Crypto World
Liquidity, Regionalization & Asset Allocation
For global investors, 2025 was one of the most undercurrent-filled years of the 21st century. Unlike the bursting of the dot-com bubble in 2001 or the global financial crisis in 2008, markets in 2025 did not experience a prolonged, large-scale liquidation cycle or a “storm-like” sequence of relentless crashes.
Yet it is clear that, amid geopolitical uncertainty, uncertainty over US fiscal and monetary policy, uncertainty across multiple countries’ economic fundamentals, and the ebbing of globalisation in favour of regionalisation, equities, bonds, commodities and crypto have all been pricing in a future that is more cautious and more defensive.
Against that backdrop, liquidity allocation has become less concentrated in equities and bonds than it once was. Commodities, FX and rates attracted greater attention in 2025. At the same time, investors have been steadily reducing leverage and trimming exposure to higher-risk assets—one of the direct reasons the crypto bull market ended in Q4 2025.
So, where do markets go in 2026? As in 2025, implied expectations embedded in derivatives-market data have already offered an answer.
Liquidity: Not Abundant
At the start of 2025, one major “bullish” factor in investors’ minds was Donald Trump’s formal inauguration. The prevailing view was that Trump would trigger more rate cuts, inject more liquidity into markets, and drive asset prices higher.
Indeed, between September and December 2025, amid “concerns about a weakening labour market”, the Federal Reserve delivered three “defensive” rate cuts and, in December, announced the end of quantitative tightening. But this did not produce the liquidity flood investors had hoped for.
From October 2025 onwards, the Effective Federal Funds Rate (EFFR) gradually moved towards the midpoint of the “rate corridor”. In the following months, EFFR crossed that midpoint and drifted towards the upper bound of the corridor—hardly a sign of easy liquidity.
EFFR is the core short-term market rate in the US. It reflects funding liquidity conditions in the banking system and how the Fed’s policy stance (hikes or cuts) is transmitted in practice. In relatively loose-liquidity regimes, EFFR tends to sit closer to the lower end of the corridor, as banks have less need for frequent overnight borrowing.
In the final months of 2025, however, banks clearly faced liquidity tightness—a key driver of the rise in EFFR.
The SOFR–IORB spread further highlights the degree of stress. If EFFR primarily reflects cash-market conditions, SOFR, secured funding collateralised by US Treasury securities, captures a broader liquidity shortage. Since October 2025, SOFR has remained above the Interest Rate on Reserve Balances (IORB), indicating that banks have been willing to pay a higher rate premium to “bid” for liquidity.
Notably, even after the Fed stopped shrinking its balance sheet, the SOFR–IORB spread did not fall sharply in January. One plausible explanation is that, during 2025, banks deployed a significant share of their liquidity buffers into financial investments rather than extending credit to the commercial, industrial, and real estate sectors.
Over the past year, commercial and industrial lending contracted meaningfully versus 2024, and consumer credit showed similar weakness. By contrast, VettaFi data suggest that margin debt rose 36.3% over the past year, reaching an all-time high of $1.23T in December 2025, while investors’ net debit balances also expanded to $ -814.1 billion—broadly matching the pace of margin debt growth.
As liquidity requirements grow to push markets higher, the banking system is showing signs of strain, and demand for short-term funding has increased. The fix is straightforward: either reduce margin lending and pull liquidity back, or obtain liquidity support from the Fed and the repo market.
For the economy as a whole, the first option is preferable—lower system-wide leverage and strengthen resilience in banks and the financial system—but it would also imply lower valuations and a sharp equity sell-off. Given the midterm-election backdrop, the White House is unlikely to accept that path.
As a result, in 2025 alone, the repo market expanded from roughly $6T to more than $12.6T—over three times its size during the 2021 bull market. In 2026, repo may need to expand further to support equity-market performance.
Repo transactions typically use US Treasuries—“high-quality assets”—as collateral. Historically, Treasury notes (T-notes) have been the most important form of collateral. But since mid-2023, that has changed, in part because the issuance and outstanding stock of Treasury bills (T-bills) has increased in an “exponential” fashion.
This is not benign: a rising share of T-bills in total government debt often signals deteriorating sovereign credit perceptions. As investors begin to doubt a government’s repayment capacity, they may become less willing to buy long-dated bonds at relatively low yields.
To reduce debt-servicing pressure, the government leans more heavily on T-bill financing—raising the T-bill share further and reinforcing investor doubts in a vicious cycle.
A higher T-bill share has another consequence: liquidity dynamics become less stable. Since a large portion of the liquidity supporting equities is channelled via repo, a greater reliance on T-bills implies more frequent rollovers and a shorter average liquidity “life”.
With overall leverage and margin debt already pushing beyond historical peaks, more frequent and more violent liquidity swings weaken the market’s shock-absorption capacity—setting the stage for potential cascading liquidations and large price moves.
In short: the quality of USD liquidity deteriorated markedly in 2025, with no clear sign of improvement so far.
So, in this macro context, how have investors’ expectations and portfolios changed?
Risk Premia and “Strict Diversification”
One cost of poorer-quality USD liquidity is that USD-based long-term funding costs remain elevated. This is intuitive: as USD asset markets become more fragile, US Treasury debt expands sharply (reaching USD 38.5 trillion by December 2025), and US fiscal, monetary and foreign policy turn more uncertain and less predictable, the perceived probability of systemic risk rises over time—prompting long-term Treasury investors to demand greater compensation.
