Predictions for 2026 - Retail Investors Won't Quit and Why...

As I have done every year since starting this blog/newsletter back in 2006, I have some predictions for 2026.

I will start with the same one I have every year…the market for ‘retail investing’ (the Instividual) will grow. Furthermore, I predict/believe that prediction markets, 24/7/365 stock markets, tokenization and the international retail investor are a Cambrian explosion of growth for financial markets.

I live this trend and in 2025 I was amazed at how it accelerated. Of course , there have been some awful years in this long trend - and 2026 will have pitfalls - but retail investors won’t quit. They have survived the internet bubble, the great financial crisis, COVID and a rising rate environment. The survivors get smarter, and the onramps keep coming. The players in the market grow. The language is not easy, but it is universal.

In 1996 when I started out as a ‘retail investor’ I had Yahoo Finance with 20 minute delayed quotes. Yahoo Finance has survived and thrived, so to think that Robinhood, Stocktwits, Coinbase etc…will just whither up and disappear is silly. In fact, this ‘post real time world’ is even better suited for retail investors.

How so?

I started my blog on Google Blogger back in the day which was great, before Twitter, before Stocktwits. Now I use Beehiiv (our fund 4 at Social Leverage invested). I love Beehiiv and now that we have connected the Stocktwits ‘cashtag API’ ( ie $GOOG ( ▲ 0.67% ) ), my posts here that are tagged are pulled/pushed into the corresponding ticker stream on Stocktwits. While the internet seems to be closing in on us as the giants wall off their users and content and force algo feeds on us, we at Stocktwits and many other narrow platforms and communities are opening up and broadening. My bet is this will continue.

The last few years I have been in awe of the way Robinhood, Polymarket, Coinbase, Alpaca and Stocktwits have grown. Retail is changing how institutions have to play the game. Polymarket got a $2 billion investment from $ICE ( ▲ 0.16% ) (New York Stock Exchange), Robinhood launched prediction markets and 24/7/365 trading (which the Nasdaq is now aiming to launch) and Coinbase just launched stock trading and predictions.

When we made our seed investment in Robinhood back in 2014, Silicon Valley and Wall Street both scoffed. In 2025, they chased anything that had just a hint of Robinhood potential.

Of course at Stocktwits we too see all the growth and changes because we are on the line of scrimmage. This year we made an acquisition to speed up AI deployment for our users and community. We just rolled out topics which allow users to quickly see 'the ‘why’ tickers are trending.

Overnight pricing and charts is now table stakes as well for retail investors around the globe…

The tools keep coming as the cost of technology plummets.

Finally, as to the growth of the retail investor, few in the mainstream media and institutional world value the size, importance, growth and demand from retail investors around the world who want to own Tesla, Google, Uber etc... While Robinhood expands globally, companies like Alpaca (a Social Leverage Fund 3 investment) have been growing exponentially by powering the localized Robinhood’s around the globe from Turkey to Dubai and India.

All the above begs the question…

Is ‘do it yourself/retail’ investing right for most?

The argument will rage forever.

My reason at 60 years of age for doing it is I love the routine, the process, the language, the community and the game itself. I mostly direct index and index and what stocks I do pick I do with the overall goal of trouncing the markets - which is the only point.

I also mostly agree with this take from Bucco..

So, as we enter 2026, the right question for investors and traders is not ‘should people try and do it yourself and beat the market’?

The right question is.. ‘how big is the TAM’ (total addressable market)?

Hit me with your thoughts of course.