Variant Fund Investment Partner Alana Levin stated in her Q4 2026 outlook that the crypto market bottom most likely occurred in July, when Bitcoin traded at $59,000 and Ethereum at $1,600. With the cycle low potentially established, market focus has shifted to distinguishing between a genuine bull market launch and a false rally, with marginal capital expected to flow into three specific asset categories. Levin identifies value-storage protocols functioning as money and revenue-generating platforms as primary beneficiaries. Bitcoin remains the dominant store-of-value benchmark, while revenue projects will be evaluated based on profit margins, income persistence during pullbacks, and exposure to stablecoins or real-world assets. Founder-led teams that survived the bear market are also expected to command higher valuation multiples. A third category includes on-chain projects benchmarked against non-crypto businesses, particularly in AI sectors like inference and compute. Levin characterizes these largely as narrative trades rather than long-term investments, questioning the necessity of blockchain in most scenarios. She noted that significant outperformance in this sector would serve as a signal that the broader market is approaching a top.