Vanguard compares Bitcoin to a “digital Labubu”

Vanguard’s Head of Quantitative Investment, John Ameriks, said the firm’s stance on crypto hasn’t changed: Bitcoin remains a speculative asset, not a core investment.

Vanguard—the world’s second-largest asset manager after BlackRock with over $12 trillion AUM—focuses on index funds and passive investing. Speaking at a Bloomberg conference, Ameriks likened Bitcoin to a “digital Labubu,” a collectible toy that went viral in 2025. He argued Bitcoin lacks the traits Vanguard looks for: stable income, capital compounding, and predictable cash flows.

That said, in early December Vanguard enabled trading of spot Bitcoin ETFs on its platform. Clients can buy them independently, but the firm offers no crypto recommendations and runs no in-house crypto funds.

Ameriks acknowledged Bitcoin could gain relevance during periods of high inflation or political instability, but noted the historical data isn’t sufficient yet. He added that blockchain technology itself remains important for improving market infrastructure.

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Visa launches USDC stablecoin settlements for U.S. banks

Visa has allowed U.S. banks to settle card transactions in USDC via the Solana blockchain, enabling near-instant, 24/7 interbank settlements instead of the usual multi-day process.

Cross River Bank and Lead Bank are the first users. Visa plans to expand the system and says such stablecoin-based settlements could become an industry standard.

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Crypto market rates this morning:

👑 Bitcoin (BTC): $86,566
2⃣ Ethereum (ETH): $2,929
😀 XRP (XRP): $1.91
👀 BNB (BNB): $859
🧂 Solana (SOL): $127

😄 Total crypto market capitalization: $2.93T
😄 Bitcoin dominance: 59.25%
😄 Fear & Greed Index: 16 (“Extreme Fear”)

📈 Among the top 100 cryptocurrencies by market cap, Morpho (MORPHO) posted the biggest gain over the past 24 hours, up 7%.

📉 Aster (ASTER) saw the steepest decline over the last 24 hours, down 7%.

Have a good Wednesday! 💜

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Bitwise releases its annual outlook with 10 key crypto predictions for 2026

Bitwise has published its annual report outlining 10 major expectations for the crypto market in 2026. Analysts expect stronger institutional demand and a shift toward renewed market growth.

Bitwise manages a spot Bitcoin ETF with over $4B in AUM. In late 2024, the firm also released forecasts for 2025, including a call for BTC to exceed $200,000, which did not materialize.

Bitwise’s key predictions for 2026:

😄 Bitcoin will set a new all-time high, breaking the traditional 4-year cycle
😄BTC volatility will be lower than Nvidia stock
😄ETFs will absorb over 100% of new supply of BTC, ETH, and SOL
😄Crypto stocks will outperform the tech sector
😄Polymarket open interest will surpass 2024 election levels
😄Stablecoins will be blamed for a currency crisis in an emerging market
😄On-chain custody (“ETF 2.0”) AUM will double
😄ETH and SOL will reach new highs if the CLARITY Act is passed in the US
😄At least 50% of top US university endowments (e.g. Harvard, Yale) will invest in crypto
😄Over 100 new crypto-linked ETFs will launch in the US
😄Bonus: Bitcoin’s correlation with equities will decline

What Bitwise got right in 2025:

😄Stablecoin supply grew by 30%+
😄Tokenized real-world assets (RWA) reached $25B
😄A wave of crypto IPOs (Circle, eToro, Bullish, Gemini)
😄Coinbase and Strategy entered major US stock indices

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The market capitalization of gold-backed stablecoins has surpassed $4 billion, tripling since the start of 2025 from around $1.3 billion.

Tether Gold (XAUT) leads the segment with a market cap of approximately $2.2 billion, accounting for about 50% of the entire gold-backed stablecoin market. Paxos Gold (PAXG) ranks second at $1.5 billion. Together, these projects control nearly 90% of the sector.

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Crypto market rates this morning:

👑 Bitcoin (BTC): $86,557
2⃣ Ethereum (ETH): $2,827
😀 XRP (XRP): $1.83
👀 BNB (BNB): $831
🧂 Solana (SOL): $122

😄 Total crypto market capitalization: $2.90T
😄 Bitcoin dominance: 59.97%
😄 Fear & Greed Index: 17 (“Extreme Fear”)

📈 Among the top 100 cryptocurrencies by market cap, pippin (PIPPIN) posted the biggest gain over the past 24 hours, up 15%.

📉 UNUS SED LEO (LEO) saw the steepest decline over the last 24 hours, down 25%.

