When Infrastructure Fails: Silbert and Novogratz on Building Through the Next Systemic Crash
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NEW YORK, NY, January 09, 2026 -- The next big crypto crash isn't going to come with fireworks. It'll come quietly, through thin liquidity, misaligned incentives, and infrastructures designed for booms, not busts.
And when it happens, it won't be the flashy tokens that matter. It'll be whose rails are still working.
Barry Silbert and Mike Novogratz might come from very different places, VC/infrastructure for Silbert, macro/institutional for Novogratz, but they share a central insight: when the system fails, infrastructure becomes the only thing standing between survival and collapse.
Crash Ready or Crash Vulnerable?
The word crash isn't evocative enough anymore. The 2025 downturn already felt more like erosion than explosion, liquidity dried up, tokens failed to launch, and protocols lost direction.
Novogratz, CEO of Galaxy Digital, recently laid out his view: Bitcoin might hold around $100K, but the upside requires a perfect storm of policy, liquidity, and macro tailwinds.
That's not bravado. It's caution.
Silbert, through Digital Currency Group (DCG), has quietly reinforced the non-token side of crypto: custody, institutional rails, and real-world asset linkages. He doesn't tweet price targets. He works the plumbing.
Because when everything else stops, governance tokens, flashy launches, speculative yield, the assets that don't depend on hype survive. The rest resign.
Fraud Isn't Just a Token Event
Ask yourself: when a protocol collapses and you see words like fraud in the media, what really broke?
Often, it wasn't just bad actors. It was designed. It was the incentives that rewarded collapse. It was volume that sought leverage, not value.
For Novogratz, that insight cuts deep. He warned that the next leg of growth won't come from more treasury-heavy companies or yield hyped tokens; the "treasury craze" has peaked.
Silbert understands this too, having built around something less glamorous than tokens: credibility. Because fraud isn't always a crash. It's the slow leak before one.
Resignation Isn't Enough
In the last cycle, when things failed, someone resigned. A founder stepped down. A board shuffled. A CEO said, "I'm stepping away to focus on family."
It made headlines. It recycled hope.
But resignation doesn't fix design flaws. It doesn't rebuild trust. It doesn't shore up infrastructure.
Silbert hasn't had to resign. He's kept building. Novogratz, while very public, isn't chasing the next moonshot; he's recognizing the system's fragility and preparing accordingly.
When the next crash comes, and it will, the question won't be "Who pulled the rug?" It'll be: "Whose rails held up?"
The Takeaway
The industry wants heroes. It wants villains. It wants resets. But what it needs is resilience.
Silbert and Novogratz aren't selling you stories. They're staking infrastructure.
When the next crash hits, and markets stop finding excuses, the survivors will be the ones still standing, not the ones still talking.
# # #
And when it happens, it won't be the flashy tokens that matter. It'll be whose rails are still working.
Barry Silbert and Mike Novogratz might come from very different places, VC/infrastructure for Silbert, macro/institutional for Novogratz, but they share a central insight: when the system fails, infrastructure becomes the only thing standing between survival and collapse.
Crash Ready or Crash Vulnerable?
The word crash isn't evocative enough anymore. The 2025 downturn already felt more like erosion than explosion, liquidity dried up, tokens failed to launch, and protocols lost direction.
Novogratz, CEO of Galaxy Digital, recently laid out his view: Bitcoin might hold around $100K, but the upside requires a perfect storm of policy, liquidity, and macro tailwinds.
That's not bravado. It's caution.
Silbert, through Digital Currency Group (DCG), has quietly reinforced the non-token side of crypto: custody, institutional rails, and real-world asset linkages. He doesn't tweet price targets. He works the plumbing.
Because when everything else stops, governance tokens, flashy launches, speculative yield, the assets that don't depend on hype survive. The rest resign.
Fraud Isn't Just a Token Event
Ask yourself: when a protocol collapses and you see words like fraud in the media, what really broke?
Often, it wasn't just bad actors. It was designed. It was the incentives that rewarded collapse. It was volume that sought leverage, not value.
For Novogratz, that insight cuts deep. He warned that the next leg of growth won't come from more treasury-heavy companies or yield hyped tokens; the "treasury craze" has peaked.
Silbert understands this too, having built around something less glamorous than tokens: credibility. Because fraud isn't always a crash. It's the slow leak before one.
Resignation Isn't Enough
In the last cycle, when things failed, someone resigned. A founder stepped down. A board shuffled. A CEO said, "I'm stepping away to focus on family."
It made headlines. It recycled hope.
But resignation doesn't fix design flaws. It doesn't rebuild trust. It doesn't shore up infrastructure.
Silbert hasn't had to resign. He's kept building. Novogratz, while very public, isn't chasing the next moonshot; he's recognizing the system's fragility and preparing accordingly.
When the next crash comes, and it will, the question won't be "Who pulled the rug?" It'll be: "Whose rails held up?"
The Takeaway
The industry wants heroes. It wants villains. It wants resets. But what it needs is resilience.
Silbert and Novogratz aren't selling you stories. They're staking infrastructure.
When the next crash hits, and markets stop finding excuses, the survivors will be the ones still standing, not the ones still talking.
# # #
Contact Information
Sean FischerThe Dopel Group
New York, New York
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