” he said, “It’s why we’ve hosted the different interested stakeholders here at the White House, and we’re going to continue to stay at the table and encourage them to find a compromise on this issue.” 

Crypto held by the U.S. government

While the Clarity Act focuses on regulatory clarity, Witt highlighted the government’s Bitcoin holdings as a separate but critical priority. 

Following an executive order, agencies halted uncontrolled liquidation of digital assets, preventing potential losses that “could have been tens of billions of dollars.” 

He said efforts are underway to centralize oversight, ensure proper accounting of wallets holding Bitcoin and other digital assets, and explore ways to increase the government’s holdings in a budget-neutral manner.

Witt pointed to existing legislation from Senator Cynthia Lummis and a forthcoming House bill from Representative Begich, which would formalize authority over government digital assets. 

“Ultimately, if Congress decides, we could add to that stockpile with outright purchases,” he said, noting that such acquisitions would require appropriations approval.

Witt spent some time in the interview stressing the broader implications for U.S. leadership in digital finance. Centralizing asset management safeguards public resources while positioning the United States to engage more strategically in Bitcoin markets. 

“There are trillions of dollars in institutional capital on the sidelines waiting to get into this space,” Witt said via X regarding the interview. 

Witt also noted that improved regulatory clarity under the Clarity Act allows both banks and crypto firms to operate with confidence, creating opportunities for innovation and institutional participation.

He emphasized that banks and crypto companies are moving toward collaboration. “There’s tremendous opportunity for the JPMorgans of the world to engage in crypto activities,” he said.

With committee reconciliation and Senate floor time still pending, Witt signaled a sense of urgency. 

“We’ve got to get this done,” he said, framing crypto legislation and government Bitcoin oversight as complementary steps to secure U.S. influence in crypto.

This post White House Executive Director: Trillions Are Waiting To Enter Bitcoin And Crypto, Working Hard on Market Structure Bill first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin Magazine

Brazil Proposes National Bitcoin Reserve, Targets 1 Million BTC Over Five Years

Brazilian lawmakers have reintroduced a bill to create a national Strategic Sovereign Bitcoin Reserve, known as RESBit, proposing the gradual acquisition of one million bitcoins over five years. 

The bill, presented by Federal Deputy Luiz Gastão (PSD/CE), outlines a comprehensive framework to integrate Bitcoin into the country’s financial strategy and diversify national reserves.

The proposed legislation establishes several guidelines for RESBit. First, the plan calls for a gradual accumulation of at least 1,000,000 BTC over five years. It prohibits the sale of bitcoins seized by Brazilian judicial authorities, ensuring that these assets remain within public control. 

The bill also allows for the collection of Brazil’s federal taxes in Bitcoin and offers incentives for public companies to engage in Bitcoin mining and storage.

Transparency is a central feature of the proposal. The bill mandates public disclosure of RESBit’s bitcoin holdings through internet-based platforms, enabling auditing by the public.

It emphasizes secure storage of digital assets using technologies such as cold wallets, multisignature wallets, and other internationally recognized mechanisms.

In addition, the legislation permits temporary holdings of spot ETFs backed by bitcoin in the reserve portfolio, subject to urgent and limited circumstances.

If approved, Brazil could join a small group of countries actively holding Bitcoin at a national level, potentially surpassing major holders like the United States and China. 

Other countries like Brazil exploring Bitcoin reserves 

Quite famously, El Salvador holds the mantle as the ‘world’s first country’ with a strategic Bitcoin reserve, reporting over 7,560 Bitcoin under President Nayib Bukele’s program.

Despite scaling back mandatory Bitcoin acceptance under IMF agreements, the government has maintained regular purchases, citing long-term financial sovereignty and reserve diversification. The National Bitcoin Office now splits holdings across multiple addresses to bolster security and transparency.

The Central American nation’s approach has inspired policymakers worldwide. In the United States, the BITCOIN Act of 2025 proposed somewhat of a federal strategic Bitcoin reserve, while several states, including New Hampshire and Arizona, have passed or proposed laws allowing portions of public funds to be invested in digital assets.

President Trump’s March 2025 executive order further directed federal agencies to explore Bitcoin accumulation from seized assets without new taxpayer costs.

In Europe, the Czech National Bank has a similar allocation in bitcoin, while Switzerland sees a citizen-led initiative proposing a constitutional mandate for Bitcoin holdings. 

Hong Kong, Ukraine, and Pakistan are also exploring frameworks to hold Bitcoin at the national level, with Pakistan pledging never to sell its future reserves.

This post Brazil Proposes National Bitcoin Reserve, Targets 1 Million BTC Over Five Years first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin Magazine

Lightning Labs Rolls Out AI Agent Tools to Help With Bitcoin Transactions on Lightning Network

Lightning Labs has released a new open-source toolkit designed to allow AI agents to operate directly on the Bitcoin Lightning Network, providing autonomous systems with a native way to make payments and access services. 

The company says the tools address a key gap in the emerging AI economy: enabling agents to transact without human intervention.

Michael Levin, Lightning Labs’ Head of Product Growth, explained that the toolkit allows AI systems to run a Lightning node, pay for services, and host paid endpoints without needing identity verification, API keys, or traditional registration. 

The repository includes seven modular features, covering tasks such as node management, key isolation, scoped credentials, L402-based payments, paid endpoint hosting, and querying the state of a node.

‘Inget’ — your bitcoin payments agent

A central feature of the release is lnget, a command-line HTTP client that works with the L402 payment standard. L402 is based on the internet’s HTTP 402 “Payment Required” status code. Instead of requiring a login or API key, an L402-enabled server responds to a request with a Lightning invoice.

lnget automatically reads the invoice, pays it through a connected Lightning backend, and retrieves cryptographic proof of payment. The agent can then access the requested resource, and subsequent requests reuse cached credentials.

The tools support several Lightning backends. Users can connect directly to a local lnd node via gRPC, use Lightning Node Connect for encrypted tunnel access, or experiment with an embedded Neutrino light wallet. 

This flexibility allows developers to experiment without running a full Lightning node, while maintaining compatibility with production setups.

Lightning Labs frames the launch as a step toward a “machine-payable web.” Traditional financial systems such as credit cards or bank accounts do not work well for autonomous agents, which need instant, programmatic payments often at very small values.

 The combination of lnget on the client side and Lightning Labs’ Aperture reverse proxy on the server side enables a full commerce loop: one agent can host a paid service, and another can consume it, with Lightning handling the payment behind the scenes.

Private key security

The toolkit emphasizes security. Lightning Labs recommends using LND remote signer architecture, which separates private key storage from node operations. The agent can interact with the node without ever directly accessing private keys. 

Developers can also use scoped credentials called macaroons, which grant limited permissions such as pay-only, invoice-only, or read-only, reducing risk while allowing agents to transact safely.

Lightning Labs’ release comes as broader efforts to enable AI payments gain traction. 

Coinbase recently unveiled Agentic Wallets, allowing agents to hold funds, make payments, and trade tokens using the x402 protocol, while Stripe has previewed machine payments for USDC.

This post Lightning Labs Rolls Out AI Agent Tools to Help With Bitcoin Transactions on Lightning Network first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

Bitcoin’s slide toward $60,000 came with the usual noise from exchanges, but the sheer size of the panic was evident somewhere else. Options tied to BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) traded about 2.33 million contracts in a single trading day, a record that arrived right as price was at its most unstable.

At the same time, the underlying asset saw a record day as well. On the same day, IBIT itself printed more than 284 million shares of turnover, worth over $10 billion in notional.

While the crash took a toll on exchanges, they weren't the only ones affected by the volatility. A lot of the fear, protection, and tactical positioning ran through a regulated US-listed product and echoed into its options chain, where investors were able to express downside protection, volatility views, and hedges without touching offshore perpetual swaps.

The fact that we saw so much volatility in derivatives matters because it changes where the market leaves clues in real time. For most of Bitcoin’s life, the fastest stress read lived in offshore leverage, especially perps, where liquidations and funding could turn a drawdown into a waterfall.

Perps still matter, but this episode shows another wrapper acting as a pressure gauge. ETF options trade on US exchanges, clear through US infrastructure, and are accessible to deep pools of institutional capital.

The timing helps explain why. Bitcoin hit an intraday low around $60,017.60 on Feb. 6 before rebounding above $70,000, a violent round trip that created perfect conditions for options demand: uncertainty, gap risk, and the need to set a known worst-case outcome.

When price can move thousands of dollars in minutes, investors who already hold exposure want to protect themselves from a worse drawdown tomorrow, and options are the quickest and easiest way to do that

The record options volume caused a lot of market chatter about whether there was a hidden unwind behind the move.

Whether or not there was an unwind, the more useful focus is on what the market actually did. In moments like this, the ETF options chain can show you what kind of participants are active, because different motives leave different fingerprints in the same place.

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Why the panic showed up in IBIT options

To understand why IBIT options are now such a dominant force in the market, we first need to understand who uses these contracts. The obvious group is directional holders. If you run a Bitcoin allocation through spot, through the ETF itself, or through a portfolio that treats IBIT as the approved wrapper, you can hedge quickly by buying puts.

A put is insurance: it costs a premium up front, and it pays out if price falls below a strike. That's a very effective tool for an investment committee that wants protection without turning its entire Bitcoin strategy upside down.

Then there are volatility traders, specialists who treat the size of the move as the product. In a crash, implied volatility can jump because everyone wants protection at once.

If you can buy options before that jump, or sell them once they're expensive, you can trade the crash without taking a long-term view on Bitcoin’s fundamentals. Those trades often come as spreads rather than single legs.

The more complex they are, the more they belong in regulated venues that can clear and net risk efficiently. Their tell is heavy turnover in spreads as implied volatility reprices.

Finally, there are basis and relative-value players, the group that makes Wall Street crypto feel like an extension of rates and equity index playbooks. Basis trades in Bitcoin often pair one instrument against another, long spot exposure and short futures, or long ETF exposure and short CME futures, capturing a carry that remains steady until volatility spikes and margin requirements jump.

When that sort of book is under stress, the quickest way to reduce risk can be buying protection through options. It can stabilize the downside while you unwind the rest of the structure over hours or days.

This is where the IBIT records start looking like a map of how risk is being warehoused. If the ETF turns over $10 billion in a day during a dump, that can mean capitulation, but it can also mean two-way activity: one participant hits out, another steps in, and dealers intermediate the flow.

Add a record 2.33 million option contracts on top, and you have a strong hint that many participants weren't just selling spot into the hole. They were reshaping exposure, adding hedges, and trading volatility itself in a venue that exists precisely to make those adjustments possible at scale.

There are three clean readings of a record options day like this, and they aren't mutually exclusive.

One reading is plain hedging demand. Price breaks, the ETF is liquid, and puts get bought because portfolios want a defined downside.

The more fear rises, the more that protection gets chased, and the more volume prints. In that version, the record is almost comforting. It shows investors using insurance rather than panic-selling their core allocation.

Another reading is forced repositioning somewhere else, with options used as a bridge. If a leveraged structure is coming apart, you might not be able to unwind it instantly without taking a huge loss.

Buying options can be a temporary stabilizer while you reduce exposures that take longer to exit. That fits the way crashes feel: they're fast, but clean unwinds are slow, so the market improvises with whatever tool is most liquid.

The third reading is speculative volatility demand. When markets are unstable, traders chase convexity, the quality options have where a small premium can turn into a large payoff if the move keeps extending.

