How Bitcoin Companies Are Aligning Globally | Bitcoin 2026

[applause] >> What's up Vegas? How we feeling? Okay, that's that day two hangover right there. Zero response. The room is looking pretty full though. See, there we go. I heard somebody. Thank you. Well, we're excited. >> Can I just say I I today I've been locked away in meetings most of this this event as with every conference and today I got to walk the exhibitor floor and spend a little bit of time in here and the energy of this event is fantastic and this is why we do this event. So just I hope you're all having a good time. Let's keep the energy flowing. Absolute. David, you're jumping ahead a little bit though cuz people don't some people don't know who you are believe it or not. So we're going to start with introductions. Well, you know, I I I just want to say thank you to Greg for that hype job coming out on stage, but I'm David Bailey. I'm CEO and chairman of Nakamoto. Nakamoto as of February is the owner of BTC Inc. which organizes this conference. So we're very proud to have this be the first in Nakamoto conference and we are trying to build the world's number one most recognized Bitcoin company and so we want Bitcoin operating companies and a Bitcoin treasury and we want to power the future of Bitcoin in the capital markets for the world. Excellent. Alexandre. Hello everyone. Alexandre Lize, board director of Bitcoin strategy at Capital B, Europe's first Bitcoin treasury company. I would like to say that I'm extremely thankful to be on this panel together with great leaders of the space. I would like to thank David for its leadership with the best Bitcoin conference in the world and not only retail here, please. Not only the retail one but as well institutional one and in terms of institutional Bitcoin adoption, it's now 2,000 institutions that are coming here with more than 10,000 attendees and much more and I think this conference specifically has contributed to Bitcoin adoption in a way that scales to the world and I'm very thankful for that. So thank you, David. Thank you. And as well to Dylan because the inspiration of Metaplanet and its rise and its success and its incredible growth has really sparked our interest as the big at the beginning at Capital B and we might not be here today if it were for strategy and for Metaplanet and and for you. And George as well, Bitcoin for corporations is going to be the most important professional organization on earth because it's based on Bitcoin and it's powered by Bitcoin treasury companies. So thank you all. Amazing. Thank you. All right, Dylan. I think my my intro will may maybe be a bit shorter. Well, thanks everyone for being here. It's my sixth conference. Time time does fly in the in the Bitcoin world. I'm head of Bitcoin strategy at Metaplanet. We're Tokyo Stock Exchange listed company on a Bitcoin standard and and we're the largest non-United States publicly traded Bitcoin holder. Awesome. Okay, well, Thank you. Okay, we are we are talking about how Bitcoin companies are aligning globally. Again, my name is George Mikhail. I'm the managing director of Bitcoin for corporations. We are a professional executive network of Bitcoin treasury companies and other Bitcoin companies who run some sort of Bitcoin playbook. And so we're up to about 43 member companies now including the three companies represented here on stage and we're talking about collaboration, competition, the difference between traditional companies versus Bitcoin companies. So I want to start by just asking the panel maybe just to help the audience understand the different dynamics, maybe the game theory around why competition looks different in the Bitcoin ecosystem compared to the legacy corporate space. Well, I kind of think of Bitcoin sometimes as a decentralized corporation. I mean, it's that's not a perfect analogy, but you know, owning Bitcoin is like holding a share in this in this corporation and so when Bitcoin goes up, anyone who holds shares in it is a winner. So from that perspective, the better Metaplanet does, the better Capital B does, the better we do. Where the competition comes in is like we each have our own P&L within the corporation. So we want as much capital on our P&L as possible. You know, we want to have as much, you know, individual success as possible, but a rising tide truly lifts all all boats with with Bitcoin companies, not just Bitcoin companies, the the Bitcoin ecosystem and community as a whole. Um you know, in terms of ways that that we collaborate, actually Nakamoto and and through our asset manager UTXO, um we're major shareholders of of both Metaplanet and Capital B. Uh we actually just launched a new product at the conference this week. Our our first digital credit fund where we're going to be buying the the prefs of MicroStrategy and Strive and and we have kind of a cool model of how we're doing it. So, you