Bitcoin to Lose Another 50% of Value to Gold, Top Bloomberg Expert Warns

U.Today

Mike McGlone, a senior commodity strategist at Bloomberg Intelligence, is raising a red flag about a metric that rarely gets as much attention as dollar prices but often tells the story earlier: how much gold one Bitcoin can actually buy.

In his latest notes and charts, McGlone points to the Bitcoin-gold cross sitting near 20x on Dec. 22 and says the balance of risk is ugly. In essence, he's saying that it's more likely that Bitcoin's value will drop to 10x rather than rise to 30 times its current value in 2026.

If that happens, the purchasing power of Bitcoin compared to gold would be cut in half, even though the USD chart might not look as dramatic.

McGlone is basically saying the Bitcoin-to-gold ratio acts like an early warning chart: when recession risk rises, this ratio tends to get pressured, and right now it’s shown next to the S&P 500 and market volatility for a reason. The key takeaway from that frame is that stocks, volatility, and the Bitcoin/gold cross are still moving together more than people admit, with the correlation sitting near 0.5376, meaning it’s still one “risk-on, risk-off” package.

$50,000 for Bitcoin in 2026

Ultimately, McGlone zooms out to a “where could the lows be” sketch for 2026: core CPI easing toward 1%, oil near $40, gasoline around $2, and Bitcoin around $50,000.

He’s not claiming dates and exact targets, he’s saying that if U.S. stocks fall about 10% and stay down instead of making it back to the "north," those are the kind of cycle-level prices that often show up when markets finally reset.

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Former FTX US president raises $35 million for traditional-asset perpetuals exchange: The Information

The Block

Former FTX US president Brett Harrison has raised $35 million for his startup Architect Financial Technologies, as the firm builds out a regulated exchange that applies crypto-market design to perpetual futures tied to traditional financial assets.

The funding round, first reported by The Information, was led by Miami International Holdings and Tioga Capital and values Architect at roughly $187 million, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Architect operates AX, a global perpetual futures exchange that allows institutional investors to trade non-expiring derivatives linked to assets such as equities and foreign exchange.

Unlike crypto-native venues that popularized perpetual futures, often referred to as "perps," AX does not list contracts linked to digital assets.

While perpetual futures remain unavailable to U.S. traders for now, interest in the product structure is growing beyond crypto-native markets.

In a recent 2026 investment outlook, Coinbase Ventures pointed to real-world-asset perpetuals as a key area of focus, arguing that demand is emerging for derivatives that offer synthetic exposure to macroeconomic data, commodities and other offchain assets.

The firm said those products could allow traders to hedge or express views on traditional markets without direct custody of the underlying assets — a use case that has so far been constrained by U.S. regulatory approval.

Harrison previously spent about 17 months as president of FTX US before stepping down in 2022, shortly ahead of the broader FTX collapse.

Since launching Architect, he has positioned AX as an attempt to adapt the efficiency of crypto market infrastructure to regulated global finance.

Disclaimer: The Block is an independent media outlet that delivers news, research, and data. As of November 2023, Foresight Ventures is a majority investor of The Block. Foresight Ventures invests in other companies in the crypto space. Crypto exchange Bitget is an anchor LP for Foresight Ventures. The Block continues to operate independently to deliver objective, impactful, and timely information about the crypto industry. Here are our current financial disclosures.

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$1.12 Billion in Five Weeks: XRP Community Reacts to ETF Milestone

U.Today

The group of five XRP spot ETFs that have launched since Nov. 13, notably those from Canary, 21Shares, Grayscale, Bitwise and Franklin Templeton have surpassed $1.12 billion in cumulative total net inflow as of Dec. 22, according to Sosovalue.

XRP enthusiast JacktheRippler spotlights this milestone in a recent tweet, implying it to mean that institutions are accumulating XRP.

JackTheRippler ©️
@RippleXrpie
🚨BREAKING: #XRP SPOT ETFs have purchased $1.12 billion worth of XRP in just five weeks!
💥INSTITUTIONS ACCUMULATING XRP💥 pic.twitter.com/XtrX3sk9eN
Dec 23, 2025

According to Sosovalue, total net assets across spot XRP ETFs have surpassed $1.25 billion, a remarkable indication of institutional interest.

XRP spot ETFs have attracted net inflows every trading day since their debut, sustaining an unbroken 33 day inflow streak. This separates them from Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs that saw several sessions of outflows in recent weeks.

