The booming U.S. stock market has, since early 2025, spurred hundreds of IPOs and, in most cases, these new offerings have delivered fine returns. But when it comes to newly-public crypto companies, their stock performance has, with two notable exceptions, been a disaster. Now, as another crop of crypto IPOs waits in the wings, it’s worth asking whether the sector as a whole is ready for primetime in the public markets.
To learn the state of play, I reviewed the share price performance of the recent vintage of 20 or so publicly-listed crypto companies. It’s not a pretty picture. Among the companies that pursued a traditional IPO, only Circle is trading close to its listing price—and that’s primarily thanks to the colossal opening day pop the company enjoyed back in June of 2025. The second best performer among the recent crypto IPO class is the blockchain-based mortgage lender, Figure, which is down around 19% from its listing day last September. That’s not calamitous, but it’s still ugly, especially when compared to the broader S&P 500, which has returned around 13% during that time.
