Economists at the US banking giant Wells Fargo are suddenly hiking their year-end S&P 500 target.

Wells Fargo is now forecasting the S&P 500 will close out the year at 7,950, up from its previous prediction of 7,300, a nearly 9% increase, reports Reuters.

The bank’s economists site three main factors for the index hike forecast: stronger corporate earnings, the U.S.-Iran interim deal easing macroeconomic risks and a recent market pullback.

Wells Fargo says the recent sell-off in the market has cooled investor sentiment, setting the stage for further upside.

“Sentiment has reset, providing room for upside in the AI trade. Hyperscalers’ race to raise capital is also a big tailwind for semis and infra.”

In a note to investors, the brokerage increased this year’s prediction for the S&P 500 earnings per share (eps) to $340 from $315, a nearly 8% increase. Wells Fargo also raised its eps in 2027 to $390 from $365.

The economists say the significant risk in the market outlook is the general increase in the prices of goods and services.

Says Wells Fargo,

“We continue to see inflation as the biggest risk to stocks, but only if the Fed were to react. A potential ‘run it hot, inflate out’ policy is bullish, and we expect stocks will be the best inflation hedge in that backdrop.”

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Bitcoin’s largest buyers are no longer behaving like a reliable backstop for the largest cryptocurrency.

The exchange-traded funds, public-company treasuries, and Bitcoin-linked equities that helped define the market’s institutional era are showing signs of strain, just as the world’s largest digital asset struggles to hold above $60,000, one of its most closely watched price levels.

This persistent drawdown has prompted a broader reevaluation of the cryptocurrency’s role in institutional portfolios, raising questions about whether the current environment reflects a temporary profit-taking exercise or a structural retreat from digital assets.

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Jun 11, 2026 · Gino Matos

Bitcoin ETF demand turns into a headwind

The clearest reversal has come from US spot Bitcoin ETFs, which entered 2026 as one of the market’s most important drivers of demand.

For much of the period after their January 2024 debut, the funds were treated as evidence that traditional financial investors were steadily adopting Bitcoin.

Their inflows helped create a simple bull-market thesis that showed that access to Wall Street would bring more capital into a fixed-supply asset, giving Bitcoin a durable source of upward pressure.

However, that thesis has been tested heavily in recent weeks.

Data from SoSoValue shows US spot Bitcoin ETFs have recorded a five-week outflow streak totaling more than $5 billion.

This is further corroborated by Glassnode data, which shows the 30-day moving average of net ETF flows has fallen to -2,450 BTC per day, the fastest sustained pace of outflows since the products launched.

The size of that flow is significant because it exceeds the network’s daily supply of newly created Bitcoin.

After the 2024 halving, miners produce about 450 BTC per day. A sustained ETF outflow of 2,450 BTC a day is more than five times that new supply, turning what had once been a source of absorption into a source of pressure.

Short bursts of ETF selling are not unusual in volatile markets. A negative 30-day moving average carries more weight because it smooths out daily noise and captures broader changes in positioning. Until that trend improves, institutional flows are less likely to provide support for Bitcoin prices.

Moreover, trading in the ETFs has also cooled. The 30-day moving average of daily volume in US spot Bitcoin ETFs has fallen to about $960 million from $4.4 billion in October, a 78% decline, Glassnode reported.

That decline points to more than simple profit-taking. It shows that speculative demand from traditional market participants has thinned even as redemptions have accelerated.

Lower volume can make price moves harder to absorb because fewer buyers are available when selling intensifies.

BTC DATs lose momentum

The ETF reversal has coincided with a slowdown in another major source of Bitcoin demand: digital asset treasury companies.

These firms, often listed publicly, raise capital or use balance-sheet resources to accumulate Bitcoin as a treasury asset. Their rise helped extend institutional adoption beyond ETFs, giving investors another way to express demand for Bitcoin through equity markets.

Like the ETFs, their buying has faded in June.

Glassnode analysts noted that while these companies remain net buyers overall, their daily accumulation has slowed to a fraction of the pace seen earlier in the quarter.

