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Norway's sovereign wealth fund indirectly holds 11,549 BTC, setting a new historical high

According to The Block, K33 research director Vetle Lunde stated that by the end of the first half of 2026, the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund's indirect Bitcoin exposure through holdings in companies such as Strategy, Metaplanet, MARA, Coinbase, Block, and Tesla has risen to 11,549 BTC, a record high valued at approximately $725 million. This exposure grew by 21.2% in the first half of the year and by 60.5% over the past year, marking the sixth consecutive reporting period of increase.Among these, Strategy accounts for nearly 86% of the fund's indirect Bitcoin exposure, corresponding to approximately 9,914 BTC. As of June 30, the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund held about 1.17% of Strategy's shares, valued at $357.3 million at that time. Metaplanet corresponds to 671 BTC, MARA corresponds to 421 BTC, and Coinbase, Block, and Tesla correspond to 183 BTC, 120 BTC, and 97 BTC, respectively.K33 pointed out that this exposure is likely not the result of the fund actively allocating to Bitcoin, but rather an indirect effect of its broadly diversified investment portfolio. Currently, the related Bitcoin exposure accounts for about 0.03% of the fund's total assets.In addition, the fund has also gained indirect ETH exposure through the Ethereum treasury company BitMine for the first time. As of June 30, it held 6.15 million shares of BitMine, valued at $88.3 million, accounting for about 1.16% of the company's shares; based on BitMine's current ETH holdings, this corresponds to an indirect exposure of approximately 67,340 ETH.

The harsh truth of encrypted infrastructure and mergers and acquisitions: paid enterprise pilots are a dead end, mergers and acquisitions are the way out

Bitcoin.com published an article stating that the model of Web3 startups conducting corporate pilots by paying traditional financial institutions "is a dead end," with 95% of pilot projects failing to reach production environments. Web2 companies only want the idle venture capital and revenue sharing from startups, rather than their open-source innovations. The article argues that true defensiveness comes from a "structural moat"—compliance licenses, deep network liquidity, or distribution lock-ins that Web2 engineering teams cannot replicate.The article cites recent cases: Stripe was acquired for $1.1 billion after proving an annual cross-border transaction volume of $5 billion with Bridge, and Robinhood acquired Bitstamp for $200 million to gain 50 global regulatory licenses and institutional liquidity, rather than maintaining long-term vendor relationships. The article predicts that the next round of B2C expansion will present an 80/20 pattern: 80% of retail liquidity will be controlled by 3 to 5 Web2/fintech giants such as Visa, Stripe, Robinhood, PayPal, and BlackRock, providing compliance and fiat entry; 20% will be an unlicensed DeFi sandbox for validating initial product-market fit. The growth path for startups should be to first validate PMF in the DeFi sandbox, then integrate or sell to the few Web2 gateways controlling the 80% distribution layer. The article believes that the current protocol cancellations and wave of startup closures are part of a "necessary market cleanup."

Samsung plans to turn 800 million Galaxy phones into stablecoin wallets, potentially becoming the world's largest stablecoin distribution gateway

Analysts say that Samsung is accelerating its layout of digital asset infrastructure, planning to provide native stablecoin functionality to approximately 800 million Galaxy smartphones through Samsung Wallet, which is expected to become an important distribution channel for stablecoins like USDC. It is reported that Samsung announced at the Galaxy Unpacked 2026 event that it will integrate stablecoin-related features into future devices, including savings and payment accounts linked to fiat currencies. Currently, Samsung Wallet covers 61 countries, with nearly 19 million users in South Korea.Joseph Goh, head of the Asia-Pacific region for crypto investment bank Areta, stated that the core bottleneck for the widespread adoption of stablecoins is not liquidity, but user accessibility. "Distribution channels are the scarce asset, and Samsung has a large number of user entry points." He believes this move could propel Samsung to become a major distributor of stablecoins like USDC. This is not Samsung's first foray into the crypto space. The company launched a digital asset wallet through the Knox security module back in 2019, supporting users in storing assets like Bitcoin and Ethereum, and connecting to Ledger hardware wallets. Additionally, Samsung is strengthening its digital asset infrastructure layout. Samsung SDS CEO Lee Joon-hee previously stated that the company’s investment in Dunamu, the operator of South Korea's largest crypto exchange Upbit, is an important strategic layout for entering the digital asset infrastructure field, including stablecoins and AI payments. In May of this year, Samsung Securities, Samsung SDS, and Samsung Card agreed to acquire approximately 4% of Dunamu, Upbit's parent company, for about $408 million. Analysts believe that Samsung Wallet is responsible for providing user distribution entry points, while infrastructure layouts like Dunamu are responsible for underlying transactions and asset services, suggesting that Samsung may be building a complete ecosystem covering stablecoins, payments, and digital asset services.
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