That trade can be rational, but it can also be crowded. A crowded convexity chase can amplify the swing, especially when dealers need to hedge their own option exposure by buying or selling the underlying as price moves.

When you only focus on what the market actually did, you see that it routed an enormous amount of crash-era decision-making through IBIT and its listed options chain.

That routing is what makes IBIT options a useful gauge going forward. A perp market can tell you about offshore leverage and liquidation cascades.

An ETF options chain can tell you about institutions, hedging demand, and how dealers are managing risk in a regulated wrapper. In a market where Bitcoin is owned by both retail crypto traders and asset managers who treat it like any other risk allocation, you want both gauges.

The shift: panic is moving onshore

The story underneath the record is a migration of where volatility gets expressed. Offshore perps still set a lot of the tempo when liquidation cascades hit, but the center of gravity for “allowed” institutional activity keeps expanding in the US listed complex: ETFs, their options, and the related futures and spreads.

That has practical effects on how crashes play out.

First, it links Bitcoin’s most dramatic days to the mechanics of US market-making. Option dealers hedge.

If a dealer sells puts, the dealer often hedges by selling some underlying exposure as price falls, and then buying it back as price rises, depending on the option’s sensitivity. When options volume is extreme, those hedging flows can become a meaningful part of intraday movement, because risk management has to react.

Second, it ties crypto volatility to portfolio behavior rather than only to exchange leverage. A US-based allocator can treat IBIT as the wrapper and treat IBIT options as the risk dial.

That can create a feedback loop: the allocator’s risk-on or risk-off decision can be expressed in options before it shows up as a clean ETF flow number.

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Feb 10, 2026 · Gino Matos

This is why it’s worth keeping flows in a supporting role rather than as the headline. Farside’s daily tally put Feb. 6 net inflows across spot Bitcoin ETFs at $371.1 million, with IBIT at $231.6 million.

Assuming those figures are correct, they sit beside the crash like a paradox: net inflows on a day when price was getting hit. But the paradox fades once you separate direction from protection.

Flows tell us who added exposure, but options tell us who needed insurance. A market can have both currents running at the same time, especially if investors buy exposure and hedge it, or if some participants step in as others pay for protection.

Third, the onshore options complex makes Bitcoin’s risk events easier to observe in real time for anyone who knows where to look. Perp funding and liquidation data is public, but it’s fragmented across venues.

Listed options publish volume and open interest in a standardized format. You can watch put activity, strike clustering, and expiry concentration with tools that look a lot like equity index options analytics.

That’s why the IBIT options record can be treated as an early-warning device for the next risk event. When protection demand surges, it tells you fear is being priced and where it’s being priced.

It also tells you something about who is active. A retail trader can buy options too, but the scale and the timing around an ETF wrapper often point to professional activity, because institutions have mandates that prefer listed products.

There's also a bigger cultural point inside all this. Bitcoin used to be a market where most activity lived outside traditional finance and only later echoed into it.

Now the order is reversed. A crash can begin or accelerate on crypto venues, but the loudest institutional response can show up in a BlackRock product, in US trading hours, through options contracts designed for insurance and volatility expression.

That’s what “Wall Street crypto” means in practice: the wrappers are no longer a side channel. They're a primary arena for risk management.

What to watch next time

Watch whether IBIT options activity stays elevated even as price stabilizes, because persistent demand for protection can suggest investors still feel tail risk. By Feb. 12, IBIT options volume had cooled back to about 565,689 contracts, which keeps Feb. 6 in the category of a true stress print.

Watch whether the next sharp down day coincides with another surge in listed option volume, because repeat behavior is what turns a one-off record into a dependable gauge.

Watch whether the ETF and its options continue to carry the crash-era decision-making load, because the more that happens, the more the US market structure becomes part of every serious Bitcoin risk story.

The post This is what “Wall Street crypto” looks like: IBIT options went vertical as Bitcoin hit $60k intraday appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Within a span of weeks in early 2026, a cluster of senior crypto operators announced they were stepping back or switching domains.

Akshay BD, who spent five years building Solana's ecosystem, posted a “life update” saying he was “grateful to pass the torch.”

Anthony Rose, a zkSync executive, announced he was “moving on” after four years at Matter Labs.

Nader Dabit left Eigen Labs to join Cognition, working on “end-to-end software agents that ship production code.”

Kyle Samani stepped down as Multicoin's managing partner to explore AI and robotics, while maintaining he's still bullish on crypto.

The timing felt coordinated, even if it wasn't.

The pattern looked like a talent drain because these roles sit at the center of capital, narrative, and hiring loops.

Ecosystem leads don't just build, they coordinate. They connect capital to projects, developers to infrastructure, and companies to users.

When they rotate out, the connective tissue weakens, even if the underlying builder base stays intact.

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Jun 14, 2024 · Mike Dalton

Jobs, capital, and option value

AI is pulling talent with measurable force. LinkedIn's January 2026 labor market report documents the creation of 1.3 million new AI jobs globally between 2023 and 2025.

Growth in specific roles is exponential: forward-deployed engineer and product manager roles grew 42 times, while AI engineer positions expanded 13 times.

Capital gravity reinforces the labor pull. Crunchbase reports $211 billion in global AI funding in 2025, accounting for roughly half of all venture capital deployed worldwide.

WIPO's analysis similarly finds that AI accounts for about 53% of global VC deal value through the third quarter of 2025. PitchBook pegs crypto VC deal value at $19.7 billion in 2025.

Meaningful, but operating in a different league.

For senior operators optimizing for learning velocity and upside, AI currently offers both at scale. Crypto offers mission alignment and the promise of rebuilding financial infrastructure, but AI offers immediate distribution, faster product cycles, and capital abundance.

Rodrigo Coehla, CEO of Edge & Node, sees the wave but disputes the characterization.

He said:

“There's definitely been a wave of high-profile departures, and it's really hard to argue with why it's happening. AI is the new, cool kid on the block and like with past crypto cycles, when the times get a little tough, a lot of people move on to greener pastures.”

However, Coehla noted that many people chasing AI will eventually return to crypto. He added:

“Once they're actually inside the AI space—even briefly—they'll realize AI is going to adopt crypto rails, which are ideal for transparency, observability, and financial control. AI agents need crypto rails for trust, observability, and autonomous transactions that traditional infrastructure can't provide.”

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Is this actually an exodus?

The cleanest signal on whether builders are leaving comes from developer activity, not anecdotes.

Electric Capital's latest developer report, updated in January 2026, shows that the total number of monthly active developers fell by roughly 7% year over year in 2024. That sounds bad until you separate newcomers from established builders.

Developers with two or more years of experience hit an all-time high, up 27% year-over-year. New developers declined, but the core builder base expanded.

This matches prior bear market patterns. Electric Capital's historical analysis shows developers grew 5% year over year in 2022 despite a 70% price decline.

Developer cohort	2024 YoY change	What it implies
Established devs (2+ years)	+27% YoY	Core builder base expanded (stickier, long-horizon contributors)
New devs	Down	Onboarding slowed / “tourists” left (cycle-sensitive inflow)

Core builders stay. Tourists leave.

The churn happening now is more consistent with newcomer drop-off and leadership reshuffles than a collapse in the builder base.

Ethan Buchman, CEO of Cycles, frames it as cyclical noise:

“Just like Bitcoin has been declared dead countless times, people pivoting away from crypto has become an old refrain, just another sign of the cyclic nature of our industry. ‘If you're in crypto, pivot to AI' is a legendary three-year-old tweet now. Crypto continues to be, without doubt, the place where the future of finance is built.”

He bets that crypto's core value propositions, like neutral settlement, programmable money, and composability, don't disappear just because AI is hiring aggressively.

Buchman added:

“Everyone is still thinking about crypto too simply, as just a way to move assets around faster, 24/7. But crypto unlocks entirely new opportunities for capital efficiency, risk reduction, savings, and growth via multilateral clearing for regular people and businesses around the world.”

Why senior exits still matter

Even if core developer counts are stable, senior exits widen bottlenecks that slow progress.

Crypto's hardest problems are rarely cryptographic. They're productization, compliance, and distribution.

Shipping boring financial infrastructure that banks and regulators will adopt requires operators who understand legal frameworks, institutional sales cycles, and enterprise integrations.

Losing those operators slows the conversion of technical capability into market traction.

Institutional trust-building takes continuity. Regulatory clarity doesn't automatically translate into adoption. Someone has to walk regulators through how stablecoins work, negotiate with banks on settlement rails, and build compliance tooling that makes crypto usable inside traditional finance.

Leadership churn delays that cycle.

What crypto has that AI can't

Crypto's durable edge is neutral settlement and programmable money.

Stablecoins, tokenized real-world assets, and on-chain treasury rails are hard to reproduce in pure AI software stacks.

Open financial primitives that can be integrated without bilateral agreements create composability that traditional finance and AI platforms don't naturally provide.

AI's edge is user pull and speed. AI products can achieve mass adoption within months. Distribution chokepoints are weaker because most AI apps don't face the same financial compliance surface area that crypto does.

However, convergence isn't just narrative. Regulation is making crypto rails more legible to institutions. The GENIUS Act created a US stablecoin framework requiring backing and disclosure. That's the kind of regulatory north star that supports the “finance rails” thesis.

Stablecoins are becoming a required infrastructure for traditional financial institutions.

Coehla sees this as the moment bottlenecks begin to disappear:

“Many crypto companies tied themselves to tokens that had nothing to do with the value they were actually creating, which meant their runway lived or died on speculation instead of fundamentals.”

Until recently, he highlighted that regulation was unclear, but the GENIUS Act changed the landscape and provided crypto with a clear north star.

This resulted in bad tokenomics removing weaker companies from the playing field, leaving behind fundamentally sound businesses.

Coelha added:

“Regulatory clarity is here. And emergent AI use cases that benefit from crypto rails are creating powerful tailwinds.”

He predicts that the talent exodus reverses when builders realize the biggest opportunity isn't another token, but infrastructure that powers the next decade of financial rails.

This will become concrete through a wave of hybrid companies that stop calling themselves crypto companies and start building real businesses at the intersection of AI and programmable money.

2026 reality check

The base case is cyclical churn with a stable core.

Senior operators do AI stints. Many remain crypto-adjacent through advising or investing, and the core developer base is anchored by infrastructure maturity and stablecoin regulatory clarity.

The downside scenario is coordination decay. Leadership churn, combined with weaker funding, reduces long-horizon infrastructure work, and greater fragmentation across Layer 2s and appchains slows execution.

The sustained drop extends to established developers as well.

The upside scenario is a convergence-driven rebound. Stablecoin frameworks and institutional rails pull crypto talent back as real distribution arrives. Hybrid companies stop branding as crypto and start selling financial infrastructure.

The indicator is accelerating stablecoin issuance and banking integrations driven by policy and enterprise adoption.

The high-profile departures in early 2026 don't prove crypto is dying. They prove AI's pull is strong and crypto's coordination costs are real.

The question is whether the industry converts regulatory clarity and institutional interest into distribution fast enough to retain the operators who build connective tissue.

The developers are still here. The infrastructure is maturing. The bottleneck is turning the “future of finance” thesis into products people actually use before AI permanently absorbs the best operators.

The post Crypto enters a “16-day danger zone” as senior crypto talent rotates into AI appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Bitcoin is holding its ground this weekend. After Friday’s soft CPI rally, price keeps leaning into the same overhead zone around $70,300, and bids keep showing up above $65,000.

That detail matters more than the stall.