Since long-term financing rates are typically anchored to the 10-year Treasury yield, it is telling that the 10-year yield fell only 31 bps over the past year—far less than the 75 bps decline in policy rates. This implies long-term funding costs stayed above 4%.
High funding costs constrain positioning. When a risk asset’s implied forward return falls below Treasury yields, holding that risk asset long-term becomes unattractive. Crypto is a textbook example: as implied forward returns declined, investors progressively reduced exposure, and the market moved into a bearish phase.
Compared with expensive long-term liquidity, short-term liquidity funded via T-bills is materially cheaper. But T-bill funding is also short-duration, creating an environment naturally favourable to speculation: investors can borrow short, apply high leverage, push prices up quickly and exit. Markets may look buoyant in the short run, but speculative froth makes rallies difficult to sustain—something clearly visible in the liquidity-sensitive crypto market.
Meanwhile, after decades, “strict diversification” made a comeback in 2025. Unlike the traditional 60/40 approach, liquidity has been spread across a broader set of instruments rather than confined to USD assets.
In fact, throughout 2025, investors steadily reduced the share of USD and USD-pegged assets in portfolios. Although persistent net outflows did not visibly hit US equities, incremental liquidity was allocated more heavily to non-US markets.
Assets tightly pegged to USD or USD-denominated leverage (crypto, WTI oil, the dollar itself) underperformed, while assets less tied to the dollar (such as precious metals) delivered far stronger performance than other major asset classes.
Notably, simply holding euros or Swiss francs performed no worse than holding the S&P 500. This suggests a profound shift in investor logic—one that goes beyond a single business cycle.
The New Order
What most deserves reassessment in 2026 is not a linear question like “will growth be stronger?”, but rather the fact that markets are adopting a new pricing grammar. Over the past two decades, returns often rested on two implicit assumptions: first, supply chains were organised around maximum efficiency, suppressing costs and stabilising inflation; second, central banks provided powerful backstops during crises, systematically compressing risk premia.
Both assumptions are now weakening. Supply chains increasingly prioritise control and redundancy; fiscal and industrial policy appears more frequently in profit models; and geopolitics has shifted from tail risk to constant noise. “Regionalisation” is less a slogan than a change in the constraint set facing the global economic system.
In this framework, the key is not to bet on a single direction, but to realign exposures to three more reliable “hard variables”: supply constraints, capital expenditure, and policy-driven order flow.
Together, they point towards a set of assets: commodity-linked equities, the AI infrastructure chain, defence and security themes, and select non-US markets that improve portfolio correlation structures. At the same time, the core question in rates and government bonds is no longer “how much tailwind will rate cuts bring?”, but how the new term structure reshapes the distribution of returns.
Regionalisation: Not “Decoupling”, but a New Cost Function
Equating “regionalisation” with “full decoupling” tends to understate its true impact. A more accurate description is that globalisation’s objective function has shifted from “efficiency at all costs” to “efficiency under security constraints”.
Once security becomes a binding constraint, many variables that previously sat outside valuation models—supply-chain redundancy, energy security, access to critical minerals, export controls on key technologies, and the rigidity of defence budgets—begin to enter discount rates and earnings expectations in various forms.
This produces two direct consequences for asset pricing. First, risk premia become less likely to revert to structurally low levels: political and policy uncertainty becomes an everyday variable, and markets require greater compensation. After all, nobody wants to bear “Cuban equity risk”, and today, even in US equities, that “Cuban equity risk” is no longer zero.
Second, global beta explains less, while regional alpha matters more: under different blocs and policy functions, the same growth and the same inflation can produce very different valuations and capital flows. For allocators, diversification in the age of regionalisation looks less like splitting assets evenly by country and more like diversifying across supply-chain position and policy elasticity.
Equities: From “Buying Growth” to “Buying Location”
If 2010–2021 equity allocation was largely about “buying growth and falling discount rates”, 2026 is more about “buying location”. “Location” refers to where a market sits on three maps: the resource map, the compute map and the security map. As the world emphasises supply-chain autonomy and critical infrastructure security, markets positioned at key nodes are more likely to earn a structural premium, even if their domestic macro picture is imperfect.
In an era where security is the top priority, increasing inventories of gold, silver, copper and other non-ferrous metals can be rational even if they are not immediately needed. Supply chains can be disrupted without warning (as last year’s trade tensions showed), sharply raising costs and forcing major countries to hold larger mineral reserves against potential shocks.
Structurally rising demand for critical minerals, combined with long-cycle supply constraints, makes commodities behave more like “supply-side assets” than mere mirrors of the traditional business cycle. Options-market implied expectations reflect this: although investors see signs of overheating in some non-ferrous metals markets (particularly silver), traders still anticipate further upside potential for gold over the longer run.
This logic also provides a clearer allocation case for equities in resource-rich countries. Copper-linked equities—Chile is a prime example—partly reflect foundational shifts in electrification and in demand for industrial infrastructure.
Precious-metals resource equities—South Africa is a typical case—combine commodity upside with the double-edged nature of risk premia: when commodities rise, profits and the currency may reinforce each other; when risk rises, politics and external financing conditions can amplify volatility. For portfolio construction, resource-country equities are better understood as a “supply-constraint factor” than simply emerging-market beta.
Another central theme is AI. AI discussions are easily pulled towards application-layer narratives, but allocators should focus on balance-sheet realities: compute, energy, data centres, networks, and cooling. These links share two traits: higher capex visibility and often benefit from joint support from policy and industry.
