Speaker 1
Let's get to the big story breakdown. Digital assets are entering the final quarter of 2026 with renewed momentum. U.S. bought Bitcoin ETFs posted $2.4 billion in net inflows last week, their largest weekly gain in nearly a year, and that surge completely raising a nearly $6 billion deficit from July, pushing year to date, flows back into positive territory.
At the same time, regulators are filling the legislative void left by Congress, with both the SEC and CFTC issuing new guidance over the past few days on token buybacks, on record keeping, as well as tokenized customer funds. While joining us live on set to break down what we're seeing in terms of the institutions and what all of this means for corporate treasuries.
Is Sam Callahan, director of strategy and research at orange BTC. Sam, great to have you back. Thank you so much for joining me.
Speaker 2
Thanks for having me back on, Rodney.
Speaker 1
Well, it has been quite the year so far in 2026, and here we are about to head into the final quarter of 2026. So where do you stand? Given all the action that we've seen from both the legislative side as well as the market. Where do you stand with Bitcoin?
Speaker 2
I mean, I've seen a lot of positive talents right now for Bitcoin. I mean, we're seeing a strong recovery. It looks like that 58K60K region is carving out to be looking like a bottom. Um, whether that's from the sentiment turn that we've seen, whether that's from bad news no longer causing any kind of drawdowns in the price, that's typically what we see.
A wall of worries start to get climbed out of a bear market, and the institutional adoption continues full force. You know, people were concerned about the delay in the Clarity Act, but really we're getting the regulatory clarity we need from the agencies and the powers they have bestowed on them from the CFTC, from the SEC.
As you mentioned, that's causing institutions to continue to lean into this new asset class from corporations buying Bitcoin like strategy and strive orange BTC in Brazil to say, today we heard the news of Citi partnering with Coinbase to provide institutional rails for stablecoins. So that'll continue in full force, providing better investor access, stronger market infrastructure for Bitcoin moving forward.
Speaker 1
Yeah. And we continue to monitor the price action as well as a lot of these partnerships that we continue to hear, including what you mentioned with the institutions out there. But when it comes to bond buybacks, where do we stand right now? What are you seeing?
Speaker 2
Well, I think the macro backdrop is a big driver for increased demand for alternatives like Bitcoin like gold. When you look at the fiscal picture and you look at what they're doing with the intervention in the bond market, really what they're saying is, hey, we can't afford to have the long end get cleared by the market because of the interest expense, and they want to keep things more sustainable.
They want to keep the Treasury operations liquid and functioning well. But really, there's no free lunch in economics. You're just moving that economic pressure into the currency. And that's why we've seen an erosion of purchasing power over the dollar, not just this year, but over the last five years, 20 to 30% of erosion of purchasing power.
That's why there's more demand for Bitcoin, and that's why it's repricing higher to the levels we see today.
Speaker 1
And of course, we have to pay attention to what's happening on the macro front, especially given all the geopolitics. And of course, we're paying attention to what's happening in the developed economies. But you mentioned Brazil. So tell us what's happening on the front.
Speaker 2
Well, really exciting developments in Brazil. Recently, Chainalysis put out their global crypto adoption index. Brazil is number one in terms of grassroots adoption for digital assets, which is why we saw a big opportunity to launch orange BTC in our mission to drive Bitcoin adoption. Part of that is improving investor access.
So a couple of weeks ago, we launched the first ETF to bring preferred equity supported by large Bitcoin balance sheets to that market. It's a new source of income ultimately derived from bitcoin which is very different. It's competitive. It's paid out monthly. It's listed publicly. Ultimately, what it does is widen the funnel for investors there to get exposure to Bitcoin products.
And so we're really excited about the launch of Digi 11. But it's only the start. And the adoption there for digital assets is growing number one in the world. And we'll just continue to service them.
Speaker 1
And Sam, while I have you here, I do want to get your take on what we're seeing on the regulatory front at the nation's capitol, especially on the heels of the recent announcements from the SEC as well as the CFTC. So how does that impact your business?
Speaker 2
Well, Bitcoin's interesting because it really had regulatory clarity for over a decade. You know, the CFTC classified it as a commodity. But all else being equal, we want to see the digital asset entire economy emerge. And there's more clarity around how do you classify these assets. You know, we saw over the last five years a lot of harm done to investors because there was a lot of assets where they maybe thought they were decentralized, when really there was an issuer where you didn't really understand the technology underlying it.
