• Major Index Performance:
    The Infrastructure Applications index rose 98%, and the Digital Assets 100 Mid-Cap Index surged 93% in Q4 reinforcing the sharp upward trend in 2023.
  • Trading Volume Increase:
    Crypto trading volume hit USD 10.3 trillion in Q4 2023, marking a 53.1% increase from Q3 and the first quarter-on-quarter growth of the year.
  • NFT Market Dynamics:
    NFT trading volume stood at USD 11.8 billion in 2023, less than half of the volume in 2022. However, it rebounded to USD 3.2 billion in Q4, thanks to strong Bitcoin Ordinals trading volume.
  • Retail vs. Whole Activity:
    There was slight growth in the number of Bitcoin addresses with balances ≥ 0.1 and ≥ 1 BTC, indicating gradual retail accumulation. Meanwhile, addresses with balances ≥ 100 and ≥ 1k BTC began to rise
    suggesting that larger entities (whales) were also accumulating Bitcoin in Q4.
  • DeFi Sector Trends:
    The Total Value Locked (TVL) in DeFi remained highly concentrated on Ethereum, which dominated with 54%. Interest in the Solana chain rose significantly, resulting in a threefold increase in TVL.
  • Stablecoin Market:
    The stablecoin market cap experienced an increase, with USDT maintaining its dominance as the biggest stablecoin by market capitalization.
  • Top Cryptocurrency Shifts:
    Solana (SOL) jumped from 7th to 5th position by market capitalization, experiencing a 917.3% price increase in 2023. Meanwhile, cryptocurrencies like Hedera (HBAR), Binance USD (BUSD), Monero
    (XMR), and True USD (TUSD) dropped out of the top 30 cryptos by market capitalization.
  • Spot ETF Speculation:
    Speculation around the approval of Spot ETFs became a major market catalyst in Q4.
  • Emerging Sectors in DeFi:
    Liquid staking, particularly in Ethereum and Solana, and the tokenization of real-world assets (RWA) gained significant traction in 2023.

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