Rather than treating AI as another software-valuation game, it may be more robust to view it as a new wave of infrastructure build-out. Higher compute density ultimately translates into greater power and engineering demand, shifting more of the return distribution upstream and into midstream “real-economy” segments.
Under regionalisation, computing infrastructure is also spreading geographically. Higher security redundancy and localisation requirements increase the strategic value of key hardware and intermediate goods.
Markets such as Korea, positioned at the industrial interface of global compute infrastructure via semiconductors and critical electronics, are often seen as more direct equity expressions of the AI capex cycle. For portfolios, the value of this exposure is not only “faster growth”, but “more observable capex and more stable policy support”.
In addition, “defence and security” has returned to investors’ agendas for the first time since the end of the Cold War. Influenced by Trump’s “Donroeism” and the Russia–Ukraine war, both the US and Europe are placing defence higher on the priority list.
The distinctive feature of defence assets is that demand does not come from marginal household consumption; it is closer to a fiscal function constrained by national security. Once budgets step up, the political resistance to reversing them is greater, so order visibility is typically stronger. This gives defence-related equities a more defensive allocation role in a regionalised world: when conflict and sanctions risk rise, they can add resilience at the portfolio level.
That said, defence-sector price sensitivity often runs ahead of fundamentals: event-driven repricing followed by mean reversion is common. A more robust framing is to treat it as a portfolio “tail insurance” or risk-hedging factor, rather than a linear-growth core holding. Its value lies in reducing drawdowns, not in guaranteeing outperformance every quarter.
Hong Kong equities and mainland China assets are another area worth considering. Labelling them simply as “cheap” is insufficient; their allocation value stems from two factors. First, pricing often bakes in pessimistic expectations early, leaving room for rebalancing.
Second, their policy function and sector composition differ from those of US and European assets, potentially improving portfolio correlation structure. In the age of regionalisation, correlations do not automatically fall; they can rise during risk events. Structurally different assets can therefore provide more meaningful hedging.
Rates and Treasuries: Keep the Curve Steepening
The core tension in 2026 rates markets can be summarised in one line: the front end is more a function of the policy path, while the long end is more a container for term premia.
Rate-cut expectations do help front-end yields decline, but whether the long end follows depends on whether inflation tail risks, fiscal supply pressure and political uncertainty allow term premia to keep compressing. In other words, long-end “stubbornness” may not mean markets have mispriced the number of cuts; it may mean markets are repricing long-run risk.
Supply dynamics amplify this structural difference. Changes in US fiscal funding composition directly affect supply–demand across maturities: the front end is easier to absorb when money markets have capacity. In contrast, the long end is more prone to pulse-like volatility driven by risk budgets and term premia.
The portfolio implication is clear: duration exposure should be managed in layers, avoiding a one-path bet on “inflation fully disappearing and term premia returning to ultra-low levels”. Curve-structure trades (for instance, steepening strategies) persist not merely because of superior trading skill, but also because they align with the different pricing mechanisms of the front and long ends.
Crypto: Separate Accounting for “Digital Commodities” and Secondary Risk Assets
In 2026, the key for crypto is not simply “will it rise?”, but sharper internal differentiation. Bitcoin is more readily understood as a non-sovereign, rules-based supply asset that is portable across borders—a “digital commodity”. Under a regionalisation narrative, it is more likely to absorb demand for alternative payment systems and hedges.
By contrast, a subset of tokens that behave more like equity-style risk assets are priced more on growth stories, ecosystem expansion and risk appetite. When risk-free yields remain attractive, regulation becomes clearer, and traditional capital markets offer more mature funding and exit channels, equity-like tokens must offer higher risk compensation to justify allocation.
As a result, crypto allocation is better approached via “separate books” rather than a single basket: place bitcoin in a commodity/alternative-asset framework, using small weights to obtain portfolio-level convexity; treat equity-like tokens as high-volatility risk assets with stricter return hurdles and clearer risk budgets. The core of the regionalisation era is not to embrace every new asset, but to identify which assets remain more explainable under the new constraints.
Use Hard-Constraint Assets as the Core, Use Structural Divergence as the Return Engine
Putting the above together, a 2026 portfolio looks more like managing a set of “hard constraints”: supply constraints restore the strategic role of commodities and resource equities; capex supports earnings visibility across the AI infrastructure chain; policy-driven orders enhance the resilience of defence and security; the return of term premia reshapes the distribution of duration returns; and select non-US assets provide reflexive hedging through valuation structure and policy functions.
This does not require perfect prediction of every event. On the contrary, the rarest skill in the age of regionalisation is to place the portfolio in a position that relies less on flawless forecasting: let hard assets and infrastructure absorb structural demand; let curve structures absorb structural divergence; and let hedging factors absorb structural noise.
Trading in 2026 is no longer about “guessing the answer”, but about “acknowledging constraints”—and rewriting asset-allocation priorities accordingly.
Disclaimer: The information provided herein does not constitute investment advice, financial advice, trading advice, or any other sort of advice, and should not be treated as such. All content set out below is for informational purposes only.
Robinhood is opening the testnet for its Arbitrum-based Ethereum Layer 2. In this episode, we sit down with the fintech’s head of crypto, Johann Kerbrat, to discuss the strategic move to build on Ethereum. He believes institutions can get the privacy and compliance guarantees they need on public chains like Ethereum, so building on private chains doesn’t make sense as they are just a “fancy database.”
