The crypto market has always loved a good story. Tokens moon. Twitter explodes. Retail piles in. Then everything crashes.
But what if the next big cycle plays out completely differently? According to one veteran market expert, that’s exactly what’s coming.
Token Speculation Is Losing Its Crown
Clem Chambers has watched financial markets for decades. As founder of ADVFN, Europe’s leading stocks and markets website, he’s seen plenty of boom-and-bust cycles across every asset class imaginable.
Speaking at BeInCrypto’s Markets Intelligence Council, Chambers made a bold call about where crypto is heading. “That era has probably ended and certainly is coming to an end,” he said, referring to the trading-driven, speculation-heavy cycles that defined crypto’s past five years. “And then that will be replaced by use cases.”
That’s a pretty significant statement. And the current market data actually backs it up.
What’s Happening Right Now in the Market
Bitcoin and Ethereum keep attracting institutional money, especially since spot ETFs opened the floodgates. But something interesting is happening beneath the surface.
Capital is piling into the top assets while mid-tier tokens struggle to hold attention or liquidity. The days when any random coin could 10x on a viral tweet are fading fast.
Meanwhile, a completely different part of the market is quietly gaining momentum. Tokenized real-world assets, stablecoin-based payment rails, and blockchain infrastructure tied to AI and data are all seeing steady, consistent growth. These sectors generate actual usage, fees, and in some cases real revenue. That’s something most speculative tokens completely failed to deliver in previous cycles.
Forget DeFi Primitives. Think Products.
Chambers was refreshingly direct about what investors should focus on next. “Forget Fi and look for apps, not Fi, apps, applications of tokens and blockchains,” he said.
Earlier crypto cycles centered on financial primitives. DeFi protocols, yield farming, and token trading dominated the conversation. But the emerging trend points toward applications that regular users actually interact with, often without caring about the underlying token at all.
This aligns perfectly with what’s happening in 2026. Tokenized funds from firms like BlackRock are gaining real traction. Stablecoin usage in payments keeps growing. Decentralized physical infrastructure networks and AI-linked protocols are pulling in developer activity and serious venture funding.
So the money is already moving. The narrative is just catching up.
The Transition Isn’t Smooth or Guaranteed
Here’s the honest part: this shift is uneven and messy.
Speculative trading still drives short-term price moves. Retail participation remains largely momentum-based, chasing whatever’s trending on social media. Many application-layer projects also struggle badly with user retention and monetization once the initial hype fades.
Building products that non-crypto users actually adopt is genuinely hard. It requires solving real problems, creating smooth user experiences, and competing with established fintech players who already have massive user bases. That’s a completely different challenge from launching a token and riding a narrative.
Plus, the crypto market has a habit of reverting to old patterns whenever prices spike. Speculation is addictive. Utility is slower and less exciting to watch.
Why This Time Might Actually Be Different
Despite the challenges, something fundamental has shifted. Blockchain technology has had enough time to prove what it can and can’t do well.
The infrastructure is more mature. Development tools are better. Regulatory frameworks, while still evolving, provide more clarity than before. And crucially, traditional financial institutions are no longer just watching from the sidelines. They’re actively building on blockchain rails.
BlackRock tokenizing funds isn’t a crypto story anymore. It’s a finance story that happens to use blockchain. That distinction matters enormously for where value flows next.
Chambers’ core argument reflects a broader market reality: rewards are starting to follow usage rather than hype. The projects attracting sustained capital in 2026 tend to have actual products, actual users, and actual revenue streams.
Whether this shift fully defines the next bull cycle depends on one key question. Can blockchain-based applications scale beyond crypto-native users fast enough to capture mainstream attention before the inevitable speculative wave returns? The answer to that question will determine whether the next cycle looks fundamentally different from every cycle before it, or just repeats the same patterns with new tokens and new narratives.
If Chambers is right, the winners of the next cycle won’t be the most hyped coins. They’ll be the most useful products.