BTC Battles $90K as Alts Mix, Regulations Brew, and Saylor Stacks Sats Amid Thin Holiday Trade

Digital Assets Decoded: Your Daily Crypto Guide podcast.

Hey folks, Crypto Willy here with your **Digital Assets Decoded: Your Daily Crypto Guide** for the week wrapping up to December 30, 2025. What a rollercoaster, right? Let's dive in like we're grabbing coffee and charting the charts together.

Kicking off with Bitcoin, our king of crypto. Binance Market Update on December 23 showed BTC dipping to $87,434 after trading $87k to $90k, with the global market cap at $2.96 trillion down 2.1%. By Christmas Day, per another Binance report, it bounced to $87,490 up 0.75%, market cap ticking to $2.95T. But hold up—CryptoNews.net warned of a crash risk on December 26 ahead of a massive $28 billion options expiry on Deribit, with $23 billion in BTC calls and $4 billion ETH puts skewed bullish around $3,000 max pain. BTC dipped below $87k that day amid thin holiday volume mirroring Dow Jones drops. KuCoin flashed BTC hitting $88,810 after a 3% slide in a $100B market sell-off, liquidations at $207 million, and spot ETFs bleeding $19 million Monday—seven straight outflow days. IC Markets' December 30 tech outlook? Straight bearish, eyeing support below pivots. Investing.com noted BTC climbing to $89k Friday on thin liquidity despite ETF woes, but stuck under $90k psych barrier, down nearly 5% for the year after peaking $126k. Even PlanB's YouTube analysis pondered what's next post-$100k drop.

Altcoins mixed it up—Ethereum hovered $2,929 to $2,959 down overall, XRP at $1.88-ish, Solana $122-$124, Doge $0.13. Outperformers like LUMIA up 28% and BANANA 35% stole the show early week.

Big news drops? Japan plans digitizing local gov bonds by 2026 via Binance. Arizona Senator pushes Bitcoin tax exemptions. Michael Selig named new CFTC Chair in US innovation push. BlackRock flags BTC ETFs as top themes despite outflows, and their strategists see limited Fed cuts in 2026. Hong Kong advances digital asset trading laws. EU Council and ECB align on digital euro. Michael Saylor's Strategy firm scooped 1,229 BTC for $108.8M, holdings now 672,497 BTC amid the chaos. CoinDesk recapped 2025's wild price forecast fails, while Bloomberg bears whisper $10k BTC in 2026—yikes!

Volatility's the name, holidays thinned liquidity, but Fed easing bets and treasury plays like Bitcoin firms outvoluming JPMorgan keep hope alive. Stay nimble, degens.

Thanks for tuning in, crew—catch you next week for more! This has been a Quiet Please production. For me, check out Quiet Please Dot A I.

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