Crypto World
Hong Kong remains committed to digital assets but feels competition from an ‘aggressive’ UAE
Hong Kong, one of the world’s major financial hubs, has long been committed to cryptocurrency and blockchain technology — but it faces a competitive challenge from the crypto-friendly UAE.
This was a fact acknowledged by panelists Joseph Chan, under secretary for financial services and the treasury in Hong Kong, and Johnny Ng, founder of web3 investment firm Goldford Group, who spoke at Consensus Hong Kong.
“The UAE is really aggressive,” said NG, who served as a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) since 2018.
He said places such as Dubai and Abu Dhabi have established a solid regulatory framework for virtual assets, and each region has also brought this under the auspices of a single, dedicated regulatory authority. Korea, which boasts many millions of crypto users and investors, also has a particular government body responsible for crypto issues, Ng added.
“I think Hong Kong’s legislative council can recommend that the government do more, particularly by creating one position to oversee all those things,” Ng said. “As a lawmaker, I will actually help the government to connect with congressmen from other countries, for example, Korea.”
Chan of the Hong Kong Treasury said an enduring attraction of Hong Kong is that there are “no surprises” from regulators, who have shown a consistent commitment to digital assets.
“Our regulation is transparent, certain and predictable, and we have stuck to that all along,” Chan said. “This compares with some other jurisdictions, without naming any names. Be it during a crypto winter or not, Hong Kong has stood by the development of the digital asset industry. If you look at other jurisdictions, as things change and there are ups and downs, they might flip-flop.”
Under Hong Kong’s mandatory licensing regime for virtual asset trading platforms (VATPs), 11 licensees have been granted under the framework, which came into effect two and a half years ago.
Regarding the stablecoin regulatory regime that kicked off last August, Chan said the first batch of licenses is targeted for the first quarter of this year.
The license regime for digital asset dealers and custodians is next, and expected to be tabled by Hong Kong’s financial secretary later this year, Chan added, pointing to multiple consultations and bill reading that must first take place.
“It sounds like a long process, but it’s very important,” Chan said. “Because it means everyone from the industry knows what’s coming, there is enough time to raise your concerns, so there will be no surprises and everybody knows what’s going to happen next.”
Major crypto assets traded lower on Wednesday morning as total market capitalization shed almost 4%
Crypto markets weakened further on Wednesday morning, Feb. 11, extending losses from earlier in the week as selling pressure spread across large-cap tokens and total market capitalization slid 3.6% to $2.34 trillion.
Bitcoin (BTC) is trading around $66,280 at press time, down over 4% in the past 24 hours, with weekly losses at 10%.
Ethereum (ETH) also slipped back below the $2,000 level, down almost 5% on the day and more than 11% over the past week. Losses were broad-based across major altcoins, with BNB down 4.6% in the past 24 hours and nearly 19% on the week, while Solana (SOL) fell close to 6% today.
Markets on Thin Ice
Analysts at QCP Capital warned in a research note today that markets still lack clear rebound confirmation, leaving prices vulnerable to renewed pressure.
The analysts cautioned that sentiment still remains fragile as the Crypto Fear & Greed Index is still deep in “extreme fear,” which the firm described as less a sign of capitulation and more “thin ice that happens to be holding.”
Glassnode echoed the cautious tone. In an X post yesterday evening, the crypto analytics firm said that assuming the early October 2025 all-time high marked the end of the most recent bull phase, this cycle has so far experienced relatively modest drawdowns, comparable to the 2015-2017 market.
Big Movers and Liquidations
Looking at the top-100 assets by market cap, Uniswap (UNI) was the biggest outperformer, surging more than 30% earlier today amid news that financial giant BlackRock made a strategic investment within the Uniswap ecosystem. Provenance Blockchain (HASH) also posted gains of around 6%.
On the downside, MYX Finance (MYX) led losses, plunging more than 30%, followed by Trump-linked World Liberty Financial’s WLFI, down over 8% amid continued risk-off positioning.
CoinGlass data shows roughly $390 million in positions were liquidated over the past 24 hours, with the majority being long positions. Bitcoin accounted for about $157 million and Ethereum roughly $126 million in the past 24 hours, while more than 120,000 traders were liquidated during the period.
ETFs and Macro Conditions
On Tuesday, Feb. 10, spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded their third consecutive positive inflow day, with a net $166.6 million flowing into the products, lifting cumulative inflows to $55 billion, according to SoSoValue data. Total value traded reached $3.38 billion, while total net assets stood at $87.7 billion.
Spot Ethereum ETFs also saw net inflows on Tuesday for the second day in a row, with $13.8 million added, pushing cumulative inflows to $11.8 billion, while total net assets stood at $11.7 billion.
In macro markets, U.S. labor data released today helped ease concerns about a sharp slowdown in employment.
Nonfarm payrolls rose by 130,000 in January, above expectations for a 55,000 increase, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The unemployment rate declined to 4.3%, while a broader measure of labor underutilization slipped to 8%.
Ripple’s XRP remains under clear bearish pressure, but instead of accelerating lower, the market has transitioned into a compression phase. The price action is now stabilizing near a key psychological floor, with volatility declining as both sides hesitate to commit aggressively.
