Few investors can readily answer this question. This is the inconvenient truth facing the market in 2026. Among the tens of thousands of projects packaged with glossy white papers and roadmaps, which ones are truly impacting our lives?
2025 has been recorded as the cruelest "year of extinction" in cryptocurrency history. According to CoinGecko data, a staggering 11.6 million tokens died in 2025 alone. This wasn't due to poor market conditions or excessive regulation. It was simply the result of projects that had no reason to exist in the first place finding their place.
The life cycle of most projects is a dead ringer. Millions of dollars are raised with a product that lacks substance and a seemingly plausible roadmap. Development takes a backseat, and marketing and hype drive up the token price. As retail investors, intoxicated by the promise of "innovation," open their wallets, founders and venture capitalists (VCs) dump their assets and flee. All that's left are tokens that have become worthless pieces of paper and victims who cry "Hold on!"
This is not an investment, it is an 'exit strategy' game with a white paper.
Among cryptocurrencies, so-called "utility tokens," 99% have no real utility. Without users, there are no revenues. Without revenues, the token's value relies solely on the liquidity of new entrants. This is no different from a Ponzi scheme. The memecoin craze, which allowed anyone to issue tokens in minutes, accelerated the creation of this "waste," ultimately leading to the disaster of 11.6 million projects being abandoned.
But the surviving 1% are different. Stablecoins like Tether (USDT) and Circle (USDC), as well as Bitcoin and Ethereum, which have built massive ecosystems, don't necessarily shout out their prices on social media. This is because they have real products, real users, and real revenue generated through them. The products have reached a point where they can prove themselves.
The market must change now. Simply promising "what we'll do in the future" is no longer enough. Cryptocurrencies that fail to prove "what they're doing now," "who's actually using it," and "where the profits are coming from" will be eliminated.
The 2025 carnage is a stark warning for the cryptocurrency market. With the 99% of bubbles bursting, only the 1% that creates real value will survive. Does your portfolio contain that 1%, or are you just carrying someone else's dirty laundry? It's time to ask yourself this.
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