If you've been paying attention to crypto over the past year or so, you've probably felt something weird.

Things look great on paper. ETFs have bought billions of dollars of Bitcoin and Ether. The President of the United States is talking about Bitcoin reserves and launching projects of his own. And yet, crypto feels dead.

There's still activity -- of course there is. Chains continue to chug along, new metas come and go, and the underlying infrastructure continues to improve from an already better-than-ever-before level.

But the vibe has gone.

There's no excitement. No big dreams or bold claims about how crypto will change the world. No hope.

And, quite concerningly, there isn't a single, clear reason for this.

I think almost everyone in the industry, every member of every group that has ever believed in this space for their many different reasons, has been simultaneously disappointed over the past year.

And those collection of disappointments have sucked the air out of the room and given the sense that the crypto dream is pretty much over.

Let me explain.

Crypto's audience has always been a curious coalition of different people. But, I think you can broadly group them into two categories.

First, there are the Cypherpunks.

For simplicity, I'm applying this label to everyone who primarily views crypto as a tool for disruption and maybe even revolution.

They may not all be cypherpunks in the strictest sense, but in general they hope that crypto will be used to liberate the masses, to increase privacy, and escape the surveillance state.

They want to use this technology to build a freer and fairer world than we currently occupy.

As such, they are generally opposed to the major corporations and institutions that govern the world today. They don't necessarily want to burn it all down, but they certainly don't love or trust them.

The second group are Speculators.

These are the people who are interested in crypto primarily as a way of making money, not enacting change. In fact, many of them are quite nihilistic.

At the end of the day, they just want to make as much money as they can. Ideally in the shortest time possible. Therefore, they love the memecoins, pump-and-dumps, and get-rich-quick schemes that the Cypherpunks would look down on as wasteful distractions.

Of course, there is complexity here; some individuals don't sit cleanly in either field. But these archetypes broadly describe crypto's audience and the tension between the different factions.

Cypherpunks and Speculators aren't natural bedfellows. In many cases they won't like each other. But crypto has given them a way to coexist.

The Speculators help to fund the projects that the Cypherpunks believe in. Meanwhile, the Cypherpunks give the Speculators narratives they can trade -- and also shield their true ambitions with. After all, it sounds much better to claim they are participating in a revolution rather than just gambling. It helps draw in the crowds they can profit off.

However, the relationship between these groups has started to degrade in recent years. And things came to a head in 2025.

See, traditionally, the energy and relative power of each group has swung back and forth like a pendulum. If one group felt lost or depressed, there was at least some solace to be found in the success and excitement of the other camp.

The Speculators feel euphoric and empowered as prices rise. Their energy and enthusiasm can even infect some of the Cypherpunks.

Then, when prices fall and bear markets set in, the Cypherpunks take charge. They can use their newfound wealth to brighten the darkness and power forward with new developments -- developments that the Speculators can get behind, starting the cycle all over again.

But, last year, for the first time in crypto's history, both groups were consistently and simultaneously disappointed. Both by each other and crypto as a whole.

And this is where crypto's 'dead' feeling comes from. Wherever you looked, there was a sense of disappointment and failure. It wasn't even possible to take comfort in the fact that others were doing well.

Let's start with the most obvious issue: prices have stopped going up.

Bitcoin pushed through the $100k milestone at the end of 2024, prompting fevered speculation about where it might end up... And then it stalled out.

Since then, price action has been fairly stagnant. Bitcoin has consistently hovered between $80,000 and $120,000 -- seemingly spending most of its time in the lower part of that range.

And that is despite significant buy pressure from ETFs and the steady trickle of institutional dollars that everyone expected to turbocharge prices.

Worse still, gold and precious metals had a barnstorming year.

Seeing them succeed while bitcoin flatlined was hugely disappointing, doing massive damage to Bitcoin's reputation as a digital alternative to shiny metal.

And if it was underwhelming for bitcoin, it was even worse for altcoins.

The market finally capitulated on the multitude of worthless tokens that largely exist to make insiders and VCs rich. Prices and liquidity fell across virtually every sector and every asset.

Even the handful of coins that arguably are worthwhile and valuable haven't been spared -- either because they are collateral damage in a collapsing market, or perhaps because they've always been overvalued in an industry driven by hype.

Again, this served to pour cold water on one of crypto's big remaining narratives: the idea that it serves as an "asymmetric bet" enabling easy money and quick wins.

As a result, it was a bad year for the Speculator class, and the 10/10 market crash was salt in the wound.

The lucky ones made it out with substantially reduced profits. The rest suffered demoralising losses.

And, crucially for the vibes in the industry, many have been left questioning if it's worth keeping a substantial portion of their net worth in digital assets. Maybe they'd be better off looking elsewhere -- especially when we consider the second big issue crypto is facing today.

There's a deeper problem behind the disappointing price action.

