2024 started on a bullish note as prices jumped significantly, and Bitcoin went on to hit a new all-time high (ATH) at almost $73,740 in mid-March. However, since then, prices have been taking a breather, with BTC down 17.3% from its peak to now trade around $61K despite Bitcoin having its fourth halving in April.
With that, the total crypto market cap is back at $2.375 trillion, down from this year’s $2.89 trillion peak after starting the year around $1.77 trillion. However, the total crypto market capitalization has yet to make new highs, as in November 2021, it surpassed $3 trillion.
This drop in price has sent the market sentiments to neutral, with the Crypto Fear and Greed Index having a reading of 56 after surging to 90 in early March.
According to crypto data provider Santiment, Bitcoin’s on-chain activity has dropped to its lowest since 2019 as traders “dramatically slowed transactions” over the last two months.
Moreover, Santiment noted crypto assets falling into the ‘Opportunity Zone’ based on their market value to realized values (MVRV) of 1-month, 3-month, and 6-month cycles and that “adding on to positions at these levels would be doing so at less risk than the average mid-term trading timeframe.”
“The market is showing signs of fear, but any dips that may occur now represent an opportunity that should be taken advantage of,” said Ape Terminal Founder Hatu Sheikh.
If we take a look at stablecoin supply in the market, it has exceeded $160bln, with Tether (USDT) in the lead at $110.7bln, adding over $19bln this year so far. During the same year, the 2nd largest stablecoin, USDC, added almost $8.5bln, and DAI added $260mln to reach $33.12bln and $5.48bln, respectively. FDUSD market cap meanwhile jumped $2bln. A new stablecoin, Ethena USDe, also emerged, capturing $2.3bln in this short period.
Meme coins, however, are ruling the market, with their combined market cap reaching $51.17bln, led by Dogecoin and Shiba Inu. However, PEPE, WIF, and FLOKI are making great moves, having surged 561%,1,900%, and 387%, respectively, year-to-date (YTD).
Restaking, meanwhile, is a narrative fast gaining traction in the Ethereum ecosystem. The market is concerned about this trend’s potentially dangerous effect, with many expecting it to top out aggressively, possibly contributing to the market crash.
Platforms like EigenLayer, Renzo, and Ether.Fi has captured tons of capital and market attention with its idea of using a blockchain to secure other apps. Every other day, a new restaking platform pops up, expanding the Ethereum ecosystem but with an extremely risky initiative that involves staking the already staked ETH.
As of this writing, the restaking tokens have a market cap of $9.25bln, while the liquid restaking market is at $7.38bln.
Despite this retsaking trend, Ethereum is seeing a drop in fees earned. In the past week, Bitcoin earned $2.94bln in total fees, taking over Ethereu’s $2.5bln, as per Cryptofees.info. In fact, Ethereum fees have dropped to a six-month low this week. This change comes as activity on Ethereum declines and NFTs and DeFi innovation spring up on the Bitcoin blockchain, with BRC20, Ordinals, Stacks, and Merlin Chain being the prominent contributors to this.
However, in 2024 so far, Ethereum is still leading with $1.425bln in fees earned, followed by Bitcoin at just over $600mln. Solana is in 6th place (after Tron, Uniswap, and Lido) with $162.77 mln, as per Token Terminal. Data from IntotheBlock, meanwhile, shows that Ethereum L2s are now settling increasing numbers of transactions, with the three largest L2s responsible for 82% of all Ethereum transactions.
Besides all this, 2024 has also been positive in terms of dApp usage, with the daily unique active wallets (dUAW) reaching 7 million in Q1, according to a DappRadar report. The social sector, in particular, has been stealing the limelight, with dUAW climbing to 1.2 million despite DeFi and blockchain gaming leading in usage.
Meanwhile, in April 2024, dUAW spiked to a new high of 10.6 million, with social dApps seeing its dUAW further climbing to almost 1.5 million. Gaming still has a “dominant” 28% share of dApps.
Even the NFT sector has been seeing a revival, recording a surge of 40% in trading volume and a 13% rise in its sales. However, in April, NFT trading volume dropped while sales count jumped, with Bitcoin-based Runestones becoming the top NFT collection. In the NFT marketplace, Magic Eden is emerging as a leader, taking over Blur.
Much like price, total value locked (TVL) in the DeFi sector has also been on the rise since Q3 2023. As of this writing, DeFi TVL stands at $90.5bln, up from $54.2bln at the beginning of the year, according to DeFi Llama. The biggest contributors to this growth in TVL include Lido, EigenLayer, Aave, Maker, JustLend, Uniswap, Pendle, Ether.Fi, Summer.Fi, and RocketPool.
These market statistics show that “this year is marked by an uptick in activity across sectors. We are also seeing new narratives taking shape in the form of DeFi and NFT on Bitcoin, Ethereum staking, meme coins on Solana, and SocialFi, and that indicates even more interesting times ahead for the wide industry,” said Sheikh.
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