Ripple Price Analysis: The Daily Chart
On the daily timeframe, XRP’s decisive breakdown below the descending channel’s midline triggered a strong impulsive sell-off that drove the price toward the $1 demand region. That breakdown confirmed a structural shift in favor of sellers. Although a rebound followed, it stalled beneath the $1.5 resistance zone, which now acts as a firm supply area.
The inability to reclaim $1.5 signals that the recent upside move was corrective rather than impulsive. Sellers remain active on rallies, defending overhead supply. As long as XRP trades below $1.5, the broader structure remains tilted to the downside.
Currently, the price is consolidating between $1 and $1.5, with $1 acting as the primary daily demand. A decisive breakdown below $1 could expose the market to deeper downside continuation, while only a strong daily close above $1.5 would shift short-term momentum back in favor of buyers.
XRP/USDT 4-Hour Chart
On the 4-hour timeframe, the rebound from $1 appears as a sharp reaction move fueled by short-term profit-taking. The recovery pushed the price toward $1.5, but the structure shows clear hesitation and rejection inside that supply region.
The market is now compressing between $1 demand and $1.5 supply, forming a range-bound structure. This reflects temporary equilibrium rather than trend reversal. Buyers are defending $1, but they lack the strength to challenge $1.5 convincingly.
If Ripple manages a clean breakout above $1.5 with momentum, the next meaningful supply zone sits around $1.8. Conversely, a breakdown below $1 would likely reintroduce aggressive selling pressure and resume the broader bearish leg.
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Crypto World
David Einhorn says the Fed will cut ‘substantially more’ than two times. So he’s betting big on gold
Greenlight Capital’s David Einhorn anticipates the Federal Reserve will issue more interest rate cuts this year than what’s being anticipated and that’s giving him greater confidence in his gold bet.
While rate cut expectations diminished a bit Wednesday following the much better-than-expected January jobs report, traders are still currently pricing in a more than 88% chance that the central bank will make two quarter percentage point cuts by the end of the year, according to the CME FedWatch Tool.
But Einhorn said that the market viewing the latest jobs figures as a reason not to cut is “wrong.” In fact, he thinks the rate cuts number could be higher than that, as he expects Kevin Warsh – President Donald Trump’s pick to succeed Jerome Powell as Fed chair – is going to be able to persuade the committee to do so.
“If we have 4% or 5% inflation, sure, then he won’t be able to persuade people, but otherwise he’s going to argue productivity,” Einhorn said on CNBC’s “Money Movers” to Sara Eisen on Wednesday, adding that Warsh, in his view, is going to take the position of cutting “even if the economy is running hot.”
“I think by the time we get to the end of the year, it’s going to be substantially more than two cuts,” he continued.
The hedge fund manager also owns gold, which sold off at the end of last month after Trump announced Warsh as his nominee for Fed chair, as the move eased anxieties on Wall Street surrounding Fed independence.
The yellow metal – typically viewed as an inflation hedge – has since seen some recovery, with gold futures being up more than 17% this year. That’s after it surged more than 60% in 2025 amid threats to central bank independence as well as heightened geopolitical tensions and unstable trade policy. Since 2024, it’s surged more than 120%.
Gold futures prices since 2024
Einhorn — who gained notoriety in 2008, when he bet against Lehman Brothers at the Sohn Investment Conference just months before the investment bank declared bankruptcy — pointed out that gold has actually gone up over the past couple years as a result of “becoming the reserve asset” to own among central banks around the world.
“U.S. trade policy is very unstable, and it’s causing other countries to say we want to settle our trade in something other than U.S. dollars,” he said.
In the long term, he said that a reason to own gold is due to the fact that the current relationship between our fiscal and monetary policies “don’t make any sense.” He also said that other major developed currencies around the world are “as bad or worse” than the U.S. The U.S. dollar suffered its biggest single-day drop since April 2025 last month after Trump said he wasn’t concerned about the currency’s recent weakness.
“There are some issues that sometime over the next number of years could play out with some of the major currencies,” he said.
Deeming betting on more cuts as “one of the best trades out there right now,” Einhorn said he was also long futures on SOFR (Secured Overnight Financing Rate), which essentially is a bet that short-term rates will continue to go lower.
TLDR
- Beta Technologies stock surged 25.5% after-hours following Amazon’s SEC filing disclosure of 11.8 million shares
- Amazon’s stake represents roughly 5% of Beta’s total outstanding shares in the electric aircraft company
- Beta went public in November 2025 at $34 per share but had fallen 41% year-to-date before the disclosure
- The company competes with Joby Aviation and Archer Aviation in the electric vertical takeoff and landing market
- Wall Street analysts maintain a Strong Buy rating with an average price target of $34.43
Beta Technologies stock rocketed higher after Amazon revealed its investment position in the electric aircraft maker. The disclosure sent shares up more than 25% in extended trading Tuesday.
Amazon owns 11.8 million shares of Beta Technologies. The position equals about 5% of the company’s total stock outstanding.
The stock closed regular trading at $16.77 before jumping to $21.04 after-hours. Beta gained just 0.3% during the standard session.
The revelation came through an SEC filing that detailed Amazon’s holdings. What makes this interesting is that Amazon initially invested in Beta back in 2021.
Amazon’s Clean Energy Play
Amazon backed Beta through its Climate Pledge Fund in 2021. The e-commerce giant has long shown interest in alternative delivery technologies.
Beta Technologies builds electric aircraft designed for quiet operation. This feature could unlock new urban flight paths previously unavailable to traditional aircraft.
