In 2025, Pantera Capital reported a sustained downturn in the non-bitcoin token market since December 2024, with a 44% drop in total crypto market capitalization, excluding BTC, ETH, and stablecoins.

Bitcoin ended 2025 down 6%, ETH down 11%, and SOL down 34%, with the broader token universe dropping close to 60%, and the median token down roughly 79%. Pantera described the year as exceptionally narrow, with only a small fraction of tokens generating positive returns.

Market price action in 2025 was dominated by macro shocks, positioning, flows, and market structure, with major liquidation cascades in October wiping out over $20 billion in notional positions, larger than during previous collapses.

Pantera highlighted unresolved questions about token value accrual, noting that governance tokens often lack clear legal claims to cash flows and residual value available to equity holders, leading to digital asset equities outperforming tokens.

Pantera anticipates a potentially more favorable backdrop for 2026 if fundamentals stabilize and market breadth returns beyond BTC, with a focus on capital-allocation shifts towards bitcoin, stablecoin infrastructure, and equity-linked crypto exposure.

In 2026, Pantera expects institutional adoption to define the year, with growth concentrated in real-world asset tokenization, AI-driven on-chain security, bank-backed stablecoins, consolidation in prediction markets, and a surge in crypto IPOs, rather than a broad return to speculative token rallies.

Read more at Yahoo Finance: Crypto’s 2025 ‘whipsaw’ year drove capitulation as markets look toward a 2026 rebound, Pantera says