A new report from CoinGecko indicates that 2025 is already the worst year for crypto project collapses: in the first quarter alone, 1.8 million tokens failed, representing 49.7% of all declines recorded between 2021 and 2025.
The analysis focused on objective data, without assigning direct blame. Nevertheless, it raises the hypothesis that market volatility during Trump's presidency may have contributed to the high failure rate.
Why are so many tokens disappearing?
The crypto industry is accustomed to cycles of rise and fall. A striking example is NFTs, which were once a trend but now have more than 95% of those assets dead.
CoinGecko's latest report shows that 2025 was an exceptional year in this regard. Compared to 2024, there were fewer token launches and many more crypto project failures just in the first quarter.
Dead Crypto Projects per Year. Source: CoinGecko
CoinMarketCap data shows that over 14.65 million different tokens are currently active, and the number has been steadily increasing.
A year ago, the number of tracked tokens was only 2.7 million. Since then, the main driver of this growth has been the memecoin boom on the Solana network, which now accounts for over 60% of all existing tokens.
Rising Solana Memecoins. Source: CoinMarketCap
However, this rapid increase in crypto projects has also led to more dead tokens. The memecoin sector is particularly volatile, and the industry has faced collapses on several previous occasions.
Moreover, an excess of project launches can dilute the potential of this market, sinking prominent projects due to concerns about quality and declining returns.
More than half of the tokens launched since 2021 have already collapsed.
CoinGecko also revealed another noteworthy fact: according to its assessment, 52.7% of crypto projects active since 2021 are dead. New launches still outnumber collapses, but the trend does not seem sustainable.
The report proposes a clear hypothesis for this behavior. CoinGecko considers it credible that Trump's tariff threats and subsequent recession fears are responsible for these dead crypto projects. The launch of memecoins dramatically increased after his election, and market turbulence is wiping them out.
To be clear, CoinGecko's study did not attempt to prove a cause; it only analyzed the failures themselves. Complicated factors may be creating all these dead crypto projects.
Still, it identified trends, and the concrete data is convincing in itself. The memecoin industry, as it is currently defined, may not last at this pace.
The article Almost 2 million crypto tokens collapsed in Q1 2025 was first seen on BeInCrypto Brazil.
