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Predator vs Protocol

Coinbits's Photo
by Coinbits
Friday, Feb 27, 2026 - 18:39

Jane Street got more publicity than it wanted this week. The secretive Wall Street trading firm stands accused of systematically suppressing bitcoin's price through spot ETF market mechanics. Jeff Park, Justin Bechler, Dave Weisberger, and Isabella Kaminska all published excellent explanations of how authorized participants like Jane Street may be using the spot bitcoin ETF structure to mute spot price discovery, routing demand through futures and derivatives rather than direct bitcoin purchases. Their work is worth reading.

Is it manipulation? Maybe. Is it new? Absolutely not. Gold markets have endured similar games from bullion banks for decades. By some estimates, if the paper gold market for futures and derivatives were not manipulated, gold would cost $80,000 to $100,000 per ounce. The financialization of hard money always invites predators who profit from structural arbitrage.

Here is the uncomfortable truth: this is largely outside of your control. Volatility, flash crashes, and short-term price suppression are guaranteed as the day is long. So get smart. Do not use leverage unless you are sure you know what you’re doing. (Hint: almost nobody does because they cannot compete with high frequency trading, proprietary AI, and inside information that Wall Street uses.) If you are borrowing against your bitcoin, understand that high-finance shenanigans can crater the short-term price without warning. It’s all part and parcel for an economy based on fiat currency – and it’s exactly what bitcoin was created to solve.

There is at least one thing that Jane Street, and every other Wall Street firm for that matter, cannot do: change the supply of real, physical bitcoin. As long as people are satisfied to accept paper promises for bitcoin, Jane Street can wheel and deal. But if you, dear reader, take the responsibility to hold your own bitcoin physically, out of their reach, the wolves and weasels of Wall Street will be shaken out.

The smartest response to the corruption unveiled this week is the simplest one: buy physical bitcoin, hold it yourself, and resist the temptation of playing their games.

Citrini Research publishes dystopian AI report, Wall Street panics

Citrini Research released a fictional scenario from "June 2028" depicting 10.2% unemployment, a 38% S&P 500 crash, and mass white-collar displacement driven by runaway AI adoption. The report went viral, triggering selloffs across software and financial stocks before critics from Citadel Securities, Deutsche Bank, and Fidelity dismissed it as speculative fiction untethered from economic fundamentals.

Where government fails, bitcoin will succeed

The Citrini scenario describes a government too confused to mount a coherent policy response as AI hollows out the tax base. Traditional tools like rate cuts and stimulus prove insufficient against structural displacement. In a world where the “intelligence premium” evaporates and politicians cannot agree on rescue plans, bitcoin offers something no institution can: a monetary system with rules that do not change regardless of who holds power or how badly they govern.

River publishes 2026 bitcoin adoption report showing record growth despite 50% price drawdown

River reported that institutions accumulated 829,000 bitcoins in 2025, 60% of top U.S. banks are building bitcoin products, and registered investment advisors have been net buyers for eight consecutive quarters. The firm also found Lightning Network payments grew 300%, merchant adoption tripled in the U.S., five new sovereign nations became bitcoin holders, and 194 public companies now hold bitcoin on their balance sheets.

There is no bear market in bitcoin adoption

River's data demolishes the narrative that falling prices mean fading interest. The opposite is true. While retail panics and sells, institutions, banks, sovereign wealth funds, and corporations are accumulating at record rates. Bitcoin's share of global wealth is 0.2%. The recommended allocation by reputable firms is between 1% and 5%. The gap between where institutional allocation is and where it is going represents an enormous wall of capital yet to arrive.

Jack Dorsey cuts 40% of Block's workforce, cites AI as catalyst

Block CEO Jack Dorsey announced the elimination of over 4,000 employees, reducing headcount from more than 10,000 to under 6,000 in what is the largest workforce reduction as a share of total employees in S&P 500 history. Block shares surged 25% after hours. Dorsey said AI tools paired with smaller teams have fundamentally changed what it means to build and run a company.

