Multicoin Capital has projected that Hyperliquid’s HYPE token could reach $319 by 2028 despite identifying several structural and market risks that could threaten its long-term outlook.

According to a new report from Multicoin Capital, the investment firm expects Hyperliquid (HYPE) to appreciate roughly fivefold from its current price near $64, based on a base-case scenario in which Hyperliquid generates about $8 billion in annual earnings by 2028 and trades at a 20-times earnings multiple.

Multicoin also disclosed that it began accumulating HYPE in February, making it one of the largest positions in its liquid fund, while adopting a three-day no-trade policy after publishing the report.

Why Multicoin believes Hyperliquid can justify a higher valuation

Much of the firm’s conviction comes from Hyperliquid’s rapid expansion during 2025. According to Multicoin, the decentralized exchange generated about $873 million in revenue from roughly $2.9 trillion in trading volume while growing its user base from around 301,000 to 923,000. During the same period, open interest climbed from approximately $2 billion to $6 billion.

Current market data cited in the report show Hyperliquid now accounts for more than 59% of decentralized perpetual futures open interest. Its outstanding open interest has also reached about $9.6 billion, exceeding that of its largest on-chain rivals combined.

Beyond decentralized markets, Multicoin argued that Hyperliquid has continued narrowing the gap with centralized exchanges. Monthly perpetual futures trading volume has reached roughly 17% of Binance’s level, while open interest stands at about 21% of Binance’s, figures the firm compared with Binance’s own early growth trajectory.

Another pillar of the investment case is HIP-3, an upgrade that allows third-party teams to launch perpetual markets tied to assets such as stocks, commodities, and equity indexes. 

According to Multicoin, open interest linked to real-world assets has already surpassed $2.9 billion, while an officially licensed S&P 500 perpetual contract generated more than $100 million in average daily trading volume during its first week.

The report also expects options trading, prediction markets, portfolio margining, and deeper integration with HyperEVM applications to expand Hyperliquid’s revenue opportunities over the coming years. Multicoin argued these additions could help transform the platform into what it described as an “everything exchange” offering around-the-clock access to multiple asset classes.

What risks could prevent the $319 forecast

Even with its optimistic valuation, Multicoin acknowledged that several factors could derail its forecast. The report identified decentralization challenges, regulatory uncertainty, governance issues, increasing competition, and potential bad debt as the primary risks facing the protocol.

Value capture remains another reason behind the firm’s bullish outlook. According to the report, approximately 99% of Hyperliquid’s protocol revenue is used to repurchase HYPE, with those tokens effectively removed from circulation. Multicoin also noted that Hyperliquid has never raised outside capital and operates without a separate equity layer, allowing the protocol’s economics to accrue directly to token holders.

The report estimates Hyperliquid has generated about $869 million in trailing earnings for HYPE holders. Based on a token price near $63, Multicoin calculated that HYPE trades at roughly 36 times trailing earnings, or about 30 times after accounting for revenue associated with Hyperliquid’s Coinbase and USDC agreement.

Meanwhile, technical charts present a more cautious picture than the firm’s long-term forecast. On the four-hour timeframe, HYPE is forming a bearish double-top pattern, with a neckline near the $52.7 support level.

If sellers push the token below that support and confirm the pattern, the measured downside target points toward the $28.5 area, suggesting traders may continue watching technical risks alongside Multicoin’s longer-term fundamental outlook.

Crypto infrastructure company BitGo Holdings laid off about 15% of its staff on Thursday as its CEO pledged to focus the company on areas including trading, stablecoins and artificial intelligence-powered infrastructure.

“Today I’m sharing a hard decision: we are reducing our workforce by nearly 15%,” BitGo co-founder and CEO Mike Belshe posted to X on Thursday. “The ecosystem has evolved, and the way we build financial services has changed dramatically.” 

“We need to be sharper, more focused, and concentrate our people and energy on the areas that matter most: security, trading, stablecoins, settlement, and AI-powered infrastructure,” he added.

The layoffs add to the thousands of jobs lost in the crypto industry so far in 2026, with many companies citing efficiency gains from AI and a wide crypto market slump as the reason for the cuts.

Source: Mike Belshe

BitGo did not confirm the number of staff affected in the layoffs. Its 2025 annual report published in March disclosed it had 603 full-time employees as of Dec. 31, 2025, meaning the layoffs could have impacted about 90 staff.

Belshe said the layoffs were “a one-time action” and BitGo does not “anticipate further reductions.” The company is still hiring for 51 roles across various regions, according to its job board.

BitGo did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Related: Blockworks acquires Messari in crypto data consolidation push

Shares in BitGo (BTGO) closed Thursday down 4.67% at $4.80, extending a nearly 73% slide from its public debut at $18 on Jan. 22.

