From "Crime Cycle" to Value Reversion: Four Crypto Market Opportunities to Watch in 2026
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From "Crime Cycle" to Value Reversion: Four Crypto Market Opportunities to Watch in 2026
We are undergoing a "cleansing" required by the market, which will make the crypto ecosystem better than ever before, even ten times better.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsAuthor: Poopman
Translation: TechFlow
Ansem has declared the market at its peak, calling this cycle a "crime."
High FDV (fully diluted valuation) projects with no real utility have drained the last dollar from the crypto space. The mass packaging and selling of memecoins have damaged the industry's reputation in the public eye.
Worse still, almost no capital is being reinvested back into the ecosystem.
On the other hand, nearly every airdrop has devolved into a "pump and dump" scam. The sole purpose of token generation events (TGEs) seems to be providing early participants and teams with exit liquidity.
Diamond-handed holders and long-term investors are suffering heavy losses, while most altcoins have never recovered.
The bubble is bursting, token prices are crashing, and people are furious.
Does this mean it's all over?
Tough times create strong builders.
Fairly speaking, 2025 hasn't been a bad year.
We've seen many excellent projects emerge. Projects like Hyperliquid, MetaDAO, Pump.fun, Pendle, and FomoApp have proven that there are still genuine builders pushing the space forward the right way.
This is a necessary "cleansing" to remove bad actors.
We're reflecting and will keep improving.
Now, to attract more capital inflows and users, we need to showcase more real-world use cases, actual business models, and revenue streams that bring tangible value to tokens. I believe this is exactly where the industry should head in 2026.
2025: The Year of Stablecoins, PerpDex, and DAT
Stablecoins mature further
In July 2025, the "Genius Act" was officially signed, marking the first regulatory framework for payment stablecoins, requiring them to be backed 1:1 by cash or short-term Treasuries.
Since then, traditional finance (TradFi) interest in stablecoins has grown steadily, with net inflows exceeding $100 billion this year alone—the strongest year in stablecoin history.
RWA.xyz
Institutional players favor stablecoins, seeing great potential in replacing traditional payment systems due to:
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Lower-cost and more efficient cross-border transactions
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Instant settlement
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Low transaction fees
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24/7 availability
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Hedging against local currency volatility
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On-chain transparency
We’ve witnessed major tech acquisitions (e.g., Stripe acquiring Bridge and Privy), Circle’s IPO receiving oversubscription, and multiple top-tier banks collectively expressing interest in launching their own stablecoins.
All signs indicate that stablecoins have indeed matured significantly over the past year.
Stablewatch
Beyond payments, another major use case for stablecoins is earning permissionless yield—what we call Yield-Bearing Stablecoins (YBS).
This year, YBS total supply effectively doubled to $12.5 billion, driven primarily by yield providers such as BlackRock BUIDL, Ethena, and sUSDs.
Despite rapid growth, recent incidents like Stream Finance and broader market weakness have dampened sentiment and reduced yields on these products.
Nevertheless, stablecoins remain one of the few truly sustainable and growing businesses in crypto.
PerpDex (Perpetual Decentralized Exchanges):
PerpDex has been another star of the year.
According to DeFiLlama data, PerpDex open interest grew an average of 3–4x—from $3 billion to $11 billion—and briefly peaked at $23 billion.
Trading volume in perpetual contracts also surged, increasing fourfold since the start of the year—from an impressive $80 billion weekly volume to over $300 billion weekly (partially fueled by points farming)—making it one of the fastest-growing sectors in crypto.
However, after the significant market correction on October 10 and subsequent downturn, both metrics have begun to show signs of slowing.
PerpDex Open Interest (OI), Data source: DeFiLlama
The rapid rise of PerpDex poses a real threat to the dominance of centralized exchanges (CEX).
Take Hyperliquid, for example—its perpetual trading volume has reached 10% of Binance’s, and the trend continues. This isn’t surprising, as traders can find advantages on PerpDex not available on CEX perpetuals:
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No KYC required
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Decent liquidity, sometimes rivaling CEX levels
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Airdrop speculation opportunities
Valuation games are another key factor.
Hyperliquid demonstrated that PerpDex platforms can achieve extremely high valuations, attracting a wave of new entrants.
