As we round the halfway point for the year, let’s take stock. We all generally agree 2025 has been an exceptional year for crypto, so one would expect performance of crypto public companies to have tracked excellently and crushed typical market indices like the S&P 500. The data unfortunately does not tell this story.
It’s pretty clear that most of the upside was baked in following the Trump election in November of 2024. Aside from that, crypto has largely underperformed. Since the beginning of the year, here is how performance breaks out:
Marquee Crypto Assets Price Change YTD
Bitcoin 17%
Ethereum -22%
Crypto Public Companies Median Price Change YTD
Architect Crypto Index 3%
Crypto Investment Platforms 14%
Bitcoin Network Operators 0%
Crypto Influencers 8.5%
While the S&P 500 has performed exceptionally well in the first half of 2025, using that as a benchmark makes the underperformance more striking. The median crypto company has lagged both the broader market and even Bitcoin itself, whose gains have been praised all year but remain only modest in absolute terms.
The bottom line is that the election-driven rally that pushed crypto assets to fresh highs in late 2024 was fully priced in by January. Since then, most listed crypto firms have failed to deliver outsized returns. Until a fresh macro or regulatory catalyst emerges, crypto equities are unlikely to meaningfully outperform traditional benchmarks because investors already paid for that optimism last November.
