Stablecoins are making huge profits, Crypto is diverging! Top Venture Capitalists Reveal the 2025 Winners List

After a year of regulatory changes and uneven market performance, crypto investors are reevaluating the direction of value accumulation toward 2025. Stablecoin companies, existing firms like Robinhood, and forecasted markets are among the sectors performing best this year. Conversely, Terraform Labs co-founder Do Kwon and the SEC during the Biden era have become the biggest losers, revealing the valuation restructuring logic of the crypto industry following policy shifts.

Stablecoins Moving from Margins to Center Stage

Pantera Capital partner Mason Nystrom, Hash3 co-founder Hootie Rashidifard, and Variant partner Alana Levin recently discussed the 2025 crypto market performance on a podcast. Rashidifard of Hash3 stated plainly that stablecoins are the most obvious winners in 2025, with trading volume and issuer profitability experiencing rapid growth. He emphasized, “Tether is the most profitable company per capita globally,” a startling conclusion that overturns many people’s perceptions of crypto business models.

Stablecoin issuers earn interest income by holding interest-bearing assets like U.S. Treasuries as reserves, with nearly zero costs. Tether’s profit in 2024 is estimated to exceed $10 billion.

More importantly, market perception is shifting. Rashidifard recalled, “In 2022-2023, no one would hype stablecoin-based projects as the coolest in their portfolio, but now people say, ‘Wow, this is a very attractive and interesting business,’ not only because it generates revenue but also because it truly provides value to some end users.” This narrative shift reflects the maturation of the crypto industry from speculative hype to practical utility.

The July passage of the GENIUS Act established a federal framework for stablecoin issuance, reserves, and regulation in the U.S., paving the way for mainstream adoption. Once regulatory uncertainty is eliminated, stablecoins are no longer products of the gray area but regulated financial instruments. This shift has attracted traditional financial institutions into the market, with giants like PayPal and Visa already launching or planning to launch their own stablecoin products, signaling explosive growth in this sector by 2025.

Existing Companies’ Counterattack After Regulatory Clarity

Nystrom from Pantera believes that existing companies have become the biggest beneficiaries by acting promptly once the regulatory environment clarified. Taking Robinhood as an example, he pointed out that the company had been cautious about crypto in recent years but adopted a more aggressive stance in 2025. With SEC Chair Gary Gensler stepping down and crypto-friendly policies advancing, Robinhood rapidly expanded its crypto product line and even began supporting more altcoin trading.

Nystrom added that as the regulatory environment becomes clearer, “established firms are doing an excellent job of capturing market trends.” These traditional fintech companies with large user bases and compliant frameworks can quickly launch crypto businesses after policy shifts, without having to build trust and compliance systems from scratch like pure crypto startups. This advantage has led to a much higher market cap growth for companies like Coinbase and Robinhood in 2025 compared to purely crypto-native projects.

Three Key Traits of 2025 Crypto Winners

Regulatory Compliance First: Possessing complete legal frameworks and licenses, enabling rapid expansion when policies relax

Real-World Use Cases Driven: Stablecoins and prediction markets providing genuine end-user value, not just speculation

Cross-Industry Resource Integration: Hybrid models of traditional finance and crypto offering the best risk-reward ratio

Insights from the Prediction Market Valuation Surge of 10x

Levin from Variant emphasized that prediction markets are among the fastest-growing sectors in 2025. Platforms like Kalshi and Polymarket have eliminated previous concerns about fake trades and election-only activities. She noted, “I think a year ago, Kalshi and Polymarket were valued at less than $1 billion, but this year, Intercontinental Exchange invested $2 billion in Polymarket, which is incredible.”

The success of prediction markets reveals a new logic of value accumulation in the crypto industry. Unlike traditional crypto projects relying on token price appreciation, Polymarket profits through trading fees and data services, a business model more easily understood and accepted by traditional investors. When giants like Intercontinental Exchange are willing to invest at a $20 billion valuation, it indicates prediction markets have moved beyond the “crypto experiment” phase and are now part of mainstream financial infrastructure.

The Biden Era SEC’s Legacy of Failure

Venture capital leaders also unreservedly pointed out the clear losers of 2025. Rashidifard believes the “Biden era” SEC is a broader systemic loser; years of aggressive enforcement have not yielded lasting benefits. He described that period as “hostile due to unreasonable political reasons,” and said this hostility forced founders to move funds overseas.

Led by Gary Gensler, the SEC launched numerous enforcement actions against major crypto firms like Coinbase, Ripple Labs, and Binance between 2022 and 2024. However, most of these cases either settled or were dismissed by courts, failing to establish clear regulatory frameworks. Instead, this “regulation through enforcement” strategy created legal uncertainty, hindering the development of the U.S. crypto industry and pushing innovation and capital toward crypto-friendly jurisdictions like Singapore and the UAE.

Levin specifically pointed out that Terraform Labs co-founder Do Kwon was the most representative individual failure in this event. Do Kwon was sentenced to 15 years in prison on December 11, after admitting to telecom fraud and conspiracy related to Terra’s collapse. Terra’s failure led to approximately $40 billion in market cap evaporating in 2022, making it one of the most painful crashes in crypto history.