Germany Runs Out of Bitcoin to Sell

Bitcoin ETFs See Largest Inflows in Five Weeks

Author

Nathaniel Whittemore
July 15, 2024

The Breakdown First Five - Monday, July 15, 2024

Welcome back to The Breakdown First Five — the 5 most interesting and/or important stories in bitcoin, crypto, and markets to start your day.

5. Defiant Trump will Attend Bitcoin 2024

After narrowly escaping an assassination attempt, former President Trump has reportedly confirmed he will still attend the Bitcoin Conference in two weeks time. It appears the campaign will continue at full steam with the Republican national convention beginning today in Milwaukee. With the internet ablaze, Trump will shortly accept the GOP nomination and then take the crypto industry’s biggest stage. 

4. Storm Delayed

Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm has made his argument that the criminal case should be dropped. The defense argued that Storm had no control over the non-custodial protocol so couldn’t be willingly conspiring with hackers. The DOJ suggested that mere knowledge and inaction were enough. Judge Fallia continued to show a grasp of crypto legal issues, poking holes in the prosecution’s case. Trial will be delayed until December. 

3. Stacks Investigation Dropped

The SEC have closed their investigation into Hiro Systems and the Stacks token. The Bitcoin layer 2 was notable among 2017 ICOs for doing things the right way and applying for SEC exemptions. This compliance was futile, with the SEC opening an investigation in 2021 in response to Hiro declaring that Stacks was sufficiently decentralized to no longer be considered a security. After three years and millions in legal fees, the investigation is now over. 

2. Largest ETF Flows in Weeks

Friday saw $310M flood into the Bitcoin ETFs, the largest flows in over five weeks. Blackrock and Fidelity led the way with more than $100M each. This capped off a $1B week and extended the streak of inflows to 6 days. Overall ETF net flows are now back to record highs, suggesting the outflows of the past month have been entirely filled in.

1. Germans out of Coins

The German government has run out of Bitcoin to dump on the market. $3.3B worth of BTC has been liquidated over the past month, with 80% sold in the past week. The selling was conducted at 16x the pace of miners block rewards, suggesting liquidity can be found at the right price. The German wallet balance briefly sat at zero until Bitcoiners began trolling the government.