Have a good Thursday! 💜

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Ho ho HODL 🎄

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Crypto market rates this morning:

👑 Bitcoin (BTC): $88,895
2⃣ Ethereum (ETH): $3,033
😀 XRP (XRP): $1.92
👀 BNB (BNB): $858
🧂 Solana (SOL): $126

😄 Total crypto market capitalization: $3.00T
😄 Bitcoin dominance: 59.59%
😄 Fear & Greed Index: 25 (“Extreme Fear”)

📈 Among the top 100 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, Midnight (NIGHT) posted the strongest gain over the past 24 hours, up 25%.

📉 Canton (CC) saw the largest decline over the last 24 hours, down 20%.

Have a good week, fam! 💜

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According to analysts at Kaiko, Binance processed $20 billion in spot trading volume and 61.9 million trades in a single day on December 1, 2025, far surpassing all other major CEXs.
For comparison, the world’s second-largest exchange, Coinbase, executed 6.2 million trades totaling $3.6 billion.

At present, Binance maintains a share of around 60% of centralized spot trading volume — a level that remains consistently stable across all market conditions, both during bull and bear markets.

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Bitcoin Price Fell Short of Major Players’ Forecasts

Wu Blockchain compiled forecasts for Bitcoin’s peak price in 2025 from major crypto market players and compared them with the actual market performance.

Since late 2024, market participants had been expecting strong Bitcoin growth following the halving, the launch of crypto ETFs in the US, and inflows of institutional capital. Many experts built models targeting Bitcoin in the $200,000–$250,000 range.

Bitcoin reached its all-time high in early October at $126,000, after which the price declined by around 30%.

😄KuCoin Research allowed for Bitcoin to rise to $250,000, citing institutional demand and ETF expansion.

😄Tom Lee of Fundstrat / BitMine stated a $250,000 target back in January.

😄Matrixport expected Bitcoin to rise to $160,000 and described 2025 as a breakthrough year for BTC.

😄Bitwise predicted that Bitcoin would set a new all-time high and exceed $200,000.

😄VanEck outlined a scenario with a peak at $180,000 in the first quarter followed by a correction, but none of the stated targets were achieved.

😄Galaxy Research projected a move above $150,000 in the first half of the year and up to $185,000 by year-end, based on institutional demand and sovereign participation. However, the market remained well below these levels.

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Crypto market rates this morning:

👑 Bitcoin (BTC): $86,830
2⃣ Ethereum (ETH): $2,921
😀 XRP (XRP): $1.84
👀 BNB (BNB): $837
🧂 Solana (SOL): $121

😄 Total crypto market capitalization: $2.94T
😄 Bitcoin dominance: 59.70%
😄 Fear & Greed Index: 24 (“Extreme Fear”)

📈 Among the top 100 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, Pippin (PIPPIN) recorded the largest gain over the past 24 hours, up 31%.

📉 Midnight (NIGHT) saw the biggest decline in the last 24 hours, falling 17%.

Have a good Wednesday! 💜

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MoMA adds CryptoPunks NFTs to its permanent collection

Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) has added eight NFTs from the CryptoPunks collection to its permanent exhibition. The works were donated and placed in the museum’s media and performance art department, which focuses on digital and experimental formats.

The current floor price of a CryptoPunk is 27 ETH (≈ $82,000).
The selected tokens are #74, #2786, #3407, #4018, #5160, #5616, #7178, and #7899. Some were donated by the project’s creators at Larva Labs, while others came from prominent NFT collectors.

Launched in 2017, CryptoPunks is considered one of the earliest NFT projects, created even before the ERC-721 standard and influential in shaping the collectible NFT market.

The inclusion is part of an initiative by the Infinite Node Foundation, which recently acquired rights to CryptoPunks and announced plans to promote the collection in major modern art museums worldwide.

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AI Beat Humans in a Crypto Trading Tournament on Aster

A trading tournament on the crypto platform Aster has ended, with 70 human participants and 30 specially trained AI agents competing. Each received a starting deposit of $10,000.

Both groups finished the tournament in the red, but the AI agents delivered a better overall aggregate result. Humans ended up down 32.21%, while the algorithms posted a drawdown of just 4.48%.
At the same time, a trader under the nickname ProMint took first place by PnL, earning $13,600. The best AI agent recorded a $8,090 result and ranked only eighth in the overall leaderboard.

The experiment aimed to test the potential of neural networks in trading during periods of high market volatility. The platform covered the losses, and participants were allowed to keep any profits.

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