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What next as Ether/bitcoin ratio bounces from 2026 lows

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A closely watched gauge of ether’s relative strength against bitcoin has climbed to a three month high, backed by surging network activity and record stablecoin inflows on Ethereum.

The ether-bitcoin ratio traded near 0.0313 on Wednesday, up from a 2026 low around 0.028 in February but still well below the January 18 high near 0.038. Ether gained 4% over the past seven days to trade near $2,325, outpacing bitcoin’s 3.9% move over the same period.

The ETH/BTC ratio tracks the relative price of ether against bitcoin on crypto exchanges and is one of the most widely followed gauges of risk appetite across the digital asset market.

A rising ratio signals that capital is flowing into ether and, by extension, riskier parts of the crypto ecosystem. A falling ratio points to a preference for bitcoin’s relative safety.

The pair peaked above 0.08 in late 2021 before entering a prolonged decline that accelerated through 2024 and into 2025, dragged lower by bitcoin ETF-driven demand, weakened fee revenue on Ethereum’s base layer following the Dencun upgrade, and a broader rotation away from altcoins.

When ether outperforms bitcoin on risk-on days rather than simply tagging along, it historically suggests capital is beginning to rotate rather than chase the same trade. The signal strengthens if ether holds up better than bitcoin during the next pullback.

Part of the case for a sustained move rests on Ethereum’s on-chain fundamentals, which have been diverging from the token’s depressed valuation.

New users on the network surged 82% quarter-over-quarter in Q1 to 284,000, according to data from Artemis, while total transactions hit a record 200.4 million for the quarter, a 43% increase from the prior period.

Stablecoin supply on Ethereum also reached an all-time high of $180 billion, up 150% over the past three years, per Token Terminal. The network holds roughly 60% of the global stablecoin market, reinforcing its dominance as the primary settlement layer for tokenized dollars and suggesting a long-term demand anchor for ETH even as short-term price action lags.

However, ether is still more than 50% below its 52-week high of $4,831, and the ratio would need to reclaim the 0.035 zone on a weekly close to provide evidence that the recovery has legs beyond a short-squeeze bounce.

UniCredit selects Slate to deliver retail investment services

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Unicredit has selected Slate to deliver a digital investment platform combing brokerage and robo-advisory tech in Poland.

Editorial

This content has been selected, created and edited by the Finextra editorial team based upon its relevance and interest to our community.

With the support of Slate’s trading-as-a-service infrastructure and technology, UniCredit enables investors to grow their wealth through advanced trading tools, portfolio management features, real-time analytics and personalized automations

Ramiro Martínez-Pardo, CEO of Slate, says: “By combining self-brokerage with robo-advisory services, we are enabling UniCredit to serve a broader range of investor needs, from active traders to those seeking guided, automated investment approaches

Operating across both Web and mobile channels, UniCedit’s retail clients will be equipped with the ability to trade, invest across a range of portfolio solutions and monitor market trends in real time.

Bitcoin Price Roars Past $76,000 As Short Squeeze Continues

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Bitcoin price surged past $76,000 on Tuesday, hitting a four-week high and marking its strongest price move in weeks as a combination of geopolitical optimism, forced short liquidations, and institutional buying pressure drove the rally.

The move began building in the evening of April 13, when bitcoin broke through a dense cluster of leveraged short positions sitting between a bitcoin price of $72,000 and $73,500. Once that resistance cracked, short liquidations became the accelerant. 

Over a 24-hour period, roughly $425 million in leveraged short positions in Bitcoin and Ether were wiped out, with 177,000 traders liquidated for a combined $530 million, according to CoinGlass data.

Analysts had flagged this setup ahead of time. Options market data from Deribit showed dealers concentrated in “negative gamma” near $75,000 — a positioning condition where market makers are forced to buy into rising prices and sell into falling ones. Rather than a traditional support or resistance zone, the $75,000 level acted as a volatility release point, with dealer hedging flows turbocharging the upside move.

