Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan Says Four-Year Cycle Is Dead, Predicts 2026 Will Be a Good Year for Bitcoin and Crypto – Here’s Why

The chief investment officer (CIO) of crypto asset management firm Bitwise, Matt Hougan, is saying the four-year cycle, which has traditionally influenced the boom and bust cycles of Bitcoin (BTC) and the rest of the crypto market, is “dead.”

Hougan says the “forces that have created prior four-year cycles are weaker” currently and this includes the Bitcoin halving.

According to Hougan, the impact and importance of the Bitcoin halving falls by half every four years.

Additionally, Hougan says there exists a friendlier regulatory environment and institutional investors have embraced Bitcoin and other crypto assets. Per Hougan, these “bigger forces” don’t synchronize with the four-year cycle.

“i) The movement of assets into [exchange-traded funds] ETFs is a 5 – 10 year trend. It started in 2024;

ii) Broader institutional adoption is just getting started (ETFs still being approved on national account platforms, pensions and endowments just now considering crypto, etc.)

iii) Regulatory progress began in earnest in January 2025 and will run for multiple years;

iv) Wall Street is just now starting to build on crypto, and will invest billions in the quarters and years to come. This started in earnest with the passage of the GENIUS Act this month.”

As a result, the Bitwise CIO says these emerging forces will be more influential in determining the future of Bitcoin and other crypto assets than the four-year cycle going forward.

“All this suggests to me that the long-term pro-crypto forces will overwhelm the classic “four-year cycle” forces, to the extent those exist, and that 2026 will be a good year.”

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