In-Depth Breakdown: The Current Situation

The broader financial landscape has provided a supportive backdrop for Bitcoin’s recent rally. The S&P 500 logged a fifth straight weekly gain, closing at an all-time high, while the Nasdaq 100 advanced on strong tech earnings from Apple and Oracle. This macroeconomic strength coincided with a major policy victory for the industry. The Senate unveiled compromise text for the Clarity Act, ending months of negotiations between crypto firms and bank lobbyists. The agreement bars stablecoin issuers from paying yield purely on reserves but preserves activity-based reward programs. Coinbase signaled immediate support, noting the language preserves rewards tied to real participation. This legislative win clears the way for a Banking Committee markup and eventual detailed rules from the Treasury and CFTC.

However, beneath the price action lies a critical technical challenge regarding Bitcoin’s security infrastructure. Millions of bitcoins sit in old wallets with exposed public keys, including the roughly 1.1 million BTC attributed to Satoshi Nakamoto, currently valued at around $84 billion. These assets are vulnerable if powerful quantum computers arrive. While developer Jameson Lopp proposed BIP-361 to phase out these addresses on a five-year timeline, that approach forces owners to move coins publicly or risk losing access. To address this trade-off, Dan Robinson of Paradigm published a proposal for "Provable Address-Control Timestamps" (PACTs).

The core concept of PACTs allows holders to privately timestamp cryptographic proofs of ownership at a specific date without revealing data to the public until they need to spend. A holder generates a random salt and uses BIP-322 to produce a proof of ownership, bundling it into an onchain commitment via OpenTimestamps. If Bitcoin later activates a soft fork that freezes quantum-vulnerable coins, the protocol would accept a STARK proof—a zero-knowledge proof secure against quantum computers—to unlock the funds. This system requires Bitcoin to adopt new STARK verification infrastructure via a soft fork and can only safeguard Satoshi’s coins if whoever controls those keys acts before quantum theft or a community-imposed freeze occurs.

Expert Insights and Analysis

Market data provider CryptoQuant has issued a cautionary note regarding the sustainability of the current rally. While Bitcoin gained 12.7% in April, registering its best month since April 2025, the underlying demand metrics suggest weakness. According to Julio Moreno, head of research at CryptoQuant, perpetual futures were the "sole driver" of the rally. The firm’s apparent demand metric for outright purchases remained negative throughout April while futures demand rose.

"This divergence – rising futures demand alongside contracting spot demand – suggests price appreciation is driven by leverage rather than fresh coin accumulation," Moreno stated in a report Thursday. Historically, such configurations lack the structural foundation required to sustain price gains without fundamental support. This indicates that the upward price action may be fueled by speculation rather than organic market growth.

Furthermore, the technical implementation of PACTs faces significant hurdles. Robinson noted that the verification infrastructure does not exist in Bitcoin currently and would require "substantial new plumbing," such as multisig wallets, complex scripts, and hardware wallet support that would all need careful standardization. The protocol only protects Satoshi if Satoshi himself, or whoever currently controls those