XRP, Zcash and Algorand Stand Out in 2025’s Selective Market
New Year Special
Crypto markets became more institutional and increasingly regulated in 2025, yet a broad-based “altcoin season” did not materialize. Bitcoin (BTC) set new highs earlier in the cycle, but much of the market underperformed. By early October, a sell-off left Bitcoin down approximately 7% year-to-date, while the combined market capitalization of altcoins fell by more than 46% from its 2025 peak, according to TradingView.
BTC and others, year-to-date chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
Despite the backdrop, several tokens outpaced the market. XRP (XRP) advanced on improving regulatory clarity, Zcash (ZEC) rallied amid renewed interest in financial privacy, and Algorand (ALGO) benefited from real-world tokenization initiatives.
XRP gains as regulatory uncertainty fades
XRP was among the stronger performers in 2025, advancing even without a broad altcoin upswing. The token rose more than 35% in July and reached a yearly high of $3.60 on July 23, marking an eight-fold increase from the prior year’s low of $0.43 on Aug. 5, 2024, per TradingView.
Momentum built alongside signs of regulatory resolution, including early reports pointing to the conclusion of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) longstanding case against Ripple Labs. Ripple and the SEC moved to end their dispute on Aug. 8, according to a court filing, submitting a joint letter requesting dismissal of the SEC’s appeal and Ripple’s cross-appeal, with each party covering its own costs and fees.
“The market is clearly rotating toward assets that regulators can classify, institutions can model, and compliance teams can sign off on. XRP fit that profile better than most altcoins this year,” said Alex Davis, Founder and CEO at blockchain ecosystem Mavryk Dynamics. He noted that resolving a multi-year legal overhang helped reopen institutional participation.
The SEC filed suit against Ripple in December 2020, alleging the company raised $1.3 billion through unregistered sales of XRP. Further interest followed the Nov. 13 launch of the Canary Capital XRP exchange-traded fund (ETF), which market participants viewed as a signal for institutional exposure to altcoins, according to Isaac Joshua, CEO of crypto startup platform Gems Launchpad.
Joshua cited three primary drivers behind XRP’s relative strength: “regulatory clarity, new institutional inflows, and a growing perception of real-world usage.” He added, “Looking into next year, if ETF demand remains strong and payment volumes keep rising, XRP may continue shifting from a speculative altcoin into a more established piece of global payment infrastructure.”
XRP ETFs recorded $756 million in net positive inflows over their first 11 trading days.
XRP/USD weekly year-to-date chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView
Zcash advances as privacy demand returns
Zcash drew increased attention in 2025 as interest in privacy-focused assets grew alongside tighter oversight of crypto transactions and identity. By mid-November, it became the most-searched cryptocurrency on Coinbase, surpassing both Bitcoin and XRP in investor interest.
ZEC rose more than 12-fold from a yearly low of $48 to a high of $744 on Nov. 7, one month after a record $19 billion market decline in early October, according to TradingView. While Zcash set a new yearly high in 2025, it remained below its all-time peak of $5,941 from Oct. 29, 2016.
Narek Gevorgyan, founder and CEO of portfolio management platform CoinStats, said privacy-focused assets outperformed amid growing demand for “financial confidentiality” in an increasingly monitored digital economy. “The recent momentum is driven more by structural factors—tightening KYC/AML rules on exchanges, increasing government scrutiny of crypto transactions, and renewed interest from institutions and developers in zero-knowledge technologies,” he said.
Launched in 2016, Zcash uses a proof-of-work consensus mechanism along with zero-knowledge proofs, allowing both transparent and fully shielded transactions where amounts and addresses are concealed. Reflecting heightened usage, the number of ZEC held in shielded addresses increased to about 4.5 million coins from 1.7 million in 2025 as of Nov. 25, with 1 million tokens moving in a three-week span.
Additional factors included Zcash’s halving on Nov. 23, 2024, which reduced the block reward to 1.5625 ZEC from 3.125 ZEC and cut daily issuance to roughly 1,800 tokens from 3,600.
Algorand gains on tokenization initiatives
Algorand drew early-year attention on signs of expanding real-world applications. ALGO climbed about 48% in three weeks, moving from $0.33 at the end of December 2024 to exceed a yearly high of $0.49 on Jan. 17, per TradingView.
On Jan. 21, Algorand partnered with Enel Group, one of Europe’s largest electricity providers by customer count, enabling Italian residents to purchase fractional shares of Enel’s solar and wind projects through tokenized Energy Utility Tokens.
“These developments reinforce Algorand’s underlying technical strengths and its focus on enterprise-grade, environmentally aligned use cases,” said Lacie Zhang, market analyst at Bitget Wallet. She noted that the chain’s real-world integrations “position the chain well for long-term relevance.”
However, Zhang said the token’s weak annual performance reflected broader structural conditions rather than project-specific issues, citing macro headwinds such as higher interest rates and Bitcoin’s prolonged dominance drawing most crypto liquidity. “In this environment, strong technical progress has not translated into price performance,” she added, while indicating that Algorand and other projects with real-world integrations could recover as investors pivot from speculation to utility-driven adoption.
Despite limited price gains after January, on-chain activity continued to grow. Staked ALGO rose 28% quarter-over-quarter to more than 1.95 billion tokens in the second quarter of 2025, according to a Messari research report.
In March, Algorand released AlgoKit 3.0, an upgraded developer toolkit, and plans to launch AlgoKit 4.0 in early 2026 with composable smart contract libraries and support for Rust, Swift, and Kotlin.
A selective market heading into 2026
The divergence between Bitcoin and the broader market left 2025 characterized by selective, fundamentals-driven performance rather than a classic cycle pattern. While some market participants still anticipate an altcoin season based on prior cycles, the current structure indicates a maturing ecosystem in which projects require practical utility to gain traction.
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