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Review of 2025: Multiple Key Events Reshape Crypto Industry Structure and Risk Perception
Summary: Instead of pushing news, Cointelegraph looks back at the events that reshaped the cryptocurrency industry in 2025. The industry was not dominated by a single narrative, but underwent reshaping through a series of events including hacker attacks, macro impacts, regulatory legislation, and integration with the financial system. February | Bybit suffers $1.4 billion theft. At ...
Instead of pushing news, Cointelegraph looks back at the events that reshaped the cryptocurrency industry in 2025. The industry was not dominated by a single narrative, but underwent reshaping through a series of events including hacker attacks, macro impacts, regulatory legislation, and integration with the financial system.
February | Bybit suffers $1.4 billion theft. At the beginning of the year, Bybit experienced one of the largest exchange theft events in history, with the U.S. attributing the attack to North Korean hackers. The event refocused the market on custody, signature processes, exchange and counterparty risks, highlighting operational risks as a core systemic risk. April | Tariff conflicts trigger risk asset resonance. Global tariff tensions escalated, causing Bitcoin to temporarily drop to a low point during the year. Cryptocurrencies exhibited high beta macro asset characteristics under pressure, with prices highly sensitive to non-crypto news. July | U.S. GENIUS Act enacted. President Trump signed the GENIUS Act, formally incorporating payment stablecoins into the federal regulatory framework, clarifying issuance, reserve, and audit requirements. Stablecoins received a clear legal position in the U.S. for the first time. Late summer to fall | Stablecoins move towards financial infrastructure. Circle announced IPO pricing, Swedish fintech company Klarna launched the KlarnaUSD stablecoin. Stablecoins shifted from trading tools to payment and settlement infrastructure, entering the core of policy and institutional vision. September | SEC fast-tracks spot crypto ETPs. The U.S. approved general listing standards for commodity trust shares, allowing crypto ETPs to be listed under unified rules, marking a key step towards the commodification and standardization of crypto assets in the capital market. October | Liquidation wave follows historic high. Bitcoin briefly surpassed $125,000, then sharply fell, triggering over $19 billion in leveraged positions liquidation, exposing systemic reflexivity risks under ETP funds and high leverage resonance. December | Integration accelerates, regulations tighten simultaneously. Circle and Ripple approved to establish or transform into U.S. national trust banks; UK initiates comprehensive crypto regulation consultation; HashKey listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. Meanwhile, Terra founder Do Kwon sentenced to 15 years in prison for fraud, closing an important case from the previous cycle.
In summary, 2025 established four long-term trends: Operational and custody risks become core variables that cannot be ignored; Cryptocurrencies are fully integrated into the macro risk cycle; Stablecoins upgrade to financial infrastructure; Market access expansion outpaces risk constraints, volatility has not disappeared but rather amplified.
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