Two thousand and twenty-five. A year for forgetting, mostly. The crypto markets promised much, as they always do, and delivered, well, less. A lot of red ink. Some of the bigger names lost half their value. It was a teachable moment, if anyone was listening. So it goes.
Which brings us to 2026. The hope, you see, is a stubborn thing. It clings. So here are three digital tokens, battered and bruised, that might, just might, avoid complete oblivion. Don’t mistake this for optimism. It’s more of a clinical observation.
Bitcoin
Bitcoin. The firstborn. Ended 2025 down only 5 percent. Sounds almost respectable, doesn’t it? But remember the whispers at the start of the year? Two hundred thousand dollars was the target. The Trump administration, in a rare moment of apparent agreement with the tech crowd, had created a certain…enthusiasm. It didn’t last. It rarely does. It settled under one hundred thousand. A cautionary tale, if you’re inclined to see one.
Wall Street, of course, is still issuing pronouncements. One hundred and fifty thousand. Two hundred thousand. They have to say something. It’s their job. Lower interest rates and a slightly less awful macroeconomic outlook might help. Or they might not. The universe is under no obligation to make sense.
Ethereum
Ethereum, too, had its moment. A peak near five thousand dollars in August. New companies built around it, promising all sorts of wonders. Then, predictably, it fell. Down to three thousand three hundred. The arc of a bubble is always the same. Beautiful, fleeting, and ultimately, deflating.
Still, Ethereum remains the biggest of the Layer 1 blockchains. It controls a good chunk of the decentralized finance market. And it’s playing with stablecoins and tokenizing real-world assets. If those trends take off, Ethereum might get a lift. Or it might not. It’s just a bunch of code, after all.
Solana
Solana. The challenger. The one that was supposed to be different. Ended 2025 down a full 44 percent. A dismal performance. It hit a high of $294 in January. People thought it could reach $400. It didn’t. It got blamed for the rise and fall of a lot of meme coins. A convenient scapegoat. So it goes.
There’s a new blockchain upgrade, supposedly unlocking blazing-fast speeds. And the Solana ecosystem is growing. Revenue of nearly $3 billion over the last year, according to one report. But lots of blockchains have ecosystems. And lots of ecosystems are full of air. It’s good to see something happening, though. Unlike those “ghost” blockchains where nothing ever seems to move.
A Fragile Hope for 2026
Can these three bounce back? They’re up a bit so far this year, 7 to 17 percent. Market sentiment is shifting. Maybe. I’m cautiously bullish, if that’s not a contradiction in terms. A contrarian pick, perhaps. But remember, the market has a way of proving everyone wrong. Especially those who think they know what’s going to happen. So it goes.
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2026-01-18 06:12