While Bitcoin ETFs have seen outflows in several sessions since the past month, XRP funds, by comparison, have attracted smaller but more consistent inflows.

XRP attracts inflows as Ethereum, Bitcoin bleed

According to the most recent CoinShares data, digital asset investment products recorded outflows for the first time in four weeks, totaling $952 million. The U.S. alone saw $990 million in outflows. This reflected a negative market reaction to delays in passing the U.S. Clarity Act, alongside concerns over continued selling by whale investors.

Ethereum saw the largest outflows, totaling $555 million, given it has the most to gain or lose from the Clarity Act, while Bitcoin saw $460 million. The opposite is seen for XRP, which rather continued to attract inflows coming in at $62.9 million, indicating selective investor support.

XRP sentiment slips, but it's all bullish

According to Santiment, XRP is seeing far more negative social media commentary than average. It notes that, historically, this setup leads to price rises, adding that when retail has doubts about a coin's ability to rise, the rise becomes significantly more likely.

XRP is trading down 1.41% in the last 24 hours to $1.88, extending its drop into the third day from a high of $1.95 on Dec. 20.

Amid the price drop, Santiment observes that XRP sentiment has slipped back to negative. However, this presents a silver lining: A sentiment drop into the bearish zone increases the likelihood of a strong price increase.

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Searching for the Next Altcoin? These Two Projects Stand Out

Coinpedia

Crypto research platform Altcoin Buzz has released a side-by-side comparison of two popular altcoins, Bittensor and Hedera Hashgraph (HBAR), aiming to help investors choose just one in a market where capital is limited.

The idea behind the comparison is straightforward. With many crypto assets trading at discounted prices, investors often do not have enough funds to buy everything. Instead of recommending both projects, the expert decided to make a clear choice by directly comparing the two across factors.

Decentralization Sets The First Major Difference

Bittensor is described as one of the most decentralized networks in the crypto space, nearly comparable to Bitcoin. There are no special privileges, insider advantages, or corporate control. Subnets compete constantly, encouraging innovation and efficiency.

Hedera, by contrast, operates as a permissioned network. It is governed by a council made up of large global companies such as Google and IBM. Only approved organizations can become validators, and applications must go through Hedera’s governance process. While this structure appeals to enterprises, it limits open participation.

Because of this, Altcoin Buzz gave Bittensor a clear edge on decentralization.

When it comes to growth and revenue, Bittensor again stood out. The network currently generates about $78,000 per day, or roughly $28 million per year. Hedera’s network revenue for 2025 is estimated closer to $5 million, following a slower first quarter.

Bittensor also has a smaller market value, around $2 billion, compared to Hedera’s roughly .5 billion. This makes TAO appear more undervalued relative to its revenue.

Hedera earned a win in compatibility and access. It is EVM-compatible, making it easy to use with common wallets and apps. Bittensor requires Polkadot-compatible wallets, which adds friction for new users.

Final Verdict

After weighing all factors, Altcoin Buzz narrowly chose Bittensor as the better single pick. The decision was driven by stronger decentralization, higher revenue relative to valuation, and long-term confidence in crypto AI.

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2026 Layer 2 Outlook

The Block

2025 has been the year that the Layer 2 narrative bifurcated: most new launches have become ghost towns shortly after airdrop farming cycles, while only a small handful of L2s have managed to escape this phenomenon.

Rollup ecosystems have matured from pure scaling experiments into distribution networks, while the key to growth is no longer technical superiority, but the ability to get their infrastructure embedded in as many channels, partners and external platforms as possible.

With major institutions launching or adopting their own L2 solutions this year, many of them have chosen to build on existing infrastructure rather than develop bespoke systems. The standout winner has been Coinbase’s Base, built on the OP Stack, having dominated across users, transactions, and overall activity throughout the year.

TVL & Liquidity Concentration

Layer 2 TVL expanded in 2025, but the growth was highly uneven. A clear power-law distribution has formed, with Base capturing the majority of new liquidity while most other L2s saw their TVLs stagnate or decline once incentive programs faded.

Source: The Block, DeFiLlama

TVL on Base rose from $3.1B in January to a peak above $5.6B in October, accounting for roughly 46.6% of all L2 DeFi TVL and extending what has essentially been uninterrupted exponential growth since launch.