According to them:

“Corporate treasury accumulation has slowed sharply, with net inflows falling from peaks above $500 million per day to near-zero levels since June.”

This slower buying removes one of the market’s clearest sources of incremental demand at a time when ETF flows are also negative.

Some of the concerns have centered on Strategy, the largest public corporate holder of Bitcoin. The company disclosed that it sold 32 BTC in the final week of May, a small amount relative to its overall holdings but a symbolically important move because of its role in popularizing the corporate Bitcoin treasury model.

Strategy later returned to the market during the selloff, buying about $100 million worth of Bitcoin. However, the purchase did not stop the price from falling below $60,000.

Other BTC-focused companies have also drawn attention. Fold and Nakamoto have sold part of their Bitcoin holdings, adding to concern that the treasury-company trade is becoming less one-directional than it appeared during the rally.

While these sales do not amount to a broad retreat by corporate buyers, they show that some treasury firms are becoming more selective, more liquidity-conscious, and more willing to adjust positions as market conditions worsen.

That shift matters because the corporate treasury model depends partly on confidence. When share prices are strong, and investor demand is high, companies can raise capital, buy Bitcoin, and benefit from the perception that they are leveraged proxies for the asset.

However, when Bitcoin falls and demand for equities weakens, the model becomes harder to sustain.

Meanwhile, that slowdown is also evident in trading activity in these companies’ equities.

Glassnode data show that the total daily trading volume for major publicly listed Bitcoin-holding companies, measured by the 30-day simple moving average, has dropped by 49% over about six months. Their volume fell from $34.2 billion in December to $17.4 billion as of press time.

That decline suggests investors are pulling back from the broader Bitcoin proxy trade, not just from the asset itself.

During stronger market periods, public Bitcoin holders often attract investors seeking leveraged exposure. Their shares could rise faster than Bitcoin’s when sentiment improves because they combine treasury holdings, operating businesses, and capital-market optionality.

That made them popular vehicles for traders who wanted equity-market exposure to crypto without directly holding tokens. But as Bitcoin corrected, that demand has significantly weakened.

Exchange inflows signal broad market anxiety

The institutional distribution has created a climate of widespread market unease, affecting participants across the wealth spectrum.

Data from CryptoQuant indicates a significant rise in exchange deposits from both large-scale holders and retail investors. Typically, such deposits are associated with an intent to sell.

As Bitcoin briefly breached the $60,000 floor, large holders, or “whales,” accelerated their movement of assets to trading platforms.

Over the past three months, whale inflows to the Binance exchange have averaged 5,280 BTC per day, a sharp increase from the 1,900 BTC daily average observed in March. Retail investors have mirrored this behavioral shift, with their average daily exchange inflows climbing to 410 BTC.

This parallel movement highlights how macroeconomic uncertainty levels the playing field regarding investor psychology.

The current environment marks the second major episode of elevated exchange deposits this year. A similar pattern emerged in early February, when Bitcoin tested the $60,000 threshold, with whale inflows spiking to 6,200 BTC and retail inflows reaching 570 BTC.

Such periods of heightened market stress historically facilitate the transfer of assets from short-term speculators to long-term holders, though the immediate effect is substantial downward price pressure.

A thinner market waits for a catalyst

This overall market has arrived as broader crypto trading activity has also cooled.

Santiment data show trading volume across the largest non-stablecoin crypto assets has fallen to levels last seen in mid-2024. The decline reflects a market in which many traders appear unwilling to chase prices higher or sell aggressively amid recent liquidations, macro uncertainty, and geopolitical risks.

For Bitcoin, that creates a two-sided setup.

On one side, a thin volume can leave the market vulnerable. When participation is low and large buyers are less active, even moderate selling can have an outsized effect on price. A negative ETF flow trend, slower treasury accumulation, and weaker proxy-stock demand can therefore weigh more heavily than they would in a stronger liquidity environment.

On the other side, low volume can also indicate exhaustion. Some of crypto’s stronger rebounds have followed periods when trading activity, attention, and conviction were weak. Markets often recover when positioning has already been reduced and sidelined capital begins to return.

