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The Securitize IPO is a bellwether moment, creating the first publicly-traded company focused purely on the infrastructure for tokenizing real-world assets.
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Correctly calling a market peak is a notoriously tricky endeavor.
Case in point: When tech stocks and startup funding hit their last cyclical peak four years ago, few knew it was the optimal time to cease new deals and cash in liquidatable holdings.
This time around, quite a few market watchers are wondering if the tech stock and AI boom has reached bubble territory. And, as we explored in Friday’s column, there are plenty of similarities between current conditions and the 2021 peak.
Even so, by other measures we’re also in starkly different territory. The current boom is far more concentrated in AI and a handful of hot companies. The exit environment is also much quieter. And of course, the macro conditions don’t resemble 2021, which had the combined economic effects of the COVID pandemic and historically low interest rates.
Below, we look at four of the top reasons why this time is different.
Four years ago, funding to most venture-backed sectors was sharply on the rise. That’s not the case this time around. While AI megarounds accumulate, funding to startups in myriad other sectors continues to languish.
Biotech is on track to capture the smallest percentage of U.S. venture investment on record this year. Cleantech investment looks poised to hit a multiyear low. And consumer products startups also remain out of vogue, alongside quite a few other sectors that once attracted big venture checks.
The emergence of AI haves and non-AI have-nots means that if we do see a correction, it could be limited in scope. Sectors that haven’t seen a boom by definition won’t see a post-boom crash. (Though further declines are possible.)
The new offering market was on fire in 2020 and 2021, with traditional IPOs, direct listings and SPAC mergers all flooding exchanges with new ticker symbols to track.
In recent quarters, by contrast, the IPO market has been alive, but not especially lively. We’ve seen a few large offerings, with CoreWeave, Figma and Circle among the standouts.
But overall, numbers are way down.
In 2021, there were hundreds of U.S. seed or venture-backed companies that debuted on NYSE or Nasdaq, per Crunchbase data. This year, there have been less than 50.
Meanwhile, the most prominent unicorns of the AI era, like OpenAI and Anthropic, remain private companies with no buzz about an imminent IPO. As such, they don’t see the day-to-day fluctuations typical of public companies. Any drop in valuation, if it happens, could play out slowly and quietly.
That brings us to our next point: In addition to spreading their largesse across fewer sectors, startup investors are also backing fewer companies.
This year, the percentage of startup funding going to megarounds of $100 million or more reached an all-time high in the U.S. and came close to a record global level. A single deal, OpenAI’s $40 billion March financing, accounted for roughly a quarter of U.S. megaround funding.
At the same time, fewer startup financings are getting done. This past quarter, for instance, reported deal count hit the lowest level in years, even as investment rose.
The last peak occurred amid an unusual financial backdrop, with economies beginning to emerge from the depths of the COVID pandemic and ultra-low interest rates contributing to investors shouldering more risk in pursuit of returns.
This time around, the macro environment is in a far different place, with “a “low fire, low hire” U.S. job market, AI disrupting or poised to disrupt a wide array of industries and occupations, a weaker dollar and a long list of other unusual drivers.
What both periods share in common, however, is the inexorable climb of big tech valuations, which brings us to our final thought.
While the argument that this time it’s different is a familiar one, the usual plot lines do tend to repeat themselves. Valuations overshoot, and they come down. And then the cycle repeats.
We may not have reached the top of the current cycle. But it’s certainly looking a lot closer to peak than trough.
Illustration: Dom Guzman
Updated on 27th October, 205
This article was first published on The Bit Journal.
Kraken revenue has reached unprecedented heights in the third quarter of 2025, marking a pivotal moment for both the exchange and the wider crypto market. The U.S.-based company reported $648 million in revenue and $178.6 million in adjusted EBITDA, a 114% year-over-year increase, underscoring the strength and resilience of its operations.
Kraken revenue increased 50% quarter over quarter, and adjusted EBITDA increased 124 percent, pushing profit margins to 27.6%, in what analysts term a clear sign of market maturity.
The exchange recorded a 23 percent increase in volume of trading of $561.9 billion in the last quarter, and currently has over $59.3 billion of client assets. Having 5.2 million funded accounts, Kraken is now on the same level with other major exchanges across the world, such as Coinbase and Binance.
The Kraken revenue growth was impressive and it did not occur in a vacuum. The success of the exchange is a year of strategic growth and product diversification. Its acquisitions of Small Exchange and NinjaTrader have strengthened its dominance in derivatives trading and broadened its access to the U.S market two areas where many competitors continue to have regulatory uncertainty.
Along the same innovative line, Kraken launched xStocks in collaboration with Backed, which enables investor crowds across 160 countries to trade U.S. equities into a token.
This innovative act blends conventional finance with Web3 because intermediaries and time constraints on the market have disappeared. Within several months, xStocks has produced over $5 billion in trading volume, which has additionally added to the overall Kraken revenue performance.
The robust Kraken financial results in Q3 have heightened market anticipations of an initial public offering (IPO). In 2025, the company had previously raised $500 million at a valuation of $15 billion and it is said to be undergoing another funding round that would potentially value the company at 20 billion a definite indicator of investor optimism regarding Kraken revenue growth and stability.
In case it becomes publicly traded in 2026, Kraken would be one of the publicly traded exchanges alongside Coinbase, Bullish and Gemini. However, the clear Proof-of-Reserves system, diversified revenue sources and excellent regulatory position put Kraken in a safer situation compared to most of its counterparts.
The gradually increasing Kraken revenue is more than just an indicator of financial success; it is the general change of the digital asset industry. The quarterly Proof-of-Reserves audits, adoption of distributed validator technology (DVT) to support Ethereum staking, and open reporting have gained the company a lot of institutional credibility.
With the Trump administration becoming increasingly crypto-friendly, the further integration of Kraken into U.S. regulated derivatives and institutional services can further drive Kraken revenue growth in the next few quarters.
Kraken revenue performance can be seen as a manifestation of the vision of a mature crypto company in a volatile and fast-moving landscape that is disciplined, profitable, and at the crossroads of traditional finance and the open economy of Web3.
Kraken’s record-breaking quarter signals more than financial strength it reflects the crypto industry’s steady shift toward institutional maturity. The shift towards a public listing by the exchange appears more and more definite, as it gains regulatory integration, product diversification, and transparency, making Kraken one of the shaping forces of the next stage in the evolution of world digital finance.
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Kraken Revenue: Income from trading, staking, and crypto services.
EBITDA: Measure of Kraken’s operational profit.
Derivatives Trading: Crypto futures and options trading.
xStocks: Tokenized U.S. stock trading on Kraken.
Tokenized Equities: Blockchain-based versions of traditional stocks.
Proof-of-Reserves: Audit verifying Kraken’s asset holdings.
DVT (Distributed Validator Technology): Enhances Ethereum staking security.
IPO (Initial Public Offering): Kraken’s potential public listing.
Web3: Decentralized internet with blockchain integration.
$648M in revenue and $178.6M in EBITDA.
Strong trading, derivatives, and xStocks success.
Yes, a possible 2026 public listing.
Proof-of-Reserves, U.S. regulation, and diversified income.
Read More: Kraken Reports Record $648M in Revenue, Eyes 2026 IPO After Massive Q3 Surge">Kraken Reports Record $648M in Revenue, Eyes 2026 IPO After Massive Q3 Surge
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