A Nasdaq company says it hasn't been able to withdraw its bitcoin from an exchange since June. The lesson for everyone who leaves crypto on one

Datavault AI, a company listed on the Nasdaq Capital Market, has told investors it can't get its bitcoin out of a crypto exchange. It asked to withdraw in June and, by its own account, still hasn't been able to. The details are corporate, but the lesson is the oldest one in crypto: coins sitting on an exchange are only as good as the exchange's ability to send them when you ask.

What the filing says

Datavault filed a Form 8-K with the SEC, dated October 26, 2026. Under the heading for financial statements that can no longer be relied on, it laid out this history:

• September 25, 2025: Scilex agreed to buy 15,000,000 Datavault shares plus a pre-funded warrant for 263,914,094 more, for $150 million paid in bitcoin, about 1,328.43 BTC at the agreed price of $112,915.52 per coin.
• September and November 2025: Through an off-chain transfer, Scilex credited 1,309.04 BTC to an account Datavault held at BICONOMY PTE. LTD. The filing says that figure reflects a 19.39 BTC reduction for cash advances Scilex made to Datavault before the deal's final closing.
• September 2025 to January 2026: Datavault sold 491.431 of those BTC back to Scilex, again off-chain, for about $40.5 million in cash.
• June 2026: Datavault asked to withdraw bitcoin from the Biconomy account to an outside account. As of the filing, it says it "has been unable to complete the withdrawal." The filing doesn't say why.

Scilex's own quarterly report adds where the bitcoin came from: in September 2025, Scilex sold shares of its subsidiary Semnur to Biconomy for $200 million in bitcoin, then used $150 million of it to buy the Datavault stock. So, according to the two companies' filings, Biconomy was both the buyer that paid Scilex in bitcoin and the platform holding Datavault's account.

Why the company is rewriting its books

After reviewing the deal, Datavault concluded that the bitcoin tied to it never met the requirements to count as the company's own digital asset. Instead it will treat the deal as money Scilex still owes for the shares (a "subscription receivable"), which reduces shareholders' equity. In practice:

• Its quarterly and annual statements from September 30, 2025 through June 30, 2026, four sets in all, "should no longer be relied upon."
• The restatements are expected to lower reported total assets by $8.1 million at September 30, 2025, $92.2 million at the end of 2025, $57.1 million at March 31, 2026 and $49.0 million at June 30, 2026. The company calls these figures preliminary and unaudited.
• Because it had counted the bitcoin as a source of cash, and says collecting from Scilex is uncertain, management is reassessing the going-concern evaluations for 2025 and the first quarter of 2026.

Investors reacted fast. CoinDesk reported that the stock closed at $0.067 on October 27, down 49.55%. CoinDesk also said Biconomy hadn't responded to its questions. We found no public statement from Biconomy when we published.

Why this matters if you hold crypto

Most people never deal with 8-K filings or subscription receivables. But the core problem here applies to anyone with an exchange account.

When you buy bitcoin on an exchange and leave it there, you don't hold bitcoin on the blockchain. You hold a balance in the exchange's records, a promise that it will send you the coins when you ask. That's called custodial storage. Transfers between two customers of the same exchange are usually "off-chain": the company edits its ledger, and nothing appears on Bitcoin's public blockchain that outsiders can check.

That's normal and convenient, and it works as long as the exchange holds what it owes and honors withdrawals. The test comes when you try to withdraw. Datavault's filing says only that it couldn't complete one, not why, and no one has said the coins are gone. But it shows how a number on a screen can stay out of reach for months.

What this means for you

• Know who holds your keys. On an exchange, the company does. In a self-custody wallet, you do, and you carry the responsibility for your backup.
• Stick to established US platforms if you use an exchange, and read how they handle customer assets. Our exchange reviews explain what to check.
• Test withdrawals. A small test withdrawal to your own wallet confirms the path works before you ever need it in a hurry.
• Treat delays as a warning sign. A withdrawal stuck for weeks with no clear explanation is a reason to stop adding funds and ask questions in writing, not a reason to send more.
• Be wary of unverifiable balances. Off-chain balances can't be checked on the blockchain. That's one reason many holders keep larger amounts in a wallet they can check themselves.

New to wallets? Our guide to how crypto wallets work compares exchange accounts, app wallets and hardware wallets.

The takeaway

Datavault AI says it hasn't been able to withdraw its bitcoin from the Biconomy exchange since June, has concluded that the bitcoin never counted as its own asset, and will restate four sets of results. Why the withdrawal failed hasn't been explained. For everyone else, it's a plain reminder that an exchange balance is a claim on a company, and coins become yours to control only once they're in a wallet whose keys you hold. This is education, not financial advice, and it reflects Datavault's SEC filing and news reports as of October 28, 2026.

Published October 28, 2026 by Dave McNaught. Educational content, not financial, legal or tax advice. Spot an error? Request a correction.

About the author

Dave McNaught

Dave McNaught has worked in IT since 1999 and founded All Business Technologies (ABT) in 2003, a Boston-area firm providing Managed IT, Cybersecurity, Managed AI, Web Design and App Development. He publishes The Crypto Guide.

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