That possibility keeps the current setup from being a straightforward bear-market call. Bitcoin continues to have institutional holders, public-company buyers, and long-term investors. Development across the broader digital asset industry has not stopped, and the ETF market remains an established bridge between Bitcoin and traditional finance.

But the immediate question is narrower. Bitcoin does not need institutions to abandon it to face pressure. It only needs the largest buyers to slow down, sell selectively, or stop absorbing supply at the same pace.

That is what the market is confronting now.

Until ETF flows stabilize, treasury-company demand recovers, or trading activity returns to Bitcoin-linked equities, the market may remain exposed to a more difficult reality: the institutional bid is still there, but it is no longer strong enough to carry the trade on its own.

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TL;DR

• Coinbase’s Quantum Advisory Council says post-quantum migration planning should begin before quantum attacks become practical.
• The report estimates about 7 million BTC are quantum-vulnerable because public keys are exposed through legacy formats or address reuse.
• About 1.7 million BTC are said to sit in legacy Pay-to-Public-Key addresses, including early mined and potentially abandoned coins.
• The council frames the issue as a long-term governance challenge, not an immediate emergency.

Coinbase’s Quantum Advisory Council has warned that Bitcoin and other crypto networks need to begin planning for post-quantum migration well before quantum computers can realistically break today’s public-key cryptography.

In a June 11 report titled “Post-Quantum Migration and Abandoned Coins,” the council framed the issue as both a technical migration problem and a governance dilemma. The core question is not only how to move users to quantum-safe addresses, but what the network should do about coins that are never migrated.

The report says no current quantum computer can break the cryptography securing crypto assets today. However, it argues that the risk is strategically important because decentralized ecosystems can take years to coordinate major upgrades, especially when user funds, abandoned wallets, and property rights are involved.

Why Some Bitcoin Is More Exposed

The Coinbase report estimates that roughly 7 million BTC are currently quantum-vulnerable. That figure includes coins in address types where public keys are already visible, as well as coins tied to address reuse, where a public key becomes exposed after a transaction is broadcast.

One especially sensitive category is legacy Pay-to-Public-Key addresses. The report says about 1.7 million BTC are held in these P2PK addresses, where public keys are directly visible. That bucket includes early mined coins, including coins associated with Bitcoin’s earliest history, as well as funds that may be lost or abandoned.

The issue is different from an ordinary software upgrade. Active users can be told to move funds to quantum-safe addresses once suitable signature schemes are ready. Abandoned coins, lost wallets, and dormant early addresses are harder because nobody may be available to move them.

The Governance Dilemma

The council outlined several broad paths. One option is a hard migration deadline, after which non-migrated vulnerable funds could be frozen or burned to prevent future quantum theft. That approach prioritizes network safety but raises serious property-rights questions.

A second option is to preserve rights and do nothing, leaving vulnerable coins untouched. That avoids forced intervention but could allow future attackers to steal exposed funds if quantum capabilities eventually become strong enough.

The report also discusses middle-ground ideas. These include rate-limiting how much can be moved from older addresses in any one block-like time interval, sometimes described as an hourglass mechanism, and using zero-knowledge proofs such as BIP-361 to let users prove ownership of old keys without exposing sensitive information.

Planning Before The Crisis

The council’s practical recommendation is to separate engineering work from the governance fight. In other words, the industry can start building and testing quantum-safe signatures now while still debating how abandoned or vulnerable coins should be handled later.

That distinction matters. Waiting until quantum attacks are imminent would leave networks trying to coordinate technical upgrades, wallet migrations, exchange support, and community governance under pressure. Starting early gives developers and users more room to test systems and avoid rushed decisions.

For Bitcoin holders, the takeaway is not that coins are suddenly unsafe today. It is that long-lived digital assets need long-lived security planning. The more value sits in crypto networks over decades, the more important it becomes to plan for cryptographic transitions before they become emergencies.

Coinbase’s report adds another major voice to that conversation. The debate over abandoned coins will not be easy, but the council’s message is clear: the post-quantum migration question is no longer theoretical enough to ignore.

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