Iran ceasefire hopes fuel risk assets like bitcoin price

The geopolitical backdrop shifted in a meaningful way on Tuesday as reports emerged suggesting the Trump administration and Iran were moving toward a deal. 

A U.S. naval blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, which had pressured oil prices above $100 per barrel and weighed on risk assets for weeks, showed signs of easing. 

Strategy’s machine keeps running

Institutional demand added fuel to the move. Strategy’s STRC at-the-market preferred stock program recorded more than $1 billion in single-day trading volume on April 13, with all activity occurring above the $100 par value required to trigger share issuance. 

According to Bitcoin for Corporations tracker estimates, the volume generated $796 million in proceeds — enough to fund the purchase of an estimated 10,834 BTC at an average price near $73,400. That figure represents more than 24 times the daily Bitcoin mining supply following the most recent halving.

The STRC program has now generated over $3.5 billion in total proceeds to date. Strategy holds about 780,897 BTC, acquired at a total cost of roughly $59 billion, cementing its position as the largest corporate Bitcoin holder on the planet.

At the time of writing, shares of Strategy are up over 8% on the day near $143 a share. 

The next resistance band for the bitcoin price sits between $80,000 and $80,600, where positive dealer gamma positioning could act as a brake on momentum. The 200-day moving average stands near a bitcoin price of $87,500, the threshold to watch as confirmation of a true long-term trend reversal.

At the time of writing, the bitcoin price is back down near $75,000.

Editorial Disclaimer: We leverage AI as part of our editorial workflow, including to support research, image generation, and quality assurance processes. All content is directed, reviewed, and approved by our editorial team, who are accountable for accuracy and integrity. AI-generated images use only tools trained on properly licensed material. In Bitcoin, as in media: Don’t trust. Verify.

Bitcoin Moves Past Halfway Point In Halving Cycle As Supply Tightens Toward 2028

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Bitcoin is moving deeper into its current halving cycle, with the network now past the midpoint as the next supply cut approaches in 2028.

The next halving is expected in mid-April 2028 at block height 1,050,000, according to Bitcoin Magazine Pro data. Roughly 105,000 blocks remain in the current cycle, placing the network just over halfway through what is known as epoch five, which began after the April 2024 halving.

Bitcoin halvings occur every 210,000 blocks and reduce miner rewards by half, tightening the flow of new supply. Miners currently receive 3.125 BTC per block, a figure that will fall to about 1.562 BTC after the next event. Daily issuance will decline from around 450 BTC to near 225 BTC, reinforcing bitcoin’s fixed supply model capped at 21 million coins.

The mechanism has long supported bitcoin’s scarcity narrative. Previous halvings in 2012, 2016, 2020 and 2024 preceded major price expansions as reduced issuance met sustained demand. This cycle, however, is showing a different pattern.

Bitcoin has gained about 15% since the April 2024 halving, rising from near $64,000 to around $74,000. The asset reached a peak near $126,000 in October 2025 before falling to about $60,000 in February. The current cycle reflects slower gains compared with prior periods, a trend often linked to BTC’s growing market size and broader adoption.

Larger capital inflows are now required to drive price movements, contributing to reduced volatility and more measured trends. Institutional participation continues to shape market structure, with spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds drawing significant inflows.

Recent price action has also been driven by derivatives activity. BTC climbed from about $70,700 to above $76,000 within roughly two days, as liquidations of leveraged short positions accelerated upward momentum. Around $225 million in positions were wiped out during the move.

At the same time, miners face pressure as block rewards decline. Lower issuance may compress margins, pushing operators to depend more on transaction fees and scale.

Bitcoin miners are pivoting to AI

Bitcoin miners are pivoting toward artificial intelligence as profitability in core mining operations deteriorates. Following the 2024 halving, block rewards were cut in half while energy, cooling, and hardware costs remained elevated, compressing margins across the industry.

In response, miners are repurposing their existing infrastructure — power-heavy data centers, cooling systems, and land — into high-performance computing hubs for AI workloads. This shift allows them to tap into more stable, long-term revenue streams tied to the surging demand for AI training and inference.

