Cryptocurrency Bear Market "Shutdown Wave" Arrives as Infrastructure and Layer 1 Projects Concentrate on Exiting or Pivoting

BlockBeats News, April 17, 2026. The cryptocurrency industry in 2026 saw a significant trend of project consolidation and shutdown, with multiple infrastructure, public chain, and application layer projects announcing the cessation of operations or entry into the liquidation process. Today, Mint Blockchain announced a complete shutdown, and users are required to complete asset withdrawals by October 20. The Base Protocol lending protocol Seamless previously announced the closure of its frontend interface and cessation of services on June 30; the privacy email system Dmail Network also announced a gradual cessation of all operations starting May 15, 2026.

Within infrastructure, wallets, and tooling projects, several applications are also in the process of exiting. The Cosmos ecosystem wallet Leap Wallet will cease operations on May 28 and require users to complete asset migration; Intergaze, focusing on NFTs and a zero Gas chain, will also conduct an asset clean-up within 14 days before the cross-chain closure. Additionally, the on-chain data analysis tool Parsec is formally discontinuing services after 5 years of operation and initiating a refund process, while the DeFi derivatives protocol Polynomial announced the orderly shutdown of its current operations.

Simultaneously, some mature applications and ecosystem products are entering a phase of strategic contraction and transformation. Magic Eden will close its Bitcoin and EVM markets and cease support for multi-chain wallets; following a hack, Step Finance announced that its SolanaFloor and Remora Markets will cease all operations, with the news and media center SolanaFloor later acquired and relaunched by the Jito Foundation. The lending protocol ZeroLend has lowered the LTV ratio on most markets to 0% and urged users to withdraw funds promptly; the decentralized stablecoin protocol Angle Protocol announced it will cease operations in March 2027 and transition into the DeFi incentive platform Merkl.

Overall, during this cryptocurrency downturn, the wave of project exits has impacted various tracks including public chain networks, lending protocols, the NFT market, wallets, analytics tools, and trading infrastructure.