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A new report has shaken up El Salvador’s bold Bitcoin story. All year long, President Nayib Bukele and the National Bitcoin Office promised they were buying one BTC every day.

Public trackers even showed holdings climbing past 6,102 BTC. Yet the IMF’s July 15 Article IV consultation says there were no new purchases since the $1.4 billion Extended Fund Facility was approved in December 2024.

Internal Wallet Moves Created Illusion Of Buying

According to the IMF report, the rise in public‑sector Bitcoin didn’t come from fresh spending. Instead, government‑owned wallets moved coins around.

Those transfers made balances pop up on public dashboards. But those were just internal shifts. They didn’t draw on taxpayer money or involve the market. Small ups and downs in the Chivo e‑wallet also came from internal corrections, not new deposits.

Turns out the IMF did in fact make El Salvador stop Bitcoin purchases in order to get a fiat loan.

Footnote #9 states they have just been making it appear as if they have been continuing to buy but in fact have just been consolidating multi government wallets.

Source :… pic.twitter.com/46AFU1oi08

— Magoo PhD (@HodlMagoo) July 17, 2025

Pressure On Bitcoin Legal Tender Reversal

Back in 2021, El Salvador grabbed headlines by making Bitcoin legal tender. That move set off cheers and warnings around the world. Reports show the country flipped that decision in January 2025 under pressure from international lenders.

They stripped Bitcoin of its legal‑tender status and agreed to stop using public funds for more coins. The IMF now confirms those promises held true.

Deadline Looms For Chivo E‑Wallet Exit

Based on reports, the government must end public‑sector involvement in the Chivo system by July 31, 2025. That date is just around the corner. El Salvador has also promised to unwind Fidebitcoin, the public Bitcoin trust it set up. Both steps aim to boost fiscal transparency and keep the Extended Fund Facility on track.

El Salvador President Nayib Bukele. Source: Getty Images

Analysts Eye Trust And Transparency Questions

Some experts say the big takeaway is about trust. Shuffling coins between wallets while claiming new buys can hurt the government’s credibility. Citizens and investors could start to wonder what else might be spun into a story.

Image: REUTERS/Johannes P. Christo/File Photo

Even if no fresh money changed hands, the mismatch between claims and reality has put a spotlight on how data gets shared.

The IMF gave credit for meeting its program targets. Yet the coming weeks will show if the government follows through on all its commitments.

Clearing out Chivo and dissolving Fidebitcoin are major moves. If El Salvador sticks to the plan, it could reset its narrative. If not, skeptics will find new reasons to doubt every future Bitcoin announcement.

Featured image from Unsplash, chart from TradingView

Editorial Process for bitcoinist is centered on delivering thoroughly researched, accurate, and unbiased content. We uphold strict sourcing standards, and each page undergoes diligent review by our team of top technology experts and seasoned editors. This process ensures the integrity, relevance, and value of our content for our readers.

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Last week, a single on-chain transaction funnelled 300 Bitcoin—worth roughly $31 million at today’s prices—into the public donation address that Ross Ulbricht began publishing soon after regaining his freedom. The sheer scale of the transfer instantly reignited decade-old rumours that the Silk Road founder might have salted away a secret war chest before his 2013 arrest. But fresh blockchain forensics paint a more convoluted picture: the coins appear to come not from Ulbricht’s own past, but from AlphaBay, the dark-web marketplace that eclipsed Silk Road before its spectacular 2017 takedown.

Where Did The 300 Bitcoin Come From?

Chainalysis, the New York-based cryptocurrency tracing firm whose software underpinned Operation Bayonet’s investigative backbone, says it has reconstructed the coins’ lineage to a cluster of AlphaBay addresses first active between 2016 and 2017. “We have reasonable grounds to suspect that these funds originated in AlphaBay,” Phil Larratt, Chainalysis’ director of investigations and a veteran of the UK National Crime Agency, told WIRED. “Looking at the amount, that would suggest they came from someone who was possibly a vendor on AlphaBay back in the early days.”

The apparent AlphaBay provenance deepens the intrigue swirling around Ulbricht, who walked free in January after former US president Donald Trump granted him a full and unconditional pardon following nearly eleven years behind bars. The clemency order has made Ulbricht a fixture on the pro-crypto speaking circuit, culminating in last week’s keynote at Bitcoin 2025 in Las Vegas, where he called for “a culture of radical self-sovereignty.”