On the other hand, TVL on Arbitrum has remained largely stable YoY, edging down slightly from approximately $2.9 billion to $2.8 billion, which still represents over 31% of L2 DeFi TVL. OP Mainnet benefited from new Superchain partners, but it continues to lag in retail usage as consumer attention has shifted almost entirely toward Base.

Source: The Block, L2Beat

The data illustrates this divergence clearly. Base (46.58%) and Arbitrum (30.86%) dominate DeFi TVL for Layer 2s. Total value secured shows a similar hierarchy, with Arbitrum and Base together representing over 75 percent of the category. TVS measures all assets bridged to or held on a network, which provides a broader view than TVL that measures only assets actively used in DeFi.

User Activity & Ecosystem Health

Source: The Block, DeFiLlama

Across all major activity metrics, Base showed the strongest sustained, organic growth in 2025. DEX volume, active wallets, and onchain interactions all point in the same direction. Over the course of the year, Base consistently captured around half of all DEX volume among L2s, benefiting from Coinbase’s mainstream funnel, a growing mix of consumer-facing apps, and real usage from products like Aero, Echo and Morpho.

Morpho has quickly become a key driver of Base’s growth, with deposits rising from $354 million in January to more than $2 billion at the time of this report. This growth is driven in large part by Morpho’s integration into the Coinbase app, which significantly simplified access to onchain lending.

Meanwhile, the broader Superchain ecosystem shows strength through distribution, with Base, World Chain, Soneium, INK, and Unichain rollups expanding the OP Stack footprint.

Source: The Block, DeFiLlama

Many emerging L2s have followed similar trajectories with heavy, incentive-driven activity ahead of a token generation event, resulting in a points-fueled surge in usage, followed by a rapid post-TGE decline as liquidity and users migrate elsewhere, highlighting the mercenary nature of on-chain participation and the challenge of establishing a true flagship application.

Source: The Block, GrowThePie

L2 Landscape: Centralization, Fragmentation, and Enterprise L2s

2025 marked the rise of the “enterprise rollup.” Major institutions began launching or adopting L2 infrastructure, often standardizing on OP Stack deployments. Kraken introduced INK, Uniswap launched UniChain, Sony launched Soneium for gaming and media distribution, and Robinhood integrated Arbitrum for quasi-L2 settlement rails for brokerage clients.

The strategic insight is becoming clear: L2s win by distributing their infrastructure outward and partnering with large platforms rather than operating in isolation.

At the same time, the L1-to-L2 migration trend accelerated, with a notable portion of the industry having largely accepted that it is better to join Ethereum’s shared network effects than attempt to rival them. For example, Celo and Lisk transitioned to OP Stack L2s, with the former secured by EigenLayer, while World Chain evolved from an application layer into a full OP Stack L2.

This has led to an increasingly fragmented L2 landscape where the number of chains continues to grow, but only a small subset matters.

Data Availability

Source: The Block, L2Beat

In early 2025, Celestia briefly appeared to dominate total data posted, but this was largely the result of short-lived activity from small sovereign rollups, test deployments, and airdrop-driven networks. These systems generated disproportionately high data volumes during their bootstrapping phases despite having minimal real economic activity. As incentives wound down and many of these chains either stabilized or became inactive, the volume of data posted to Celestia declined sharply.

At the same time, Ethereum has reasserted itself as the primary data-availability layer for rollups with strong user bases. The effects of EIP-4844, which launched in March 2024, became fully visible throughout 2025 as major rollups optimized their batching systems to take full advantage of blob-based data posting. Optimism, for example, upgraded its batcher to rely primarily on blobs rather than call data, cutting DA costs by more than half. zkSync reworked its proof-submission pipeline to compress state updates into fewer, larger blobs, reducing posting frequency and improving fee efficiency.

Linea followed a similar path, shifting its sequencer to a blob-first submission strategy that meaningfully lowered its L1 data footprint. Enterprise-focused L2s also contributed to this shift, with several operating using centralized or hybrid DA setups. For example, Immutable zkEVM runs in validium mode with off-chain data availability, and Mantle uses a hybrid EigenDA-based approach. These designs lower costs but introduce additional trust assumptions, which raises security concerns compared to Ethereum’s blob-based DA.

Overall, DA markets are fragmenting, but Ethereum remains the premium option.