Last Sunday I framed $71,500 as the market’s checkpoint, the line that decides whether this bounce becomes a recovery or fades into another leg down. The logic stays the same, the level stays the same, and the market’s behavior underneath it looks different this time.

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Bitcoin must recover $71,500 soon or the drift back to $60,000 begins

BTC has failed this critical test three times already and the fourth attempt signals a massive breakout or a brutal rejection.

Feb 8, 2026 · Liam 'Akiba' Wright

Bitcoin already lived through the violent part of this story. The crash down toward $60,000 left a long wick and a long memory. Since then, price has clawed back into the low $70,000s, and every push higher has forced the same question, is this rally rebuilding structure, or is it simply giving traders a cleaner place to sell?

The soft CPI print gave Bitcoin the kind of fuel it usually needs to test resistance with conviction. Price rallied, the chart brightened, and the market drifted into that familiar decision zone again.

Now it’s Saturday morning, liquidity is thinner, and the candles look like they’re hesitating around $70,300. On paper, this is where weak bounces often unwind, especially after a macro headline move. In practice, Bitcoin keeps refusing to give sellers the easy follow through.

That refusal is the setup.

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Bitcoin spikes 6% on softer US inflation but government data has holes that haven't been fixed

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Feb 13, 2026 · Liam 'Akiba' Wright

A market that wants lower prices tends to show it quickly on a weekend. It slips through shelves, it hunts stops, it revisits the wick, and it turns every bounce into an exit ramp. This weekend has a different feel, the pullbacks keep getting caught, and the floor around $65,000 keeps holding even as price struggles to clear the next ceiling.

That kind of behavior fits a familiar phase in a damaged market, the part where price stops falling fast, starts moving sideways, and forces both sides to wait.

It also fits the human side of this cycle. Traders remember $60,000 as the panic candle. Long term holders remember the speed of the drop and the silence that followed. Newer investors remember how quickly confidence turned into liquidation.

When price holds above $65,000 after a CPI-driven pop, it gives the crowd something they rarely get after a shock, time.

The weekend floor is the real story, and $65,000 has turned into a barometer

Weekend price action strips markets down to their basics. The order book gets thinner, the headlines slow down, and the only thing that matters is whether buyers actually show up when the chart looks heavy.

Right now, they are showing up.

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Jan 1, 2026 · Andjela Radmilac

Bitcoin keeps pressing into the $70,000 area, it keeps bumping into $70,300, and it keeps backing off in slow motion. The important part sits underneath, each dip keeps finding support before it turns into a slide. That support is clustering around $65,000, and it is starting to feel like a line the market respects.

That matters because the last major reference point beneath it is the wick low near $60,000. That zone carries the kind of emotional weight that turns small pullbacks into big reactions. When price hovers in the high $60,000s and low $70,000s, the market starts asking whether another wick revisit is coming.

When price holds through a weekend, the market starts asking a different question, whether the wick already did its job.

A local bottom rarely arrives with a clean announcement. It usually arrives as a change in rhythm.

The rhythm shift looks like this, sellers push, buyers absorb, and price stops traveling as far on each wave. The chart starts building a range instead of building fear. The market starts trading time instead of trading distance.

That is why a stall at $70,300 can still read bullish in context.

A stall becomes valuable when it comes with resilience underneath. It turns resistance into a pressure test. It also turns support into a living level that everyone watches in real time.

It is also worth remembering how $71,500 fits into this.

Last week, Bitcoin kept knocking on that door, and each attempt ran out of oxygen. This week, the market is hesitating earlier, which often shows up when sellers try to defend sooner, and buyers keep stepping in anyway. That dynamic can lead to a breakout later, and it can also lead to more sideways frustration first, especially when traders keep trying to front-run the move.

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Bitcoin failing 7 times to break $71,500 is much more ominous than boring ‘sideways action’

The market printed a lower high during its latest run which suggests that buyers are finally getting tired.

Feb 10, 2026 · Liam 'Akiba' Wright

Sideways action has a strange reputation in Bitcoin, because people associate it with boredom. In reality, sideways often marks the most important negotiation in the whole move. It’s where leverage resets, where late sellers finally exit, where patient buyers accumulate, and where the market decides whether the next push has support behind it.

If Bitcoin keeps holding $65,000 while continuing to probe $70,300, the chart starts to look less like a failed bounce and more like a base forming under resistance. That base does not erase the larger cycle debate, but it does change the near-term path.

$71,500 remains the checkpoint, and $60,000 remains the scar tissue

The market still has a clear hierarchy of levels.

$71,500 remains the major checkpoint, because it has already rejected price multiple times since the crash. It is the line where traders decide whether the recovery has real acceptance above it, or whether the move stays trapped in the same band.

$70,300 matters today because it is where the market is stalling right now. It is also close enough to $71,500 to act like a pretest, a place where sellers try to lean early, and where buyers get a preview of how crowded the ceiling is.

$65,000 matters because it is the line Bitcoin keeps defending during thin weekend liquidity. It is the nearest shelf that keeps the chart from sliding into the emotional gravity of the wick.

Then $60,000 sits below everything as the scar tissue level. That wick low created a shared memory, and shared memories create reflexes. Traders tighten stops, holders feel tension, and the market becomes jumpier the closer price gets to that zone.

Bitcoin's sideways action reduces the immediate pressure from that memory. It also gives the market space to do something healthier, to trade sideways and rebuild structure.

This is where the broader cycle story still matters, because a local base can form inside a bigger bearish framework. The market can carve out a range, squeeze shorts, reclaim a level, and still face deeper stress later in the year when liquidity shifts, when risk appetite fades, or when macro conditions tighten again.

My $49,000 bear target still sits in that bigger picture. It remains a plausible destination later this year if the cycle continues to unwind and if risk drains out of the system again. That target belongs to the macro path, the kind of move that comes with fear returning, volatility expanding, and market plumbing showing stress.

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Akiba's medium term $49k Bitcoin bear thesis – why this winter will be the shortest yet

Shorter bears, sharper floors: why $49k could print early, and what would flip the tape.

Nov 24, 2025 · Liam 'Akiba' Wright

The current price behavior belongs to a nearer chapter. This chapter looks like resilience, a rally sparked by soft CPI data, a stall under resistance, and a steady defense of $65,000 even when the weekend gives sellers a chance to press.

Both chapters can be true at the same time.

That is why this moment is useful. It gives the market a chance to show whether the bounce has a floor, and it gives traders a map that doesn’t rely on predictions.

If Bitcoin reclaims $71,500 and holds above it, the next resistance zones on my map come back into focus, around $73,700, then $77,000, then just under $79,000. Those levels matter because they are where the market has paused, reversed, or accelerated before, and they are where profit taking and leverage triggers tend to cluster.

If Bitcoin keeps stalling under $70,300 and slips back into the mid range, the shelves below stay relevant, especially $66,900 and $65,000. A strong defense of those levels keeps the sideways thesis alive, and a clean break beneath them shifts attention back toward the $60,000 memory zone.

Levels to watch, and what “bullish” looks like from here

This setup is simpler than it looks.

A bullish read in the near term looks like continued range building, price holding above key levels, and repeated pressure on $70,300 that eventually leads to another attempt at $71,500. It looks like dips that get bought quickly, and it looks like sellers struggling to push the market into a deeper unwind.

It also looks like patience.

A range can last longer than people expect, especially after a violent move. It can chop up both longs and shorts, and it can frustrate anyone who needs a clean narrative. That frustration often becomes fuel later, because it shakes out leverage and rebuilds a healthier base.

Here is the clean map for the week ahead.

• $71,500, the major reclaim line, acceptance above it changes the tone and opens the higher bands.
• $70,300, today’s stall point, a sustained push above it increases the odds of a fresh $71,500 test.
• $70,000, the psychological hinge, a level that often decides whether dips stay controlled.
• $66,900, the mid band shelf, where momentum often resets and where weak moves often fade.
• $65,000, the weekend barometer, a level that keeps the local bottom thesis intact while it holds.
• ~$60,000, the wick low memory zone, a revisit would likely bring speed and emotion back into the chart.
• $49,000, the larger cycle bear target, a later-year destination if macro stress returns and risk unwinds further.

What I’m watching when the market moves is also simple.

Speed, does Bitcoin slice through resistance or grind into it. Follow through, does price hold above reclaimed levels long enough for acceptance to form. Reaction, does the market defend support aggressively, or does it give it up in slow motion.

Saturday’s data point so far is clear. Bitcoin is stalling around $70,300, and it is holding above local lows through thin liquidity. That combination leans bullish for a local bottom and a sideways phase, because it suggests demand is active underneath, and sellers are running into absorption.

The bigger cycle still has room for another painful chapter later this year. The near term chart is printing a quieter signal, resilience after a shock.

Disclosure, this is market commentary, financial decisions require personal responsibility and appropriate professional guidance.

The post Bitcoin refuses to lose $70,000 this weekend. Was my $49k bottom call wrong? appeared first on CryptoSlate.

One input mistake at South Korea’s Bithumb turned a routine promo payout into a $44 billion disaster for a simple reason: crypto moves at internet speed, but many exchanges still run on back-office habits built for slower systems.

On Feb. 6, Bithumb meant to hand out tiny cash rewards as part of a promotion, about 2,000 won per recipient. Instead, its internal system credited affected users with Bitcoin, at least 2,000 BTC each, and the totals added up to roughly 620,000 BTC on the exchange’s ledger.

About 695 customers were affected, and Bithumb restricted trading and withdrawals for those accounts within 35 minutes once the error was detected.

It quickly turned into a whole market event in one venue. Some users who suddenly saw giant balances did what you would expect: they tried to sell. The on-venue selloff briefly knocked BTC down about 17% to roughly 81.1 million won before prices rebounded.

Bithumb’s recovery effort was fast and, by its own accounting shared via regulators, mostly successful. Reuters reported that 99.7% of the mistakenly credited bitcoin was recovered. Two days later, regulators said 93% of the bitcoin that had already been sold before restrictions were imposed was retrieved.

That combination of a huge number, a contained blast radius, and a human cause is exactly why this matters beyond South Korea.

Crypto’s adoption argument has spent years circling around custody, hacks, and code risk. This episode put a different weakness on display: operational controls.

The industry can build systems that settle instantly, but it still struggles with the stuff that keeps finance boring, like permissions, payout validation, and reconciliation under stress.

The weakest link is the controls

To understand the true implications of this issue, we need to start with what actually failed, because it wasn’t Bitcoin and it wasn’t the blockchain. It was the exchange’s internal process for creating credits inside its own ledger.

In traditional finance, payout is a workflow, rather than a single button. There are limits, multi-person approvals, denomination checks, and monitoring designed to catch nonsense before it reaches clients.

In crypto, some of that exists, but Bithumb shows how quickly just one missing guardrail can turn a marketing action into a live trading shock.

The error we saw is as old as spreadsheets: the system paid in the wrong unit. It was a 2,000 BTC versus 2,000 won mix-up, which is exactly the sort of mistake a payout tool should be built to refuse. Even if you assume a human will sometimes mistype, good controls assume they'll do that, then build a cage around the mistake.

That cage has layers.

One is privilege, which means who can initiate payouts and how large. Another is validation, whether the system forces an explicit denomination and blocks numbers that are orders of magnitude outside the intended range.

Another is dual approval, a second person required once a payout crosses a threshold. Then there is the last line of defense: circuit breakers that freeze promo credits from being traded or withdrawn until reconciliation clears them.