Companies like TeraWulf and Core Scientific have already secured multi-billion-dollar AI hosting agreements, while others are reallocating capital away from BTC holdings to fund data center buildouts.

X Launches New Cashtag Feature for Stocks and Crypto: X

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X introduced a new cashtag feature enabling users to tag and discuss stocks and cryptocurrencies directly on the platform.

X launched a new cashtag feature on Tuesday, April 14, 2026, expanding its capabilities to include tagging for both stocks and cryptocurrencies. The feature allows users to reference assets using cashtag notation, similar to existing stock market discussion tools on social platforms. The announcement was made via the official WatcherGuru account on X.

The cashtag feature builds on X’s existing infrastructure for financial discussions, enabling users to easily reference and track conversations around specific crypto assets and equities. This addition positions X as a platform for broader financial discourse beyond traditional social networking.

Sources: WatcherGuru on X

This article was generated automatically by The Defiant’s AI news system from publicly available sources.

WealthArc Launches AI Agent to Turn Alternative Data and Documents Into AI-Ready Investment Data

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WealthArc today announced the launch of its new AI Agent, designed to automatically interpret financial documents such as account statements, portfolio reports, and private market investment documents and convert them into structured investment data available within the company’s global data infrastructure service.

The launch reflects a broader shift across the wealth management industry as firms seek to adopt artificial intelligence across investment operations and client servicing.

Before AI can automate workflows, generate insights or support investment decisions, firms must first solve a harder problem: a reliable data layer to clean, reconciled portfolio data across custodians, currencies and reporting systems. 

Wealth managers frequently receive portfolio information and alternative investment data through PDFs, spreadsheets or proprietary reporting formats. Before the information can be used for reporting or analysis, teams often spend hours manually extracting and reconciling the data.

Artur Kluz, CEO of WealthArc, said the real opportunity for AI in wealth management lies in solving these underlying data challenges: “AI won’t replace advisers, rather equip them with deep knowledge and flexible workflows. The real barrier to AI adoption in wealth management isn’t the models themselves but turning fragmented financial data into reliable, structured data.”

Turning financial data into structured investment data

WealthArc’s AI Agent enables firms to upload financial documents in a wide variety of formats and automatically transform the information they contain into structured portfolio data.

Examples of documents the AI Agent can process already include:

  • Custodian account statements

  • Private markets investment reports

  • Portfolio summaries and capital account statements

  • Investment performance reports

  • Other structured or semi-structured financial documents

Once processed, the extracted information becomes part of the data layer, where portfolio data from multiple custodians, asset classes and currencies is standardized and made available for reporting, analytics and AI-driven workflows to clients.

By automating document interpretation and data extraction, the AI Agent helps reduce the operational effort required to prepare portfolio data for analysis.

Moving beyond traditional automation

Unlike traditional automation tools that rely on fixed templates or predefined document structures, WealthArc’s AI Agent is designed to interpret financial information across documents that vary widely in format, terminology and reporting structure.

The AI-enabled technology analyzes the financial context of the data contained within documents and can highlight potential inconsistencies that require review.

To ensure reliability in financial environments, the AI Agent operates within a human-in-the-loop framework, where suggested interpretations or corrections are reviewed and confirmed by users before being applied to the portfolio dataset.

Radomir Mastalerz, CTO of WealthArc  said this approach is critical when working with financial data across multiple institutions: “Traditional automation works well when documents follow predictable formats, but financial reporting rarely does. Statements from different custodians often use different terminology, structures and assumptions. WealthArc’s AI Agent helps interpret that context and flag potential inconsistencies, while keeping humans in control of the final outcome.”

Building the data infrastructure for AI-driven wealth management

The AI Agent forms part of WealthArc’s broader strategy, continuing to build the data infrastructure and it’s 1000+ new generation global data feeds required for AI-driven wealth management.

At the center of this infrastructure is WealthArc Data Box, a universal multi-custodian and multi-currency data engine that aggregates, reconciles and standardizes portfolio data across wealth management stakeholders including banks, investment managers and family offices.

