21Shares has cut several of its 2026 crypto forecasts, saying institutional adoption has continued to grow even as weaker prices and slower enterprise adoption have delayed parts of the industry’s recovery.

According to 21Shares’ midyear outlook, the digital asset industry has continued to build stronger infrastructure despite a difficult market environment.

The asset manager said progress in areas including exchange-traded funds, stablecoin regulation, tokenization, and prediction markets has exceeded what recent price action suggests. Even so, weaker crypto prices, major decentralized finance exploits, and slower enterprise adoption have prompted the firm to reduce several expectations it had set earlier this year.

The report argues that institutional participation has increased without changing Bitcoin’s long-established market structure. According to 21Shares, Bitcoin reached roughly $126,000 in October 2025 before entering a decline that has largely followed historical post-halving patterns. While larger institutional ownership has reduced the severity of drawdowns, the firm said the four-year market cycle remains intact.

Former 21Shares co-founder Ophelia Snyder, who left the company after its acquisition by FalconX in 2025, recently expressed a similar view in a Substack post.

Snyder wrote that crypto’s investor base has become more institutional and increasingly tied to the wider financial system, making prices more responsive to macroeconomic developments, geopolitical events, and competing investment narratives.

Prediction markets and consolidation stand out

Among the strongest-performing segments, 21Shares identified prediction markets as one of the industry’s fastest-growing sectors. The firm expects annual trading volume in prediction markets to exceed $100 billion this year.

The report also identified consolidation as an accelerating trend across crypto markets. According to 21Shares, several publicly listed companies that hold digital assets on their balance sheets are trading below the value of their crypto holdings, increasing the likelihood of mergers or acquisitions among smaller treasury firms.

A comparable pattern is developing within Ethereum’s layer-2 ecosystem. The report said a small number of leading rollups continue to capture users and liquidity, while many smaller networks have struggled to build meaningful activity.

Institutional investors continue accumulating through volatility

Crypto investment products have also continued attracting institutional capital despite recent market weakness, according to the report.

Although U.S. spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds have recorded about $3 billion in net outflows this year, 21Shares said ETF holdings remain above 1.25 million BTC, close to a record high. The firm argued that these figures indicate many investors have maintained or quietly increased positions instead of exiting the market during the downturn.

Recent market volatility has nevertheless weighed on sentiment. As crypto.news reported earlier, a stronger-than-expected U.S. PCE inflation reading renewed concerns that the Federal Reserve could keep monetary policy tighter for longer, triggering nearly $1.5 billion in crypto liquidations and pushing Bitcoin, major altcoins, and crypto-related equities lower.

Earlier this week, Bank of America also revised its outlook to forecast three 25-basis-point Federal Reserve rate hikes this year, citing persistent inflation risks.

Despite the latest selloff, some institutions have maintained their longer-term outlook. As crypto.news reported earlier in June, Standard Chartered’s Geoffrey Kendrick reiterated the bank’s $100,000 Bitcoin and $4,000 Ethereum targets after an earlier market decline.

Kendrick argued at the time that Bitcoin’s drop toward $59,000 likely represented the cycle low, while stronger ETF flows and institutional demand remained key conditions supporting the bank’s longer-term price targets.

Looking ahead, 21Shares said improving regulatory clarity in the U.S. continues to support product launches. The firm pointed to the Securities and Exchange Commission’s generic listing standards, which have accelerated approvals beyond Bitcoin and Ether products.

Hyperliquid was highlighted as one example, with the report noting that U.S. spot ETFs tracking the asset gathered more than $150 million in net inflows within their first month, signalling continued institutional interest in digital assets.

Bitcoin has slipped to around $58,000, a level that long-term power-law analyses have historically associated with major cycle lows. While the data stops short of confirming a precise “bottom,” several widely referenced support and quantile signals suggest BTC is trading in a statistically familiar drawdown zone rather than clearly breaking from its long-run behavior.

Derivatives pricing and liquidation maps add another layer to the picture. Traders are watching $55,000 for the next support magnet, while the $65,000–$68,000 area is emerging as a major upside liquidity pocket if downside momentum fades.

