Crypto’s Wild Ride: Guide, Deliver, or Get Liquidated!

by

CoinDesk Indices

What to know:

Ah, you’ve stumbled upon Crypto Long & Short, our weekly newsletter where we dissect the absurdities of the crypto world for the professional investor. Or, as we like to call them, the brave souls who haven’t yet run screaming for the hills. Sign up here to join the madness every Wednesday.

Welcome to the asylum, also known as our institutional newsletter. This week, we’ve got a smorgasbord of delights:

  • Jordan Brewer on the missing piece in token markets: institutional-grade investor relations (or, as we call it, “the art of not liquidating your treasury”).
  • Martin Burgherr on crypto markets maturing, becoming more efficient, and less of a wild west for institutions (though let’s be honest, it’s still pretty wild).
  • Top headlines institutions should pay attention to by Francisco Rodrigues (because who doesn’t love a good crypto drama?).
  • Collector Crypt: revenue recovery meets token re-rating in Chart of the Week (spoiler: it’s a rollercoaster).

-Alexandra Levis, your guide through this madness.

Expert Insights

Guide, deliver, repeat: the hidden driver of token performance (or how not to crash and burn)

By Jordan Brewer, investment analyst, Runa Digital Assets (aka the guy who’s seen it all)

In early March, just three months after a Solana Breakpoint mainstage appearance by Ranger Finance co-founder Fathur Rahman (who probably thought he was onto a winner), and two months post-ICO, tokenholders forced the liquidation of the protocol’s treasury. How does a 14x oversubscribed ICO unravel so quickly? Simple: poor investor relations. Or, as we like to say, “the art of promising the moon and delivering a potato.”

Institutional-grade investor relations remains the missing piece in token markets. Crypto has spent years in a venture-style framework, but now protocols want public market investors to provide more durable capital. Translation: they want your money, but they’re not quite sure how to keep it. A key part of investor relations is a regular investor call where management walks through forward guidance – teams at Maple Finance and EtherFi are leading here (or at least trying not to trip over their own feet).

It pays to give guidance (as long as you beat it, otherwise, good luck)

Research shows the value of forward guidance isn’t just in providing it, it’s in its accuracy. Bartov, Givoly, and Hayn (2002) found that firms that consistently meet or beat their own guidance enjoy a measurable stock price premium over firms that don’t. This premium compounds for “habitual beaters,” meaning the market increasingly trusts and rewards management teams that repeatedly deliver. Or, as we like to say, “the market loves a winner, but it adores a consistent winner.”

Crypto is beginning to produce its own version of this dynamic. In December 2024, when Maple’s AUM was $460 million and their ARR was $4 million, Maple set guidance of $4 billion in AUM and $25 million in ARR for 2025 and later raised guidance to $5 billion in AUM and $30 million in ARR. Maple delivered, hitting $5 billion in AUM and $28 million in 30-day annualized revenue in October (see table below). That’s a guide-and-deliver cadence that any public market investor would recognize and reward. From December 2024 to June 2025, the SYRUP token price rose from $0.10 to a high of $0.60, outperforming competitors like AAVE by 475%. Not bad for a market that’s still figuring out what day of the week it is.


EtherFi is another example of this dynamic. On their March 2026 tokenholder call, the team projected a 55% reduction in customer acquisition cost while raising their advertising budget 420% throughout 2026, which would imply 11x year-over-year customer growth. That’s the kind of specific guidance that gives investors something concrete to hold them to. Or, as we like to say, “put your money where your mouth is, and maybe don’t eat it later.”

However, guidance without delivery is just marketing. Investor relations in crypto doesn’t end with a dashboard, that’s where it starts. Guidance and accountability are at the heart of credibility for protocol teams, and it is credibility that builds conviction in public investors. Or, to put it another way, “don’t promise the moon if you can’t even leave the atmosphere.”

Principled Perspectives

Institutions are separating custody from execution in crypto (because who wants to keep all their eggs in one volatile basket?)

By Martin Burgherr, chief clients officer, Sygnum Bank (aka the guy who’s seen the chaos and lived to tell the tale)

There is a quiet but significant shift underway in how institutional capital moves through crypto markets. Major trading firms are increasingly separating where they hold assets from where they execute trades. More than a tactical change, it signals a broader evolution in digital asset market structure. Or, as we like to say, “it’s about time they stopped treating crypto like a wild west saloon.”

For most of crypto’s institutional history, there has been a basic architectural assumption: to access liquidity, you keep capital on the exchange. Historically, if you want to trade on an on-chain options exchange or run strategies across multiple venues, you wire the collateral to each exchange and leave it there. The model works, until you ask what it costs. And let me tell you, it costs a lot more than just money-it costs sanity.

That cost is not just counterparty risk, though that matters too. It is capital inefficiency. Every dollar posted as margin on an exchange sits idle, earns nothing, and cannot be redeployed. For an institutional trading desk managing hundreds of millions in positions, the opportunity cost is enormous – and in a rising-rate environment, it is getting harder to justify. Or, as we like to say, “idle money is the devil’s workshop.”

