Strategy Authorizes $1.25B in Bitcoin Sales

• Strategy’s never-sell era ends
• BNY makes USDC the first stablecoin on its custody platform
• BlackRock adds Ethena's USDe to its $20T risk platform
• Cosmos Labs Acquires Mintscan and Team (Partner)
• CFTC expands its Polymarket probe
• DraftKings launches a prediction-markets exchange
• Inside DTCC's Move to Stellar (Partner)

Michael Saylor built Strategy on one promise: it would never sell bitcoin. On Monday, the company authorized selling up to $1.25 billion of it.

The board cleared Strategy to sell bitcoin to fund its STRC preferred dividend, now raised to 12%, along with debt interest and stock buybacks. The authorization formalizes a pivot that began when the company sold 32 bitcoin in May, its first sale since 2022. It follows Thursday's milestone, when Strategy's enterprise mNAV fell below 1 for the first time, pushing the combined value of its debt, preferred, and equity above its 847,363-BTC treasury and closing the equity-accretion channel that funded the buying spree.

Selling was the one outcome the whole structure was built to avoid. The preferred shares and convertible debt were sold on the premise that bitcoin would only be accumulated, with equity issued above net asset value to buy more. Funding dividends by selling the asset inverts that logic. The open question is whether measured, dividend-driven sales steady the capital stack or confirm that the accretion machine has run out of road.

Read more below!

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WATCH

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CEFI

Strategy Authorizes up to $1.25B of Bitcoin Sales as Saylor Formalizes Capital Pivot

Strategy's board authorized the company to sell up to $1.25 billion of bitcoin to fund its STRC preferred dividend, debt interest, and stock buybacks, and raised the STRC dividend to 12%. The move formally ends the never-sell doctrine Michael Saylor built the treasury around. Strategy still holds 847,363 BTC, and the authorization caps sales at a fraction of that, but the direction is set: the largest corporate holder can now be a seller.

Why this matters: Selling bitcoin to pay preferred holders reverses the model's core mechanic. The authorized amount is small, but the precedent reshapes how the treasury can be funded.

TRADFI AND FINTECH

BNY Adds USDC to Institutional Custody Platform in Expanded Circle Partnership

BNY, the world's largest custodian with $59.4 trillion in assets under custody, made USDC the first stablecoin on its Digital Asset Custody platform, letting institutional clients store, transfer, mint, and redeem Circle's token alongside traditional assets. The integration puts a systemically important bank directly in the stablecoin settlement path.

Why this matters: With BNY holding USDC natively, the largest allocators can treat a stablecoin as just another custodied asset.

DEFI

BlackRock Adds Ethena's Synthetic Dollar to Its $20T Aladdin Risk Management Platform

BlackRock added Ethena's USDe synthetic dollar to its $20 trillion Aladdin platform, and its BUIDL fund will become the primary backing for Ethena's whitelabel stablecoins. Listing USDe as an approved asset on the system most institutions use to model risk moves a crypto-native synthetic dollar into mainstream portfolio plumbing.

Why this matters: BlackRock's risk engine normalizes USDe for every desk.

REGULATION

CFTC Expands Polymarket Probe to Staged Trades and Fake Wins

The CFTC expanded its Polymarket investigation to cover staged trades and fake wins, Bloomberg reported, widening scrutiny beyond the platform's earlier paid-influencer scheme. Polymarket holds a US license but ran the staged activity on its offshore site, leaving the regulator probing conduct partly outside its direct reach.

Why this matters: The probe tests how far US oversight extends over an offshore-hosted, US-licensed venue.

MARKETS

DraftKings Launches Proprietary Prediction Markets Exchange With $3.4B Annualized Consumer Volume

DraftKings launched DKeX, a proprietary prediction-markets exchange, reporting $3.4 billion in annualized consumer volume as it enters a field already crowded with Kalshi, Polymarket, Meta's Arena, and Robinhood. The sports-betting giant brings a built-in user base to a market regulators are still mapping.

Why this matters: A licensed sportsbook entering prediction markets blurs the line between betting and event contracts.

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