The company’s ALIA platform comes in two versions. The ALIA CTOL functions as a conventional fixed-wing electric plane. The ALIA VTOL offers vertical takeoff and landing capabilities.
Beta has also built out charging infrastructure. The company operates over 50 charging sites spread across the U.S. and Canada.
Competitive Landscape
Beta faces direct competition from Joby Aviation and Archer Aviation. All three companies are racing to commercialize electric vertical takeoff and landing technology.
GE Aerospace also holds a major stake in Beta. The jet engine manufacturer was listed as a 5% or more shareholder in Beta’s IPO prospectus.
The two companies are collaborating on hybrid aircraft propulsion systems. GE Aerospace appears extensively in Beta’s regulatory filings.
Beta completed its IPO in November 2025. The company priced shares at $34 each during the public offering.
Stock Outlook
The stock struggled after going public. Shares dropped 41% year-to-date through Tuesday’s close.
Wednesday’s pre-market trading showed continued momentum. Beta stock rallied approximately 17% before the opening bell.
Analyst sentiment remains positive despite recent price weakness. Seven analysts rate Beta a Buy with one Hold recommendation.
The consensus price target stands at $34.43. That implies potential gains of more than 105% from current levels.
Neither Amazon nor Beta responded to media requests for comment. The companies have not disclosed any strategic plans related to the shareholding.
Amazon’s investment history in delivery technology is extensive. The company has tested drone deliveries and continues exploring automation options.
Beta Technologies stock opened Wednesday’s regular session with strong gains following the Amazon stake news.
Crypto World
Best Smart Contract Auditors and Web3 Security Companies (2026): Ranked by Verifiable Public Evidence
Executive Summary
- Top 3 overall: Sherlock, Trail of Bits, OpenZeppelin (ranked by verifiable methodology, published proof of work, depth of verification, scope breadth, and service completeness).
- Rankings reflect comparative positioning, not hype: platforms score higher when they show repeatable processes and transparent artifacts, and score lower when claims can’t be corroborated publicly.
- In this ranking, ‘best smart contract auditors’ and ‘best Web3 security companies’ means the strongest combination of documented methodology, inspectable proof of work, verification depth, scope coverage, and repeatable capacity.
Intro
We wanted to produce the most accurate and verifiable compilation of Web3 smart contract security providers we could: one with clear reasoning and evidence for why each firm deserves its placement. Security vendors are easy to market and hard to evaluate from the outside, so we built a rubric first and then required every inclusion to be supported by public artifacts that a reader can confirm independently.
We focused on observable signals: documented methodology, published work (report libraries, audit archives, contest indices), verification approach (manual review, testing/tooling, formal methods when applicable), breadth of scope across real production surfaces (contracts, integrations, privileged controls, and relevant offchain components), and capacity signals that indicate repeatable execution. Where we draw a 2026 takeaway, it is based on current public positioning and recent public activity visible in those sources rather than hearsay or private claims.
Methodology
We assembled and ranked providers using a reproducible process designed to reduce subjectivity.
Step 1: Candidate set construction. We started from providers that appear consistently across developer shortlists and third-party roundups, then expanded the set through public cross-references (audit archives, contest platforms, tooling documentation, and published reports).
Step 2: Evidence threshold. We validated each candidate using primary sources that directly document (a) how they work (methodology), (b) what work exists (report libraries/archives), and/or (c) how verification is structured (contest rules, program docs, formal verification docs). Providers that could not substantiate core claims with these artifacts were excluded.
Step 3: Scoring rubric. We scored each remaining provider across six dimensions, using comparisons that can be checked from public material:
- Methodology clarity (is the review process described in a concrete, repeatable way?)
- Proof of work & transparency (public reports, archives, consistent published artifacts)
- Verification depth (manual review plus testing/tooling and/or formal methods where applicable)
- Scope breadth (contracts, integrations, privileged controls, and relevant offchain surfaces when in scope)
- Service completeness / unique value proposition (ability to support the full security need for modern protocols—e.g., pre-launch review options, remediation support, and adjacent security programs)
- Capacity signals (evidence of repeatable execution): published volume metrics (e.g., number of audits/contests), size of public report/contest archives, and visible cadence of engagements.
H2 Top Web3 Auditing and Smart Contract Security Providers (Ranked)
- Sherlock — Best choice overall for complete security coverage (development → audit → post-launch)
Sherlock ranks #1 because it supports a full security workflow across development, pre-launch review, and post-launch programs, including Sherlock AI for development-time analysis.
For audits, the model emphasizes matching teams sourced from Sherlock’s 11,000+ researcher network to the protocol’s risk surface and codebase (rather than a fixed team), and it includes fix verification as part of the loop.
For higher-stakes scopes, Blackthorn is described as a tiered engagement that prioritizes a more senior reviewer set.
Public proof points include a Morpho Vaults V2 Blackthorn case study and an Ethereum Foundation audit contest hosted on the platform with public contest pages/announcements, which makes the approach easier to verify end-to-end. That combination – repeatable workflow plus public, inspectable evidence across both high-stakes and ecosystem-scale engagements – is why Sherlock leads this ranking.
- Trail of Bits — Best boutique option for deep systems work across onchain + offchain
Trail of Bits explicitly scopes blockchain security work to include more than contract review, calling out system-level surfaces like oracles, DeFi integrations, upgradeability patterns, and deployment/incident-response considerations.
