2025 was a reality check for crypto
Less noise. Less speculation
More structure, cash flow, and institutional behavior
Binance Research’s full-year report shows what actually worked in crypto last year - and why 2026 looks adoption-led, not narrative-led
The significant shift in 2025:
Cryptocurrency moved from a volatility-driven market to an infrastructure-led economy.
Prices moved higher, but activity normalized
This is what industrialization looks like
Bitcoin’s Great Decoupling
BTC didn’t rally because people were transacting more on-chain
It rallied because it became a macro asset
➤ BTC dominance held ~60% all year
➤ $21B+ net inflows into U.S. spot ETFs
➤ Corporate & institutional holdings crossed 1.1M BTC (~5.5% supply)
➤ Meanwhile, base-layer active addresses fell ~16%
Liquidity moved off-chain
Bitcoin is no longer being treated as a payment network.
It’s being treated like:
• Institutional collateral
• A liquidity-sensitive macro asset
• A portfolio allocation, not a trade
DeFi’s Blue Chip moment
In 2025, top DeFi protocols generated $16.2B in revenue
That’s more than:
• Nasdaq ($7.4B)
• CME Group ($6.1B)
- combined
This wasn’t incentive-driven yield.
This was organic cash flow from real usage.
Even more important:
Collateral quality flipped.
For the first time, RWA TVL ($17B) surpassed DEX TVL.
DeFi is moving away from volatile crypto-native collateral
→ toward tokenized Treasuries, credit, and institutional assets.
That’s production finance
Stablecoins quietly became the adoption layer
• $33T in annual transaction volume
• Nearly 2x Visa’s volume
• Stablecoin velocity ~110x vs fiat M2 at ~1.4x
• Market cap > $300B (+49% in 2025)
This is internet fiat at scale.
Stablecoins were not used solely for trading.
They became:
• Settlement rails
• Liquidity for RWAs
• Payment infrastructure
• Risk-off capital parking
Even as speculation cooled, stablecoin usage stayed resilient.
That’s real adoption
BNB Chain’s barbell strategy worked
BNB Chain scaled on both ends of the market:
• ~15–18M daily transactions
• ~2.7–4.5M daily active users
• DEX volumes up ~164% YoY (peaking >$7B/day)
• Institutional RWAs live — including BlackRock’s BUIDL fund
Retail scale and institutional finance
Few chains pulled that off
Under the hood, growth came from:
► One-BNB Stack (execution, throughput, data)
► On-chain trading as the core engine
► PancakeSwap as liquidity hub
► RWAs moving from pilots → production
It was product-market fit.
So what does this unlock for 2026?
Binance Research expects an adoption-led year, driven by structure:
► PayFi (wallets + neobanks + yield-bearing stablecoins)
► On-chain money markets & RWAs
► Value shifting from blockspace → applications
► Prediction markets as information infrastructure
► Agentic / AI-driven finance
► Clearer policy backdrop across major regions
The macro context matters.
Crypto is now liquidity-led:
► Stronger correlation with rates, liquidity, and risk assets
► Institutional flows becoming persistent, not episodic
► Shift from speculation → allocation
That’s what 2025 confirmed
2025 separated narratives from reality.
It showed what actually scales under real-world conditions
No price calls
No forecasts
Just structure, usage, and cash flow
➡️ Full Binance Research report:
https://www.binance.com/en/research/analysis/full-year-2025-and-themes-for-2026/