When you have more clarity and more investor protections, perhaps we can prevent some of the harm being done to some investors. Now Bitcoin has always been different. Bitcoin to commodity. On the on the on the margin. If there's more regulatory clarity and investors feel more confidence to invest in the class.
Bitcoin is the largest, most liquid, most established digital asset. And so it'll kind of benefit from those flows given the more regulatory clarity we have. So really good news coming from the CFTC and SEC. I think we're going to see more innovation than ever before, more efficiencies than ever before in the rails and infrastructure of our entire financial system.
Speaker 1
Yeah. And I know that you focus on Bitcoin. So I do want to get your take on bitcoin allocation, especially when it comes to the institutions. So there are so many ways to access Bitcoin here in 2026. But what are you seeing in reality when it comes to the actual allocation.
Speaker 2
Well I think you're seeing a lot of different approaches. I mean, part of what we did with Digi 11 was bring in a new way to gain exposure to Bitcoin. That's what strategy has done with their stock. Strive with Zeta. If investor wants a fixed income, if it fits their investment mandates, now they can get exposure to Bitcoin through those products.
And so you saw that really start with the ETFs back in January 2024. Opened the door. And now it's the most profitable one of the most successful ETF launches of BlackRock's history. And mostly that's driven by institutions where it kind of fits into their existing operations. They're kind of familiar with how an ETF works, but they can get exposure to Bitcoin the underlying through those products.
And so I think we're going to see that see that continue. And there's a lot of tailwinds for Bitcoin moving forward. There's a lot of convergence with AI. There's a big trend there. What what money is AI going to use. Well it's probably going to be a digitally native money that doesn't require any kind of permissions like Bitcoin.
And so there's a bunch of tailwinds there. There's institutional adoption that's really just scratching the surface in terms of sovereign wealth funds, pension funds, endowments. They're going to start getting in more and more. And that's where the marginal demand is going to come in through these new products, through institutions that haven't allocated before and through the convergence of maybe AI agents providing some demand for Bitcoin to.
Speaker 1
Yeah. And of course, since you mentioned artificial intelligence, let's talk about what's happening in the space, because there are a lot of concerns about what will happen when it comes to the role of agent AI. And we've been hearing from both the publicly traded companies as well as private companies out there in terms of what they expect to do.
And of course, there's the question of regulation. How much should government be involved when it comes to artificial intelligence, but what is your perspective and what do you foresee?
Speaker 2
Well, I think I think one of the things that I am a big proponent of is open source technologies. Obviously being a proponent of Bitcoin as part of that. And so I actually think when there's more eyeballs on it, when the entire market's regulating it, it's almost better than, say, giving this to only a few centralized companies or the government taking power over these really important, groundbreaking technologies that affects every single person.
So I am actually a proponent of open source models and giving that power back to the individual and then having the entire market regulate it as opposed to one one government or only a pair of companies kind of controlling these really, really important technologies.
Speaker 1
And finally, Sam, before I let you go, there are a lot of events taking place in New York City regarding digital assets. So give us a sense of what you're looking forward to and some of the conversations you've had heading into this week.
Speaker 2
Well, I think the conversations that I'm having is mostly with institutions and money managers and trying to get them to understand why they should maybe allocate to Bitcoin or Bitcoin equity products or Bitcoin fixed income products. You know, why are they different than, say, traditional alternatives?
I mean, when you look out at the macro backdrop, people are looking for diversification. Really. Bonds and stocks again are moving in the same direction. Even when it's up or down. It's not really a good thing when you're thinking about how to diversify your portfolio with a backdrop of inflationary pressures, debasement, financial oppression.
You know, you start to think about, well, maybe, maybe some allocations to an asset that protects against that is important. You know, that protects against that geopolitical uncertainty, that high increased risk of currency debasement. And so that's what the kind of conversations that I'm having, because there's still a lot of education that needs to be done about bitcoin, kind of why Bitcoin is different and how it could benefit a diversified portfolio.
Speaker 1
Well Sam, always great having you on the show. Thank you so much for joining us here in New York, and I appreciate your insights as well as your perspective.
Speaker 2
Thank you.
Speaker 1
Thank you so much.
