Claims Under Review

“Bitcoin's mining difficulty is in the second-longest stretch in its history without a new all-time high.”

True, with one qualification the claim does not state. Difficulty last set an all-time high of 1.5597 × 10¹⁴ at the adjustment at height 921,312, timestamped 29 October 2025, and had not exceeded it 324 days later on 19 September 2026. Measured between successive all-time highs, the only longer completed stretch caused by a decline is the 364 days from 1 August 2011 to 30 July 2012. There is, however, a longer interval still: the 360 days from the genesis block to the first adjustment on 30 December 2009, during which difficulty sat at its floor of 1 because there was not yet enough hashrate to raise it. Ranking the current stretch second therefore requires excluding that period, which is defensible — it was a starting condition, not a decline — but it is an exclusion and it is unstated. The current stretch passes the 1 August 2011 record on 28 October 2026 and completes a full year on 29 October 2026.

3 sources · checked 19 Sep 2026

“Holding bitcoin through a regulated custodian is the same as owning bitcoin.”

Bitcoin defines ownership as control of a key. A coin is a chain of digital signatures, and it moves when the party controlling it signs. A customer whose custodian holds the keys therefore does not hold bitcoin in the protocol's sense: they hold a contractual claim against the custodian, which the custodian settles from keys it controls. Deutsche Bank's September 16, 2026 announcement describes exactly that arrangement in its own words. Custody can be prudent, insured, and for some institutions the only lawful option. It is a different relationship to the asset, not the same one.

2 sources · checked 16 Sep 2026