Ten31 Timestamp 854,339

It was a landmark week for both bitcoin and Ten31, as many of the world’s most prominent business leaders and politicians convened in Nashville for this year’s Bitcoin Conference. The week included many notable speeches and updates, with Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump’s remarks undoubtedly making the greatest waves to close out the conference (even if the speech itself probably fell short of some loftier expectations). In what would effectively be the most geopolitically consequential act of civil asset forfeiture in history, President Trump pledged to use the US Treasury’s existing stockpile of bitcoin as the foundation for a national strategic bitcoin reserve, while also promising that his administration would end the federal government’s overly adversarial regulatory posture toward bitcoin. Senator Cynthia Lummis took the strategic reserve proposal a step further, announcing legislation that would see the Treasury purchase 1 million bitcoin over a set period (or ~5x the US’s current stockpile of seized bitcoin), and long-shot nominee Robert F. Kennedy, Jr took the theme further still with a proposal for the US to acquire 4 million bitcoin. 

While the actual implementation of any of these proposals is 1) entirely uncertain, 2) subject to all the caveats that should always accompany political promises, and 3) unnecessary for bitcoin’s monetization in the long run, it’s tough to argue that agendas like these don’t signal a sea change in mainstream regulatory acceptance of bitcoin and the clear rise of bitcoin holders as a relevant voting bloc. Following the resounding success of the new bitcoin ETFs through the first half of the year, this week’s political milestones have further bolstered momentum for the bitcoin ecosystem, and the Ten31 portfolio showed a noteworthy example of that momentum this week via the announcement of Fold’s upcoming public listing. The company – one of Ten31’s largest investments and one of the premier fintech brands in bitcoin – is set to become the first pure-play bitcoin financial services company to go public and intends to list on the Nasdaq with its own strategic treasury of over 1,000 bitcoin. Ten31 views this as a watershed transaction for the bitcoin technology ecosystem that offers a glimpse of what’s to come for the best companies in this space over the coming decade, and the declining political frictions on display this week will serve as that much more rocket fuel for the sector’s emerging category leaders.

Portfolio Company Spotlight

Fold is a financial services platform providing the most comprehensive bitcoin-denominated consumer rewards programs and a suite of services bridging bitcoin and traditional financial rails. Fold offers debit cards that accrue cash-back rewards in bitcoin that can be withdrawn to customer-controlled wallets, on top of unified checking and bitcoin custody accounts allowing users to seamlessly combine their USD and bitcoin activities. Fold will be rapidly expanding its product offering over the coming year and is set to achieve a public listing in the near-term with over 1,000 bitcoin on its balance sheet, giving the company one of the largest corporate bitcoin treasuries in the world. 

Selected Portfolio News

Fold announced a definitive agreement to take the company public on the Nasdaq with 1,000+ bitcoin on the company’s balance sheet at listing:

Fold also a completed a redesign of its app interface and launched new ACH reward options for bill payments:

Cathedra completed its business combination with Kungsleden:

Mempool.space officially moved its Mempool Accelerator into open beta and is now working with mining pools accounting for ~40% of bitcoin network hashrate:

Large publicly traded miner Riot Platforms announced its acquisition of Block Mining:

Unchained launched “Unchained Connections,” a new feature allowing users to collaborate with friends and family for bitcoin custody:

Unchained also enabled an in-platform USD cash balance, with ACH capabilities coming soon:

Strike announced a new plugin for BTCPay Server:

Hoseki announced a collaboration with Metaplanet to verify the company’s bitcoin treasury holdings:

Media

AnchorWatch Co-Founder and CEO Rob Hamilton appeared on the What Bitcoin Did podcast to discuss bitcoin insurance solutions and the growing bitcoin normalization.

Cathedra Co-Founder Drew Armstrong published an essay in Bitcoin Magazine on the growing synergies between bitcoin mining operations and GPUs running AI/ML workloads. 

Market Updates

US GDP for the second quarter came in well above expectations as the metric posted nearly 3% growth vs just 1.4%  in Q1. 

Less encouragingly, the Philadelphia Fed’s non-manufacturing activity index declined precipitously in July, turning sharply negative for the first time since 2022.

The US housing market continued to slow, as existing home sales declined sequentially for the fourth consecutive month and are now hovering around a 10-year low, even as median sale prices continued to rise on the back of tight inventory. 

After months of sustained weakness and new multi-decade lows, the Japanese Yen strengthened dramatically against the dollar this week, a move that has had implications for a variety of other asset classes globally. 

Investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald – a major custodian of reserve assets for stablecoin Tether – announced a new bitcoin-backed financing business, including an initial commitment of $2 billion in debt capacity. Cantor’s CEO also verbally confirmed the company holds a substantial amount of bitcoin. 

Michigan’s public retirement system made a small allocation to ARK’s spot bitcoin ETF. The move makes Michigan the second US state to publicly disclose such an allocation following Wisconsin’s similar investment several months ago. Meanwhile, the mayor of Jersey City announced the city is in the process of allocating a portion of its pension fund to the ETFs.

Regulatory Update

Republican Presidential nominee Donald Trump headlined the Bitcoin 2024 Conference in Nashville this weekend with a stump speech outlining a pro-bitcoin agenda, including the creation of a strategic bitcoin reserve (though with no target amount specified) and an end to undue regulatory pressure against bitcoin businesses. 

Shortly after, Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis announced new legislation that would direct the US Treasury to purchase 1 million bitcoin over a set period of time while reaffirming protections for bitcoin self-custody in the US. 

Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr also announced several ambitious proposals at the conference, including an executive order to purchase 4 million bitcoin for a national strategic reserve over a 20-year period. Kennedy also proposed treating all USD to bitcoin transactions as tax-exempt. 

Amid a broad Republican embrace of the bitcoin camp over the past several months, various Democrat politicians signed a letter to the DNC encouraging a more pro-bitcoin stance within their party. 

The Virtual Currency Tax Fairness Act was reintroduced in the Senate this week. The bill would create a de minimis capital gains tax exemption for cryptocurrency transactions. 

Noteworthy

Proton, a privacy-oriented communications and data management platform with over 100 million accounts, announced a new self-custodial bitcoin wallet aimed at easy onboarding and email-like UX for new users. 

OpenSats announced its sixth wave of grants for bitcoin open source projects. 

Foundry – one of the world’s largest bitcoin mining pools – launched Foundry Donate, a new initiative that will allow miners using Foundry’s pool to automatically and verifiably donate directly to OpenSats and Brink to support open source bitcoin development. 

An individual user of a Bitaxe – a lightweight, desktop bitcoin mining device – found a bitcoin block this week, earning over 3 bitcoin in the process. 

Travel

• Austin BItDevs, Aug 15

• BitcoinMENA, Dec 9-10