The Daily Wolf | Bitcoin's weekend leverage gets liquidated, Strive stacks bitcoin, and the Trump-Stablecoin lawsuit

Bitcoin’s weekend decline from about $82,000 to $79,000 triggered $815 million in liquidations over 24 hours, before prices recovered into the $80,000s. Scott Melker said thinner weekend trading and fewer traders defending price levels can magnify price moves and force leveraged positions to close, worsening volatility. He contrasted the sell-off with about $1.2 billion in liquidations when FTX’s collapse was announced and more than $19 billion on October 10 of the prior year, putting the weekend flush in perspective without treating it as unprecedented.

Strategy made no Bitcoin purchase that week and reportedly repurchased $205 million of STRC to help restore the security to par. The company held 848,517 Bitcoin and $5.1 billion in USD assets. Strive, by contrast, bought 6,182 Bitcoin in its largest purchase to date, bringing reported holdings to 43,000 Bitcoin; it funded the acquisition through its new fixed-rate 15% SATS product. Bitmine bought 10,452 ETH and was reported to hold about 6 million ETH, equivalent to 4.95% of total supply and roughly 58,000 ETH short of its stated 5% target. Melker said it remains unclear whether Bitmine will keep buying or hold passively once it reaches that goal.

A lawsuit filed October 22 challenges two transactions associated with World Liberty Financial, the crypto venture launched by Donald Trump and his sons: a UAE-linked $500 million purchase of a 49% stake consisting of Trump’s shares, and MGX’s $2 billion investment settled using USD1. The plaintiff, Jay Benjamin Greenberg, is described as a Circle shareholder and former Circle employee; the suit alleges harm to Circle, while Circle says it has nothing to do with the litigation. Critics characterize the UAE-linked transactions as buying influence from Trump, while others argue that World Liberty Financial is privately owned and question the deals’ significance. The White House called the lawsuit frivolous and denied conflicts of interest. Melker said it was the first lawsuit he knew of to allege an Emoluments Clause violation and direct harm to Circle, and expected the matter to take a long time in court. The synopsis does not specify the suit’s detailed allegations or requested relief.

Franklin Templeton filed updated prospectuses on October 22 for proposed Bitcoin dividend-reinvestment ETFs, FBEQ and FIBT. The funds are designed to hold 95% equities and 5% Bitcoin, with dividends from the equity holdings reinvested into Bitcoin. Melker questioned the idea that investors might end up owning Bitcoin without realizing it, arguing that many would likely choose the products specifically for their Bitcoin exposure; he expected more blended investment products to follow. On the market outlook, he cited Mike McGlone’s $10,000 Bitcoin forecast and said he and Dave Weisberger saw possible outcomes as high as $1 million, while emphasizing that nobody knows where Bitcoin will go. Melker expected the Federal Reserve to hold rates and pointed to upcoming big-tech earnings and macroeconomic concerns as possible headwinds.

Ethereum’s Glamsterdam upgrade, intended to reduce network congestion, was delayed from its planned timing to Q3, with no new date announced. Melker noted that previous upgrades had reduced congestion and fees but said the timing and impact of Glamsterdam remain uncertain. Electrum disclosed an actively exploited wallet flaw that could allow a malicious server to suppress a transaction and show a forged replacement payment to an attacker if a user approved a fee increase. Two reported attacks involved attacker addresses whose last four characters matched those of the intended recipients, making the substitution harder to spot.