Markets are forward looking. They try to price in events that are likely to occur in the future. As a result, the major events that we call "catalysts" only matter if people don't know they are coming.

And the bad news is that since Trump's win in November 2024 -- perhaps even since the arrival of spot ETFs -- everybody had a good idea of what would be happening in the future.

Once upon a time, the ETFs were something to look forward to. To price in.

When they happened, they were a massive deal. They were even a rip-roaring success, sucking in billions of dollars at some of the fastest rates in ETF history.

But now they're just a thing that exists.

The same goes for the institutional pivot to crypto. Kind remarks from the likes of Larry Fink, or big banks suggesting they would use or invest in crypto, used to make headlines and drive conversations for days.

Now it's just an event that happens on a semi-regular basis. It's almost a given that major corporations would have some kind of crypto-related activity today.

Then there's regulatory clarity. We've seen a bit, but the projections may actually have been overoptimistic here. Real change looks much less likely than many would have hoped this time last year.

At least there's SEC is onside and has ceased hostilities. For now. Still, that would have been priced in at the time of the election.

Virtually everything we've seen in crypto of late, every piece of good news and meaningful progress, had been discussed, analysed, and priced in well before they occurred in reality.

And now markets, and the Speculator class that drive them, are looking ahead and asking: "what next?"

What other major events could be coming up that aren't already on the radar? What do we have to look forward to?

And the answer, right now, is not much.

The big structural wins, the things that were supposed to change everything, like ETFs and a pro-crypto president, are here. And prices topped out on their arrival. But there was nothing else coming down the pipe to drive excitement and push prices higher.

And this isn't just painful for the Speculators. Just as markets are forward looking, individuals are too. They need hope. And without clear catalysts on the horizon, even the Cypherpunks feel the weight of the malaise.

Next, we have the "be careful what you bargained for" situation, where some of those good things that had been priced in turned out to be... well, not so good.

The obvious one is Trump.

Many crypto advocates have long dreamed that governments and policymakers would open up to crypto, to tolerate it and regulate it sensibly. They didn't necessary want a supportive administration, just one that wasn't actively seeking to harm the industry whenever it got the chance.

Therefore, Trump's embrace of crypto ahead of the 2024 election felt like a revelation.

Not only would crypto finally get a fair shake from the US government and its regulatory bodies, it would be actively encouraged.

Finally we might see positive, proactive regulations to foster certainty while protecting many of crypto's special properties. We might see a thumbs up for TradFi to start getting involved. We might even see a Bitcoin reserve that would solidify its status as digital gold.

There was something here for all but the most extreme, most anti-institution Cypherpunks to get excited about. And, as we saw earlier, it was exactly the kind of catalyst that Speculators love to trade on.

It should have been a massive win, for everybody. But then it wasn't.

Shortly before his second inauguration, Trump decided to launch a memecoin. And then a second memecoin, this time for his wife.

This was a gut punch for the Cypherpunk side of the industry. The supposedly pro-crypto President was leaning into what they consider to be one of the industry's worst aspects, and making the whole thing look like a joke.

Even the Speculators were left reeling as both coins plummeted in value and, quite predictably, insiders made off with most of the gains.

Trump's venture into DeFi with World Liberty Financial has been equally questionable.

At its best, this could have been an opportunity to promote some of crypto's more innovative and exciting developments. Instead, it's just another thing for critics of both Trump and crypto to point to, highlighting corruption and greed and -- once again -- shining a light on some of crypto's least desirable traits.

To the Cypherpunks, it's clear that Trump has entered crypto on the extreme end of the Speculator side of the spectrum. I think that would be demoralising on its own. But it has also led to larger problems.

The blowback from Trump's antics have delayed significant new regulation that could have put the industry on a stronger footing. Now politicians must waste time arguing about how to prevent conflicts of interests and ethical issues in future presidencies.

Worse still, his behaviour risks exacerbating crypto's partisan appeal -- something the industry has been working hard to overcome. There's no way of knowing how severe the repercussions of this could be in the long term.

But all of these failures pale in comparison to his biggest fumble: delivering the Strategic Reserve.

This should have been an easy win: anointing Bitcoin as a true alternative to gold, declaring it a macro asset worthy of nation-states. But somehow even this went wrong.

The message was confused and diluted by the creation of not just a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, but a second, entirely unnecessary Digital Asset Stockpile holding a basket of altcoins.

I suspect the inclusion of XRP and Cardano in this basket was particularly painful for many in the Cypherpunk crowd, given how widely they are mocked as joke projects exclusively backed by naive newcomers.

But the bigger problem is one of optics.

The second fund made the announcement look more like a corrupt kickback to donors and allies from the crypto industry, rather than a thoughtful or strategic move to safeguard something valuable.

Of course, it hasn't been all bad. We've seen a few positives.

The GENIUS act for stablecoins was passed in July, providing some additional clarity for that portion of the market. And the SEC has become much more friendly to crypto -- though, without underlying regulation to crystallise these changes, there's nothing to stop this reversing under the next administration.

