Coinbase (COIN) has its own strategy for BTC on the corporate balance sheet, but it’s not a bitcoin maximalist play like that of Michael Saylor’s Strategy (MSTR).

On the company’s first quarter 2025 earnings call, CFO Alesia Haas revealed that Coinbase purchased $150 million in crypto, “predominantly bitcoin,” bringing its long-term investment portfolio to $1.3 billion, or 25% of net cash.

Haas, however, went out of her way to draw a line between Coinbase and firms that explicitly tie their corporate identity to holding bitcoin on the balance sheet.

“To be clear, we’re an operating company,” she said. “But we do invest alongside the space.”

In other words, Coinbase isn’t betting the company on bitcoin. On a Q&A call with retail investors, Armstrong said there was a temptation in its early days to put a lot of BTC on the balance sheet, but it was too risky. Crypto is volatile and, at the time, Coinbase was too young of a company to take that risk.

Now, as a listed giant things have changed, but there’s still not a need to go all-in on bitcoin. Coinbase is allocating profits from operations back into crypto assets, similarly to how a commodity firm might accumulate raw materials it understands deeply. The move is less Michael Saylor and more sector-aligned capital recycling.

In fact, Coinbase didn’t even trumpet the purchase in its shareholder letter. The news only surfaced in response to a retail shareholder’s question about “accruing hard crypto reserve assets.”

CEO Brian Armstrong didn’t speak directly about the purchases, but he did offer a philosophical context. Coinbase, he reminded investors, isn’t dabbling in crypto – it is crypto.

“We’ve been focused on crypto since the beginning, 12 years ago, and we continue to be focused there,” Armstrong said. “Crypto is eating financial services.”

For Armstrong, buying BTC is a byproduct of conviction and operational alignment and not a headline play, treasury pivot, or activist bet.

Coinbase isn’t holding BTC to signal to markets some broader conviction, or become a proxy like MSTR. Behind the accounting language is something deeper: a long-view bet that holding Bitcoin, like building the rails beneath it, is simply part of Coinbase’s job.

That’s not a treasury strategy — it’s something in the middle.

Bitcoin pushed past the six-figure mark for the first time in over two months, coming within a hair of $104,000 in early Asian hours Saturday, as crypto markets staged a sharp rebound on improving macro sentiment and Ethereum’s latest network upgrade.

Dogecoin (DOGE) led altcoin gains with a 10% rally, while ether (ETH) rose 3.5% following the successful implementation of its long-awaited Pectra upgrade, bringing weekly gains over 30%.Other majors including Solana (SOL), Cardano (ADA), xrp (XRP) and BNB Chain’s BNB rose between 2-6%, driven by a shift in investor sentiment from caution to risk-on.

The move follows a string of pro-crypto developments in the U.S. this week. On Wednesday, New Hampshire passed a bill allowing the state to create a strategic Bitcoin reserve. Arizona followed suit a day later with its own legislation supporting a crypto reserve. The state-level momentum comes as political leaders lean further into digital asset policy ahead of the November election.

President Donald Trump’s bullish remarks on upcoming U.S.-China trade talks also helped ease market jitters. The comments coincided with the U.S. and U.K. signing a fresh trade agreement that will remove reciprocal tariffs and lower duties on American goods — further lifting sentiment across equities and crypto alike.

“President Trump’s optimistic outlook on this weekend’s China trade talks is easing fears of an escalating trade war, encouraging traders to shift capital back into asset classes like cryptocurrencies,” said Jeff Mei, COO at BTSE, in a message to CoinDesk. “This could very well drive Bitcoin back towards its all-time high and potentially surpass it.”

BTC trades about 5% below its January record high of over $108,700 as of European morning hours on Saturday.

Analysts say the recent moves mark a decisive break from the sluggish price action that plagued altcoins through much of March and April.

“Traders believe the crypto industry may have finally found its second wind as a hedge against market uncertainty,” Nick Ruck, director at LVRG Research, told CoinDesk in a Telegram chat.“Investors are changing their perspectives on crypto now that altcoins have departed from a negative trend and found buying pressure from a renewed risk-on sentiment,” Ruck added.

Ethereum’s 30% rally this week is also being attributed to growing institutional interest and the momentum behind its Pectra upgrade, which introduces long-anticipated execution layer reforms aimed at boosting efficiency and scalability.

“The upgrade provides reforms Ethereum desperately needs to cement its position as a leading chain amidst growing competition,” BTSE’s Mei said. “Given that Ethereum is trading well below its all-time high, we could see substantial upside in the coming weeks and months, especially as macro fears ease and institutions become more willing to allocate towards crypto and crypto ETFs.”

Still, traders are watching this weekend’s U.S.-China trade negotiations closely. Talks are set to begin later on Saturday in Switzerland, and any signs of stalemate or renewed tension could undercut the current rally.

Tech titan Meta (META) has reportedly been looking into the possibility of a return to the stablecoin market after having spurred a U.S. regulatory backlash from its efforts in years past, and U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren told CoinDesk that the pending legislation to govern stablecoins needs to insist that’s not possible.

A high-stakes crypto bill to set up U.S. rules for stablecoins such as Tether’s USDT and Circle’s USDC was virtually sailing through the Senate until Democrats — including some who had supported the effort in committee — rose against it in recent days and halted the bill’s progress on the Senate floor this week. The Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act needs to change to prevent the large corporations from issuing their own money, Warren said.

«The Senate must fix the GENIUS Act so it prohibits Big Tech companies and other commercial giants from owning or affiliating with stablecoin companies,» the Massachusetts Democrat said in a statement to CoinDesk. «No Senator should vote to make it easier for Big Tech to pry into our financial transactions or choke off small businesses and political adversaries from the payments system.»

Six years ago, Meta sought to launch its own crypto stablecoin, Libra (later called Diem), and nearly made it to the finish line before an uproar from certain regulators and lawmakers derailed the project. She argued that Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg, whose company gave $1 million to President Donald Trump’s inaugural fund, is trying to get back into the business, and she called for Zuckerberg «to explain to Congress if this is another attempt to control the American people’s money.»

Meta’s spokespeople didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on Warren’s views.

The GENIUS Act is now back in negotiations, and some lawmakers remained hopeful it could reappear on the Senate floor as early as next week. There’s also a House of Representatives version similarly winding its way through the process in that chamber of Congress.

Binance and the Treasury

Warren, the senior Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee has been busy with her crypto-sector scrutiny, also joining in with colleagues on Friday to question Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Attorney General Pam Bondi on their interactions with Binance as it reportedly sought to smooth out the U.S. legal demands the exchange still labors under after a 2023 settlement.

Five DemocratIc senators — also including Richard Blumenthal, Chris Van Hollen, Mazie Horono and Sheldon Whitehouse — sent a letter to the officials about the exchange’s discussions with the U.S. government as Binance increases business ties with World Liberty Financial, the crypto company tied to President Donald Trump and his family.

«As the administration loosens oversight on an industry where bad actors have violated money laundering and sanctions law, it is not surprising that Binance, which has admitted to prioritizing its own growth and profits over compliance with U.S. law, would seek to roll back the oversight required by its settlement,» they wrote in the letter, noting Binance’s constraints based on its past guilty pleas to a list of charges including money laundering and sanctions violations, for which the company is still under the observation of independent monitors. 

«Our concerns about Binance’s compliance obligations are even more pressing given recent reports that the company is using the Trump family’s stablecoin to partner with foreign investment companies,» the senators said.

Spokespeople for Binance didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Nikhilesh De contributed reporting.