“Most people spend more time and energy going around problems than in trying to solve them.” – Henry Ford
Hello everyone! I hope you’re all taking care of yourselves – it got chilly fast where I am. Bringing out the winter sweaters this weekend.
IN THIS NEWSLETTER
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While the circulating supply of stablecoins from Tether and Circle dropped by $4 billion in the first 9m of 2026, overall supply increased by $1.2 billion (0.4%) and the number of issuers with more than $1 billion outstanding climbed to 15, up from 11 in 2025.
*Download Allium’s *State of Stablecoins and Payments Q3 2026.
*And get weekly onchain data and more analysis like this from the *Allium Research team on Substack.
WHAT I’M WATCHING
Bitcoin: narratives and volatility
Bitcoin appears to be in an interesting transition phase: the narratives are getting more positive, but market metrics aren’t.
In previous cycles, it would be the other way around – the numbers would trigger the narratives. But this time, BTC signals have been ok but not notable, while big institutions are putting out eye-catching reports and launching new products.
A clue as to why this feels different is in the above sentence: “big institutions”. We can’t deny that the BTC market is much more institutional now than in previous cycles – more on the sell-side than the buy-side. Put differently, several large firms offer investment vehicles or research linked to the price of BTC, which can influence coverage (I’m not casting aspersions, but I used to work sell-side and unless incentives have changed a lot…).
That said, they do influence the overall “mainstream” mood, while reducing the reputational risk of any professional manager considering an allocation.
The bullishness
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