Digital asset markets are heading into a tumultuous 2026, with prices under pressure even as the foundational plumbing of the system, from Wall Street’s tokenization to Bitcoin’s quantum-proof upgrades, is quietly progressing.
A new mid-year update from Fidelity Digital Assets positions this year as a year of “structural reform,” with regulatory developments, infrastructure improvements, and institutional experimentation paying off more than headline prices suggest.
Bitcoin has fallen about 13% since the beginning of the year, due to deleveraging through liquidations, stubborn inflation, and geopolitical shocks that pushed interest rate expectations back toward tightening, Fidelity said.
However, the asset has outperformed many traditional benchmarks in recent escalations in global conflict, suggesting renewed demand for liquid and politically neutral assets when stress spikes.
At the same time, demand for crypto exposure through mainstream channels remains strong, with options on spot BTC exchange-traded products launched in late 2024 now recording open interest comparable to native Bitcoin-settled options.
Tokenization is also a quiet growth area, with major financial institutions rolling out blockchain-based products and major exchanges investing in digital asset platforms, supported by joint guidance from the SEC and CFTC and legislation like the CLARITY Act aimed at formalizing digital asset taxonomy.
Discussion on AI, mining, and Bitcoin security
One of the most novel developments so far this year is the interaction of AI and Bitcoin mining capabilities. Fidelity notes that 30-day average hash rate and mining difficulty are each down about 8-9% from their all-time highs before the slow recovery, suggesting that miners may be redirecting power and infrastructure to higher-margin AI datacenter workloads.
The company reports that on-chain, the expansion of the amount of data allowed in Bitcoin’s OP_RETURN field has not caused the feared “blockchain bloat” and that block sizes and usage rates remain within expected ranges.
Instead, the focus is on node diversity and long-term security. Bitcoin Core still accounts for about 77% of nodes, compared to about 17% for Bitcoin Knot, and despite accelerating work on proposals such as quantum-resistant Pay-to-Merkle-Root outputs, Fidelity points out that the risk of fragmentation under certain conditions is not zero.
bitcoin vs gold
Outside of cryptocurrencies, gold has reaffirmed its status as a macro hedge, jumping nearly 30% at the start of the year before returning to a still-solid 3-4% year-to-date gain, the report said.
Along with isolated but symbolically important moves such as Iran accepting BTC for certain payments related to Strait of Hormuz traffic, Fidelity points to continued strong purchases by central banks and evidence that gold is overtaking the US dollar and government bonds in some foreign exchange reserve compositions.
