BITCOIN BOX SCORE

Exchange Rate: $67,010
Market Capitalization: $1.34T
Hash Rate (90 days): 1,019.8 EH/s
Transactions (30 days): 13,293,533
Network Fees (economy): 1 sat/vB
Bitcoin Dominance: 58.82%

What do these numbers mean?

Goldman Sachs's Mathew McDermott wrote this week that bitcoin got "caught in the crosswinds of a broader risk-off environment," falling below $70,000 as markets digested the Kevin Warsh nomination and fears that AI would disrupt the software sector.

What McDermott frames as a difficult backdrop is, in fact, the early tremors of a credit system under structural stress. Blue Owl Capital, the $295 billion alternative asset manager, halted redemptions at its retail private credit fund this week after investors stampeded for the exits. The fund's largest industry exposure is internet software, the very sector AI is disrupting. Credit stress shows up first in redemption queues and rushed asset sales, long before it reaches mainstream headlines.

Meanwhile, Calle shipped NUT-24, a protocol that lets AI agents pay for API calls using bitcoin ecash over HTTP. No credit cards, no accounts, no KYC, just sats for service.

What other asset has the scarcity of gold and can settle a billion dollars across the world with no counterparty risk in minutes?

The old system is cracking due to AI stress. The new one (bitcoin + AI) is being built in the very same week.

UAE sits on $344 million in unrealized bitcoin mining profit as Paradigm reframes mining as grid infrastructure

The United Arab Emirates holds roughly 6,782 bitcoins worth $454 million that it gained through its mining operations. This amounts to an estimated $344 million in unrealized profit according to on-chain data from Arkham Research. Wallets tied to Abu Dhabi's Royal Group continue to produce about 4.2 coins per day through partnerships, including Marathon Digital's 250-megawatt immersion-cooled facility.

Paradigm published a research note arguing that bitcoin mining is mischaracterized in energy debates, framing miners as flexible grid demand that responds to price signals and consumes just 0.23% of global energy.

Sovereign mining is the new strategic reserve

Unlike the U.S. or UK, whose bitcoin holdings largely stem from asset seizures, the UAE is converting energy infrastructure into a compounding digital reserve. In a market where many miners sell into weakness to fund operations, the Gulf nation is doing the opposite, steadily accumulating during the drawdown while retail investors head for the exits. This is what patient, sovereign-scale conviction looks like.

Trump sons predict $1 million bitcoin as Goldman Sachs CEO discloses personal holdings

Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. renewed their public support for bitcoin at the World Liberty Forum, calling it the defining asset class for a new generation and predicting it could eventually reach $1 million. Eric Trump cited adoption by Fidelity, Schwab, JPMorgan, BlackRock, and Goldman Sachs as evidence of accelerating institutional acceptance. Separately, Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon disclosed he now holds a personal position in bitcoin.

The Overton window has moved

Two years ago, Solomon publicly dismissed bitcoin as speculative with no real-world use case. Now he owns it. As the saying goes, everyone gets bitcoin at the price they deserve.

BLS revisions are the cost of measuring a massive economy in real time

Peter Earle of AIER wrote this week that every time the government releases major revisions to employment data, a familiar chorus pipes up claiming a conspiracy is afoot. In reality, early payroll estimates rely on incomplete surveys and statistical models that sharpen as more data arrives. You have two choices – release data early and often, knowing it will inevitably be revised, or hold back until you’re sure. We would argue timely release is worth the risk of revisions; in fact, it is rare that revisions are significant (though it does happen sometimes). To put things in perspective, the most recent revision changing employment numbers by 1 million took place within a 171-million-person workforce. That amounts to less than 0.006%.

Measure twice (except on your own node)

The modern economy is too vast and complex to be measured perfectly in real time. Policy, rates, and trillions in capital allocation are all calibrated to numbers that, by design, are rough drafts. In contrast, bitcoin's monetary policy requires no revisions, seasonal adjustments, or birth-death models. Twenty-one million. Final answer.

Lightning Network crosses $1 billion in monthly volume as Voltage launches dollar-settled credit line

Bitcoin's Lightning Network processed an estimated $1.17 billion across 5.22 million transactions in November, marking a milestone driven by growing exchange activity and merchant adoption.

