Primers - Reports
Key Takeaways
The third quarter of 2025 marked another milestone in the maturation of the digital asset ecosystem. Crypto markets extended their strong year-to-date performance, supported by a constructive macro backdrop, improving liquidity, and unprecedented regulatory clarity across major economies. While the Nasdaq Crypto IndexTM (NCITM) continued to outperform traditional equity benchmarks, the quarter also underscored how structural developments—from tokenization and stablecoins to institutional-grade products—are redefining the foundations of modern finance.
Regulatory Advancements:
The global regulatory landscape evolved rapidly, led by the GENIUS Act in the U.S., which established the first federal framework for stablecoins, and Europe’s progress toward a digital euro. In Asia, Japan advanced its yen-backed stablecoin, while Chinese fintechs giants advocated for a yuan-pegged alternative. Together, these initiatives signal a coordinated shift toward digital money, where tokenized assets and sovereign-backed currencies converge to modernize financial infrastructure.
Institutional Adoption:
Institutional engagement accelerated on multiple fronts. BNY Mellon and Goldman Sachs launched a tokenized Money Market Fund, one of the many recent cases of institutions bridging traditional finance and blockchain. S&P Global Ratings issued the first-ever credit rating to a DeFi protocol, while the U.S. Department of Commerce began publishing Gross domestic product (GDP) data on-chain—each a milestone in legitimizing blockchain within established financial and governmental systems.
Ecosystem Developments:
Crypto market performance remained robust, with bitcoin and ether reaching new all-time highs and the NCITM outperforming major equity benchmarks. Ether led gains among infrastructure tokens, highlighting the growing relevance of looking beyond bit- coin. Meanwhile, decentralized finance and stablecoins continued to expand their real-world footprint: transaction volumes surged, average fees declined, and Layer-2 net-works such as Base posted record activity-illustrating how blockchain infrastructure is steadily transitioning from experimentation to scaled utility.