Bitcoin Pushes Higher as Policy and Regulation Accelerate

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Optimism has finally started to spill over from equities and commodities into crypto, with Bitcoin pushing to a multi-month high near $95K and Ethereum reclaiming $3.3K. The move is notable because it’s coming through across majors rather than being a single-asset rotation, signalling broader risk appetite returning after a relatively muted end to 2025.
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Institutional behaviour also remained a key theme. Strategy made headlines with its largest purchase since July 2025, acquiring 13,627 BTC (~$1.25B) at an average price of $91,500, bringing total holdings to 687,410 BTC at an average cost basis of $75,353. Regardless of near-term volatility, this reinforces the same pattern we’ve seen throughout this cycle, treasury-style buyers continue to accumulate into pullbacks and consolidation phases, rather than chasing strength after rallies.

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Bitcoin Prints a 3-Month High as Structure Improves

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Bitcoin reclaiming the 2025 $94K yearly open zone has been one of the cleaner market-structure shifts we’ve seen since late 2025, and a level our analyst team has been tracking closely since November. Below this range, price action consistently sat in what we’d describe as a “no-trade, choppy zone”, where momentum was unreliable and both sides of the market were getting chopped up. This region acted as a repeated ceiling across the prior range, so pushing back above it changes the behaviour from rejection to acceptance, which is often where trend shifts begin to form.
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The next key confirmation is whether Bitcoin can hold daily closes above this zone, rather than briefly tagging it and slipping back into the previous range. Key support remains $88K–$90K, where the market previously absorbed sell pressure during the pullback. From here, the next phase will be shaped less by headlines and more by whether this reclaim is spot-driven and sustained, rather than a short-lived momentum burst. 

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Morgan Stanley Expands Its Crypto Push Into 2026

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This week Morgan Stanley has doubled down on there adoption push of crypto early in 2026, launching a comprehensive cryptocurrency strategy, filing S-1 registration statements with the SEC for three spot ETFs covering Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana between January 6-7. The Bitcoin Trust will track spot prices through direct cryptocurrency holdings, while the Ethereum and Solana Trusts introduce staking functionality that generates quarterly rewards distributed to shareholders. Complementing these ETF filings, the bank plans to launch direct spot cryptocurrency trading on its E*Trade, a subsidiary investment brokerage of Morgan Stanley, in the first half of 2026, serving over 5 million users while also keeping its clients inside their own ecosystem. 

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This marks the first instance of a major U.S. bank seeking to issue its own spot cryptocurrency ETFs rather than merely distributing third-party products. Additionally, the bank plans to introduce a proprietary digital wallet in the second half of 2026 supporting cryptocurrencies and tokenised real-world assets including stocks, bonds, and real estate, featuring institutional-grade security through cold storage.

Morgan Stanley’s aggressive filing comes as traditional Wall Street banks like Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan roll out broader crypto trading and custody operations, and the success of BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF (IBIT), growing into one of the most profitable financial products with over USD 70 billion in assets under management. Additionally, the intensive crypto expansion plan Morgan Stanley has taken to start 2026 could signal the parabolic phase of institutional competition in digital assets, as major Wall Street firms race to integrate crypto trading, ETFs, and tokenized products into their core businesses.

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Powell Under Fire as DOJ Subpoenas Trigger Fed Tensions

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Macro volatility returned this week as tensions escalated between the Trump administration and the Federal Reserve. Reports suggested the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) issued grand jury subpoenas linked to Fed Chair Jerome Powell. Powell responded publicly by defending the Fed’s independence and pushing back against what he framed as growing political pressure.

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The policy divide is straightforward. Trump’s incentive is lower rates and easier financial conditions, supportive for growth, markets, and sentiment heading into the mid-term period. The Fed’s mandate, however, is to balance inflation, employment, and credibility, even when that conflicts with political priorities. In the near term, this kind of public tension increases uncertainty and tends to show up quickly in price action. Traditional hedges pushed higher, with gold and silver printing fresh highs during the escalation, while Bitcoin began to firm shortly after as markets started reassessing the broader liquidity implications.

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CLARITY Act Enters a Critical Phase

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U.S. crypto regulation continues to move quickly into 2026, with the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act entering a critical phase as lawmakers prepare for the next Senate markup, currently expected to take place in mid to late January after last week’s delay. In simple terms, CLARITY is about creating a clear rulebook for crypto in the U.S., defining who regulates what, and whether assets should fall under the SEC (securities) or the CFTC (commodities). After years of regulation by enforcement, the shift toward an actual framework is a meaningful step forward, even if negotiations are still ongoing behind the scenes.

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One of the biggest sticking points is stablecoin yield. The current draft allows activity-based rewards, incentives tied to actions like spending, transacting, staking, or providing liquidity, but restricts passive yield, meaning users wouldn’t earn rewards simply for holding a stablecoin in their wallet. The logic is straightforward, lawmakers want stablecoins to work like digital dollars for payments, while banks want to prevent stablecoins from acting like high-yield savings accounts that pull deposits out of the traditional system. The trade-off is important, because many stablecoin models today distribute reserve yield broadly, meaning parts of the industry may need to redesign how rewards are delivered if CLARITY becomes law.

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This debate is now becoming a pressure point for major platforms like Coinbase. While Coinbase supports regulatory clarity overall, leadership has made it clear that protecting customer reward pathways remains a priority, pushing back against any effort to tighten the rules further. From a market-structure standpoint, this matters because stablecoins are quickly becoming one of the most important rails in crypto and the final wording in CLARITY will determine whether on-chain dollars can compete meaningfully with bank deposits and savings products. With Senate discussions approaching, and prediction markets increasingly tracking the bill’s progress, the next few weeks could be one of the most important regulation windows crypto has seen in years.

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Privacy Coins Split: Monero Rips, Zcash Breaks

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Privacy tokens continue to gain traction into early 2026, but the sector is splitting between strong narrative momentum and project specific execution risk. The clearest divergence has been between Zcash and Monero, with Zcash suffering a major setback after internal governance disputes, while Monero pushed to new highs as demand for censorship resistant privacy tools accelerates.

Zcash faced a governance shock on January 7, when the Electric Coin Company development team resigned following disagreements around long-term mission alignment. The market reacted quickly, with ZEC dropping roughly 25%, falling from late 2025 highs near $735 to around $390. In contrast, Monero (XMR) broke out above the $450–$470 resistance zone and rallied over 45% on the week. 

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Live Webinar Tonight XRP 2026 Outlook

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Tonight at 7:30 PM AEDT, UpTrade and Mastering the Markets will be hosting a focused live webinar covering XRP’s 2026 outlook, with a structured breakdown of fundamentals and the macro environment shaping market conditions. The session is designed to cut through the noise and provide a clear, research driven view of XRP’s positioning. For anyone who can’t attend live, the webinar will be recorded and uploaded to UpTrade Alpha, with access available to all members, including free users.

Register Here - https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_uce1xe6USwu5a_-5FBCKoA

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Recent Token Listings‍

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Lighter $LIT, Midnight $NIGHT, Fluid $FLUID

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