But these are hardly the epic wins and big-picture changes people hoped a crypto-friendly president would bring about.

The Cypherpunks especially hoped for a President who would protect privacy, decentralisation, and personal freedom. They wanted someone to promote Bitcoin as a store of value worth holding, and to highlight the positive changes that this technology could unlock.

At the very least, they wanted someone who would put a permanent end to the regulatory hostility and ambiguity that has plagued the industry since inception. Even that looks unlikely now.

Crypto certainly isn't in a worse place than before Trump's second term -- I don't think anyone would claim that. But it isn't radically better either. And that's a massive disappointment when you think about where we could have been.

The ETFs are another example of "wins that feel like losses."

They're clearly a step forwards in terms of accessibility and ease of use. They slot beautifully into the traditional financial system, letting people hold Bitcoin, ETH, and other cryptoassets right alongside the stocks and shares they already own. And they come with the endorsement and protection of widely trusted financial giants like BlackRock, who will look after your bitcoin for you.

Except, for the Cypherpunks, that's the problem.

Crypto, and Bitcoin in particular, was built to be yours. To be owned, held, and used by you. With no intermediaries. No custodians. No gatekeepers of any kind.

The main aim was freedom.

But now the largest holders of Bitcoin are almost entirely institutional custodians. Or, casting an even wider net, custodians and treasury vehicle companies like MicroStrategy.

So, although many Cypherpunks will appreciate the way ETFs make crypto more mainstream and more palatable, which might help to spread its message a little further, they're likely to find them bittersweet at the very least.

This victory in terms of adoption has come at the cost of crypto's fundamental nature -- and it's a change that is extremely unlikely to be undone.

It's easy to see why this would be dispiriting for the Cypherpunks. It's easy to see why it might even turn some away from crypto entirely.

The ETFs and institutional adoption have robbed crypto of much of its rebellious character and freedom-loving nature. But, at least the frontier spirit can still be found amid the technical innovation and revolutionary ideas pumped out crypto's "shadowy supercoders", right?

Well... no.

It kind of feels like the major innovations have dried up and there's nothing new to discover.

Previous crypto cycles were built around a series of newly created categories within crypto. These were obvious innovations that felt revolutionary and hinted at incredible futures.

ICOs were a new form of fundraising, democratising access to early stage investments and the generous returns they could offer. DeFi did for finance what Bitcoin did for money, cutting out intermediaries and inefficiencies that degrade the TradFi experience. And NFTs promised to change the world of art, entertainment, and digital ownership forever.

Of course, none of these things went entirely to plan.

Many of the claims made about each of these categories in their early days were rather naive. The rosy futures we envisaged are either much further away than initially hoped, or entirely unrealistic in reality.

But I think everyone, deep down, kind of knew that all along. And it didn't matter.

Because everyone knew these were bold and exciting ideas. They gave everyone something to work towards, to imagine, to believe in. Even some of the Speculators got caught up the fantasy.

But, if you look back over the past couple of years, what do we see?

No new categories. No innovations. Nothing to dream about. It ties back to the lack of catalysts I mentioned earlier.

Instead, the biggest trend in 2024 and 2025 was hypergambling.

This was primarily driven by memecoins and things like Pump.fun, but it also covers people's obsession with perps platforms like Hyperliquid and arguably even prediction markets like Polymarket. Even short-lived trends like AI-coins that purported to be innovative were little more than memecoins in disguise.

It's hardly on par with the grand inventions that excited the Cypherpunks in previous years. It may have just about satisfied the Speculators. But, even for them, it feels like a lot of empty calories. Surely they would prefer a much more substantial, long-lasting trend that the masses could get behind.

Ultimately, it's hard to escape the feeling that crypto has run out of new territory to explore.

It seems like we have now tried everything crypto is capable of, so all we have left is to double down on what works. And, clearly, hypergambling and financialisation are some of the key strengths.

It's not that they are the only success stories -- just the loudest and, sadly, perhaps the least inspiring.

Elsewhere, stablecoins are another clear winner. DeFi is still around and performing admirably, though there was a worrying wobble when Balancer was hacked last year. And L2s and the broader scaling roadmap is rolling out largely as expected.

Now it's just about iterating on and refining these concepts, which isn't nearly as exciting as discovering new applications.

Perhaps the best thing we can hope for is a revisiting of old ideas now that the underlying technology has improved. But, again, that won't feel revolutionary or exciting. Especially for the grizzled veterans who are likely jaded after having their dreams crushed long ago.

At the end of the day, when so much of crypto has been underpinned by hype and inflated ideas for so long, these smaller-scale developments seem boring. It feels like something special has died.

I've already mentioned how Bitcoin has lost some of its shine thanks to gold's outperformance. But there is another "grass is greener" story that has affected the entire market, alts included.

