Crypto Market Review 2025Q2: Structural Transformation from Compliance Boom to Real Yield

In the second quarter of 2025, the crypto market shows an overall warming trend, with multiple positive factors working together to accelerate the industry's pace. On one hand, the global macroeconomic environment is stabilizing, and tariff policies have been somewhat relaxed, providing a more friendly background for capital flow and asset allocation. On the other hand, multiple countries and regions have introduced friendly policies for the crypto industry, with traditional financial markets beginning to actively embrace cryptocurrencies, linking token structures with traditional financial assets to achieve capital structure "financialization".

The stablecoin track was particularly active this quarter, from the scale expansion of USDT/USDC to the landing of multi-country compliance frameworks and Circle's IPO, all pushing the crypto narrative closer to mainstream capital markets and releasing strong positive signals. Meanwhile, the on-chain derivatives narrative continued to heat up, with Hyperliquid becoming a phenomenal leader, with daily trading volumes repeatedly approaching or exceeding some centralized exchanges. Its native token continued to outperform the market, becoming one of the most strongly performing assets. As on-chain matching systems and user experience continue to be optimized, the derivatives market is accelerating its structural leap from "off-chain replication" to "on-chain native", further promoting the development of DeFi.

Global Stablecoin Regulation Landing and Potential Opportunities

Genius Act Accelerates Global Stablecoin Regulation

In the second quarter of 2025, the global stablecoin market showed continuous growth and accelerated regulatory framework landing. As of June 24, the total market value of global stablecoins reached $240 billion, growing by about 20% from the beginning of the year. US dollar stablecoins dominate, with a market share of over 95%. The two leading stablecoins, USDT and USDC, have scales of $153 billion and $61.5 billion respectively, accounting for 89.4% of the market share, further intensifying market concentration. In terms of trading volume, stablecoin on-chain trading volume exceeded $10 trillion in the past three months, with an adjusted effective trading volume of $2.2 trillion and 2.6 billion transactions, adjusted to 519 million transactions. Stablecoins are gradually evolving from crypto trading tools to mainstream payment media, and are expected to expand the US dollar stablecoin market to $2 trillion in the next three years, further strengthening the dollar's dominant position in the global digital economy.

Overall, the Genius Act is both a key node in U.S. financial strategy and a major milestone in the institutional evolution of the crypto industry. Through dual legal and regulatory clarity, stablecoins will become the core driving force for modernizing payments, enhancing the global influence of the U.S. dollar, and paving a solid compliant path for on-chain financial innovation and digital asset mainstreaming. ArkStream will continue to monitor the implementation progress of this act and its profound impact on the global digital financial ecosystem.

Beyond the U.S. Genius Act, multiple countries and regions globally are actively promoting stablecoin regulatory frameworks. South Korea is actively constructing a stablecoin regulatory framework. In June 2025, the ruling party proposed the "Digital Asset Basic Act", allowing local companies meeting certain conditions to issue stablecoins, strengthening reserve and capital requirements to promote industry legalization. Regulatory authority is handed to the Financial Services Commission (FSC), while establishing a Digital Asset Committee for unified supervision. The Bank of Korea (BOK) has shifted from initial opposition to support, on the premise of obtaining supervision rights over Korean won stablecoins. This "co-managed by central bank" model reflects pragmatic regulatory evolution against the backdrop of stablecoin impact on traditional banking systems and monetary policies. Simultaneously, South Korea is advancing broader market liberalization reforms, such as postponing crypto taxes to 2027, opening corporate crypto accounts, planning spot crypto ETFs, and combating market manipulation and illegal trading platforms, forming a "guide compliance + crack down on violations" regulatory approach aimed at consolidating its position in the Asian crypto hub.

Hong Kong will officially implement the "Stablecoin Regulation" in 2025, becoming one of the first jurisdictions to establish a stablecoin licensing system. The regulation is expected to take effect in August, requiring stablecoin issuers to register in Hong Kong, maintain 1:1 reserve assets, undergo audits, and be included in regulatory sandbox testing mechanisms. Hong Kong's system design both aligns with international standards (such as MiCA) and provides Chinese enterprises with a compliant overseas channel, reinforcing its position as a "controlled innovation" financial bridgehead.

In this context, Chinese enterprises like JD.com and Ant Group, along with multiple Chinese securities firms and financial institutions, are attempting to enter the stablecoin industry. For instance, JD.com is piloting a Hong Kong dollar stablecoin through its JD Coin Technology in the Hong Kong regulatory sandbox, emphasizing compliance, transparency, and efficiency, with the goal of reducing cross-border payment costs by 90% and settlement time to 10 seconds. Its strategy follows a "B2B first, C2C follow" path, planning to obtain licenses in major global countries to serve global e-commerce and supply chain settlements. This layout complements the domestic positioning of China's digital renminbi, jointly constructing a "dual-track system" of national digital currency strategy - with the central bank controlling the internal circulation and leading enterprises exploring the external circulation, thereby occupying the initiative in the global digital asset landscape.

