News Brief
Published Jul 26, 2026 11:26
News Brief

Bitcoin News - July 26, 2026 at 11:00 AM

Bitcoin News Jul 26, 2026 11:00 Scheduled 11 outlets
119Articles 119Extracted 0Failed 26.1mRuntime

Top of Mind

The Clarity Act's Senate path has materially narrowed. Galaxy Research cut 2026 passage odds to 30% (from 50%), Senate Majority Leader Thune publicly doubted a pre-recess vote, and seven Democrats rejected the latest ethics text as insufficient. The August 7 deadline is the practical kill date for this legislative cycle. For positioning: NYDIG calls Clarity "the most important forward catalyst" for the industry; Bitwise says passage would likely mark the cycle bottom. Failure keeps Strategy and other treasury companies in deleveraging mode, per Grayscale's Pandl. The FOMC meeting July 29 is the other near-term binary.

Market Structure

  • BTC spot and ETF flows: BTC traded ~$64–65K this week, touching $67K mid-week before Iran escalation pushed it to $64,600 by Thursday. Spot ETFs snapped a 7-day, ~$1B inflow streak with $225M in outflows Thursday—IBIT alone shed $202.5M; Morgan Stanley's MSBT was the lone holdout at +$5M. Weekly ETF volume hit its lowest since October 2024 at $8.05B. YTD net outflows remain ~$5.2B.
  • ETF cross-currents: Ether ETFs outperformed for a second straight week, pulling in $103.9M vs. BTC ETFs' $33.8M net for the week—notable given ETH holds ~1/8 the net assets of BTC products. Characterization: CoinShares calls this "rotation within crypto, not exit."
  • On-chain signals mixed: Binance saw a single-day net outflow of 9,000 BTC—largest since November 2024—suggesting self-custody accumulation. BTC supply in profit rose to 57.5% from a 46.2% June low, but CryptoQuant flags a prior failed recovery (April–June) where same metrics rolled over after 35 days above threshold.
  • Derivatives: VanEck data shows put/call skew at +11.4pp (83rd percentile), options put/call premium ratio 1.49 vs. 0.71 average, and perp funding near +4.5%—all consistent with defensive positioning, not capitulation. VanEck says a true bottom requires skew >+15pp or funding flipping negative.

Policy and Institutions

  • Clarity Act deteriorating: Galaxy at 30% odds; Thune says floor vote unlikely before recess; Democrats reject DOJ-only ethics enforcement; seven Dem senators say draft "falls short." Goldman CEO Solomon broke from Wall Street peers to back the bill; Fidelity, major trade groups also supportive. Sources disagree on viability: White House crypto adviser Witt called Thune's read "perplexing" and remained "slightly more optimistic."
  • Trump financial disclosures: OGE filings show Trump earned >$1.16B in crypto in 2025—$526.8M from World Liberty Financial token sales, $635M in "Celebration Coins" royalties. He still holds ~$900M in WLF tokens and >$33M in BTC proceeds. Directly fueling the ethics impasse blocking Clarity.
  • Coinbase/SEC FOIA settlement: SEC paid Coinbase $150,000—one of its largest FOIA awards—after admitting loss of senior officials' text messages during peak anti-crypto enforcement. The FDIC settlement over Operation Choke Point 2.0 letters preceded this. Both settlements close regulatory overhang chapters but are backward-looking.
  • State Dept. Freedom Tech Program: Bitcoin Policy Institute named founding partner alongside Palantir and Anduril, embedding BTC/privacy expertise in U.S. diplomacy. Signals continued executive branch alignment with Bitcoin as a foreign policy tool.

Network and Industry

  • Quantum defense consortium: Strategy, BlackRock, Coinbase, Fidelity, ARK, Galaxy, Block, Blockstream, and Anchorage formed the Bitcoin Security Consortium, pledging $15M over 3 years for post-quantum R&D. Galaxy separately pledged $5M in developer grants. BlackRock's report frames migration as technically feasible but a coordination challenge; ~35% of BTC supply holds exposed public keys. Debate on timeline remains: Adam Back says 20–40 years; Bernstein says 3–5 years.
  • BIP-110 miner vote: Foundry USA (~23.8% of hashrate) opened a customer vote on BIP-110, a soft fork to restrict non-monetary data in transactions. Closing at block 961,632 (~early August). Adam Back and Michael Saylor both oppose it; outcome could signal miner sentiment ahead of any activation attempt.
  • BitMEX shutdown / Poolin bankruptcy: BitMEX closes September 23 after HDR Global Trading's strategic review; a 623 BTC class-action fraud suit was filed the same day. Poolin (0.2% hashrate) filed Chapter 11 in New Jersey with $100M–$500M in liabilities and a $52M stalking-horse bid for Texas sites—$163.7M owed to ~11,700 wallet users frozen since 2022.
  • Protocol (Optech #415): Draft BIP459 proposes full BIP340 Schnorr signature aggregation via DahLIAS scheme—64-byte aggregate regardless of signer count. Key application: cross-input signature aggregation (CISA) to reduce on-chain fees for multi-input transactions.

Macro Linkages

  • Iran escalation drove Thursday's selloff: U.S. strikes on Iranian bridges and Chabahar port pushed Brent crude above $100, 10-year Treasury yields to 18-month highs, and July Fed rate-hike odds to ~40% (from ~12% a week prior)—directly pressuring BTC below $65K and triggering the ETF outflow day.
  • Soft CPI provided mid-week support: June headline CPI came in at 3.9% vs. 4.2% prior (core 2.6% vs. 2.9% est.), driving BTC toward $67K Tuesday before the Iran move reversed gains. FOMC July 29 is now the binary: Coinbase Research says a hold with stable long-term yields keeps BTC "resilient."

Standouts

  • EU sanctioned HTX (Huobi Global SA) under its 21st Russia sanctions package; transaction ban takes effect August 23, barring all EU dealings. Removes a major non-compliant venue from European flow.
  • Morgan Stanley's MSBT Bitcoin ETF crossed $391M AUM since April launch, the only ETF to log inflows on Thursday's outflow day. Validates bank-issued ETF demand channel.
  • Hyperliquid RWA perpetuals hit 54% of weekly volume ($26B)—first time non-crypto exceeded crypto on any major DEX. Structurally significant for where price discovery migrates.
  • Strategy debuted "net Bitcoin per share" metric stripping $22.3B in senior claims from gross BTC holdings; mNAV resets to ~1.02x under new formula, obscuring prior discount. Watch for adoption as standard by treasury company analysts.
  • Foundry USA's BIP-110 miner vote closes in early August; with ~24% of hashrate, Foundry's signal could materially influence whether the proposal gains traction or stalls.