2025 Q1 Crypto Industry Report

The cryptocurrency market experienced a downturn in early 2025, contrasting sharply with the euphoric highs of late 2024. The total crypto market capitalization dropped by 18.6% in Q1, closing at $2.8 trillion after briefly reaching $3.8 trillion on January 18, just before Donald Trump’s inauguration. This decline was accompanied by decreased investor activity, with average daily trading volumes falling 27.3% quarter-on-quarter to $146.0 billion.

Amid the market slump, Bitcoin increased its dominance, finishing Q1 at 59.1%, a level not seen since early 2021, as altcoins suffered the most. Although BTC reached a new all-time high of $106,182 in January, it dropped to $82,514 by the end of the quarter, marking an 11.8% decline.

Our comprehensive 2025 Q1 Crypto Industry Report covers everything from the crypto market landscape to analyzing Bitcoin and Ethereum, delving into the decentralized finance (DeFi) and non-fungible token (NFT) ecosystems, and reviewing the performance of centralized exchanges (CEX) and decentralized exchanges (DEX).

Top 8 Highlights of CoinGecko’s 2025 Q1 Crypto Industry Report

1. Total Crypto Market Cap Fell -18.6% in 2025 Q1, After Reaching a Year-to-Date High of $3.8T

2. Bitcoin Increased Its Dominance, Now Accounting for 59.1% of the Total Crypto Market Cap

3. Bitcoin Fell -11.8% in 2025 Q1, Outperformed By Gold & US Treasuries 

4. The Price of ETH Plummeted From $3,336 to $1,805 in 2025 Q1, Erasing All of Its Gains From 2024

5. Meme Coins Tank and Daily Tokens Deployed on Pump.fun Plummets -56.3% After Libra Incident

6. Spot Trading Volume on Centralized Exchanges Hit $5.4T in 2025 Q1, Down -16.3% QoQ

7. Solana Continued Its Dominance of on-chain Spot Decentralized Exchange Trades From end-2024, Accounting For 39.6% of All Trades in 2025 Q1

8. $48.9B Was Erased From Total Multichain DeFi TVL in 2025 Q1, a -27.5% Decrease

1. Total Crypto Market Cap Fell -18.6% in 2025 Q1, After Reaching a Year-to-Date High of $3.8T 

Total crypto market cap fell -18.6% ($633.5 billion) to end 2025 Q1 at $2.8 trillion. The market found a local top of $3.8 trillion on January 18, two days before Donald Trump’s inauguration. However, it trended downwards soon after for the rest of the quarter. 

Meanwhile, average daily trading volume in Q1 also plummeted, falling -27.3% Quarter-on-Quarter (QoQ) to $146.0 billion. 2024 Q4 trading volume stood at $200.7 billion. 

2. Bitcoin Increased Its Dominance, Now Accounting for 59.1% of the Total Crypto Market Cap

Bitcoin (BTC) continued to climb in dominance, increasing by 4.6 percentage points (p.p.) in 2025 Q1. It ended the quarter with a 59.1% dominance amidst the downturn which hit altcoins harder. These are levels not seen since 2021 Q1. 

Stablecoins also benefited from the market downturn, as investors flock to stability. Tether (USDT) climbed slightly to a 5.2% market share, while USDC regained its #7 spot, replacing Dogecoin (DOGE). 

Ethereum (ETH) fell by a whopping -3.9 p.p. in Q1, with its dominance at 7.9%, the lowest it has been since late-2019. ‘Others’ fell by smaller magnitude, dropping -3.5 p.p. to encompass 15.7% of the market. Amongst the majors, only XRP and BNB managed to retain their market share. 

3. Bitcoin Fell -11.8% in 2025 Q1, Outperformed By Gold & US Treasuries Bitcoin

Bitcoin (BTC) rallied at the start of the year, reaching a marginally new all-time high on Jan 22, 2025, at $106,182. This was two days after Trump’s inauguration, which marked a YTD top for BTC, as it trended down to end Q1 with a -11.8% decline at $82,514. 

Amidst this quarter of turmoil and uncertainty, Gold (+18.0%) emerged as the strongest asset class in 2025 Q1. Alongside BTC, risk assets such as the NASDAQ and SP500 also declined, falling -10.3% and -4.4% respectively. 

The DXY, usually inversely correlated to risk assets, fell -4.6%, potentially due to uncertainty over U.S. tariffs. The JPY (+5.2%) and EUR (+4.5%) strengthened against the USD, the former at least partially due to further unwinding of the Yen carry trade as the BOJ raised interest rates in January.

