In brief
- 21Shares predicted that Bitcoin’s four-year cycle would fall in 2026, but conceded that it hasn’t yet.
- The firm indicated the market cycle has changed, however, pointing to a less severe drawdown and no complete capitulation as $BTC trades below $60,000.
- It also forecasted significant growth for crypto ETF assets under management (AUM) and gains for DeFi TVL, both of which have been hampered early this year.
Crypto investment firm and ETF issuer 21Shares previously predicted that Bitcoin would break from its four-year cycle in 2026.
Nearly six months later, the firm conceded on Wednesday that that’s not the case—right as Bitcoin breaks below the $60,000 mark for the second time this month.
“Heading into 2026, we believed that Bitcoin’s four-year cycle could be finished,” the firm wrote in its latest “State of the Market” report. “Six months in, we have to be honest: price action still looks familiar.”
But while the four-year cycle—a historical trading pattern that has seen $BTC peak and then bottom following the quadrennial halving of its mining reward—may not have broken, the market has bent, the firm says, noting that its “thesis is not entirely wrong.”
“Market structure has clearly changed: ETF ownership is increasingly institutional and the current drawdown of roughly 50% remains far milder than the 80%+ bear markets of prior cycles,” 21Shares wrote.
As it stands, Bitcoin has fallen 52% from its all-time high of $126,080, recently changing hands at $59,781 on Wednesday. At that marker, it is holding above its on-chain cost basis of $54,000 according to data from Glassnode, signaling that the market has not yielded to “outright capitulation.”
While the Bitcoin ETFs have helped quell cycle dynamics, they have not seen the influx in investment that 21Shares expected this year.
In addition to its cycle-breaking prediction, the firm anticipated crypto ETFs would jump towards $400 billion in assets under management during this year. But through six months of activity, more assets have actually left crypto ETFs than have entered this year, catalyzing the fall from all-time high marks for both Bitcoin and Ethereum.
Data from CoinGlass indicates that nearly $3 billion in assets have left crypto ETFs during the last quarter, and crypto ETFs as a whole are down nearly $5 billion since the start of the year.
Other breakouts predicted by the firm have also fallen short, including predictions of a jump to a $1 trillion stablecoin market cap, $300 billion in DeFi total value locked (TVL), and $250 billion in assets under management for crypto treasury firms (DATs)—a trio which has been combatted with lingering regulatory uncertainty, consistent DeFi exploits, and declining crypto prices.
But one prediction that remains on pace is the firm’s optimism around prediction market trading volumes, which it anticipated would breach $100 billion this year.
Led by Polymarket and Kalshi, that number is well within reach, as data gathered by the firm indicates prediction market platforms had done more than $57.5 billion in volume by the end of May—well ahead of the pace needed to eclipse the number. (Disclaimer: Decrypt’s parent company Dastan operates the prediction market platform, Myriad.)