When those layers are thin, the failure mode is ugly because of speed. The ledger credit appears instantly, and then users react instantly. The venue’s order book absorbs the flow until a certain point, and then the venue price breaks away from the wider market.

That's why we saw Bitcoin briefly drop below $55,000 on Bithumb while the aggregate global price remained well above $60,000.

And that's why controls can become the adoption bottleneck. If crypto wants to plug into mainstream finance, banks, brokerages, and payment rails, asset managers won't judge it only on whether a chain resists attacks.

They'll judge whether the institutions running the interfaces can prove that routine operations won't create chaos.

A local glitch, a global lesson

It's tempting to file this under contained embarrassment, because the broader market didn't fall 17% that day. But crypto doesn't get to choose how these stories travel, and optics quickly become policy.

South Korea’s Financial Supervisory Service used the incident to argue for tougher rules as digital assets become tied more closely to traditional finance. The regulator’s language matters here because it turned a single exchange’s internal failure into a system-trust issue.

The FSS governor raised the problem of “ghost coins,” the fear that an exchange can appear to distribute assets it doesn't actually hold, at least temporarily, inside its own systems.

That phrase captures the gap between an exchange’s internal ledger reality and actual reserves, and it's the gap regulators obsess over because accidents and fraud can sometimes look identical from the outside.

When Bithumb credited 620,000 BTC by mistake, it didn't move Bitcoin on the blockchain. But it did create a claim to Bitcoin within its own environment, and for a brief window, that claim was tradable on the exchange.

That's enough to cause a price shock on the platform, and enough to spook policymakers who worry about what happens when exchanges like that are deeply linked to banks, payment providers, and leveraged products.

The recovery numbers also draw a hard line around what exchanges can and can't reverse. Inside one exchange, a ledger entry can be rolled back.

Once funds cross a boundary, a withdrawal to a private wallet, a hop to another exchange, or a conversion into another asset that gets moved off-platform, you enter an irreversibility window where the exchange needs to start negotiating with the real world rather than fix a database.

It's also why minutes mattered here. The fact that restrictions were imposed within 35 minutes looks like a win, but it also implies there was a 35-minute period where the exchange was effectively running a live experiment on its own integrity.

So what does a good practice look like?

It looks like payout tooling that can't run without explicit denomination confirmation and strict bounds checking. It looks like promo credits that land in a quarantined state until reconciliation clears them, so they can't be dumped instantly.

It looks like anomaly detection that triggers before screenshots go viral. It looks like permissions that prevent a single operator from pushing a payout live without a second set of eyes, and limits that scale with the intent of the program rather than the maximum capacity of the platform.

The point is not that this will never happen again. Complex systems fail, and some failures are human. The point is that as crypto tries to sit inside mainstream markets, operational risk has to become boring.

When an exchange can show that promotions can't create tradable ghost balances, that reversals are orderly, and that exchange prints can't erupt from basic process errors, the sector gets closer to the kind of trust that brings in the next category of participants.

The post Traders walked into a “free Bitcoin” trap on Bithumb and it triggered a 17% flash drop appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Bitcoin bottom signals: ETF outflows, miner stress, and why a 2026 recession looks like the outlier

Bitcoin could be approaching a cycle low as spot Bitcoin ETF flows keep leaking and miner economics stay tight, even while recession talk dominates the timeline.

The key point: a 2026 recession or stock-market crash still looks like the outlier scenario, which means Bitcoin can bottom on Bitcoin-native mechanics: forced selling, leverage unwinds, miner stress, and a clearing level where the buyer base changes personality.

• TL;DR: ETF flows are still draining, which usually forces price to find a new clearing level.
• Miner economics look wintry (fees are tiny versus revenue), raising the odds of mechanical selling pressure in drawdowns.
• Macro forecasts and market odds still treat a 2026 recession as a minority outcome, so Bitcoin can bottom without a global crash.

The framework I use for Bitcoin hasn’t really moved since last September, when I wrote about it ahead of October’s all-time high.

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Bitcoin’s cycle clock points to a final high by late October, will ETFs rewrite history?

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Sep 18, 2025 · Liam 'Akiba' Wright

I spelled it out again in my medium-term $49,000 Bitcoin bear thesis on Nov. 24, 2025, then checked in on it on Jan. 30, 2026.

Across both posts, the message stayed consistent:

Bitcoin still trades in cycles, the real “this is the low” moment tends to arrive when miner economics and institutional flows align, and the eventual bottom print usually feels mechanical rather than emotional.

What has changed is the framing people keep trying to bolt onto 2026. The conversation has slid into a predictable groove: many are leaning hard into a narrative where Bitcoin can’t truly bottom unless there’s a global recession, or an equity wipeout that drags every risk asset down in one synchronized liquidation.

I understand why that narrative spreads. It’s tidy. It’s dramatic. It gives everyone one clean culprit.

But it’s starting to look less like the center lane as Bitcoin has already fallen over $20,000 since the start of the year, while the stock market prints new all-time highs.

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Akiba's medium term $49k Bitcoin bear thesis – why this winter will be the shortest yet

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Nov 24, 2025 · Liam 'Akiba' Wright

Bitcoin ETF outflows: the cleanest stress gauge in the cycle

The second pillar in my framework is flow elasticity, and spot ETF flows are the cleanest real-time window we’ve ever had into that.

By late January, flows were telling a story of risk appetite draining away even as price tried to stabilize.

On Farside, multiple large outflow days hit, including roughly -$708.7 million on Jan. 21 and -$817.8 milion on Jan. 29. The year-to-date total was around -$1.095 billion when I checked in on Jan. 30. Since then, yearly flows have reached -$1.8 billion, with $1 billion leaving Fidelity's FBTC alone.

Those are the kinds of prints that change how “buy the dip” psychology works. In the friendly version of the ETF regime, down days get met with steady net buying because allocators treat weakness as inventory. In the stressed version, the pipe flips into a drain, and price has to travel to a clearing level where that drain turns back into a bid.

The key point: this can unfold even if everything else looks fine. Equities can keep grinding, growth forecasts can stay intact, and Bitcoin can still go through a violent internal reset because its marginal buyer and seller are now visible day-by-day in a flow table.

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Feb 13, 2026 · Liam 'Akiba' Wright

Miner economics and the Bitcoin security budget already feel like winter

My original bear case leaned on miner economics for a reason: mining is where Bitcoin’s real-world cost base intersects with market structure.

On Jan. 29, miners earned roughly $37.22 million per day in revenue. On the same date, total transaction fees paid per day were about $260,550.

That puts fees at roughly 0.7% of revenue.

This matters because it tells you what the chain is actually relying on to stay secure. Fees have been basically negligible; issuance has been doing the heavy lifting; and issuance continues stepping down on a schedule. When conditions tighten, that shifts the burden back onto price and hash economics.

You can see the same vibe in the live fee market. The mempool feed has repeatedly shown next-block median fee projections staying sleepy for long stretches, exactly the type of environment where a sharp price leg can happen without any macro headline acting as the trigger.

This is why the $49,000 to $52,000 region still reads to me as a plausible cycle floor: it’s the zone where narrative debates tend to give way to inventory transfer, from forced sellers and exhausted holders to allocators who have been waiting for a level they can size into.

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Bitcoin sets sight on $50,000 floor as recession fears retreat despite scary headlines

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Feb 12, 2026 · Liam 'Akiba' Wright

2026 recession odds: why a macro crash still looks like the outlier

The major forecasting shops keep using “slowdown” language rather than “breakage” language. The IMF has global growth at 3.3% for 2026.

The World Bank sees growth easing to 2.6% in 2026 and still frames the system as broadly resilient, even with trade-tension noise.

The OECD is in the same ballpark, pencilling global GDP growth down to 2.9% in 2026.

Then there’s the market-implied, crowd-sourced version of that same “risk is real but not dominant” idea. On Polymarket, the probability of a U.S. recession by end-2026 has been hovering in the low-20s, high enough to matter, but not high enough to describe the consensus baseline.

Where this debate gets real for normal people is jobs, because labour markets are how “macro” translates into lived experience.

And here, the latest data delivered both a warning sign and a reminder that “grind” and “crash” aren’t the same thing.

Jobs data: the macro stress test still points to a grind

The BLS benchmark revision slashed 2025 nonfarm job growth to 181,000 from 584,000. That’s the kind of adjustment that changes the tone of the whole discussion. It also maps onto how 2025 felt: slower hiring, fewer easy job switches, and a noticeable cooling in white-collar momentum.

At the same time, that same BLS release shows unemployment at 4.3% in January 2026, with payrolls up 130,000, driven mainly by health care and social assistance. That’s a cooling market, but it’s still a market with forward motion. And it helps explain the weird split screen: stocks can keep levitating while households keep talking about “recession” over dinner.

That disconnect is exactly why I keep separating Bitcoin’s internal cycle mechanics from the global-doom storyline. A recession could still arrive in 2026, but markets are still treating it like a minority outcome.

And that matters for Bitcoin because it means you don’t need a worldwide inferno to get a major drawdown. A local fire is enough: leverage unwinds, miners are pushed into mechanical selling, ETF flows continue leaking, and price falls until the buyer base changes personality.

Bitcoin has already slid into the high $60,000s while equities keep tagging fresh highs. That divergence is the story. The chart reads like a standard cooling phase; the internals have felt like winter for weeks.

So when I say “2026 recession or stock crash looks like the outlier,” I’m not saying risk is gone. I’m saying the base case has shifted toward friction the system absorbs, messy politics included.

Which leaves a straightforward setup: Bitcoin can still print a cycle low on Bitcoin-specific mechanics.

Debt, delinquencies, and corporate bankruptcies: stress can rise without a recession label

There’s another macro pocket that matters here, even if it sits below GDP forecasts and stock indexes in most people’s mental hierarchy.

Corporate failures have been rising, and the numbers are now high enough to change the “feel” of the cycle even while the headline economy keeps moving forward. S&P data showed qualifying U.S. corporate bankruptcy filings hit 785 in 2025, the highest since 2010, with December alone at 72 filings.

The month-to-month story is straightforward: refinancing became tougher, interest costs stayed stubborn, and the weakest balance sheets started breaking sequentially. Market Intelligence showed the pace was already elevated by mid-year, with first-half 2025 filings at the highest level since 2010.

For households, stress is even easier to visualize because it shows up at the register. The NY Fed put total household debt at $18.8 trillion in Q4 2025, up $191 billion on the quarter, with credit card balances at $1.28 trillion.

Credit card strain has been climbing too. The NY Fed charts show roughly 13% of card balances 90+ days delinquent in Q4 2025, and the quarterly transition rate into 90+ day delinquency for credit cards around 7% of balances.

The sharpest edge appears among younger borrowers. The same NY Fed age breakdown has 18–29 in the ~9–10% range for serious delinquency transitions on credit cards, with 30–39 not far behind.

Put together, this looks like a late-cycle slog: cracks spreading in weaker areas, while policy gets tugged closer to easing as the year progresses.

That’s relevant for Bitcoin because Bitcoin is effectively a trade on liquidity, risk appetite, and forced selling, well before an “official recession” label lands.

2026 macro outlook: friction, not collapse

The reason I keep resisting the “everything must crash together” framing is simple: most forward-looking indicators still point to a muddle-through environment.

The IMF describes a steady global economy, with tech investment and adaptation offsetting trade policy headwinds. The World Bank uses “resilient” and explicitly notes easing financial conditions as a cushion. The OECD flags fragilities, but remains in a world where growth continues.

