Bitcoin (BTC) gives back last week’s gains, with a temporary quote around $77,060 as of May 18. Strategy chairman Michael Saylor hinted at buying Bitcoin, encouraging retail investors to allow payment of half-month dividends in the STRC dividend voting. A suspect allegedly tied to being a co-founder of Forsage—has reportedly been extradited from Thailand back to his home country, and refused to plead not guilty in a $340 million Ponzi scam case, becoming the first of four co-defendants to go on trial in the United States.
Macro events & crypto market highlights
1、Strategy chairman Michael Saylor said on Sunday that the Bitcoin reserve company will buy more crypto assets in the coming week, while encouraging retail shareholders to vote on a proxy proposal that allows the company to pay half-month dividends to its STRC perpetual preferred stock.
“Big Dot Energy” is a tweet Saylor posted later Sunday morning, accompanied by a bubble chart tracking Strategy’s Bitcoin purchase activity over nearly six years. The chart comes from the StrategyTracker website registered in Iceland, and Saylor typically publishes this chart a few days before the company makes Bitcoin purchases.
2、According to The Block, a Ukrainian citizen accused of co-founding the Forsage crypto investment platform was extradited from Thailand back to his home country last week and pleaded not guilty in federal court in Portland, Oregon, becoming the first of four co-defendants charged in the $340 million Ponzi scam case to be tried in a U.S. court.
According to a notice released by the Oregon district attorney’s office, 42-year-old Olena Oblamska (online name “Lola Ferrari”) was arraigned on May 11, charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud. A magistrate judge ordered her held in custody pending a four-day jury trial scheduled to begin July 14.
News roundup
1、Blockaid: Verus—Ethereum cross-chain bridge attacked, losses of about $11.58 million
2、Iran launches Bitcoin-settlement maritime insurance platform Hormuz Safe
3、U.S. National Credit Union Administration publishes proposed rules for licensing stablecoin issuers
4、Aave updates rsETH technical recovery plan: WETH LTV restored to pre-event levels
5、From the media: Israel’s prime minister discusses potential resumption of war with Iran with Trump
6、Trump issues a threat of force to Iran, to discuss military action options on Tuesday
7、Huang Licheng’s ETH long positions were liquidated again and quickly opened a new position; total losses have exceeded $32.4 million
8、Michael Saylor posts a Bitcoin Tracker message again, may disclose buy-in data next week
9、Data: Tokens including ZRO, KAITO, PYTH, etc. will see major unlocks this week, with PYTH unlocking value of about $95.5 million
Market performance
1、Bitcoin latest news: $BTC gives back last week’s gains, temporarily at around $77,060; in the past 24 hours, $181 million was liquidated, with longs as the main target;
2、All three major U.S. stock indexes closed lower on May 15, with declines exceeding 1% across the board. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed down 537 points, while the S&P 500 Index and the Nasdaq Composite Index fell 1.2% and 1.5%, respectively. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index plunged 4%, and TSMC ADR dropped 3.2%. Both the SOX and Nasdaq weekly charts ended lower, ending a streak of six consecutive weeks of gains. The S&P 500 Index also logged a streak of seven straight weeks of gains, setting the longest winning run since December 2023.
（Source: Gate）
3、In the Gate BTC/USDT liquidation map, based on the current 77,207.80 USDT level: if it drops to around $76,470, the cumulative long liquidation amount will exceed $216 million; if it rises to around $77,251, the cumulative short liquidation amount will exceed $432 million. The short-side liquidation amount is significantly higher than the long-side; it is recommended to manage leverage levels reasonably and avoid triggering large-scale liquidations amid market fluctuations.
（Source: Coinglass）
4、Within the past 24 hours, BTC spot inflows were $1.1 billion, outflows were $1.18 billion, for net outflows of $80 million.
（Source: Gate）
5、Within the past 24 hours, derivatives trading net outflows led for contracts including $ZEC, $DOT, $HYPE, $CL, $LAB , etc., suggesting trading opportunities.
Selected views from X KOLs
Phyrex Ni（@Phyrex_Ni）：「The U.S.-Iran war has been going on for nearly two months, and the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz has also been for nearly two months. In these two months, how many times have there been back-and-forths and TACO, but the same script is still playing out every week. The external force Trump can use should be about the same, right? When visiting China, what can be made public is that Xi Jinping agreed to help coordinate Iran relations, but so far there hasn’t been any progress.」
「On Sunday, Trump kept dropping tough talk saying Iran doesn’t have much time left, and Iran also responded very firmly. In just a few hours, the CME opens. I guess the WTI price will keep feeling uncomfortable too. Shorting WTI this week feels much better. Binance finally finished modifying the funding rate mechanism—not only were funding rates not spiking over the weekend, but even at the close of regular U.S. stock market hours they returned to normal levels.」
「At least this keeps the cost of continuing to hold shorts lower. Otherwise, I honestly wouldn’t have the courage to keep holding. It’s really too exhausting. I hope things improve this week, because before I can’t hold on anymore, I think U.S. inflation also won’t be able to hold on. With U.S. risk markets facing inflation this high, they likely won’t hold up either.」
「This time, the two rounds of shorting WTI made a bit of money, but it was too tiring—especially this time the two-week period wasn’t that long, yet the funding rate and all the back-and-forths were almost unbearable. If this week hadn’t changed the funding rate, I probably would have lost money and left.」
「Looking back at Bitcoin data, the weekend numbers are very normal—nothing seems off. After the U.S. stock market opens on Monday, I might need to start doing dual-currency financial management again, getting back into the investable range. Personally, I don’t believe that short-term $BTC will drop to $40k or anything like that. At least, so far I haven’t seen any reason it could drop that low. Of course, if there is truly an economic recession in the future, or a world war, that’s a different story.」
「But at least for now, I still believe the market is moving along with the U.S. economy, macro, and politics—especially with the boost from strong AI FOMO. A sudden collapse of the market can only be driven by an external black swan.」
Outlook for today
1、China April industrial value added above designated size (year-over-year), prior value 5.70%
2、China April total retail sales of consumer goods (year-over-year), prior value 1.7%
3、U.S. May NAHB home price index, prior value 34
