PATRIOT Act Reloaded: Treasury Targets Bitcoin Privacy

Happy Monday Bitcoiners - it’s Bam with another weekly update!

Each week, we condense the most impactful news releases into a concise, easy-to-read update so you’re always in the know!

Notable events this week include 👇

• Namecheap just sold its biggest domain ever (paid entirely in BTC)

• Harvard economists finally treat Bitcoin as a credible reserve asset

• Congressman calls for Strategic Bitcoin Reserve clarity within 90 days

Let’s dive in⚡

Weekly Live Stream 🚨

Join Rob Wallace live today with Hector Alvero, Bitcoin educator and COO of Rhino Bitcoin, as they break down the latest headlines and share updates on global Bitcoin education efforts.

Latest News 📰

🙌 Adoption

• Chipper Cash, the African fintech giant serving millions, reports that over 50% of Bitcoin transactions on its platform now run on Lightning, one of the largest real-world deployments of the L2, powered by Voltage.

• Namecheap CEO says the company’s largest-ever domain sale, a one-word .com for $2M, was paid entirely in Bitcoin via BTCPayServer.

• My First Bitcoin announces its 7th Educators Unconference, happening this November in El Salvador during Bitcoin Week. Attendees pitch session ideas, which are then organized into breakout discussions.

⚖️ Legal

• Aikido Security warns of a massive npm supply chain attack. 18 packages with 2B+ weekly downloads were injected with wallet-draining code targeting MetaMask and Phantom users.

• US Treasury moves to apply the PATRIOT Act to digital assets. FinCEN Director confirms plans to finalize the “mixer rule,” which would label common BTC privacy practices as primary money laundering concerns.

• US Rep. David Joyce introduces a bill directing the Treasury to study the feasibility of a federal Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, including custody, security, and accounting, with a report due in 90 days.

📈 Markets

• Cantor Fitzgerald launches the ‘Gold Protected Bitcoin Fund’, offering 45% of Bitcoin’s 5-year upside while using gold to fully protect principal on the downside.

• JP Morgan sees a September rate cut despite CPI risks. BlackRock’s CIO is calling for a 50bps move this week, while Morgan Stanley projects steady cuts through 2026, with rates down to 2.75–3.0%.

• Tether announces USAT, the first U.S.-approved, bank-grade stablecoin, fully compliant with the GENIUS Act. Former Trump advisor Bo Hines will serve as CEO as they plan to launch by year-end.

🏦 Treasury

• Strategy receives a Buy” rating from Benchmark with a $705 price target, the same week a shareholder transparency lawsuit against the company was dismissed.

• Metaplanet raises $1.4B in an upsized international share offering to grow its Bitcoin treasury, reinforcing its reputation as Japan’s MicroStrategy.

• Brazil’s Meliuz is selling cash-secured Bitcoin puts to grow its 600+ BTC treasury, earning yield if prices hold, or buying more BTC on dips, but missing upside if Bitcoin surges.

⛏️ Mining

• Al Jazeera reports it costs just $20,000 to mine one Bitcoin in Ethiopia, thanks to abundant hydropower. The industry is also helping expand the country’s developing power grid.

• Ocean Mining, the only Bitcoin pool that lets miners create their own block templates, has entered the top 10 for the first time, with both measured and self-reported hashrate confirming its rank.

• Bitmain accuses Orb Energy of diverting Bitcoin and damaging equipment in a Texas bankruptcy case, seeking to reclaim 2,700 Antminer servers it claims still belong to the company.

🗳️ Politics

• Russia accuses the US of planning to erase its $35T debt with crypto. Putin adviser Kobyakov claims Washington will push debt into stablecoins, devalue it, and reset the system.

• Harvard economist Matthew Ferranti publishes the first peer-reviewed study treating Bitcoin as a credible reserve asset, showing that central banks facing sanctions risk benefit from holding Bitcoin alongside gold.

• IMF confirms that the total amount of El Salvador’s government-owned Bitcoin has not increased and that the increase in the Bitcoin Reserve Fund corresponds to movements across government wallets.

🧠 Bitcoin Trivia 🧠

Bam’s 2 Sats 🧢

The Road to $10 Million Bitcoin

Bitcoin rebounded this week on speculation of imminent Fed rate cuts. Alongside the bounce came the usual predictions: $150K by year-end (per Mel Mattison at TFTC), and even an outrageously bullish call for $1 billion per coin by 2038 from Fidelity.

I usually avoid short-term Bitcoin predictions, often deliberately. But one stuck with me: Erik Yakes on the WBD Podcast made the case for $10 million per coin within seven years.

Part of his thesis is that the world is desperate for a neutral global money. As money printing accelerates, governments need an escape hatch — a way to inflate without crushing the lower classes under soaring housing costs and inflated zombie-company valuations.

Enter Bitcoin: a $2 trillion asset in just over a decade, with the potential to rival gold and replace U.S. Treasuries as the world’s reserve asset. Its fixed supply and growing adoption make it the ultimate escape hatch.

A fixed supply, combined with expanding adoption, eventually leads to exponential price appreciation, especially in the face of massive capital inflows.

And it’s not just math — Bitcoin is also rising as a revolutionary movement. It’s bleeding into politics and culture, with demand compounding across retail, institutions, and now sovereigns.

Maybe we’re nearing the “gradually, then suddenly” moment. The irony? It could hit just as macroeconomists declare the bull cycle over, in a system so overleveraged it shouldn’t be able to continue but somehow does.

That is, until the elite find another way to kick the can, a shiny new “innovation” like stablecoins combined with the oldest trick in the book: more money printing.

If Yakes is right, the biggest missed opportunity won’t be failing to predict the collapse of fiat. It will be failing to prepare for the rise of Bitcoin.

Stay safe and keep on stacking!
-Bam

Gen Z Overthrows Nepalese Government (Organized Through Discord!)

In just 48 hours, the youth of Nepal overthrew a corrupt regime, not with generals, but with TikTok, Discord, and freedom tech like Bitchat.

Get a glimpse of what decentralized, internet-native movements can look like in the 21st century 👇