At higher frequency, the J.P.Morgan Global Composite PMI printed 52.5 for January, and S&P Global’s read-through ties that level historically to roughly a 2.6% annualised global GDP pace. That’s not exciting growth, but it’s still growth.

Trade is another area where people expect fractures to show up first, and that picture also looks more complicated than collapse-ready. The UNCTAD trade update heading into 2026 talks about fragmentation and regulatory pressure, but “pressure” is not the same thing as “breakdown.” The Kiel Trade Indicator helps here because it runs closer to real time than most macro series, separating shipping noise from underlying demand.

Bitcoin miners are operating two businesses now — and drawdowns behave differently

One underappreciated shift this cycle is that many miners no longer resemble pure Bitcoin margin machines.

A growing number now look like energy and infrastructure businesses that also mine Bitcoin.

That matters in two ways.

First, it alters survivability. A second revenue stream can keep operations running through low-fee conditions, and it can help finance capex even when hash economics are tight.

Second, it changes how stress expresses itself in market behaviour. A miner building a compute roadmap may sell Bitcoin more mechanically, funding buildouts, protecting liquidity for power contracts, or curtailing in ways that make network conditions more elastic precisely when the market wants stability.

You can see the outline of the pivot in public disclosures. TeraWulf announced long-duration AI hosting agreements tied to large capacity, with Google involved in the structure per the company release. DataCenterDynamics reported Riot has also been exploring options to pivot capacity toward AI and HPC.

Zoom out and the operational picture gets busy fast: negotiating power, managing shareholders, planning data halls, buying machines, while still competing in the most brutal hash race on earth. More moving parts tends to mean more reflexivity when price starts sliding.

This is a big reason the market can feel like winter internally even before the chart delivers a full cathartic flush.

The $49,000 to $52,000 Bitcoin bottom thesis (and why it still fits)

When you stitch the inputs together, the path is not complicated.

Macro is resilient enough that the synchronized global risk-event story has drifted out of the centre lane. The Polymarket recession odds reflect that. And the major forecasters, the IMF, the World Bank, and the OECD, are broadly in the same neighbourhood.

Meanwhile, Bitcoin’s internals look strained: fees remain a tiny slice of miner revenue, ETF flows have shown real risk-off windows, and the on-chain fee tape on mempool has been lethargic.

That combination builds pressure.

And pressure usually resolves the same way in crypto: a fast move, two or three sharp legs down, leverage getting rinsed, and a new buyer base stepping in with conviction.

There’s also a real-economy overlay that markets often ignore until they can’t. The S&P bankruptcy counts and the NY Fed delinquency charts both say the same thing: a lot of companies and households are running out of slack at the margin. That can matter without an equity crash.

It tightens credit, drags on discretionary spending, increases the odds that rates drift lower over time, and shortens the runway to the kind of policy response that tends to arrive once strain becomes undeniable in the data.

A final flush can still be driven by Bitcoin-native mechanics: fees staying depressed, miner economics tightening, ETF flow tables staying messy. Macro adds a second ingredient, a world where stress rises quietly, and the path toward easier conditions gets shorter.

If the market gives us that mechanical reset, the liquidity regime can look friendlier on the other side, and that’s the part of the cycle I care about most.

The $49,000 to $52,000 band remains my base case for that inventory transfer. It’s close enough to feel plausible from here, and it’s psychologically clean enough to attract real size, especially from allocators who’ve been waiting for sub-$50,000 to treat Bitcoin as inventory.

The wildcards never disappear. Geopolitics can always break the neat forecast world. The odds of a China-Taiwan escalation have been actively traded on Polymarket, and those prices can move quickly when headlines hit.

But my focus stays intentionally boring: fees, ETF flows, miner behaviour.

If those inputs remain weak while price keeps bleeding, a sharp print into the $40,000s remains a live outcome, even if the global economy keeps trudging forward and equities keep acting like nothing is wrong.

Disclosure, this is market commentary, not financial advice. Risk management matters more than narratives.

FAQ: Bitcoin bottom, ETF outflows, miner capitulation, and 2026 recession odds

Is Bitcoin near a bottom in 2026?

It’s possible. The “near-bottom” setup usually shows up when forced selling becomes more mechanical than emotional, and this cycle you can see that in two places: persistent spot Bitcoin ETF outflows and tightening miner economics. The key is whether price finds a clearing level where the buyer base shifts from dip-traders to allocators sizing real inventory.

What are the biggest signs Bitcoin is bottoming?

The most useful “bottom signals” tend to cluster, rather than appear alone. In this framework, the big three are: (1) ETF flows stabilizing after sustained outflows, (2) miner stress peaking (or capitulation risk getting priced in), and (3) price finding a level where selling pressure fades and bids start absorbing supply consistently. You’ll often see the bottom feel “mechanical,” a transfer of inventory, rather than a clean narrative moment.

How do Bitcoin ETF flows affect Bitcoin’s price?

Spot ETF flows act like a daily, observable gauge of marginal demand. In the “friendly” version of the ETF era, down days get met with net inflows, which supports price and compresses drawdowns. In the “stressed” version, outflows turn the pipe into a drain, and price usually has to travel to a level where those flows stop leaking and demand reappears.

What is miner capitulation, and why does it matter for a Bitcoin bottom?

Miner capitulation is the idea that miners get squeezed enough, by price, costs, or revenue conditions, that they’re forced into more aggressive selling or operational shutdowns. It matters because miners are a recurring source of structural supply, especially when fees are low and profitability tight. Bottoms often show up around periods where miner stress peaks and the market clears that supply.

Can Bitcoin bottom without a 2026 recession or stock market crash?

Yes. Bitcoin doesn’t require a synchronized global liquidation to print a cycle low. A local fire can do it: leverage unwinds, ETF outflows persist, miners sell more mechanically, and price falls until the buyer base changes character. A recession could still happen, but it isn’t required for Bitcoin to hit a clearing level.

Why does the $49,000–$52,000 range matter in this thesis?

It’s a psychologically clean zone that’s close enough to be plausible, and it’s also the kind of level where “narrative debate” can flip into inventory transfer. In other words: a band where forced sellers and exhausted holders hand supply to allocators waiting for a number they can size into. The market doesn’t bottom because the number is magic, it bottoms because behaviour changes around it.

What would invalidate the “Bitcoin bottom soon” thesis?

The simplest invalidation would be the stress gauges getting worse without any sign of absorption: continued heavy ETF outflows, miner economics tightening further, and price failing to find a level where bids consistently offset selling. If those conditions persist, the “bottom soon” call becomes less about timing and more about waiting for a deeper clearing event, potentially into the $40,000s if the unwind accelerates.

The post Early Bitcoin bottom signals are starting to flash as BTC is still down $20k as stocks rip appeared first on CryptoSlate.

Mark Moran is using a meme coin on Solana to elevate his U.S. Senate bid, rallying degens against a pro-crypto Democrat in Virginia.

Despite its 45% fall since its October peak, Bitcoin has not yet found its bear market bottom, according to a new report from CryptoQuant.

Blockchain lender Figure said hackers accessed customer data after an employee was targeted in a social engineering attack.

Truth Social Funds applied for ETFs that would give investors exposure to crypto—one focused on Bitcoin and Ethereum, the other on Cronos.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent suggested that the crypto market would be calmed by the passage of the Clarity Act.

Vitalik Buterin has questioned the current direction of prediction markets, urging platforms to pivot from short-term speculation toward long-term hedging.

Bitcoin price, along with MSTR stock, has rebounded by the end of the week, showing high volatility on Valentine’s Day.

XRP burn rate is back to levels around 500 despite surging past 850 XRP a few days ago, but its price is seeing a massive price surge amid renewed interest.

Dogecoin's futures traders have swung into full action over the past day, with its open interest soaring past 12% over the period as its price turns bullish.

RippleX sends crucial alert to all XRP Ledger node operators and validators.

The digital asset landscape is shifting, and finding the best crypto to buy right now requires looking beyond the household names. While established players like Monero continue to offer privacy-centric utility, and analysts weigh in on the long-term Cardano price prediction, a new contender is rewriting the rules of entry. Zero Knowledge Proof (ZKP) is currently capturing the market’s attention with its unique Initial Coin Auction (ICA), a system designed for pure transparency.

As the Monero price USD faces typical market volatility, ZKP is moving through its final days of Stage 2. With the transition to Stage 3 occurring in just 5 days, the window to participate in the current 190-million daily token distribution is closing. Investors are pivoting toward ZKP’s deflationary burn mechanics and fair-launch protocol, seeking the stability and growth potential that traditional presales often lack.

Tracking Volatility and Demand for Monero Price USD

Privacy remains a core focus within the blockchain sector, making the Monero price USD a key metric for those tracking anonymity-centric assets. Recent market data indicate that Monero has faced notable volatility, including a sharp decline of over 50% from its January high of nearly $800. This correction has seen the Monero price USD stabilize around the $340 to $370 range as of February 2026.

Regulatory pressure continues to influence its market standing, with the asset facing approximately 73 exchange delistings over the past year due to tightening global compliance standards. While technical indicators like the RSI currently show oversold conditions, consistent selling pressure from long-term holders has impacted liquidity. Monero remains a specialized utility for private transactions, though it operates under persistent structural headwinds and shifting regulatory frameworks.

Analyzing the Future Through Cardano Price Prediction

Cardano continues to maintain its position as a major cryptocurrency by market capitalization, currently valued at approximately $9.22 billion. When analysts evaluate a long-term Cardano price prediction, they frequently focus on the protocol’s peer-reviewed development phases, such as the Voltaire era for on-chain governance. Technical data from February 2026 shows the asset trading near $0.26, supported by over 1.3 million active staking wallets that contribute to network decentralization.

Recent milestones include the launch of regulated ADA futures on the CME Group marketplace, marking a step in institutional integration. While a conservative Cardano price prediction often accounts for its methodical scaling approach, the network has reached 17,000 smart contract deployments, reflecting the steady development of its underlying technical infrastructure over time.

ZKP’s Stage 2 Presale Auction Enters Final Countdown

While many market participants wait on external price swings, Zero Knowledge Proof (ZKP) is introducing the first Initial Coin Auction (ICA), a radical shift toward true decentralization. This is precisely why it is being highlighted as the best crypto to buy right now. Unlike traditional models where prices are set behind closed doors, the ZKP price is determined by real-time market demand through a transparent, 24-hour on-chain process.

The urgency has reached a fever pitch as ZKP’s presale auction enter final days of Stage 2. This represents the absolute last window to access the largest remaining daily distribution of 190 million tokens. In just 5 days, the protocol triggers a structural supply cliff, transitioning to Stage 3 where the daily allocation is slashed by 10 million tokens to a 180-million limit.

This aggressive reduction continues across every subsequent stage of the 450-day timeline, meaning the available daily supply is rapidly evaporating. Furthermore, any unallocated tokens are burned permanently at the end of each day, ensuring that every 24-hour cycle is a final opportunity to participate at the current stage’s specific supply level.

To maintain total integrity, ZKP utilizes an “Anti-Whale” protocol, capping daily contributions at $50,000 per wallet. This prevents large players from dominating the auction, ensuring that the best crypto to buy right now remains accessible on equal terms. With no gas wars, no insider advantages, and a daily supply that drops by 10 million tokens in less than a week, the window to secure a position before the Stage 3 reduction is closing fast.

