Citi analysts set bitcoin bull case at $189,000 in 2026

Blockchain.com, one of the oldest crypto firms, announced it confidentially submitted a draft registration statement on Form S-1 with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, a step toward conducting an initial public offering.

The number of offered shares and price range has yet to be determined, according to a Thursday press release. If the company completes its IPO, Blockchain.com would join Circle and Bullish as crypto companies that have gone public in the year.

Simultaneously, a number of other companies, namely ethereum development firm Consensys, security hardware firm Ledger, and rival crypto exchange Kraken, have paused their plans to IPO due to rough market conditions.

The exchange started in 2011 as a bitcoin search engine before expanding to providing wallets and powering bitcoin transactions. The company raised funds through a series of funding rounds, with a Series D funding round in 2022 giving the firm a $14 billion valuation at the time.

While investors are opting out of ETFs focused on the two largest cryptocurrencies, some are adding ETFs of alternative coins, chief among them being hype, the native token for Hyperliquid. 

Digital asset managers 21shares and Bitwise rolled out hype ETFs last week and have yet to notch any outflows. Tuesday saw the highest level of inflows so far at over $11 million, outpacing XRP and solana ETFs’ combined inflow of nearly $5.3 million. Meanwhile, bitcoin and ethereum saw $393 million exit their funds yesterday, according to SoSoValue.

Bloomberg senior ETF analyst Eric Balchunas noted the 21shares Hyperliquid ETF “is growing volume each day since launch in the tens of millions now, 8x over day one, which is [a] really good sign of organic interest.”

The ETF flows coincide with the token’s outperformance, jumping 5.7% in the last 24 hours, 29.5% in the past seven days, and more than 100% year to date, data from CoinMarketCap shows. Bitcoin, ethereum, solana, and XRP are all down double digits in 2026.

Hype began trading a week after former SEC Chairman Gary Gensler announced ending his tenure, and has an all-time high price of $59.30, set in September 2025.

Hyperliquid, the perpetual futures exchange built on its own blockchain, gained traction among users who wanted to trade assets such as commodities, cryptocurrencies, and equities with leverage in hours when traditional venues are closed. 

Treasury firm Hyperliquid Strategies has also rallied on news the SEC will soon greenlight trading tokenized versions of stocks.

Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan thinks investors are underestimating Hyperliquid’s impact and value. “The market is valuing Hyperliquid as a perpetual crypto futures exchange that happens to be growing quickly. But it should be valued as a global super-app covering all assets,” Hougan said in a Tuesday memo.

“Its addressable universe is not the $3 trillion crypto market, but the $600 trillion market for global assets. Those are two completely different businesses,” Hougan continued. “Today’s prices suggest you’re being offered the second at the cost of the first.”

Last week, Coinbase and Circle announced a new agreement with Hyperliquid. Coinbase became Hyperliquid’s official treasury deployer of Circle’s USDC on Hyperliquid, a move that translates to sharing around 90% of stablecoin reserve yield with the protocol.

99% of fees generated on Hyperliquid are dedicated to token buybacks, which, annualized, comes to $618 million, data from DefiLlama shows. The market capitalization of hype stands at $12.3 billion. 

On Monday, two researchers announced they were leaving the nonprofit organization tasked with supporting the second-largest blockchain network, adding to a growing exodus from the Ethereum Foundation.

Carl Beek, who helped architect the early design of ethereum’s beacon chain, will end his seven-year tenure with the foundation at the end of the month, while research scientist Julian Ma, who focused on product and growth work, has also decided to leave after four years.

Beek and Ma deepen a recent bout of turnover. Last week, the foundation said in a blog post that lead developers Barnabé Monnot and Tim Beiko are moving on from the organization. In April, Josh Stark, who was on the Ethereum Foundation leadership team for five years, left, as did Trent Van Epps, who organized Protocol Guild, which provides funding to core developers. The string of departures has raised concerns among those in the ecosystem.

“There have been a lot of disagreements about where ETH should move, whether from an issuance or architectural standpoint,” Laurens Fraussen, a research analyst at data provider Kaiko, told Sherwood News. “I’d assume the people leaving are either looking for greener pastures or don’t agree with the way the EF is being run.”

The foundation exodus comes as investors exit from ethereum ETFs. The investment vehicles saw more than $86 million in outflows on Monday, making six straight days of outflows, the longest streak since March, according to SoSoValue.

Meanwhile, an address identified as Galaxy Digital has a $2.3 million short position on ethereum using 20x leverage on Hyperliquid, data from blockchain analytics firm Nansen shows. The price of ethereum stands just under $2,110 as of 12:10 p.m. ET. With an entry point of $2,203, the firm has an unrealized gain of $102,000.