A Massive Tech firm will combine a crypto pockets in 2026, and extra Fortune 100 firms will begin their very own blockchains, crypto VC agency Dragonfly’s managing companion Haseeb Qureshi has predicted.
He additionally tipped that fintechs launching L1s to compete with public chains like Ethereum and Solana will fail to draw sufficient customers.
In a put up to X on Monday, Qureshi mentioned a lot of the Fortune 100 adoption is more likely to come from the banking and fintech sectors, with many leveraging the Avalanche blockchain and present crypto toolkits like OP stack, Orbit, and ZK Stack. The setup would allow these networks to extra non-public and permissioned whereas remaining linked to a public blockchain.
Quite a lot of Fortune 100 companies within the monetary providers business have already constructed non-public blockchains, together with JPMorgan, Financial institution of America, Goldman Sachs, and IBM — although many of those options are nonetheless within the testing section or have solely been utilized in restricted methods.
Earlier this month, crypto funding agency Galaxy Digital predicted at the least one Fortune 500 financial institution, cloud supplier, or eCommerce platform would launch a layer 1 blockchain that settles greater than $1 billion of actual financial exercise in 2026 and construct a bridge for decentralized finance entry.
Qureshi additionally believes one of many Massive Tech firms that dominate on-line life — doubtlessly Google, Meta, or Apple — will launch or purchase a crypto pockets in 2026 — a transfer that has the potential to onboard billions of customers into crypto.
Public fintech chains gained’t threaten Ethereum’s dominance
Nonetheless, Qureshi isn’t bullish on new L1 blockchains constructed by fintech companies — arguing that they gained’t entice ample customers or seize sufficient community exercise to problem crypto-native networks like Ethereum and Solana.
“Regardless of the joy across the current crop of fintech chains, their metrics will underwhelm.” Each day lively addresses, stablecoin flows, and RWAs—Tempo, Arc, and Robinhood Chain will underdeliver, whereas Ethereum and Solana will overdeliver.”
“Finest builders will proceed to construct on impartial infra chains,” Qureshi added.
Bitcoin to prime $150K however lose market share
In the case of value forecasts, the Dragonfly govt expects Bitcoin to commerce above $150,000 by the tip of 2026, however ideas that Bitcoin dominance will fall.
Galaxy Digital took a tough move on making a strong prediction and mentioned 2026 can be “too chaotic” to even guess, as the worth may vary wherever between $50,000 and $250,000 by the tip of subsequent 12 months.
In the meantime, Qureshi expects the $312 billion stablecoin market to develop by 60% in 2026, with the present market chief Tether (USDT) seeing its dominance drop from 60% to 55%.
Qureshi bullish on prediction markets, however not AI in crypto
Prediction markets will proceed to growth subsequent 12 months, however AI gained’t discover a use case in crypto past safety, Qureshi mentioned.
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“AI brokers will nonetheless not be ‘paying one another’ or spending any significant cash in 2026,” Qureshi mentioned, whereas additionally predicting that no efficient answer will emerge to curb spambot proliferation on social platforms.
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