Futures
Access hundreds of perpetual contracts
TradFi
Gold
One platform for global traditional assets
Options
Hot
Trade European-style vanilla options
Unified Account
Maximize your capital efficiency
Demo Trading
Introduction to Futures Trading
Learn the basics of futures trading
Futures Events
Join events to earn rewards
Demo Trading
Use virtual funds to practice risk-free trading
Launch
CandyDrop
Collect candies to earn airdrops
Launchpool
Quick staking, earn potential new tokens
HODLer Airdrop
Hold GT and get massive airdrops for free
Launchpad
Be early to the next big token project
Alpha Points
Trade on-chain assets and earn airdrops
Futures Points
Earn futures points and claim airdrop rewards
More
Ethereum 2026: 5x Growth Window Opens, Institutions Snatch Up, ETH Revaluation
Original author: Vivek Raman, Etherealize
Original compilation: Saoirse, Foresight News
Editor’s note：At the start of 2026, while global financial institutions are still searching for a certain path to digital transformation, Ethereum has quietly become the core battleground for institutional allocation—backed by a decade of security, scalable technical support, and a clearly defined regulatory environment. From JPMorgan deploying money market funds on public chains, to Fidelity bringing asset management into Layer1 networks, to the U.S. “GENIUS Act” clearing regulatory hurdles for stablecoins, and then to platforms such as Coinbase and Robinhood using Layer2 to build dedicated blockchains—these moves collectively confirm Ethereum’s evolution from a “technology experimentation ground” into a “global financial infrastructure.” In this analysis, Vivek Raman of Etherealize not only breaks down the underlying logic behind Ethereum becoming the “best business platform,” but also makes predictions of “5x growth across three tracks”: tokenized assets, stablecoins, and ETH price. His interpretation of institutional positioning trends and the “blockchainization” turning point of the financial system may offer us key references for understanding the direction of the crypto market and financial changes in the new year.
Over the past decade, Ethereum has established its position as the safest and most reliable blockchain platform for global institutions to adopt.
Ethereum’s technology has already achieved large-scale applications, institutional use-case precedents are already in place, the global regulatory environment has adopted an openly welcoming stance toward blockchain infrastructure, and the growth of stablecoins and the progress of asset tokenization are bringing fundamental change.
Therefore, starting in 2026, Ethereum will be the best platform to conduct business.
After a decade of application promotion, stable operations, global adoption, and high-availability assurance, Ethereum has become the first choice for institutions to deploy blockchain. Next, let’s review the key journey over the past two years of how Ethereum has gradually become the default platform for tokenized assets.
Finally, we will provide our forecast for Ethereum in 2026: tokenized asset scale, stablecoin scale, and the ETH price are all expected to achieve 5x growth. The stage for Ethereum’s revival has been set, and the timing for enterprises to adopt Ethereum infrastructure is already mature.
Ethereum: The Core Platform for Tokenized Assets
Blockchain’s transformation of the asset space is like the internet’s reshaping of the information space—enabling assets to become digital, programmable, and globally interoperable.
Asset tokenization digitalizes assets by integrating assets, data, and payments into a single underlying infrastructure, thereby fully upgrading business processes. Stocks, bonds, real estate, and other assets—and the capital behind them—will be able to move at internet speed. This is a major upgrade the financial system should have achieved long ago, and now, global public blockchains such as Ethereum have finally made this vision a reality.
Asset tokenization is rapidly shifting from a hot concept to a fundamental business-model upgrade. Just as no company would abandon the internet to go back to the fax-machine era, once financial institutions experience the efficiency, automation, and high-speed advantages of a globally shared blockchain infrastructure, they won’t revert to traditional modes—tokenization becomes irreversible.
At present, the tokenization of the vast majority of high-value assets is completed on the Ethereum platform—because Ethereum is the most neutral and secure global infrastructure. Like the internet, it is not controlled by any single entity and is open to all users.
As of 2026, the “trial stage” of asset tokenization has officially ended, and the industry has entered the deployment phase. Major institutions are directly launching flagship products on the Ethereum platform to tap into global liquidity.
