According to Woofun AI, Datavault AI Inc. (DVLT.US) shares suffered a sharp decline on Tuesday, falling 49.55% to close at $0.067 on volume of roughly 244 million shares, with the core trigger being the company's inability since June to withdraw the Bitcoin it holds from a wallet maintained by crypto trading platform Biconomy.
This liquidity exhaustion event has forced Datavault AI Inc. (DVLT.US) to restate its financial statements, fundamentally altering the market's expectations regarding its asset position.
A more critical variable lies in the nature of this asset transfer. Tracing back to September 2025, Datavault reached an agreement with Scilex Holding Company (SCLX.US), under which the latter agreed to purchase $150 million worth of Datavault shares and warrants using Bitcoin. Scilex transferred 1,309.04 Bitcoin to Datavault's account at Biconomy through an off-chain transfer, a process that was not executed via a transaction on the Bitcoin blockchain.
Subsequently, Datavault sold 491.4 Bitcoin back to Scilex for approximately $40.5 million in cash, leaving 817.64 Bitcoin still stranded in the Biconomy account and unable to be withdrawn.
According to data compiled by Woofun AI, Scilex disclosed in its June financial report that it had used $200 million worth of stock from its subsidiary Semnur to exchange for Bitcoin, then allocated $150 million of that to purchase Datavault securities, with Biconomy participating in the Bitcoin supply side of this investment.
However, Datavault stated that when it attempted to transfer these Bitcoin to an external account in June, the transaction was unsuccessful, and as of the filing on Monday, the transfer remained incomplete.
The company further warned in the same filing that this restatement could lead to a delayed submission of its third-quarter 2026 report and bring about Nasdaq listing compliance risks; management has not yet completed its assessment of whether these matters constitute a material internal control deficiency.
From a structural perspective, Datavault currently believes that the Bitcoin transferred in through the Scilex investment should be treated as share subscription amounts owed by Scilex, which should be recorded in shareholders' equity rather than listed among the company's cryptocurrency assets.
This adjustment in accounting classification will have far-reaching implications: the revision is expected to reduce total assets as of September 30, 2025, December 31, 2025, March 31, 2026, and June 30, 2026 by $8.1 million, $92.2 million, $57.1 million, and $49 million, respectively.
Previously, Datavault had regarded these Bitcoin balances as funds available to sustain business operations, but it must now reassess this position and acknowledge that these assets are essentially not freely disposable.
As of the Asian session on Wednesday, CoinDesk contacted Biconomy regarding the withdrawal request and the Bitcoin backing Datavault's account, but has not yet received a response.
This marks yet another trust crisis triggered by the disconnect between private agreements and on-chain ownership confirmation, following similar off-chain asset disputes at several crypto custodians, highlighting the enormous compliance and execution risks inherent in non-transparent asset transfer models.
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