[English Thread] The Challenges of the 2025 Cycle: Why This Time Is More Difficult Than Ever

Chainfeeds Guide:

The current state of the crypto market in 2025 is as follows: there are too many tokens; a large amount of unnecessary technology exists; many projects have not found product-market fit; tokenomics have failed; airdropped tokens are immediately swapped by users for stablecoins; trading has become significantly more difficult, and any asset worth trading with sufficient liquidity faces extremely fierce competition.

Source:

Route 2 FI

Opinion:

Route 2 FI: If anyone still wonders why most people are so frustrated in the crypto space, just look at the following facts: the prices of the current top 50 altcoins have already fallen back to the levels seen after the FTX collapse in 2022. Even worse, major coins like SOL, ETH, and BTC have also returned to their December 2024 price levels. Now, many users in the crypto community have gained almost no substantial returns in this cycle, which has made them anxious and eager to "earn back" their losses. Coupled with the current poor market sentiment and the fact that we are already approaching the end of the cycle (if you believe in the 4-year cycle theory), we have actually crossed the crucial 18-month mark, which historically has often marked the top of bitcoin’s early cycle. The crypto market before us is undergoing dramatic changes. In the past four years, most token issuance models have been low circulation, high FDV models. The 240 million USD worth of TIA sold by Polychain in July this year is a typical example of this phenomenon, but are they really the only "culprits"? If you think about it, they are really just doing their job. You can imagine that anyone holding unlocked tokens would choose to do the same thing. Do you remember in the past? When a token was listed on a CEX, it usually meant its price would go up. Now, that is history. Today, almost everyone is feeling frustrated: traders are adapting to the new market environment, meme coin players are fighting each other, project founders complain that users are unwilling to use their protocols, retail investors complain that the market is oversaturated, and VCs have missed the easy money days of the past (things have become much tougher since 2023). Traditional finance is entering, but they have no intention of buying our altcoins. Now, in 2025, we are facing this dilemma: too many tokens, excess technology, projects have not found product-market fit (PMF), tokenomics have failed, almost all airdropped tokens have been sold for stablecoins, and trading is becoming increasingly difficult because any high-quality trading asset with sufficient liquidity becomes even more competitive. In other words, almost no one believes in these tokens anymore. After "Black Friday," about half of crypto traders lost all their assets, and many of them may never return to this market. Yes, winning a single trade may mean victory for some, but overall, the capital flows from this event also mean that degens/professional traders and retail investors have all become poorer. Altcoins have entered a whole new stage. The problem is that too many new tokens are launched with excessively high valuations, which draws liquidity away from stronger, more promising projects, making the entire market weaker. Now, token issuance generally features high FDV, large airdrops, low circulation, and a large amount of VC unlocking later on. We have become used to hearing "any token will rise as long as market conditions are right." But is that really true now? Think about it: there are more "useful" tokens on the market now than in 2021. Every week, 3 to 5 "high-quality" tokens enter the market. The total market cap keeps climbing, and everyone seems to think this is wonderful. But you can’t help but ask: who is actually going to buy these tokens? Unless institutional investors or retail users enter on a large scale, this market will always be a zero-sum game. Now, every week, new "high-quality" projects are launched, and their FDVs are extremely high. This means there is a huge supply in the market, and unless new buyers keep coming in, these tokens can only go down (at least in the long run). It is already October 2025, and the capital flowing into altcoins has become even more selective, which is not enough to offset the massive unlocks from VCs.