In 2025, the crypto industry hit a major turning point. Spot ETFs, stablecoins, and tokenized real-world assets (RWAs) became central to how money flows into crypto. Big institutions went from being cautious to fully integrating digital assets into their strategies. This shift kicked off a broad repricing across the market, driven by crypto blending more with traditional finance and real-world use cases.

Crypto is no longer a niche market. To understand it today, you also need to follow gold, U.S. stocks, and interest rates. These influence how money moves in and out of crypto.

Gold saw massive gains from 2023 to 2025, jumping around 150%. This wasn’t just a typical commodity boom — it was a response to deeper fears about currencies and government debt. Central banks bought over 1,000 tonnes of gold in 2024 and kept buying in 2025, signaling a shift away from the U.S. dollar. With a market cap of over $31 trillion, gold’s rally was mostly about long-term strategy, not short-term hype.

U.S. stocks also rose in 2025, with the S&P 500 up nearly 20% including dividends. But gains were uneven — most of the growth came from big tech and AI companies. The Nasdaq did even better, gaining around 22%, driven by excitement around AI, semiconductors, and cloud tech. Still, the broader market lagged behind.

The economy looked disconnected from these gains. Valuation metrics like the Buffett Indicator reached risky levels. Gold’s surge suggests investors are worried about stocks overheating, and some are turning to Bitcoin as a hedge.

Bitcoin had a wild year. It hit an all-time high above $126K but dropped back to around $90K by year-end. Despite strong ETF inflows and growing institutional support, it ended the year slightly down. This suggests Bitcoin may be acting more like a stress indicator for the broader financial system than a simple risk-on asset.

Institutional activity played a big role in Bitcoin’s performance. Spot ETFs attracted billions, and corporations added Bitcoin to their reserves. However, the price still faced sharp drops, showing that long-term adoption doesn’t eliminate volatility.

Ethereum also had a bumpy ride. It started 2025 above $3K, dropped to $1.5K during a market sell-off, then hit a new high of $4.9K in August before sliding back near $3K. But behind the scenes, Ethereum made strong technical progress. Upgrades like Petra and Fusaka improved speed and reduced gas fees. Ethereum stayed dominant in DeFi and Layer-2 development.

Treasuries holding ETH grew fast — from under 1% to over 4% of total supply by October — even surpassing Bitcoin treasury holdings. ETH treasuries can earn passive income through staking and DeFi yields, adding new value streams.

Digital asset treasuries (DATs) also became more important for other tokens. Unlike ETFs, DATs can actively manage capital, but they’re sensitive to market changes and regulation. Today they help prices go up, but if things turn south, they could accelerate losses.

DeFi also shifted. In 2021, TVL (total value locked) was spread across DEXs and yield farms. By 2025, most of the TVL is in lending, liquid staking, and restaking — areas where capital stays put longer. Aave, Lido, and restaking platforms lead this trend.

BNB Chain made a strong comeback in 2025. It led all chains in daily users and hit record highs in stablecoin supply and TVL. Its growth was powered by the Binance Alpha program and the launch of Aster, a new perpetual DEX backed by CZ. Aster drew huge volumes and helped push BNB’s price to a record $1,369 in October before retracing.

Technical upgrades like Lorentz and Maxwell improved BNB Chain’s speed and cut fees significantly. An upcoming Fermi upgrade aims for even faster finality and higher throughput.

Solana had a rollercoaster year too. It started strong with memecoin mania but saw a crash as hype faded. Still, Solana ended as the top chain by DEX volume with $1.55T traded and $1.3B in revenue. Innovations like prop AMMs — which manage liquidity internally — helped boost trading efficiency.

SOL hit a high of $293 in January but dropped to $100 before recovering to $130 by year-end. The launch of Solana ETPs and ETFs helped attract institutional interest late in the year.

Base had its best year yet, becoming the top Layer-2 chain by revenue and fifth overall by TVL at $10B. Backed by Coinbase, Base integrated directly into the Coinbase app and rebranded its wallet as Base App to drive adoption.

Base also introduced x402 — a protocol for per-request payments using stablecoins — aimed at powering APIs and services on-chain without subscriptions or accounts.

The long-awaited altcoin season didn’t happen in 2025. While some tokens hit new highs briefly (like BNB and SOL), most fell back hard. Bitcoin dominance stayed above 50%, and altcoins struggled due to capital fragmentation and weak demand.

A flood of new tokens diluted attention and liquidity. Most new coins quickly dropped below their launch price. High-FDV tokens gave early investors most of the gains while public markets got stuck with limited upside.

Retail investors shifted focus from altcoins to memecoins early in the year but later moved on entirely as those markets collapsed too. Institutional money focused on safer bets like ETH, SOL, XRP, and tokenized treasuries.

ETF inflows boosted markets during summer but reversed in November with $3.5B in Bitcoin outflows, followed by another $1.1B in December — stalling the recovery.

Some token sectors still performed well — privacy coins like ZEC (+861%) and XMR (+123%) surged as users looked for privacy-focused alternatives amid rising concerns around surveillance and compliance.

RWAs were one of 2025’s strongest growth areas. The total value tripled from $5.6B to $18.7B, led by tokenized U.S. Treasuries worth $8.5B. Other segments like commodities, institutional funds, and private credit also grew rapidly.

Ethereum remained the top RWA chain with over $12B hosted on its network. Still, fragmentation remains an issue — RWAs live on multiple chains with different standards, creating inefficiencies.

Stablecoins became the backbone of crypto in 2025 thanks to regulatory clarity from the U.S. GENIUS Act and Europe’s MiCA law. These frameworks gave stablecoins legal status and opened doors for wider adoption.

Stablecoin market cap jumped 50%, led by USDT (from $137B to $187B) and USDC (from $44B to $76B). Activity exploded: 44M active users sent over $11T across 2.2B transactions in 2025 alone.

BNB Chain overtook TRON as the top chain for stablecoins by activity growth, while Ethereum still held the largest share of supply at over $170B.

Prediction markets came back strong in 2025 after dipping post-election in 2024. Platforms like Polymarket and Kalshi led the way with record-breaking months — November alone saw over $14.5B traded.

Polymarket returned to the U.S. after getting CFTC approval and raised over $2B at a $9B valuation during the year. It plans to launch its POLY token in 2026 with possible user airdrops.

Kalshi raised over $1B this year with major VC support and grew fast through sports markets and partnerships like Robinhood integration. It’s also testing on-chain contracts via Solana.

New players like Opinion and Probable are gaining traction as well.

Perpetual DEXs took off again in 2025 with volumes soaring from $89B in October 2024 to $1.8T by October 2025 — a 20x jump as traders left memecoins behind for leverage plays.

Hyperliquid remained a top performer with $2.9T traded but started losing steam as rivals like Aster and Lighter launched with aggressive rewards.

Aster quickly ranked among the top three perp DEXs after launching its token in September with explosive volume growth.

Lighter offered zero-fee trading powered by Payment for Order Flow (PFOF), making it attractive to high-volume traders looking for cost savings.

Looking ahead, institutional adoption will continue driving crypto growth — especially in RWAs, stablecoins, regulated DeFi products, payments infrastructure, and custody tools built for enterprises.

Retail crypto is shifting too — away from speculative games toward real-world finance use cases like payments, savings, and secure investments that mirror traditional finance.

As protocols generate real revenue streams through mechanisms like token buybacks or fee sharing — backed by clear regulation — crypto could enter a new phase focused more on economic value than hype-driven speculation.