HTX Research's latest report interpretation: When AI becomes a "liquidity black hole," how does the crypto market regain pricing power?

Recently, HTX Research, the research department under Huobi HTX, released the latest research report titled "AI Bubble, Liquidity Black Hole, and Repricing of the Crypto Market: A Study on Macroeconomic and Risk Asset Correlation in Mid-2026," analyzing how the AI investment supercycle reshapes the distribution of global liquidity and thereby alters the correlation structure between Bitcoin and risk assets. Rather than judging whether AI will collapse, the report focuses more on how global capital migrates between AI, U.S. stocks, bonds, energy, and crypto.

Coexistence of Real Technological Revolution and Financial Bubble

HTX Research points out that this AI cycle is not entirely the same as the internet bubble of 2000. Large models have indeed improved efficiency in scenarios such as coding, content creation, customer service, and data analysis, and cloud vendors, model companies, and hardware supply chains have real revenues. However, a real technological revolution does not equate to asset prices being forever rational; historically, the most dangerous bubbles are often built on real technology being excessively financialized, over-capitalized, and overly optimistically priced.

The core risk of the AI market has shifted from "Is the technology real?" to "Is the capital return sufficient to support current investments?" After 2024, global capital expenditure on AI data centers will accelerate, with large-scale cloud vendors, model companies, data center developers, private credit funds, and the bond market participating together, rapidly pushing up the financing scale of AI infrastructure. AI is transitioning from a growth narrative in the stock market to a balance sheet engineering project supported by the bond market, private credit market, and energy market.

"Liquidity Black Hole": Why Crypto Has Not Fully Benefited from This Round of Easing

According to traditional logic, M2 expansion, fiscal deficits, expectations of monetary easing, and rising risk appetite typically drive Bitcoin and crypto assets stronger. However, from the end of 2024 to mid-2026, a significant portion of the new dollar liquidity will be absorbed by the AI industry chain: stock investors buy AI equity assets, bond investors purchase AI-related credit assets, private equity funds participate in data center financing, and banks and non-bank institutions lend to tech giants and data center projects.

Thus, AI CapEx has become a "liquidity black hole" for global risk capital, and this change alters the pricing logic of Bitcoin over the past decade. Bitcoin was originally mainly correlated with dollar liquidity, real interest rates, risk appetite, and regulatory cycles, but by 2026, it must face a new variable: whether AI continues to absorb global marginal risk capital. This also explains why, in an environment where macro liquidity is not particularly tight, the incremental funding dominance in the crypto market has been continuously suppressed.

Research Framework for the Second Half of 2026: A Multidimensional Monitoring System Composed of Six Types of Indicators

The methodological value of the report is concentrated in the research framework for the second half of 2026. In the face of changes in the correlation between the AI bubble and the crypto market, a single indicator cannot determine market direction. HTX Research provides a multidimensional monitoring system that observes macro, AI, credit, stocks, crypto, and political risks together, covering six types of indicators.

Among them, two types of indicators are particularly critical. The first type is energy and inflation. The foundation of AI is electricity; sustained increases in energy prices will reprice the training and inference costs of AI, compressing the gross margins of model companies and the CapEx returns of cloud vendors. At the same time, oil prices directly influence the Federal Reserve's policy space through inflation. For the crypto market, the most favorable environment typically occurs when "declining inflation + liquidity easing + risk appetite recovery" all happen simultaneously, and mid-2026 has clearly not entered this state. Brent, WTI, natural gas, grid load in concentrated data center areas, as well as CPI, PCE, and inflation expectations are all signals that need to be continuously tracked.

The other type, which is undervalued yet potentially the most important, is AI credit financing indicators. The bursting of the AI bubble may not first occur in stock prices but could happen first in the credit market. The scale of bond issuance by tech giants, credit spreads, pricing of data center ABS/CMBS, private credit fundraising, bank loan standards, and cases of project financing failures together form the most concerning warning line. Once the credit market shifts from "willing to finance indefinitely" to "requiring cash flow proof," the expansion speed of AI CapEx will be suppressed and transmitted to the crypto market through risk appetite.

The remaining four types of indicators each have their focus: AI CapEx and order indicators, which pay attention to whether there is language about "controlling pace" in the capital expenditure guidance of tech giants; large IPOs and lock-up release rhythms, observing whether companies like SpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic can be accepted by the public market after going public; political and regulatory indicators, tracking policy changes regarding AI data centers and electricity prices in swing states; and internal liquidity in the crypto market, which assesses whether crypto is passively bearing external risks or is beginning to be viewed as an alternative allocation after the clearing of the AI bubble through metrics like net inflows into BTC and ETH ETFs, stablecoin supply, and on-chain activity.

Three Scenarios and Longer-Term Judgments

Based on the above framework, HTX Research has projected three scenarios for the second half of the year: AI continues to expand, crypto continues to be suppressed; AI experiences a moderate pullback, crypto faces short-term pressure before differentiation; and AI bubble bursts rapidly, triggering credit contraction. In the third scenario, the crypto market may struggle to rise independently in the short term, but after policy rescue and monetary easing reappear, Bitcoin may stabilize first, becoming one of the most resilient assets in the next round of liquidity repair.

In the longer term, AI is reshaping the flow of global liquidity, while the crypto market is in the process of rediscovering pricing power. The truly important intersection of the two may lie in the combination of "AI × Crypto Financial Infrastructure": stablecoins becoming the payment layer for AI agents, on-chain markets becoming the trading layer for AI assets, and exchanges becoming the unified entry point for global risk assets. Huobi HTX is also exploring this direction through its self-developed AINFT product, aggregating mainstream large model capabilities into the platform ecosystem.

HTX Research believes that the key at this stage is to identify changes in capital flows. AI may continue to rise, but it is no longer a risk-free growth story; the crypto market will still be volatile, but it is no longer an isolated high-volatility asset. What will truly determine market direction in the second half of the year is whether AI CapEx can continue to secure financing, whether energy prices can stabilize, and whether Bitcoin can regain marginal pricing power over global liquidity.

About HTX Research

HTX Research is the exclusive research department under Huobi HTX, responsible for in-depth analysis across a wide range of fields including cryptocurrencies, blockchain technology, and emerging market trends, writing comprehensive reports, and providing professional assessments. HTX Research is committed to providing data-driven insights and strategic foresight, playing a key role in shaping industry perspectives and supporting informed decision-making in the digital asset space. With rigorous research methods and cutting-edge data analysis, HTX Research consistently stands at the forefront of innovation, leading the development of industry thought and promoting a deeper understanding of the ever-changing market dynamics.