Just as crypto has started to slow, AI has exploded onto the scene with its own dramatic developments and bold promises.

Now, if you want to be where the action is, if you want a shot at participating in a world-changing events, you need to be involved with AI.

Crypto is, at best, an afterthought. It may come up when discussing how our AI overlords will one day pay each other, but that's about it.

This is another blow for some of the Cypherpunks. Another reason for them to abandon crypto and turn their attention elsewhere.

And it's another, far more compelling opportunity for the Speculators to pursue as well. It's a new bubble forming, with billions of dollars rushing in from all over the world, and plenty of potential catalysts on the horizon that could keep things moving.

With AI as the hot new thing, crypto looks like yesterday's revolution. Once again, it looks like its light is fading.

So, here's what this all boils down to: crypto has finally run into reality -- and reality is far less exciting than the wild dreams the industry used to have.

Crypto dreamt about delivering dramatic, revolutionary changes that would ensure freedom and self-sovereignty for all. The harsh reality is that is has been co-opted. It won't revolutionise anything. Instead, the institutions it sought to replace will integrate the technology to incrementally improve their existing offerings. Developments will slow, regulations will be imposed, and intermediaries will... well, intermediate.

And, we should have expected this.

In fact, I think many, to a large extent, did expect it. They just didn't want to admit it. Because no one wanted to acknowledge that this revolutionary new technology would one day become just another asset for people to use and trade.

But, at the end of the day, adoption requires compromise. Industries and technologies get boring as they mature. The rate of change decreases.

This is a bitter pill for the Cypherpunks to swallow. Yes, they won in the sense that crypto is now legitimised and seeing genuine adoption. But it cost them almost everything that made crypto special to them. They are once again locked in the system that they wanted to escape from.

Meanwhile, the Speculators have lost their fast-money opportunity. The clash with reality has been particularly painful and damaging for many altcoins, whose worthlessness is undeniable in the cold light of day, and which may never recover. Crypto's future is likely to be a steady grind that could last for years or even decades -- much like tech stocks after the dot-com bubble. Hardly the environment for someone who wants to get-rich-quick.

So nobody, from crypto's core group of constituents, is happy. And when nobody is happy, and the energy and excitement have left the room, the space is left feeling quite dead.

Of course, crypto -- and Bitcoin in particular -- has been proclaimed dead time and time again, and those arguments have always been wrong before. This time isn't too different.

Crypto isn't gone. The technology clearly works -- better than ever, in fact. The infrastructure is still there and is, as we've seen, slowly improving.

But, this time, the proclamations are true in that the vibe really has died. That sense of possibility. The idea that we're on the frontier, building or exploring something novel and revolutionary. It's gone.

And we're left with something less glamorous. Less colourful. Less exciting.

And this more staid environment provides fertile grounds for a new, rapidly growing and now-dominant cohort into crypto's curious coalition. Let's call them the Professionals. They sit somewhere between the Cypherpunks and the Speculators.

They aren't as ideologically driven as Cypherpunks. They don't want to radically reshape the world. But they do want to solve some problems and, as we've seen, incrementally improve things.

And they like money -- they certainly want to make some for themselves -- but they aren't as extreme or as extractive as some of the Speculators. They are happy to grind away for a decade to make bank, they don't need their riches tomorrow. And they probably won't be throwing money at ludicrous coins of dubious value.

They're the kind of people who would work on stablecoins at Stripe, or at TradFi giants integrating crypto infrastructure. They're the serious, serial founders who are replacing eccentric visionaries of crypto's past.

Institutional money requires institutional talent, which the Professionals clearly are. But they're boring relative to the pirates and pioneers who came before them.

Crypto's dead and empty feeling is the inevitable result of handing the baton off to this new group of comparatively dull participants. The future of the industry is in their hands.

Perhaps there's still a way to wrestle control back from them.

Maybe we will still see a genius idea that transforms things, re-energising the Cypherpunks and giving the Speculators something to get behind.

Maybe we'll see the old guard fighting back. The recent resurgence of privacy coins, combined with Ethereum's Cypherpunk-aligned community finally getting its act together, hints that it could just about be possible.

Most likely, we'll see a fragmentation.

Crypto will enter a new era. One where the less extreme Cypherpunks and Speculators will give up their wild dreams and join the Professionals in their journey, doing what little they can to maintain a semblance of the old ways. Meanwhile, those on the fringes will break away and explore new opportunities or build elsewhere.

But crypto hasn't died. And it won't, even if this comes to pass.

It may be tamed and transformed. It may lose many of its ideals and characteristics and excitement. But, for those who chose to remain, crypto is very much still alive -- it's just something less than it used to be.

Anything expressed here is my own opinion stated for informational and educational purposes; nothing I say should be taken as investment or financial advice. Many projects mentioned on this channel are highly experimental and therefore come with risks. Please evaluate your own risk tolerance before experimenting with these projects.

I may own some of the cryptoassets mentioned.

