Gold has hit its highest share of central bank reserves in decades, potentially shaping Bitcoin’s path as a future reserve asset, according to Deutsche Bank. Global central banks have been increasing their gold reserves over the past few years in a trend that may have major implications for Bitcoin, according to a recent report from Deutsche Bank. Gold’s share of central bank reserves reached 24% in the second quarter of the year, its highest share since the 1990s, Deutsche Bank strategists reported Thursday. With official demand for gold running at twice the pace of the 2011–2021 average, some Deutsche Bank analysts see growing parallels between gold and Bitcoin (BTC), which has seen a record-breaking performance in 2025. Read more
A new integration allows South Africans to spend Bitcoin, stablecoins and other crypto directly at more than 650,000 merchants nationwide. South Africans can now pay with cryptocurrency at thousands of retail stores nationwide, following a new partnership between QR payments provider Scan to Pay and Bitcoin payments company MoneyBadger. According to a Tech Central report, the integration allows users of major exchanges, including Binance, Luno, Blink and VALR, to pay using Bitcoin (BTC), stablecoins and other crypto assets at over 650,000 Scan to Pay-enabled merchants. Crypto holders can pay for their purchases through QR codes at checkout counters, while the merchants will receive their settlements in rand. The system works through the MoneyBadger platform, linking payments to users’ exchanges or Bitcoin Lightning accounts. Read more
In one of their first moves in two months, the Bitcoin whale returned to short Bitcoin and Ether for hundreds of millions of dollars, betting on their short-term price decline. A large cryptocurrency investor who surfaced two months ago with about $11 billion worth of Bitcoin has opened almost $900 million in short positions against Bitcoin and Ether, signaling expectations of a market correction despite widespread optimism for October. The whale returned to trading on Thursday with a $360 million Bitcoin (BTC) transfer that piqued the interest of cryptocurrency investors, Cointelegraph reported. On Friday, the whale opened a $600 million 8x leveraged short position on Bitcoin and a leveraged short worth over $300 million on Ether (ETH), according to blockchain data platform Onchain Lens. Read more