Crypto companies spent years monetizing volatility, but now, they’re trying to survive without it.

First-quarter earnings underscored that crypto’s era of easy moonshots and hype-driven returns is fading. As lower bitcoin and ether prices drained speculative demand – and investors pulled back from risk assets broadly amid macro uncertainty – trading activity across exchanges cooled and retail participation faded. The slowdown showed up in public companies’ quarterly updates, with exchanges, brokers and crypto financial firms reporting weaker transaction and staking revenue and softer client activity.

It’s nothing new to Coinbase and Robinhood, for whom trading was once the lifeblood of their platforms. Both have been working for…