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“No sympathy for the devil; keep that in mind. Buy the ticket, take the ride...and if it occasionally gets a little heavier than what you had in mind, well...maybe chalk it up to forced consciousness expansion: Tune in, freak out, get beaten.” – Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

Tune in. Freak out. Get beaten. Thompson could have easily written those lines about anyone who invested in bitcoin in 2025, only to see its value cut in half in a matter of months as 2025 sprang into 2026.

Even so, if you didn’t know there was a bear market, nothing would alert you to the contrary walking the labyrinthian halls of Bitcoin 2026.

The conference definitely drew fewer attendees than last year (I heard from one employee, for instance, that they were expecting ~25,000 this year, whereas 2025 drew 31,000+ according to Nakamoto (NASDAQ: NAKA)’s 2025 10-K).

But the turnout, energy, and engagement from Bitcoin companies was surprisingly resilient given current market conditions. And as I’ll get into below, this was the first Bitcoin Conference with Nakamoto acting as parent company to the combined NAKA/BTC Inc. entity following the February 2026 acquisition, and this combination changed very little about how BTC Inc. ran the conference – and who attended it. 

This was BTC Inc’s seventh conference, and it’s coming at a time of unprecedented flux in Bitcoin’s business landscape as institutions continue to march into the market, while entrenched industries like bitcoin mining are being remodelled almost overnight. 

With that flux in mind, here are my takeaways from Bitcoin 2026.

The biggest takeaway, perhaps, is that former BTC Inc. CEO David Bailey didn’t burn as much goodwill with Nakamoto (NASDAQ: NAKA) as many thought.

There was plenty of hemming and hawing among Bitcoin maximalists about boycotting the event because Bailey “rug pulled” or “scammed” investors with NAKA. But if Bitcoiners did boycott it, nobody noticed – except those who didn’t show up.

Or as BTC Inc’s newly minted CEO Brandon Bailey put it on a recent Blockspace Live, “the people that are most upset about the conference are the ones that secretly have FOMO and are staying home.”

Instead, the scene on the ground was indistinguishable from conference’s past: plebs mingling with plebs, industry heads rushing around for back-to-back meetings, and all the corporate logos synonymous with Bitcoin blazoned on the expo floor. 

This is still the conference to go to in Bitcoin, and it looks like they had no trouble securing attendees or sponsors for the event. Business as usual.

So all told, Bailey’s foibles with NAKA did not harm the conference, just like countless maximalist scandals – from Ordinals to Bailey’s endorsements of Trump – did nothing to tarnish it in years past. 

Maybe next time, the dissidents would have more luck with their boycott if they glued themselves to one of the stages like Just Stop Oil protesters.

Galaxy Digital reported a $216 million net loss for the first quarter ended March 31, 2026, narrower than the $482 million loss in the same period a year earlier. The company said falling cryptocurrency prices drove the result, with total - link

Bitcoin mining service firm Luxor has expanded its LuxOS firmware to MicroBT’s WhatsMiner machines and signed a term sheet for a strategic investment from MicroBT, alongside a planned $100 million hardware purchase. - link

Canaan said Tuesday it received a follow-on order from Tether for high-density mining hash board modules designed for immersion-cooled mining systems. The modules will be deployed to a Tether-affiliated mining facility in South America. - link

Strategy sold 1,451,601 Class A common shares for $255 million in net proceeds and used that capital to buy 3,273 bitcoin during the week of April 20 to April 26, according to an 8-K filed with the SEC on Monday. - link