SAN FRANCISCO — Paul Chou was among the many Bitcoin aficionados who thought big Wall Street institutions were about to become heavy hitters in the cryptocurrency markets.

Mr. Chou came from one of those institutions, Goldman Sachs, and created a cryptocurrency exchange, LedgerX, that would cater to big investors with sophisticated financial contracts.

Now, in the wake of last year’s Bitcoin crash, Mr. Chou is being forced to confront how few of the big finance companies acted on their cryptocurrency plans.

“It was definitely part of the original plan that institutions would be a big part of this market,” he said. “We were wrong.”