Some newcomers are backed by major VCs or CEXs (e.g., Lighter, Aster), while others differentiate through native mobile apps or loss-reimbursement mechanisms (e.g., Egdex, Variational).
Retail investors have high expectations for high FDV (fully diluted valuation) at launch and anticipate generous airdrops, fueling today’s "points war."
While PerpDex can be highly profitable, Hyperliquid chose to reinvest profits back into the token by using its "Assistance Fund" to buy back $HYPE (buybacks totaling 3.6% of total supply so far).
This buyback mechanism, delivering real value accrual, became a key driver of the token’s success and effectively pioneered the "buyback metaverse" trend—prompting investors to demand stronger value anchoring instead of high-FDV governance tokens with no utility.
DAT (Digital Asset Treasuries):
Due to Trump’s pro-crypto stance, we saw massive institutional and Wall Street capital flow into crypto.
Inspired by MicroStrategy’s strategy, DAT has become one of the primary ways for traditional finance (TradFi) to gain indirect exposure to crypto assets.
Over the past year, approximately 76 new DATs emerged. Currently, DAT treasuries hold $137 billion worth of crypto assets—over 82% in Bitcoin (BTC), about 13% in Ethereum (ETH), and the rest spread across various altcoins.
See chart below:
Bitmine (BMNR)
Tom Lee’s Bitmine (BMNR) became one of the standout highlights of the DAT craze and the largest ETH buyer among all DAT participants.
However, despite initial excitement, most DAT stocks experienced "pump and dump" action within the first 10 days. Since October 10, capital inflows into DATs have plummeted 90% compared to July levels, and most DATs now have mNAV below 1, indicating premium erosion—effectively signaling the end of the DAT hype cycle.
From this cycle, we learned the following:
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Blockchains need more real-world applications.
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The primary use cases in crypto remain trading, yield, and payments.
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Today, people prefer protocols with fee-generation potential over purely decentralized ones (source: @EbisuEthan).
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Most tokens need stronger value anchors tied to protocol fundamentals to protect and reward long-term holders.
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More mature regulation and legislative environments will boost confidence for builders and talent joining the space.
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Information has become a tradable asset on the internet (source: PM, Kaito).
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New Layer 1/Layer 2 projects without clear positioning or competitive advantage will gradually fade away.
So what comes next?
2026: The Year of Prediction Markets, More Stablecoins, More Mobile Apps, and Real Revenue
I believe crypto will evolve in four directions in 2026:
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Prediction Markets
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More stablecoin payment services
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Greater adoption of mobile dApps
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More real revenue generation
Prediction Markets Again
Undoubtedly, prediction markets have become one of the hottest sectors in crypto.
"Bet on anything"
"90% accuracy predicting real-world outcomes"
"Participants bear their own risk"
These headlines attracted massive attention, and the fundamentals are equally compelling.
At the time of writing, weekly trading volume in prediction markets has already surpassed peak levels seen during election periods—even including wash trading.
Today, giants like Polymarket and Kalshi dominate distribution channels and liquidity, leaving little room for undifferentiated competitors to gain meaningful market share (except Opinion Lab).
Institutions are entering too—Polymarket received investment from ICE at an $8 billion valuation, with secondary market valuations reaching $12–15 billion. Meanwhile, Kalshi raised its Series E at an $11 billion valuation.
This momentum is unstoppable.
Moreover, with the upcoming $POLY token launch, anticipated IPO, and mainstream distribution via platforms like Robinhood and Google Search, prediction markets are likely to become one of the dominant narratives in 2026.
That said, prediction markets still have room for improvement—such as optimizing outcome resolution and dispute mechanisms, developing defenses against malicious traffic, and maintaining user engagement over long feedback cycles—all areas needing further development.
Besides the dominant players, we can also expect new, more personalized prediction markets, such as @BentoDotFun.
Stablecoin Payments
Post-"Genius Act," increased institutional interest and activity in stablecoin payments have become a major driver of widespread adoption.
Over the past year, monthly stablecoin transaction volume has climbed to nearly $3 trillion, with adoption accelerating rapidly. While imperfect as a metric, it clearly reflects the significant increase in stablecoin usage following the "Genius Act" and Europe’s MiCA framework.
