Narratives For '25/'26 I've been thinking a bit about thematic narratives over the medium-term (6-12 months) (ex. AI), and it seems that there's a couple of pretty obvious ones that are currently playing out or are already well entrenched in the zeitgeist. None of this is groundbreaking or even slightly novel, but it's useful for me to express in written form to help me internalise. 1. The Fiat Debasement Trade If it was not obvious all along it should be obvious now that America and its glorious leader have abandoned the mirage of fiscal austerity for the sweet liquid golden fruits of currency debasement and inflating their way out of it. Other countries and central banks are quickly falling in line to create an enormous global currency debasement race. The invalidation here (if there is one) is real yields staying high and cooling inflation. Tickers: BTC, Gold 2. The Gambling Trade As the narrative of a global debasement of currency takes hold in the common zeitgeist, and the horror of a future of AI controlled economies distils into a lack of purpose for most of the population, people will lean even more into the most popular of depressionary pastimes - gambling. 'Gambling' extends to any highly speculative instruments that offer the illusion of an 'edge' and the prospect of economic freedom from reality - so you could include perps, 0DTE's (although these have so far failed to gain any meaningful market share in crypto), sports betting, memes. The most obvious invalidation here is a regulatory pivot in major economies - which at this point seems overwhelmingly unlikely (it's still crime season). Tickers: HYPE, LIGHTER, RLB/SHFL, DKING, Memes? 3. Regulatory Arbitrage Uno-Reversal Pretty obvious. Legal clarity and institutional embrace in the US, EU and Asia leads to massive growth opportunities in stablecoins, tokenised assets / RWA and KYC-friendly DeFi. Opening up the US market probably also creates opportunity for centralised exchanges that have mindshare but little US market penetration. Again, the invalidation here is a regulatory pivot. Tickers: ETH, LINK, AAVE, BNB/MNT, WLFI/ENA/SKY What other emerging narratives have legs here?

Oh I missed 'neobanking' I guess, although I think it's a bit of a silly narrative. Tickers: ETHFI, XPL (which is currently not an investable asset imo)