Grayscale Unveils New Assets Under Consideration for Future Investment Products: Key Details

Grayscale has expanded its list of digital assets under consideration for future investment products, outlining where one of the largest crypto-focused asset managers sees sustained relevance going into 2026. The updated disclosure, published on January 12, 2026, identifies 36 assets across multiple crypto sectors that Grayscale is actively evaluating for possible inclusion in future trusts or exchange-traded products. 

The update is significant because Grayscale’s product decisions have historically shaped institutional access, liquidity conditions, and regulatory discussion around digital assets.

What the Assets Under Consideration List Represents

Grayscale’s assets under consideration list identifies digital assets that are not currently included in any Grayscale investment product but have been reviewed internally as potential candidates for future inclusion. The firm states that the list may be updated as frequently as 15 days after the end of each quarter, reflecting ongoing research, changes in market structure, and evolving regulatory or custody considerations.

The January 12, 2026, update expands the list from 32 assets in the fourth quarter of 2025 to 36 assets in the first quarter of 2026. Assets are grouped using Grayscale’s Crypto Sectors framework, which categorizes tokens based on their primary economic or technical role rather than by market capitalization alone. Some assets are marked with an asterisk, indicating that they were not formally classified within the framework as of December 31, 2025, and are considered emerging or newly evaluated projects.

Grayscale emphasizes that inclusion on this list does not constitute approval, endorsement, or a commitment to launch an investment product. Each asset remains subject to regulatory approval, custody readiness, liquidity analysis, and broader market conditions.

Assets Currently in the Grayscale Product Suite

As of January 12, 2026, Grayscale already offers exposure to a broad range of digital assets through single-asset and multi-asset products. These holdings span six core sectors.

Currencies

This sector includes crypto assets designed to serve as a medium of exchange, a store of value, or a unit of account. Grayscale’s current products include Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin, Stellar Lumens, XRP, and Zcash. No additional currency assets were added to the under consideration list in the Q1 2026 update.

Smart Contract Platforms

Smart contract platforms form the base layer for decentralized applications and on-chain execution. Grayscale’s existing products already provide exposure to Ethereum, Solana, Cardano, Avalanche, Optimism, Hedera Hashgraph, Sui, Stacks, Ethereum Classic, and Horizen.

Financials

The financials sector covers decentralized finance protocols focused on lending, trading, liquidity provision, and structured products. Current Grayscale products include Aave, Uniswap, Curve, Aerodrome, Ondo Finance, and DeepBook.

Consumer and Culture

This category includes assets tied to advertising, virtual environments, and memecoins. Grayscale’s current exposure consists of Basic Attention Token, Decentraland, and Dogecoin.

Artificial Intelligence

AI-related assets currently held in Grayscale products include Bittensor, Livepeer, Near, Render, and Story.

Utilities and Services

This sector focuses on infrastructure and enterprise functionality. Existing products include Chainlink, Filecoin, Lido DAO, Pyth, Space and Time, The Graph, and Walrus.

Smart Contract Platforms Under Consideration

Smart contract platforms represent the largest share of assets under consideration in the Q1 2026 update, reflecting continued institutional focus on scalability, execution efficiency, and interoperability.

Aptos is a Layer-1 blockchain built on the Move programming language, designed to prioritize execution safety and high throughput. 

Arbitrum, an Ethereum Layer 2 rollup, remains under consideration due to its role in reducing transaction costs while maintaining Ethereum security guarantees.

Binance Coin is also included, reflecting the scale of the Binance ecosystem and its extensive on-chain activity. Grayscale filed a statutory trust for a BNB-related product in December 2025, indicating a more advanced stage of evaluation. Polkadot’s presence highlights sustained interest in multi-chain architectures and shared security models.

The addition of Tron represents a notable change from the prior quarter. Tron has seen growth in stablecoin settlement and decentralized finance usage, which appears to have influenced its inclusion. 

Emerging projects such as MegaETH and Monad are also under consideration, despite being early-stage networks focused on high transaction throughput and Ethereum compatibility.

Financials and Decentralized Finance Assets

The financials sector includes eleven assets under consideration, making it one of the most heavily represented categories in the update. These projects span decentralized lending, derivatives trading, yield generation, and liquidity management.

Ethena is a synthetic dollar protocol that provides dollar exposure through derivatives rather than traditional reserves. 

Hyperliquid, a decentralized perpetuals exchange, has also drawn attention. Grayscale has filed for a Hyperliquid-related exchange-traded product structure, signaling deeper internal analysis.

Pendle focuses on yield tokenization by separating principal and yield components into distinct tradable instruments. 

Plume Network reflects growing institutional attention to real-world asset tokenization, an area that surpassed $ 20 billion in on-chain value in 2025. 

Other assets under consideration, such as Morpho, Maple Finance, and Kamino Finance, indicate a continued focus on capital efficiency and chain credit markets.

Consumer and Culture Assets

The consumer and culture category contains fewer assets but reflects distinct risk and use case profiles. Bonk, a Solana-based memecoin, remains under consideration due to its liquidity and integration within the Solana ecosystem.

The ARIA Protocol represents a different approach, focusing on tokenizing intellectual property rights. Its inclusion suggests that Grayscale is monitoring niche applications that aim to bring traditionally illiquid rights and licensing structures onto public blockchains.

Artificial Intelligence Focus Areas

Artificial intelligence remains a growing area of emphasis within the list under consideration list. Seven AI-related assets are currently being evaluated, many of which focus on decentralized data access, model training, or identity systems.

Grass, a decentralized physical infrastructure network designed for AI data collection, reportedly generated approximately $ 20 million in revenue in 2025. 

Worldcoin continues to attract institutional attention for its biometric-based digital identity system tied to AI use cases.

Nous Research and Poseidon are newly added projects described as decentralized AI research or infrastructure platforms. Both are pre-token and lack public market pricing, indicating that Grayscale is tracking technical development rather than market performance alone. 

Prime Intellect, which appeared in earlier lists, was removed following reevaluation.

Utilities and Services Infrastructure

Utilities and services assets focus on the underlying infrastructure that supports interoperability and network functionality. 

Layer Zero and Wormhole address cross-chain communication, a persistent technical challenge for decentralized systems.

Jito provides maximum extractable value optimization services on Solana, while DoubleZero is a newly added decentralized infrastructure project focused on utility-level services. Their inclusion reflects ongoing interest in the operational layers that support broader crypto activity.

What the Update Signals for Institutional Crypto Strategy

The updated list indicates that Grayscale’s research priorities entering 2026 center on scalable smart contract platforms, mature decentralized finance infrastructure, decentralized artificial intelligence systems, and cross-chain utilities. It also reinforces the view that institutional crypto exposure is increasingly thematic, aligning with areas such as AI integration, real-world asset tokenization, and decentralized infrastructure.

At the same time, Grayscale continues to stress that regulatory uncertainty, custody constraints, and market volatility remain limiting factors. Inclusion on the list should be interpreted as analytical interest rather than an investment recommendation.

Conclusion

Grayscale’s Q1 2026 assets under consideration update offers a structured view into how institutional asset managers evaluate the evolving crypto landscape. By expanding its watchlist across smart contract platforms, decentralized finance, artificial intelligence, and infrastructure services, Grayscale highlights the technical characteristics and economic functions it views as most relevant to sustained digital asset adoption. 

While the list does not predict product launches, it provides a clear snapshot of the areas receiving the most institutional research attention as the crypto market matures.

Sources:

• Grayscale Report: Assets Under Consideration and Current Products