Outpoll | Outpoll Weekly Recap: Finance (February 16

Finance

This week, the financial world felt the tectonic plates shifting as the long-anticipated SEC approval of a spot Ethereum ETF finally landed, sending shockwaves through both TradFi and DeFi corridors. Prediction markets, which had been cautiously optimistic, went into overdrive, with contracts on platforms like Outpoll skyrocketing from a 35% probability to near-certainty in the 48 hours leading up to the announcement.The immediate aftermath saw ETH surge past the $5,000 mark, but the more fascinating story unfolded in the prediction markets themselves, where volumes for contracts tied to ‘ETH hitting $6,000 by Q2’ and ‘BlackRock launching a tokenized fund on-chain’ doubled overnight. This isn't just a crypto story; it's a bridge-building moment.We're witnessing institutional capital's formal, regulated on-ramp to smart contract functionality, which is going to turbocharge everything from tokenized treasury bills to real-world asset (RWA) protocols. Speaking of RWAs, prediction markets are now heavily favoring a wave of mergers between traditional asset managers and blockchain-native infrastructure firms, with one major contract pricing a 60% chance of a landmark deal before the end of Q1.Meanwhile, in a quieter but equally significant corner, the Fed's latest minutes hinted at a more dovish tilt than markets expected, causing a sharp recalibration in rate-cut odds. Contracts predicting a cut by the June FOMC meeting jumped from 40% to 65%, flattening the yield curve and sending a fresh bid into growth-sensitive tech stocks.The interplay here is key: easier monetary policy traditionally fuels risk assets, and now with a newly legitimized crypto-adjacent asset class, we're looking at a potent liquidity cocktail. The real test will be in the coming weeks as the initial euphoria settles and the market digests the mechanics of these new ETFs—custody, staking yields, and the inevitable regulatory nuances.For forward-looking investors, the action is no longer just in picking winners, but in betting on the convergence itself. The most active prediction contracts this week weren't about Bitcoin or the S&P in isolation; they were on the correlation between the two, signaling that the old walls are crumbling fast.

#Weekly recap

Outpoll Weekly Recap: Finance (February 16 – 22, 2026)