know, each of these different companies as they kind of progress on the frontier of what's possible in the capital markets, they provide a a new floor for people to build on top of and so, you know, I can't wait for Metaplanet to issue their prefs at some point in time, but the more prefs that are out there, the better this fund product can be, the more diversified its holdings can be. So like the better the outcome for us. So it's really as we keep pushing it forward, we open up a new design space of where we can grow the business and make money for the entire ecosystem. Same question. I think the world has never needed Bitcoin so much. There is of course geopolitical uncertainty. Of course, macroeconomic uncertainty and Bitcoin gives the peace of mind for everyday people and for corporations that you can really associate yourself with the asset on earth that has the power to bring growth for you, for your corporation and what Bitcoin treasury companies are doing and what we are doing over in Europe is exactly this. It's really uh taking Bitcoin as the cornerstone asset of the balance sheet and bringing Bitcoin adoption towards the continent. In Europe, you have one of the highest levels of taxation in the world. You have a lot of security issues and you have at the same time the second largest credit market in the world and so it makes a lot of sense to bring Bitcoin towards the brokerage accounts and within the banks and actually in the last few weeks in France, we've had a systemic bank launch a Bitcoin offering and we've had Amundi, Europe's BlackRock, launch a Bitcoin ETP and it's just accelerating at a pace that I think it's not really appreciated. And on top of that, you have the growth and the success of digital credit with of course STR C from strategy and Strive and Satya and many more to come and our role is really to bring that digital credit adoption towards Europe and you know, we've had a lot of shareholders, 20,000 shareholders, get to Bitcoin as well through Capital B and I think for the 99% of the population that cannot withstand the volatility of Bitcoin, digital credit will be a great answer and will provide a lot of inflows to the space. And as you said, the success of the product of strategy enables more success for us to launch a similar product over in Europe and will enable the success of Strive and and Metaplanet and and many more and I think the key takeaway from to this conference is that everybody in the conference, in the institutional areas, is organizing, structuring, launching digital credit instruments, digital credit funds, digital credit ETPs, everything that you can imagine and tokenization and everything else and the investment banks are laser focused on digital credit as well and this space is going to explode and you can already see that STRC is buying up 5x the supply of Bitcoin and this is not sustainable unless the Bitcoin price goes up. Definitely. Dylan, would you agree? Zero-sum game or we all kind of playing together in some ways and watching the market expand? Yeah, I think it's it's definitely a positive-sum game with with Bitcoin and that's that's different than than other industries, all right? So, you know, I think everybody here on on this on this panel has has a experience where you know, Michael Saylor, the the lead, you know, person, visionary, you know, executive in this space in this industry has, you know, personally, one-on-one, laid out the playbook, explained how to navigate this, how to navigate that and and I don't think you can imagine that in any other industry or any other, you know, would Elon Musk, you know, give the playbook to his competitor? No, he's he's focused on his business. And so I think there's something beautiful about that is that everybody's coming together and everybody's success is is, you know, you know, very much kind of building on on top of everybody else. So Yeah, definitely. It it is a unique dynamic. I remember one of the first things that one of these CEOs of these companies said to me when we first started Bitcoin for corporations was that we were providing cover in in a lot of ways because it was, you know, it was one thing for Saylor and Strategy to be out there that you were the the first company, the only company doing this. But once additional companies started entering the fray, following the playbook, and once we created a network that kind of legitimized this, I think that it helped these companies feel like, okay, this is an actual thing that's happening. It's not just one they said there's one person out there. And so part of the dynamic is also that we're we're still early, right? I guess it's we're still just getting started. People don't really even know what this movement is capable of or what, you know, how far it will go. But I mean, it's it's not going to be early for very long, right? We're we're getting kind of into the later later