Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan, in a note to clients late Monday, said bitcoin could break its four-year cycle and reach new all-time highs in 2026. He expects lower volatility and weaker correlation with equities, noting bitcoin was less volatile than Nvidia stock throughout 2025. According to The Block, bitcoin is down over 30% from its Oct. 6 peak near $126,000.

Since its launch in November, the US Spot XRP ETF has accumulated more than $1 billion in net inflows, signaling heightened institutional appetite for XRP-based products. While Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs have seen notable outflows, XRP trades around $1.90 with a market cap near $114.97 billion and a sharply higher 24-hour volume, highlighting a shift in market positioning toward alternative assets.

Throughout 2025, Michael Saylor‑led Strategy accumulated 223,800 Bitcoin at a weighted average cost of $99,908 per BTC, lifting its total holdings to 671,268 BTC and pushing the firm’s treasury value to about $60.05 billion. A Form 8-K dated December 15, 2025 disclosed the latest weekly purchase of 10,645 BTC for roughly $980.3 million at an average of $92,098, implying an acquisition pace of around 641 BTC per day and leaving the company with an unrealized gain of about $9.73 billion, or 19%.

On 16 December 2025, CoinGecko data indicated that Solana attracted more ecosystem-related interest than any other major blockchain, measured by verified organic website traffic. The analysis, covering early 2024 through mid-December 2025, showed Solana captured over a quarter of all attention, leaving Base, Ethereum, Sui, BNB Chain, Bitcoin, and Cardano trailing behind.

Solana faced a sustained DDoS campaign over the past week, with peak traffic reaching 6 Tbps. Despite the pressure, Solana's block production and consensus remained stable. SUI encountered a smaller attack in the past day, which briefly degraded performance before being resolved.

U.S. spot XRP ETFs crossed $1 billion in cumulative net inflows one month after launch. As of December 16, SoSoValue data shows a $10.89 million daily inflow on December 15, lifting total XRP ETF net assets to $1.12 billion, nearly 1% of XRP's market cap. Canary Capital leads with $376.5 million since its November 13 debut.

Dogecoin has lagged the broader crypto market in the current bull cycle, recording the weakest year-to-date performance among the top 10 coins while several smaller meme tokens have rallied. Analysts highlight five alternatives—Fartcoin, Pepe, Pippin, Maxi Doge, and Pepenode—which feature low to mid caps, high trading volumes or presale inflows, and in some cases staking rewards or on-chain activity that could support stronger upside into 2026. These projects span Solana- and Ethereum-based ecosystems and are being accumulated by so-called smart money investors looking for higher risk-reward opportunities.

On 16 Dec 2025, the US Senate Banking Committee postponed markup of the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act of 2025, known as the CLARITY Act, pushing any decision on federal crypto market structure rules into early 2026. The House had already passed H.R.3633 in July 2025, so the Senate delay leaves trading platforms, token issuers and financial institutions without a unified national framework for digital asset trading and custody.