The Self-Value of Bitcoin in the Institutional Age: Why BTC Remains Silent While Gold Grows in 2026

Amid the global “risk-off” market movements, Bitcoin’s self-perception is undergoing a profound transformation. While Bitcoin has fallen to $87.79K (with a -2.26% 24-hour change), gold continues to reach new record levels, raising a critical question: does Bitcoin’s quietness reflect market maturity or a re-alignment of institutional valuation of the asset?

According to Philippe Bekhazi, CEO of XBTO, one of the leading crypto trading firms, what is happening is not a crisis but a revolutionary shift. He states that Bitcoin has entered a “post-IPO institutional” era, where self-valuation is based on long-term value thesis rather than speculative volatility.

Bitcoin and the New Pricing Paradigm

In recent years, Bitcoin has been known for bursts of volatility and venture-style gains. Now, the picture is creating a new phase of understanding. “We have moved beyond the speculative phase of Bitcoin, with large gains,” Bekhazi explains in his analysis. The cryptocurrency is no longer traded as a frontier asset but as a balance sheet instrument whose value proposition opens up over a longer horizon.

This shift is directly connected to self-valuation. As institutional ownership deepens through regulated vehicles, corporate treasuries, and ETFs, investors have become more cautious in their risk assessment. Volatility is decreasing, and price movements appear more rational and less dramatic.

Data from derivatives markets show an interesting pattern: traders are more inclined toward protective puts and short positions than aggressive spot selling. This stems from institutional buyers who “often seek exposure to Bitcoin but need to hedge against sharp declines,” Bekhazi notes.

The Risk Management Strategy That Sparked the Quiet Movement

Bitcoin’s “quiet” movement does not indicate complacency. Instead, it reflects enhanced risk management strategies by major investors. The liquidation cascade in October, where over $19 billion in leveraged positions were wiped out in just a few hours, became a turning point for the industry.

Since that event, market structure has been studied more carefully. The “purely peculiar issue of an exchange”—how active managers become liquidity providers during price gaps driven by liquidations—continues to influence price changes. This microstructure allows for alpha generation through strategic positioning rather than brute-force directional bets.

The result: less volatile, more cautious positioning, and a more mature landscape where asset self-valuation is based on structural demand from ETFs, corporate treasuries, and long-term institutional mandates rather than reflexive trading.

Why Gold Is Growing as the ‘Safe Haven’ in Times of Macro Stress

While Bitcoin remains calm, gold and silver are advancing toward historic heights. The LBMA forecast for 2026 has become the most bullish of this century, with analysts estimating that the average gold price will rise by nearly 40% from 2025, while silver nearly doubles.

This phenomenon is directly linked to macro stress and how different asset classes are re-evaluating themselves. Traditionally, gold remains “the world’s safe haven currency when things are not going well.” For governments and central banks facing liquidity constraints and mandates to quickly scale positions, gold offers a directly increasing value.

Bekhazi suggests that capital will shift from Bitcoin to gold as macro stress intensifies, especially among investors with pure Bitcoin exposure. However, this is not an existential threat to the Bitcoin thesis. Instead, it is a cyclical movement where asset classes reconfigure their self-valuation based on the current macro environment.

The Bitcoin-to-gold ratio, according to Bekhazi, is more important than the absolute performance of both. This ratio reflects relative valuation risk appetite and institutional positioning, not just nominal price movements.

Signals from Derivatives Markets and Structural Imbalances

ETH has fallen to $2.93K with a -3.63% 24-hour change, showing weaker performance compared to Bitcoin. Larger spot selling pressure and faster declines reflect less defensive positioning and weaker institutional demand for secondary altcoins during risk-off moves.

Overall, crypto derivatives markets have shown:

• Decreasing open interest: traders are reducing leveraged exposure
• Lower volatility: the market is adopting a more predictable pattern
• Protection bias: large inflows into put options and short hedges

These patterns do not indicate the death of institutional demand. Instead, they show a more mature approach to portfolio management, where the goal is not short-term alpha but stable long-term exposure to Bitcoin with managed downside.

The fragmented structure of crypto markets continues to amplify this dislocation. Imbalances between spot and derivatives, and the lack of a comprehensive regulatory framework for cross-market trading, lead to opportunistic liquidations not seen in more mature markets.

The Dissection of Pudgy Penguins and Other Ecosystem Developments

In the NFT ecosystem, Pudgy Penguins is emerging as one of the strongest native brands of this cycle. The platform has shifted from speculative “digital luxury goods” to a multi-vertical consumer IP platform. The strategy is simple: attract users through mainstream channels (toys, retail partnerships, viral media), then onboard them into Web3 via games, NFTs, and the PENGU token (currently $0.01).

This ecosystem now covers phygital products (with >$13M retail sales and >1M units sold), games and experiences (Pudgy Party with >500K downloads in just two weeks), and a widely distributed token (airdropped to over 6M wallets).

In the current market, Pudgy is priced at a premium compared to traditional IP peers; success depends on execution in retail expansion, gaming adoption, and deeper token utility.

Other ecosystems are also showing signs of maturation. The Optimism community has approved a 12-month plan to allocate nearly half of its revenue to buy back OP tokens starting February. But despite bullish structural developments, the token’s value remains under pressure amid broader market headwinds.

The Future: Maturation or Mispricing?

Bekhazi clearly states that if Bitcoin’s thesis fails, it will be because BTC is sold as a high-beta tech asset during inflation or crises, and the “digital gold” narrative will collapse. If ETF launches continue during a 20% correction, it signals weak institutional hands. And if prices rise while on-chain activity or stablecoin usage decline, it suggests an institutional phase driven by speculation rather than real utility.

Currently, markets are testing whether Bitcoin can remain calm—and even quiet—as gold absorbs macro stress and safe-haven demand. That self-valuation gap is not a measure of action but of reach.

If that underperformance reflects genuine market maturity or a mispricing of strength, the next halving cycles will reveal it. For investors navigating the institutional age of Bitcoin, the question is not only where prices are headed but how their own asset valuation will evolve as the world around it develops.