Massive Opportunities Brought by Stablecoin Compliance to the Crypto Market

Besides Circle, multiple listed companies have taken substantial steps in digital asset allocation strategies. The most representative is SharpLink Gaming (SBET), which has accumulated 188,478 ETH as of June 20, 2025, and has earned 120 ETH in staking rewards by deploying all holdings to staking protocols. The company raised funds through PIPE financing and "in-market" issuance mechanisms, supported by institutions like ConsenSys and Pantera. Additionally, SharpLink actively utilizes At-The-Market (ATM) financing mechanisms to flexibly issue shares based on market conditions, rapidly raising operational funds and further strengthening its asset allocation and business expansion capabilities. With diverse financing channels, the ETH strategy has become SharpLink's core asset management path.

DeFi Development Corp (formerly Janover Inc.) is restructuring its business with Solana as its core asset. In April 2025, it cumulatively purchased 251,842 SOL through two transactions, approximately $36.5 million, and announced a $500 million equity credit line on June 12 for further investment. DFDV plans to tokenize company stocks on the Solana chain through cooperation with Kraken, creating a "native on-chain listed company". This represents not only a change in asset allocation mode but also an innovation in financing and liquidity mechanisms.

Besides Ethereum and Solana, Bitcoin remains the primary reserve asset for institutions. Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) held 592,345 BTC as of June 2025, with a market value exceeding $63 billion, firmly maintaining its position as the world's largest public BTC holder. Metaplanet is rapidly advancing its Bitcoin reserve strategy in the Japanese market, adding 1,111 BTC in the second quarter of 2025, with total holdings reaching 11,111 BTC, and planning to achieve a target of 210,000 BTC by 2027.

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From a geographical perspective, corporate crypto asset strategies are no longer limited to the US market, with active exploration in Asian, Canadian, and Middle Eastern markets, demonstrating global and multi-chain characteristics. Correspondingly, there are attempts at more complex asset utilization methods, including staking, DeFi protocol integration, and on-chain governance participation. Companies are no longer passively holding assets but constructing asset-liability sheets and yield models centered on crypto assets, driving financial models from "reserves" to "interest-bearing" and from "hedging" to "production".

On the regulatory front, Circle's IPO representing regulatory compliance, and the SEC's abolition of SAB 121 and establishment of a "crypto task force" signal that US policy positions are developing in a more clear direction. Meanwhile, although Kraken still faces SEC litigation, its proactive pursuit of previous IPO financing shows that top platforms still have expectations for capital markets. Animoca Brands' plan to list in Hong Kong or the Middle East, and Telegram's exploration of TON-driven revenue sharing mechanisms, also reflect how regulatory location is becoming an important component of crypto enterprise strategies.

The market trends and corporate behaviors this quarter indicate that the crypto industry is entering a new phase of "institutional structural reallocation" and "enterprise balance sheet on-chain". Strategies similar to MicroStrategy provide new incremental funding for several top Altcoins. ArkStream believes that native crypto VCs should seize the opportunity and will focus on the following directions: first, projects with stablecoin, staking, and DeFi yield capabilities; second, service providers assisting enterprises in executing complex asset allocations (such as institutional-level staking platforms and crypto financial accounting systems); third, top enterprises embracing compliance and willing to enter public capital markets. Future corporate allocation depth and mode innovation in specific Altcoin ecosystems will become the core variable for the next round of industry valuation reconstruction.

Hyperliquid, On-Chain Derivatives, and the Rise of Real Yield DeFi

The success of Hyperliquid is not just about growth in trading data, but has also reignited industry attention to the concept of real yield in DeFi. In the DeFi realm, "real yield" refers to income generated from actual economic activities, such as trading fees, lending interest, or protocol revenue, rather than through inflationary token issuance. This stands in stark contrast to the early DeFi model of 2020-2022, when protocols rapidly grew by distributing native tokens as rewards, but these rewards often exceeded the platform's actual income, leading to short-term prosperity followed by long-term dilution and capital flight. The shift towards real yield is crucial for the long-term viability and survival of DeFi protocols, as any yield model requires a foundation of actual income to be sustainable. Its key characteristics include income sources from actual protocol activities rather than promises, focusing on long-term capital efficiency and user trust, providing genuine financial utility that users would use even without incentives, and emphasizing reliability, usability, and true value, rather than pure hype.

Therefore, as an investment institution, priority should be given to protocols with actual economic activities and defensible business models, strong token economics and revenue-sharing models, such as Hyperliquid and AAVE, with a focus on their long-term sustainability, rather than just TVL or speculation.