Generation Change and Asset Recomposition from 2026 to 2035: Why Are Young People Betting on Bitcoin?

The world is now experiencing multiple historic turning points simultaneously. The three pillars that supported economic growth over the past 40 years—population growth, globalization, and technological advancement—are now collapsing at the same time. This is not a warning; it is the reality unfolding before us. Especially during the decade from 2026 to 2035, the largest intergenerational transfer of wealth in human history will occur, necessitating a fundamental overhaul of investment strategies.

Social Crisis Signal: Drastic Population Decline

The Future Outlook Visible in South Korea

Let’s start with an astonishing phenomenon. Birth rates are rapidly declining worldwide. The situation in South Korea is particularly severe.

In 2023, South Korea’s total fertility rate dropped to 0.72. This means, on average, one woman will have only 0.72 children in her lifetime. This figure is far beyond normal fluctuations. Neighboring Japan faces similar difficulties, with birth numbers projected to fall below 670,000 in 2025, marking the lowest since statistical records began in 1899. The population is decreasing at a rate that even the most pessimistic government forecasts cannot keep up with.

This decline is driven not only by economic hardship but also by a fundamental rebellion among young people against social structures. Among young women in South Korea, a “4B Movement”—a “reproductive strike” refusing marriage, childbirth, romantic relationships, and sex—has emerged. This is literally organized resistance against workplace gender discrimination, unequal division of domestic and childcare responsibilities, and social stereotypes. When upward mobility feels impossible and maintaining even a respectable lifestyle seems out of reach, cutting off descendants becomes the only rational response.

South Korea’s aging speed is the fastest in the world. By 2065, it is projected that over half of the population will be over 65, which will have devastating effects on pension systems, national defense, and healthcare infrastructure.

The “Economic Nihilism” in Western Advanced Countries

This phenomenon is not limited to East Asia. Young people in the West are heading in the same direction, though for different reasons.

The generation born in the 2000s has directly experienced the 2008 financial crisis, the unlimited QE easing in 2020, and high inflation. They feel the continuous devaluation of fiat currency firsthand and believe that the traditional banking system is inefficient and manipulated by a small elite.

Real estate purchasing has become an unrealistic goal for them. In many regions, acquiring a house requires spending a decade’s entire income for a couple. When the conventional life plan of “owning a home, a car, and building a family” becomes inaccessible, young people naturally choose to “enjoy the present” or to invest everything in high-risk digital assets aiming for a “life reversal.”

Concerns about climate change are also a significant factor. Many young Westerners believe it is immoral to bring children into a world destined to burn out, which is a moral decision beyond economic calculations.

The $84 Trillion Wealth Transfer Driving Crypto Assets

Intergenerational Wealth Transfer Mechanism

Over the next 20 years, especially from 2026 to 2035, the world will see a transfer of up to $84 trillion of wealth from the baby boomer generation to millennials and those born in the 2000s.

This is crucial. The assets of the baby boomers are mainly concentrated in real estate, blue-chip stocks, and traditional pensions, and they believe in “long-term holding” and “value investing.” However, the younger generations born in the 2000s are fully digital natives, having grown up amid the internet, financial crises, and asset bubbles.

Will they follow their parents’ asset allocation strategies?

The answer is almost certainly “no.”

This enormous capital will likely flow into digital assets, especially cryptocurrencies. This aligns perfectly with the previously mentioned “economic nihilism” logic.

Why Cryptocurrencies?

First, a fundamental distrust of the traditional financial system

For the 2000s generation, decentralized digital assets like Bitcoin are not just investment products but safe havens against fiat currency devaluation and a quiet protest against the financial system. They believe the new digital world offers fairer opportunities for competition.

Second, capital outflow from real estate to digital assets

As population decline forecasts make long-term real estate value preservation uncertain, young people prefer highly liquid, low-entry barrier digital assets with exponential growth potential. They seek “portable, globally freely tradable digital wealth,” not fixed assets.

Third, extreme risk appetite

Young people are no longer satisfied with annual returns of 4–5%. They seek “exponential growth that changes lives.” Data shows that the adoption rate of cryptocurrencies among the young is more than three times that of their parents.

Currently, Bitcoin (BTC) is trading at $92.83K (as of January 2026), with a market capitalization of $1.85 trillion and a dominant market share of 56.46%. Its liquidity and scale make it one of the few digital assets capable of withstanding massive capital inflows due to generational shifts.

The “Cantillon Effect” of AI Robots and the “Tech Cantillon Effect”

Wealth Redistribution Mechanism

The progress of AI and robotics is irreversible, but its benefits are not distributed universally—in fact, quite the opposite.

