Institutions, whales, and options are all in on the rally

BTC hit a one-month high above $66K. ETF inflows ran 5 straight days for the first time since April. And Clarity Act odds jumped 11 points overnight. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ SPONSORED BY Tuesday, July 21, 2026   Bitcoin climbed above $66,000 on Tuesday — a one-month high — and for the first time it is worth asking whether the buyer profile is structurally different. Institutions are in via ETFs, which just posted five straight days of inflows totaling $727 million, the longest streak since April. Long-term on-chain holders are accumulating. And a trader or group of traders has been purchasing large bull call spreads targeting $72,000 by month-end. Then overnight came a catalyst: reports that President Trump agreed to the ethics provision that has been the last major obstacle to the Clarity Act. Polymarket odds of the bill passing this year jumped 11 points to 43%. BTC broke above its 50-day moving average. The 100-day sits at $70,173. The bear market that began last October ends if bitcoin clears the 200-day at $72,800+. Read today’s full report → Market snapshot As of 8am EST Asset Price 24h BTC $66,271 +2.03% ETH $1,924 +4.00% SOL $78.40 +3.60% XRP $1.14 +4.00% Prices approximate. Visit coindesk.com/price for live data. A message from Grayscale Grayscale Hyperliquid Staking ETF (ticker: HYPG) is the lowest-fee HYPE fund in the U.S.1 Hyperliquid is emerging as critical infrastructure for onchain markets — a high-performance blockchain that processed nearly $3 trillion in derivatives volume and generated ~$800 million in revenue in 2025, with no venture capital backing.2 Lowest management fee in its category (0.29%) Over $100 million in AUM3 Potential staking rewards — HYPG seeks to stake 70%+ of its assets; HYPE staking rewards averaged ~2.2% last year.4 HYPG, an exchange traded product, is not registered under the Investment Company Act of 1940, as amended (“40 Act”), and therefore is not subject to the same regulations and protections as 40 Act registered ETFs and mutual funds. HYPG is subject to significant risk and heightened volatility. HYPG is not suitable for an investor who cannot afford the loss of the entire investment. An investment in HYPG is not a direct investment in HYPE. Learn more 1 Lowest-fee HYPE fund in the U.S. based on management fee of 0.29%. Brokerage fees and other expenses may apply. 2 Crypto Briefing, December 26, 2025. 3 Bloomberg L.P. as of 6/X/26. Subject to change. 4 Stakingrewards.com. Historical daily average measured from 5/1/25 to 04/21/26. Past performance is not indicative of future results. This information must be preceded or accompanied by a Grayscale Hyperliquid Staking ETF prospectus, which may be obtained by clicking here. Please read the prospectus carefully before investing. This information should not be relied upon as research, investment advice, or a recommendation regarding any security in particular. Potential staking rewards are earned by the Fund. Staking rewards are not guaranteed and should not be considered an indication of Fund performance. The Fund’s ability to engage in staking is conditional and may be modified. Staking requires that the Fund lock up HYPE for the period of time required by the staking protocol, meaning the Fund cannot sell or transfer the staked HYPE, thereby making it illiquid for the period it is being staked. Foreside Fund Services, LLC is the Marketing Agent for the Fund. © 2026 Grayscale. CoinDesk Disclosure: The information contained in this newsletter, and any information linked through the items contained herein, is not intended to provide sufficient information to form the basis for an investment decision. You should seek additional information regarding the merits and risks of investing in any cryptocurrency or digital assets. L1.co Disclosure: This material is for informational purposes only, and the content contained herein should not be considered investment advice or a solicitation, offer, or recommendation to sell or buy any asset, strategy, or product. Investing in digital assets involves a high degree of risk, including the loss of principal. What matters today Markets   Story 1 of 3 Bitcoin’s rally has broad-based support as institutions, whales, and options traders pile in. Bitcoin climbed above $66,000 on Tuesday — a one-month high — and the buyer profile underpinning the move is meaningfully different from the speculative-led rallies of the past year. Institutions are in via ETFs: spot bitcoin funds have attracted over $700 million across five consecutive days of inflows, the longest streak since April and a sharp reversal from the $7.5 billion that exited between mid-May and June. Onchain wallet data shows long-term holders — addresses with a history of holding BTC for at least six months — are snapping up coins. CryptoQuant data, cited by FxPro’s Alex Kuptsikevich, shows large whale wallets have been building positions over two months while medium-sized wallets sold — a divergence he describes as a constructive medium-term signal. Glassnode describes the market as “increasingly balanced, with long-term conviction providing support while speculative participation remains contained.” In options, a trader or group purchased large bull call spreads targeting $72,000 by month-end. BTC has now broken above its 50-day moving average, a widely tracked gauge of near-term trend. The next resistance sits at the 100-day average at $70,173; a sustained break above the 200-day at $72,800+ would confirm the end of the bear market that began in October 2025. The main near-term headwind is U.S. Treasury issuance: $56 billion in bill settlements expected Tuesday, $37 billion Thursday, $13 billion Friday — and heavy issuance likely continues until Labor Day, draining liquidity from the system. Read more → Finance   Story 2 of 3 Bitcoin ETFs post a fifth straight day of inflows — a first since April. U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs took in approximately $227 million on July 20, extending their positive run to five consecutive sessions — the first such streak since late April, per SoSoValue data. Ether ETFs added around $38 million on the same day, led by BlackRock’s ETHA with roughly $34 million. The five-day run has pulled in about $727 million in total, the most sustained stretch of institutional buying since the record outflows of June. Total bitcoin ETF assets have climbed back to approximately $79 billion from a July low near $75 billion. The return of the ETF bid addresses what has been the structural missing piece through a quarter of mostly negative flows: Tagus Capital put it starkly in a note, describing the renewed institutional interest as standing in sharp contrast to the severe selling pressure and record redemptions of earlier in the summer. Still, two complications loom. First, hedge funds have sold U.S. information technology stocks in six of the last eight weeks at the fastest pace in at least a decade, with tech’s share of hedge fund market exposure falling to its lowest since February and possibly hitting a five-year low as early as next week. Broad de-risking is not the same as an AI-to-crypto rotation — it removes the risk-on backdrop. Second, the Fed meets July 28–29, and Big Tech earnings this week — Alphabet, Tesla and Intel — will show whether AI spending, the trade bitcoin has moved with all month, is still climbing or starting to plateau. The test is what the inflow streak holds through. Read more → Policy   Story 3 of 3 Clarity Act odds jump 11 points on Polymarket after reports Trump agreed to the ethics deal. Polymarket traders sharply raised the implied odds of the Clarity Act becoming law this year — from 32% on Friday to 43% on Monday — after reports surfaced that President Trump agreed to the ethics provision that has been the final major obstacle to the bill. The move reversed a slide to a record low last week. The Clarity Act would create the first comprehensive federal framework for digital assets, splitting oversight between the SEC and the CFTC. The ethics dispute has centered on how much top officials can profit from crypto while in office — a question sharpened by scrutiny of Trump’s memecoins and his family’s World Liberty Financial stake, which disclosures last month showed earned him millions. The ethics provision was discussed at a July 16 meeting between Trump, Republican Senators Bernie Moreno and Cynthia Lummis, and White House crypto adviser Patrick Witt. The Senate has until early August to vote before the recess. A source familiar with the matter told CoinDesk that Democrats have not yet seen the bill text, and no text has been publicly released — meaning the reports remain unverified. Bitcoin traded near $66,300 following the news, up about 3% over 24 hours, with ether and XRP adding around 4%. Traders attributed most of the rally to the rebound in AI and semiconductor stocks — Samsung and SK Hynix were both higher in Seoul — but the reported ethics breakthrough added to the risk-on tone and provided the regulatory catalyst the institutional bid has been waiting for. Read more → CoinDesk Disclosure: The information contained in this newsletter, and any information linked through the items contained herein, is not intended to provide sufficient information to form the basis for an investment decision. You should seek additional information regarding the merits and risks of investing in any cryptocurrency or digital assets. L1.co Disclosure: This material is for informational purposes only, and the content contained herein should not be considered investment advice or a solicitation, offer, or recommendation to sell or buy any asset, strategy, or product. Investing in digital assets involves a high degree of risk, including the loss of principal. Crypto Daybook Americas: A newsletter from CoinDesk Were you forwarded this newsletter? Sign up here.  Copyright © 2026 CoinDesk, All rights reserved.  CoinDesk, Inc., 61 9th Avenue, 5th Floor, New York, NY 10011, USA Unsubscribe Manage preferences