If you've been paying attention to crypto over the past year or so, you've probably felt something weird.

Things look great on paper. ETFs have bought billions of dollars of Bitcoin and Ether. The President of the United States is talking about Bitcoin reserves and launching projects of his own. And yet, crypto feels dead.

There's still activity -- of course there is. Chains continue to chug along, new metas come and go, and the underlying infrastructure continues to improve from an already better-than-ever-before level.

But the vibe has gone.

There's no excitement. No big dreams or bold claims about how crypto will change the world. No hope.

And, quite concerningly, there isn't a single, clear reason for this.

I think almost everyone in the industry, every member of every group that has ever believed in this space for their many different reasons, has been simultaneously disappointed over the past year.

And those collection of disappointments have sucked the air out of the room and given the sense that the crypto dream is pretty much over.

Let me explain.

Crypto's audience has always been a curious coalition of different people. But, I think you can broadly group them into two categories.

First, there are the Cypherpunks.

For simplicity, I'm applying this label to everyone who primarily views crypto as a tool for disruption and maybe even revolution.

They may not all be cypherpunks in the strictest sense, but in general they hope that crypto will be used to liberate the masses, to increase privacy, and escape the surveillance state.

They want to use this technology to build a freer and fairer world than we currently occupy.

As such, they are generally opposed to the major corporations and institutions that govern the world today. They don't necessarily want to burn it all down, but they certainly don't love or trust them.

The second group are Speculators.

These are the people who are interested in crypto primarily as a way of making money, not enacting change. In fact, many of them are quite nihilistic.

At the end of the day, they just want to make as much money as they can. Ideally in the shortest time possible. Therefore, they love the memecoins, pump-and-dumps, and get-rich-quick schemes that the Cypherpunks would look down on as wasteful distractions.

Of course, there is complexity here; some individuals don't sit cleanly in either field. But these archetypes broadly describe crypto's audience and the tension between the different factions.

Cypherpunks and Speculators aren't natural bedfellows. In many cases they won't like each other. But crypto has given them a way to coexist.

The Speculators help to fund the projects that the Cypherpunks believe in. Meanwhile, the Cypherpunks give the Speculators narratives they can trade -- and also shield their true ambitions with. After all, it sounds much better to claim they are participating in a revolution rather than just gambling. It helps draw in the crowds they can profit off.

However, the relationship between these groups has started to degrade in recent years. And things came to a head in 2025.

See, traditionally, the energy and relative power of each group has swung back and forth like a pendulum. If one group felt lost or depressed, there was at least some solace to be found in the success and excitement of the other camp.

The Speculators feel euphoric and empowered as prices rise. Their energy and enthusiasm can even infect some of the Cypherpunks.

Then, when prices fall and bear markets set in, the Cypherpunks take charge. They can use their newfound wealth to brighten the darkness and power forward with new developments -- developments that the Speculators can get behind, starting the cycle all over again.

But, last year, for the first time in crypto's history, both groups were consistently and simultaneously disappointed. Both by each other and crypto as a whole.

And this is where crypto's 'dead' feeling comes from. Wherever you looked, there was a sense of disappointment and failure. It wasn't even possible to take comfort in the fact that others were doing well.

Let's start with the most obvious issue: prices have stopped going up.

Bitcoin pushed through the $100k milestone at the end of 2024, prompting fevered speculation about where it might end up... And then it stalled out.

Since then, price action has been fairly stagnant. Bitcoin has consistently hovered between $80,000 and $120,000 -- seemingly spending most of its time in the lower part of that range.

And that is despite significant buy pressure from ETFs and the steady trickle of institutional dollars that everyone expected to turbocharge prices.

Worse still, gold and precious metals had a barnstorming year.

Seeing them succeed while bitcoin flatlined was hugely disappointing, doing massive damage to Bitcoin's reputation as a digital alternative to shiny metal.

And if it was underwhelming for bitcoin, it was even worse for altcoins.

The market finally capitulated on the multitude of worthless tokens that largely exist to make insiders and VCs rich. Prices and liquidity fell across virtually every sector and every asset.

Even the handful of coins that arguably are worthwhile and valuable haven't been spared -- either because they are collateral damage in a collapsing market, or perhaps because they've always been overvalued in an industry driven by hype.

Again, this served to pour cold water on one of crypto's big remaining narratives: the idea that it serves as an "asymmetric bet" enabling easy money and quick wins.

As a result, it was a bad year for the Speculator class, and the 10/10 market crash was salt in the wound.

The lucky ones made it out with substantially reduced profits. The rest suffered demoralising losses.

And, crucially for the vibes in the industry, many have been left questioning if it's worth keeping a substantial portion of their net worth in digital assets. Maybe they'd be better off looking elsewhere -- especially when we consider the second big issue crypto is facing today.

There's a deeper problem behind the disappointing price action.