Below are some examples of institutions conducting asset tokenization on Ethereum:
Ethereum: The Core Blockchain for Stablecoins
Stablecoins are the first clear case in the asset tokenization space to achieve “product-market fit”—and in 2025, the stablecoin transfer volume surpassed $10 trillion. At their core, stablecoins are tokenized dollars—essentially a “software upgrade for money.” They allow dollars to move at internet speed and have programmable features.
2025 was a pivotal year for stablecoins and public blockchain development: the U.S. “GENIUS Act” (also known as the Stablecoin Act) was officially passed. The bill simultaneously establishes a regulatory framework for stablecoins and gives a “green light” to the underlying public blockchain infrastructure powering stablecoins.
Even before the GENIUS Act passed, Ethereum’s stablecoin adoption rate was already far ahead. Today, 60% of stablecoin deployments are on Ethereum and its Layer2 networks (if we include future Ethereum Layer2 that could be Ethereum Virtual Machine-compatible chains, this figure would reach 90%). The passage of the GENIUS Act marks Ethereum’s official move toward “open commercial applications”—institutions obtain regulatory approval to deploy their own stablecoins on public blockchains.
Just as email and websites achieved large-scale adoption thanks to access to a unified global internet (rather than fragmented internal networks), similarly, stablecoins and all tokenized assets can fully realize their utility and network effects only within a unified global public blockchain ecosystem.
So the explosive growth of stablecoins is just getting started. A typical case is: SoFi, a U.S. national bank, became the first bank to issue stablecoin (SoFiUSD) on an unpermissioned public blockchain—and it ultimately chose the Ethereum platform.
This is only the “tip of the iceberg” of stablecoin development. Investment banks and new banks are exploring issuing their own stablecoins either individually or as alliances, and fintech companies are also pushing forward stablecoin deployment and integration. The digitalization of dollars on public blockchains is already fully underway, and Ethereum is the default platform for this process.
Ethereum: Building Dedicated Blockchains
Blockchain is not a “one-size-fits-all” tool. Global financial markets need customized adaptation based on differences in geography, regulatory systems, and customer groups. That is why Ethereum, from its early days, was designed with high security as a core objective—and by using “Layer2 blockchains” that can be flexibly deployed on top of it, it enables a high degree of customization.
Just as every company on the internet has its own website, applications, and customized environment, many companies in the future will also have their own dedicated Layer2 blockchains within the Ethereum ecosystem.
This is not a theoretical architecture—it is real-world application that is already in place. Ethereum Layer2 has formed precedents for institutional applications, enabling large-scale deployment and becoming a core support for Ethereum’s “business-friendly” characteristics. Here are some examples:
The value of Layer2 lies not only in customization; it is also the best business model in the blockchain space. Layer2 integrates Ethereum’s global security, and through operations it can achieve profit margins of over 90%, opening up brand-new revenue streams for enterprises.
For institutions adopting blockchain technology, this is the best “win-win” approach—leveraging Ethereum’s security and liquidity while maintaining their own profit margins, and operating a dedicated environment within the Ethereum ecosystem. Robinhood’s choice to build its own blockchain on Ethereum Layer2 is precisely for this reason: “Building a truly decentralized security chain is extremely difficult… But with Ethereum, we can default to getting security guarantees.”
Global financial markets will not concentrate on a single blockchain, but the global financial system can achieve coordination by relying on an interoperable network—one that is precisely the Ethereum ecosystem and its Layer2.
Changes in the Regulatory Environment
Without regulatory support, a fundamental upgrade to the global financial system is impossible. Financial institutions are not technology companies, and they cannot achieve innovation through “rapid trial and error.” The movement of high-value assets and capital requires a comprehensive regulatory framework, and the U.S. is playing a leading role in this area:
Over the past decade or more, blockchain ecosystems have long been in a “regulatory gray area,” which has suppressed the potential of institutional-grade applications. Now, led by the U.S., the regulatory environment has shifted from “resistance” to “enabling support.” The stage for Ethereum to become the “best business platform” and for it to flourish has been fully set.
ETH: Institutional Treasury Asset
Ethereum has established its position as the “safest blockchain,” so it has become the default choice for institutional adoption. Based on this, in 2026, ETH will be re-priced—alongside BTC, becoming an “institutional-grade store of value.”
