The Algorand Foundation on Wednesday joined the ranks of crypto firms slashing headcount, losing 25% of its fewer than 200 employees and citing “the uncertain global macro environment” and a broader crypto downturn.

The cuts arrived as a wave of layoffs proliferates across the industry. In February, Gemini Space Station (GEMI) said it would eliminate roughly 200 positions, about a quarter of its staff, a figure that had grown to 30% by mid-March. On Thursday, Crypto.com said it is trimming 12%, about 180 roles.

That’s on top of 20 employees who got the chop at OP Labs, the company building layer-2 blockchain Optimism, earlier this month and the five full-time employees and three contractors let go at PIP Labs, the team behind Story Protocol, 10% of its workforce. Messari, a crypto data provider that now bills itself as an AI-first company, announced its third round of layoffs since 2023 alongside a CEO change, without giving a number.

Official explanations varied. Algorand pointed squarely at macro conditions and weak token prices, though many framed their cuts as a pivot toward greater use of AI in the workflow.

“AI is now too powerful not to use at Gemini,” the company said in its letter to shareholders. “Not using AI at Gemini will soon be the equivalent of showing up to work with a typewriter instead of a laptop.”

“We are joining the list of companies integrating enterprise-wide AI,” a Crypto.com spokesperson told CoinDesk on Thursday, pointing to increased efficiencies needing fewer workers. CEO Kris Marszalek on X said companies that do not pivot toward integrating AI into their processes will fail.

Algorand’s cuts reportedly hit community management and business development roles, not positions obviously displaced by AI. To be fair, the company blamed the broader crypto environment. It’s ALGO token recently traded around $0.09, down 98% from its 2019 peak. Bitcoin BTC$70,314.33, the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, has lost 20% this quarter.

Industry consolidation

Industry observers pointed to a broader consolidation dynamic. Entire crypto sectors like restaking, DePIN and layer 2s, which were once flush with talent have contracted sharply, while M&A activity is adding to redundancies as acqui-hires — employees acquired by buying a company — displace legacy employees.

“I see no real indication that these layoffs have anything to do with AI workforce replacement at scale,” said Dan Escow, the founder of crypto recruitment agency Up Top. “Entire categories like restaking, DePIN and L2s that were once robust with talent are basically non-existent. Companies are forced into cost-cutting mode to buy time to figure out how to execute on whatever comes next.”

The broader hiring picture supports that reading. New job postings across major crypto job boards ran at roughly 6.5 per day in January, down around 80% from the same period a year earlier.

Just the companies mentioned in this story — excluding Messari, which did not disclose numbers — have announced around 450 job cuts in a matter of weeks. Thay may be the tip of the iceberg, in crypto winter of 2022 CoinDesk tracked more than 26,000 job losses over the course of the year, a tally that took months to become apparent.

TLDR:

• XRPL now hosts $2.3 billion in tokenized real-world assets, drawing major institutional players worldwide.
  
• The XRP Ledger settles transactions in 3 to 5 seconds at fractions of a penny, far outpacing traditional wire transfers.
  
• Société Générale, SBI Holdings, and Braza Bank have all launched financial products directly on the XRPL platform.
  
• Ripple has processed over $100 billion in volume across a network of more than 300 global financial institutions.

The story of money spans thousands of years, from grain trades in ancient villages to decentralized digital ledgers. Each era of exchange solved a problem the previous one could not.

Today, the XRP Ledger stands at the end of that long chain of innovation. With $2.3 billion in tokenized real-world assets and three to five second settlement, XRPL represents the most complete financial infrastructure ever built on a blockchain.

How Every Era of Money Removed a Middleman

Ancient economies ran on barter, trading grain for cattle, salt for silk, and labor for shelter. That system worked within small communities where both parties held what the other needed.

However, it collapsed under its own limits. You cannot carry livestock to a market and expect a clean trade every time.

Coins and precious metals solved that problem. Gold and silver gave value a portable, universal form. For centuries, commerce expanded on the back of metal currency. Then governments stepped in, replacing metal with paper, and banks took control of the system entirely.