Key takeaways

• Power-law modeling cited by analyst Giovanni places BTC’s long-term trend near ~$135,000, putting $58,000 about 54% below the trend and within a historically “cycle-low-like” deviation band.
• The same framework points to a near-$68,000 “-1σ” support estimate, with a stronger long-run floor closer to ~$55,000.
• On the derivatives side, liquidation clustering shows roughly $4B of shorts near $65,000 versus about $1B below $55,000, implying a potential relief rally could run into $65,000–$68,000.
• Technical read-throughs hinge on whether BTC can reclaim $60,000 on a daily basis; a daily close above it would help preserve bullish RSI divergence across multiple time frames.
• Realized price levels near $54,000–$55,000 are highlighted as another historically reliable bear-market support zone going back to prior cycle bottoms.

Why $58,000 is getting attention from power-law models

The market’s latest move is being interpreted through a long-running statistical lens: power-law models designed to map Bitcoin’s historical trend and the distribution of deviations over multiple cycles.

According to Giovanni’s Bitcoin power-law model, the network’s long-term trend price sits near $135,000. With BTC at roughly $58,000, the drawdown is about 54% from the all-time high reference point used in the model’s framework and roughly 1.22 standard deviations below the estimated trend.

The key point for cycle context is that Giovanni’s model suggests past bear-market lows—in 2012, 2015, 2019, 2020, and 2022—arrived within a similar statistical range. In that view, the current decline fits a pattern consistent with prior deep lows rather than an abrupt break from Bitcoin’s longer-term growth path.

Support bands: $68,000 as a checkpoint, $55,000 as the bigger line

Giovanni’s estimates place a commonly referenced “-1σ” support zone near $68,000. However, the analyst also emphasizes that a more meaningful historical floor appears closer to $55,000. Importantly, Giovanni also noted that the power-law model would only be considered invalid if BTC traded below approximately $17,000 for more than a year—an assumption that, in the present context, remains far from being tested.

A second statistical metric referenced alongside the model also points toward “rarely seen” valuation. Bitcoin’s power-law quantile is cited at 6.2%, which implies the asset is cheaper than roughly 94% of its historical observations measured against the power-law trend. The article ties that pattern to earlier cycle lows, including 2015, 2020, and 2023, suggesting BTC has returned to a historically uncommon valuation band.

Investors should treat these signals as scenario probabilities rather than guarantees. Power-law work can indicate where markets often bottom, but it does not automatically confirm that a cycle bottom has already been printed—especially when short-term liquidity conditions and technical structure are still evolving.

Liquidations, $60,000 reclaim, and where the next liquidity sits

While the long-term math draws a wide “cycle-low” envelope, the near-term tape is being shaped by derivatives positioning. BTC reportedly printed a new yearly low near $58,000 after aggressive selling swept through Binance, according to taker sell volume metrics cited from CryptoQuant.

The flush included an hourly taker sell volume of about $2.1 billion, followed by another $1.9 billion in the next hour after the New York market open—described as Binance’s largest hourly sell pressure since May 4. Following that liquidation event, the move is said to have cleared more than $300 million in long BTC positions before price rebounded toward $60,000.

That $60,000 level is now central to the short-term technical narrative. A daily close back above $60,000 is described as preserving developing bullish RSI divergence across one-hour, four-hour, and daily time frames—an indication that selling momentum may be weakening even as price continues to mark lower lows.

Futures trader Byzantine General offered a related interpretation on social media: the drop to $58,000 allegedly cleared out leveraged longs while attracting fresh short selling. In his view, a daily close above $60,000 would strengthen the argument that a local bottom has been set for now.

Betting the range: upside liquidity near $65,000–$68,000 vs. the $55,000 floor

Derivatives positioning also highlights an asymmetry in where forced buying could emerge in a rebound. The liquidation map described the concentration of short liquidations near $65,000 at more than $4 billion, compared with roughly $1 billion below $55,000—creating a reported four-to-one imbalance. In practice, that means a relief rally might find additional fuel as shorts are forced to cover into rising prices.