Bitcoin infrastructure company Voltage launched Voltage Credit, the first revolving line of credit with instant Lightning payment finality and optional dollar settlement, targeting CFOs and treasurers who want "send now, pay later" flexibility on bitcoin rails. The product builds on Voltage's role supporting a $1 million Lightning transaction between Secure Digital Markets and Kraken earlier this month.

Bitcoin's payment rails go institutional

The average Lightning transaction has nearly doubled, and now sits at $223. This is very different from just a few years ago when most Lightning payments were tiny. Once thought to be an enabler of retail commerce using bitcoin, Lighting has transformed into a high speed settlement system for institutional capital.

The agentic AI revolution may change that in favor of micropayments. Lightning Labs released an open-source toolkit enabling AI agents to run Lightning nodes and make autonomous payments, while Voltage is embedding credit directly into the payment flow, underwriting against transaction volume rather than static collateral.

BITCOIN ADOPTION CONTINUES

Nakamoto Inc. signed definitive agreements to acquire BTC Inc. (parent of Bitcoin Magazine) and UTXO Management in an $107 million all-stock deal, consolidating media, advisory, and asset management under one public, bitcoin-focused company.

U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs have recorded $53 billion in cumulative net inflows despite months of redemptions, far exceeding Bloomberg's original projections of $5-15 billion and cementing their status as among the most successful ETF launches in history.

Wells Fargo analysts predict a "YOLO" trade resurgence as up to $150 billion in larger-than-expected tax refunds, inflated by the "Beautiful Act" and outdated IRS withholding tables, flows into bitcoin by late March.

Steak 'n Shake reports 18% same-store sales growth since accepting bitcoin payments via Lightning eight months ago, saving 50% on processing fees and routing all bitcoin revenue into its corporate Strategic Bitcoin Reserve.

Miami-based fintech Milo crossed $100 million in bitcoin-backed mortgage originations, including a record $12 million single transaction, allowing holders to buy homes without selling their bitcoin or triggering taxable events.

The Payjoin Foundation secured 501(c)(3) status from the IRS, making U.S. donations to bitcoin's most promising on-chain privacy protocol tax-deductible and establishing long-term nonprofit funding for open-source development.

HOW BITCOIN WORKS

Learn one key idea about bitcoin each week. This week:

The slow burn of fiscal dominance

We've covered fiscal dominance before in this newsletter. Fiscal dominance is the idea that when government debt grows large enough, it severely constrains monetary policy. As U.S. government debt continues to grow, we thought it was time for an update.

The Congressional Budget Office just projected the 2026 deficit at $1.9 trillion, growing to $3.1 trillion by 2036. Economist Alexander Salter wrote that deficits of this magnitude are clearly structural: entitlements, demographics, and insufficient revenues are baked into the system. No amount of fiscal discipline from lawmakers can fix the problem.

The reason is a “doom loop”: When rates rise, Treasury refinances maturing debt at higher yields. Higher yields mean higher interest costs. Higher interest costs mean larger deficits, which require more borrowing. The problem compounds, as can clearly be seen in how interest payments are now among the fastest-growing components of federal spending.

Lyn Alden detailed in her analysis of what she calls "the gradual print" that the Fed announced $40 billion per month in balance sheet expansion starting in January, with a baseline of $20–25 billion per month going forward.

This isn't quantitative easing, exactly – the Fed is buying short-term Treasury securities to maintain "ample reserves." But the effect is the same because it is just another way to monetize the debt. As Alden says, champagne by any other grape is still sparkling wine.

And so, we are going to find out how far the U.S. can push this thing. Can steady, compounding expansion of the monetary base through stablecoin proliferation and dollar milkshake dynamics keep a structurally indebted system on the rails?

The fiat financial system continues to expand and devalue itself. Bitcoin keeps chugging along toward 21 million bitcoins in circulation, a number that cannot be changed by politicians and their out-of-control spending.

COIN CHECK

What is the name of the bitcoin-native digital cash protocol that enables instant, private, offline-capable payments using cryptographic tokens called "ecash"?

A. Lightning
B. Cashu
C. Liquid
D. Fedimint

Check your answer at the end of the page.

FROM THE MEME POOL

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ANSWER

Answer: B. Cashu is a free and open-source ecash protocol built on bitcoin. It enables instant, private, and lightweight transactions using cryptographic tokens — digital bearer instruments that can be sent and received without revealing the identity of either party. Think of it as digital cash that actually works like cash: no accounts, no identity checks, and no transaction history tied to you.

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