Kimi AI Model Shakes Crypto & AI Markets: Free K3 Release

A free AI model from Beijing, Kimi K3, just rattled crypto markets. Moonshot AI released Kimi K3 on Thursday, and its arrival sent Bitcoin and ether sliding. This 2.8 trillion-parameter model is available for free download, with full public weights coming on July 27. What's interesting is Kimi K3 scored 1,679 on Arena’s Frontend Code leaderboard, surpassing Anthropic’s Claude Fable 5 and OpenAI’s GPT-5.6. Following the announcement, Chinese AI rivals Z.ai and MiniMax saw their stocks drop by 27% and 16% respectively. Bitcoin is now increasingly behaving like a leveraged bet on the AI capital cycle, moving with semiconductor and AI infrastructure sentiment. The bottom line is new, powerful AI technology can have immediate and significant impacts across different markets.