SharpLink Co-CEO: Ethereum TVL Could Grow 10x by 2026

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse told CNBC in an interview that he remains bullish on Bitcoin, but believes Strategy’s model of buying Bitcoin via preferred stock financing has harmed the crypto market. “Financial engineering does not drive long-term value,” Garlinghouse said, adding that the long-term value of any digital asset comes from its utility. He also noted, “Michael Saylor’s team hasn’t focused on the right things, which is hurting the overall market.” Garlinghouse’s criticism centers on the financing mechanism Strategy uses to accumulate Bitcoin. Over the past year, Strategy has raised funds by issuing preferred stock to continue purchasing Bitcoin. Its STRC stock carries an 11.5% annual dividend yield and was designed to trade near $100. Garlinghouse pointed out that STRC is currently about 25% below that level, calling it a “harsh rejection” of the strategy. STRC hit an all-time low on Thursday, dipping roughly 26% below its face value at one point. Meanwhile, Strategy’s common shares fell to their lowest since February 2024, closing at around $82 on Friday; Bitcoin, meanwhile, dropped below $59,000. This week, Strategy’s financing model has faced more pressure. CryptoQuant advised Strategy to pause Bitcoin purchases and rebuild cash reserves. STRC’s dividend coverage period has shrunk from over 7 years to roughly 14 months. When STRC falls below $100, the mechanism where the company issues stock to buy Bitcoin stalls, which is why the firm suspended that mechanism. Mark Palmer, an analyst at Benchmark-StoneX, argued that Strategy’s financing engine has merely become “less efficient” rather than failed entirely, and pushed back against comparing STRC to assets that have collapsed completely.

Crypto analyst Ali Charts said in a post that Bitcoin chart signals indicate a market bottom is forming, and the current period may be one of the better long-term entry windows over the past decade. Over the last 10 years, the 200-week simple moving average (SMA) has served as a critical benchmark for identifying Bitcoin cycle bottoms. Historically, whenever Bitcoin has touched or fallen below this MA, it has typically opened a macro accumulation window. He cited examples: Bitcoin hit the 200-week SMA in August 2015, triggering a bull run that pushed its price up over 8,500%; it tested the MA in December 2018 before rallying 267%; during the March 2020 liquidity crunch, Bitcoin validated the 200-week SMA as support, then surged 1,125%; and in June 2022, Bitcoin broke below the MA for the first time, consolidated under it until December 2022, and once it reclaimed the level, it rallied 680%. Currently, Bitcoin’s 200-week SMA stands at $63,500, while the cryptocurrency trades at roughly $60,000, slightly below that level. Based on a decade of market history, he views this as a key accumulation zone for long-term investors. He also noted Bitcoin could still dip further to $54,000, or even $40,000. As such, he recommends dollar-cost averaging into positions across the $58,000 to $40,000 range to build exposure in the technically discounted area. The $63,500 level is a critical watchpoint: once Bitcoin reclaims the 200-week SMA on the higher time frame and confirms it as macro support, history shows this typically marks the early stages of a new bull market.

Tokenized financial products infrastructure Metal has closed its seed funding round, co-led by Airwallex and Capital49. As part of the investment, Airwallex has joined Metal as its first design partner. Positioned as an infrastructure tailored for tokenized financial products, Metal aims to deliver full-stack infrastructure for all types of tokenized financial products and services, covering institutional-grade privacy and compliance, native proxy support, identity and authorization, plus global on/off ramps for as many countries and currencies as possible.

In a post, Serenity stated that robotics will be the next key growth area. Citing March PitchBook data referenced by a16z, it reported that both deal volume and investment value in the robotics sector are rising rapidly. A positive factor is that many AI data center-related exposures often also have exposure to the scaling of humanoid robots. For example, DRAM and NAND in the storage space can be used for inference and storage in humanoid robots; DFB lasers in the photonics space are applied in FMCW LiDAR for vision and perception. Serenity noted that most related exposures are currently concentrated in upstream components or in-house projects of large firms including Amazon and Tesla. It believes that the global IPO season for pure-play robotics or humanoid robot companies will be worth watching from the second half of 2026 to 2027.

Renowned researcher Oguz Erkan’s data analysis indicates that based on current capital costs, operating margins of hyperscale cloud service providers, and depreciation periods, the return on investment (ROI) for AI capital expenditure will turn positive when AI revenue reaches roughly 1.7 to 1.8 times depreciation and amortization. Currently, AI revenue is approximately 1.2 times capital expenditure depreciation. Erkan projects that if AI sales grow robustly, the ROI is expected to turn positive within 24 months.

Michael Saylor issued a statement noting that Bitcoin is operating normally, and so are we (Strategy).