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Jack Mallers is out at Twenty One Capital. The company confirmed on July 21, 2026, that Mallers had stepped down as CEO, with Raphael Zagury, the founder and CEO of Elektron Energy, stepping in as his replacement.
Mallers retains his role as CEO of Strike, the Lightning Network payments platform that made him a prominent figure in crypto circles.
A company still finding its footing
Twenty One Capital was announced in April 2025 as a Bitcoin-native public company, entering the market with over 43,000 BTC on its balance sheet. The structure was purpose-built: a SPAC merger with Cantor Equity Partners, backed by Tether as a major stakeholder, designed to give traditional investors a way to hold Bitcoin exposure through a publicly traded vehicle.
The company completed its NYSE listing in December 2025 under the ticker $XXI. Initial shares saw a significant decline after listing.
In May 2026, Tether acquired SoftBank’s stake in Twenty One Capital, giving it majority ownership of the firm. Tether, the issuer of the world’s most widely used stablecoin, now holds the keys to a publicly listed Bitcoin treasury with approximately 43,500 BTC on its books.
The merger that won’t happen
The proposed merger between Twenty One Capital, Strike, and Elektron Energy will not proceed. That deal had been floated as a way to combine treasury management, Bitcoin payments infrastructure via the Lightning Network, and energy operations into a single integrated platform.
Mallers, for his part, stays focused on Strike, where he has spent years building Bitcoin payment rails. His departure from Twenty One Capital effectively unwinds the personal overlap that made the proposed merger feel coherent in the first place.
What this means for investors
The abandonment of the Strike merger removes one of the company’s most interesting strategic differentiators. Without a payments angle, Twenty One Capital looks more like a straightforward Bitcoin holding vehicle, which puts it in direct competition with every other publicly traded Bitcoin treasury company, including Strategy, which pioneered the model and still holds the largest corporate Bitcoin position in the world.
Investors who bought into $XXI based on the original vision are now holding shares in a company with a new CEO, a narrower strategy, and a Tether-controlled board. The stock’s initial post-listing decline already suggested the market had reservations.
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