stages. Do you think this is the last cycle that we're going to see this uh this flood of treasury companies. Dylan's already laughing. You can take this one first if you want. Sure, I'll uh Go for it. Um you know, I I think, you know, everybody here is is, you know, interacting with Bitcoin in some way. Everybody here is, you know, came to a Bitcoin conference. And so, you know, when George says, "Well, it's early." Maybe you're like, "Well, you know, it doesn't feel early. I've known about Bitcoin for 5 years." Um but I think the reality is, and this is something that I I didn't fully appreciate un- until kind of sitting on on this side as you know, as an operating company talking to, you know, various classes of of institutional investors, you know, like 99% of the capital in the world can't buy Bitcoin. They can't even buy Bitcoin ETFs. And uh George, I think we spoke on this uh on a panel, you know, 2 days ago or yesterday. Like these these big pools of capital, trillions and trillions of dollars, have mandates, and they can't buy Bitcoin. They can't buy commodities, they can't buy funds or ETFs. They can only do one thing. Some of them are fixed income, some of them are equity investors, some of them are, you know, long short or convertible arbitrage. And so, you know, a lot of Bitcoiners, including myself, had this, you know, vision or has this thesis that Bitcoin wins, and it, you know, hyperbitcoinization is this event. And, you know, at some point Bitcoin's worth a million or five or 10 million dollars equivalent at some point in time. But what that actually looks like, right? If you're a Bitcoin maximalist in that fashion, it it doesn't happen without all of this happening, right? It doesn't happen without, you know, big bad BlackRock and the and Wall Street coming in and institutionalizing the asset. Like, what do you think Bitcoin winning looks like? It looks like $200 trillion flooding into the market in in some way or some form. And right, so that's, you know, there's private credit, there's there's equity investment, preferred investment, senior debt, right? All of this stuff, these are pools of capital that are latent, that are ready to be tapped into. And right, so the genius of of, you know, Michael Saylor and strategy from 2020 onwards was realizing that and then creating an instrument for each of those pools, right? And so, you know, Stretch is a big big TAM, right? Everybody wants no volatility and high yield, right? so I think that's the that's the golden goose. But I think, you know, a lot of idealist Bitcoiners who think Bitcoin is going to go to $10 million simultaneously dislike Wall Street or dislike the treasury companies. And that's in my opinion, that's very paradoxical, right? This is this is what Bitcoin winning looks like. Definitely. Were either of you surprised by what's happening, or do you feel like institutional adoption was always going to be inevitable even even through like a Bitcoin sort of maximalist uh lens? Well, as as long as the technology isn't being changed and it's the same Bitcoin yesterday as it is today and it's the same Bitcoin tomorrow as it is today, then yes, I mean, these these companies have no uh entrenched advantage over any other user. BlackRock has the same um has to play by the same rules that someone who owns $10 of Bitcoin has to play by. And so, yes, this is us eating the financial system. It's us eating the capital markets. And, you know, at the end of the day for us to have hyperbitcoinization happen, it means that every financial institution, every corporation, every economic agent in the world is going to have to use Bitcoin. So, you know, there we don't get to draw a box around certain groups of people and say, "Well, these people don't get to use Bitcoin." That's not how Bitcoin works. And so, I think um you know, in terms of where we are in this process, I actually think we're at the very very very early stages of the process. It's wild to me that only a couple hundred companies own Bitcoin on their balance sheet, public companies. Um when I look at the cap tables of different uh treasury companies that are out there, there is a lot of commonality between the shareholder base. I would be, you know, I wouldn't be surprised if if the actual individual shareholders on cap tables, minus MicroStrategy, cuz that they're a behemoth, but um you know, it's probably sub 250,000 individual shareholders spread across the ecosystem. And so, when you compare that to the investing category, I mean, there's over 100 million uh people in the United States alone that have exposure to the capital markets. So, I think we're still very early in the process. Um and I think we're we're discovering what works. Like, one of the cool things you were asking earlier about collaboration, one of the cool things is like when one treasury company has success doing a certain thing, it it it shows