14 January 2026
Your January Newsletter for All Things BitPay and Crypto
The Important Bits
2026 is off to a strong start for crypto. From market movers and key trends to a full recap of how people and businesses used crypto in 2025, this month’s Cryptie highlights what’s driving momentum right now. Plus, don’t miss limited-time offers, merchant shoutouts, and new ways to get more value from crypto with BitPay.
Industry News & Headlines
Industry News
Read news from across the blockchain industry:
Morgan Stanley Files for Bitcoin and Solana ETFs in Digital Assets Push: Morgan Stanley became the first major U.S. bank to seek approval for spot crypto ETFs, signaling growing confidence in regulated BTC and SOL exposure as banks move from passive custody to active crypto investment products amid clearer U.S. rules. (Reuters 1/6/26)
Crypto Trading Activity Falls to Lowest Level Since October 2024: Global spot and derivatives trading volumes dropped sharply in December as holiday slowdowns and low bitcoin volatility reduced short-term trading activity, even as exchanges closed 2025 with record annual volumes. (CoinDesk 1/13/26)
Bank of America Recommends Bitcoin Allocations Across Wealth Platform: Bank of America is now allowing more than 15,000 advisers to proactively recommend spot bitcoin ETFs, joining JPMorgan, Citi, and Morgan Stanley and reinforcing bitcoin’s growing role as a standard portfolio allocation for institutional and high-net-worth clients. (Yahoo Finance 1/7/26)
Marshall Islands Launches Universal Basic Income With Crypto Payments: The Marshall Islands rolled out a nationwide UBI program offering payments via a U.S. dollar-pegged stablecoin alongside traditional methods, highlighting how crypto can support financial inclusion and government payouts without replacing employment. (CoinDesk 12/16/25)
Tether-Backed Rumble Launches Crypto Wallet for Creator Tipping: Rumble introduced a non-custodial crypto wallet integrated into its streaming platform, allowing fans to tip creators directly in bitcoin and USDT, highlighting how crypto wallets are expanding real-world monetization and creator payments without traditional intermediaries. (The Block 1/7/26)
Market Movers
A quick snapshot of notable market activity, trends, and cryptocurrencies driving headlines.
BitPay in the News
Crypto at the Checkout: How Retailers Can Prepare for the Next Evolution in 2026
Decrypted 2025: A Recap of the Past Year in Crypto
Explore the trends of how people and organizations utilized crypto in 2025, as told by BitPay user and merchant stats.
Top BitPay highlights from the year:
Payment volume grew 12%, with an average transaction size of $800
Stablecoin payments made up 40% of total payment volume
Businesses sent more payouts using crypto; payout transactions increased 12% from 2024
BitPay Wallet users bought, sold, and swapped more than $100 million in crypto with BitPay’s partners
Enjoy No BitPay Fees on Your First Crypto Purchase via Simplex
Buy BTC, LTC, ETH, BCH, MATIC, and 60+ top coins at great rates from Simplex. Get the BitPay app for an easy, convenient, and cheap way to build your crypto portfolio through Simplex. This limited-time offer is open to first-time Simplex buyers.
Terms of Service: https://bitpay.com/legal/terms-of-use/
Campaign Terms & Conditions: https://www.bitpay.com/simplex-buy-no-fees-terms-conditions
Limited-Time Offer: 5% Boost on Select Gift Cards
Now, through the end of January, get 5% more when you buy select gift cards with crypto in the BitPay app! Use your favorite coins to score extra value on brands including GameStop, Airbnb, Domino's, TopGolf, and One4all. Terms and conditions apply.
Offer ends January 31st - don’t miss out! Check the BitPay app each month for more boosted gift cards.
Best of BitPay 2025: Nominate Your Favorite BitPay Merchants
The Best of BitPay Awards are designed to recognize and celebrate the forward-thinking merchants who integrate crypto payments into their business operations.
Nominations begin January 1st through January 31st. Nominate your favorite merchants that accept crypto payments via BitPay in the form below. Merchant categories span everything you can buy with crypto, from automotive and clothes, to travel and watches/jewelry. Once nominations are in, voting will begin on February 1st and run through February 28th.
Merchant Shoutouts
Highlighting merchants driving crypto adoption and exciting promotions.
Shop APMEX’s silver and gold popular categories, including pop culture collectibles. Shop now!
OneGold gives you direct ownership of vaulted gold, silver, and platinum at an ultra-low cost. Start your free account today.
Buy a domain name with Namecheap today!
Ready to start accepting crypto with your Shopify business? Get started today with the BitPay app!
Instantly deploy high-performance cloud servers, cloud GPUs, bare metal, and cloud storage worldwide with Vultr. New users receive $100 to test their platform.
Use BrandBucket to name your business.
Shop US stores and have your items reliably shipped back home with Qwintry
Merchant Shoutouts
BitPay Travel is now open to all! In collaboration with Xeni, BitPay Travel allows crypto users to pay for flights, hotels, rental cars, and activities with their cryptocurrency. Book your travel at great prices and pay straight from your cryptocurrency wallet.
Developer Notes
Added Python 3.14 Support
With the release of the Python SDK v7.0.8, we've updated dependencies and added Python 3.14 support. Since we have not yet dropped Python 3.9 support, we did not introduce a major version, and since no new features were added, we made the decision to bump to a minor version. The test matrix has been updated as well, with Python 3.14 running the full test suite.
Deprecating Python 3.9
In our next major release of the Python SDK v8.0.0, we will be dropping support for Python 3.9 in the latest version of the SDK. This will be released in late January or early February.
Deprecating PHP 8.1
PHP 8.1 reached its end of life at the end of 2025, so we have dropped support for PHP 8.1 in v10.0.0 of the SDK. This coincides with dropping PHPUnit 10.x as it is no longer needed, with PHPUnit 11.x and 12.x being supported.
Upcoming PHP 8.5 Support
In late January or early February, we will be finalizing our support for PHP 8.5.
Upcoming WooCommerce Changes
A new major version WooCommerce plugin is upcoming, with a release date yet to be announced. The new version will be v8.0.0 and will require PHP >= 8.2. While this does not strictly follow WordPress' compatibility back to PHP 7.2, WooCommerce recommends PHP 8.3 or greater (https://woocommerce.com/document/update-php-wordpress/) and while it works with some EOL versions of PHP, doing so could leave sites vulnerable to exploitation so we are aligning our supported PHP versions with PHP's lifecycle.
Dropping "Unified"
We previously had two versions of our SDKs: Full and Light. The full version supported the merchant and payment facades, and the light versions only supported the point-of-sale (pos) facade. In prioritizing stability, testability, and more frequent updates, we rebuilt our SDKs, generally a few major versions ago, to support all facades. This reduces duplication and enables us to move more efficiently across our updates. WIth that, we will be updating our documentation to drop the name "Unified". For example, the Python Unified SDK will just become our Python SDK. This is a minor, non-impacting change that does not affect functionality.
Note: All information herein is for educational purposes only, and shouldn't be interpreted as legal, tax, financial, investment or other advice. BitPay does not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information in this publication and we neither endorse, nor are we responsible for, the accuracy or reliability of any information submitted or published by third parties. Nothing contained herein shall constitute a solicitation, recommendation, endorsement or offer to invest, buy, or sell any coins, tokens or other crypto assets. BitPay is not liable for any errors, omissions or inaccuracies. For legal, tax, investment or financial guidance, a professional should be consulted.