WealthArc is now working to significantly expand this infrastructure.

“Our goal is to build more than 1,000 next-generation global data feeds in the coming years,” Kluz said. “By expanding this infrastructure, we are building the foundational data layer for the wealth and asset management ecosystem—enabling institutions to scale operations, automate workflows and adopt AI with confidence.”

WealthArc’s services also include automated data processing and monitoring capabilities designed to transform fragmented custodian data into trusted, AI-ready portfolio datasets.

New AI agents roadmap 

The AI Agent represents the next stage in WealthArc’s roadmap to embed AI capabilities directly within investment data workflows powered by WealthArc Data Box.

Future developments will focus on expanding AI agents across:

  • Data feeds development 

  • Data cleaning, validation and quality monitoring 

  • Portfolio reconciliation

  • Multi-custodian data integration

  • Advanced data analytics 

Call for Collaboration

WealthArc invites wealth and asset management institutions—including wealth managers, family offices, private banks, as well as WealthTech and FinTech firms—to collaborate on AI-driven document processing and data integration use cases.

Firms interested in exploring these capabilities are encouraged to engage with the WealthArc team.

The Suit, The Songs, The System

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Revolutions leave behind artifacts. In August 2022, seven Adams County sheriff’s deputies in Ohio executed a search warrant on the home of Joseph Foreman — better known to the world as Afroman. They found nothing (save the lemon pound cake), and no charges were filed. What followed was a First Amendment masterclass in an American flag suit.

Using footage from his own home surveillance system, Foreman turned a botched raid into songs, videos, and a public record the Ohio deputies could no longer control. The officers later sued him for defamation, emotional distress, and invasion of privacy, claiming the videos ridiculed them and damaged their reputations. In March 2026, a jury ruled in Afroman’s favor. But by then, the videos and songs had grown exponentially beyond anything a courtroom could contain.

Born Joseph Edgar Foreman in Los Angeles, most people still know him from “Because I Got High” — the 2001 breakout hit that made him a household name. But what happened in Ohio revealed something more enduring beneath the comedy: an instinct for turning humiliation into visibility, and visibility into power. In his own telling, the deputies “brought me material.” What they intended as force became fodder. What could have remained a private violation became songs, satire, and evidence.

What unfolded was not just a legal victory. It was protest art in the modern age — raw, low-budget, absurdist, and deeply American. Wearing the flag while defending free speech. Turning ridicule back on the people who expected silence. Alongside Mear One’s Occupy Wall Street murals and Kolin Burges’ Mt. Gox vigil sign, Afroman’s American flag suit belongs to a lineage of cultural objects created when people refuse to let institutions bury the story. That suit will be on display at Bitcoin Conference 2026 in Las Vegas as part of Relics of a Revolution, an exhibition exploring protest art and asymmetric responses to institutional power.

I sat down with Joseph Foreman to talk about the raid, the songs, the verdict, and what it means to turn injustice into art.

BMAG: You testified that “the whole raid was a mistake” and that “all of this is their fault.” Seven deputies with assault rifles found nothing in your home and filed no charges. What was the first thing you did after they left?

Afroman:  I put on my green and white outfit that matches my house and I quickly took a picture of the most damaged part of my house so I could infinitely reflect on the positivity of my mentality. I wanted to show humanity how I was gonna turn a bad situation into a financial good one. So as soon as I got home, I dressed up and I took the picture for the album LEMON POUND CAKE. 

BMAG: You’ve said that if they hadn’t raided your house, there would be no songs, no lawsuit, and you wouldn’t even know their names. They sued you for defamation over the music you made from their own raid. What do you think they expected you to do instead?

Afroman: They expected me to get bullied like the rest of the small American civilians they bully every day. They weren’t expecting me to stand up to them using my FREEDOM OF SPEECH.

BMAG: “They stormed my home with assault rifles and they want to sue me for cracking jokes?” Why does humor disarm or scare power so much? The songs went viral — you can’t un-laugh or unsee it.

