Key takeaways:

Norges Bank lost $40 billion in Q1 2025 as US tech stocks fell, exposing the risk of concentrated positions.

The bank’s indirect Bitcoin exposure via stocks reached $356 million, raising sell pressure risk amid a global trade war and recession concerns.

Abu Dhabi’s $437 million spot Bitcoin ETF stake shows sovereign wealth funds see Bitcoin as a hedge.

Norges Bank, Norway’s $1.7 trillion sovereign wealth fund, reported a $40 billion loss in the first quarter of 2025, with most of the decline caused by a drop in the value of US-listed technology companies. Norges Bank also indirectly owned 3,821 BTC through its stock market investments by the end of 2024, presenting a potential sell pressure risk to Bitcoin, especially when considering the socio-political uncertainty and the risk of an economic recession caused by the global trade war.

In such times, could Norges Bank increase its investments in Bitcoin-related companies or even buy spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) as a way to hedge risk?

For now, it seems unlikely that Norway’s investment fund would consider buying a Bitcoin ETF, especially since the fund does not hold any gold. Besides stocks and bonds, Norges Bank invests in real estate, including retail, industrial, renewable energy, and logistics properties worldwide.

Norway sold all of the central bank’s gold by early 2004, when gold was trading below $400. Since then, gold has outperformed the S&P 500 by 280%. Equities now make up 71.4% of the fund’s total investments, so if the global trade war continues, significant losses could occur.

Gold/USD (orange) vs. S&P 500. Source: TradingView / Cointelegraph

Norges Bank investments generated $222 billion in profits in 2024, and its stock market portfolio dropped by only 1.6% in the first quarter of 2025. Norway’s sovereign wealth fund is “mainly index-driven,” according to CEO Nicolai Tangen, specifically following the FTSE Global All Cap Index.

Although this index includes over 7,100 stocks from both developed and emerging markets, it is based on market capitalization, which means 65% of the exposure is to North American companies. But, according to Norges Bank Deputy CEO Trond Grande, there is some flexibility for active investment, and their exposure to US-listed tech stocks has been below the benchmark for the past 18 months.

Some of these holdings, such as Strategy, Mara Holdings, Coinbase, and Riot Platforms, hold large amounts of Bitcoin (BTC) on their balance sheets. As a result, even if not intentional, the sovereign wealth fund had a $356 million indirect exposure to Bitcoin at the end of 2024.

FTSE Global All Cap (purple) vs. FTSE + 10% Bitcoin (green). Source: TradingView / Cointelegraph

Data shows a 5% hypothetical allocation in Bitcoin back in 2018 would have boosted the fund’s equities benchmark performance by 56%.

Buying Bitcoin ETFs seems unlikely, but indirect exposure remains possible

Technically, it seems unlikely that Norges Bank could buy into the spot Bitcoin ETF without changing the fund’s mandate. However, increasing exposure to companies with significant Bitcoin holdings appears possible. Still, there is no sign of such a move, although Nicolai Tangen stated on April 24 that the fund will increase investments in US stocks.

Related: China may shift from US Treasurys toward gold, crypto — BlackRock exec

The fact that Mubadala Investments, one of Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth funds, held a $437 million stake in BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin ETF (IBIT) helps build a case for such investment. Similarly, the State of Wisconsin Investment Board held $321 million in spot Bitcoin ETFs, showing the growing use of cryptocurrency as a hedge.

This article is for general information purposes and is not intended to be and should not be taken as legal or investment advice. The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed here are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.

Michael Saylor’s Strategy is “synthetically halving Bitcoin” (BTC) by purchasing half or more of the newly minted supply from miners every single month, according to Adam Livingston, a BTC analyst and author of “The Bitcoin Age and The Great Harvest.”

Livingston said miners currently produce around 450 BTC per day or approximately 13,500 BTC per month, but Strategy acquired 379,800 BTC in the last six months. This translates to the firm purchasing roughly 2,087 BTC per day — far in excess of daily miner output. The author added:

“When Bitcoin becomes this scarce, access to Bitcoin will require paying a premium. Lending against Bitcoin will cost more. Borrowing Bitcoin will become a luxury business reserved for nation-states and corporate whales, and Strategy will control the bottleneck.”

