The Daily: JPMorgan says bitcoin crossing $85,000 could ease miner selling pressure, and more

The following article is adapted from The Block’s newsletter, The Daily, which comes out on weekday afternoons.

Happy Thursday! Bitcoin is trading around $84,250, with JPMorgan saying a sustained move above its estimated $85,000 production cost could ease miner selling pressure.

Also in today's newsletter, New York moves to block Polymarket, a Brooklyn man gets up to 12 years over a $16 million Coinbase social engineering scheme, IBM connects Digital Asset Haven to SWIFT for tokenized deposit transactions, and more.

Meanwhile, Solana Foundation tapped former Binance and Polygon executives to drive institutional adoption and payments, and Ondo launched onchain portfolio tokens based on BlackRock-developed strategies.

P.S. Don't forget to check out The Latent, our new sister website covering AI. Get The Latent Daily here and all other The Block newsletters here.

JPMorgan says bitcoin crossing $85,000 production cost could ease miner selling pressure

Bitcoin's move above JPMorgan's estimated $85,000 production cost could give miners relief and reduce the risk of forced selling if sustained, the bank's analysts said.

• Bitcoin spent 280 days below its estimated average production cost before moving above it during this week's rally, the longest such period since 2018.
• Production cost has historically acted as a "soft floor" for bitcoin, as prolonged periods below it can push higher-cost miners to sell bitcoin, shut down machines or leave the market.
• Miners have responded to weak profitability by moving equipment to cheaper-power regions, selling or retiring older machines and placing some equipment on standby.
• Miners are also shifting capacity toward AI computing, with Bitcoin's hash rate down about 19% from its October peak and mining difficulty down roughly 15%.
• JPMorgan said the shift toward AI could limit excess hash rate growth and cause bitcoin's production cost to rise more slowly outside halving events.

New York moves to block Polymarket over alleged illegal gambling

New York sued Polymarket, accusing the prediction market platform of operating an illegal gambling operation and asking a court to block it from operating in the state.

• Attorney General Letitia James and Gov. Kathy Hochul said Polymarket is violating state gambling laws, with Hochul saying the platform is putting underage New Yorkers at risk.
• New York wants Polymarket to stop doing business and advertising in the state until it properly registers and is also seeking $100,000 among other fines.
• Polymarket Chief Legal Officer Neal Kumar said the company is staying in New York and had been working with the state to address its concerns.

Brooklyn man gets up to 12 years over $16 million Coinbase scheme

Brooklyn resident Ronald Spektor was sentenced to four to 12 years in prison for a scheme that stole nearly $16 million from about 100 Coinbase users.

• Prosecutors said Spektor posed as a Coinbase representative, warned users their assets were at risk and persuaded them to move crypto to wallets he could access.
• The yearlong scheme resulted in losses of $15.94 million, with some victims losing $1 million or more.
• Spektor pleaded guilty to a 31-count indictment and was ordered to forfeit more than $500,000 in assets and pay nearly $16 million in restitution.

IBM connects Digital Asset Haven to SWIFT blockchain ledgers

IBM added access to SWIFT's blockchain-based shared ledger to Digital Asset Haven through a beta ISO 20022 messaging adapter.

• The adapter lets institutions instruct tokenized deposit transactions on SWIFT's ledger using standard payment messages instead of blockchain-specific workflows.
• Financial institutions participating in SWIFT's program have already tested tokenized deposits through Digital Asset Haven, with 17 institutions taking part in the broader pilot.
• IBM is also adding an on-premises beta version of Haven that can run on IBM Z and LinuxONE without relying on public cloud infrastructure.

ARK Invest brings $1.3 billion venture fund onchain through Securitize

Cathie Wood's ARK Invest is tokenizing its $1.3 billion ARK Venture Fund through Securitize, marking the first ARK fund to be brought onchain.

• The actively managed fund invests in private and public technology companies including OpenAI, Anthropic, Stripe and Databricks, with the tokenized version available to eligible investors on Ethereum.
• The launch expands a partnership that began with ARK Invest's strategic investment in Securitize in October 2025 to advance tokenized securities and regulated investment products.

In the next 24 hours

• U.S. August durable goods and final September consumer sentiment data are due Friday, with New York Fed President John Williams and Cleveland Fed President Beth Hammack also scheduled to speak.
• Euro Area August money supply and bank lending data are due Friday, with ECB official Boris Vujcic also scheduled to speak.
• Plasma, Particle Network and AltLayer are among the crypto projects set for token unlocks.

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