Bitcoin reached its highest price in more than a week on Monday morning after reports surfaced that Pakistan is mediating a 45-day ceasefire between the US and Iran, with negotiators referring to the agreement as the Islamabad Accord. The news triggered a wave of risk-on buying across cryptocurrency, equity, and oil markets. Within hours, BTC climbed past $70,000 and the broader crypto market gained roughly $70 billion in total market capitalization.
The optimism proved short-lived. As Trump‘s 48-hour deadline drew closer to expiration, ceasefire expectations dimmed and Bitcoin retreated approximately 3%, settling near $68,300 by evening. Oil surged 4% to $114 per barrel, while stock futures slipped 0.5% ahead of the deadline. Markets remain unsettled as the situation continues to develop.
Strategy ended a one-week pause in Bitcoin accumulation on Monday, announcing the purchase of 4,871 BTC for $330 million at an average price of $67,700. The acquisition was funded primarily through STRC, which contributed $227 million compared to $72 million raised via common stock. STRC saw strong trading volume on Monday, generating enough activity to support an additional estimated 936 BTC in purchases.
In a separate treasury development, BitMine, led by Tom Lee, added 71,252 ETH valued at approximately $152 million last week, bringing its total holdings to more than 4.8 million ETH. That stash is currently valued around $10.3 billion and represents roughly 3.98% of all circulating Ethereum supply. The firm is actively staking 3.14 million ETH, generating an estimated $272 million annually in yield, and is on track to control 4% of the entire ETH supply within another week at this pace.
Prediction market platform Polymarket announced what it describes as its biggest change to date, replacing its existing smart contract infrastructure with a new order book system. Alongside the technical overhaul, the platform introduced Polymarket USD, a native stablecoin backed one-to-one with USDC. Users will be required to convert their USDC into Polymarket USD to participate in the updated system.
The introduction of a platform-native stablecoin carries notable implications. By controlling the float, Polymarket positions itself as a potential competitor to on-chain savings products, particularly if the stablecoin offers yield. Analysts also view a native stablecoin as a logical precursor to the eventual launch of a native POLY token.
Circle‘s Layer-1 blockchain project Arc announced Monday that its upcoming mainnet will launch with post-quantum signature support built in from the start. The decision is a direct response to a recent Google paper that assigned a credible probability to quantum computers breaking Bitcoin’s elliptic curve cryptography by 2032. Arc’s implementation is opt-in and requires no mandatory migration or network reset, contrasting sharply with a potential Bitcoin quantum migration that experts say could take months of continuous processing even under the best circumstances.
OpenAI released a 13-page policy paper Monday titled “Industrial Policy for the Intelligence Age: Ideas to Keep People First,” urging governments worldwide to reform tax structures, strengthen worker protections, and establish safety oversight systems before AI-driven economic disruption accelerates. The document outlines proposals including worker input into AI usage decisions, public access to AI tools, shorter work weeks, and a public wealth fund. It also calls for stronger safety measures in high-risk sectors such as cybersecurity and biology, along with an AI trust framework covering verification and privacy-preserving audit logs. OpenAI argues the AI transition is likely to be faster and more destabilizing than previous industrial revolutions, and that society must have a voice in determining who benefits, who governs the technology, and who receives protection.
Originally reported by Decrypt.