Traders are also watching internal liquidity near $68,000, which the article links to a “daily fair-value gap” area of interest. The implication is that if BTC can recover from the current zone, upside pathways may be supported not only by technical recovery but also by derivative settlement dynamics.

On the other hand, a daily close below $60,000 would reinforce a bearish read across both short-term and longer-horizon charts. In that case, attention would likely shift back toward the $55,000 area—where multiple value frameworks converge.

The article adds another support argument by pointing to Bitcoin’s realized price. Realized price, which tracks the average cost basis of onchain coins, is described as having historically provided support at major Bitcoin bear-market bottoms since 2014. That historical relationship is used to frame the $54,000–$55,000 region as a key level to monitor if selling pressure continues.

For now, the market’s next decision point looks tied to whether BTC can hold and reclaim $60,000 on a daily basis; that would keep the door open for a move into the $65,000–$68,000 liquidity pocket. If it fails, the focus likely returns to the $55,000 and $54,000–$55,000 realized-price convergence, where historical cycle behavior suggests the most important support test may be underway.

Strategy’s options market has remained below historical crisis levels even as defensive Bitcoin positioning has climbed into the top fifth of historical readings, according to new research from Anchorage Digital.

According to a June 25 report by Anchorage Digital head of research David Lawant, traders across Bitcoin options, BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT), and Strategy (MSTR) continue to pay a premium for downside protection, yet Strategy’s options market is not signaling fears of a severe company-specific breakdown.

The research examined options activity on Deribit alongside IBIT and MSTR, arguing that the combination offers a more complete picture of sentiment across crypto-native participants, institutions, and retail investors than any single market on its own.

The Put skew remained elevated in both Deribit and IBIT options, indicating that investors have preferred hedging against losses instead of chasing additional upside. According to the report, defensive positioning ranked in the 82nd percentile of IBIT’s history and the 84th percentile of Deribit’s five-year record.

Lawant also found that Bitcoin options have spent nearly half of 2026 pricing one-week implied volatility above one-month implied volatility. The report attributed the unusual pattern to repeated macroeconomic events, geopolitical developments, and crypto-specific catalysts that have kept traders focused on immediate uncertainty.

Lawant wrote that a return to one-month implied volatility trading above one-week levels would suggest investors are becoming more comfortable looking beyond current risks.

Strategy options remain below historical stress levels

Although Strategy has come under growing pressure in recent weeks, Anchorage Digital said its options market has not reached the conditions that accompanied previous periods of severe market stress.

According to the report, traders continue to buy downside protection, but put skew has not climbed to levels that typically signal expectations of forced deleveraging or a broader crisis surrounding the company.

The assessment comes as Strategy’s capital structure has faced fresh strain. The company’s perpetual preferred stock, STRC, dropped to $82.53 on June 22, about 17% below its $100 par value, before recovering after Strategy disclosed that it had increased its fiat reserves to $1.3 billion. By Thursday, STRC was trading near $75, leaving it roughly 25% below par.

Pressure has also spread to the company’s common stock. Yahoo Finance data showed MSTR shares were trading around $85 on Thursday after falling about 78% over the past year and reaching a fresh 52-week low.

Legal scrutiny has intensified alongside stock weakness

Outside the options market, Strategy has encountered increasing legal and investor scrutiny.

Rosen Law Firm recently announced that it is investigating whether the company made materially inaccurate business disclosures. The firm said it is evaluating potential securities claims and considering a possible class action on behalf of shareholders who suffered losses.

The investigation followed public comments from Bitcoin critic Peter Schiff, who argued that investors in Strategy’s STRC preferred shares could have legal grounds to pursue claims if they purchased the security based on Michael Saylor’s promotion of the company’s Bitcoin treasury strategy. Schiff made those remarks before any law firm publicly disclosed an investigation into potential shareholder claims.

Adding to investor attention, Strategy director Jarrod Patten recently sold another 1,500 MSTR shares as the stock continued its decline.

Despite those developments, Anchorage Digital’s analysis indicates that options traders are preparing for additional volatility rather than pricing in a severe breakdown.