Afroman: They know that if a joke shows how wrong and pathetic they are, it can spread like wildfire through the population. It’s hard for five cowboys to control hundreds of cows that KNOW THEIR RIGHTS. The thought of the hundreds of cows — the American people — unifying and trampling a few cowboys is the worst-case scenario for a crooked government official. So if a joke points out how crooked or wrong a government or law official is, they want to silence you before they lose control over the population, and their jobs.

BMAG: To step back for a moment — what’s going on in Ohio? “Four Dead in Ohio” was fifty years ago and the state is still making headlines for the wrong reasons. Or is that just America?

Afroman:I’m from Los Angeles and Mississippi. You have two types of people in this world — good and bad — and they’re gonna be all over America. They’re gonna be all over the world. Just to put everything in a nutshell: I am a new Ohio immigrant. I don’t know too much of Ohio’s dirty past. All I know is this — BAD PEOPLE ARE NEVER GOING AWAY. Therefore, good people must put things in place that check the bad people. There’s always gonna be a common cold, but humanity is no longer scared of the common cold because when we get the common cold, we have the remedies to treat it. So good people need to have remedies for bad people, no matter what, where, why, or when.

BMAG: After the verdict, you walked out of the courthouse shouting “We did it, America” and “Power to the people.” You said “we” — not “I.” In a country that keeps dividing people into sides, who were you talking to?

Afroman: I WAS TALKING TO THE ENTIRE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. I was talking to all sides. We all almost lost our freedom of speech — and I’m gonna say “we” because people’s hearts and spirits were fighting with me on the internet. People were riding by the courthouse blowing their horns. I didn’t do it by myself. I fought with America. America fought with me. Thanks to that unification, America still has freedom of speech.

BMAG: The suit will be on display at Bitcoin Conference 2026 inside Relics of a Revolution. Claire Salvo painted your portrait on a dollar bill. Songs get pulled. Platforms disappear. Footage gets buried by algorithms. Even the dollar loses its value over time. The suit is the one thing from this story that can’t be deleted or devalued. Now you’ve got a Constitution suit and a Statue of Liberty suit in the works.  When did the suits become part of the art?

Afroman: One time I went to a party — and all of my friends are cool, all my friends dress really cool — and me and my friend almost wore the same suit to the same party. It was that night I decided to go custom. All cool guys shop at the same store, so me and another cool guy, we’re gonna like the same outfit. TO STOP THESE CLOTHING CATASTROPHES, I began ordering, designing, and making custom-made suits.

This is Part III of a three-part interview series accompanying the Relics of a Revolution exhibition. Part I features Kolin Burges, and Part II Mear One.

Fix the money. Fix the world.

Afroman will appear as a main stage speaker and performer at Bitcoin Conference 2026 at The Venetian in Las Vegas, April 27–29. The auction for his American flag suit can be previewed on Scarce.city at scarce.city/auctions/americanflagsuit. 

The Bitcoin Museum & Art Gallery (BMAG) is the curatorial and cultural programming division of BTC Inc and the Bitcoin Conference. Since 2019, the BMAG conference art gallery has facilitated more than 120 BTC in art and collectible sales. Learn more about BMAG at museum.b.tc.

Bundle your Bitcoin 2026 pass with a stay at The Venetian and get your fourth night free. Use code AFTERS for a free After Hours Pass, or get your pass alone here. 

Unveiling the Wonders of GPT Technology  

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GPT, or Generative Pretrained Transformer, has become a revolutionary force in the field of artificial intelligence. Its impact can be felt across various industries, from content creation to customer service. In this article, hellogpt we will explore the different aspects of GPT and its significance in today’s digital landscape.

What is GPT?

GPT is a type of language model developed by 国产混合AI公司. It is trained on a vast amount of text data, enabling it to generate human – like text. The model uses a deep learning architecture called the Transformer, which allows it to understand the context and relationships between words. GPT can perform a wide range of tasks, such as text completion, summarization, translation, and question – answering. Its ability to generate coherent and relevant text has made it a popular tool for many applications.

How Does GPT Work?

