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š„ More Americans hold BTC than gold? š¤Æ
PLUS: VC crypto funding just hit $7.7B (YTD) š°
Todayās edition is brought to you by Meanwhile - the life insurance that lets you access your Bitcoin wealth tax-efficiently while you're still alive.

GM. This is Milk Road, your one-stop crypto shop for news, insights, and un-solicited pop culture references.
Hereās what we got for you today:
āļø Funding Friday
āļø More Americans hold $BTC than gold?
āļø What you missed in macro this week
šļø The Milk Road Show: Bitcoin Is Winning the Macro Game w/ Coinbase Head of Research David Duong

FUNDING FRIDAY š°
Thatās right ā Funding Friday is back baaaby!
(If youāre new here, this is kinda like the Milk Road version of the McRib returning.)
The segment works like this:
We gather a list of crypto companies that have recently received funding ā lay out how much money theyāve just pocketed ā tell you what theyāre trying to build with it.
First, hereāre the blockchains that saw the most āmonetary loveā last week:
And now for the main eventā¦
1/ World (aka: Worldcoin) raised $135M from Andreessen Horowitz, Bain Capital Crypto, Selini Capital, Mirana Ventures, Arctic Digital.
In case you havenāt seen pictures of/doomsday posts about Worldās big iris-scanning-orbs ā theyāre trying to create a āproof of humanityā system where you:
Scan your iris ā get added to the network & receive some tokens ā can prove online that youāre a human and not an AI by signing in with a World wallet.
ā¦unless youāre a rogue AI that has stolen a humanās World ID ā but thatās a (dystopian horror) story for another day.
2/ Slash raised $41M from Goodwater Capital
Imagine if the tabs in your bank app read āchecking, savings, crypto.ā
Thatās what Slash is trying to bring to the table ā all of your fiat nā crypto finances, under one roof, and tailored to business customers.
3/ Catena Labs raised $18M from Andreessen Horowitz, Coinbase Ventures, Breyer Capital, Circle Ventures.
Q: If youāre a financial firm, how do you let AI Agents hold assets and trade on your behalf, without breaking regulatory guidelines?
A: No idea, but Catena Labs is trying to figure that out (and monetize it.)
In total, 19 crypto startups raised $246.4M last week ā bringing the total funding raised in 2025 up to ā wait for itā¦
$7.7B! Thatās an 89% increase compared to this same period in 2024. š
I know, I know. Life insurance = snooze fest.
But hear me out for a sec ā this oneās different:
Meanwhile's BTC Whole Life insurance product lets you benefit by allowing you to borrow money from your policy as a tax-free loan.
Hereās how it works:
Say you pay into the policy today when Bitcoin is at $100K
Fast forward to 2035ā¦and Bitcoinās at $1M (nice!)
You borrow a Bitcoin from your policy and sell it right away for $1M cash
The best part? No capital gains tax on the $900K appreciation.
Pretty neat, huh? Click below to learn more! š

ITāS OFFICIAL: AMERICANS LOVE $BTC MORE THAN GOLD ā„ļø
First three thoughts that come to mind after looking at this chart? š
1/ Holy hell ā more Americans hold $BTC than Gold??
2/ Thereās no way this chart takes ownership of gold jewelry into account
3/ Thereās room to grow! (49.6M people is roughly ~15% of the total US population)
Ok, now ā on that last point, we have good newsā¦
The ownership gap is most likely about to widen in Bitcoinās favor, thanks to this:
This means that 401k providers will now encounter less red tape if/when they choose to allocate to Bitcoin.
ā¦are they all going to rush in and start allocating? Hell no.
And the ones that do are probably going to do so in small percentages.
But hereās the thingā¦
Thereās roughly $8.9 trillion locked up in 401k accounts right now.
So even if only a small percentage of a small portion of providers decide to allocate to $BTC ā it still has the potential to be massive!

WHAT YOU MISSED IN MACRO THIS WEEK š
We just wrapped up the first week of Milk Road Macroā¦and thousands of you signed up to learn macro investing on āeasy mode.ā
Weāre still catching our breath (and refreshing the sub count), but the early reviews are in:

Weāre flattered. And slightly concerned that a university education is losing out to a free newsletter with memes.
Hereās what we covered:
šµ How the U.S. dollar (DXY) quietly influences the crypto cycle ā and why a weaker dollar now might mean a stronger Bitcoin by summer
š Why rising yields could be good for your bags ā because when the 10-year hits 4.5%, the government hits the liquidity button
Itās all delivered twice a week. Readable, fast, no econ degree required.
š Havenāt subscribed yet? Fix that:

The connection between sports and Web3 is only getting stronger. We just dropped an article on how Chilizās fan tokens let you turn game day hype into potential profits.*
Remember the hack on Cetus? The Sui-based DEX has now fully reimbursed users. Pretty fkn impressive.
Crypto-friendly SEC, baaaby! Theyāve now dropped the lawsuit against Binance after two-years of back and forth.
Everything is slowly going to get automated. Unstake lets you deploy no-code AI agents to manage communites on X and Telegram. Yep, weāre all getting replaced soon.
A new position just opened up. Weāre lookinā for a detail-obsessed operator to take the reins of Milk Road PRO.
Invest as you spend with the Gemini Credit CardĀ®. Get approved by 6/30/25 to earn $200 in Bitcoin when you spend $3,000 in your first 90 days. Issued by WebBank. Terms apply.**
*this is sponsored content.
**this is partner content.

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