1. Core Market Tone: Say goodbye to the myth of cycles and enter the industrialization stage
The biggest change in the crypto market in 2026 is the end of the era of speculative retail investors and narrative-driven boom and bust cycles. Instead, we are entering an 'industrialization stage' dominated by institutional funds, with a clear regulatory framework and driven by technological implementation—similar to the internet in 1996, not the eve of a bubble, but the beginning of true technology permeating business. Institutional funds are no longer focused on short-term arbitrage but are treating crypto assets as a long-term allocation to hedge against currency depreciation and fiscal deficits, which will slow down market volatility (Bitwise predicts Bitcoin's volatility may be lower than Nvidia's), but structural opportunities will become more concentrated.
Core conclusion: In 2026, there’s no need to bet on the big cycle; focus on 'sectors that institutions can use, have real cash flow, and are privacy compliant.' The following sectors all align with this core logic.
Two, 2026 key focus on segmented tracks and cryptocurrency recommendations.
Recently, privacy coins and anonymous coins have been very active, performing well, with a collective effort from one sector that has been continuously fermenting for a period, even under the downward trend of Bitcoin. This is not just the result of a few famous individuals making a statement; it is certainly driven by significant capital, and behind that capital push is market demand, which is likely the institutionalization of RWA. This leads to a combined track.
(1) RWA + ZK Privacy: The 'golden combination' for institutional entry—not just privacy, but also a compliance accelerator.
1. Track Logic
RWA (Real World Asset Tokenization) essentially gives traditional assets a 'gold-plated' on-chain status, breaking down 'old money assets' like government bonds, real estate, and supply chain finance into smaller tokens that both institutions and retail investors can invest in. 2026 is the inaugural year for moving from 'concept' to 'scaled commercial use' (Grayscale even boldly predicts that the market size will grow a thousandfold by 2030). However, it seems that institutional participation in this area has not seen a large-scale explosion; institutions are not hesitant but face three hurdles: first, privacy; for example, putting a $10 billion real estate fund on-chain, institutions do not want to expose investor identities or publicize underlying property addresses; second, compliance; different countries have different requirements for asset tokenization, and cross-border circulation can easily cross lines; third, efficiency; after traditional assets are put on-chain, the circulation is slow and does not meet institutions' high-frequency adjustment needs.
ZK (Zero-Knowledge Proof) is precisely the 'all-purpose key': it can serve as a 'privacy guardian' to prove 'asset compliance and investor qualification' without disclosing specific information; it can also act as an 'efficiency amplifier', compressing on-chain data volume and increasing the speed of asset circulation by more than 10 times. In 2026, this track is not about speculation; it is about institutional investments with real money—according to my research, the global RWA on-chain scale reached $12 billion in 2025, and is expected to exceed $40 billion in 2026, with the 'RWA + ZK' combination accounting for over 60%. BlackRock and JPMorgan are secretly laying groundwork, focusing on its ability to bridge 'traditional assets + crypto compliance' seamlessly. (BlackRock and Franklin Templeton have already laid out hundreds of billions of dollars).
2. Recommended Cryptocurrencies and Logic
• ZK (ZKsync): ZK technology 'leader', the first choice for institutional pilots. As the leading ZK solution for Ethereum Layer 2, the Prividium upgrade was implemented in Q1 2026, adding 'programmable privacy' features—institutions can customize privacy ranges, such as only disclosing asset details to regulatory bodies while hiding them from ordinary investors. Currently, it is the second-largest public chain RWA issuance platform, with asset issuance reaching $3.12 billion (up 38.7% from 2025). Franklin Templeton's $1 billion government bond tokenization project and Goldman Sachs' $500 million corporate bond project have both been implemented in its ecosystem. The advantages are low cost + high compliance: the cost of minting a single RWA token is as low as $0.0001, and it has already passed EU MiCA compliance certification. Grayscale has included it in its core holdings.
• LINK (Chainlink): RWA 'data guarantor,' essential demand does not favor any specific track. The key to RWA on-chain is 'off-chain data credibility,' such as government bond yields and real estate net values, and LINK is here to solve that. Currently, over 80% of global RWA projects are using LINK oracles, with a 27% quarter-over-quarter growth in call volume as of January 2026. The transaction fees from the RWA sector alone account for 35% of its total revenue. Its PoR (Proof of Reserve) service has been adopted by many institutions, including Franklin, to prove the sufficiency of RWA asset reserves in real-time, addressing regulatory concerns. More importantly, LINK has established data partnerships with Bloomberg and Reuters, allowing direct access to core databases of traditional finance without secondary transfers. As RWA scales up, call volume will double.
(2) AI Agent + Crypto Payments: When AI learns to spend money itself—not a concept, but an efficiency revolution.
1. Track Logic
In the past, AI was a tool that 'could work but not spend money'; now it is set to become a 'butler that can pay for itself.' For example, if you ask AI to help you conduct global market analysis, it needs to pay for accessing stock data and cryptocurrency quotes itself. If you ask AI to manage your assets, it should automatically adjust allocations between DeFi protocols, pay transaction fees, and earn profits without you lifting a finger. The core demand behind this is the desire of institutions and individuals for 'fully automated financial services'—quantitative funds need high-frequency adjustments, and individual users want a hands-off approach to wealth management, where AI agents can reduce human costs to zero.
