VCs Pick Incumbents, Stablecoins as 2025 Crypto Winners
VCs identified incumbents like Robinhood, stablecoin companies, and prediction markets as top crypto performers in 2025.Summary
In a recent podcast, venture capital partners from Pantera Capital, Hash3, and Variant assessed the crypto landscape of 2025, identifying incumbents, stablecoins, and prediction markets as the major winners. Mason Nystrom of Pantera noted that incumbents like Robinhood benefited from clearer regulatory environments, acting aggressively once clarity emerged. Hootie Rashidifard of Hash3 highlighted stablecoins, pointing to Tether's profitability and the shift in perception towards stablecoin-founded projects as providing real customer value. Alana Levin of Variant emphasized prediction markets, citing the massive $2 billion investment by the Intercontinental Exchange into Polymarket as evidence of their rapid growth past earlier skepticism. Conversely, the executives named clear losers: Levin singled out Do Kwon of Terraform Labs, who was sentenced for fraud related to the 2022 Terra collapse, while Rashidifard criticized the "Biden-era" SEC for years of ineffective, hostile enforcement that drove founders overseas before policy shifted in 2025 with the passage of the GENIUS Act and other legislative signals.
(Source：Cointelegraph)