Markets are forward looking. They try to price in events that are likely to occur in the future. As a result, the major events that we call "catalysts" only matter if people don't know they are coming.

And the bad news is that since Trump's win in November 2024 -- perhaps even since the arrival of spot ETFs -- everybody had a good idea of what would be happening in the future.

Once upon a time, the ETFs were something to look forward to. To price in.

When they happened, they were a massive deal. They were even a rip-roaring success, sucking in billions of dollars at some of the fastest rates in ETF history.

But now they're just a thing that exists.

The same goes for the institutional pivot to crypto. Kind remarks from the likes of Larry Fink, or big banks suggesting they would use or invest in crypto, used to make headlines and drive conversations for days.

Now it's just an event that happens on a semi-regular basis. It's almost a given that major corporations would have some kind of crypto-related activity today.

Then there's regulatory clarity. We've seen a bit, but the projections may actually have been overoptimistic here. Real change looks much less likely than many would have hoped this time last year.

At least there's SEC is onside and has ceased hostilities. For now. Still, that would have been priced in at the time of the election.

Virtually everything we've seen in crypto of late, every piece of good news and meaningful progress, had been discussed, analysed, and priced in well before they occurred in reality.

And now markets, and the Speculator class that drive them, are looking ahead and asking: "what next?"

What other major events could be coming up that aren't already on the radar? What do we have to look forward to?

And the answer, right now, is not much.

The big structural wins, the things that were supposed to change everything, like ETFs and a pro-crypto president, are here. And prices topped out on their arrival. But there was nothing else coming down the pipe to drive excitement and push prices higher.

And this isn't just painful for the Speculators. Just as markets are forward looking, individuals are too. They need hope. And without clear catalysts on the horizon, even the Cypherpunks feel the weight of the malaise.

Next, we have the "be careful what you bargained for" situation, where some of those good things that had been priced in turned out to be... well, not so good.

The obvious one is Trump.

Many crypto advocates have long dreamed that governments and policymakers would open up to crypto, to tolerate it and regulate it sensibly. They didn't necessary want a supportive administration, just one that wasn't actively seeking to harm the industry whenever it got the chance.

Therefore, Trump's embrace of crypto ahead of the 2024 election felt like a revelation.

Not only would crypto finally get a fair shake from the US government and its regulatory bodies, it would be actively encouraged.

Finally we might see positive, proactive regulations to foster certainty while protecting many of crypto's special properties. We might see a thumbs up for TradFi to start getting involved. We might even see a Bitcoin reserve that would solidify its status as digital gold.

There was something here for all but the most extreme, most anti-institution Cypherpunks to get excited about. And, as we saw earlier, it was exactly the kind of catalyst that Speculators love to trade on.

It should have been a massive win, for everybody. But then it wasn't.

Shortly before his second inauguration, Trump decided to launch a memecoin. And then a second memecoin, this time for his wife.

This was a gut punch for the Cypherpunk side of the industry. The supposedly pro-crypto President was leaning into what they consider to be one of the industry's worst aspects, and making the whole thing look like a joke.

Even the Speculators were left reeling as both coins plummeted in value and, quite predictably, insiders made off with most of the gains.

Trump's venture into DeFi with World Liberty Financial has been equally questionable.

At its best, this could have been an opportunity to promote some of crypto's more innovative and exciting developments. Instead, it's just another thing for critics of both Trump and crypto to point to, highlighting corruption and greed and -- once again -- shining a light on some of crypto's least desirable traits.

To the Cypherpunks, it's clear that Trump has entered crypto on the extreme end of the Speculator side of the spectrum. I think that would be demoralising on its own. But it has also led to larger problems.

The blowback from Trump's antics have delayed significant new regulation that could have put the industry on a stronger footing. Now politicians must waste time arguing about how to prevent conflicts of interests and ethical issues in future presidencies.

Worse still, his behaviour risks exacerbating crypto's partisan appeal -- something the industry has been working hard to overcome. There's no way of knowing how severe the repercussions of this could be in the long term.

But all of these failures pale in comparison to his biggest fumble: delivering the Strategic Reserve.

This should have been an easy win: anointing Bitcoin as a true alternative to gold, declaring it a macro asset worthy of nation-states. But somehow even this went wrong.

The message was confused and diluted by the creation of not just a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, but a second, entirely unnecessary Digital Asset Stockpile holding a basket of altcoins.

I suspect the inclusion of XRP and Cardano in this basket was particularly painful for many in the Cypherpunk crowd, given how widely they are mocked as joke projects exclusively backed by naive newcomers.

But the bigger problem is one of optics.

The second fund made the announcement look more like a corrupt kickback to donors and allies from the crypto industry, rather than a thoughtful or strategic move to safeguard something valuable.

Of course, it hasn't been all bad. We've seen a few positives.

The GENIUS act for stablecoins was passed in July, providing some additional clarity for that portion of the market. And the SEC has become much more friendly to crypto -- though, without underlying regulation to crystallise these changes, there's nothing to stop this reversing under the next administration.

