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⌐◪-◪ → South Korea’s National Pension Service (NPS) just purchased $34M worth of MicroStrategy shares to gain indirect exposure to Bitcoin.

This move is part of a broader trend of long-term institutional investors, including those in Wisconsin, Michigan, and New Jersey City, investing in Bitcoin.

For context: South Korea’s pension fund is the 3rd largest in the world, with over $800B under management, and is the largest investor in South Korea.

The only thing I’m trying to understand is why they invested in MicroStrategy instead of the various Bitcoin ETFs, which provide more direct exposure to Bitcoin.

💬 Any idea why they chose MicroStrategy over the BTC ETFs?

⌐◪-◪ → Both NASDAQ and NYSE have withdrawn their applications to list and trade options for two spot Bitcoin ETFs — Bitwise (BITB) and Grayscale (GBTC).

Bloomberg analyst James Seyffart expects both parties to re-file in the coming days/weeks, similar to what CBOE did earlier this month.

For context, CBOE’s original filing was 15 pages, and their re-filing was 44 pages, suggesting the SEC provided some feedback.

While this looks like progress, we still don’t know if the SEC is truly engaging here, and this likely restarts the clock regarding the April 2025 deadlines.

Meanwhile, investors can buy a 1.75x leveraged MicroStrategy ETF— and MSTR is already a leveraged bet on Bitcoin—but we still don’t have in-kind creation/redemptions or options trading.

💬 How important of a milestone is options trading for BTC ETFs?

⌐◪-◪ → MakerDAO just approved a proposal to lower the WBTC debt ceiling to zero, effectively disabling any borrowing against BitGo’s WBTC.

Note: The liquidation threshold was not changed, meaning any existing WBTC-backed loans will not be affected.

This decision comes after BitGo, the developer and custodian of WBTC, announced a partnership with BiT Global to manage WBTC custody, shifting it from the U.S. to Hong Kong and Singapore.

BiT Global has ties to Justin Sun, a controversial figure that MakerDAO didn’t want to be beholden to from an influence and control standpoint, as discussed in the DAO’s general forum.

It’s amazing to me that mere affiliation with one person’s name/brand (Justin Sun) can mobilize an entire DAO to disable an entire asset class and subsequently put WBTC’s long-term dominance into question.

💬 The real question is, will Coinbase’s cbBTC flip WBTC?