Large Bitcoin holders accumulated over 270,000 BTC ($16.7 billion) in two weeks ending July 3, even as U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs bled a record $4.06 billion in June — creating the largest whale-vs-ETF divergence since the funds launched, a pattern Bitfinex analysts say has historically appeared near cycle lows.
Large Bitcoin holders accumulated over 270,000 BTC ($16.7 billion) in two weeks ending July 3, even as U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs bled a record $4.06 billion in June — creating the largest whale-vs-ETF divergence since the funds launched, a pattern Bitfinex analysts say has historically appeared near cycle lows.
U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded their worst month ever in June 2026, shedding $4.06 billion in net outflows — surpassing the previous record of $3.56 billion set in February 2025. The selling intensified into a 10-day consecutive outflow streak that drained $2.73 billion, pushing year-to-date ETF flows to approximately -$5.4 billion.
Meanwhile, on-chain data analyzed by Bitfinex and shared with CoinDesk reveals that whale wallets accumulated more than 270,000 BTC ($16.7 billion) during the same two-week period. Critically, the U.S. spot premium remained negative throughout, meaning the buying was not coming through spot desks — it was happening through OTC channels, direct custody withdrawals, or non-U.S. venues.
On July 2, ETF flows finally turned positive with $221.7 million in net inflows — the largest single-day intake in two months. Fidelity's FBTC led with $165.96 million, followed by ARKB at $91.84 million. BlackRock's IBIT remained an outlier with a $40.43 million outflow.
The divergence pattern — institutions selling via ETFs while large holders accumulate on-chain — is what Bitfinex analysts described as "familiar," matching the behavior seen near prior cycle lows where long-term holders absorb supply from forced sellers before a price recovery materializes.
Bitcoin traded around $62,600 on July 4, rebounding from 21-month lows under $58,000 earlier in the week. The recovery was aided by a weak June jobs report (57,000 non-farm payrolls) that reduced Federal Reserve rate-hike pressure.
Securitize (NYSE: SECZ, ~$5B AUM) launched Securitize Stocks today at 13:00 UTC: 12 tokenized US mega-caps — including Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, Tesla, Circle, Strategy and Palantir — each backed 1:1 by a real share, settling in USDC on Solana with Jump Trading running the proprietary AMM and clearing firm RQD* handling custody and settlement. It is the first product live under the SEC's five-year Innovation Exemption for onchain stock trading, granted September 17.
Anthropic's much-anticipated IPO prospectus — reported in detail by Reuters and the Financial Times — pursues a $2 trillion valuation while disclosing a $42 billion net loss for 2025 and plans to spend $518 billion on cloud, computing, and infrastructure in the coming year. Roughly 80 of the filing's 261 main-body pages cover risk factors, including that advanced AI could pose 'catastrophic or existential risks to humanity,' versus 48 pages describing the business. Nvidia separately disclosed that Anthropic has more than $180 billion in contracted compute commitments — 2.5GW of Nvidia infrastructure shipping through 2028.
Nvidia's board authorized an additional $150 billion in share repurchases on Monday — which the company says is the largest single authorization increase ever announced by a public company — lifting total remaining buyback capacity to $235 billion, expected to be spent through fiscal 2028. NVDA rose 2.8% to a $5.42 trillion market cap as Jensen Huang called AI 'a once-in-a-generation platform shift.'