Shitcoin Season Index remains at a low level, currently at 17

On December 21, Cathie Wood—founder of ARK Invest—said 2026 could be a "Goldilocks year." After facing tariff risks, government shutdown risks, and hawkish Fed rhetoric, she noted that if oil prices and rents keep falling, the U.S. inflation rate could drop to zero or below.

Galaxy Digital Research Director Alex Thorn noted in a December 21 post that Bitcoin is projected to hit $250,000 by end-2027. He added that 2026’s trend is too volatile to forecast, though a new all-time high remains possible. Current options market pricing shows Bitcoin has roughly equal odds of falling to $70,000 or rising to $130,000 by end-June 2026; odds of hitting $50,000 or $250,000 by end-2026 are also close. This wide range reflects high mid-term uncertainty. As of this writing, the broader crypto market is mired in a bear market, and Bitcoin has yet to build clear bullish momentum. Short-term downside risks persist until BTC firmly holds the $100k-$105k range. Macro uncertainties are mounting too, including the pace of AI capex, monetary policy conditions, and November’s U.S. midterm elections. Year-to-date, Bitcoin’s long-term volatility profile has been easing—partly driven by broader covered selling and the rollout of Bitcoin yield-generating strategies. Notably,

December 21: Jameson Lopp, co-founder of Bitcoin custody firm Casa, said in a social media post, “I’ve been publicly talking about the risk quantum computing poses to Bitcoin for 18 months. My main takeaway: I truly hope quantum computing development stalls or even retreats—because adapting Bitcoin to the post-quantum era will be extremely tricky, for many reasons.” “Quantum computers won’t break the Bitcoin network in the short term. We’ll keep monitoring its progress. That said, a full overhaul of the Bitcoin network (and unprecedented fund migration) could take 5 to 10 years. We should hope for the best, but prepare for the worst-case scenario.”

December 21 On-chain analyst Ai Auntie (@ai_9684xtpa) reports the whale that’s been consistently shorting BTC since March 2025 cut another 20 BTC from its position 20 minutes ago, netting a $465,000 profit. Remaining open short position: 550.7 BTC (valued at $48.6M), with unrealized gains of $12.8M, funding fee profits of $9.6M, and total account profits exceeding $55.51M.

On December 21, the Ethereum Community Foundation posted on Platform X in response to the "50 Million USDT Phishing Attack" incident, calling for an end to truncating cryptocurrency addresses with ellipses (e.g., 0xbaf4b1aF...B6495F8b5). Addresses must be fully displayed—hiding the middle portion creates unnecessary risks. Some wallets and blockchain explorers currently offer UI options with security flaws, but these issues can be fixed. As previously reported, the phisher generated an address matching the victim’s in the first and last three digits, then sent 0.005 USDT to the victim’s address. When the whale either transferred funds officially or copied the address from the latest transaction record, the full 50 million USDT went to the phisher’s spoofed address. The phisher quickly swapped the 50 million USDT for DAI (to avoid freezing) before converting all of it into 16,624 ETH. These ETH were later laundered via Tornado.

On December 21, Decenter reported—citing unnamed sources—that the Bank of Korea (BOK) has recently sent a formal document to major local banks outlining plans for a second round of central bank digital currency (CBDC) testing. A BOK official noted, “Details including specific methodologies and timelines are currently under discussion.” The upcoming round is considering distributing a portion of government subsidies via CBDC, with the goal of restricting how the funds are used and cutting administrative and management costs tied to subsidy disbursement. Back in April, the BOK launched a three-month CBDC pilot involving seven participating banks, but later paused the project. At the time, the pilot faced criticism for its limited practical value and for imposing billions of Korean won in costs on the participating institutions.