That matters because many real failures sit at boundaries between contracts and the surrounding infrastructure, not inside a single function. Their positioning is backed by a concrete services breakdown that describes design assessment and security analysis across these system components, rather than generic “we audit smart contracts” language.
In this list, ToB sits near the top because its public scope definition makes it easy to validate what “systems work” means before you hire them.
- OpenZeppelin — Best default private audit firm for process maturity + repeatability
OpenZeppelin publishes a plain-language description of how audits are run, including a line-by-line review model where each line is inspected by at least two security researchers.
They also describe using fuzzing and invariant testing when needed, which is a concrete “verification depth” signal that readers can evaluate without reading between the lines.
OpenZeppelin ranks highly here because the methodology is spelled out clearly enough to be audited itself: you can see the process they claim to follow, not just outcomes.
If you’re choosing an auditor primarily on predictability and documented process, this is one of the more checkable options in the market.
- Zellic (and Zenith) — Best research-driven audit shop, plus ownership of Code4rena
Zellic’s acquisition of Code4rena is a major structural signal because it ties a boutique audit team to a competitive-audit engine, and the acquisition rationale is publicly explained by Zellic.Zellic ranks above pure competitive platforms because it offers both a premium audit path (Zenith) and ownership of the contest channel, but ranks below the top three because its “complete offering” is less explicitly packaged end-to-end (development-time analysis + post-launch programs) than Sherlock’s.
Relative to traditional audit firms, Zellic’s differentiation is research posture plus platform adjacency; the firm adds a staffed audit option and toolchain narrative.
- Certora — Best formal verification option for specification-driven correctness
Certora is best known for formal verification: instead of relying only on review + testing, teams write explicit correctness properties (specs) and use the Certora Prover to check whether the contract can violate them. That’s a distinct verification mode that’s especially useful for protocols where “it seems fine” isn’t good enough: complex accounting, invariants across upgrades, or edge-case state transitions.
Certora publishes detailed primary documentation on the Prover and the Certora Verification Language (CVL), which makes the methodology easy to inspect before engaging. Under this rubric, it earns a top slot because the verification approach is concrete, reproducible, and documented at a level most audit firms don’t expose publicly.
- Cyfrin (CodeHawks) — Best rising competitive audits alternative with clear productization
CodeHawks documents what it is and how it works in its own docs, describing competitive audit marketplaces that can be run as public or private competitions.
That kind of documentation matters for evaluation because it clarifies what the engagement actually looks like (competition structure, participation model), not just marketing outcomes.
CodeHawks ranks on this list because it represents a second major competitive-audit option with visible, structured artifacts that an evaluator can review quickly.
If you’re comparing contest-style review paths, this is one of the more straightforward platforms to validate from primary sources.
- CertiK — Best large-scale security provider (audits + continuous monitoring footprint)
CertiK positions itself as the largest Web3 security service provider and emphasizes both audit services and real-time monitoring (Skynet), giving it a “security program” footprint rather than a pure audit shop identity.Skynet’s public-facing pages (including leaderboards) provide a concrete artifact for the monitoring claim, which is part of why CertiK is commonly mentioned in “best web3 security company” prompts.
CertiK ranks below boutique leaders and research-heavy firms because the rubric here prioritizes depth of verification and transparency of methodology over sheer breadth/scale, and large-scale providers tend to be more variable across engagements.
It still belongs high on the list because buyers often need a provider with a broad menu (audit + monitoring) and high visibility across many ecosystems, and CertiK has verifiable signals for that role.
Concluding Thoughts
Use this ranking as an evidence-based shortlist. “Best” only matters if a provider’s documented methodology and public proof-of-work match the ways your protocol can actually fail: value-moving paths, trust boundaries, integrations, and upgrade surfaces.
A practical way to choose:
- Start by mapping loss paths and trust boundaries. Write down how funds can be drained or stuck, which roles can change behavior, and which dependencies (oracles, bridges, keepers, relayers) can alter outcomes.
- Match the provider to the surface area. System-level scopes (offchain components, bridges, infra) require different skill sets than a contracts-only review.
- Validate with artifacts, not claims. Prefer providers that publish clear methodology, report/contest archives, and verification details you can inspect.
- Plan for remediation and follow-up. The engagement should include fix verification and clarity on what changes trigger re-review.
As a rule of thumb: pick the firm (or combination) whose public evidence best supports your needs – private audit depth, broader independent reviewer coverage, formal verification, or post-launch incentives—rather than optimizing for a name alone. We’ll keep updating this list as offerings and publicly verifiable evidence change.
The mood among top venture capitalists at Consensus Hong Kong was not retreat, but recalibration, as the crypto market experienced a prolonged downturn.
Hasseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly, described today’s venture market as a “barbell:” On one side, proven verticals compounding at scale; on the other, a narrow set of high-risk, next-generation bets.
“There’s stuff that’s working, and it’s just like, scale it up, go even bigger,” Qureshi said, pointing to “stablecoins, payments and tokenization in particular.” In a market that’s cooled from speculative excess, these are the sectors still demonstrating product-market fit and revenue.
On the other side is crypto’s intersection with artificial intelligence (AI). Qureshi said he is spending time on AI agents capable of transacting onchain, even though if “you give an AI agent some crypto, it’s probably going to lose it within a couple days.” The opportunity is real, but so are the attack vectors and design flaws.
