Laura Katherine Mann, a partner at international law firm White & Case, sees 2025 as the “test year” for crypto IPOs, but says 2026 is the real proof point: the year the market discovers whether digital asset IPOs are a “sustainable asset class” or simply a cyclical transaction that only works when prices rise.
2025 has been a busy year for crypto companies going public. Stablecoin issuer Circle (CRCL) listed in June, followed by CoinDesk owner Bullish (BLSH) in August and crypto exchange Gemini (GEMI) in September.
Potential candidates for next year include South Korean crypto exchange Upbit, prime broker FalconX, and blockchain analytics firm Chainanalysis. Asset manager Grayscale has already filed for a US IPO
Global crypto activity has recovered significantly after the boom and bust of 2021. According to Mann, the open question heading into 2026 is whether “cryptocurrency issuers can maintain this momentum” long enough to meet public market standards, not just the enthusiasm of crypto-natives, she told CoinDesk in an interview.
Momentum is real, but volatility is a concern
Mann highlights the backdrop public investors will keep until 2026: bitcoin more than doubled in 2024, then reached new all-time highs in 2025 before falling sharply. She says this type of volatility is exactly what stock investors will consider when evaluating IPO candidates next year, because it doesn’t just affect sentiment, it affects revenue sustainability, customer activity and valuation multiples across the industry.
She says traditional finance is signaling that crypto is big enough to be indexed, pointing to S&P Dow Jones Indices’ October announcement of the launch of a product combining digital assets with public crypto companies, another sign of institutionalization as mainstream market infrastructure begins to condition the sector.
But she says the institutionalization story has a flip side: Risk tolerance increases, but selectivity increases faster. Mann points out that MSCI is exploring excluding companies – particularly DAT-style listings – that hold more than 50% of their assets in crypto., interpreting it as a sign that index providers and allocators can increasingly draw a line between operational activities and balance sheet proxies for token exposure.
The result, she says, is a market where investors can accept risk, but not all types of risk. We will see investors “accepting risk but being more discriminating about the risk they accept,” she added.
Regulatory and institutional tailwinds mean the U.S. is more investment-friendly
One of the biggest changes Mann envisions by 2026 is the regulatory tone. She says the United States has moved from an unfavorable environment to a “much more constructive environment for digital assets,” citing the GENIUS Act as an example of the direction to take. This shift, she says, has “made the U.S. market more investment-friendly,” and she says she’s also seeing more signs of institutional adoption.
A rotation in what becomes public: from DATs to financial infrastructures
If 2025 relied heavily on DAT listings, Mann expects 2026 to mark a shift: more IPO candidates that look like financial infrastructure, businesses that can be explained through familiar public market frameworks like compliance posture, recurring revenue and operational resilience.
It expects the 2026 IPO cohort to come from three categories:
Regulated exchanges and brokerages
Mann says the most likely listings are from exchanges and brokerages that “already live under bank-style compliance regimes” because they can present themselves as known quantities to public investors and regulators. She sees an IPO for these companies as “the logical next step.”
Crypto exchange Kraken has already filed for an IPO, with a potential listing as early as the first quarter of next year.
Infrastructure and guard games
Mann expects investor preference to shift toward infrastructure and custody, particularly where revenue is recurring or subscription-based rather than closely tied to daily token prices. She says the talk resonating across public markets is stability, business models that can defend performance even as cryptocurrency volatility increases.
Stable payments and cash-like platforms
Mann sees stablecoin-related issuers and treasury platforms as increasingly viable public candidates as legal frameworks strengthen on both sides of the Atlantic. She says the GENIUS Act provides a clearer path forward in the United States, while MiCA has done the same in Europe. According to her, this creates “a stronger legal framework for fiat-backed stablecoin issuers and payment platforms that closely resemble regulated financial institutions,” structures that public investors already know how to subscribe to.
What could limit the 2026 IPO window?
Mann is clear that favorable winds do not eliminate goalkeepers. She says “valuation discipline is back in the room” and she points to recent tech sector IPOs in which companies were generally larger and more mature when they debuted. In his view, cryptocurrency IPO applicants in 2026 will be judged against this same bar.
This means preparation matters. Mann says investors will look for high-quality digital asset companies, companies that can demonstrate that they are operationally prepared, can withstand scrutiny and have a consistent equity story.
It also points to macroeconomic uncertainty in regions as a variable that could quickly tighten risk budgets. And it highlights recent market action: a sharp decline in crypto prices since October. If this weakness persists, or if it is linked to a broader reassessment of tech or AI valuations, Mann says it could likely close the IPO window and reduce the number of crypto companies that can realistically enter the market in 2026.
On the other hand, Mann says a rebound could quickly change the calculus. If markets recover and bitcoin hits new highs, she expects more companies to try to capitalize on the wave., particularly if the regulatory posture continues to evolve in a direction favorable to digital assets.
The results for 2026
Mann suggests that 2025 will test whether crypto companies can go public again. The year 2026 will test whether they can do this sustainably.
