Bitfinex

Bitfinex analysts are quoted in Bloomberg today on the supply-side dynamic building beneath the current bitcoin market. Long-term holders continue to accumulate while miners, helped by stronger economics, are selling less inventory into the market. The result is a gradual tightening of available supply, though one more likely to play out over months than days. The analysts describe the current moment as "a gradual tightening of actively traded supply, even as price action remains relatively muted." The broader context is the US Senate Banking Committee's 15-to-9 vote to advance the Clarity Act, a landmark digital asset market structure bill that pushed bitcoin past $80,000 on the news. https://lnkd.in/dBE48DPr

North American listed miners are responding to post-halving economics by pivoting towards AI infrastructure. The weighted average cost to produce one bitcoin among listed miners sat at roughly $80,000 in Q4 2025. Hashprice hit approximately $29/PH/s in Q1 2026. The sector is not moving uniformly. Some companies are exiting Bitcoin entirely. Others are building AI optionality around existing power assets while remaining among the largest miners in the market. The “Bitcoin miner” label now covers very different underlying businesses. Paraguay, Ethiopia and Oman have entered the global top 10 for hashrate. Difficulty recalibrates as hashrate shifts. The network does not rely on any single geography. We examine what the pivot means for listed miners, for the companies holding the original thesis, and for Bitcoin. https://lnkd.in/epU4tUgS

Paolo Ardoino, CTO of Bitfinex, sees El Salvador's trajectory clearly. "I think El Salvador has the opportunity to see its economy growing tenfold in the next twenty years." He describes it as a place being built around the things people actually need: safety, stability and the financial freedom to participate in a new kind of economy. For those looking to build, he sees El Salvador as one of the few places where all three are coming together. Learn more about how El Salvador is pushing things forward in our Financial Freedom Tour of El Salvador series: https://lnkd.in/dRC5Ywrp

BTC has held around $80,000 through the midweek but stalled after reclaiming the key cost-basis levels that defined resistance for much of this year. The on-chain picture is the most constructive since early February, but price action is not yet reflecting that. The institutional bid has narrowed to a single channel. The corporate treasury demand that powered the prior leg has stepped back, and with the STRC ex-dividend date on 15 May, the buying the market anticipated around that event appears to have arrived early. The options market is positioned for a sharp move in either direction. Our midweek Bitfinex Alpha report covers what breaks the range. https://lnkd.in/ehgGTHnG

Bitfinex has received a Digital Asset Service Provider licence in El Salvador, completing the company's regulated footprint in the country alongside Bitfinex Securities and Bitfinex Derivatives. El Salvador's Comisión Nacional de Activos Digitales (CNAD) has now licensed more than 70 digital asset service providers since Bitfinex Securities became the first platform approved under the country's Digital Assets Issuance Law in April 2023. The licence paves the way for Bitfinex to offer spot trading, along with its already regulated derivatives and tokenised securities activities in El Salvador, one of the most deliberately constructed digital asset jurisdictions in the world. Learn more: https://lnkd.in/eMmQUhWk

Bitcoin broke through $80,000 while consumer sentiment hit a 73-year low. The hard data is holding. Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta GDPNow is tracking Q2 real growth at 3.7 percent. ISM Services recorded its twenty-second consecutive month of expansion. Nonfarm payrolls came in at 115,000 against a 55,000 consensus. The soft data is breaking. The University of Michigan Index of Consumer Sentiment fell to 48.2 in May, the lowest reading since the survey began in 1952. Households are funding the marginal dollar of consumption from credit card balances rather than real income gains, with revolving credit expanding at a 9.1 percent annualised pace against an average APR of 21 percent. CME FedWatch is pricing a 94 percent probability of a hold at the June FOMC. The Fed is watching the hard data. The consumer is living the soft data. Bitfinex Alpha 204 looks at whether the breakout survives the fracture.

Bitcoin's institutional flows are shifting from speculative to structural. 🔸Morgan Stanley into E*Trade 🔸CME launching $BTC volatility futures 🔸Spot ETFs close to $800m this week. Structural demand does not wait for price confirmation.

Bitfinex publishes three newsletters covering the analysis behind the price action, delivered directly to your inbox. • Bitfinex Alpha is weekly institutional research on bitcoin market structure and macro developments, out every Monday. • Bitfinex Bytes is a monthly digest covering on-chain data and institutional flow analysis. • Topical News is a weekly overview of the key developments shaping digital asset markets. If you are not already subscribed, the link is below. https://lnkd.in/eDvJGZyC

The US Strategic Bitcoin Reserve exists today as an executive order. ARMA, the American Reserves Modernisation Act, would transform that into a congressional mandate for the Treasury to actively accumulate up to 200,000 BTC per year for five years. The proposed annual target exceeds the network's total annual mining output. How that volume gets sourced, and how it gets funded, are the two questions the bill has not yet answered. The full piece covers the legislative path, the funding problem, and what statutory reserve status would mean for Bitcoin's standing as a global reserve asset. Read more: https://lnkd.in/gEFFP6tu

Bitfinex analysts note this means shorts paying for the privilege are no longer present at scale. The question now is whether new ETF capital recreates the carry trade or the squeeze has further to run. The other two signals covered in the piece are the break above the True Market Mean and Short-Term Holder Cost Basis on-chain, and short gamma dealer positioning of roughly $2 billion around $82,000 that forces hedging in the direction of the move. https://lnkd.in/d2qHa-6t