The infrastructure is catching up (finally)

The separation of custody and execution is not theoretical. Firms including Wintermute and Nomura’s digital asset arm Laser Digital are already operating this way, using collateral held in regulated bank custody while maintaining full access to exchange liquidity. BlackRock’s BUIDL tokenized money market fund, which sits at roughly $2.5 billion AUM, is now accepted as off-exchange collateral. The infrastructure is not being built by startups. It is being built by the institutions that intend to use it. Or, as we like to say, “the big boys are finally playing with their own toys.”

When collateral moves into regulated custody, it can take a different form. U.S. Treasuries or tokenized money market fund shares can serve as trading collateral while earning yield. The collateral does not just sit in a vault – it remains productive while still backing trading activity. Capital that previously sat inert can now generate returns, reducing the effective cost of maintaining trading positions. This is not a marginal efficiency gain. It fundamentally changes the economics of running an institutional crypto trading operation. Or, as we like to say, “it’s like discovering your couch can also make you coffee.”

A maturing market structure (or at least, less of a circus)

Crypto is beginning to follow a familiar pattern. Traditional finance solved this problem long ago – equities trade on exchanges, assets settle through custodians. The two functions live in different places, governed by different entities. That separation is what makes institutional participation possible at scale. Or, as we like to say, “it’s about time crypto stopped reinventing the wheel and just used the one that works.”

According to EY-Parthenon’s 2026 institutional investor survey, 73% of institutional investors plan to increase their digital asset allocations this year, with respondents getting more selective about counterparty risk. The infrastructure is scaling to meet them. The migration is already underway. Or, as we like to say, “the herd is moving, and it’s about time.”

Headlines of the Week

By Francisco Rodrigues (aka the man who reads the news so you don’t have to)

This week’s headlines highlight that while the bridges between traditional finance and the crypto sector keep on growing, the devastation caused by smart contract exploits is hitting the market. Or, as we like to say, “one step forward, two steps back-welcome to crypto.”

  • U.S. military runs a Bitcoin node, sees crypto as ‘power projection’ vs China: Admiral Samuel Paparo, head of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, told Congress that INDOPACOM is operating a live node on the Bitcoin network for cybersecurity testing and views the protocol as a tool of American power projection against China. Or, as we like to say, “crypto: the new Cold War frontier.”
  • Aave raises nearly 80% of the $200 million it needs to cover bad debt left by Kelp DAO exploit: The DeFi United recovery initiative has gathered roughly $160 million of the $200 million needed to recapitalize rsETH and erase the bad debt, with Mantle and the Aave DAO supplying 55,000 ETH, around $127 million, of the total. Or, as we like to say, “crypto: where the community bails you out, one ETH at a time.”
  • More than 100 crypto firms urge Senate to move on U.S. market structure bill: A coalition including Coinbase, Ripple, Kraken, Andreessen Horowitz, and Paradigm wrote to the Senate Banking Committee pressing for a markup of the Clarity Act, warning that without a federal crypto framework, investment and jobs will move offshore to jurisdictions like the EU that already have one. Or, as we like to say, “crypto: the great regulatory migration.”
  • JPMorgan says persistent security flaws curb DeFi’s institutional appeal: Wall Street’s largest bank told clients that repeated bridge and infrastructure exploits, headlined by the KelpDAO attack that wiped roughly $20 billion in TVL within days, and flat ETH-denominated growth are pushing capital toward Tether’s USDT and keeping institutions on the sidelines. Or, as we like to say, “crypto: where security is a feature, not a bug.”
  • EU’s largest measures against Russia yet include escalation of crypto sanctions evasion: Brussels’ 20th sanctions package imposes a sectoral ban on all Russia-based crypto service providers and DeFi platforms, prohibits transactions in the digital ruble and the RUBx stablecoin, and designates the Kyrgyz exchange TengriCoin, the first time a third-country VASP has been hit for facilitating the Garantex-Grinex-A7A5 evasion network. Or, as we like to say, “crypto: the new frontier in geopolitical chess.”

Chart of the Week

Collector Crypt: revenue recovery meets token re-rating (or, the crypto rollercoaster continues)

After peaking in September 2025, Collector Crypt’s weekly revenue pulled back sharply before grinding back to ~$1 million/week since March – with the CEO’s revenue-funded buyback programme providing a mechanical bid under CARDS throughout the recovery. The recent price spike was then turbo-charged by a community update on April 24 claiming $146.9 million Q1 revenue and $8.6 million profit, though the token remains 73% below its all-time high. Or, as we like to say, “crypto: where the only constant is volatility.”

Looking for more? Receive the latest crypto news from coindesk.com and market updates from coindesk.com/institutions. Or, as we like to say, “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em-and then write about it.”

Read More

2026-04-29 18:02