Bitcoin Pressured by $10B Options Expiry; MSTR Faces Stress

Bitcoin faced significant selling pressure, declining more than 4% to a new 52-week low as the market confronted a $10 billion options expiry. Bloomberg noted the cryptocurrency is struggling with fading institutional demand and macroeconomic headwinds. Despite the current weakness, 21Shares reversed its broken-cycle call and now projects Bitcoin could recover to $100,000 by year-end, asserting the four-year cycle remains intact. The options expiry represents a major test for a market already under considerable strain from multiple fronts.

Strategy ($MSTR) faced intensifying pressure across its capital structure as Bitcoin weakness rippled through the company's holdings. The company's STRC preferred stock trades at a 17.5% discount to par, while unrealized Bitcoin losses have reached $11 billion according to Strategy's filings. CryptoQuant analysts stated the company needs to stop buying Bitcoin and start stacking cash to rebuild reserves. One analyst warned that Strategy's structure—which runs on Bitcoin, MSTR common stock, and STRC preferred—is weakening simultaneously across all three components. Meanwhile, Strategy announced that TEOCO Corporation selected its cloud-native Strategy One platform to power AI-enhanced reporting capabilities, potentially signaling diversification efforts beyond Bitcoin.

Robinhood Markets ($HOOD) settled at $97.22, down 5.85% from its previous close, as Meta Platforms developed a competing prediction markets app. Shares of Coinbase ($COIN), Strategy, and Robinhood all declined as Bitcoin's price action weighed on crypto-related equities. Galaxy Digital turned its $65 million acquisition of the Helios mining facility during the 2022 crypto downturn into a major AI infrastructure business, anchored by a $4.5 billion hosting agreement with CoreWeave. Despite the deal's potential to generate more than $1 billion in annual revenue, investors continue to value Galaxy largely as a crypto company rather than reflecting its AI infrastructure pivot.

Coinbase ($COIN) established its EU crypto hub in Luxembourg after obtaining its Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA) license from the country's financial supervisory authority. The license allows the crypto exchange to offer its full suite of crypto products and services to more than 450 million people across all 27 EU member states. Coinbase follows Ripple in securing Luxembourg-based MiCA authorization as Binance exited its Greek bid before the July 1 deadline. The MiCA framework represents a comprehensive regulatory structure for digital assets across the European Union, and Coinbase's early compliance positions it advantageously for EU market access.

Cboe Global Markets launched a prediction market tied to the performance of the benchmark S&P 500, marking the Chicago Board Options Exchange's entry into the rapidly growing prediction markets space. The move comes as Meta Platforms develops a competing prediction markets app, news that contributed to Robinhood's 2.7% morning session decline. The expansion of traditional financial infrastructure providers into prediction markets signals growing mainstream acceptance of these instruments. PayPal Holdings joined major fintech, technology and blockchain firms in pledging to combat illicit financial flows linked to the illegal wildlife trade, focusing on identifying and disrupting financial channels that enable wildlife trafficking activities.