4. The Price of ETH Plummeted From $3,336 to $1,805 in 2025 Q1, Erasing All of Its Gains From 2024 ETH closed 2025 Q1 at $1,805, representing a -45.3% decrease within the quarter, having fallen from $3,336. It has erased its gains from 2024, returning to levels last seen in 2023. It has severely underperformed majors such as BTC, SOL, XRP, and BNB, all of which declined to a much lesser degree.

Trading volume dropped in Q1 as well, from a daily average of $30.0 billion in 2024 Q4 to $24.4 billion in the latest quarter.  Days in which volume spiked saw the price of ETH plummet. 

5. Meme Coins Tank and Daily Tokens Deployed on Pump.fun Plummets -56.3% After Libra Incident

Prior to Trump’s inauguration, the sudden launch of his official  TRUMP meme coin, and MELANIA shortly after, drove a wave of meme coin frenzy, and propelled the number of tokens deployed on pump.fun to a new daily ATH of 72K.

This led to the birth of the ‘political memecoin’ trend, with dozens of tokens affiliated with politicians and countries being launched. However, this trend came to a grinding halt with the launch of LIBRA, which was promoted by Argentinian president Javier Milei. The price of the token collapsed soon after he tweeted about it, as the developers rugpulled, causing the market cap to fall from a peak of $4.6 billion to $221.0 million in a matter of hours. 

Since then, activity on Pump.fun has significantly dropped, with daily tokens deployed falling by over -56.3% from its peak in January to 31K at the end of 2025 Q1. ‘Graduated’ tokens also fell, from a rate of 1.4% in January, to 0.7% at the end of the quarter.

6. Spot Trading Volume on Centralized Exchanges Hit $5.4T in 2025 Q1, Down -16.3% QoQ

In 2025 Q1, the top 10 centralized exchanges (CEXs) recorded $5.4 trillion in spot trading volume, a decrease of -16.3% quarter-on-quarter (QoQ). 

Binance remained the dominant spot CEX, ending March with a 40.7% share. It saw its market share climb throughout the quarter. However, its trading volume plummeted to $588.7 billion in March, after climbing above the $1 trillion mark in December. 

HTX was the only exchange in the top 10 to grow in Q1, with its volume increasing by +11.4%. Other top 10 CEXs saw volumes drop between 1.8% and 34.0%. Upbit suffered the largest drop, with its volumes plunging -34.0% from $561.9 billion in 2024 Q4 to $371.0 billion in 2025 Q1. 

After suffering a major hack in February, Bybit had the largest month-on-month (MoM) drop. It fell by -52.4% MoM from $178.2 billion to $84.7 billion.  

7. Solana Continued Its Dominance of on-chain Spot Decentralized Exchange Trades From end-2024, Accounting For 39.6% of All Trades in 2025 Q1

Continuing the trend from end-2024, Solana continued to dominate DEX trades, hitting  52% dominance in January 2025; newcomers Sonic & Bera make their mark

Solana was the dominant chain for DEX trading in 2025 Q1, with its market share hitting 39.6% for the quarter. It grew +35.3%, from $217.0 billion in Q4 to $293.7B in Q1.

In January, Solana accounted for 52% of on-chain trades amongst the top 12 blockchains, driven by the ‘political memecoin’ frenzy led by $TRUMP. It recorded over $184.8 billion in trading volume, an all-time high for the chain. This caused Ethereum’s market share to drop below 20% for the first time.

However, as the meme coin trend receded, Ethereum managed to reclaim the top spot in March, with a 30.1% market share compared to Solana’s 23.4%.

Optimism and Polygon were edged out of the top 10 in March by newcomers Sonic and Berachain. However, over the entire quarter, both chains stayed ahead.

8. $48.9B Was Erased From Total Multichain DeFi TVL in 2025 Q1, a -27.5% Decrease 

Multichain DeFi Total Value Locked (TVL) trended downwards by -27.5% in 2025 Q1, from $177.4 billion at end-2024 to $128.6 billion at the end of March 2025. This was largely due to the significant depreciation in value of altcoins. 

Ethereum in particular lost a significant portion of its TVL, falling from a dominance of 63.5% at the start of 2025, to 56.6% at the end of Q1. It lost 35.4% of its TVL, dropping from $112.6 billion to $72.7 billion. 

Solana and Base also saw large decreases in TVL, falling by -23.5% and -15.3%, respectively, but mostly due to large price drops in SOL and ETH. Despite that, both networks have slightly increased their TVL dominance.

Berachain, launched on February 6, quickly grew to $5.2 billion in DeFi TVL by the end of 2025 Q1, and now has the sixth largest TVL share. Its Boyco pre-deposit vaults alone attracted ~$2.3 billion in funds, boosting its day-one liquidity Source: CoinGecko-Updated April 16 2025 Q1 Crypto Industry Report 4.3 original article URL: 2025 Q1 Crypto Industry Report | CoinGecko