Hacked, Rugged, and Wrecked: "Crypto" Traders Reel as Big Finance Bets on Bitcoin

Happy Monday Bitcoiners, it's Bam here with another Bitcoin update!

Each week, our team at Bitcoin News saves you time by curating the most impactful events into a concise, easy-to-read update.

Notable events this week include:

• North Korea’s Lazarus Group steals $1.5 billion in ETH from Bybit.

• 1,573 institutions now have Bitcoin exposure.

• U.S. Marshals track seized Bitcoin with Excel… and don’t know the total.

Let’s dive in! ⚡

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LATEST NEWS 📰

🙌 ADOPTION

• Fidelity Digital Assets releases a report on the Lightning Network, stating that it is the most efficient way to transact in the digital asset ecosystem.

• Strive Asset Management is making it their goal this year to assist at least one company in every sector to adopt a Bitcoin treasury.

• Bitwise fulfills its pledge to donate 10% of gross profits from its Bitcoin ETF annually, contributing $150,000 to Brink, OpenSats, and HRF to support Bitcoin open-source development.

⚖️ LEGAL

• Digital asset legislation has now been introduced in 32 U.S. states.

• North Korea’s Lazarus Group pulls off the largest crypto exchange hack in history, stealing $1.5 billion in ETH. They have already begun swapping it for Bitcoin on decentralized protocols.

• Senator Rand Paul demands a full audit of the U.S. Mint’s gold holdings, including physical tests, and requests an in-person inspection of Fort Knox.

📈 MARKETS

• A 13F report summary shows 1,573 institutions—banks, hedge funds, RIAs, endowments, pensions, and sovereign wealth funds—held long Bitcoin positions in Q4 2024. The median allocation was 0.13%, far below BlackRock’s recommended 1–2%, signaling early adoption.

• Metaplanet acquires 68.59 BTC, bringing its total holdings to 2,100 BTC, verifiable on-chain. It is also set to execute a 10-for-1 stock split, increasing outstanding shares from ~39.2M to ~391.7M.

• Fold becomes the first Bitcoin-only financial services company to go public on NASDAQ, with over 1,000 BTC on its balance sheet.

⛏️ MINING

• LN Energy, fresh off a $26M infrastructure sale to CleanSpark, has been denied a permit by the Pierce County Commission for a proposed Bitcoin mine in Blackshear, Georgia.

• Japanese news program visits Bitcoin Brabant’s greenhouse, where Bitcoin mining rigs generate heat to grow tulips.

• Russia’s regional Bitcoin mining ban frees 300 MW, easing strain on Siberia’s grid and preventing winter outages. Authorities now propose a registry to track mining equipment and curb unauthorized power use.

🗳️ POLITICS

• A source claims the U.S. Marshals Service manages seized Bitcoin with Excel spreadsheets, shares deposit addresses via unencrypted email, and is unable to confirm its total holdings.

• Donald Trump, speaking at the Future Investment Initiative Institute in Miami—an organization run by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund—declared, “Bitcoin has set multiple all-time highs because everyone knows I’m committed to making America the crypto capital.”

• New FBI Director, Kash Patel, holds over $100K in Grayscale’s Bitcoin products and up to $100K in Core Scientific stock, a Bitcoin mining company.

BAMS 2 SATS 🧢

Recently, bearish sentiment toward Bitcoin has grown within the broader crypto space, perhaps due to repeated rug pulls of meme coins on other chains, leaving them dazed, confused, and disillusioned. They overlook Bitcoin’s true value: its fixed supply of 21 million and the sovereignty it grants each holder over their property.

These “crypto investors” fail to see that continuously creating new tokens or base layers undermines value accretion. Introducing new forms of money is inherently dilutive.

While traders waver, true Bitcoiners embrace volatility and keep stacking. Behind the scenes, big players are making moves. ETFs are accumulating, and Strategy (MSTR) is doubling down. With billions in convertible note offerings, MSTR isn’t just bullish on Bitcoin, it’s in a race with itself to accumulate as much Bitcoin as possible before the price takes off.

A few days ago, Adam Back suggested we’re still in the early stages of a bull market. That might surprise some, but if you’ve followed this newsletter, the reasoning is clear: ETFs are buying nearly twice the daily mined Bitcoin and MSTR is matching that pace.

Consider that some of the biggest names in global finance added over one million MSTR shares in Q4 2024.

The result of this surging demand? MicroStrategy is on the verge of a massive Bitcoin buy, likely exceeding $2 billion this week, as appetite for its financial products shows no signs of slowing.

While some are screaming “top” and playing games, others are positioning themselves for a significant inflow of capital into Bitcoin.

Oh, and let’s not forget that the former CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald was just appointed to manage the U.S. Sovereign Wealth Fund. That same firm recently acquired over three million MSTR shares, now 40% of its total portfolio. No surprise they outperformed last quarter, far exceeding Bitcoin’s gains.

Stay safe and keep on stacking!
Bam

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