Strategy, led by Executive Chairman Michael Saylor, remains the world’s largest corporate holder of Bitcoin with 847,363 BTC on its balance sheet after pioneering the corporate Bitcoin treasury model in 2020.

A CoinShares survey has found that 52% of UK financial advisers cannot see most of their clients’ cryptocurrency holdings because of firm-level restrictions.

According to a survey released by digital asset investment firm CoinShares on Thursday, more than half of UK financial advisers say most of their clients’ cryptocurrency holdings sit outside their view, even as digital assets become more common in investment portfolios.

The survey covered 261 wealth management professionals across Europe and found that 52% of advisers in the UK said the majority of their clients’ crypto exposure was effectively “invisible” to them.

Across the wider group of countries surveyed, including France, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland, the figure fell to 25%. CoinShares also found that 61% of respondents worked at firms that either restricted digital assets or had no clear internal policy on handling them.

Firm policies are limiting adviser visibility

Commenting on the findings, CoinShares co-founder and CEO Jean-Marie Mognetti argued that internal company rules, rather than investor demand or adviser knowledge, are preventing wealth managers from understanding their clients’ complete financial positions.

According to Mognetti, clients have already committed capital to digital assets, but advisers often cannot factor those holdings into portfolio management because firm policies stop them from discussing or overseeing them. He said this creates what he described as a “wrong-way risk,” where advisers are expected to manage wealth without access to a complete picture of client assets.

Mognetti also argued that advisers cannot properly allocate investments, manage risk, or build trust unless they first have visibility into those digital asset holdings.

“The capital has already been allocated. The people entrusted with managing it simply cannot see it, and in most cases not because clients are unwilling to engage, but because firm policy prevents them from doing so. This is not a knowledge problem. It is not a demand problem. It is a firm-policy problem becoming a wrong-way risk.”

The findings arrive as crypto ownership continues to grow in the UK. According to the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority, around 8% of adults in the country owned cryptocurrency as of its December report.

More recently, the regulator proposed allowing authorized investment funds to allocate up to 10% of their assets to cryptocurrency exchange-traded notes, signalling continued regulatory engagement with the sector.

Payment infrastructure is expanding alongside regulation

The survey comes as industry executives continue to argue that crypto’s next stage of adoption will be driven by payments rather than speculation.

As previously reported by crypto.news, Ripple executive Reece Merrick compared today’s crypto payments market with the early years of e-commerce, when online shopping represented only a small share of retail activity despite the underlying technology already being developed. 

Merrick said improvements such as secure payment gateways, wider internet access, and smartphones eventually made e-commerce part of everyday life, and he believes scalable blockchains, stablecoins, regulated fiat on-ramps, and user-friendly wallets now play a similar role in crypto payments.

Separately, crypto.news previously reported that Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse said stablecoins are increasingly attracting interest from corporate finance teams and treasury departments evaluating blockchain-based payment systems and treasury management.

Regulators are also paying closer attention to how crypto transactions move through financial markets. In India, the Financial Intelligence Unit has asked at least three major cryptocurrency exchanges to provide records of over-the-counter crypto transactions exceeding $10,000, with the request covering data that exchanges must preserve from January 2026 onward.

The directive focuses on private OTC trades, which allow large transactions to avoid public order books but can make beneficial ownership harder to verify when intermediaries or closely held entities stand between exchanges and the original source of funds.

Bitcoin slid sharply over the past several sessions, briefly testing levels last seen in September 2024 and triggering a wave of leveraged liquidations. While broader risk assets steadied after a key US inflation print, crypto-specific flows and derivatives positioning pointed to waning demand and a market that may be primed for further volatility.

At the same time, institutional indicators are sending mixed signals: spot Bitcoin ETFs saw meaningful net outflows, and an upcoming options expiry appears structurally bearish. With traders increasingly reassessing risk-reward against interest-bearing alternatives, the near-term question for Bitcoin is no longer just whether the macro backdrop improves, but whether crypto can generate its own catalyst.

