Presidential Pardons, Privacy Coin Surges

Another eventful year for crypto is now behind us.

Bitcoin notched a new all-time high but ended the year in the red, the regulatory climate in the US warmed, privacy coins stormed the market, institutional adoption surged and the US president even launched a memecoin.

With 2026 now underway, Cointelegraph takes a look at some of the biggest comebacks in crypto last year and what it could mean for the next 12 months. 

Ross Ulbricht and CZ get presidential pardons 

The year kicked off with a presidential pardon of one of the biggest names from the early days of Bitcoin. 

After spending over 11 years in jail for his role in creating dark web marketplace Silk Road, Ross Ulbricht was pardoned by President Donald Trump from his double-life-time jail sentence and freed in late January.

The move gave Ulbricht a second chance at life, at what seemed like a slim chance at ever being able to live a normal life again.  

“Thank you so much, President Trump, for giving me this amazing blessing. I am so, so grateful to have my life back, to have my future back, to have this second chance. This is such an important moment for me and for my whole family,” Ulbricht said after receiving his pardon. 

This wasn’t the only pardon to a crypto figure Trump gave out in 2025. In October Binance co-founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao (CZ) also received a similar honor.

Zhao completed a four-month prison sentence after pleading guilty in late 2023 to one count of violating the Bank Secrecy Act over a failure to implement an adequate Anti-Money Laundering (AML) program at Binance. 

While the pardon didn’t wipe off the admission of guilt by CZ, it marked an acknowledgement by the government that the Binance co-founder faced too harsh of a penalty, and cleared the way for CZ to get more involved in crypto again.   

“I don’t know him, I don’t believe I’ve ever met him, but I’ve been told he had a lot of support, and they said that what he did is not even a crime, it wasn’t a crime, he was persecuted by the Biden Administration,” Trump said of CZ’s pardoning. 

What this means for 2026: With crypto hostility dying down in the US in 2025, it opens the door for greater mainstream and institutional adoption, with entrepreneurs more comfortable dipping their toes into the industry as regulatory clarity grows.  

It also means that crypto firms and projects may feel more comfortable offering the full suite of their services in the US with less worry about sudden crackdowns or legal disputes.  

Privacy coins re-emerge: Zcash and Monero adapt and rally

Privacy coins stormed the market in 2025 and became one of the key themes in crypto this year as investors sought to keep their on-chain anonymity. 

Amid this boom, the price of Monero (XMR) climbed back up above $400 for the first time in four years, putting an end to a lengthy spell of flat price action.

While the asset didn’t breach a new all-time high, XMR closed the year with a gain of around 120% as per CoinGecko data, compared to Bitcoin which ended the year in the red. 

Zcash (ZEC), another privacy coin, closed 2025 with a whopping 817% gain, climbing above the $500 mark for the first time in seven years. 

What this means for 2026: Given that most blockchains are built around providing a public ledger of information, privacy-focused networks have further room for growth in 2026. 

In a recent report, crypto investment giant a16z highlighted this, arguing that privacy networks will have strong potential to retain users who value anonymity as they will not bridge out assets to public blockchains to avoid public data leaks. 

“When users are on private blockchains, on the other hand, the chain they choose matters much more because, once they join one, they’re less likely to move and risk being exposed,” a16z said, adding: 

“This creates a winner-take-most dynamic. And because privacy is essential for most real-world use cases, a handful of privacy chains could own most of crypto.”

Ripple grows after the SEC ends its lawsuit

After a lengthy, costly and highly contested legal battle with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Ripple Labs finally reached the end of a pivotal dispute for the crypto industry, after both Ripple and the SEC withdrew their final appeals in August. 

While it was confirmed in March that they still had to pay a $50 million civil settlement, the final ruling ultimately dismissed the core accusation that the firm had violated securities laws by issuing and selling XRP (XRP) to institutions. 

Related: How privacy prevailed in an otherwise dismal Q4 for crypto

Had the court ruling swayed the other way, it may have had a massive knock-on effect for the classification of many crypto asset, andspurredr additional cases against similar firms.