At its core, GPT works by predicting the next word in a sequence of text. It analyzes the patterns and relationships in the training data to make these predictions.Hellogpt下载安装详细指南 The model is pre – trained on a large corpus of text, which helps it learn grammar, semantics, and general knowledge. When given an input, it uses this pre – trained knowledge to generate an appropriate response. The more data it is trained on, the better its performance becomes. Additionally, fine – tuning can be done on specific datasets to adapt GPT to particular tasks or domains.

Applications of GPT

GPT has numerous applications in different fields. In content creation, it can be used to write articles, stories, and marketing copy. For example, journalists can use GPT to quickly generate drafts, and marketers can create engaging product descriptions. In the field of customer service, GPT – powered chatbots can answer frequently asked questions and provide support to customers. It can also be used in education for generating study materials and providing explanations. Moreover, in the field of research, GPT can assist in data analysis and literature review.

The Future of GPT

The future of GPT looks promising. hellogpt官网 As technology advances, we can expect even more powerful and sophisticated versions of GPT. These models may have better understanding of complex concepts, improved language generation capabilities, and enhanced ability to interact with users. However, there are also challenges that need to be addressed, such as ethical concerns regarding the use of generated content, potential biases in the training data, and the impact on employment. Despite these challenges, GPT is likely to continue to play a significant role in shaping the future of artificial intelligence and digital communication.

In conclusion, GPT has opened up new possibilities in the world of language processing. Its wide range of applications and potential for further development make it an exciting area of research and innovation. As we continue to explore and utilize GPT, we can look forward to a future where it enhances our productivity, creativity, and communication.

In conclusion, GPT has opened up new possibilities in the world of language processing. Its wide range of applications and potential for further development make it an exciting area of research and innovation. As we continue to explore and utilize GPT, we can look forward to a future where it enhances our productivity, creativity, and communication.







Bitmine sits on $10 billion ETH but books $3.6 billion loss

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Bitmine Immersion Technologies has turned itself into the Ethereum version of Strategy, doubling its outstanding shares in six months and raising over $10 billion in equity to amass nearly 5% of all ether in existence.

it reported a $3.8 billion quarterly net loss in Tuesday’s 10-Q filing, with share count going from 232 million to 494 million between August 31 and February 28.

Additional paid-in capital jumped from $8.36 billion to $18.55 billion over the same period, and those funds went straight into ETH.

As of April 12, Bitmine held 4.87 million ether at an average cost of $2,206 per token, making it the largest corporate Ethereum treasury globally and the second-largest corporate crypto treasury behind Strategy.

The bet is underwater but not by much. Ether traded near $2,325 on Wednesday, roughly 5% above Bitmine’s average entry. The $3.78 billion in unrealized losses on the quarter’s income statement reflects the drawdown from the token’s August 2025 highs near $4,900, not a loss from its cost basis.

Under fair-value accounting rules adopted in 2024, those mark-to-market swings flow through the P&L regardless of whether the company has sold anything.

But the transformation from mining company to leveraged ETH treasury play is creating its own set of pressures.

Self-mining revenue collapsed 86% year-over-year to $219,000 for the quarter. Staking has replaced it entirely, generating $10.2 million of the company’s $11 million in total quarterly revenue.

General and administrative expenses hit $75 million for the quarter, up from $964,000 a year earlier. For the full six-month period, G&A reached $298.6 million against just $13.3 million in revenue. Some of that likely reflects stock-based compensation tied to the equity raises, but the gap between operating costs and operating revenue is stark for a company whose core product is now holding and staking a single token.

The filing also reveals derivatives exposure that wasn’t previously detailed.

Bitmine booked $65.3 million in unrealized losses on derivatives and $24.1 million in option premium income during the quarter, suggesting the company is running options strategies on its ETH holdings, possibly covered calls to generate additional yield.

Chairman Tom Lee said in March that the company views the ether pullback as “attractive, given the strengthening fundamentals,” and noted Monday that Bitmine has accelerated its buying pace over the past four weeks.