Key takeaways

• Bitcoin fell about 9% in three days, reaching its lowest level since September 2024 and sparking over $1 billion in liquidations on leveraged long positions.
• Spot Bitcoin ETF activity deteriorated, with $469 million in net outflows reported for Wednesday—an oft-cited proxy for institutional demand.
• Friday’s Bitcoin options expiry is heavily skewed toward puts, with Deribit put open interest expected to exceed calls by $3.4 billion.
• Rising confidence in a cooling inflation trend helped stocks and pressured demand for non-yielding assets like Bitcoin, while 5-year US Treasuries yielded about 4.15%.

Bitcoin’s sharp drop and the forced unwinds

Bitcoin traded down roughly 9% across three days, hitting a low not seen since September 2024. The subsequent retest of the $58,000 area proved painful for bulls: more than $1 billion in liquidations were recorded across bullish BTC leveraged positions. Although BTC recovered modestly to around $59,500, the move left traders cautious rather than confident.

Part of the timing lined up with the release of the US Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) index. The data showed May inflation rising 4.1% year over year. Even so, the market response suggested investors believed inflation pressures had begun to cool—especially as crude Brent retreated from roughly $95 earlier to around $75 more recently.

That easing in energy prices appears to have helped equities. The article notes that the S&P 500 and gold had erased their intraday losses, indicating that traders were willing to rotate back into risk assets after digesting macro updates.

Why crypto’s correlation story is breaking

Even when Bitcoin moves in tandem with broader markets, investors often look to whether the “risk-on” tailwind is actually benefiting crypto. Here, several crypto-specific signals suggest BTC is not simply lagging equities—it may be diverging.

The piece highlights a shift in how traders may be framing opportunity costs. It points to stronger performance in parts of the tech sector, referencing notable stock moves such as Micron’s 16% jump and a similar surge in Sandisk, alongside gains in chipmaking equipment. In that environment, Bitcoin can lose relative appeal if capital is finding stronger payoff in equities.

Beyond stock action, the article ties the broader risk appetite to shifting government emphasis on areas that support infrastructure and computing capacity. It also references a set of policy angles—such as a stake in Intel and proposals and frameworks related to quantum computing and “frontier models”—which are presented as supporting factors for the tech and data infrastructure narrative.

For Bitcoin traders, the key implication is straightforward: if equities are offering both momentum and an improving macro narrative, then BTC needs more than soft correlations to attract incremental risk capital.

Fixed income turns into a more competitive hedge

One of the article’s central arguments is that the balance of hedging tools may be changing. When rates are rising or expected to rise, investors often prefer assets that can generate yield—particularly in uncertain regimes where non-yielding assets like Bitcoin face more headwinds.

According to the coverage, traders may be pricing in an elevated probability of US rate increases into year-end. It cites the CME FedWatch Tool showing an 80% chance of US interest rate hikes by December, up from 68% a month earlier. In the same vein, it points out that 5-year US Treasuries were yielding about 4.15%, providing an alternative “parking place” for capital compared to Bitcoin.

That matters because the attractiveness of Bitcoin frequently hinges on whether investors believe they can finance exposure cheaply or whether cash is earning too much elsewhere. If Treasury yields remain competitive, the burden shifts to crypto-specific demand drivers—ETF flows, onboarding, or derivative positioning that reflects genuine upside conviction.

ETF outflows and options skew reinforce caution

Two of the most immediately actionable signals in the report come from flows and derivatives.

On the spot ETF side, the article says Bitcoin’s outlook took a hit from $469 million in net outflows on Wednesday. It frames this metric as a proxy for institutional demand—meaning persistent negative flows can signal that large allocators are not actively adding to exposure at current prices.

Derivatives are sending a similar cautionary message. The coverage points to Friday’s upcoming Bitcoin options expiry of about $13 billion, stating that the distribution of open interest favors put instruments. It reports that put open interest on Deribit is expected to exceed call open interest by $3.4 billion.

It also adds that most neutral-to-bullish options structures are likely to expire worthless, because 78% of call options are priced at $72,000 or higher. Taken together, the options market suggests the crowd is paying for downside protection—or positioning for reduced upside.