Independent sleuth ZachXBT, whose crowdsourced investigations have repeatedly preceded formal indictments, corroborated Chainalysis’ conclusion in real time. Despite the donor’s use of several mixing hops, he traced the funds to an address already red-flagged in Chainalysis Reactor and concluded that the gift represented “a legitimate donation but not legitimate funds.” He added, “Usage of multiple mixers, spreading out CEX deposits, etc., that is done typically if you are trying to avoid getting illicit funds frozen.”

Crucially, the trail snakes through Jambler, a little-known, centralised “white-label” tumbler that advertises itself as an infrastructure provider for would-be mixer operators—a choice that seasoned privacy advocates generally shun in favour of open-source CoinJoin-style protocols. Jambler’s own marketing promises partners “ready-to-use mixing infrastructure” and boasts of “eliminating risks of deanonymization,” underscoring investigators’ suspicion that the sender took pains to launder ageing contraband gains rather than to make a mere political statement.

AlphaBay, founded by the late Alexandre Cazes and once clocking an estimated $2 million in daily sales, was dismantled in July 2017 when an FBI-led multinational strike seized its servers and, in parallel, covertly hijacked rival market Hansa in an operation known as Bayonet. The crackdown left Cazes dead in a Bangkok jail cell under contested circumstances. His lieutenant, the security administrator who went by “Desnake,” has never been identified, fuelling conjecture that at least one AlphaBay high-roller—administrator or vendor—rode Bitcoin’s forty-fold price appreciation into nine-figure territory and is now rewarding Ulbricht’s pioneering role in crypto-based contraband commerce.

Why gift tens of millions to a man who, in the popular imagination, authored the playbook for their own success? Blockchain-security researcher Taylor Monahan offers a psychological reading: “People donate when they’re deeply inspired by someone and/or grateful and/or have some sort of remorse for the situation. Survivor’s guilt is wild.”

Chainalysis declined to describe the heuristics or proprietary clustering techniques that linked the donor wallet to AlphaBay, citing ongoing investigative sensitivities. Yet the company confirmed it is sharing its findings with US and European law-enforcement partners. Whether those agencies will be able to pierce the mixer fog and attach a legal identity to the pseudonymous benefactor remains uncertain; any suspect would have had nearly eight years to perfect operational security and distance themselves from now-tainted coins.

For Ulbricht, the windfall comes with its own complications. Under the terms of his pardon, he is no longer subject to restitution or forfeiture orders, but an inflow demonstrably tied to narcotics trafficking could invite renewed scrutiny from financial-crime regulators. Ulbricht has not commented publicly on the provenance of the donation, and representatives of the Free Ross campaign did not respond to multiple requests for clarification.

At press time, Bitcoin traded at $102,814.

Featured image created with DALL.E, chart from TradingView.com

Editorial Process for bitcoinist is centered on delivering thoroughly researched, accurate, and unbiased content. We uphold strict sourcing standards, and each page undergoes diligent review by our team of top technology experts and seasoned editors. This process ensures the integrity, relevance, and value of our content for our readers.

As of today, DOGE sits near $0.21, marking a 10% weekly drop. Investors are watching the bigger picture, hoping long‑term signals point to a renewed uptrend.

Analyst Maintains Bullish Outlook

According to analyst Javon Marks, a key trendline gave way in late 2023. This line had capped Dogecoin since its $0.70 peak. He says the break ushered in higher highs and higher lows.

A fresh low near $0.15 has held so far. Based on this view, he kept his $0.65 target, which would mean a 200% gain from $0.21. Marks also mentioned $0.74 and $1.25 as possible future milestones.

$DOGE and a +174% climb to its first target at $0.6533 continues to be in the cards … https://t.co/7Jt82s0jLy

— JAVONMARKS (@JavonTM1) May 18, 2025

Resistance Levels Remain Key Barrier

Based on reports from market watcher Ali Martinez, the $0.25–$0.26 range is a major hurdle. That zone worked as support in December 2024 but flipped to resistance in early 2025.

