According to a market review by Bitwise Asset Management, reported by The Block on July 15, 2026, the Bitwise Crypto Innovators 30 Index, a benchmark of publicly listed crypto-adjacent companies, gained roughly 23% in H1 2026. Bitwise characterised the period with the headline framing "bull markets everywhere."

Over the same period, the broader token market fell approximately 36%, by Bitwise's aggregate measure.

Crypto equities substantially outpaced other major benchmarks over the period. The S&P 500 gained 8.3%, while the MSCI Emerging Markets Index, driven largely by semiconductor and AI-exposed economies including South Korea and Taiwan, returned approximately 11.5%.

Token prices fell hard; on-chain activity did not

Bitcoin dropped roughly 50% from its October 2025 all-time high to trade near $60,000 by mid-2026.

Ethereum shed more than 66% from its August 2025 peak, dipping below $1,800 during a volatile February.

Bitwise's 10 Large Cap Crypto Index declined 15.4% in Q2 2026 alone, with eight of its ten constituents closing the quarter in the red.

Spot bitcoin ETFs recorded their worst quarterly outflows on record in Q2.

Despite those price declines, several on-chain metrics moved in the opposite direction. Tokenized real-world assets (RWAs, meaning financial instruments like bonds or commodities represented on a blockchain) hit a record $32.89 billion in Q2 2026, up 50.3% year to date and up roughly 16 times over two years.

Stablecoin settlement volume now runs at 2.3 times Visa's on-chain volume; in June 2026 alone, Visa's own on-chain analytics recorded $1.79 trillion in adjusted stablecoin volume.

Prediction market trading reached $43.2 billion in Q2, an 18-fold year-over-year increase.

Ethereum transaction activity is running approximately 13 times above its 2022 bear-market bottom.

Bitwise framed the contrast directly: "Crypto fundamentals are getting stronger despite a third straight negative quarter."

Why crypto equities held up

The equity side of the sector is structurally different from holding tokens. Companies like Coinbase generate revenue from subscription services, stablecoin revenue, and institutional products that do not move in lockstep with token prices.

Coinbase posted net revenue of $1.41 billion in its most recently reported quarter, with subscription and services contributing $583.5 million.

That revenue base cushions the business during token downturns in ways a spot ETF cannot.

MicroStrategy, now rebranded Strategy, illustrates the other end of the spectrum. The company reported an earnings-per-share figure of negative $38.25 in Q1 2026, including a $14.46 billion unrealized loss on its bitcoin holdings under fair-value accounting rules.

Both companies are classified as crypto equities, but their risk profiles are substantially different.

A US-Iran conflict and persistent ETF outflows added pressure across the board during the period.

What this means for South Asia and Africa

For the roughly 119 million crypto users in India and 40 million in Pakistan, the token-versus-equity split matters in a direct way. Most retail holders in both markets are exposed to spot tokens rather than equity products, meaning H1 2026 was markedly worse for them than headline equity performance suggests. In India specifically, a 30% capital gains tax combined with a 1% tax deducted at source on digital asset transactions has suppressed domestic exchange volumes and pushed traders offshore, concentrating retail exposure in spot tokens and amplifying the impact of H1's price declines. Coinbase's launch of direct INR payment rails in 2026 is one sign that institutional infrastructure is beginning to catch up with that retail base.

Pakistan's regulatory picture shifted significantly in March 2026 when the Virtual Assets Bill 2026 was signed into law, establishing the Pakistan Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (PVARA). The framework covers exchange licensing, AML compliance, investor protections, and Shariah-compliant digital asset services. Pakistan now has clearer regulatory parameters for digital assets than India does, despite India's considerably larger user base. That framework gives Pakistani exchanges a clearer path toward offering new product types, including tokenized assets, as the RWA market matures.

In Sub-Saharan Africa, on-chain transaction value grew 52% year over year to approximately $205 billion. Nigeria accounts for around 60% of regional stablecoin activity, and the stablecoin story carries particular weight in a region where remittance costs are high. Kenya and South Africa have also seen notable regulatory progress: Kenya's VASP Act, passed in late 2025, established a formal licensing framework for virtual asset service providers, while South Africa's exchange environment has stabilized under cleaner regulatory ground rules.

A Mercy Corps Ventures pilot in Kenya found that routing micropayments through stablecoins reduced transaction fees from 29% to 2% for Kenyan freelancers receiving payments from abroad.

The same stablecoin infrastructure underpins the RWA settlement layer that institutional investors in wealthier markets are now scaling.

What comes next

Industry analysts, with projections cited by KuCoin, RWA.xyz, and Finextra, forecast that the tokenized RWA market could exceed $100 billion by year-end.

BlackRock's BUIDL tokenized Treasury fund has already surpassed $2.5 billion.

As editorial analysis based on the asset classes currently seeing the most institutional traction in RWA markets, the products most likely to reach users in South Asia and Africa first include tokenized government bonds, commodities, and private credit instruments accessible through regulated local exchanges.

The current environment, with token prices depressed but on-chain infrastructure expanding, may be a more favorable window for builders and early institutional participants than the price charts alone would suggest.