“BTC’s global cost of capital will no longer be set by ‘the market.’ It will be set by the gravitational policies of the first Bitcoin superpower: Strategy,” Livingston continued.

The author’s prediction of a Bitcoin supply crunch translates into much higher BTC prices if Strategy can continue its pace of BTC acquisitions while market demand for the supply-capped digital asset grows among institutional and retail investors.

The Bitcoin miner reserve, a metric tracking the total amount of BTC held in miner wallets, continues to decline. Source: CryptoQuant

Related: Michael Saylor hints at Bitcoin purchase as whales stack aggressively

Institutions like Strategy are driving the world toward hyperbitcoinization

Cypherpunk and Blockstream CEO Adam Back predicted that Strategy and other institutions that have adopted a Bitcoin corporate treasury plan will drive the market capitalization of BTC to $200 trillion.

“Strategy and other treasury companies are an arbitrage of the dislocation between the Bitcoin future and today’s fiat world,” Back wrote in an April 26 X post.

Critics of the company warn that the debt-based approach to BTC acquisition could sink Strategy financially if a prolonged BTC bear market takes effect and also warn of greater systemic risks to BTC from such a high concentration of the digital currency held by a single entity.

An overview of Strategy’s Bitcoin investment performance. Source: Michael Saylor

However, Bitcoin advocate and author Saifedean Ammous recently said that Strategy’s concentration of BTC doesn’t threaten the protocol.

Ammous argued that institutions like BlackRock and Strategy holding high concentrations of BTC could not engineer a hard fork increasing Bitcoin’s maximum supply, as it would massively devalue their holdings, which, at the end of the day, belong to shareholders with the power to divest.

Magazine: Bitcoin in Senegal: Why is this African country using BTC?

Key points:

Bitcoin booked a 10% gain in the past week and technical indicators remain bullish going into a new week.

Analysts expect Bitcoin to gain an additional 40% by the end of the year

Select altcoins are showing a positive bias on improving crypto sentiment.

Bitcoin (BTC) rose more than 10% this week as buyers made a strong comeback, pushing the price to the overhead resistance at $95,000. Although buyers are struggling to clear the overhead hurdle, a positive sign is that they have not given up much ground to the bears.

The sharp up move is backed by solid buying in the US spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs), which witnessed inflows of $3.06 billion, according to Farside Investors data. Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas said in a post on X that it was really notable to see “HOW FAST the flows can go from 1st gear to 5th gear.”

Crypto market data daily view. Source: Coin360

After Bitcoin’s recovery, 21st Capital co-founder Sina said in a post on X that Bitcoin reclaimed the power-law price. Sina’s Bitcoin Quantile Model projects Bitcoin to reach between $130,000 and $163,000 before the end of 2025. Anonymous Bitcoin analyst apsk32 had an even bigger target of more than $200,000 for Bitcoin in Q4 of this year.

Could Bitcoin maintain its momentum and rise above the overhead resistance? Let’s study the charts of the cryptocurrencies that look strong in the near term.

Bitcoin price prediction

Bitcoin has been witnessing a tough battle between the bulls and the bears near the crucial $95,000 level.

BTC/USDT daily chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView

The upsloping 20-day exponential moving average ($88,619) and the relative strength index (RSI) near the overbought zone indicate that bulls are in command. A close above $95,000 could propel the BTC/USDT pair to $100,000 and eventually to $107,000. Sellers are expected to aggressively defend the zone between $107,000 and $109,588.

The 20-day EMA is the critical near-term support to watch out for because a break below it brings the large $95,000 to $73,777 range into play.

BTC/USDT 4-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView

The 4-hour chart shows the bears are fiercely defending the $95,000 level but are struggling to sink the pair below the 20-EMA. If the price rebounds off the 20-EMA, it enhances the prospects of a break above $95,000. The pair could then surge to $100,000.

Instead, if the price maintains below the 20-EMA, the pair could tumble to the 50-simple moving average. This is an important level for the bulls to defend because a break below it could pull the pair to $86,000.

Sui price prediction

Sui (SUI) has been facing resistance near $3.90, but the shallow pullback suggests that the bulls are in no hurry to dump their positions.

