On 23 May 2026 Brescia once again proved itself Italy’s Bitcoin capital. The Teatro Clerici — a new, larger venue compared to previous editions — hosted the fourth edition of the BitCare Forum, the only conference in Italy dedicated exclusively to Bitcoin and conducted entirely in Italian. It’s an event that has grown edition after edition: in 2025 it had already drawn 1,200 people to the Brescia Chamber of Commerce, and this year it aimed to beat that record with a venue seating 1,800 in front of the main stage.

What the BitCare Forum is — and why it exists

The crypto conference scene in Italy is crowded with generalist events that mix Bitcoin, altcoins, NFTs, DeFi and every kind of speculative financial product. The BitCare Forum was born in 2023 with a radically different idea: one asset, one language, one standard. No altcoins, no shitcoins, no exceptions.

This approach reflects a specific vision of the Bitcoin world: the view that Bitcoin is not simply “the oldest” among many equivalent projects, but something structurally different — a neutral monetary protocol, censorship-resistant, with a fixed supply of 21 million. It’s a thesis that in Brescia isn’t preached but discussed, analysed and tested live.

The event is organised by CDS SRL, based in Provaglio d’Iseo, and the forum is backed by an ecosystem of Bitcoin-only sponsors: BitBox (the Swiss hardware wallets), TaxCare (Bitcoin taxation), Liana Wallet, Seedor, Bringin, CheckSig, Villaggio Bitcoin and more. Media partners: Atlas21 and Bitcoin Italia Podcast.

The fourth edition: three stages, one city

The 2026 edition took place at the Teatro Clerici in Brescia, at Via San Zeno 168. Compared to the Chamber of Commerce that hosted the 2025 event, the new venue can accommodate larger audiences and structure the event across multiple parallel spaces:

Red Stage — the main stage inside the theatre, seating 1,800. This is where the talks and panels with the best-known speakers, both national and international, took place. Accessible only with a Pro, Maxi or Premium ticket.

Green Stage — inside the IceRink, dedicated to workshops, technical sessions and more interactive panels. Also accessible with the Social ticket (€49), designed for those who want to learn without already having an advanced background.

Blue Stage — also in the IceRink, focused on discovering the products and services of the companies operating in the Bitcoin ecosystem: wallets, peer-to-peer exchanges, custody solutions, business tools.

Alongside these were the Bitcoin Bazar — where you can buy goods and services paying in bitcoin — and the Games Area run by Bitpolito, with Chain Duel, table football, arcade games and card games for learning Bitcoin technology in a playful way.

The topics at the heart of the debate

The BitCare Forum is not a trade fair disguised as a conference. The panels are often uncomfortable, the speakers contradict one another, and audience questions put people on the spot. In previous editions this approach has produced some of the most interesting Italian-language discussions on the future of the protocol.

In 2025 the dominant themes had been: on-chain privacy, home mining, Italian tax regulations, and the relationship between Bitcoin and the mainstream media. An entire panel had been devoted to the possibility of a 51% attack on the Bitcoin network — a thorny topic, but tackled with technical rigour by Rikki, Guybrush, Daniela Brozzoni and others. The closing panel, “The future of Bitcoin: glory or death”, had brought Giacomo Zucco, Marco Argentieri, Federico Tenga and David Coen around the same table to discuss the possible scenarios for the protocol’s future soft forks.

In 2026, the anticipated themes followed the same track: Lightning Network and second-layer protocols (including Ark), advanced privacy (taproot, coinjoin, silent payments), European regulation (DAC8, MiCA and the implications for self-custody), Bitcoin in business and possible protocol upgrades. In a global context where governments and financial institutions are progressively trying to fit Bitcoin into their own control frameworks, the technical and ideological conversation takes on a concrete urgency.

Giacomo Zucco and the Italian Bitcoin-only tradition

No list of speakers at the BitCare Forum would be complete without mentioning Giacomo Zucco — probably the best-known Bitcoin-only voice in Italy, an international consultant, co-founder of BHB Network and a point of reference for the European cypherpunk movement. His 2025 talk on the pragmatism of the Cypherpunk movement had connected the origins of the ideology to Bitcoin’s technical structure: the centrality of privacy, the paradox between secrecy and transparency, digital agorism.

Over the years he has been joined by names such as Francis Pouliot (CEO of Bull Bitcoin), Martina Granatiero, Federico Tenga (Bitfinex and Ark), Daniela Brozzoni, Marco Argentieri — and dozens of developers, entrepreneurs and educators who form the backbone of the Italian community.

This is probably the BitCare Forum’s most important legacy: building, year after year, an Italian Bitcoin community that meets in person, debates technically, and resists the temptation to dilute the message in order to attract a wider audience.

The Academy: Bitcoin for businesses

One of the most significant innovations of the 2025 edition — confirmed again in 2026 — was the Academy: a training track reserved for entrepreneurs and professionals, focused on real-world use cases of Bitcoin in a corporate setting. Not abstract theory, but practical questions: how do you integrate Bitcoin into a company’s treasury? What are the tax implications? How do you manage custody in a corporate context?

The day before the conference also featured the Bitcoin Hack Day — aimed at developers and technicians — with talks on privacy, descriptors, Bitcoin Core, hardware wallets and soft forks.

Why Brescia, why Bitcoin-only

There’s something meaningful in the fact that Italy’s only Bitcoin-only conference isn’t held in Milan, Rome or Turin, but in Brescia. An industrial, pragmatic city, not much given to spectacular narratives. In a way, it seems like the right choice.

And the Bitcoin-only format isn’t a marketing decision but a decision of consistency. In an ecosystem where many events are funded by altcoin projects seeking visibility, holding the line means turning down sponsors, lowering margins and shrinking the potential audience. It means betting that the quality of the conversation matters more than the number of attendees.

After four editions, it looks like a winning bet.

Conclusion

The BitCare Forum 2026 was more than a conference: it’s proof that the Italian Bitcoin community exists, organises itself, grows and debates without compromise. For those who couldn’t make it, the recordings will be available on the official channels in the months following the event. For those who were there — or for anyone who regrets missing it — the date is already set: same place, same city, same protocol. Next year.

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