Shares in BitGo on Thursday slid more than 4.5% after the company announced it cut 15% of its staff. Source: Google Finance

Crypto companies have so far cut more than 5,000 jobs this year, with Block Inc. undertaking the biggest round of layoffs by cutting 4,000 staff or about half its workforce in February. 

Robinhood cut 10% of its workforce on June 16, while in May, crypto exchange Kraken cut 150 staff, data company Dune cut 25% of its workforce and Coinbase cut 700 employees, or about 14% of its workforce.

Earlier this year, Gemini laid off 200 employees and Crypto.com also laid off about 180 staff, with both citing the rising use of AI.

So far this year, the wider US technology sector has seen over 121,500 layoffs from over 200 companies, according to Layoffs.fyi.

Magazine: Guide to the top and emerging global crypto hubs: Mid-2026

Crypto held in an IRA or 401(k) is treated differently. These accounts generally do not receive a step-up in value. Instead, they continue to follow the rules that apply to retirement assets. Distributions are typically taxed as ordinary income, and in many cases, non-spousal beneficiaries must withdraw the full account balance within 10 years. Mixing crypto’s volatility and forced liquidation can create financial planning considerations.

Q. Who should I choose to be in charge?

Careful consideration when choosing the person to manage your assets is vital to make sure your plan works as you envisioned. This can be a stressful and emotional period for families, and the person you choose will likely be making decisions under pressure.

In most estate plans, the person in charge is there to coordinate with institutions to carry out your wishes. Bitcoin can be different. If crypto is held in a wallet, the person you choose isn’t just overseeing the process; often, they are interacting with the system directly. There is no institution stepping in to move assets or correct mistakes. If something is entered incorrectly, it may not be fixable.

Someone who can follow instructions and be patient to avoid guesswork may be more important than a financial or technical background. Being capable of acting in emotional situations, rationally, is a quality to look for. When putting systems in place to ensure your crypto is accessible, also consider making sure someone with no experience can follow the steps without guessing. In traditional planning, there’s usually a backstop; there often isn’t with crypto.

Strategy turned a software company into the largest corporate Bitcoin holder on earth by exploiting a simple loop: trade above your Bitcoin’s value, issue stock, buy more Bitcoin, repeat. In June 2026, Bitcoin broke below $60,000, the stock fell under its own Bitcoin value, and the loop began running the other way. Here is how the machine works, why it reverses, and whether Saylor is actually trapped.

For five years, Michael Saylor ran one of the most effective financial machines in modern markets, a self-reinforcing loop that converted a mid-sized software company into the largest corporate holder of Bitcoin on earth, with more than 847,000 coins on its balance sheet.

The machine had a simple engine at its center: as long as Strategy’s stock traded at a premium to the value of the Bitcoin it held, the company could issue new shares or preferred stock above that value, use the cash to buy more Bitcoin, and increase the amount of Bitcoin backing each existing share, which justified the premium and let the loop run again. It was elegant, it was relentless, and for a long time, it worked spectacularly, turning Strategy into a Bitcoin proxy that often rose faster than Bitcoin itself.

In late June 2026, that engine threw itself into reverse. Bitcoin crashed below $60,000, Strategy’s stock fell beneath the value of its own Bitcoin, and the loop that had compounded gains on the way up began compounding pressure on the way down.

This piece explains how the flywheel works, why a falling price flips it into a doom loop, and whether Saylor is genuinely trapped or merely strained.

The reason this matters far beyond one company is that Strategy is the template. Hundreds of imitators built Bitcoin and crypto treasury companies on the same premium-driven logic, and the entire category has never faced a real test of what happens when the premium evaporates, and the price of the underlying asset sits below cost.

Strategy is now running that experiment in public, with its stock at a multi-year low, a stack of preferred shares trading below their face value, a dividend bill that has quadrupled in six months, and analysts openly debating whether the company can keep funding itself without selling the Bitcoin on which its entire identity is built, never selling.

The mechanics are intricate, but the core story is one of reflexivity, a feedback loop that amplifies whatever direction the market is already moving, and the lesson it is teaching is that a flywheel is only a flywheel while the premium holds.

The machine that made Strategy the biggest Bitcoin holder on earth

To understand why Strategy is in trouble, you first have to understand why it worked so well, because the same mechanism does both. The key number is something analysts call mNAV, shorthand for the ratio between the company’s market value and the net asset value of the Bitcoin it holds.

