Institutions and the Broader Economy Now Drive a Third of Blockchain Revenue

The second annual 1kx Blockchain Revenue Report puts the 2026 total at about $100 billion, with public companies earning 16%. A backtested index of dividend-paying tokens returned 82% through September, beating Bitcoin.

NEW YORK, Oct. 29, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- 1kx, a research-driven, fundamentals-focused global investment firm, today released the 1kx Blockchain Revenue Report, the second edition of its annual analysis of blockchain revenues. This year's measure is broader than last year's Onchain Revenue Report, which tracked only onchain user-paid fees. The report now covers all blockchain revenues, including offchain exchange fees, the revenues of public companies, other income such as stablecoin reserve interest, as well as mining and staking rewards.

The report combines onchain data from more than 2,600 protocols, the earnings reports of more than 100 public companies, and additional sources on private entities, through the end of Q3 2026. The full report is available at https://1kx.capital/writing/revenue-report-2026.

Report Findings

Blockchain revenues fell 28% in 2026 but rose again in Q3. Full-year 2026 blockchain revenues are expected to reach about $100 billion, down 28% from roughly $140 billion in 2025 and in line with the decline in digital asset prices - although relative to total digital asset market capitalization, revenues were flat. Onchain user-paid fees were $3.9 billion in Q3 2026 and estimated $14B for all of 2026.

Beneath the drawdown, the mix is changing. Revenues from institutional adoption, meaning revenue earned by institutions as owners (ETF, card network and chain fees) and from institutional clients, were 12% of blockchain revenues in 2026 through Q3, up from 6% in 2021. In dollars, they doubled over three years to $6.1 billion in the first half of 2026, though they fell $0.7 billion year over year as price-sensitive asset management, custody and staking fees declined; their share rose because total revenues fell faster. The report cuts the same total three ways: by who earns it (public companies, 16% in 2026), by what drives it (institutional and broader-economy adoption, 33% in Q3 2026 and 30% for the year) and by sector (blockchain infrastructure, 21% in Q3 2026).

Broader-economy adoption overtakes blockchain infrastructure. Revenues from broader-economy adoption, including tokenized assets, payments and prediction markets, grew 58% year over year in the first half of 2026, led by prediction markets and trading in tokenized real-world assets, and overtook blockchain infrastructure revenues in Q3 2026 for the first time (22% versus 21%). Institutional and broader-economy revenues together reached 33% of blockchain revenues in Q3 2026.

Public companies now earn 16% of blockchain revenues, up from 7% in 2022; the six largest account for about 60% of public-company blockchain revenue. Large banks and traditional finance incumbents that had negligible blockchain revenue three years ago are on track to earn $1B this year. One way this group expands its revenue is via acquisitions - and there have been quite a few lately: BVNK (Mastercard), OpenZeppelin (S&P Global), bitbank (SBI), Zodia Custody (Standard Chartered).

Dividend-paying tokens beat Bitcoin. 1kx's dividend-token index, which tracks protocols that distribute value to token holders, returned 82% through September 30, 2026, versus a 5% decline for Bitcoin; outperforming Bitcoin was rare in recent years. The index figures are hypothetical and based on backtests. A record 283 protocols distributed value to token holders in Q3 2026.

Among protocols, leadership keeps rotating. In YTD Q3 2026, six of the top 20 protocols by onchain fees were not in last year's top 20, and Robinhood Chain became the third-largest ecosystem by fees within a quarter of launch.

Prediction market fees grew 19x in a year. 1kx estimates prediction market fees at more than $1.5 billion in Q3 2026, up from $86 million in Q3 2025, on roughly $55 billion settled in the quarter, concentrated in Kalshi and Polymarket; most of these fees are not yet traceable onchain, so the figure is an estimate based on Allium data. Robinhood alone reported $173m in events contracts in Q3 2026, up over 6x from a year earlier. A noteworthy shift is how they (and other public companies) are building their own settlement layers and exchanges for these event contracts, such as Robinhood Chain.

Payment card spend tripled. Spend on digital asset payment cards tripled year over year to $3.4 billion in Q3 2026, almost all of it on Visa's network.

Tokenized stocks ascendant as markets move 24/7. Volume in tokenized stocks on Robinhood Chain passed $13 billion in Q3 2026, over 70% of it while US exchanges were closed, before Nasdaq moves to 23-hour trading in December. RWA perp volume also increased 122x YoY in Q3 2026.

"The end of the bull market in 2025 also marked a peak in blockchain revenues, but the more important story is underneath the drawdown," said Robert Koschig, Head of Economics at 1kx. "We've seen a shift towards fundamentals, with revenues tied to institutional and broader-economy adoption reaching about a third of blockchain revenues in the third quarter. That growth comes with rising activity and ownership from traditional finance across the full stack, from infrastructure to applications.

"Tokenized stocks trading around the clock, prediction markets inside brokerage apps, and payment volume on card networks signal the convergence of traditional finance and digital assets in practice. For us as investors, the data confirms where we focus: on the fundamentals. We look for areas where legacy structures cannot yet deliver and where an intermediary's take is compressible, and onchain data is how we track that in real time."

1kx publishes the Blockchain Revenue Report annually and updates its revenue dashboard monthly at https://1kx.capital/onchain-revenue-dashboard.

About 1kx
1kx is a research-driven, fundamentals-focused global investment firm. Founded in 2018 by tech entrepreneurs Lasse Clausen and Christopher Heymann, the firm is headquartered in New York and invests at key inflection points where blockchain technologies meet the broader economy. Since the firm's inception, its Cost of Trust thesis has defined where 1kx invests: in businesses and networks that lower the cost of trust and create what legacy infrastructure cannot. With a hands-on approach and technical rigor, 1kx has made more than 160 investments across three market cycles, often leading early rounds before their categories were proven. The firm partners with a global institutional investor base that includes sovereign wealth funds, pension funds, endowments, foundations, funds of funds, corporations and family offices. To explore 1kx's research and thesis work, visit 1kx.capital and follow @1kxnetwork on X.

About the methodology
The report covers 2,621 protocols and the earnings reports of 104 public companies through Q3 2026. Protocol data was sourced from Allium, DeFiLlama, Dune and TokenTerminal, complemented by onchain-based estimates for offchain fees and third-party reports; protocol valuations are from CoinGecko. Revenues are classified into six sectors (Blockchain infrastructure, Middleware, DePIN, DeFi/Finance, Wallets and Consumer) and mapped by origin into four categories: institutional adoption, broader economy adoption, blockchain applications and blockchain infrastructure. The full methodology, including adjustments for double-counting, is in the report's appendix.

Disclosures
The contents of this publication are for general information purposes only and should not be construed as, or relied upon in any manner as, investment, financial, legal, regulatory, tax, accounting, or similar advice. They do not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any securities. 1kx may hold positions in certain projects or assets discussed in this publication. Full disclosures: https://1kx.capital/important-disclosures 

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SOURCE 1kx