The Frontier

Block’s company mission is to make Bitcoin everyday money, a goal Miles Suter says requires Bitcoin to function as peer-to-peer electronic cash to retain its transformational quality of permissionless transactions.

Block launched Square Bitcoin payments nationwide by November after a year-end promise, with over 800,000 payments-enabled businesses now and a new one added every 8 seconds.

Block’s Bitcoin map shows Cash App’s nearly 60 million monthly active users where to find Bitcoin-enabled merchants, and merchants on the map see payment counts nearly 500% higher than those not listed.

Block introduced auto-enrollment for Bitcoin payments, a merchant-facing toggle, and a 5% Bitcoin rebate through Cash App for the rest of the year, alongside a 'dollars on Lightning' feature to settle payments without a taxable event.

Block is developing tap-to-pay for Bitcoin built on an open standard, compatible with wallets like Wallet of Satoshi and Phoenix, and experimenting with proximity payments that don't require NFC.

Cash App now allows users to auto-convert a percentage of incoming peer-to-peer payments into Bitcoin with zero fees, expanding existing zero-fee options for direct deposit conversion, card roundups, and scheduled auto-invest.

Block recently introduced free Bitcoin buys for any amount over $2,000 on Cash App and is working on outbound ACH functionality as a key part of living on a Bitcoin standard.

Block’s new Bitkey hardware wallet includes a screen for a more intuitive self-custody experience, and the company envisions seamless ecosystem connectivity where a paycheck converts in Cash App and auto-withdraws to self-custody.

Block invests in open-source Bitcoin development through Spiral and decentralizes mining through Proto's RIG initiative, focusing on durable, repairable hardware to prevent network centralization.

Block launched a proof of reserves for Bitcoin custodied across Cash App, Square, and Block, claiming to be the only company with both public financial audits and on-chain verification.

Suter argues the AI revolution will integrate with Bitcoin as open systems choose open money, and Block is building AI like Square’s Manager Bot and Cash App’s Money Bot to proactively manage financial life with Bitcoin.

Block will roll out a public Bitcoin roadmap across Square, Cash App, Bitkey, and Proto to build in public and allow community influence on development priorities.

Jack Mallers says Strike is a global Bitcoin bank selling financial services, offering fee-free Bitcoin acquisition and withdrawal, direct deposit, bill payments, and Bitcoin-backed loans/credit lines.

Mallers says Strike lending products are the most successful he has launched in his 14-year Bitcoin career, finding product-market fit by providing liquidity without selling Bitcoin.

Strike expanded its Bitcoin-backed loans and lines of credit across most of the United States and parts of the European Union, while lowering its lowest pricing tier to 7.49%.

Mallers announced Strike will publish quarterly lending proof-of-reserves with external auditors for transparency, acknowledging customers need trust when collateral cannot be withdrawn.

Strike partnered with Tether to offer segregated address collateral for large loans, enabling clients to verify their Bitcoin collateral directly on-chain without rehypothecation.

Mallers announced 'volatility-proof loans' as a top customer request, a product where Bitcoin collateral is protected from liquidation despite market price drops.

Tether provided Strike with a $2.1 billion credit facility to finance growth in Bitcoin-backed credit products, aiming to meet any demand for loans or lines of credit.

Mallers's co-founders proposed merging Strike and Tether's mining business, Electron, into 21.co, aiming to create a company with both financial distribution and Bitcoin production.

Mallers positions crypto exchanges like Binance, Coinbase, and Robinhood as high-operating-income but low-Bitcoin-conviction businesses, citing Coinbase's $10 billion fiat versus $1 billion Bitcoin balance sheet.

Mallers cites Jim Chanos's analysis showing Robinhood customers lost 5% in February versus a 0.9% S&P 500 drop, framing it as evidence Robinhood promotes hyper-speculation not conviction.

Mallers positions Bitcoin treasury companies like MicroStrategy and Metaplanet as high-conviction but low-operating-income businesses, focused on capital markets not product-building.

Mallers defines his ideal Bitcoin company as high-conviction and high-operating-income, with a financial services arm, physical Bitcoin infrastructure, capital markets leverage, and strategic M&A.

