Crypto Fear & Greed Index hits record low despite ongoing institutional push into DeFi

The Crypto Fear and Greed Index fell to a reading of 5 on Feb. 12, its lowest recorded level, reflecting a market sentiment environment that has deteriorated sharply over the past several months.

The index is a composite sentiment gauge that aggregates signals across volatility, market momentum, social media activity, dominance, and search trends, distilling them into a single score between 0 (extreme fear) and 100 (extreme greed).

The prolonged slide into fear territory traces back in large part to the events of Oct. 10, 2025, widely referred to as "10/10." The events of the day triggered the largest liquidation event in crypto's history, with over $19 billion in leveraged positions forcibly closed within 24 hours across more than 1.6 million accounts.

Bitcoin fell roughly 14% that day, while altcoins saw far more severe drawdowns. The cascade exposed structural vulnerabilities in crypto derivatives markets, thin liquidity, excessive cross-margined leverage, and exchange infrastructure that buckled under the load, and sentiment has not meaningfully recovered since.

The current reading is particularly notable for its divergence from ongoing institutional developments.

BlackRock, Citadel, and other major traditional finance players continue to deepen their engagement with DeFi and tokenization, and broader real-world asset adoption projects continue to make measurable progress. Retail sentiment and institutional conviction are clearly operating on different time horizons at the moment, a dynamic worth monitoring as markets search for a floor.

This is an excerpt from The Block's Data & Insights newsletter. Dig into the numbers making up the industry's most thought-provoking trends.