Crypto IPOs: Is the Window Closing? Lessons from Circle, Gemini, and the 2025 Market
The initial public offering (IPO) frenzy of 2025 promised to be a watershed moment for the crypto industry, signaling mainstream acceptance and maturity. While Circle’s successful debut at $69, more than doubling its initial pricing, offered a glimmer of hope, the subsequent performance of other crypto-related IPOs paints a far more sobering picture. Companies like eToro, Bullish, and Gemini have experienced significant value declines, raising serious questions about investor appetite for crypto equities. This article delves into the factors driving this divergence, analyzing the strategic split between infrastructure plays and speculative platforms, and forecasting the outlook for crypto IPOs in 2026.
The 2025 IPO Class: A Tale of Two Fortunes
Circle’s initial success was seen as validation – investors were willing to pay a premium for a regulated stablecoin issuer with demonstrable revenue. The perception was that USDC rails represented essential financial infrastructure, distinct from the speculative nature of many other crypto assets. Six months later, Circle trades at $82.58, a nearly 20% increase from its opening price, suggesting the initial thesis held strong.
However, the broader picture is less encouraging. eToro, which debuted at $69.69, now sits at $35.85, a 48.6% drop. Bullish plummeted from $90 to $43.20, a 52% wipeout. Perhaps the most dramatic failure was Gemini, the Winklevoss-backed exchange, which lost 70% of its value, trading at $11.07 by mid-December. Even Figment, a staking provider, barely cleared its launch price, gaining only 11.2% to $40.04.
Against the backdrop of Bitcoin’s 8.5% year-to-date decline to around $85,620, the cohort’s performance feels less like a triumph of crypto equities and more like a rigorous stress test of investor risk tolerance. The stark dispersion in performance highlights a crucial shift in market sentiment.
Infrastructure vs. Beta: The Strategic Divide
Circle’s outperformance isn’t accidental. The company generates revenue from USDC reserves, capitalizing on the spread between Treasury yields and the zero interest paid to stablecoin holders. This model is resilient, functioning effectively regardless of Bitcoin’s price fluctuations. This insulates Circle from the directional bets that define exchanges like Gemini or trading platforms like eToro.
When crypto spot volumes decline, exchanges immediately feel the impact on their fee revenue. Circle, however, continues to earn. Similarly, Figment’s modest gain reflects its focus on staking infrastructure, which depends on the adoption of proof-of-stake networks, not speculative trading activity. As long as Ethereum, Solana, and other PoS chains continue validating blocks, Figment collects its cut.
eToro, Bullish, and Gemini, in contrast, are heavily reliant on retail enthusiasm. When Bitcoin dipped and altcoin volumes followed suit, trading activity evaporated on these platforms. Investors who anticipated sustained crypto mania found themselves holding leveraged downside. The losses aren’t indicative of broken businesses, but rather a market repricing of what “crypto equity” truly means when the underlying asset experiences volatility.
Public Market Demand for Risk Compensation
Public investors demanded compensation for this volatility, and stock prices adjusted accordingly. The lesson for 2026 is clear: crypto equities are bifurcating. On one side are companies with durable, counter-cyclical, or quasi-infrastructure business models capable of justifying premium valuations even during periods of sideways Bitcoin movement. On the other side are platforms whose earnings are inextricably linked to speculative fervor. The former can access public markets when the IPO window opens; the latter requires all-time highs to make underwriting viable.
2025: A Test Run, Not a Victory Lap
Circle and Figment demonstrated that legitimate businesses can successfully go public and maintain value. Gemini, eToro, and Bullish, however, proved that investors won’t blindly chase crypto beta in equity form. This repricing happened quickly. By late November, Bloomberg Law reported that new US IPOs posted slightly negative returns in the fourth quarter, even as the S&P 500 eked out gains, with crypto IPOs being “among the biggest casualties” of the quarter’s drawdown.
The message was unambiguous: public investors are still willing to buy crypto risk, but only at the right price and with earnings visibility. The “anything with a blockchain” phase ended somewhere between Circle’s June debut and Gemini’s December collapse. Consensys’s decision to join the queue signals confidence in 2026, but also an awareness that the opportunity won’t last indefinitely.
What the Scorecard Signals for 2026 Risk Appetite
The underperformance of the 2025 IPO cohort relative to Bitcoin suggests that equity investors are treating these businesses as leveraged, fee-driven proxies for the crypto cycle rather than secular growth stories. This raises the bar for 2026. Companies seeking to go public will need to demonstrate cash generation that can withstand a flat or declining market, not just hockey-stick projections based on sustained retail euphoria.
However, Circle’s resilience points to continued demand for regulated crypto infrastructure. Investors remain interested in stablecoin rails, tokenization platforms, and custody providers – businesses where regulation and earnings are transparent. This appetite didn’t vanish when Bitcoin dipped; it simply became more selective.
The Broader IPO Market and Crypto’s Place Within It
Nasdaq expects billion-dollar-plus listings to increase in 2026, with U.S. IPO proceeds projected to rise roughly 80% in 2025 compared to 2024. Falling interest rates, high valuations, and positive market sentiment support this view. However, the winners’ list remains narrow. A tech-capital-markets analysis of 2025 IPO gainers revealed that AI and crypto names like CoreWeave and Circle dominated, with few breakouts outside these themes. The risk budget for 2026 is concentrated rather than broadly distributed.
Any new crypto listing will need to fit into a clear structural narrative – such as stablecoin infrastructure, tokenized assets, on-chain AI integration, or institutional custody – to attract capital. A16z’s “State of Crypto 2025” frames the year as one of institutional adoption, with Circle’s IPO marking the moment stablecoin issuers became mainstream financial institutions.
The report notes that exchange-traded products (ETPs) now hold approximately $175 billion in crypto assets, up 169% year-over-year, and that public “digital asset treasury” companies control roughly 4% of the combined Bitcoin and Ethereum supply. Together, ETPs and treasury plays account for around 10% of outstanding BTC and ETH. This represents a deepening pipeline between capital markets and tokens, with the IPO cohort representing another node in that infrastructure.
However, institutional participation remains limited. Reuters reported mid-year that less than 5% of spot Bitcoin ETF assets are held by pensions and endowments, with another 10-15% held by hedge funds and wealth managers. Most flows still originate from retail investors. As genuinely long-horizon institutions enter the market, they are more likely to start with regulated wrappers, ETFs, listed exchanges, and stablecoin issuers, rather than direct altcoin bets.
The Real Question for 2026
The 2025 cohort’s performance doesn’t definitively determine whether crypto IPOs are a sustainable asset class. It clarifies the terms of engagement for public markets. Investors will underwrite crypto businesses, but they are no longer willing to pay growth-stock multiples for cyclical fee streams.
Circle’s resilience demonstrates an appetite for infrastructure plays that generate revenue independent of token-price euphoria. Gemini’s 70% collapse shows there’s no appetite for platforms whose earnings disappear when retail interest wanes. This creates a narrow path for 2026. The regulatory environment is clearer and more stable, stablecoins are becoming mainstream, and the general IPO window is open. However, crypto risk is increasingly expressed through public market structures – such as ETFs, corporate treasuries, and the scrutinized IPO cohort – rather than through token speculation.
The companies that successfully navigate this landscape will be those that convince investors they are building financial plumbing, not simply riding a wave. Those that fail will likely wait for the next cycle, whenever that arrives.
Mentioned in this article: Bitcoin, USDC, Circle, Consensys, Gemini, eToro, Kraken, Nasdaq