a path of what the market wants. And, you know, as an operator um and as an issuer, you want to be responsive to where the investor demand and appetite is. And so, you know, when these prefs first started launching, you know, we we we were very intrigued, but we didn't know how they were going to play out. I think they've played out unbelievably well. I mean, I think uh Saylor's looking like an absolute genius, Drive's looking like a genius. So, they're showing a path for other treasury companies to follow um in their footsteps. And so, you know, I I I think this is really still just the beginning of this. And, you know, if you hate BlackRock getting involved now, you're going to really hate it with the, you know, Federal Reserve starts buying Bitcoin. So, you know, but it is what it is. Yeah, I think there are a lot of benefits of the adoption of Bitcoin in the financial ecosystem. One is to increase the capacity of everybody to not sell the Bitcoin. Because one key aspect of holding Bitcoin is the number one rule is you don't sell your Bitcoin. And in order to be able to not sell your Bitcoin, to buy a house and to finance projects and to invest in the future, you need a financial institution that will actually give you a loan out of your Bitcoin. And with the Bitcoin treasury companies all around the world, all the banks have developed different offerings for offering custody for Bitcoin. And over time, this is offering options for individuals to have more options to custody their Bitcoin and to get financing in their Bitcoin and to recognize their assets as part of their overall portfolio and to get to get more advantages in the financial ecosystem. And I guess the issue maybe is that we are winning too hard and that effectively, yes, the US government uh is for Bitcoin and that you have all the US financial institutions that are rushing into Bitcoin. You have 200 plus companies that have adopted Bitcoin. And all of this is extremely important for Bitcoin adoption. Every time that we have a meeting with a financial institution, a systemic bank, you get like 10, 20 people that get introduced to Bitcoin. And ultimately, 1 year later, they tell you, "Thank you, I bought Bitcoin after we met you." And thank you so much. And I think that's just increasing the pace. And we are so early. When we meet with systemic banks, we have to explain in Europe what is Bitcoin and what is a Bitcoin treasury company and what is digital credit and so on. And then they realize and they say, "Oh, what what? 11 plus percent performance with less than 2% volatility? That's less volatility than the S&P 500 with about the same performance. So, you don't even need the S&P 500." And then they realize that their target for their fund is 12%. So, they can just buy Stretch and go to vaca- on vacation, basically. And then they realize like, "Oh, but there is now a basket of potential digital credit instruments. And that means that I can now provide um really a sustained uh result for my investors." And I think that's transforming the structure of the market. It's redefining risk, redefining performance. If as a credit issuer, you don't uh generate more than 10% of performance, uh at least in the US, uh you don't have a use case as a credit instrument, basically. So, I think that and and then there are differences in terms of geographical specificities because rates are so low in Japan, in Europe, in Switzerland, and so on. And I think that all that we are doing is working for Bitcoin, working to increase Bitcoin adoption. And I think uh participating in a Bitcoin treasury company not only is the best performing uh stocks since the launch of their respective strategies, um but on top of that, you contribute to Bitcoin adoption in the world. And that's where we are for. We work for Bitcoin. Yeah, I Can I just say one more thing on the institutional side, too? You know, when you think about certain brands that have a very a negative connotation with the old financial system, these institutions are really big. There's a lot of people that make them up. And as these companies have seen the opportunity to make money in Bitcoin, the teams that they're building to to run those operations, those people get infected by the Bitcoin virus. And now there's Bitcoiners inside of these institutions. And so, I feel like, you know, in some ways Bitcoin is this like global conspiracy for freedom and capitalism. And as we put more and more Bitcoiners inside of a BlackRock, BlackRock doesn't change Bitcoin, Bitcoin changes BlackRock. And I think the more institutions that we can build as part of our coalition, as part of our conspiracy for freedom, the faster we can accelerate the end state of what we want, which is hyperbitcoinization. Yeah, amen. Well said. And and I think that does bring us to uh the the specific ways that we have collaborated even over the last couple of years. Uh