When mNAV is above one, the stock trades at a premium: investors are paying more for a share of Strategy than the Bitcoin behind that share is worth. That premium is the fuel for the entire engine. When the stock trades above the value of its Bitcoin, Strategy can issue new shares into the market, raise cash at that elevated price, spend the cash on more Bitcoin, and end up with more Bitcoin per share than it started with, even after the new shares dilute the count. Existing shareholders come out ahead, the higher Bitcoin-per-share figure justifies the premium, and the company can do it all again.

This is the flywheel, and for years it spun in Strategy’s favor with remarkable force. Every time Bitcoin rose, the premium tended to widen, which let Strategy raise more capital on better terms, which bought more Bitcoin, which lifted Bitcoin-per-share and the stock alongside it.

The liquidation heatmap shows a bulk of clustered liquidation risk above current prices, not below. That means that a move to the downside is unlikely to be amplified by a cascade of forced selling; the real danger is for those positioned short.

Open interest has risen roughly 0.28% over the past 24 hours, even as price fell by around 3% – signaling that traders aren’t closing their shorts, they’re doubling down and betting on a breach of the $58,000 level of support. Funding rates are also negative, another sign that the market is paying a premium for downside exposure.

Spot market depth reinforces strength beneath a delicate surface; CoinGlass data shows that there is a total of 6,900 BTC ($409 million) sat in bids on the order book between the current price and $50,000, while there are just 1,570 BTC ($93 million) in resting sell orders between the current price at $70,000, creating a bullish skew in terms of supply.

Typically, in scenarios like this, when a clearly overcrowded trade is identified, astute traders and market makers will target that weakness and move the price in the other direction. This could lead to those in shorts closing their positions to avoid paying funding and prevent liquidation.

Aave founder Stani Kulechov has rejected reports suggesting Aave would sell AAVE tokens to Kraken at a roughly 70% discount, while confirming that discussions around long-term strategic partnerships have taken place.

Earlier, a report claimed that Kraken is in advanced talks to invest 35,000 ETH in exchange for 250,000 AAVE tokens and a 15% equity stake in Aave Group. The reported transaction was valued at approximately $71 million and implied an Aave Group valuation of about $385 million.

Responding to the report, Kulechov argued that its framing did not accurately describe the discussions. He said there was “no way” Aave would sell AAVE tokens at a 70% discount. While disputing that characterization, he did not deny that negotiations with strategic partners have occurred.

Instead, Kulechov explained that Aave Labs holds an allocation of AAVE tokens that several market participants have expressed interest in purchasing as part of deeper, long-term partnerships. His comments drew a distinction between Aave Labs, which develops the protocol, and the Aave DAO, which governs the ecosystem and controls protocol economics.

Protocol revenue continues flowing to the DAO

Expanding on that structure, Kulechov said every dollar of revenue generated by the Aave Protocol and the GHO stablecoin accrues to AAVE through the Aave DAO. He added that the same arrangement now covers revenue from Aave App, Aave Pro, and swap-related products following the approval of the Aave Will Win governance proposal.

Under that framework, Aave Labs does not keep protocol or product revenue. Instead, the development company receives funding approved by the DAO to continue building the protocol.

Kulechov said Aave is currently generating approximately $134 million in annualized revenue, with those proceeds flowing to the DAO rather than the development company. He also stated that the Aave brand, protocol software, and other intellectual property created for the ecosystem now belong to AAVE under the updated governance model.

Separately, Kulechov revealed that the team is designing Aavenomics 3.0, which he said will introduce an automated, non-discretionary AAVE buyback mechanism. He did not disclose the launch timeline, funding source, or expected size of the program.

Aave already operates a buyback system funded by excess protocol revenue. Based on Kulechov’s comments, the proposed mechanism would automate purchases rather than relying on governance decisions for each buyback.

Tokenized assets remain central to Aave’s valuation case

Looking beyond governance, Kulechov said Aave is expanding its focus beyond crypto lending to include tokenized real-world assets and other financial products.

That strategy aligns with a recent assessment from crypto.news, which reported last week that Grayscale Research considers AAVE undervalued at current prices using a cash-flow model commonly applied to traditional financial companies.

Grayscale estimated Aave could generate roughly $60 million in revenue during 2026 and placed the token’s current fair value between $80 and $100 based on a 20x to 25x fintech earnings multiple.

According to Grayscale Research, a fair value of about $175 could become possible within a year if regulatory clarity accelerates the use of tokenized assets such as Treasury products, private credit, and money market funds as collateral in DeFi lending.

The research noted that the estimate is model-based rather than a guaranteed price target and depends on tokenized assets bringing additional deposits, borrowing activity, and fee generation to the protocol.

Following Kulechov’s comments, AAVE climbed to an intraday high of $87.50 before easing to around $82, while the token continued to receive support from Standard Chartered’s previously published $3,500 price target for the end of 2030.

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.