But these are hardly the epic wins and big-picture changes people hoped a crypto-friendly president would bring about.

The Cypherpunks especially hoped for a President who would protect privacy, decentralisation, and personal freedom. They wanted someone to promote Bitcoin as a store of value worth holding, and to highlight the positive changes that this technology could unlock.

At the very least, they wanted someone who would put a permanent end to the regulatory hostility and ambiguity that has plagued the industry since inception. Even that looks unlikely now.

Crypto certainly isn't in a worse place than before Trump's second term -- I don't think anyone would claim that. But it isn't radically better either. And that's a massive disappointment when you think about where we could have been.

The ETFs are another example of "wins that feel like losses."

They're clearly a step forwards in terms of accessibility and ease of use. They slot beautifully into the traditional financial system, letting people hold Bitcoin, ETH, and other cryptoassets right alongside the stocks and shares they already own. And they come with the endorsement and protection of widely trusted financial giants like BlackRock, who will look after your bitcoin for you.

Except, for the Cypherpunks, that's the problem.

Crypto, and Bitcoin in particular, was built to be yours. To be owned, held, and used by you. With no intermediaries. No custodians. No gatekeepers of any kind.

The main aim was freedom.

But now the largest holders of Bitcoin are almost entirely institutional custodians. Or, casting an even wider net, custodians and treasury vehicle companies like MicroStrategy.

So, although many Cypherpunks will appreciate the way ETFs make crypto more mainstream and more palatable, which might help to spread its message a little further, they're likely to find them bittersweet at the very least.

This victory in terms of adoption has come at the cost of crypto's fundamental nature -- and it's a change that is extremely unlikely to be undone.

It's easy to see why this would be dispiriting for the Cypherpunks. It's easy to see why it might even turn some away from crypto entirely.

The ETFs and institutional adoption have robbed crypto of much of its rebellious character and freedom-loving nature. But, at least the frontier spirit can still be found amid the technical innovation and revolutionary ideas pumped out crypto's "shadowy supercoders", right?

Well... no.

It kind of feels like the major innovations have dried up and there's nothing new to discover.

Previous crypto cycles were built around a series of newly created categories within crypto. These were obvious innovations that felt revolutionary and hinted at incredible futures.

ICOs were a new form of fundraising, democratising access to early stage investments and the generous returns they could offer. DeFi did for finance what Bitcoin did for money, cutting out intermediaries and inefficiencies that degrade the TradFi experience. And NFTs promised to change the world of art, entertainment, and digital ownership forever.

Of course, none of these things went entirely to plan.

Many of the claims made about each of these categories in their early days were rather naive. The rosy futures we envisaged are either much further away than initially hoped, or entirely unrealistic in reality.

But I think everyone, deep down, kind of knew that all along. And it didn't matter.

Because everyone knew these were bold and exciting ideas. They gave everyone something to work towards, to imagine, to believe in. Even some of the Speculators got caught up the fantasy.

But, if you look back over the past couple of years, what do we see?

No new categories. No innovations. Nothing to dream about. It ties back to the lack of catalysts I mentioned earlier.

Instead, the biggest trend in 2024 and 2025 was hypergambling.

This was primarily driven by memecoins and things like Pump.fun, but it also covers people's obsession with perps platforms like Hyperliquid and arguably even prediction markets like Polymarket. Even short-lived trends like AI-coins that purported to be innovative were little more than memecoins in disguise.

It's hardly on par with the grand inventions that excited the Cypherpunks in previous years. It may have just about satisfied the Speculators. But, even for them, it feels like a lot of empty calories. Surely they would prefer a much more substantial, long-lasting trend that the masses could get behind.

Ultimately, it's hard to escape the feeling that crypto has run out of new territory to explore.

It seems like we have now tried everything crypto is capable of, so all we have left is to double down on what works. And, clearly, hypergambling and financialisation are some of the key strengths.

It's not that they are the only success stories -- just the loudest and, sadly, perhaps the least inspiring.

Elsewhere, stablecoins are another clear winner. DeFi is still around and performing admirably, though there was a worrying wobble when Balancer was hacked last year. And L2s and the broader scaling roadmap is rolling out largely as expected.

Now it's just about iterating on and refining these concepts, which isn't nearly as exciting as discovering new applications.

Perhaps the best thing we can hope for is a revisiting of old ideas now that the underlying technology has improved. But, again, that won't feel revolutionary or exciting. Especially for the grizzled veterans who are likely jaded after having their dreams crushed long ago.

At the end of the day, when so much of crypto has been underpinned by hype and inflated ideas for so long, these smaller-scale developments seem boring. It feels like something special has died.

I've already mentioned how Bitcoin has lost some of its shine thanks to gold's outperformance. But there is another "grass is greener" story that has affected the entire market, alts included.