The cautious tone reflects lessons learned. Qureshi said he initially dismissed non-fungible tokens (NFTs) as “definitely a bubble,” only to reverse course months later and back infrastructure plays like Blur. That experience, he said, was a reminder to balance conviction with adaptability in fast-moving cycles.
Dragonfly also famously missed an early opportunity in prediction market Polymarket.
“We were actually his first term sheet,” Qureshi said of founder Shayne Coplan, but passed when a rival fund offered a higher valuation. “Generational miss,” he called it, although Dragonfly later joined a 2024 round before the U.S. election and is now a major shareholder. The takeaway: Thematic conviction, in this case around prediction markets, can take years to pay off.
Maximum Frequency Ventures’ Mo Shaikh argued that venture success in crypto still hinges on long time horizons. His best thesis, he said, wasn’t a trade but a 15-year bet that blockchain could re-architect financial risk systems.
“Have a 15-year timeline,” he advised, urging founders and investors to resist 18-month cycle thinking.
If the venture environment feels tighter, Pantera Capital’s data supports it. Managing partner Paul Veradittakit said crypto VC capital rose 14% year over year, even as deal count fell 42%, evidence, he said, of a “flight to quality.” Investors are concentrating into “accomplished entrepreneurs” and “tangible use cases.”
After more than a decade fundraising in crypto — from $25 million early funds dominated by family offices to today’s $6 billion platform — Veradittakit sees institutions increasingly driving the next leg. But his advice to founders in a softer market was blunt. “Focus on product, market fit … If there is a token, it’ll naturally come.”
In a downshifted cycle, the venture message is clear: scale what works, experiment selectively and don’t confuse narrative with fundamentals.
Crypto World
JPMorgan bullish on crypto for rest of year as institutional flows set to drive recovery
Wall Street bank JPMorgan is striking a constructive tone on crypto despite the plunge so far this year, arguing that institutional inflows and regulatory clarity could underpin the next leg higher for digital assets.
“We are positive in crypto markets for 2026 as we expect a further rise in the digital asset flow but more led by institutional investors,” analysts led by Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou, said in the Monday report.
The optimism comes despite the recent sharp correction, which dragged bitcoin below the bank’s estimated production cost, a level that has historically acted as a soft price floor. The world’s largest cryptocurrency was trading around $66,300 at the time of publication.
Crypto markets have endured a steep pullback over the past few weeks. Bitcoin briefly fell below key breakeven levels tied to miner production costs, compressing sentiment and trimming onchain activity.
Despite the drawdown, volatility remains elevated and institutional interest has held up better than retail engagement, setting the stage for a potential rebound if capital rotation into digital assets resumes.
The analysts now estimate bitcoin’s production cost at roughly $77,000, down significantly in recent weeks. While prolonged trading below that level could pressure miners and force higher-cost operators offline, in turn lowering the aggregate production cost, the bank sees the dynamic as ultimately self-correcting.
At the same time, bitcoin’s relative appeal has improved. Gold has significantly outperformed BTC since October, while the precious metal’s volatility has climbed sharply. That combination, the report argued, makes BTC look increasingly attractive versus gold on a long-term basis.
JPMorgan expects a rebound in digital asset flows in 2026, led primarily by institutional investors rather than retail traders or digital asset treasuries (DATs). That shift, it says, will likely be supported by further regulatory progress in the U.S., including potential passage of additional crypto legislation such as the Clarity Act.
Read more: Bitcoin a tech trade for now, not digital gold, says Grayscale
The dollar continues to decline ahead of the US January labour market report and has yet to show signs of firm stabilisation. Pressure on the US currency persists, although it is possible that following the release of the employment data the dollar may attempt to steady and find short-term support.
Investors are still trimming dollar positions in advance of the Non-Farm Payrolls report, as well as the unemployment rate and wage growth figures, which are viewed as key indicators for assessing the Federal Reserve’s next steps. After a spike in volatility at the start of the week, trading activity has eased and the market has shifted into wait-and-see mode, watching whether the data will confirm a gradual easing scenario or instead provide grounds for dollar stabilisation and a corrective rebound.
USD/JPY
USD/JPY remains under pressure amid NFP expectations and domestic developments in Japan. The yen found support after Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s decisive victory in the snap election, which boosted investor confidence in the country’s economic outlook.
The sharp rally in Japan’s equity market and fresh record highs in the Nikkei and Topix indices have been interpreted as a sign of political stability and the potential for large-scale reforms. This has strengthened demand for the yen and added downward pressure to USD/JPY.
Technical analysis suggests a possible retest of the January extremes near 152.20–152.70, as a bearish engulfing pattern has formed on the daily timeframe. The bearish scenario would be invalidated by a sustained move above 154.50.
Key events for USD/JPY:
- Today at 15:30 (GMT+2): US Non-Farm Payrolls
- Today at 15:30 (GMT+2): US average hourly earnings
- Today at 17:15 (GMT+2): Speech by FOMC member Michelle Bowman
USD/CAD
As expected, a test of the key resistance zone at 1.3700–1.3720 brought the upward impulse to an end. Following the formation of a dark cloud cover pattern, the pair declined towards 1.3520.
Should US employment data disappoint, a renewed test of the 1.3480 low is possible. A resumption of the upward correction may be considered only after a confident break and hold above 1.3580.
Key events for USD/CAD:
- Today at 15:30 (GMT+2): Canadian building permits
- Today at 17:30 (GMT+2): US crude oil inventories
- Today at 20:30 (GMT+2): Bank of Canada summary of deliberations
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