The past week was rich in events: the leading cryptocurrency showed a confident recovery, and China's Moonshot AI unveiled a model capable of designing a chip on its own. Additionally, regulatory initiatives in the US and resistance from miners were in focus.
Bitcoin: From Correction to Consolidation
The week began with Bitcoin falling to around $61,000 amid geopolitical tensions between the US and Iran. However, after the release of US Consumer Price Index (CPI) data, which showed a slowdown in core inflation to 2.6% (versus a forecast of 2.8%), the market reversed course. An additional catalyst was the "dovish" rhetoric from Fed Chairman Kevin Warsh during his speech in Congress.
A local high of $65,500 was reached on the evening of July 15, after which the asset entered a consolidation phase. By the end of the week, despite a decline amid the crisis in the semiconductor industry, Bitcoin recouped its losses and is trading around $64,500, gaining approximately 1% over the week. The Fear and Greed Index rose to 28 points but remains in the "red zone."
Democrats vs. CLARITY Act Without Anti-Corruption Provisions
Democratic Senators Chris Murphy, Jeff Merkley, and Chris Van Hollen opposed the current version of the CLARITY Act. Their main demand is to include provisions in the document that prohibit the president, vice president, and other high-ranking officials, including their family members, from owning or profiting from cryptocurrency businesses. In their view, the bill in its current form creates loopholes for conflicts of interest, especially given the business interests of the current president's family. Consideration of the proposal is expected starting July 20.
BIP-110: Miners Said "No"
The BIP-110 proposal, aimed at limiting non-payment data in Bitcoin transactions, did not find support among miners. Over a two-week period, no major mining pool signaled approval—the adoption rate barely reached 1%, against the required 55%. The initiative was criticized by Michael Saylor and Adam Back. In contrast to BIP-110, a developer under the pseudonym Leonidas introduced the DOG Mode client, which instead expands limits to facilitate work with Ordinals and Runes.
Kimi K3: A New AI Giant That Shook the Market
China's Moonshot AI released the Kimi K3 model with 2.8 trillion parameters and a context of 1 million tokens. Developers claim that in aggregate benchmarks, it is second only to proprietary solutions from Anthropic and OpenAI. A demonstration of the model's capabilities, which independently designed a chip, caused panic in the semiconductor market. Chipmaker stocks plummeted worldwide: the Taiwan index lost over 6%, the Nasdaq fell 1.5%, and Z.ai shares in Hong Kong crashed nearly 30%. Investors are already comparing this effect to the "DeepSeek effect."
My analysis: The launch of Kimi K3 is not just another stage in the AI arms race but a signal of a fundamental shift. Chinese open-source models are beginning to directly compete with closed-source giants, calling into question the current market capitalization of companies like Nvidia. For the crypto market, this is a double blow: on one hand, the decline in Tech sector stocks drags down risk appetite; on the other, AI development directly stimulates demand for computing power and, consequently, for GPUs, which could indirectly support mining. However, short-term volatility is inevitable.