just this last year, MSCI, which was a index, one of the largest uh indexes in the world, was threatening basically to exclude Bitcoin treasury companies who have 50% or more of their balance sheet on in Bitcoin or other digital assets. And uh they they asked for a public review period, we pushed back. These the companies on the stage were potentially impacted along with six other Bitcoin corporations members and so we thought it was important that we would advocate and we all kind of came together with one voice. But the other thing that happened was the community really showed up and this is what I love about Bitcoin is that the community is very passionate and and they don't really particularly like it when uh their own get kind of messed with or pushed around and uh we were able to make some noise. We gathered 1,500 signatures in our coalition letter and the end result was that we we won that battle for all for now. For all intensive purposes that battle was was was fought and it was won. And so what I want to ask is what can we anticipate? I know there's a there's topics which is a new one. Dylan, I want to hear you speak about this. That's t o p i x um and that is the index in Japan that is basically threatening something similar. So can you share a little bit about kind of what's going on there and what people need to know? Sure. Um yeah, the TOPIX is the you know basically the kind of the Russell equivalent in in the in Japan. Um so there's like a thousand companies in the TOPIX um and they basically publish vague guidance um to not allow new entrants um to have a a balance sheet composed primarily of of of primarily of an asset i.e. digital asset treasury companies. Um so it it was it was a bit vague but um we're engaging with them and and we've you know in a very constructive um you know a charitable way and so you know both publicly and an open letter and privately and I I think you know Bitcoin for Corporations is doing great work for us to kind of help organize and uh mobilize the community and to to to make to make their voice heard. So you know the public comment period is is open until May 7th. Um you know we would really you know encourage anybody to visit the Bitcoin for Corporations website and and take a look and and sign the letter. Um it would it would be a a big help for us. Do you think that the the they're kind of observed observed what happened in MSCI and they're they're looking for ways I guess like what's the motivation? What's the incentive for for an MSCI or for a TOPIX and anyone can take this to to come out and >> respect Bitcoin. They don't respect Metaplanet. They feel like Metaplanet is stealing their liquidity, is stealing their market cap waiting and they want Metaplanet kicked out of the club. That's what that's what's happening. Well, you know to put it more uh diplomatically, you know I I think um >> [laughter] >> like well what one we're not in the index so it's not we're not being removed. It would be you know a potential addition that you know is you know delayed or doesn't happen. Um but yeah, I think it's a new concept right? So you know there's there's a lot of there's a lot of volatility in Bitcoin. This is a new this is a new asset in the public markets in Japan. You know it's like similar to 2022 with MSTR, right? There was a lot of noise. On the other side of it everything emerged clear. It was clear from you know the domestic you know political scene and you know the financial and regulatory scene that this is something that we want to embrace, that we want to encourage and we want to foster in our market. And so I think Japan's leading the same way. Um you know all of the regulatory you know guidance and the road map there is is all in in one direction and it's pro it's pro Bitcoin. It's it's it's pro digital assets. And so you know we're we're optimistic and and we'll see what happens um after the comment period. I won't speak for Metaplanet but there is definitely a uh I mean it's called TradFi for a reason. Um there is a a a club, there's an industry. They do many deals together. Some of that industry likes Bitcoin. Some of that industry has total disdain for Bitcoin and you know we're the barbarians at the gate. And I guess you know for the people that have a problem with that they're right. We are the barbarians at the gate and we are coming for them. So I mean maybe maybe they're justified in not liking us. Um but I I I think that that's all the more reason why it matters that that we as quickly as possible build a large coalition of of institutional investors, of retail investors, of pension funds that are invested because the the people that want to set the rules of the system and favor certain things and not favor other things. The only thing that protects us from those those people are all of you, are the masses, are the political capital that we build, are the financial