Crypto insiders 'dispirited' by 'messy' value free fall despite Trump’s embrace

After a week in which the cryptocurrency market wiped out billions of dollars in value, crypto insiders are feeling “dispirited” despite President Trump's embrace of the industry.

Bitcoin has fallen nearly 50 percent from its October peak of more than $126,000 and erased all the gains made since Trump's election, according to the recent report in Politico.

Wiping out billions of dollars in value, the company Strategy — which built its business model around buying large amounts of bitcoin — reported a $12.4 billion net loss for the final quarter of 2025. Michael Novogratz's Galaxy Digital meanwhile lost nearly $500 million, while Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss' Gemini is slashing up to 200 jobs and leaving international cryptocurrency markets.

“I’ve never seen people so dispirited about the crypto industry before, even at the lowest lows," Nic Carter, founding partner of the crypto investment firm Castle Island Ventures, told Politico. "Psychologically, this feels really hard for people to handle.”

He later added, “The rapture didn’t happen, we’re just stuck here on Earth and it sucks.”

Novogratz, putting his own spin on the situation, told analysts that “anyone who’s been in crypto for more than five years realizes that part of the ethos of this whole industry is pain.” His attitude was echoed by Saylor, who professed faith in Trump by telling Politico “we have a bitcoin president, and he’s intent upon making America the bitcoin superpower, the crypto capital of the world and the leader in digital assets.”

Steve Sosnick, chief strategist for Interactive Brokers, was far less sanguine.

“There’s a huge unwind in a wide range of speculative trades, certainly cryptocurrencies,” Sosnick said. "The problem is when you have very crowded trades, it can get very messy when the psychology causes people to all head for the exits at the same time."

The cryptocurrency trades have become considerably more crowded since Trump took office, with the president frequently promoting the controversial and volatile monetary medium. The president promoted a meme coin based on himself, as well as one based on First Lady Melania Trump. A Wall Street Journal report in September revealed Trump accepted a $500 million investment from the Abu Dhabi royal family in his family’s crypto venture, months before he gave the United Arab Emirates access to highly sensitive artificial intelligence chip technology.

Trump’s crypto deregulations have been so lucrative for crypto investors that a group awarded the president with a 15-foot gold-covered statue of himself called “Don Colossus.”

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