Just as crypto has started to slow, AI has exploded onto the scene with its own dramatic developments and bold promises.

Now, if you want to be where the action is, if you want a shot at participating in a world-changing events, you need to be involved with AI.

Crypto is, at best, an afterthought. It may come up when discussing how our AI overlords will one day pay each other, but that's about it.

This is another blow for some of the Cypherpunks. Another reason for them to abandon crypto and turn their attention elsewhere.

And it's another, far more compelling opportunity for the Speculators to pursue as well. It's a new bubble forming, with billions of dollars rushing in from all over the world, and plenty of potential catalysts on the horizon that could keep things moving.

With AI as the hot new thing, crypto looks like yesterday's revolution. Once again, it looks like its light is fading.

So, here's what this all boils down to: crypto has finally run into reality -- and reality is far less exciting than the wild dreams the industry used to have.

Crypto dreamt about delivering dramatic, revolutionary changes that would ensure freedom and self-sovereignty for all. The harsh reality is that is has been co-opted. It won't revolutionise anything. Instead, the institutions it sought to replace will integrate the technology to incrementally improve their existing offerings. Developments will slow, regulations will be imposed, and intermediaries will... well, intermediate.

And, we should have expected this.

In fact, I think many, to a large extent, did expect it. They just didn't want to admit it. Because no one wanted to acknowledge that this revolutionary new technology would one day become just another asset for people to use and trade.

But, at the end of the day, adoption requires compromise. Industries and technologies get boring as they mature. The rate of change decreases.

This is a bitter pill for the Cypherpunks to swallow. Yes, they won in the sense that crypto is now legitimised and seeing genuine adoption. But it cost them almost everything that made crypto special to them. They are once again locked in the system that they wanted to escape from.

Meanwhile, the Speculators have lost their fast-money opportunity. The clash with reality has been particularly painful and damaging for many altcoins, whose worthlessness is undeniable in the cold light of day, and which may never recover. Crypto's future is likely to be a steady grind that could last for years or even decades -- much like tech stocks after the dot-com bubble. Hardly the environment for someone who wants to get-rich-quick.

So nobody, from crypto's core group of constituents, is happy. And when nobody is happy, and the energy and excitement have left the room, the space is left feeling quite dead.

Of course, crypto -- and Bitcoin in particular -- has been proclaimed dead time and time again, and those arguments have always been wrong before. This time isn't too different.

Crypto isn't gone. The technology clearly works -- better than ever, in fact. The infrastructure is still there and is, as we've seen, slowly improving.

But, this time, the proclamations are true in that the vibe really has died. That sense of possibility. The idea that we're on the frontier, building or exploring something novel and revolutionary. It's gone.

And we're left with something less glamorous. Less colourful. Less exciting.

And this more staid environment provides fertile grounds for a new, rapidly growing and now-dominant cohort into crypto's curious coalition. Let's call them the Professionals. They sit somewhere between the Cypherpunks and the Speculators.

They aren't as ideologically driven as Cypherpunks. They don't want to radically reshape the world. But they do want to solve some problems and, as we've seen, incrementally improve things.

And they like money -- they certainly want to make some for themselves -- but they aren't as extreme or as extractive as some of the Speculators. They are happy to grind away for a decade to make bank, they don't need their riches tomorrow. And they probably won't be throwing money at ludicrous coins of dubious value.

They're the kind of people who would work on stablecoins at Stripe, or at TradFi giants integrating crypto infrastructure. They're the serious, serial founders who are replacing eccentric visionaries of crypto's past.

Institutional money requires institutional talent, which the Professionals clearly are. But they're boring relative to the pirates and pioneers who came before them.

Crypto's dead and empty feeling is the inevitable result of handing the baton off to this new group of comparatively dull participants. The future of the industry is in their hands.

Perhaps there's still a way to wrestle control back from them.

Maybe we will still see a genius idea that transforms things, re-energising the Cypherpunks and giving the Speculators something to get behind.

Maybe we'll see the old guard fighting back. The recent resurgence of privacy coins, combined with Ethereum's Cypherpunk-aligned community finally getting its act together, hints that it could just about be possible.

Most likely, we'll see a fragmentation.

Crypto will enter a new era. One where the less extreme Cypherpunks and Speculators will give up their wild dreams and join the Professionals in their journey, doing what little they can to maintain a semblance of the old ways. Meanwhile, those on the fringes will break away and explore new opportunities or build elsewhere.

But crypto hasn't died. And it won't, even if this comes to pass.

It may be tamed and transformed. It may lose many of its ideals and characteristics and excitement. But, for those who chose to remain, crypto is very much still alive -- it's just something less than it used to be.

Anything expressed here is my own opinion stated for informational and educational purposes; nothing I say should be taken as investment or financial advice. Many projects mentioned on this channel are highly experimental and therefore come with risks. Please evaluate your own risk tolerance before experimenting with these projects.

I may own some of the cryptoassets mentioned.