Electron, Tether's mining business, has 50 exahash of capacity representing roughly 5% of the Bitcoin network, built for both economic profit and philosophical network protection.

21.co holds 43,514 Bitcoin, the second-largest corporate treasury, but Mallers insists he wants to build beyond capital markets into products that change users' lives.

Eugene Jarecki explains his documentary 'The Six Billion Dollar Man' won the Khan Film Festival and a Golden Globe, but faced a media blackout where no streamer or mainstream outlet would touch it.

Wikileaks began accepting Bitcoin in 2011 after the US government blocked payments through Visa, Mastercard, and PayPal, a move Jack Dorsey says saved the organization and served as a key proof of concept for Bitcoin.

Jack Dorsey notes Satoshi Nakamoto left the Bitcoin project shortly after Wikileaks began using it, viewing the creator's departure as a selfless act that proved the protocol's resilience.

Dorsey and Jarecki frame Bitcoin as a tool for routing around gatekeepers like global banks and payment networks, directly linking financial sovereignty to the cause of freedom of information championed by Wikileaks.

Jarecki details how a security firm spied on Julian Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy for US agencies, listening to his lawyer meetings and nullifying attorney-client privilege.

The film includes testimony from Edward Snowden, who credits Wikileaks with helping him escape Hong Kong for Moscow when established newspapers retreated under government pressure.

Jarecki and Dorsey are launching a global watch party for the film via the6billiondollman.com, using Bitcoin and Nostr to crowdfund and distribute it directly, bypassing traditional media gatekeepers.

Paolo Ardoino says Tether holds over 130,000 Bitcoin and is a continuous buyer.

Ardoino frames Tether's mission as creating stability against societal 'darkness' marked by war, inflation, and currency instability, inspired by Asimov's psychohistory.

Ardoino cites 4 billion people globally lack access to basic financial services, creating a societal gap that AI will widen 100x for the excluded population.

Tether operates in 160 countries with 573 million users across its USDT, Tether Gold, and other services, adding 34 million new wallets per quarter.

Ardoino introduces the 'resilience stack', Tether's open-source infrastructure suite designed to outlast societal instability, with over 1,000 projects on GitHub.

Holepunch is Tether's rebuilt, cryptographic peer-to-peer protocol for scalable real-time data, enabling server-less applications like a peer-to-peer Uber.

Keet is Tether's messaging app built on Holepunch, with over 5 million users, designed to be unstoppable and will be fully open-sourced.

The WDK library provides self-custodial wallet creation for people, machines, and AI agents, with built-in support for Bitcoin's Lightning Network for scale.

Key Vault is Tether's open-source SDK for building private, local AI tools, applying a 'not your keys, not your coins' principle to artificial intelligence.

David Marcus notes that the daily global financial system processes 10 billion transactions worth approximately $5.5 trillion, yet lacks a unified global account akin to Gmail for email.

Marcus cites recent regulatory clarity, including the United States' Genius Act and Europe's MiCA, as enabling platforms to use digital assets like stablecoins without fear of prosecution.

Marcus presents Lightspark's Grid Global Account, a product launched on Spark, a layer built on Bitcoin that he argues is also the best network for stablecoins running on Bitcoin.

Marcus announces Lightspark is becoming a principal member of the Visa network. The partnership will enable users to spend at 175 million merchants globally, initially in 33 countries and expanding to 100 by year's end.

The Grid Global Account integrates with 65 countries' domestic real-time payment systems, with plans to expand to 75. It allows instant conversion and transfer to local bank accounts, even off-hours.

Marcus explains the account is interoperable across blockchains; a dollar balance can move to USDC on Solana or USDT on Optimism. It also supports buying and selling Bitcoin natively from the same address.

Marcus frames the product as a revenue source for platforms, offering stablecoin yield, FX and card interchange fees, and Bitcoin transaction revenue, rather than being a cost center.

Marcus demonstrates AI agent delegation using an example wallet called Bread. An agent named 'M' can execute tasks like buying coffee or sending $500 to a contact in Brazil via Pix, with user-controlled spending limits.

Marcus argues building on Bitcoin, while harder, ensures neutrality and prevents becoming a tenant on a proprietary network. He cites collaboration with firms like Block and River on this open network.