In Summary

In a market defined by choice, the path forward depends on specific objectives. While monitoring the Monero price USD remains vital for privacy-focused utility, and tracking the long-term Cardano price prediction is essential for patient, research-oriented holders, the shift toward transparent infrastructure is undeniable. ZKP stands out as the best crypto to buy right now, offering a fair-launch model that established projects simply cannot replicate.

With Stage 2 and its 190-million daily ceiling ending in just 5 days, the opportunity to secure tokens at this level is vanishing. As the supply cliff approaches and unallocated tokens burn daily, the window for maximum allocation is rapidly closing. The transition to Stage 3 marks a permanent tightening of the ecosystem, positioning ZKP as a high-momentum choice for those observing the shrinking supply.

Explore Zero Knowledge Proof:

Website: https://zkp.com/

Presale: https://buy.zkp.com/

X: https://x.com/ZKPofficial

Telegram: https://t.me/ZKPofficial

The post ZKP Stage 2 Presale Auction Ends in 5 Days! Buyers Rush Ahead of Supply Drops, as Monero and Cardano Track Trends appeared first on Blockonomi.

Two of the most consequential U.S. financial regulators just loudly indicated that crypto isn’t going anywhere. The CFTC has packed its new Innovation Advisory Committee with 35 members, including the CEOs of Coinbase, Ripple, and Gemini. And the Federal Reserve published a working paper proposing that crypto be treated as a distinct asset class for initial margin requirements on derivatives, slipping in an acknowledgement of the sector’s maturity at the institutional level.

That’s some remarkable Bitcoin price news in a market defined by fear, despite how BTC has dropped above 25% year-to-date, and sentiment sits at extreme lows. But clearly, regulators are preparing infrastructure for a much larger version of this market.

And with this in mind, DeepSnitch AI, a trading intelligence platform with five AI agents, has a true shot at a 1000x run after it launches in the coming days. It’s raised above $1.59M at $0.03985 per DSNT token, so it’s still priced for early entry, so the time to buy, if moonshot gains are what you’re after, is now.

CFTC stacks a 35-member panel with crypto heavyweights as the Fed maps out derivative margin rules

Chair Mike Selig of CFTC said the new committee, of 35 members, will help “develop clear rules of the road,” and the roster reads like a who’s-who of crypto: Brian Armstrong (Coinbase), Brad Garlinghouse (Ripple), Tyler Winklevoss (Gemini), Hayden Adams (Uniswap), Anatoly Yakovenko (Solana Labs), and Chris Dixon (a16z Crypto), to name just a few. Twenty of the 35 members come from crypto-linked firms, a composition that would have been unthinkable two years ago.

Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve’s working paper proposes creating specific risk weightings for cryptocurrencies, including BTC, ETH, ADA, DOGE, and XRP, within derivatives margin frameworks. The paper argues that crypto’s volatility doesn’t fit neatly into existing categories like equities or commodities, and that a dedicated benchmark index mixing floating cryptos with pegged stablecoins could better model the sector’s behavior.

And the Fed has also recently reversed its 2023 guidance that limited bank engagement with digital assets, further clearing institutional pathways.

Regulatory clarity of this kind could have a range of impacts on Bitcoin price news in the coming weeks, but essentially, when the framework catches up to the market, capital follows. And with that in mind, it’s worth considering how emerging crypto projects like DeepSnitch AI, priced at presale levels with live utility, sit in the direct path of that flow.

Regulatory tailwinds meet oversold markets

1. DeepSnitch AI updates ahead of anticipated moonshot launch

There’s a difference between a platform that shows you data and one that lets you question it. DeepSnitch AI is the latter.

Once it launches, its five AI-driven snitches form a unified cognitive layer, made up of “snitches” that all operate together so you can query any signal, explore any token, and track anomalies like whale splashes as they happen, without hopping between dashboards or deciphering raw feeds.

What this means in practice is that you’re not staring at numbers with eyes going blurry due to all you have to independently absorb. Instead, you’re asking the system direct questions and getting actionable answers backed by multi-source data fusion and real-time analytics.

Take Token Explorer, for instance, which gives you visual risk profiling with liquidity metrics and holder concentration in a single view, plus a live alert feed per token that catches narrative turns as they develop.

The system keeps expanding, too. SnitchGPT gets smarter with each feedback loop, and the roadmap includes multi-chain security coverage, enhanced alert taxonomy, and multi-token comparative analysis. And holders right now aren’t just early to a token with a shot at a 1000x run once it launches; they’re also accumulating signal and experience on a platform whose utility is proven beyond measure.

Priced low still, at $0.03985, with above $1.59M raised, staking live and uncapped, and a platform launch in the coming days, DeepSnitch AI is resistant to Bitcoin volatility. Whether the market rebounds or grinds sideways, a platform that helps traders avoid traps and identify quality has value. And that value is about to get priced by the open market.

2. Bitcoin price news as the token hunts for a floor

Bitcoin price news isn’t looking very favorable right this second, priced at $67,000 as of February 13, down roughly 25% year-to-date and sitting about 47% below its October 2025 all-time high above $126,000.

RSI reads 31, teetering on oversold, and the 50-day SMA is projected to decline toward $74,300 by mid-March. Fear sentiment has reached extreme lows, and leveraged long liquidations above $79 million in 24 hours have added selling pressure.

Based on Bitcoin price movement today, if BTC defends $65,000, a relief bounce toward the 7-day SMA near $69,000 remains plausible, though a crack below could accelerate the decline toward $62,000. Its year-end target right now is near $78,500, which would mean a roughly 17% recovery from current levels.

3. Ethereum’s institutional inflows hint at a possible recovery

ETH was near $1,955 on February 13, roughly 2% lower on the day and deep in a broader downtrend. Yet, underneath the surface, Ether ETFs did attract $71 million in fresh inflows earlier in the week, breaking a three-day outflow streak, with assets under management stabilised at $13 billion.

Weekly DEX volumes on Ethereum also doubled to $20 billion month-over-month, and DApps revenue climbed to $26.6 million, narrowing the gap with Solana.

With all this taken into consideration, there’s definitely the potential for a rebound toward $2,400 if this base-building continues.

Wrapping up

This is an unusual moment in crypto, with the CFTC putting CEOs at the table and the Fed designing derivative frameworks around digital assets, and yet BTC sits at extreme fear levels while ETH is accumulating institutional interest. No matter what, Bitcoin price news is a mainstay in the headlines, but the tokens that produce the most dramatic returns won’t be the ones everyone already owns.

DeepSnitch AI, priced at only $0.03985, has tools already shipped, credibility to write home about, uncapped staking, and a launch that’s all but here. If you don’t want to look back on this opportunity and feel like you missed out on something major, given its sincere, utility-driven 1000x potential after it launches, then use the tiered bonus codes when you buy in right now for even higher rewards.

These codes can bring in up to 300% extra tokens depending on your buy-in, and when those bonus tokens compound through dynamic staking APR, the effective entry price drops even further.

To get into the presale, head over to the official website while it’s still priced like a secret, and follow DeepSnitch AI on X and Telegram for more updates from the team.

FAQs

What is the latest Bitcoin price news in February 2026?

According to Bitcoin price news, the token is testing $65,000 to $67,000 support amid extreme fear sentiment, but the CFTC and Fed are both signaling deeper institutional engagement with crypto. DeepSnitch AI offers a way to position for the recovery at presale prices before its imminent launch.

Is Ethereum a good buy at current prices?

ETH is showing quiet institutional accumulation through ETF inflows and rising DEX volumes, with analysts pointing toward a possible $2,400 recovery. For significantly higher upside potential, though, DeepSnitch AI’s micro-cap structure offers an asymmetric bet that doesn’t require a full market reversal to come through.

How does DeepSnitch AI perform amid Bitcoin volatility updates like these?

DeepSnitch AI’s value is tied to utility, not Bitcoin price news. Its AI agents help traders avoid honeypots and identify quality tokens regardless of market direction, and with the launch approaching fast, the presale price of $0.03985 is unlikely to reflect the platform’s maturity for much longer.

The post Bitcoin Price News for February 2026: CFTC Fills Advisory Panel With Crypto CEOs, BTC Tests $65K Support, and DeepSnitch AI Presale Approaches Moonshot Launch appeared first on Blockonomi.

In 2026, the digital asset market has matured into a high-stakes arena where architectural precision determines long-term survival. While the era of speculative “moonshots” has faded, the demand for protocols that can handle massive transactional loads without sacrificing decentralization is at an all-time high.

Major assets like Binance Coin and Solana continue to anchor portfolios with their massive liquidity, and Cardano remains a benchmark for peer-reviewed security. However, the narrative is rapidly shifting toward BlockDAG, which has recently transitioned to a live Mainnet environment. For those identifying the best crypto to buy right now, the convergence of proven legacy power and fresh, scalable infrastructure offers a clear roadmap for the current cycle.

1. BlockDAG: Final Call for $0.00025 Entry Before Feb 16 Listings

BlockDAG has moved beyond the development phase to become a fully operational powerhouse in the Layer 1 space. With its Mainnet now live, the network has transitioned into active block production, signaling the true beginning of the Genesis era. For anyone scanning the market for the best crypto to buy right now, the data behind BlockDAG (BDAG) is compelling.

The project has already raised a staggering $452M through its presale batches, and the Token Generation Event (TGE) rails are now active, meaning BDAG is being issued directly on the BlockDAG Mainnet. Minting is complete, and the vesting contracts are running, with the claim function for the initial airdrop set to go live shortly.

The current window represents the final private sale allotment, offering a fixed price of $0.00025 for only the next 3 days. This is a rare structural opportunity, as the coin is confirmed for launch on over 20 global exchanges on February 16 with a target listing price of $0.05. This pricing gap implies a 200x potential at launch.

Unlike many early-stage projects, this final allocation carries zero vesting, ensuring that 100% of the coins are delivered to user wallets on launch day. Furthermore, participants in this round gain the advantage of trading up to 9 hours before the public markets open, allowing them to position themselves ahead of the initial volatility and front-run launch liquidity.

Securing the $0.00025 final allocation is the definitive move before the February 16 launch. With the Mainnet live, this is the last window to front-run global markets and 200x potential.

2. Solana: Testing Recovery Near the $80 Support

Solana is currently hovering around the $80 level, showing tentative signs of recovery after recent market fluctuations. As a high-throughput layer‑1 blockchain, Solana supports a broad spectrum of DeFi, NFT, gaming, and payment applications, leveraging fast transaction speeds and minimal fees. Its utility is particularly strong for developers needing quick finality without high operational costs.

Active staking and network participation help secure the network while incentivizing holders, keeping developer engagement robust. While Solana occasionally faces network congestion and performance challenges, these are typical trade-offs for high-speed chains. For investors assessing the best crypto to buy right now, Solana remains relevant due to its resilient ecosystem and adoption, even as it navigates price recovery and market volatility.

3. Binance Coin: Exchange Utility and BNB Smart Chain

Binance Coin is the native token of the Binance ecosystem, used for transaction fees, participation in launchpad events, and as gas on the BNB Smart Chain. It is currently trading around the mid‑$600s, following recent market fluctuations. The network records millions of active daily users, supporting a variety of decentralized applications and DeFi protocols.

BNB has a circulating supply of approximately 136.36 million, with periodic token burns reducing supply over time. Technical data indicate resistance near $620, while derivatives markets show a balanced long-to-short ratio. For those considering the best crypto to buy right now, BNB provides a practical case study in exchange and network utility, reflecting consistent usage rather than speculative activity.