L2 Security & Centralization: Little Decentralization After Years of Promises

Even though the rollup ecosystem has made progress in their decentralization efforts over the past year, most L2 networks are still far more centralized than they appear. Many L2s continue to rely on trusted operators, upgrade keys, and closed infrastructure, as 2025 has shown that decentralization is still treated as a long-term goal rather than an immediate priority.

Source: The Block, L2Beat

Centralized Sequencers Are Still the Norm

Sequencers are responsible for transaction verification on L2s and submitting state reconstruction data to the L1.

Most L2s still use a permissioned sequencer run by a single operator, which means censorship resistance and neutrality depend on the integrity of a single entity. Shared-sequencer networks like Espresso have continued to develop, but adoption remains limited. Astria, once a leading shared-sequencer effort, shut down entirely in 2025, underscoring how early and fragile this category still is.

The pattern is even more common among smaller, low-activity rollups, which often launch with a fully centralized sequencer, no clear plan for fraud proofs, a centralized DA committee, and emergency upgrade keys controlled entirely by the team. In these networks, the entire architecture still depends on trusting the operator.

Upgrade Keys and Governance Are Still Highly Centralized

While some L2s, such as Base, have improved their governance with longer timelocks or larger security councils, many chains can still be upgraded quickly by a small multisig. This leaves the door open to governance capture, insider mistakes, or key compromise.

The exit window refers to the period during which users can withdraw their funds before an L2 executes an upgrade. However, several L2s lack reliable, trustless exit windows, meaning that if a sequencer goes offline or upgrade keys are compromised, users may not have a guaranteed or timely way to withdraw their assets safely.

State Validation Has Improved at the Top but Remains Weak Elsewhere

State validation refers to the type of proof system that L2s use for ensuring the correctness of their state.

The largest optimistic rollups have made progress. Arbitrum, OP Mainnet, and Base all have live, permissionless fraud proof systems and are now classified as Stage 1. However, many smaller optimistic rollups still do not have working fraud proofs. These chains remain at Stage 0, which means users must rely entirely on the operator to act honestly.

ZK rollups still depend on centralized proving circuits and centralized prover infrastructure. Generating proofs is technically demanding, so most networks rely on a single prover or a small, controlled set of circuits. A few teams, such as zkSync, have begun experimenting with external or distributed prover networks, but practical prover decentralization is still in the very early stages. Most ZK rollups continue to rely on trusted parties to validate state transitions.

Despite years of promises, the average L2 still operates far closer to a sidechain than a trust-minimized rollup.

Bitcoin L2: Another year of noise over substance

Source: The Block, DeFiLlama

Bitcoin L2 TVL has shrunk by over 74% this year, while TVL in BTCFi has declined by 10%, from a cumulative TVL of 101,721 BTC to 91,332 BTC, representing just 0.46% of all Bitcoin in circulation.

Source: The Block, DeFiLlama

This year saw yet another wave of raises for projects attempting to compete for the Bitcoin DeFi dream, with Build on Bitcoin (BB) raising an additional $9.5 million, totalling up to $21 Million with their previous raises from last year; Lombard raising another $6.75 million through their token sale in September, to add to their $16 million raised in 2024.

Despite these additional raises, the ecosystem has not grown since last year’s explosion in TVL, and still remains dwarfed by the EVM ecosystem,with the two largest projects being Bitcoin restaking projects, Babylon Protocol and Lombard, with respective TVLs of $4.95 billion and ~$1 billion.

Launching the same existing primitives seen on EVM-based L2s on a BTC chain is not enough to attract liquidity or developers.With the Ordinals narrative fully played out, BTCFi is in desperate need of a novel catalyst and while “DeFi but Bitcoin” may still be able to attract VC money, the same cannot be said for builders.

Source: The Block, GrowThePie

Starknet, meanwhile, has benefited from the broader Q4 resurgence in ZK-driven narratives. Its pivot toward BTC-aligned functionality, combined with renewed market interest in quantum-resistant chains like Zcash, has helped reposition it as one of the few ecosystems gaining traction late in the year. The past two months have shown that user interest is returning to ZK rollups that offer new cryptographic capabilities, in sharp contrast to BTCFi’s stagnation and its repeated attempts to repackage existing Ethereum primitives.

