The Next Bull Market is Here, and Obvious | Spencer and Aleks, Blockchain Capital

The crypto industry is transitioning from a speculative, infrastructure-heavy phase to a mature ecosystem defined by application-layer value capture and institutional integration. While the "buy and burn" token model currently serves as a necessary signal of quality and alignment, it represents a temporary response to market uncertainty. As block space becomes abundant and cheap, value is shifting away from infrastructure rent-seeking toward efficient, user-facing applications. Stablecoins are driving this evolution, with every $1 billion in issuance generating roughly $19 million in annual downstream protocol revenue. This liquidity provides the foundation for tokenizing real-world assets like equities, which will eventually offer global, programmable access to traditional financial markets. By moving assets out of private, siloed institutions and onto public, permissionless infrastructure, the industry is creating a more competitive, efficient financial system that operates beyond the constraints of legacy banking.