Creative destruction is accelerating

Block's move is a warning shot to every bloated corporation in America. The market rewarded this decision immediately because it understands that AI-driven productivity gains compress the need for human headcount.

Meta plans stablecoin comeback, aims for second half of 2026 launch

Meta sent out requests for proposals to third-party firms to administer stablecoin-based payments across its three billion-user platform, with Stripe identified as a likely partner. The move follows the failed Libra/Diem project that was shut down in 2022 under hostile regulatory conditions and marks a return to payments ambitions under a more favorable U.S. regulatory climate including the GENIUS Act.

Stablecoins are the trojan horse

Meta reintroducing stablecoins to three billion people is significant, but it is not bitcoin. Stablecoins are still denominated in dollars and subject to the whims of the institutions that issue them. They are useful as payment rails but they do not solve the fundamental problem of money that can be printed without limit. Every stablecoin user who discovers the difference between a digital dollar and a digitally scarce bearer asset is a potential future bitcoiner.

BITCOIN ADOPTION CONTINUES

Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund Mubadala increased its BlackRock bitcoin ETF stake by 46% to $630 million, while fellow Abu Dhabi firm Al Warda holds $408 million, bringing their combined position to nearly $1.4 billion.

South Korea's National Pension Fund boosted its stake in Strategy by 20%, adding to the growing list of sovereign and pension funds with indirect bitcoin exposure.

Strategy made its 100th bitcoin purchase since 2020, adding 592 bitcoins and bringing total holdings to 717,722.

A solo miner turned $75 in rented hashpower into a $200,000 block reward, mining block 938092 via CKPool.

London-based Smarter Web Company secured a $30 million bitcoin-collateralized credit facility from Coinbase to accelerate treasury accumulation.

Brazil's OranjeBTC announced plans to raise R$100 million (approximately $17 million) to fund a bitcoin investment.

HOW BITCOIN WORKS

Learn one key idea about bitcoin each week. This week:

Bitcoin mining: the grid's silent hero

Everyone loves to talk about bitcoin's price when it's down relative to all time highs. But while traders obsess over candles, something quietly remarkable happened during January's devastating winter storms that is worth closer examination. Bitcoin miners helped keep the lights on.

Joakim Book, writing for the Mises Institute, published an excellent piece detailing how bitcoin miners function as the electricity grid's consumer of last resort. The concept is elegant. Miners run electricity through specialized computers to produce bitcoin. During normal conditions, they consume every available watt. But when a storm hits, and household demand spikes, miners participating in demand-response programs shut off their machines immediately, returning that capacity to the grid.

During January's storms, bitcoin's hashrate dropped by roughly a third as hundreds of exahash worth of mining capacity curtailed operations. Every watt that previously powered the network was redirected to heat homes and power emergency infrastructure. The Texas grid, which has become a global hub for bitcoin mining, benefits enormously from this arrangement. Miners are functionally like massive, spread-out batteries, but more economically efficient than backup power generation infrastructure that would sit idle most of the time.

This arrangement does not amount to a government subsidy. Miners receive curtailment credits in exchange for a specific service: the willingness to be outbid by millions of households when electricity is needed most. No other industrial consumer, like AI data centers or manufacturing facilities, can match this flexibility. Only bitcoin miners can shut off and restart without operational loss.

In the middle of a brutal drawdown, stories like this are a welcome break. The price will recover as it aways does. While we wait, it is worth stepping back to appreciate that bitcoin is an incredible technology quietly making the world work better in various ways.

COIN CHECK

According to River's 2026 bitcoin adoption report, how many sovereign nations are now estimated to own bitcoin?

A. 7
B. 15
C. 23
D. 41

Check your answer at the end of the page.

FROM THE MEME POOL

Follow us on X for more fresh content

ANSWER

Answer: C. 23.

Contributor posts published on Zero Hedge do not necessarily represent the views and opinions of Zero Hedge, and are not selected, edited or screened by Zero Hedge editors.
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