Layer 2 Outlook for 2026

With this year ending, the L2 landscape could be shaken up by the rise of MegaETH, which has become one of the year’s most-watched projects. With a goal to offer parallel, high-throughput execution on an Ethereum-aligned L2, using a runtime where independent transactions can be processed concurrently rather than through a single global queue. This would enable developers to build computation-heavy, and more responsive on-chain applications that feel closer to real-time for users. This has raised expectations for what L2 performance should look like, though the real test will be whether its apps attract meaningful usage after launch.

Looking ahead, distribution is set to play an even larger role as more major consumer platforms explore launching their own L2s. Competition between ecosystems will intensify as liquidity concentrates around a few leading networks, and many smaller chains will continue to struggle to find a clear purpose.

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$513,836,820 Bitcoin Mystery Stuns Biggest US Crypto Exchange, Coinbase: Details

U.Today

A half-billion-dollar Bitcoin transfer just left Coinbase and went into a fresh, unlabeled wallet. This kind of move can be seen in two ways: coins being pulled off an exchange, or an exchange moving inventory between its own addresses.

It all started with Whale Alert noticing 5,869 BTC worth $513,836,820 moving from Coinbase to an unknown new wallet. The on-chain trail in the screenshots shows a familiar multi-hop route.

BINANCE:BTCUSD by TradingView">

It looks like the money leaves a Coinbase cold wallet, goes through an intermediate address, and then settles in the destination wallet, which now has the full amount. In the same window, that destination also got some extra inbound pieces, including transfers around 152.611 BTC and a smaller 50.87 BTC chunk.

Bitcoin price reaction deciphered

The price of the cryptocurrency didn't go up after the alert emerged, which counters the thesis of some mysterious buyer withdrawing coins. According to the TradingView chart, is sitting at around $87,648, down a bit after an intraday sell-off drove the price into the low $87,000s, but a rebound pushed it back into the mid-$87,000s.

When BTC leaves an exchange and doesn't move, it's often seen as a reduced immediate sell availability. The thing is, "unknown" is just a label, not proof of a new whale. Large venues rotate custody addresses, rebalance cold storage, and route settlement flows. These movements can look identical to a customer withdrawal until subsequent wallet behavior clarifies intent.

The next signal is follow-through. If a wallet starts sending to other venues in batches, it might be a sign of distribution pressure.

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Bitcoin (BTC) Can Break $100,000 in One Move, Data Shows

U.Today

This time, the setup is more tidy than most people realize, as Bitcoin is once again condensing into a technically and structurally significant zone.

Where most action is packed

Following a strong corrective leg, price action over the last few weeks has shown Bitcoin grinding just below the $90,000-$92,000 range. It is taking place right beneath one of the densest liquidity clusters that can be seen on derivatives markets right now. Leveraged positions are clearly concentrated, stacked just above $90,000, according to liquidation heatmaps.

BINANCE:BTCUSDT Chart by TradingView">

This is significant, because Bitcoin does not pass through these zones gradually. Once momentum aligns, price tends to move aggressively to the side of the market where liquidity accumulates. A clean push through $90,000 can result in forced buying in this situation, because the majority of stop orders and short liquidations are just overhead.

After a deep retracement that cooled momentum indicators and flushed late longs, Bitcoin is technically stabilizing. While volume on the downside has already peaked and begun to contract, RSI has reset without going into extremely bearish territory. Instead of new distribution, that combination typically indicates seller fatigue.

Despite trading below short-term moving averages, the price is remaining above significant structural support from the prior range expansion. The $90,000 threshold is psychological in and of itself, but what is above it is the true trigger. The available sell-side liquidity quickly decreases once Bitcoin trades firmly into the $91,000–$93,000 range. At that point, the market is engaging with leverage rather than negotiating with spot sellers. Moves accelerate at that point.

Bitcoin's rapid move

In the past, Bitcoin has traveled great distances quickly in this manner. From a wider angle, the existing structure doesn’t resemble a macro top at all. Open interest has returned to normal, funding rates have decreased, and sentiment is anything but exuberant. The blow-off top environment is the opposite of this. It is the kind of background where asymmetric upside appears subtly rather than loudly.

That does not imply that tomorrow will bring $100,000. It does imply that there won’t be much technical resistance until six figures once Bitcoin breaks through the liquidity barrier above $90,000. If the move occurs, it is unlikely to be courteous or slow.

To put it briefly, $90,000 is the entry point rather than the final destination. The path to $100,000 becomes more about mechanics than belief if Bitcoin breaks it with conviction.

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