Bitcoin opened Monday at $64,647, little changed from last week, as two competing forces roughly canceled each other out: a modest return of institutional money into spot ETFs, and a fresh wave of risk-off sentiment triggered by escalating U.S.-Iran military strikes.
Oil Jumps, Bitcoin Doesn't Move
Brent crude climbed nearly 4% on Friday after reports of new U.S.-Iran strikes, according to CoinDesk. That kind of geopolitical shock typically sends investors scrambling for safety — but Bitcoin's response was muted. Asian chip stocks were already under pressure from Friday's Chinese AI release from Alibaba's Qwen model, adding another layer of market unease. The net effect was a Bitcoin price that held its ground without finding new momentum.
Traders are watching a key long-term trend line that has held as support for three consecutive weeks, according to Cointelegraph. One closely followed analyst maintained a $67,000 price target for the near term, though the broader setup remains cautious.
ETF Inflows Return — But Analysts Aren't Impressed Yet
U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs pulled in $75.7 million in net inflows last week, extending a two-week inflow streak totaling $273 million, according to CoinDesk. That sounds meaningful — until you compare it to the scale of recent outflows. Analysts quoted by CoinDesk called the figure "peanuts" relative to the selling that preceded it. Two weeks of fresh inflows have not come close to filling the gap left by the prior exodus. Demand exists, but it is not yet strong enough to sustain a new uptrend.
Strategy Raises Cash, Skips Bitcoin
For the second week in a row, Strategy — the publicly traded firm that holds the largest known corporate Bitcoin treasury — chose not to buy more Bitcoin. Instead, it sold $263.5 million in MSTR shares, pushing its U.S. dollar cash reserve to a record $3.225 billion, according to reporting from Bitcoin Magazine and CoinDesk. Its Bitcoin holdings remain unchanged at 843,775 BTC, worth roughly $54.7 billion — about 4% of the total 21 million Bitcoin that will ever exist, according to The Block.
The back-to-back weeks of cash accumulation rather than Bitcoin purchases represent a notable shift in strategy. The firm has said the raised capital is earmarked for dividend payments on its preferred stock. Whether the pause continues will be one of the week's most watched data points.
BIP-110 Debate Heats Up
Michael Saylor published a 110-point essay arguing against BIP-110, a proposed soft fork that would temporarily block certain types of data — sometimes called "spam" — from being recorded on the Bitcoin blockchain. Saylor's core objection, as reported by CoinDesk and Cointelegraph, is that any mechanism capable of filtering one type of transaction could eventually be used to censor others. He called the proposal a threat to Bitcoin's neutrality, even while saying he agrees with the underlying goal of a cleaner network. The soft fork faces an August community showdown, making this debate one to follow closely over the coming weeks.
The neutrality argument matters well beyond technical circles. Bitcoin's value to nonprofits and international donors rests partly on the fact that no central authority can block a legitimate transfer — making the BIP-110 debate directly relevant to anyone who relies on the network to move funds across borders for humanitarian purposes.