Bitwise CIO: Crypto valuations could double on token revenue

Bitwise Chief Investment Officer Matt Hougan argued on Aug. 12 that crypto valuations outside Bitcoin could rise sharply as more protocols connect revenue generated by network activity to their native tokens.

In a memo, Hougan pointed to Hyperliquid, Uniswap, Aave, Pump.fun and Lighter as examples of projects using fees or other protocol revenue to finance token purchases or burns. He expects more DeFi applications and layer 1 networks to adopt similar structures over the next 12 to 24 months.

His strongest forecast was explicitly conditional. Hougan wrote that “we could see valuations double or more” if his view that the link between protocol revenue and token value continues strengthening proves correct. Bitwise also states that the memo represents an assessment at a particular time and is neither a guarantee of future results nor investment advice.

Hougan’s argument rests on a change in how some tokens capture economic activity. Historically, many governance tokens gave holders voting powers without directly tying protocol fees to token demand. Buyback and burn systems attempt to create that connection by using revenue to acquire tokens from the market and then removing them from supply or holding them in protocol controlled mechanisms.

Hyperliquid provides one of the clearest current examples. Its official documentation says trading fees flow to the Assistance Fund, which converts them into HYPE, with acquired HYPE burned and removed from circulating and total supply. Hougan estimates that roughly 99% of fee revenue has been directed toward the mechanism.

The model has already become a major part of HYPE’s investment narrative. As previously reported, Hyperliquid routed more than $1.16 billion in trading fees into HYPE purchases, creating recurring token demand linked to exchange activity. That demand still depends on trading volumes and fee generation, meaning weaker activity would reduce the amount available for future purchases.

Hougan compared the structure with stock buybacks, but the comparison has limits. A crypto token does not automatically carry the legal rights attached to corporate equity. Token holders generally lack a shareholder’s contractual claim on profits, assets or distributions, and governance can change token economics. Hougan acknowledged those differences in his own analysis.

Uniswap has moved further toward an automated burn structure since governance approved UNIfication in December 2025. The measure burned 100 million UNI from the treasury and activated protocol fees for v2 and v3 pools. By July, Uniswap governance reported that protocol fees had financed about 7.5 million additional UNI in burns, worth roughly $25.6 million at the figures used in its proposal.

The system has continued expanding. An onchain vote to activate v4 protocol fees on Ethereum, Arbitrum, Base, BNB Chain, Polygon, Optimism and Robinhood Chain was executed on July 27 with 46.6 million UNI voting in favor. In related coverage, Uniswap expanded its revenue-linked UNI burn mechanism as governance pushed protocol fees into more versions and networks.

Aave uses a different structure. DAO funding records show its buyback program acquired more than 205,000 AAVE during its first 10 months after launching in April 2025. About $42 million had been allocated to those purchases, representing more than 1.28% of AAVE’s 16 million total supply.

Aave’s broader revenue framework is also evolving. Its Aave Will Win proposal directs 100% of revenue from Aave branded products to the DAO treasury, after specified partner revenue sharing and user incentives. The framework also states that the DAO receives protocol fees. That does not mean every dollar reaching the DAO is automatically and immediately used to purchase AAVE.

Kulechov said in June that “100% of Aave Protocol and GHO revenue goes to the $AAVE token,” while also saying the team was designing an automated and nondiscretionary Aavenomics 3.0 buyback system. The distinction matters because the new automated mechanism was described as work in progress rather than an already completed deployment. Earlier crypto.news coverage showed Aave governance considering larger recurring AAVE buybacks.

Pump.fun has made its fee model unusually explicit. Its official token page lists 50% of protocol revenue as allocated to buybacks. The platform previously moved from a model that committed all revenue to purchases to a structure that directs half of net revenue toward automated PUMP buybacks and burns.

The mechanism is producing measurable activity. As crypto.news reported this week, Pump.fun generated $10.03 million in weekly protocol fees while burning $5.02 million of PUMP during Aug. 3 through Aug. 9. The platform said 2.15 billion PUMP were purchased and burned during that period.

The same debate is moving to base layer economics. Hougan cited Solana’s SGP 0003 process, which combines proposals designed to increase fee burns and reduce token issuance more quickly. One component, SIMD 0553, would replace Solana’s flat signature fee with an inclusion fee plus a resource based charge that is burned.

Modeling from proposal author Temporal estimates that full implementation could raise daily burns from roughly 648 SOL to between 7,500 and 9,000 SOL at comparable network activity.

The proposal has moved beyond an initial concept. Validator signaling cleared the required threshold on Aug. 5, and the formal governance process is now underway. The proposal still requires validator approval, so the projected increase in SOL burns should not be treated as an implemented change.

Hougan attributes part of the shift toward token revenue mechanisms to a more permissive U.S. regulatory environment. His argument references the Ripple litigation and the change in SEC leadership, but the legal history requires more precision than simply saying XRP was ruled not to be a security. The district court found Ripple’s institutional sales violated securities laws while certain other sales did not constitute investment contracts. The SEC and Ripple dismissed their appeals in August 2025, leaving the final judgment in place.

The regulatory framework has since changed further. In March 2026, the SEC adopted an interpretation that created categories for crypto assets and addressed when a nonsecurity crypto asset may nevertheless be involved in an investment contract. Chairman Paul Atkins described the framework as an effort to provide clearer boundaries under existing federal securities laws.

That does not amount to a blanket legal approval for token buybacks, burns or revenue distributions. The securities analysis can still depend on how a token is offered, what rights or promises accompany it and the relationship between buyers and a project team. Hougan’s claim that regulatory change will accelerate revenue capture is therefore an investment thesis rather than an established legal outcome.

The next U.S. development arrives quickly. The SEC is scheduled to hold an open meeting at 10 a.m. ET on Aug. 14 to consider whether to propose tailored offering rules for certain investment contracts involving crypto assets. The agenda does not say those rules will specifically authorize token revenue sharing. Any proposal would also precede further rulemaking steps before becoming final.

That regulatory process will matter to Hougan’s broader thesis. As crypto.news previously reported, Hougan expects U.S. crypto growth to continue despite delays to the CLARITY Act, partly because he believes agency rulemaking can provide another route toward clearer operating conditions. Whether those rules make revenue capture easier, and whether investors assign higher valuations as a result, remains unproven.