Open Range | Banks, Brokerages & Bills
The week’s signals clustered around one theme: convergence. Retail Bitcoin interest appeared to pick up as evidenced by Coinbase jumping on the app store rankings, as Charles Schwab announced their intents to enter the apace to compete directly with Coinbase. Meanwhile, institutional Bitcoin interest remained driven by Standard Charted turning on institutional trading, while Strategy has amassed almost 3% of Bitcoin's supply, and Adam Back launched his own SPAC. On the policy front, “Crypto Week” in the House delivered three significant bills and set up a potential executive order expanding 401(k) access. The demand stack, banks, brokerages, corporates, retail, and legislators, keeps growing even as new supply growth maintains its certainty.
Bitcoin Update
Despite an early-week rise in price, Bitcoin ended roughly flat, despite the volatility introduced by rumors of Federal Reserve Chair firings and volatile tariff rumors.
Early Riders Media
Michael, Brian, and Liam discuss the latest in bitcoin adoption amid volatility, public corporate adoption, and capital mismanagement on this week's podcast.
You can find all our episodes on our podcast website as well as listen on YouTube and Spotify.
Industry & Institutional Updates
Charles Schwab will launch direct Bitcoin trading for retail brokerage clients, explicitly targeting users who currently move assets to specialized exchanges like Coinbase, signaling further convergence between legacy discount brokerage and native crypto platforms.
Standard Chartered launched deliverable spot BTC and ETH trading for institutional clients.
Cantor Fitzgerald is finalizing a $4 billion SPAC deal with Blockstream founder Adam Back, seeded with more than to 30,000 BTC.
Strategy acquired 4,225 Bitcoin to reach a total of 601,550, holding almost 3% of the total supply.
Coinbase climbed 63 places in the U.S. App Store rankings, signaling an increase in retail interest in the asset class.
Volcon (e‑bike / EV maker) announced it raised $500M to allocate toward a Bitcoin treasury.
LQWD Technologies added 57.5 BTC, bringing its holdings to 238.5 Bitcoin and posting a 54.6% BTC yield YTD.
Regulatory Updates
The U.S. House, after rare procedural turmoil, passed the CLARITY Act (294–134), GENIUS stablecoin Act (308–122) and Anti‑CBDC Surveillance State Act (219–210), sending GENIUS to the President and the others to the Senate.
Reports indicate Trump is preparing an order to open 401(k) plans to Bitcoin, gold and private equity, directing agencies to remove current barriers.
A FOIA response shows the U.S. Marshal Service holds 28,988 Bitcoin (≈ $3.4 billion) in seized assets. Other seizures may be held by other U.S. Government departments.
El Salvador’s President Bukele met Pakistan’s Minister of Crypto to discuss mining cooperation and sovereign Bitcoin reserves.
A recent IMF paper confirmed that El Salvador has not been acquiring more Bitcoin since the IMF issued the country its latest loan. The increase in Bitcoin holdings reflects the consolidation of Bitcoin across various government-owned wallets.
UK lawmakers proposed a ban on crypto donations to political campaigns over traceability concerns.
Roman Storm's trial related to Tornado Cash opening statements framed core questions on developer liability for open‑source privacy software.
Chart of the Week
Despite a recent uptick in price over the past two weeks, Bitcoin's price performance since the halving has still significantly underperformed historical trends, partially due to the fact that in 2024 was the first time Bitcoin hit an all time high leading up to a halving.
Please forward this to someone in your network who may find this valuable, or reach out to us directly to learn more about Early Riders and how to get involved.
Make sure to keep up with all our research at earlyriders.com/research.