Since then, the meme coin has tried and failed to push past it. In February, it hit $0.28 before reversing to below $0.15. A March rally saw a move above $0.19 but stopped short again.

The most recent test in May peaked at $0.24 before closing at $0.22. Traders will be looking for a clear close above $0.26 to signal new momentum.

On‑Chain Activity Sees Strong Uptick

Based on latest data, wallet activity has jumped sharply. New addresses grew by over 100% in the last seven days. Active addresses climbed by 110%.

Even zero‑balance addresses rose by 155%, which often hints at fresh participation or address cleanup. Higher on‑chain counts don’t always mean a price rise, but they do show more users are logging transactions again.

Stretch Targets Face Big Hurdles

Dogecoin’s long‑term goals may sound exciting, but getting there won’t be simple. A move to $0.6533 or beyond requires first holding above $0.26. Then it must break $0.28 with real volume behind it.

Big price swings could scare some holders into booking profits. Even if the chart lines line up, outside events like social media buzz or exchange listings may be needed to push DOGE past $0.30.

In the short term, traders will watch whether DOGE can reclaim $0.25 and hold it for a few days. If that happens, the higher‑low pattern stays intact. If it falls back below $0.21, the setup could collapse and open the door to further losses.

For now, the coin sits in a tug‑of‑war between bullish chart fans and those who see more downside.

Featured image from Unsplash, chart from TradingView

Vaneck, a global investment management company with a strong reputation in Exchange-Traded Funds (ETF) arenas with nearly 70 years of history, has issued an impressive price target for Solana (SOL). In a post shared on X on January 6th, the New York-based company predicted that by the end of 2025 Solana would skyrocket the value of its Solana to $520.

Vaneck predicts Solana $520 by the end of 2025

Vanek’s paper focuses on Solana’s share within the Smart Contract Platform (SCP) market and the historical correlation between crypto market capitalization and US growth. M2 money supply. According to the company:

“The Solana price target by the end of 2025 is $520. We value Solana (SOL) based on our forecast year-end market share within the Smart Contract Platform (SCP) market. SCP’s market forecast is , given its strong historical correlation with crypto market capitalization, it is derived from the growth of the US M2 money supply.”

Related readings

Vaneck’s analysis predicts that M2 (a measure of US money supply that accounts for cash and easily convertible US money supply near deposits) will reach $22.3 trillion by the second half of 2025. October 2023. Vaneck estimates, citing regression analysis.

“We expect to reach 22.3T M2 by the end of 2025, maintaining an annual growth rate of 3.2% since the last trough in October 2023. We use regression analysis to total capitalization of SCPs using regression analysis. estimates that the company will increase by 43% each year to 1.1T. 2025 ($77 billion today), surpassing the 2021 peak of 989b.”

The company points out that “strong correlation between M2 and SCP’s market capitalization” with a 12-month moving average of R²0.36 and a T-statistic of 5.7 (P <0.0001). Currently, Solana holds approximately 15% of SCP's market capitalization. However, Vaneck expects that proportion will rise significantly by 2025.

“Currently, Solana holds 15% of the SCP’s market capitalization, but we expect its share to rise to 22% by EOY 2025. This forecast is supported by Solana’s developer control. , supports increased market share of DEX volume, revenue and active users.”

Related readings

By combining this expected increase in market share with an autoregressive (AR) forecast model, Vaneck believes Solana’s market capitalization will rise to around $250 billion.

Short-term Sol Price Analysis

However, at this time, Solana is continuing its correction phase, with price trading at $189 at reporting time. The 4-hour Sol/USDT chart shows a well-defined descending channel characterized by a series of low highs and low lows.

Sol’s price action has been limited to the descending channel since January 18th, marked by two parallel trend lines that emphasize sustained sales pressure. The lower limit of the channel, which is now close to $175, serves as immediate support, while the boundary near $215 serves as resistance.

In particular, the SOL is currently located just below the midline of the downward channel. If it fails to exceed this level in the short term, it appears likely that it will move towards the lower boundary of the channel. Additionally, Sol continues to struggle to regain the critical Fibonacci retracement level, where a retracement of 0.236 ($203.40) serves as the first major resistance.

At the time of pressing, Sol was traded for $190.

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