Binance (CRYPTO: BNB) co-founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao recounted on Thursday a moment from a recent interview, in which the host surprised him with a moving gesture.

The ‘Lamborghini’ Surprise

CZ appeared on Patrick Bet-David’s podcast earlier this week, where they discussed a wide range of topics, including Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC), artificial intelligence, and the rise of Binance.

Recalling the podcast, CZ mentioned never sitting in a Lamborghini before. But to his surprise, Bet-David had one waiting in the driveway for him to experience as he left.

“I sat in it for a bit,” CZ said, adding a laughing emoji.

‘I Don’t Have Crazy Obsessions’

The conversation revolved around CZ’s…

Read more on Benzinga

Mow’s Calculation

Mow pointed to Saylor’s personal stash of 17,732 BTC, based on his last public disclosure, and a 9.9% ownership of Strategy’s shares, as reflected in SEC filings.

As of this writing, Strategy holds 818,869 BTC in its reserves. Mow put Saylor’s indirect exposure at 9.9% of the total holdings, translating to 81,068 BTC. Including Saylor’s personal stash, his total effective exposure equaled 98,800 BTC.

Mow’s math showed a 1:1 valuation requires roughly $8.6 million per BTC to push Saylor’s wealth past Musk’s current wealth, estimated by Forbes at $826 billion. Saylor’s wealth was estimated at $5.4 billion.

However, he noted that if MSTR traded at a premium to its…

Read more on Benzinga

Leading cryptocurrencies were up in the green on Thursday after the Clarity Act passed the Senate Banking Committee on a bipartisan vote.

Crypto Market Pops

Bitcoin hit $82,000 in the afternoon, then stalled and moved sideways. The trading volume soared 27% in the 24-hour period. Ethereum re-entered the $2,300 region, while XRP and Dogecoin also traded in the green.

These moves come after the Clarity Act cleared the Senate Banking Committee vote, moving to a full vote on the Senate floor.

Over $250 million was liquidated in the past 24 hours, predominantly in short positions, according to Coinglass data.

Bitcoin’s open interest popped 2.21% over the last 24 hours. However, sentiment in the…

Read more on Benzinga

Gemini Space Station Q1 Highlights
Q1 Revenue: $50.27 million, versus estimates of $49.29 million

Q1 Loss: 93 cents, versus estimates of 96 cents

Total revenue was up 42% on a year-over-year basis, driven by strong growth in services and OTC revenue. Gemini Space Station reported 589,000 monthly transacting users, up 17% year-over-year.

Gemini Space Station ended the quarter with $215.6 million in total cash and cash equivalents.

Gemini Space Station also announced Winklevoss Capital Fund made a $100 million strategic investment into the company at $14 per share.

“We believe the market has significantly undervalued Gemini, and that this investment will allow us to set up the company…

Read more on Benzinga

Markets historically deliver their strongest returns under divided government rather than full political sweeps, according to analyst Benjamin Cowen.

He examined the performance of the S&P 500, Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) and gold across different U.S. political power structures — with surprising conclusions.

BTC On Political Party Sweeps

In a podcast published on May 13, Cowen argued Bitcoin historically reacts poorly to full political party “sweeps,” as both Democratic and Republican control correlate with weaker median returns despite strong outlier years like 2017.

He noted Bitcoin’s best median performance has historically come under split governments, suggesting markets may prefer…

Read more on Benzinga

Anthropic’s Claude helped a user recover 5 Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) worth $395,000 by locating an old wallet backup file on their computer.

Claude Found The File, Not The Password

The owner had been trying for eight weeks to brute-force the password on their current Blockchain.com wallet, testing roughly 3.5 trillion combinations using the btcrecover service on a rented computing chip. 

Total GPU spend on the failed brute-force attempts was around $15.

The recovery happened when the user “dumped my whole college computer into Claude” as a last-ditch effort. 

The AI assistant found an old wallet backup from December 2019 that the user had encrypted with a password already written down in…

Read more on Benzinga

The move strengthens USDC’s position as a core liquidity layer for decentralized trading and broader on chain capital markets.

Why It Matters

In a May 13 blog post, Coinbase said concentrating liquidity around USDC improves market efficiency by reducing the need for stablecoin conversions while enabling faster capital movement across trading venues.

The company also framed the integration as part of a broader push toward 24/7 on chain capital markets powered by stablecoin infrastructure.

Coinbase will now have the rights to acquire USDH brand assets. Also, USDH remains fully backed during the transition period, with users still able to redeem into USDC or fiat without fees.

The Bigger Picture

Benzinga