The article further notes deterioration in the Strategy (MSTR) position, referencing “huge unrealized loss” after buying $64.1 billion worth of Bitcoin since 2020. While equity-linked narratives can influence trader sentiment, the bigger takeaway is that corporate exposure does not automatically translate into stable support for spot demand, especially when ETF flows are negative.

What to watch next

With liquidations behind BTC for now but ETF outflows and a put-heavy options expiry still in focus, traders should look for evidence that spot demand returns—either through improved ETF flow trends or a shift in derivatives positioning as the expiry passes. Until then, Bitcoin’s ability to reclaim strength may depend less on macro tailwinds and more on whether crypto-specific demand reappears.

Bitcoin’s (BTC) drop to $58,000 has pushed the price into a zone that long-term power-law models have historically associated with cycle bottoms. The data does not confirm a bottom range, though it shows BTC trading in a price range that has repeatedly marked major lows since 2014. 

Derivatives data and liquidation levels highlight $55,000 as the next key support level and the $65,000-$68,000 range as the next major upside area of interest. 

Bitcoin power-law puts $58,000 in historical range

Giovanni’s Bitcoin power-law model places the network’s long-term trend price near $135,000, making the recent drop to $58,000 roughly 54% below the all-time high and 1.22 standard deviations beneath that trend.

According to the analyst, the key takeaway is straightforward: the previous cycle lows in 2012, 2015, 2019, 2020, and 2022 all fell within a similar statistical range. By that measure, the latest decline falls within a territory that has historically marked the deep bear-market lows rather than a break in Bitcoin’s long-term growth path.

Bitcoin price deviation based on the power-law trend. Source: X

The model estimates the commonly referenced “-1σ” support near $68,000, while the stronger historical floor sits closer to $55,000. Giovanni also noted that Bitcoin would need to trade below roughly $17,000 for more than a year before the power-law itself could be considered invalid.

A second metric points in the same direction. Bitcoin’s power-law quantile has fallen to 6.2%, indicating the asset is cheaper than roughly 94% of its historical observations when measured against the power-law model. The chart highlights similar readings during the 2015, 2020, and 2023 cycle lows, with the current market now revisiting that historically rare valuation zone.

Bitcoin power-law quantile regression chart. Source: Checkonchain

Related: Bitcoin drops to $58K on high US PCE inflation as trader sees ‘manipulation’

Key BTC price levels to watch

Bitcoin fell to a new yearly low of $58,000 after aggressive selling swept through Binance. The hourly taker sell volume reached $2.1 billion, followed by another $1.9 billion in the next hour after the New York market open, marking the exchange’s largest hourly sell pressure since May 4.

Bitcoin taker sell volume on Binance. Source: CryptoQuant

The flush liquidated more than $300 million in long BTC positions before the price rebounded toward $60,000. That level now carries added significance. A daily close back above $60,000 preserves the developing relative-strength index (RSI) bullish divergence across the one-hour, four-hour, and daily time frames which signals that selling momentum is fading even as the price prints lower lows.

BTC/USDT, one-day chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView

Futures trader Byzantine General shared a similar outlook, saying the move to $58,000 cleared out leveraged longs while drawing in fresh short sellers. In his view, a daily close above $60,000 would strengthen the case that Bitcoin has printed a local bottom for now. 

That would also shift attention toward a large pocket of upside liquidity. More than $4 billion in short liquidations cluster near $65,000, compared with about $1 billion below $55,000, creating a four-to-one imbalance. A relief rally could then target internal liquidity near $68,000, where a daily fair-value gap adds another area of interest for traders. 

BTC liquidation map. Source: CoinGlass

Meanwhile, a daily close below $60,000 reinforces the bearish bias on both the short-term and long-term charts. The next area of interest then shifts to $55,000, where Bitcoin’s September 2024 weekly range low converges with its realized price near $54,000. 

The realized price, which tracks the average cost basis of all onchain coins, has historically provided support at every major Bitcoin bear-market bottom since 2014. That trend makes the $54,000-$55,000 region a key level for traders to watch if selling pressure continues. 

Bitcoin’s realized price. Source: X

Related: Bitcoin drop to $58K brings out bears: Is BTC’s next stop below $50K?