Mercado Bitcoin's Full Brazilian Perspective on Six Major Crypto Trends Reshaping 2026

São Paulo-based Mercado Bitcoin, one of Latin America’s largest crypto trading platforms, has published comprehensive market analysis identifying six transformative trends expected to define the industry by year-end 2026. The full scope of their research reveals shifting dynamics across store-of-value assets, financial infrastructure, and emerging market segments—offering insights into where capital flows are heading next.

The firm’s findings paint a picture of an increasingly mature crypto ecosystem, where institutional adoption, regulatory clarity, and technological innovation are converging to reshape market structure. Here’s what Mercado Bitcoin’s analysts are forecasting for the coming year.

Bitcoin’s Rebalancing Against Gold: A Store-of-Value Revolution

Mercado Bitcoin estimates that Bitcoin could capture 14% of gold’s total market capitalization by the end of 2026, implying more than a doubling in price from current levels. This represents a significant shift from today’s 5.65% ratio.

The research highlights Bitcoin’s fundamental advantages over traditional gold: its digital nature eliminates storage and transport friction, while its borderless and self-custodied design appeals to investors seeking alternatives to conventional safe havens. Institutional adoption has accelerated this shift—treasuries have already accumulated over 1.09 million Bitcoin, demonstrating that cryptocurrency is no longer a niche asset class.

What sets this analysis apart is its methodological rigor. Developed in partnership with UCLA researchers, Mercado Bitcoin’s Bitcoin Valuation Framework applies a Total Addressable Market (TAM) approach to estimate BTC’s theoretical value. Rather than forcing traditional cash flow models onto a monetary asset, the framework starts with the global store-of-value market, uses gold as the primary benchmark, and models what share Bitcoin might capture under different adoption scenarios. Their base case leads to the 14% figure.

Infrastructure Layer Expansion: Stablecoins and Asset Tokenization

Mercado Bitcoin expects the stablecoin sector to roughly double in scale, reaching $500 billion by the end of 2026. This growth will be fueled not just by dollar-denominated stablecoins but by the emergence of alternatives tied to other currencies, as stablecoins evolve from trading tools into genuine payment instruments.

These digital assets now serve as essential liquidity sources for the broader crypto ecosystem, enabling rapid and secure movement of capital without exposure to digital asset volatility. The 2025 data already supports this trajectory—stablecoin market capitalization grew nearly 50% year-over-year, a trend Mercado Bitcoin attributes to widening adoption and regulatory clarity, particularly across the United States. The sector currently stands at $307 billion, with USDT commanding approximately 60.5% market share.

Beyond stablecoins, Mercado Bitcoin forecasts explosive growth in tokenized real-world assets, projecting a 200% volume increase that would push the segment past $54 billion. Major institutional players—including BlackRock, Franklin Templeton, and WisdomTree—have already launched tokenized fund products, while others are actively studying potential entry points. The European Union’s recent approval for larger tokenized transaction volumes on permissioned blockchains, combined with U.S. recognition of blockchain-based asset transfer records, is removing regulatory barriers and accelerating this trend.

Institutional Market Expansion: Altcoin ETFs and Prediction Platforms

Following regulatory approval of altcoin exchange-traded funds in late 2025, capital has rapidly deployed into XRP, Solana, and Chainlink products. XRP ETFs alone now manage approximately $1.47 billion in assets, while Solana ETFs command another $1.09 billion.

Mercado Bitcoin projects that the altcoin ETF market will reach at least $10 billion by the end of 2026, with XRP and SOL expected to drive roughly 80% of new inflows. This segment excludes Bitcoin and Ether ETFs, focusing instead on regulated market listings for alternative cryptocurrencies.

In parallel, prediction markets are experiencing explosive growth potential. Platforms like Polymarket and Kalshi enable users to trade on the probability of future events—elections, sports outcomes, and other macroeconomic scenarios. Mercado Bitcoin forecasts capital locked in prediction markets could reach $20 billion by end-2026, expanding roughly 25-fold from current levels below $1 billion. The growth will be driven by major sporting events like the 2026 World Cup, presidential elections across key economies, and the rising appeal of entertainment and climate-related prediction markets. The peer-to-peer model and aligned incentives between users and platforms further support this expansion thesis.

Autonomous Intelligence: AI Agents Accelerating Onchain Activity

Mercado Bitcoin identifies blockchain-integrated AI agents as an emerging force multiplier for onchain activity. These autonomous systems, designed to execute independent transactions and decisions, are leveraging emerging technical standards like x402 and ERC-8004 to enable transparent, traceable, and efficient micropayments.

The firm estimates that volume traded by AI agents will exceed $1 million daily in 2026, quadrupling from current levels. As these agents become more sophisticated and integrated into trading and payment infrastructure, they’re likely to unlock new use cases and drive significant capital movement across decentralized systems.

What This Means for the Broader Crypto Market

Mercado Bitcoin’s full analysis suggests 2026 will be a pivotal inflection point where crypto infrastructure matures, institutional capital continues its multi-year deployment, and technological innovation opens entirely new market segments. The convergence of these six trends points toward a more resilient, diversified, and functional ecosystem—one where crypto assets increasingly occupy spaces previously dominated by traditional finance.