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Retail investors will dominate the crypto markets

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1 week ago

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Opinion by: Hatu Sheikh, founder of Coin Terminal

Crypto began its journey with Bitcoin (BTC) — the epitome of decentralization — promising open access and equitable distribution of financial resources. It evolved into starkly different territories, where lucrative market opportunities are often inaccessible for retail investors.

Wealthy individuals, high-net-worth family offices, company insiders and venture capitalists secure early access to prime crypto deals. Retailers are left in the lurch as their late entry leads to higher market risks and limited profitability.

The table is turning, mainly with the rise of real-world asset (RWA) tokenization and a decisive repudiation of venture capital-backed tokens. Crypto is no longer a niche asset class for institutional investors — retail users are now actively shaping the future of finance.

Crypto has a retail-institutional divide

Retail investors have long stayed away from the crypto market. Analyzing the Bitcoin wallet activities of retail tokenholders demonstrates this.

According to Glassnode, Bitcoin retail spend volumes of user wallets holding less than 0.1 BTC have dropped by 48% since November 2024. A crypto commentator has corroborated the data, showing retail interest reached a three-year low.

Institutional investors like Metaplanet, Strategy and Intesa Sanpaolo have recently increased their Bitcoin holdings, taking advantage of BTC’s price drop. Simultaneously, large Bitcoin holders or crypto whales have accumulated over 39,620 BTC worth $3.79 billion in a single day.

Matt Hougan, chief investment officer at Bitwise, said, “There is an absolutely massive disconnect between retail and professional sentiment in crypto right now.” The data suggests that retail sentiment is bearish while professional investors remain bullish, almost like two parallel worlds.

The expanding adoption of BTC reserves by corporations and institutional demand for Bitcoin futures has led to shrinking retail investors. The Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) controls 85% of the monthly futures market, while crypto exchanges control retail-led perpetual contracts.

CME’s open interest in monthly BTC futures offers hedge funds and investment banks exposure to BTC and liquidity access. It also indicates, however, a diminishing influence of retail investors’ participation in Bitcoin’s price discovery.

The market structurally restricts retail investors’ access to capital reserves, denying them early-stage opportunities in financial markets. The psychological “unit bias” adds to the problem as retailers cannot own a complete unit of assets like Bitcoin.

Recent: Crypto shows how powerful tokenizing private stocks would be

As governments contemplate the formation of strategic Bitcoin reserves, they risk being locked in central bank cold wallets. For optimal utilization, it’s essential to keep Bitcoin accessible to retail investors through open reserves.

Despite such constricted market opportunities, the crypto industry offers innovative products like asset tokenization and memecoins to democratize access for retail investors.

Retail investors are reclaiming crypto

Sometimes, the best way to achieve financial inclusion is to remove complexities and make investing fun and relatable. Memecoins have done that successfully, leveraging speculation as a utility to make a statement against low-float-high-fully diluted valuation coins backed by VCs. That’s the reason retail investors are buying memecoins in such large numbers.

Although memecoins are subject to severe market volatily, they continue to dominate retail speculation. Nicolai Søndergaard, a research analyst at Nansen, thinks the altcoin season is yet to come because memecoins have topped investor mindshare and capital allocation. 

The memecoin phenomenon shows the power of ordinary people to monetize virality and harness mimetic desire through collective community-led wealth generation. But more importantly, it shows retail investors’ rejection of VC-led token pumps that deny fair entry to high-value token launches.

Memecoins also give tokenholders a sense of belonging to facilitate bonding over shared values and culture. Thus, when US President Donald Trump launched his memecoin, 42% of investors were first-time buyers, signaling memecoins’ potential to onboard retailers.

Beyond speculative memecoin trading, retail investors adopt tokenized real-world assets to hedge against uncertain market conditions. The RWA tokenization market has recently surpassed $17 billion, enhancing retail investor accessibility and market opportunities through improved liquidity and fractional ownership.

Retailers and small investors can now participate in tokenized capital markets, previously reserved for institutions and wealthy individuals. Thus, tokenization is a democratic and inclusive market strategy to help new investors access the financial system without facing liquidity challenges.

Mastercard recently published a white paper explaining how RWA tokenization offers significant socio-economic benefits to people from emerging economies, such as Latin America. In developing economies, tokenization resolves the trust deficit by enabling transparent ownership tracking for seamless asset transfers.

Asset tokenization helps retail investors participate in DeFi markets by improving capital efficiency. A PricewaterhouseCoopers report shows tokenization benefits buyers and sellers in the opaque $1.5-trillion private credit market through fractionalized lending and borrowing.

Amid turbulent market conditions, institutional investors with abundant capital reserves have the luxury of continuing to accumulate Bitcoin and other altcoins. However, retail investors with a fixed capital supply must find asset classes with the lowest entry barriers.

With the crypto industry providing diversified investment options and innovative products, retailers now have the freedom to invest in their preferred assets. It’s finally time for retail investors to come onchain.

Opinion by: Hatu Sheikh, founder of Coin Terminal.

This article is for general information purposes and is not intended to be and should not be taken as legal or investment advice. The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed here are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.

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Coin Market

Blockchain Association CEO will move to Solana advocacy group

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48 minutes ago

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April 1, 2025

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Kristin Smith, CEO of the US-based Blockchain Association, will be leaving the cryptocurrency advocacy group for the recently launched Solana Policy Institute.

In an April 1 notice, the Blockchain Association (BA) said Smith would be stepping down from her role as CEO on May 16. According to the association, the soon-to-be former CEO will become president of the Solana Policy Institute on May 19.

