Delphi Digital Releases Top 10 Cryptocurrency Market Predictions for 2026: The Industry is Moving Towards a New Maturity Stage

2026 will become a pivotal year for the maturity of the cryptocurrency industry. According to the latest annual outlook report by renowned crypto research firm Delphi Digital, it reveals the top ten key trends shaping the future of financial markets.

The core view of the report suggests that the crypto industry is shifting from speculation-driven to structurally mature, with the institutionalization process accelerating. Emerging sectors represented by perpetual contract decentralized exchanges, AI proxy economies, and prediction markets are expected to experience explosive growth.

01 Industry Maturation Period

The cryptocurrency industry is entering a mature phase. According to the Delphi Digital report, a structural transformation will occur in 2026, with formal institutional participation becoming the norm.

The traditional four-year halving speculation cycle is gradually losing influence, and market development is shifting towards being driven by structural factors such as regulation, infrastructure, and application deployment.

02 Rise of AI Proxy Economy

AI proxies will achieve fully autonomous trading. The x402 protocol allows AI proxies to access any API via encrypted payments, while the ERC-8004 protocol establishes a reputation system for proxies.

AI proxies can be entrusted with travel planning, subcontracted to specialized flight search agents, pay data fees via the x402 protocol, and complete ticket bookings on-chain—all without human intervention.

03 Perpetual DEX Disrupts Traditional Finance

Perpetual contract decentralized exchanges are disrupting traditional financial systems. Traditional finance incurs high costs due to fragmentation, whereas blockchain consolidates all functions into a single smart contract.

Platforms like Hyperliquid are building native lending features, enabling Perp DEX to potentially serve as broker, exchange, custodian, bank, and clearinghouse simultaneously.

04 Prediction Markets Become Financial Infrastructure

Prediction markets will evolve into part of traditional financial infrastructure by 2026. Thomas Peterffy, chairman of Interactive Brokers, views prediction markets as a real-time information layer for investment portfolios.

Prediction markets will expand into areas such as stock event markets (e.g., earnings forecasts), macroeconomic indicators (e.g., CPI and Federal Reserve decisions), and cross-asset relative value markets.

05 Ecosystem Recovers Stablecoin Yields

The distribution pattern of stablecoin yields is changing. Traditionally, stablecoin issuers earn most of the reserve yields, while platforms creating demand have limited earnings.

Last year, Coinbase earned over $900 million in reserve yields just through USDC distribution, while the total fee income of several mainstream blockchains was only about $800 million, despite hosting over $30 billion in stablecoin reserves.

06 DeFi Overcomes Uncollateralized Lending Challenges

Breakthroughs in DeFi lending have arrived. zkTLS technology enables users to prove their bank balances exceed certain thresholds without revealing account details.

This verification-based, real-time, uncollateralized credit service based on Web2 financial data can also be used to provide credit loans to AI proxies based on their performance history.

07 On-Chain Forex Finds Market Footing

On-chain forex markets will first find product-market fit in emerging market currency pairs. Currently, USD stablecoins account for 99.7% of total supply, but this dominance may have peaked.

Traditional forex markets involve numerous intermediaries and dispersed settlement systems, whereas on-chain forex can significantly reduce transaction costs and complexity by placing all currencies as tokenized assets on a shared execution layer.

08 Gold and Bitcoin Lead Currency Devaluation Trades

Gold and Bitcoin will continue to serve as primary tools for hedging currency devaluation. Gold prices recently surged by 60%, with central banks worldwide purchasing over 6000 tons of gold, with China being one of the most active buyers.

Gold typically leads Bitcoin by three to four months. As currency devaluation becomes a mainstream issue before the 2026 mid-term elections, both assets will attract more safe-haven capital.

09 Exchanges Evolve into Super Apps

Mainstream crypto exchanges are transforming from single trading platforms into “super apps.” Coinbase has Base as its operating system, Base App as its interface, and USDC yields as a core revenue source.

As user acquisition costs decrease, value will increasingly concentrate on platforms with large user bases. By 2026, industry leaders will further widen the gap with competitors.

10 Privacy Infrastructure Meets New Demands

As regulatory pressure on privacy increases, privacy infrastructure is rapidly developing to meet challenges. The EU has passed the “Chat Control Act” and limited cash transactions to below €10,000.

Privacy encryption cards, protocol-level encrypted services, on-chain KYC that does not expose personal data, and privacy infrastructure aimed at major financial institutions are accelerating.

Altcoins’ returns will remain highly fragmented; the widespread gains seen in previous cycles may not recur. Over $3 billion worth of tokens are about to unlock, facing fierce competition from AI, robotics, and biotech sectors.

Future Outlook

In response to the emerging crypto financial ecosystem described in the Delphi Digital report—featuring AI proxies, perpetual DEX, and privacy trading—leading platforms like Gate are already prepared.

The crypto world is building the foundational layer for global finance. In this new era where smart contracts unify fragmented traditional finance, exchanges have become super apps that integrate trading, custody, clearing, and lending functions.

As DeFi’s uncollateralized lending becomes infrastructure, and on-chain forex in emerging markets finds its footing, cryptocurrencies will serve as the core engine driving global finance toward transparency and efficiency.