Wire transfers and SWIFT later allowed money to cross oceans for the first time. Yet the cost remained steep, ranging between $10 and $50 per transaction.

Settlements took days, not seconds. Worse, correspondent banking required roughly $27 trillion locked in idle accounts just to function.

Bitcoin arrived as the first serious break from centralized control. It proved that value could travel without a bank acting as intermediary.

But Bitcoin was slow, expensive, and never designed for everyday payments. The architecture that actually completed the journey came next.

Why XRPL Closes the Chapter That Bitcoin Opened

RippleXity described the arc plainly on X: “From Barter to Blockchain. The Story of Money and Why XRPL Is the Final Chapter.” XRPL was the first blockchain to support native tokenization of any currency.

Dollars, euros, yen, and reais can all be issued and traded directly on the ledger. No smart contracts, no complex programming, just trustlines, tokens, and a built-in decentralized exchange.

The numbers behind the ledger reflect that ambition. It processes up to 1,500 transactions per second at fractions of a penny per transfer.

Settlement completes in three to five seconds. The network also operates on a carbon neutral model, which matters to institutions with governance commitments.

Major financial players have already moved onto the ledger. Société Générale launched its euro stablecoin on XRPL. SBI Holdings issued a $65 million on-chain bond through the platform.

Braza Bank brought a Brazilian real stablecoin to the ledger as well. Ripple’s own RLUSD stablecoin has crossed $1.5 billion in market capitalization.

Ripple now counts over 300 financial institutions in its network and has processed more than $100 billion in volume.

The company has applied for a Federal Reserve master account and filed VASP licenses across multiple jurisdictions. Every stage of money’s history removed one layer of friction. XRPL appears to have removed the rest.

The recent guidance from the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission establishing a taxonomy for digital assets put a “final nail” in the coffin of SEC policy under former Chairman Gary Gensler, according to Alex Thorn, the head of firmwide research at investment firm Galaxy.

The SEC guidance, published on Tuesday, established a taxonomy for digital assets, dividing them into five categories, including digital commodities, digital collectibles like non-fungible tokens (NFTs), digital tools, stablecoins, and tokenized securities. 

Under the old SEC policy framework, the regulations governing which cryptocurrencies met the legal criteria of “investment contracts” were legislative rules, as opposed to the new 2026 guidance that was filed as an interpretive rule, Thorn said. He explained the significance:

“The distinction matters enormously under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). A legislative rule or substantive rule goes through notice-and-comment rule-making, has the force and effect of law, and binds both the agency and regulated parties. 

An interpretive rule is exempt from notice-and-comment requirements, does not have the force of law, and merely explains how the agency understands existing statutory provisions,” he continued. 

The interpretive rule does not legally bind courts to enforce the policies, which gives the SEC and the crypto industry flexibility in adapting to future regulatory changes, he added.

The new regulatory approach gives the crypto industry much-needed clarity over the next 30 months, Thorn Said; however, he clarified that the CLARITY crypto market structure bill must be codified into law to cement the rules over the next several decades. 

Related: SEC interpretation on crypto laws ‘a beginning, not an end,’ says Atkins

The CLARITY Act stalls, but rumors emerge of a tentative deal between White House and lawmakers

The CLARITY Act stalled in January 2025, after crypto exchange Coinbase and other industry players voiced concerns over the prohibition on stablecoin yield and a lack of protections for open-source software developers.

Crypto companies and industry thought leaders also cited provisions that would effectively gut the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector by imposing reporting requirements and know-your-customer controls on DeFi as a major cause of contention. 

On Friday, Politico published a report of a tentative deal between the White House and lawmakers to move the CLARITY bill forward.

Specific details of the prospective deal have not yet been revealed, although Senator Angela Alsoboorks said the tentative deal includes a ban on stablecoin yield from “passive balances.” 

Magazine: How crypto laws changed in 2025 — and how they’ll change in 2026