The traditional Cantillon effect describes how, when central banks print new money, those who get it first benefit the most, while those who get it last suffer from inflation. The same logic applies to the wave of AI.

Core production resources of AI—computing power, data, algorithms—are extremely expensive and highly concentrated among a few tech giants and early investors. It is nearly impossible for ordinary people to own these assets.

As AI significantly boosts productivity, the new wealth generated initially manifests as rapid profit increases and stock price surges for tech companies. Shareholders and executives of these companies are “the closest to the printing press,” enjoying the earliest benefits.

Double Pressure on Workers

For ordinary workers, AI initially presents not good news but competition. During the transition period (the next 10 years), the risk of being “replaced” will become apparent first.

Even if nominal wages increase, they cannot keep pace with asset price rises driven by technological gains (housing, stocks, education, healthcare). Worker classes will face wage deflationary pressure and asset inflationary pressure simultaneously.

The integration of robotics and large language models (LLMs) will impact both blue-collar and white-collar workers. If the productivity explosion’s wealth is not fairly distributed as wages, the structural contradiction of “excess supply and insufficient demand” will intensify, leading to a crisis of overall societal purchasing power.

The investment strategy is clear: invest in companies owning robots, short the labor costs replaced by robots. Become a shareholder in technology or face obsolescence.

Rapid Growth of Prediction Markets and New Financial Games

The Rise of Event Prediction Markets

Traditional “value discovery” investing is declining, while “event prediction markets” are rapidly emerging.

Platforms like Polymarket and more importantly Kalshi are experiencing explosive growth. Users can bet real money on the outcomes of specific events, such as U.S. election results, Fed interest rate cuts, or geopolitical conflicts.

Kalshi temporarily captured over 60% of the global trading volume after regulatory approval.

For institutional investors, this is not just gambling but a powerful tool. Unlike traditional hedging instruments (gold, government bonds), prediction markets enable precise hedging at the event level. Moreover, the prices in these markets often surpass opinion polls and expert forecasts in accuracy, functioning as collective intelligence with real money.

Potential Risks

However, two major risks exist.

First, financial nihilism. If capital flows from real economy companies into pure zero-sum games, financial markets will become “casino-like.” If young people realize it’s easier to “bet” in prediction markets than to analyze corporate earnings, the foundation of value investing will be further eroded.

Second, Soros’s reflexivity effect. As prediction markets grow large enough, there is a risk that huge capital attempts to manipulate event outcomes. Through propaganda, misinformation, and social influence, financial markets could dominate the real world, creating a situation where “truth” becomes subordinate to capital.

Asset Allocation Strategies for the Next Decade

Aggressive Portfolio

Concentrate investments in leading tech giants

Focus on beneficiaries of the “tech Cantillon effect”: dominant tech companies with control over large models, proprietary data, and computing power. In the AI era, the “winner-takes-all” structure will squeeze out second-tier tech firms.

Digital Scarcity Assets

Bitcoin remains the core asset to counteract fiat devaluation. It should occupy an important position in growth portfolios. As the 2000s generation gains influence over wealth, digital assets will continue to enjoy liquidity premiums.

Leverage Demographic Bonus in Emerging Markets

Avoid East Asia; instead, focus on regions with healthy demographic structures like India and Southeast Asia. However, careful evaluation of infrastructure capacity and political stability is essential.

Defensive Portfolio

Hedge Event Risks

Use regulated platforms like Kalshi to build dedicated hedging strategies against geopolitical conflicts and policy shifts.

Strategic Allocation of Physical Assets

Despite young people’s distancing from real estate due to “economic nihilism,” prime urban housing and land in top cities will retain value as supply stagnates and as safe havens for the entrenched. Caution is needed regarding property taxes and focusing on regions with extremely limited land supply.

Basic Gold Allocation

As the last de-politicized currency reserve, gold remains a core component of basic allocations and a hedge against sovereign debt crises.

Assets to Avoid

Low-cost labor-intensive service industries: Facing double pressures from rising labor costs and AI substitution, profit margins are severely challenged.

Consumption stocks dependent on population growth: In a “proactive contraction” society, growth logic collapses. Baby products, mass fashion, and household-related consumer goods will face long-term market contraction.

Conclusion: Era of Major Selection

The period from 2026 to 2035 will be a brutal “big sorting” era.

Whether it’s the despair behind “active population decline,” the deprivation behind the “Cantillon effect” of AI, or the nihilism behind financial “gamification”—being able to see through these will determine whether you can preserve and grow wealth during this major transformation.

Universal beta returns no longer exist. Only highly differentiated alpha remains. In this new world, the choice is clear: become a stakeholder in technology, be a winner in events, or become a footnote in history.