Bitmine held $879.6 million in cash as of February 28, along with 198 bitcoin, a $200 million stake in Beast Industries, and an $85 million position in Eightco Holdings.

Bitcoin’s ‘your keys, your coins’ promise just got an expiry date from a new developer proposal

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Bitcoin was built on a promise that no one can touch your coins without your private key. No government, no bank, nobody.

That promise is now, for the first time in Bitcoin’s 16-year history, being challenged from the developer community itself, as a part of measures to build defenses against future quantum computers that could compromise Bitcoin’s blockchain and steal your coins.

The proposal

Jameson Loop, one of the outspoken bitcoin contributors, and other cryptographers, have proposed a move that could force bitcoin holders to migrate their coins to new quantum-resistant addresses or face having their coins frozen permanently by the network itself. In that scenario, holders would technically still “own” the coins, but lose the ability to move them.

It is called Bitcoin Improvement Proposal (BIP)-361 and was updated in Bitcoin’s official proposal repository Tuesday with the title “Post Quantum Migration and Legacy Signature Sunset.”

This comes as a recently released Google report warned that a sufficiently powerful quantum machine could require significantly less firepower to compromise the Bitcoin blockchain than initially estimated. This prompted some observers to cite 2029 as the quantum deadline for bitcoin.

To understand the need to freeze coins, you need to know what it is protecting against.

Every Bitcoin wallet is secured by a form of cryptography called ECDSA, or Elliptic Curve Digital Signature algorithm. Think of it as a lock on your wallet. When you set up a wallet, two keys are generated: Private key, which is a unique password used to prove that you own the coins you are spending. Then there is a public key derived from the private key. This public key helps receive funds, verify transaction signatures, and ensure security without revealing the owner’s private key.

Here is the problem: your public key is revealed on the blockchain, permanently for anyone to see when you send funds. A sufficiently powerful quantum machine can use it to reverse engineer your private key and drain your funds.

As of March, the sum of all BTC in vulnerable addresses was approximately 6.7 million BTC, according to the Google study.

BIP-361 builds on the proposal put forward in February under BIP-360, which introduced a soft fork—a network upgrade—designed to enable a new transaction type called pay-to-Merkle-root (P2MR). The approach borrows from Bitcoin’s Taproot (P2TR) framework, but strips out the key-based spending path, removing an element widely viewed as exposed to potential quantum-era risks.

Three phases

The BIP 361 proposal structures the migration in three phases. The Phase A kicks in three years after potential activation, blocking anyone from sending new bitcoin to old-style, quantum-vulnerable addresses. You can still spend from these addresses, but cannot receive anything.

The Phase B, to kick in five years after activation, will render old style signatures (ECDSA and Schnorr) completely invalid such that attempts to spend from quantum-vulnerable wallets will be rejected by the network. In essence, your coins will be frozen.

Finally, Phase C, is a proposed rescue, still under research, where holder with frozen wallets could potentially prove ownership using a zero-knowledge proof, a way of proving the knowledge of a secret without revealing the secret itself. If it works, coins frozen by Phase B could be recovered.

Community backlash

The idea of freezing coins as a defense against quantum threats cuts directly against one of Bitcoin’s most fundamental promises: sovereign, permissionless control over funds.

At its core, Bitcoin is designed to ensure that whoever holds the private keys controls the coins – without exception. Introducing a mechanism that allows coins to be frozen, even under extraordinary circumstances like a quantum attack, implies that this principle can be overridden.

The community, therefore, is not happy with the proposal.

“This quantum proposal is highly authoritarian and confiscatory, but of course, it’s from Lopp. There is no good rationale for forcing the upgrade and rendering old spends invalid. Upgrade should be 100% voluntary,” one X user said.

“This reeks of central planning with the deadlines, behavior coercion, and forced migration,” another user said.

Developers, however, called it a defensive measure.

“This is not an offensive attack, rather, it is defensive: our thesis is that the Bitcoin ecosystem wishes to defend itself and its interests against those who would prefer to do nothing and allow a malicious actor to destroy both value and trust,” they said.