The blockchain ecosystem will have more than one store-of-value asset: BTC has established its status as “digital gold,” while ETH becomes “digital oil”—a store-of-value asset with yield potential, utility, and an underlying ecosystem-driven economy powering economic activity.
MicroStrategy (Strategy), the company holding the most Bitcoin, led the process of making BTC a store-of-value asset. Over the past four years, MicroStrategy has continuously added BTC into its treasury assets and promoted BTC’s value thesis, making it the core category in institutional digital asset holdings.
Today, four “MicroStrategy-like” companies have emerged in the Ethereum ecosystem, pushing ETH toward a similar breakthrough:
MicroStrategy holds 3.2% of the circulating supply of BTC. Meanwhile, the four companies above holding ETH have collectively purchased about 4.5% of the circulating supply of ETH over the past 6 months—and this process is only just beginning.
As these four companies continue to add ETH to their balance sheets, the share of institutional holdings in these ETH-holding companies is rising rapidly, and ETH is expected to be re-priced—once again becoming an institutional-grade store of value alongside BTC.
Ethereum Forecast for 2026: 5x Growth
Tokenized Assets: 5x Growth to $100 Billion
In 2025, the total value of tokenized assets on blockchains increased from about $6 billion to more than $18 billion, with 66% deployed on Ethereum and its Layer2 networks.
The global financial system has only just begun its process of tokenizing assets, and institutions such as JPMorgan, BlackRock, and Fidelity have already made Ethereum the default platform for tokenized high-value assets.
We predict that in 2026, the total size of tokenized assets will achieve 5x growth to nearly $100 billion, with the vast majority deployed on the Ethereum network.
Stablecoins: 5x Growth to $1.5 Trillion
Currently, the total stablecoin supply on public blockchains is $308 billion, of which about 60% is deployed on Ethereum and its Layer2 networks (if we include future Ethereum Layer2 that could be Ethereum Virtual Machine-compatible chains, this proportion will reach 90%).
Stablecoins have become a strategic asset for the U.S. government. The U.S. Treasury has repeatedly stated that stablecoins are the core initiative to consolidate the dollar’s dominance in the 21st century. At present, the total circulating supply of the U.S. dollar is $22.3 trillion. With the GENIUS Act taking effect and large-scale stablecoin applications kicking off, it is expected that 20%-30% of dollars will migrate to public blockchains.
We forecast that in 2026, the total market capitalization of stablecoins will achieve 5x growth to $1.5 trillion, and Ethereum will play a leading role in this process.
ETH: 5x Growth to $15k
ETH is rapidly developing into an institutional-grade store of value alongside BTC. ETH is a “bullish option” on blockchain technology growth, and its value growth will benefit from the following trends:
Holding ETH is equivalent to holding a portion of equity in the “new type of financial internet.” Its value growth logic is clear: growth in user base, asset scale, number of applications, improvements in Layer2 networks, and higher transaction frequency will all drive ETH’s value upward.
We predict that in 2026, ETH will achieve at least 5x value growth (market cap reaching $2 trillion, comparable to BTC’s current market cap), ushering in ETH’s “NVIDIA moment” (referring to a key phase similar to NVIDIA’s explosive growth driven by the AI wave).
Ethereum: The Best Platform for Conducting Business
As of 2026, discussions about “why adopt blockchain” have become a thing of the past. Now, institutions are competing across asset tokenization, stablecoin applications, and the deployment of customized blockchains in a full-scale way, and the structural upgrade of the global financial system has already begun.
When institutions choose blockchain infrastructure, the factors they prioritize include: long-term operational track record, application precedents, security, liquidity, availability, and risk level—while Ethereum performs best across all dimensions. If enterprises have the following needs, Ethereum will be an ideal choice:
2025 is a turning point for Ethereum’s development: the infrastructure is upgraded, institutional pilot projects achieve large-scale rollout, and the regulatory environment shifts toward favorable conditions.
In 2026, the global financial system will experience an “internet moment”—and this transformation will happen on Ethereum, the best platform for conducting business.