The association’s notice did not provide an apparent reason for the move to the Solana advocacy organization nor say who would lead the group after Smith’s departure. Cointelegraph reached out to the Blockchain Association for comment but did not receive a response at the time of publication.

Blockchain Association CEO Kristin Smith’s April 1 announcement. Source: LinkedIn

Smith, who has worked at the BA since 2018 and was deputy chief of staff for former Montana Representative Denny Rehberg, will follow DeFi Education Fund CEO Miller Whitehouse-Levine, leaving his position to join the Solana Policy Institute as CEO. According to Whitehouse-Levine, the organization plans to educate US policymakers on Solana.

This is a developing story, and further information will be added as it becomes available.

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Coin Market

APX Lending gains exemptive relief from Canadian Securities Administration

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48 minutes ago

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April 1, 2025

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APX Lending, a crypto-backed loan company, has gained exemptive relief from the Canadian Securities Administration (CSA) to offer crypto-backed loans without requiring traditional dealer registration or prospectus filings.

“Over the last 2 years, APX developed a […] regulatory framework in collaboration with the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) to facilitate this, as no such framework previously existed in Canada,” a spokesperson for APX told Cointelegraph. “This exemption is specific to APX and does not establish a precedent for other companies.”

The platform currently supports Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) as backing collateral for loans in Canadian or US dollars. APX plans to add more digital assets and fiat currencies options in the near future.

The company claims to be expanding its reach to the United States, with future expansions planned for Australia and New Zealand pending regulatory approval. Andrei Poliakov, founder and CEO of APX Lending, said in a statement:

“By engaging with Canadian regulators and leading the way in Canada, we are setting a new benchmark for compliance and security in crypto-backed lending, helping retail and institutional borrowers unlock liquidity while maintaining ownership of their digital assets.”

APX loans range from 20%-60% loan-to-value (LTV), with an automated liquidation mechanism triggered at 90% if no corrective action is taken by the borrower to top up collateral or partially repay the loan when LTV reaches the 80% warning level and they are notified of the potential liquidation.

Loan terms range from three months to five years, reflecting the comparatively flexible structure of crypto-backed lending versus the more rigid and often less accessible options found in traditional financial systems.

APX Lending is registered with the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada (FINTRAC). Its key competitors in the local market include Ledn, Nexo, and YouHodler, among others.

APX Lending founder and CEO Andrei Poliakov onstage at the Blockchain Futurist Conference in 2024. Source: Blockchain Futurist Conference

Related: What Canada’s new Liberal PM Mark Carney means for crypto

Canada’s shifting political landscape could spell trouble for crypto regulations

Recently elected Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney is a former central banker who once criticized Bitcoin for being supply-capped, calling the 21 million maximum supply a “serious deficiency.”

In a speech to the Scottish Economics Conference at Edinburgh University in March 2018, Carney said: “Recreating a virtual global gold standard would be a criminal act of monetary amnesia.”

Carney’s critical view of Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies may influence the direction of regulation in Canada and raise uncertainty about the future of the country’s crypto industry.

However, Carney’s 2025 platform outlined goals to make Canada a global leader in emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and “digital industries” amid increasing geopolitical competition and trade tensions with the United States.

Magazine: Home loans using crypto as collateral: Do the risks outweigh the reward?

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Coin Market

GoMining launches $100M Bitcoin mining fund for institutional investors

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2 hours ago

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April 1, 2025

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GoMining, a platform that allows users to mine Bitcoin (BTC) through data centers, is launching a $100 million Bitcoin mining fund for institutional investors. Custodied by Bitgo, the fund promises annual distributions from mining yield and a strategy that focuses on Bitcoin rewards and reinvestment.

GoMining’s Alpha Blocks Fund comes as more companies have added Bitcoin to their balance sheets, capturing enthusiasm surrounding the resurgence of the world’s top cryptocurrency by market capitalization. Companies that have done so, including Japan’s Metaplanet and medical technology company Semler Scientific, have seen their stock prices increase.

“Unlike passive equity investments, the Alpha Blocks Fund offers direct exposure to mined Bitcoin via a fully managed, compounding hashrate strategy,” a GoMining spokesperson told Cointelegraph.

“BTC rewards are reinvested to increase the fund’s hashrate and improve miner efficiency — creating real, yield-driven outcomes. Our model is built for performance, not market sentiment, and integrates utility-based advantages that listed mining companies typically don’t offer.”

According to a press release shared with Cointelegraph, GoMining Institutional operates with 7.3 Exahash of active hash power.

Related: Is cryptocurrency mining still profitable in 2025?

“This framework ensures compliance with relevant regulatory requirements and supports our focus on delivering institutional-grade exposure to Bitcoin mining yield strategies,” said the spokesperson, adding that retail users can access a separate digital mining product.

The fund will charge a 2% flat annual management fee, with no performance fees applied.

While GoMining’s Bitcoin fund caters to institutional investors, its flagship product is geared toward retail miners who may lack the funds to create a heavy-duty mining rig. In 2024, it revealed an attempt to gamify Bitcoin mining through the use of non-fungible tokens.

Institutional investment in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies like Ether (ETH) has been on the rise since 2024, when the first cryptocurrency exchange-traded funds were launched in the United States.

Regulatory clarity from Europe’s MiCA and the enthusiasm for digital assets in the United States might be changing institutional investors’ skepticism about cryptocurrencies. In March 2025, a report by Coinbase revealed that 83% of institutions are planning a crypto allocation.

Magazine: AI may already use more power than Bitcoin — and it threatens Bitcoin mining

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