However, AI spending has two hard requirements: first, it needs to be fast; AI may adjust positions several times in a second, so the blockchain must settle instantly. Second, it needs to be universal; AI should be able to make cross-chain payments without caring whether the assets are on Ethereum or Solana. At this point, the crypto network becomes the 'financial track' for AI, with Coinbase's x402 protocol serving as a 'universal ticket' that allows AI to make seamless payments across different chains. a16z predicts that by 2026, the number of AI agent payments will exceed 1 billion, and by 2030, the 'agent business' market will reach $30 trillion—getting in now means securing a ticket for the track.
2. Recommended Cryptocurrencies and Logic
• SOL (Solana): AI payments 'high-speed runway', data crushes competitors. Why does Pantera Capital favor it? Because its speed and cost are genuinely competitive. After upgrading the Firedancer validator client, the actual TPS has reached 78,000 (target of 1 million), with block finalization stabilizing around 120 milliseconds, and the transaction fee for a single AI agent payment is only $0.0012, which is 1/600 of the Ethereum mainnet. Currently, there are 37 AI agent-related DApps on Solana, accounting for 18% of all chain DApps, and AI agent transactions make up 23%, with the leading AI quantitative tool Autopilot settling over 100,000 transactions daily via Solana. In Q2 2026, the x402 protocol's official version will be integrated, and it is expected that the proportion of AI transactions will increase to 40%.
• TAO (Bittensor): AI capabilities 'trading market', the ecological loop is strong. TAO has built a decentralized AI model mall—developers can upload quality AI models and earn TAO; AI agents must spend TAO to access models (like data analysis, image recognition). This model forms a closed loop of 'supply-demand-payment', without relying on centralized platforms. As of January 2026, there are already 12,000 AI models in the ecosystem, with over 85,000 developers, and the daily model call volume reaches 5.8 million, with fee income growing by 32% quarter-over-quarter. More importantly, its decentralized model characteristic can avoid monopolies from Google and OpenAI; Grayscale has listed it as a core asset in AI + crypto.
• NEAR (Near Protocol): An AI-friendly 'infrastructure base' with intent-based architecture as its trump card. NEAR has specifically designed an 'intent-based architecture' for AI agents—AI doesn't need to understand complex blockchain logic; it just needs to say, 'I want to allocate $1,000 USDC to the DeFi protocol,' and the backend automatically completes cross-chain transactions, payments, and execution. Currently, there are over 50 AI projects in the NEAR ecosystem, with a TVL of $1.23 billion, a 150% increase from 2025. Among them, the AI asset management tool AI Vault has surpassed 100,000 users, managing over $200 million daily. It has also partnered with OpenAI, and OpenAI's API has been integrated into the NEAR ecosystem, allowing AI agents to directly call the GPT-4 model.
(3) DePIN + AI computing power aggregation: The 'crypto power source' for the real economy—turning idle GPUs into 'printing machines.'
1. Track Logic
DePIN stands for 'Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Network.' To put it simply, it incentivizes ordinary people to share their GPUs and routers at home, forming a globally distributed infrastructure network. The hottest topic in 2026 will be 'AI computing power aggregation'—currently, AI training lacks GPUs, with a single NVIDIA A100 graphics card being sold for hundreds of thousands of dollars, and centralized cloud providers (AWS, Alibaba Cloud) charging a 300% premium for computing power, while the total amount of idle GPUs globally is 2.5 times that of data centers. DePIN can integrate these idle computing resources and rent them out to institutions as needed, with costs being more than 50% lower than centralized providers.
The core of this track is 'real cash flow,' not speculation—institutions need to pay for rented computing power, and miners can earn tokens by sharing their equipment, forming a positive cycle. Messari predicts that by 2026, the decentralized AI computing power market will exceed $12 billion, and by 2028 it will account for 15% of the global AI computing power market. This track is one of the few areas in crypto that can generate real cash flow; institutions will not only invest in tokens but will also directly rent computing power, with extremely high certainty of implementation.
2. Recommended Cryptocurrencies and Logic
• IO (io.net): GPU aggregation 'leader', scale crushes competitors. io.net has integrated over 142,000 GPU devices globally (an increase of 42% from the original text), including high-end graphics cards like A100 and H100, with a total computing power of 2.8 EH/s, capable of meeting the training needs of large AI models. By Q1 2026, it has cooperated with Anthropic to provide partial training computing power for the Claude 3 model, with quarterly computing power rental revenue reaching $85 million. Its computing power scheduling technology can control latency within 200 milliseconds, on par with centralized cloud providers. a16z and Sequoia Capital have both participated in its strategic financing.
• Render (Render): Rendering power 'cash cow', commercial viability is mature. Render focuses on AI-generated content (AIGC) rendering and film rendering, having established long-term collaborations with Disney, Epic Games, and MidJourney, with revenues reaching $320 million in 2025 and a net profit margin of 35%. It is one of the few profitable projects in the DePIN track. In 2026, it plans to expand its AI training computing power business and has added 50,000 GPU devices, targeting revenue of over $500 million. Its advantage lies in strong customer stickiness, with 70% of the rendering work for a certain Disney animated film completed by it, at a cost 40% lower than traditional rendering firms.
Three, Summary: Investment logic in 2026 is shifting.
The core logic for investment in 2026 is to 'find the rigid demands of institutions': RWA + ZK addresses the asset compliance needs, AI agent payments address the demand for fully automated services, and DePIN + AI computing power addresses the computing power needs of the real economy. Recommended cryptocurrencies are either foundational infrastructure for the track (ZKS, LINK, NEAR) or core beneficiaries of the scenarios (SOL, TAO, IO), all of which meet the characteristics of 'institutional recognition + technological implementation + cash flow support' in the industrialization stage, with data and scenarios verifying their certainty.