Why is crypto still only 20% of Biden-Era levels despite Trump?

When Donald Trump returned to the White House, most of the crypto market expected a familiar script. Pro-crypto rhetoric, friendly regulations, institutional earnings and renewed appetite were all expected to combine into an exponential bull market.

Instead, as 2025 approaches, the crypto market is ending the year at a 20% peak from the Biden era.

Even with Trump, the Crypto market is still only 20% of Biden-Era levels.

That contradiction is at the heart of a growing debate about whether crypto is stuck in a difficult phase or whether something more fundamental has broken down.

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“It's time to admit that the crypto market is broken,” said Ran Nunner, analyst and host of Crypto Banter.

Analysts highlighted an unprecedented disconnect between fundamentals and prices. According to Nenner, 2025 had “all the makings of a bull market”:

“Even with all of the above, we're going to lower 2025 and end up with only 20% of where we were with Biden,” Nunner said.

This suggests that traditional explanations no longer hold. Theories around four-year cycles, pent-up liquidity, or an IPO moment feel more like post-hoc rationalizations than real answers for crypto.

According to Nener, the result is a market with two plausible paths forward.

A hidden structural seller or mechanism is suppressing prices, or it is for the setup that he calls “the mother of all traders” as the Crypto markets finally return to equilibrium.

Not everyone agrees that anything is broken

Market analyst Gordon Gecko, a prominent user on X, pushed back, saying the pain was intentional and structural but not functional.

“Nothing is broken; this is how the market makers intended it. Sentiment is at its lowest level in years; traders are losing everything. It's not supposed to be easy; only the strong will be rewarded,” he wrote.

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That split reflects a profound change in how crypto works compared to previous cycles. During Trump's first term in office from 2017 to 2020, crypto thrived in a regulatory vacuum.

Retail speculation held sway, leverage was unproven, and a reactionary momentum drove prices above their fundamental values.

Under Biden, by contrast, the market became institutionalized. Enforcement-first regulation limits risk-taking, while EFAs, custodians and compliance frameworks have changed the allocation and flow of capital.

Interestingly, many of crypto's most anticipated tailwinds have arrived in this more tumultuous era:

ETFs have opened access, but mainly to Bitcoin institutions, but are often mechanically hedged and balanced. There was fluidity, but it flowed into TradFi packaging rather than the on-chain ecosystem.

The result is without stimulation measurement.

Bitcoin will catch on as Altcoins break into the new crypto system.

This structural change has been especially painful for altcoins, with analysts and KOLs like Shanaka Anslem and others arguing that a unified crypto market no longer exists.

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Instead, 2025 is split into “two games”:

Institutional crypto: Bitcoin, Ethereum and ETFs with suppressed volatility and longer time horizons, and focus crypto: where millions of tokens compete for fleeting liquidity and collapse over several days.

Capital doesn't flow smoothly from bitcoin to alts, the term-altcoin season or the alt season. It flows directly into the authority it is designed to serve.

“…Your only choices now: play institutional crypto with patience and macro awareness. Or play focused crypto with speed and infrastructure,” Anslem wrote.

According to this opinion leader, holding altcoins on thesis for months is the worst strategy right now.

“They haven't reached the bottom line yet. They're waiting for a market structure that doesn't exist,” he added.

Perhaps this is the basis of the trader's conviction in knowing where to look. Lisa Edwards supports this thesis, calling on market participants to understand liquidity flows.

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“Things change, cycles change, money moves in new ways. If you're waiting for the old Alsace, you're going to miss things that are running right in front of you,” she said.

Quintin Francois echoes that view, noting that the 2025 token count will dwarf previous cycles. With over 11 million tokens in existence, the idea of ​​a broad altseason similar to 2017 or 2021 may simply be outdated.

Between Replacement and Recovery: The Post-Institutional Challenge of Crypto

Meanwhile, macro pressures continue to weigh on sentiment. Bitcoin's slide toward its 100-week moving average (MA) reflects renewed AI bubble fears, uncertainty over future Fed leadership and year-end tax loss selling, according to investment analyst and Coin Bureau co-founder Nick Pukrin.

“This will all end in 2025,” he said in an email to BeinCrypto, warning that BTC could drop below $80,000 in the short term if the sell-off accelerates.

Whether crypto is crashing or trending is anyone's guess, and investors should do their own research.

However, what is clear is that Trump-era expectations are clashing with Biden-era market structures, and the old playbook no longer applies.

Discussions between economists and investors at the main tables suggest a brutal condemnation or violent rally, which could define crypto's post-institutional identity.