4. Cardano: CME Futures Launch Amid Institutional Consolidation

Cardano is currently trading in the $0.26 – $0.27 range, reflecting moderate volatility. The network uses a proof-of-stake consensus and emphasizes formal verification and research-driven development. Recently, Cardano futures were introduced on the CME Group, offering institutions a regulated way to participate and adding structure to market activity.

At the same time, the ecosystem is gradually expanding into DeFi, including the integration of USDCx via LayerZero. While price movement remains relatively conservative compared to newer high-throughput networks, its capped supply and predictable issuance schedule provide consistent tokenomics. For those evaluating the best crypto to buy right now, ADA illustrates steady adoption and measured network development, prioritizing security and protocol reliability over rapid growth.

Why BlockDAG Tops the 2026 Rankings

The February 2026 market presents a clear contrast between established utility and high-velocity growth. While Solana, Binance Coin, and Cardano remain functional pillars of the industry, they are currently navigating phases of technical resistance and institutional consolidation. For buyers identifying the best crypto to buy right now, these assets offer reliability but lack the explosive multiplier potential found in a Tier-1 launch.

BlockDAG stands apart because its Mainnet is now live, providing a high-throughput ecosystem paired with a final $0.00025 private allocation. With the February 16 exchange debut approaching and a $0.05 target price, the window to secure a 200x edge is closing fast. This is the definitive moment to act before the fixed-price era ends and global market FOMO takes over.

The post Best Crypto to Buy Right Now: Why BlockDAG, Solana, BNB, and Cardano Could Shift the Market appeared first on Blockonomi.

Bitcoin miners have transferred a combined total of nearly 49,000 BTC, worth approximately $3.2 billion, to exchanges over a two-day period. This massive outflow, one of the largest since November 2024, coincided with sharp price swings that saw Bitcoin rebound from $62,000 to over $70,000.

But DeepSnitch AI offers a unique value proposition that protects capital while maximizing growth, with the presale raising over $1,590,000. Investors believe that, given its scarcity mechanics and market fit, DeepSnitch AI is one of the best altcoins to buy, offering a realistic path to turn a strategic $3,400 investment into a life-changing $180,000 portfolio.

The great miner capitulation

The data from CryptoQuant gives an outlook of an industry in transition. On February 5, Bitcoin miner outflows jumped to 28,605 BTC, worth about $1.8 billion. Just a day later, another 20,169 BTC, worth $1.4 billion, left miner-linked wallets.

To put this into perspective, the combined January production of eight major public mining companies, including CleanSpark, Marathon, and Riot, was roughly 2,377 BTC. The outflows in a single day were more than ten times the monthly production of the industry’s titans. This discrepancy suggests that miners are liquidating reserves to cover operational costs or move to new business models like AI compute.

The best altcoins to buy now as miners sell

DeepSnitch AI ($DSNT): The opportunity to $180k gains

DeepSnitch AI is marching forward with strength, especially for those who want to make massive profits in the current market cycle. The presale is going very well, raising $1,590,000 in Stage 5 of its presale.

Moreover, the postponed launch gives those who buy now a distinct advantage in a volatile market. As more users join the presale to get access, the demand builds up behind a dam. When the token finally lists on Tier-1 crypto exchanges, the dam breaks, and the price is forced upward by the volume of buyers trying to enter.

To show you the potential of joining the DeepSnitch AI presale, imagine you make a $3,400 investment at the current price of $0.03985. This gives you about 85,320 DSNT tokens.

But assuming DeepSnitch AI captures the market’s demand for safety tools and hits a target of $2.11, that initial $3,400 would transform into $180,000. This potential for a 50x-plus return is why DeepSnitch AI is the top pick for 2026 as one of the best altcoins to buy now.

Dogecoin ($DOGE): One of the undervalued altcoins?

Dogecoin’s recent price performance has been brutal. The meme coin leader has declined by 5% on the weekly chart as of February 12th, underperforming a global market that is actually up 4%.

With extreme fear dominating sentiment, Dogecoin is trading at levels not seen since the depths of the bear market. Forecasts predict Dogecoin could hit $0.1222 by the end of 2026, a 30% gain. For investors seeking the best altcoins to buy, Dogecoin lacks the explosive upside of DeepSnitch AI. A 30% gain won’t change your life, but a 50x gain will.

Solana ($SOL): One of the promising altcoins?

Solana ($SOL) is making headlines with technical advancements, specifically the new Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) bridge using Hyperlane to connect Ethereum and Solana. This infrastructure upgrade is bullish for DeFi interoperability.

However, the price has not responded positively. Solana is down 9% in the last week as of February 12th, underperforming the market. Despite heavy trading volume of over $3.7 billion, selling pressure remains high. Global crypto platform BYDFi is sponsoring Solana events in Hong Kong to boost engagement, but institutional interest seems to be pausing.

Final verdict

Miners are selling, and the market is fearful. This is the exact moment to buy the future. DeepSnitch AI offers the technology and the tokenomics to turn this correction into a fortune.

You get roughly 85,320 DSNT tokens when you invest $3,400. However, using the bonus code DSNTVIP30 gives you an additional 30% bonus. Incentives like this are why investors favor DeepSnitch AI among the best altcoins to buy.

Visit the official DeepSnitch AI website, join Telegram, and follow on X for more updates.

FAQs

What are the best altcoins to buy during miner capitulation?

DeepSnitch AI is one of the best altcoins to buy during miner capitulation because its presale price is fixed and immune to open market selling pressure, unlike Bitcoin or Dogecoin.

Why is Dogecoin underperforming the market?

Dogecoin is underperforming because it is a high-inflation asset suffering from extreme fear sentiment. Investors are rotating into deflationary or high-upside crypto projects like DeepSnitch AI.

Is Solana a good buy after the drop?

Solana is a solid long-term hold among promising altcoins, but its recent drop suggests continued volatility. DeepSnitch AI offers a better risk-reward ratio for short-to-medium term growth.

The post Best Altcoins to Buy for 2026 Profits: Bitcoin Miners Dump $3.2 Billion, Creating a Buying Opportunity Where DeepSnitch AI Is the Gem to Turn $3,400 Into $180k appeared first on Blockonomi.

The United Kingdom’s government has appointed HSBC’s tokenization platform to power a pilot issuance of digital government bonds, known as gilts. This historic step marks the institutional validation of blockchain technology, proving that the future of value transfer is on-chain.

Nevertheless, many investors are still focused on identifying the top crypto presale projects. Ahead of Digitap and LivLive, DeepSnitch AI has raised over $1.59 million, and investors believe DeepSnitch AI is likely the top crypto presale to buy now, offering the asymmetric upside that defines generational investment opportunities.

The UK Government moves to the blockchain

According to an announcement, the UK government has appointed HSBC to facilitate the Digital Gilt Instrument (DIGIT) pilot issuance. This initiative is part of a broader push to modernize sovereign debt markets using distributed ledger technology (DLT). The Treasury published a DIGIT pilot update in July 2025, outlining plans to explore blockchain applications in UK sovereign debt issuance and support the development of domestic tokenization infrastructure.

Lucy Rigby, the UK Economic Secretary to the Treasury, explained that this pilot will help the UK capitalize on DLT to enhance efficiency and reduce costs for businesses. “We want to attract investment and make the UK the best place to do business,” Rigby stated.

The top crypto presale to invest in

1. DeepSnitch AI ($DSNT): Likely the top crypto presale to buy now

In a market saturated with speculative meme coins and copycat chains, DeepSnitch AI has emerged as the definitive utility project of 2026. The project has successfully raised more than $1,590,000 in Stage 5 of its presale, with the token price rising to $0.03985.

Investors are also exploring the passive income opportunity with staking. As many as 36 million tokens have been staked, allowing people to earn more before the final launch.

Moreover, with speculations of listing on big exchanges, many are positioning for what could be the next crypto to explode. The investment case for DeepSnitch AI centers on its strategic launch mechanism. By postponing the public listing while keeping the platform live for presale buyers, the team has engineered a unique supply-demand dynamic.

For investors seeking the best crypto presales right now, DeepSnitch AI offers the rare combination of immediate utility, institutional alignment, and explosive upside potential. It is the project that transforms a portfolio from average to exceptional.

2. Digitap

Digitap enters the conversation as a formidable competitor among the early entry tokens. The project has drawn significant attention this month after reporting a relatively large presale raise early on. This substantial capital injection puts it on the radar for buyers tracking momentum.

Digitap distinguishes itself by focusing on a utility-first concept rather than leaning into meme culture. This approach aligns well with the current market sentiment, which favors projects with tangible products. However, DeepSnitch AI remains the superior choice for investors seeking the top crypto presale, especially one with both meme energy and tangible utility.

3. LivLive

LivLive takes a different approach to the top crypto presale narrative, placing itself around actual platform activity rather than just early-stage marketing. The project focuses on building visible usage from the start, pointing to active users, partnerships, and clear rollout milestones to support its value.

Instead of leaning on big claims or aggressive token narratives, LivLive focuses on steady, real-world progress as the product develops. This strategy appeals to conservative investors looking for high-upside launches with lower risk profiles. As the presale moves forward, attention around LivLive seems tied to that practical approach.

Final verdict

In this new era, data is the most valuable commodity. DeepSnitch AI is the only project on this list that provides the intelligence tools needed to move through this complex future. For the top crypto presale, DeepSnitch AI is your asymmetrical bet on the future of finance.

Imagine securing a position worth nearly $150,000 for a fraction of the cost simply by applying a special code at checkout. A $12,500 investment at the Stage 5 price of $0.03985 secures roughly 313,676 DSNT tokens. However, using the bonus code DSNTVIP150 grants you a massive 150% bonus.

Visit the official DeepSnitch AI website, join Telegram, and follow on X for more updates.

FAQs

What is likely the top crypto presale to buy now?

DeepSnitch AI ($DSNT) is likely the top crypto presale to buy now because of its strong fundraising.

What are the best early entry tokens for 2026?

The best early entry tokens are those with live utility and strong community backing. DeepSnitch AI fits this profile perfectly with its active SnitchScan platform and over 36 million tokens staked during the presale.

Why is LivLive considered a quiet presale?

LivLive focuses on real-world usage metrics rather than aggressive marketing hype. While this makes it a safer, steadier investment, it may lack the explosive short-term growth potential of high-upside launches like DeepSnitch AI.

The post Top Crypto Presale for 2026: UK Government Tokenizes Bonds with HSBC, but DeepSnitch AI Is Likely the Top Crypto Presale to Buy Now appeared first on Blockonomi.

Braden John Karony, SafeMoon’s former CEO, has been sentenced to 8 years in prison for his role in a multi-million dollar crypto fraud scheme.

U.S. District Judge Eric Komite handed out the judgment in a Brooklyn federal court after a jury convicted him in May 2025 following a three-week trial.

Details of The Sentencing

Court documents show that Karony was found guilty of conspiracy to commit securities fraud, wire fraud, and money laundering. As part of the ruling, he has been ordered to forfeit approximately $7.5 million, while the amount of restitution to victims will be determined at a later date. The jury also issued a verdict instructing the forfeiture of two residential properties.

Meanwhile, one of his co-conspirators, Thomas Smith, pleaded guilty in February 2025 and is awaiting sentencing, while Kyle Nagy remains at large.

“Karony lied to investors from all walks of life—including military veterans and hard-working Americans—and defrauded thousands of victims in order to buy mansions, sports cars, and custom trucks,” said United States Attorney Joseph Nocella, Jr.