Meanwhile, Visa, Mastercard, and Stripe are actively embracing stablecoin payments—whether by supporting stablecoin spending via traditional payment rails or partnering with CEXs (e.g., Mastercard with OKX Pay). Merchants can now accept stablecoin payments regardless of how customers pay, demonstrating Web2 giants’ confidence and flexibility toward this asset class.
At the same time, crypto-native banking services like Etherfi and Argent (now rebranded as Ready) have started offering card products allowing direct stablecoin spending.
For example, Etherfi’s daily spending has steadily grown to over $1 million per day, with no sign of slowing down.
Etherfi
Nonetheless, challenges remain for crypto-native banks, including high customer acquisition costs (CAC) and difficulty monetizing deposits due to self-custody models.
Potential solutions include integrating in-app token swaps or repackaging yield products as financial services sold to users.
With payment-focused chains like @tempo and @Plasma gaining traction, I expect significant growth in payments—especially given Stripe and Paradigm’s distribution power and brand influence.
Mobile App Adoption
Smartphones are becoming increasingly ubiquitous worldwide, with younger generations driving the shift toward digital payments.
To date, nearly 10% of daily transactions globally are conducted via mobile devices. Southeast Asia leads this trend due to its "mobile-first" culture.
Payment Method Rankings by Country
This represents a fundamental behavioral shift in traditional payment networks, and I believe this transition will naturally extend into crypto as mobile transaction infrastructure has improved dramatically compared to just a few years ago.
Remember account abstraction, unified interfaces, and mobile SDKs from tools like Privy?
User onboarding experiences on mobile are now much smoother than two years ago.
According to a16z Crypto research, the number of crypto mobile wallet users grew 23% year-over-year, and this trend shows no signs of slowing.
Beyond Gen Z’s evolving spending habits, we also saw a surge in native mobile dApps in 2025.
For instance, Fomo App—a social trading app—with its intuitive and unified UX, attracted many new users, enabling anyone—even without prior knowledge—to easily participate in token trading.
Developed in just six months, the app achieved an average daily trading volume of $3 million and peaked at $13 million in October.
Following Fomo’s rise, major players like Aave and Polymarket began prioritizing mobile savings and betting experiences. Newcomers like @sproutfi_xyz are experimenting with mobile-first yield models.
As mobile behavior continues to grow, I expect mobile dApps to become one of the fastest-expanding areas in 2026.
Give Me More Revenue
One simple reason why people struggle to believe in this cycle:
Most tokens listed on major exchanges still generate little to no meaningful revenue, and even when they do, there’s often no value anchoring between the token and its underlying “equity.” Once the narrative fades, these tokens fail to attract sustainable buyers—leading inevitably in one direction: down.
Clearly, the crypto industry relies too heavily on speculation and too little on real business fundamentals.
Most DeFi projects fall into the trap of designing "Ponzi schemes" to drive early adoption, only to shift focus post-TGE from building lasting products to figuring out how to dump.
To date, only 60 protocols have generated over $1 million in revenue over 30 days. In contrast, around 5,000–7,000 Web2 IT companies achieve monthly revenues at this level.
Luckily, under Trump’s pro-crypto policies, change began in 2025—enabling profit sharing and helping solve the long-standing issue of token value anchoring.
Projects like Hyperliquid, Pump, Uniswap, and Aave are now actively focusing on product and revenue growth. They recognize that crypto is an asset-holding-centric ecosystem that naturally requires active value return.
This is why buybacks became such a powerful value anchor in 2025—they represent one of the clearest signals of team-investor alignment.
Which businesses are generating the strongest revenue?
The main use cases in crypto remain trading, yield, and payments.
However, due to fee compression in blockchain infrastructure, chain-level revenue is expected to decline by about 40% this year. In contrast, DEXs, exchanges, wallets, trading terminals, and apps emerged as the biggest winners—growing 113%!
Bet more on apps and DEXs.
If you still don’t believe it, according to 1kx research, we’re actually experiencing the highest point in crypto history for value flowing to token holders. See data below:
Conclusion
The crypto industry is not over—it’s evolving. We’re undergoing a necessary "cleansing" that will leave the ecosystem stronger than ever before, potentially tenfold better.
Projects that survive, deliver real-world utility, generate real revenue, and build tokens with actual utility or value return will ultimately become the biggest winners.
2026 will be a pivotal year.
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