Can agentic commerce dominate the global economy?

Meta's CMO on agentic commerce and stablecoins. Strategy raises $3.2B without selling bitcoin. And Cardano just upgraded itself by vote for the first time. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Monday, July 20, 2026 Meta's CMO on agentic commerce, stablecoins, and why taste is now the only moat that matters Meta CMO and head of analytics Alex Schultz doesn't treat stablecoins as a bet — he treats them as a given. In a wide-ranging conversation with CoinDesk, Schultz laid out why Meta thinks agentic commerce could dominate the global economy, with over a million businesses already running Meta AI agents. His read on creativity in the AI era is equally direct: taste is now the only real moat, and the people who thrive will be the ones managing fleets of AI tools rather than competing with them. He invokes the radiologist argument — that every automation wave has created more jobs than it killed — to push back on AI doomerism, and draws a straight line from WhatsApp's conversational commerce in Brazil and India to where the rest of the world is heading. On what Meta missed with TikTok, why the Valley has always been crypto-bullish while the rest of America hasn't caught up, and what he'd tell a founder building a brand from scratch today — it's all in the full video. Watch full video → Sponsor message Business Strategy raises cash reserves to $3.225 billion, leaving bitcoin holdings unchanged Strategy sold 2.7 million MSTR shares for roughly $263.5 million through its ATM program last week, lifting its USD reserve to $3.225 billion while leaving its 843,775 BTC stash untouched — the second consecutive week it chose equity dilution over bitcoin sales. The move is a direct response to pressure on its preferred stock dividend structure: annual obligations have grown sharply and the company is prioritizing cash buffer over accumulation. At $64,700 per coin, the BTC treasury is worth roughly $55 billion. Read more → Markets Inside Cardano's 'Van Rossum' hard fork, and what it means for users Cardano's Van Rossum hard fork activated July 18, moving the network to protocol version 11 — but the bigger story is how it happened. For the first time in Cardano's history, the upgrade was proposed, debated, and ratified entirely through its onchain governance system, without Input Output directing the outcome. Delegated representatives voted 78.97% in favor, well above the 60% threshold; the constitutional committee unanimously approved it; and pool operators cleared it 53% to 47%. The fork lowers smart contract execution costs and lays procedural groundwork for Ouroboros Leios, the scaling upgrade expected later in 2026 that will actually change what users feel. Read more → Know someone who should be reading this? Share this newsletter See all of CoinDesk’s newsletters    CoinDesk, Inc., 61 9th Avenue, 5th Floor, New York,NY,10011,USA, Unsubscribe Manage Preferences   Copyright © 2026 CoinDesk, All rights reserved.