FBI Assistant Director in Charge James C. Barnacle said the former executive abused his position and betrayed investors’ trust by stealing more than $9 million in cryptocurrency to finance a lavish lifestyle. The proceeds were used to purchase luxury vehicles and real estate, including a $2.2 million home in Utah, additional homes in Kansas, a $277,000 Audi R8 sports car, a Tesla, a custom Ford F-550, and Jeep Gladiator pickup trucks.

IRS-CI New York Special Agent in Charge Harry T. Chavis added that Karony carried out the scheme by exploiting his access to SafeMoon’s liquidity pool while attempting to conceal the transactions, which law enforcement eventually traced, exposing the scheme.

Liquidity Pool Misrepresentations

SafeMoon tokens were launched in March 2021 by the firm on a public blockchain, with each transaction automatically subject to a 10% tax that was split into two 5% tranches. One was meant to be reflected to holders in proportion to their holdings, increasing their token balances, while the remaining 5% was designated for its pools to boost market liquidity.

In the months following its debut, SafeMoon attracted millions of customers and reached a market capitalization exceeding $8 billion.

Prosecutors claim that Karony and his partners lied about important details of the company, including false statements that its reserves were locked and could not be used for personal reasons, that tokens would only be used for specific business purposes, that digital asset pairs would be added to the liquidity pool manually when trades occurred on certain exchanges, and that the developers were not using or trading SafeMoon for their own gain.

In reality, they retained access to the liquidity pools and diverted millions of dollars’ worth of crypto for personal enrichment.

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Coinbase reported a $667 million net loss for the fourth quarter of 2025, its first quarter in the red since 2023.

The loss, which was largely driven by non-cash write-downs on the company’s crypto holdings and strategic investments, landed far below analyst expectations and reversed a $1.3 billion profit from the same period last year.

Record Growth Metrics Masked by Portfolio Pain

Coinbase’s shareholder letter, published after market close, painted two divergent pictures of its 2025 performance. On the operational side, the company logged all-time highs in total trading volume ($5.2 trillion, up 156% year-over-year), crypto trading market share (6.4%, double the year before), and subscription revenue.

In the letter, the crypto firm stated that paid Coinbase One subscribers have nearly hit 1 million and that it now has 12 products generating over $100 million in annualized revenue.

However, fourth-quarter financials told a different story, with total revenue falling 21.6% year-over-year to $1.78 billion and missing consensus estimates of about $1.83 billion. Additionally, transaction revenue, the company’s core fee business, dropped 36% from Q4 2024 to $983 million. Adjusted earnings per share of $0.66 also came in below analyst forecasts, which ranged from $0.86 to $0.96, according to market commentator MartyParty.

Per Coinbase’s report, the primary culprit behind the GAAP loss was a $718 million unrealized markdown on the exchange’s crypto investment portfolio, as Bitcoin (BTC) and other tokens declined in Q4.

The company also recorded a $395 million loss on strategic investments, including its stake in Circle, the issuer of USDC, which dropped approximately 40% quarter-over-quarter. Ultimately, Coinbase ended the year with $11.3 billion in cash and cash equivalents.

Market Share Gains Face New Competitive Pressure

Recent data suggests Coinbase is facing rising competition, with analytics firm Artemis reporting that decentralized derivatives platform Hyperliquid processed $2.6 trillion in trading volume, nearly double Coinbase’s $1.4 trillion in the same period. Artemis also reported a sharp divergence in market performance this year, with Hyperliquid’s token up 31.7% while Coinbase shares were down 27% over the same stretch.

The company’s mixed quarter follows a busy 2025, where it joined the S&P 500, secured approval to operate across the European Union under MiCA rules, and completed major acquisitions, including Deribit. It also benefited from a legal win when the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) dropped a lawsuit against the firm.

Not all commentary has been positive, though, as shown by security researcher Taylor Monahan’s argument that user protection on Coinbase is still lagging, citing more than $350 million in preventable losses during 2025.

Nonetheless, the exchange has maintained that its strategy focuses on diversification beyond spot trading. It said it is building an “Everything Exchange” that includes derivatives, equities, and prediction markets, and it recently partnered with Kalshi to support event-based contracts. Whether that broader model offsets swings in crypto prices will become clearer in the coming quarters.

The post Coinbase Swings to $667M Q4 Loss as Crypto Portfolio Markdowns Bite appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Ethereum’s recent price action reflects a market transitioning from impulsive selling into a potential short-term stabilisation phase. After a sharp decline toward the $1,750 demand zone, ETH has reacted with a moderate rebound, yet is expected to continue fluctuating in the short term.

Ethereum Price Analysis: The Daily Chart

On the daily chart, ETH continues to trade inside its descending channel, with lower highs and lower lows still intact. The recent impulsive drop pushed the price sharply into the $1.8K demand area, where buyers reacted and triggered a rebound toward the $2.1K region.

However, the asset remains below the 0.5 Fibonacci level at $2.4K and well under the 0.618 level at $2.5K, confirming that the current move is corrective rather than a confirmed trend reversal.

The $2.7K range, aligned with the 0.702–0.786 retracement levels, stands as a major supply zone and would be the key resistance area if a stronger recovery unfolds. As long as ETH remains below $2.5K, the broader structure favours sellers, while the $1.7K level remains the critical support to hold.

ETH/USDT 4-Hour Chart

On the 4-hour chart, the price action has formed a short-term contracting structure after the sharp bounce from $1.7K. The market is currently fluctuating between the ascending short-term support trendline and the descending local resistance trendline, compressing near the $2.1K area. A successful break above $2.1K could open the path toward $2.5K, which is the next key resistance.

Conversely, losing the $2K intraday support would likely expose the $1.8K zone again. For now, ETH appears to be in a short-term consolidation phase between $1.8K and $2.1K following the recent volatility spike.

Sentiment Analysis

The Ethereum Spot Average Order Size chart shows a notable increase in green dots during the recent decline toward the $1.8K region. These green clusters indicate large whale-sized spot orders entering the market as prices traded at low levels. This behaviour suggests potential accumulation by bigger players during the panic-driven sell-off.

While this does not immediately signal a trend reversal, the concentration of whale activity near $1.8K strengthens this zone as a structurally important demand area. If accumulation continues and price stabilises above $2K, the probability of a broader recovery toward higher resistance levels will gradually increase.

The post Ethereum Price Analysis: ETH Needs to Reclaim This Key Level to Flip the Script appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Bitcoin (BTC) fell to about $60,000 on February 5 after sliding roughly 50% from its peak near $126,000, according to the latest market note from Binance’s research arm.

The report argues that, compared with prior cycles, the scale and structure of the decline suggest a market shaped more by institutional capital and macro forces than retail speculation.

Drawdown Data and Macro Forces Shaping the Slide

In a post published February 13, Binance Research wrote that the current 50% pullback “represents a modest correction relative to prior cycles,” noting that BTC has logged nine separate drawdowns of that magnitude or larger.

Historical examples listed by the firm include two separate falls of 94% in 2010 and 2011, a 78% dip between November 2021 and November 2022, and an 84% collapse during the 2017 to 2018 bear market.

The report attributed the present decline to macro conditions rather than crypto-specific failures, pointing to firm labor data and policy uncertainty tied to the Federal Reserve as factors that have kept liquidity tight and reduced appetite for risk assets. The researchers added that capital has rotated toward AI-linked equities and defensive sectors, leaving digital assets competing for investor attention.

Price data from CoinGecko shows Bitcoin trading less than 200 bucks below $67,000 at publication time, with the asset barely budging in 24 hours but gaining about 3% over the past week. Momentum is also weak across longer timeframes, with losses of about 19% in two weeks and nearly 30% in a month.

According to Binance Research, altcoins have lagged more sharply, with capital concentrating in large assets. The analysts linked that shift to a crowded token market after more than 11 million new tokens launched in 2025, many of which are no longer actively trading.

Structural Signals Suggest a Different Cycle Profile

Not all indicators paint the same picture, especially considering that analysis from Alphractal reported that Bitcoin’s long-term Realized Cap Impulse has turned negative for the first time in three years. This is a signal that has historically coincided with extended downturns as capital inflows slowed. The firm’s founder, Joao Wedson, said institutional buying and ETF accumulation have not fully offset supply pressure.

Macro uncertainty may also be contributing, with data from CryptoQuant showing its Global Uncertainty Index at a record level, higher than readings during events such as the 2008 financial crisis and the COVID-19 period. Elevated uncertainty often leads investors to reduce exposure to volatile assets.

However, Binance’s researchers argue that structural participation has deepened. They cited steady assets under management in spot Bitcoin ETFs, stablecoin supply near cycle highs, and rising interest in tokenized real-world assets. One example came this week when BlackRock settled trades for its tokenized Treasury fund through Uniswap infrastructure, a sign that traditional finance firms are still testing blockchain settlement rails.

The post Bitcoin’s 50% Decline Seen as ‘Modest,’ Signals Market Maturity appeared first on CryptoPotato.

Despite growing criticism and controversy surrounding the project, many Pioneers continue to publicly praise and support the Pi Network Core Team and the ecosystem they have built.

The underlying asset has finally shown notable signs of recovery, prompting a prominent analyst to hint at buying PI and making bold price predictions.

“Adding Some PI”

Captain Faibik, a renowned cryptocurrency analyst with well over 100,000 followers on X, made a rare call on Pi Network’s native token. In a recent tweet, Faibik outlined their 500% surge expectation for PI after explaining that they had added some of the token for the midterm.

Adding Some $PI for the Midterm..!!

Expecting +500% Bullish Rally..#Crypto #PI #PIUSDT pic.twitter.com/LQppQBAblo

— Captain Faibik (@CryptoFaibik) February 14, 2026

PI has performed rather well in the past day, jumping by 10% to over $0.16. This means the asset is now 23% higher than its all-time low of $0.1312, set on February 11. Despite this daily increase, PI remains deep in the red on almost all other scales, down nearly 95% from its all-time low recorded last February.

If Captain Faibik’s 500% surge prediction is to come true, the token could be on its way to $1. However, that seems unlikely at the moment, given the overall market environment and PI’s inability to stage a longer, more profound recovery.

There’s a big elephant in the Pi Network room for the next few weeks. The token unlock schedule from PiScan indicates that, on average, more than 7.2 million PI will be released daily over the next month, but the number will frequently exceed 13.5 million by February 25. The unlocks will ease in March, though.

These large unlocking events are viewed as bearish, as they can increase immediate selling pressure from investors who have been waiting for their tokens for a long time.

Co-Founder Speaks Out

Pi Network’s Core Team has faced significant scrutiny over the past several weeks. However, this didn’t stop them from announcing a new series of upgrades with a February 15 deadline for Mainnet nodes.

One of the project’s co-founders, Dr. Nocolas Kokkalis, also issued the same reminder to his over 120,000 followers on X, claiming that the PI nodes are the “4th role in the PI ecosystem.” He urged users to run the PI node on their laptop or desktop to validate transactions, strengthen network security, and support global consensus and trust.

Pi Nodes — The 4th Role in the Pi Ecosystem
Run Pi Node on your laptop or desktop and help power decentralization:
Validate transactions on a distributed ledger
Strengthen network security
Support global consensus & trust
Every node makes the network stronger… pic.twitter.com/jrxy0IKSyM

— Dr. Nicolas Kokkalis (@drnicolas_) February 14, 2026

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