Bitcoin (BTC) mining firms should hold their mined Bitcoin and use it as collateral for fiat-denominated loans to pay operating expenses instead of selling BTC and losing the upside of an asset that miners expect to surge in price, according to John Glover, chief investment officer at Bitcoin lending firm Ledn.

In an interview with Cointelegraph, Glover said that holding onto the BTC carries several benefits including, price appreciation, tax deferment, and the potential to make extra revenue by lending out BTC held in corporate treasuries. The executive added:

“If you are mining, you are generating all this Bitcoin. You understand the thesis behind Bitcoin and why it is likely going to continue to appreciate in the future. You do not want to sell any of your Bitcoin.”

This debt-based approach is similar to companies like Strategy, which issue corporate debt and equity to finance Bitcoin acquisition and profit from the diverging fundamentals of BTC and the fiat currencies the corporate capital raises are denominated in.

BTC mining hashprice, a metric used to gauge miner profitability, has collapsed as ever-increasing computing resources are deployed to secure the network. Source: Hashrate Index

Bitcoin-backed loans could be a valuable lifeline for miners struggling in the highly competitive industry, which is facing increased pressure due to the ongoing trade tensions brought on by the Trump administration’s protectionist trade policies and macroeconomic uncertainty.

Related: Riot Platforms secures $100M ‘Bitcoin-backed’ loan from Coinbase

Trade war places even more pressure on beleaguered mining industry

The Bitcoin mining industry is characterized by high competition and capital costs that increase over time as more powerful computing resources are used to mine blocks and secure the network.

US President Trump’s sweeping trade tariffs have cast a cloud over the already competitive sector, raising fears that import duties will raise the cost of mining equipment, like application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs), to unsustainable levels.

Mining firms collectively sold over 40% of their mined supply produced in March 2025 amid the heightened macroeconomic uncertainty and fears that the ongoing trade tensions will cause price increases across the board.

According to TheMinerMag, this 40% sell-off marked the reversal of a trend that began post-halving, in April 2024, and represented the highest monthly BTC liquidation among miners since October 2024.

Magazine: Korea to lift corporate crypto ban, beware crypto mining HDs: Asia Express

Ethereum’s Ether (ETH) token is approaching a critical price zone against Bitcoin (BTC), which historically marked the beginning of a massive rebound.

ETH price fractal from 2019 hints at bottom

The ETH/BTC pair, currently trading near 0.019 BTC, is edging closer to 0.016 BTC — the exact level it reached in September 2019 before rallying nearly 450% over the following year.

ETH/BTC weekly performance chart. Source: TradingView

The current ETH/BTC setup resembles 2019, with both periods marked by oversold relative strength index (RSI), long stretches below key moving averages, and multiyear declines.

In 2019, ETH/BTC fell over 90% in the prior two years, driven by the ICO collapse.

As of 2025, the pair is down over 80% from its 2021 peak, weighed by skepticism over Ethereum’s switch to proof-of-stake (PoS), rising competition, and Bitcoin’s growing dominance as an institutional asset.

In response to the growing concerns, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has proposed new architecture and protocol-wide standards to make Ethereum simpler, faster, and as maintainable as Bitcoin within five years.

Related: Ethereum to simplify crosschain transactions with new token standards

One analyst called Buterin’s proposal “the most bullish thing for ETH.”

The bullish hopes come as ETH/BTC attempts to break free from its multi-year “bearish parabola.” This resistance curve has been instrumental in limiting the pair’s upside attempts since December 2021 but showed signs of exhaustion as of May 3.

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“We might see an end of this bearish parabola,” wrote chartist Jimie.

He noted that if the curved resistance holds, ETH/BTC could drop toward 0.016 BTC — the same level where it bottomed in September 2019 before rallying by roughly 450%.

Flush ETH and buy Bitcoin, says Adam Back

Skeptics like Bitcoin’s proof-of-work pioneer, Adam Back, argue that Buterin is overlooking deeper design flaws while proposing to simplify Ethereum in the coming years.

Back criticizes Ethereum’s account-based system, saying it adds unnecessary complexity compared to Bitcoin’s simpler UTXO (unspent transaction output) model. He argues this growing complexity increases technical risks and makes Ethereum harder to scale and secure.

Source: X/Adam Back

He also warns that Ethereum’s shift to PoS has concentrated power among insiders by redirecting miner rewards to large tokenholders.

“At this point, just flush ETH before it hits zero and buy Bitcoin,” he wrote, suggesting no upgrade can fix what he views as Ethereum’s flawed foundation.

This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.

Tokenized gold carries several benefits over other forms of paper gold, including gold exchange-traded funds (ETFs), according to Melissa Song and Dustin Becker, representatives of Gold DAO, a decentralized autonomous organization that facilitates investor access to tokenized gold.

In an interview with Cointelegraph, the DAO representatives outlined three major benefits unique to tokenized gold, including 1:1 redeemability for a specific quantity of physical, serialized gold, usage as collateral in decentralized finance (DeFi) applications, and transactional efficiency through on-demand liquidity.

“When you buy an ETF, you are betting on the gold price going up, but you do not own any specific gold bar,” Song told Cointelegraph.

The pair added that the price of gold surged in 2025 due to the current macroeconomic uncertainty, the high level of US government debt, and geopolitical tensions that are reshaping the global monetary order.

Gold’s price hits all-time highs against the US dollar. Source: TradingView

Related: Geopolitical tensions fuel central bank shift toward gold, crypto — BlackRock exec

Macroeconomic uncertainty spikes gold prices, leaves USD in doubt

Gold hit an all-time high of $3,500 per ounce in April 2025 amid the trade tariffs announced by United States President Donald Trump that caused turmoil in risk-on asset markets like stocks and crypto.

Traders shifted to gold, cash, and other safe-haven assets to weather the extreme volatility caused by the protectionist trade policies and the counter-response from other countries.

This rush to gold also caused gold-backed cryptocurrencies such as Paxos Gold (PAXG) and Tether Gold (XAUT) to spike in price during April 2024.

The Volatility S&P Index (VIX) tracks the volatility of the US stock market and surged following Trump’s tariff announcement. Source: TradingView

Bitcoin advocate Max Keiser argued that gold-backed tokens will outcompete fiat stablecoins due to the lack of geopolitical risk and inflationary resistance inherent in gold.

“A stablecoin backed by Gold would out-compete a USD-backed stablecoin in world markets: Russia, China, and Iran should take note,” Keiser wrote in a March 22 X post.

“The United States dollar has no volatility, but you are guaranteed to lose purchasing power,” the BTC advocate continued.

Gold’s current rally could spill over into Bitcoin if investors shift from viewing Bitcoin as a risk asset to more of a store of value in turbulent economic times that is counter-cyclical to the stock market and other speculative investments.

Magazine: Crypto wanted to overthrow banks, now it’s becoming them in stablecoin fight

This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.