SUI/USDT daily chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView

If the price stays above the 38.2% Fibonacci retracement level of $3.14, the bulls will make another attempt to shove the SUI/USDT pair above $3.90. If they can pull it off, the pair may skyrocket to $4.25 and then to $5.

Contrary to this assumption, if the price turns down and breaks below $3.14, it signals the start of a deeper correction toward the 50% retracement level of $2.94. Buyers are expected to fiercely defend the zone between $2.94 and the 20-day EMA ($2.69).

SUI/USDT 4-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView

The 4-hour chart shows that the pair is finding support at the 20-EMA, but the sellers are active at higher levels. The bears will again attempt to sink the pair below the 20-EMA. If they succeed, the pair could slump to $3.14.

Buyers will have to swiftly push the price above the $3.81 to $3.90 overhead resistance zone if they want to retain the advantage. If they do that, the pair could start the next leg of the up move to $4.25.

Avalanche price prediction

Avalanche (AVAX) has been range-bound between $23.50 and $15.27 for the past few days. In a range, traders usually buy near the support and sell close to the resistance.

AVAX/USDT daily chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView

Although buyers have failed to push the price above $23.50, a positive sign is that they have not ceded much ground to the bears. That increases the likelihood of a break above $23.50. If that happens, the AVAX/USDT pair will complete a double-bottom pattern, which has a target objective of $31.73.

This optimistic view will be negated in the near term if the price turns down and breaks below the moving averages. The pair may then remain stuck inside the range for a few more days.

AVAX/USDT 4-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView

The pair has been consolidating in a narrow range between $21.60 and $23.10 for some time. That suggests the bulls are holding on to their positions as they anticipate another leg higher. If buyers propel the price above $23.10, the pair could surge to $25. There is resistance at $23.50, but it is likely to be crossed.

Alternatively, a drop below $21.60 signals that the bulls have given up. That may pull the price down to $19.50.

Related: Bitcoin trades at ‘40% discount’ as spot BTC ETF buying soars to $3B in one week

Official Trump price prediction

Official Trump (TRUMP) surged above the $12.45 resistance on April 23 and held the retest of the breakout level on April 24.

TRUMP/USDT daily chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView

A rally above $16 is attracting sellers, but a shallow pullback suggests that every minor dip is being purchased. If buyers drive the price above $16, the TRUMP/USDT pair may reach $17.69, where the bears are expected to mount a strong defense. However, if buyers bulldoze their way through, the pair could skyrocket to $19.60 and then to $22.40.

Conversely, a deeper pullback suggests that the short-term bulls are booking profits. The zone between $11.56 and $12.45 is expected to act as a solid support.  If the price rebounds off the support zone, the pair may swing between $11.56 and $16 for some time. Selling could accelerate if the pair breaks below the 20-day EMA ($10.73).

TRUMP/USDT 4-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView

The pair turned down from $16 but is finding support near the 20-EMA on the 4-hour chart. That suggests the bulls are active at lower levels. Buyers will try to push the price above the $16 overhead resistance, starting the next leg of the uptrend.

Contrarily, a break and close below the 20-EMA suggests that the bullish momentum has weakened. The pair may then slump to $14 and later to the solid support near $12. Sellers will be back in the driver’s seat on a drop below $11.50.

Bittensor price prediction

Bittensor (TAO) broke and closed above the downtrend line on April 20, suggesting that the bears are losing their grip.

TAO/USDT daily chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView

The up move is facing resistance at $375, but the pullback is expected to find support at the 20-day EMA ($298). A solid bounce off the 20-day EMA signals a change in sentiment from selling on rallies to buying on dips. The bulls will then attempt to drive the TAO/USDT pair above $375. If they succeed, the next stop may be $495.

Contrary to this assumption, if the price turns down and breaks below the downtrend line, it will indicate that the markets have rejected the breakout. The pair then risks falling to $222.

TAO/USDT 4-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView

The pullback is finding support at the 20-EMA on the 4-hour chart. Buyers will try to resume the up move by pushing the price above the $375 resistance. If they manage to do that, the pair could reach $425.

Sellers are likely to have other plans. They will try to sink the price below the 20-EMA, opening the doors for a drop to the 50-SMA and later to the downtrend line. A break below the downtrend line tilts the advantage in favor of the bears.

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.