Bitwise chief investment officer: decentralized finance may lead crypto rebound

In a client memo published on 17 February 2026, Hougan argued that bear markets can hide progress because investors tend to discount positive developments. He described large DeFi protocols as operating businesses with active users, citing Uniswap trading volumes that have at times exceeded Coinbase’s centralized exchange and Aave generating more than $100 million in annual revenue.

Hougan said token prices have not always reflected that usage because many DeFi assets were designed mainly for governance and avoided direct economic rights during earlier regulatory uncertainty. He noted Aave was down about 50% over the past year and Uniswap’s token has been broadly flat over the past five years, despite continued protocol activity.

He highlighted a recent Aave governance proposal from Aave Labs as a potential inflection point. The proposal would route revenue from Aave-branded products to the DAO treasury controlled by token holders, alongside a transfer of intellectual property rights and a restructuring of incentives between developers and the community. Hougan said the framework could better align protocol performance with token value by giving token holders control over how revenue is used, including funding development or building reserves. He added that the plan has drawn criticism from some community members, including objections to the scale of the funding request and questions about how revenue would be defined and governed.

Hougan also pointed to rising institutional participation, citing investments he said included BlackRock in Uniswap-related exposure and Apollo in Morpho, an Aave competitor. 

Separately, Strategy executive chairman Michael Saylor struck a similar tone about the cycle in a Fox Business interview on 17 February 2026, describing the market as being in a crypto winter but calling it milder than past downturns and likely shorter. In an X post, he repeated the theme, saying spring is coming and bitcoin is winning.