capital that we build. And you know if if they could crush us, they would. So um you know we we need allies and we need a coalition in order to keep our businesses from being discriminated against just like the banks discriminated against you know Bitcoin users for over a decade. Definitely yeah and so if you do get a chance check it out. It's uh TOPIX t o p i x dot bitcoinforcorporations.com. It'll take you 30 seconds to sign the letter. For MSCI we got 1,500 signatures but we had a lot more time. This time we have about 10 more days so there is a level of urgency. Alexander, I want to go to you as we kind of begin to wrap up here. You're watching on from Europe. Is there concern that something like an MSCI going through or something like a TOPIX going through? By the way, I I did check with Claude and it's top picks not TOPIX. Claude could have been lying to me Dylan but I'm just saying. We should probably get that one right. >> on it. >> [laughter] >> Uh is there concern that a that a precedent could be set that you know this is they're basically just looking to create a rubric and and Europe obviously you know has its fair share of regulatory challenges. What are you observing? Well, I'm more concerned about the index providers than for Bitcoin treasury companies. I just think that the indices that will remove or make more difficult the inclusion of Bitcoin treasury companies will die out and will have no liquidity over time and will have will be completely irrelevant. So that's my concern for them. Actually we are working for their survival frankly for them to be able to maintain Bitcoin exposure in their indices and the banks that don't adopt Bitcoin are already irrelevant. The banks that don't favor the adoption of Bitcoin at scale are irrelevant and those indices they just need Bitcoin as everybody else and I think everything is good for Bitcoin and whatever the outcome Japanese investors like Metaplanet and they will just find ways to get exposures and they will even it's like when China bans Bitcoin mining, who cares? Everybody wants Bitcoin and everybody will find ways and 20% of mining is still in China. So I'm not concerned at all and over in Europe I think this reminds about the last discussion that this is a fight uh that continues and needs work and needs proof of work and it requires people to take agency and go engage with the political ecosystem, go engage with the institutional ecosystem and it's a responsibility of everybody. So I think that's working for Bitcoin and over in Europe you you've had two Bitcoin treasury company projects that's been shut down by the Swiss regulators and the Netherlands regulators. So this reminds you that you have to actually work for it every day. And so I think that every company on earth that adopts Bitcoin should be supported and that's really uh the end game is for Bitcoin to be adopted at scale and we will work every day for that. Can I just I know we're out of time but I I uh just wanted to piggyback on that for a second. You know at UTXO we we funded and underwrote roughly 20 Bitcoin treasury companies around the world and when you're on the investor side it is very easy to deploy capital and it looks easy to run a Bitcoin treasury company. Now that I'm running a Bitcoin treasury company and I've gotten my ass thoroughly kicked in the capital markets. It's hard. It's hard to run a public company. It's easy to have conviction about putting Bitcoin on your balance sheet when your stock is soaring. It's hard to have conviction about what you're doing when the price is going down. And I just want to give a shout out to Alexander and for Dylan and for all the people that are pushing forward the frontier of a of a Bitcoin treasury company and Bitcoin in the capital markets for demonstrating conviction and you know in my time in Bitcoin where real conviction comes from is not from the 10x gains you made because the Bitcoin price went down. It's actually seeing Bitcoin recover after every single bear market. That's what gives you conviction to hold through the hard times. And so y'all's leadership is doing that for other issuers and operators. I you know I I I don't think there's going to be a ton of new Bitcoin treasury companies probably until the Bitcoin price starts going back up. But then if we're going to go from 200 to 2,000 it's going to be because of people like you. So just thank you. Amen. Let's see it. Can we give it up for our panel here? Thank you guys so much. You've been a great crowd. Hope you all enjoy the rest of the conference. >> [applause] [music] >> Every year this community comes together >> [music] >> to celebrate, to debate, to build what comes next. >> [music] >> And every year the stage gets bigger. >> [music] >> Sound money center stage. So [music] where do you go to celebrate the next chapter in Bitcoin history? You come home. >> [music] >> Nashville, July 2027.