Bitwise CIO: Gold’s ascent and U.S. regulatory limbo will steer crypto’s next chapter

An extraordinary surge in the gold price has crystallized demand for non-sovereign stores of value, compressing price-discovery timelines in precious metals and exposing broader discomfort with reliance on traditional custodial arrangements. Central banks’ reserve choices since recent geopolitical shocks — favoring assets less vulnerable to sanction or seizure — have amplified that signal and made alternative stores of value more salient. Digital assets present an explicit alternative: networks and token designs that allow value to be held and moved without a single point of intermediation. Yet technical attributes alone will not determine outcomes; public policy in the United States is the proximate variable capable of reshaping market expectations. A planned committee markup on the Clarity Act was recently pulled after key industry support weakened, turning what had been seen by many as an imminent regulatory milestone into an open-ended negotiation and prompting firms to reassess rollout timetables. That pause has produced a material re-pricing of regulatory odds, slowed some partnership timetables and intensified industry lobbying around custody, stablecoin interest-bearing provisions and token trading/clearing mechanics. Still, product-led demand persists: U.S. spot-Bitcoin exchange-traded products have recorded repeated days of net inflows and new dollar-backed on-chain lending marketplaces have launched with multibillion-dollar ceilings, underscoring continuing institutional and product-level appetite. Market infrastructure is also shifting — derivatives activity is migrating toward perpetual, decentralized venues and many DeFi teams are tightening operational controls and communications to reduce fraud and reputational exposure as they approach mainstream rails. Europe’s phased MiCA rollout offers a counterpoint: clear authorization paths and cross-border licensing are prompting firms to concentrate European operations in single domiciles and plan predictable compliance investments. The result is a bifurcated global landscape where legal clarity in the EU accelerates regulated product build-out while U.S. uncertainty sustains selective participation and favors incumbents with deep government-affairs resources. For strategists and allocators the immediate mandate is scenario planning: model both a policy-enabled expansion that compresses regulatory premia and a prolonged adoption-focused period where demonstrable utility, not legislative promise, validates valuations. Regardless of the path, custody practices, market structure and interoperability choices will be re-examined, and firms that preserve architectural flexibility and engage proactively with lawmakers and standards bodies will retain optionality as the regulatory draft evolves.