Bitcoin and Dogecoin Faltered in 2026, But This Little-Known Token Exploded 375% as SpaceX IPO Fever Took Over

An under-the-radar cryptocurrency has delivered stratospheric gains in recent months, while more popular premium cryptocurrencies have struggled.VELVET Defies Crypto Bear MarketVelvet (VELVET), which operates primarily on BNB Chain , has jumped 378% year-to-date.Contrast this with Bitcoin , Ethereum and Dogecoin , which have lost a significant chunk of their value in 2026.CryptocurrencyYTD Gains +/-VELVET+378%Bitcoin -27.28%Ethereum -36.47%Dogecoin  -44.41 Read Also: What Sparked Velvet’s RallyVelvet is an AI-powered decentralized finance operating system and trading terminal that streamlines onchain research, trading and portfolio management.According to CoinMarketCap, the introduction of synthetic pre IPO products on the platform played a major role in boosting its price. Users were allowed to trade tokenized, leveraged pre IPO exposure directly from Velvet’s on-chain terminal.In fact, as Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (NASDAQ:SPCX) public listing approached, VELVET exploded 1,400% in a week.“This surge was driven by intense trader interest in the SpaceX and AI pre-IPO markets,” CoinMarketCap said.Price Action: At the time of writing, VELVET was trading at $0.6772, up 201.17% in the last 24 hours, according to data from Benzinga Pro. Read Also: Bernie Sanders Slammed Google Co-Founder for Spending Millions to Stop California's Billionaire Tax Proposal—Crypto Punters Weigh Passage Odds Photo courtesy: Samuel Boivin / Shutterstock.com