Bird, the developer of the XRPL-based meme coin DROP, has triggered discussion by saying that anyone holding more value in XRP than in their bank account is a "genius." He contrasts bank savings rates of around 4–6% with rising living costs and frames XRP as a forward-looking asset, while also noting that how much XRP to hold is subjective and depends on personal circumstances.

US spot Bitcoin ETFs attracted about $1.42 billion in inflows over the latest week, marking the strongest weekly increase since early October and briefly lifting Bitcoin prices. Midweek activity concentrated the surge, with one day drawing more than $840 million and another roughly $754 million, while BlackRock's IBIT reportedly contributed around $1.03 billion to the total. Analysts note that these bursts of institutional demand via regulated funds have recently produced short-lived price bounces rather than lasting trend changes.

Strategy chairman Michael Saylor argued on a podcast that corporate Bitcoin purchases are cash allocation choices, not moral missteps. Public disclosures indicate listed companies hold about 1.1 million BTC, with Strategy at 687,410 BTC. Bitcoin traded near $95,250 at the time of writing, within an intraday range of roughly $94,320 to $95,660.

Debate in the US Senate over the Clarity Act has revived attention on XRP and other token-backed exchange-traded funds, with reports indicating the bill may clarify how ETF underlying assets are treated under existing rules. Since their November 2025 debut, XRP spot ETFs have reportedly attracted about $1.37 billion in inflows, fueling community discussion about whether in-kind structures could let holders use these products in a bank-like way. Some XRP advocates argue that, once legal status is clearer, investors may treat regulated ETFs as a preferred place to park tokens while preserving access.

Canary Capital CEO Steven McClurg said during a podcast with Paul Barron that XRP and Hedera could follow a different performance path than Bitcoin this year, supported by enterprise adoption and tokenization use cases. He expects only modest, low double-digit gains for these networks, while warning that Bitcoin, which he believes topped at $126,200 on October 6, 2025, could decline another 20–30% over the next six to nine months.

CoinGecko's annual report said crypto treasury firms were major buyers in 2025, deploying nearly $50 billion and lifting holdings from more than $56 billion to $134 billion by January 1, 2026. The market briefly neared $4.4 trillion before ending 2025 around $3.0 trillion after an October liquidation of about $19 billion, while treasuries held over 5% of Bitcoin and Ethereum.

According to ValidatorQueue, staked ETH has risen to nearly 36 million—about 30% of circulating supply—valued at over $119 billion. Since early January, totals increased from 35.5 million while ETH fell more than 30% since August; reports indicate a zero unstaking queue and a 2.5 million ETH staking queue. On January 14, 2026, Vitalik Buterin urged builders to ship real apps.

At about 2:52 pm UTC on January 14, 2026, Sui halted block production and checkpoints, and service was restored at about 8:44 pm UTC, ending roughly five hours and 52 minutes of downtime. Validators applied changes to resync nodes. During the pause, more than $1 billion in value was inactive and SUI traded around $1.80–$1.85 after recovery.

Russia's State Duma has prepared a draft law to broaden retail access to cryptocurrencies, including a yearly purchase cap of 300,000 rubles (roughly $3,800) for non‑qualified investors. The text will be taken up in the spring session, with implementation targeted for 2026, while penalties for illegal intermediaries are planned by the Bank of Russia from 2027.