Digital Asset Market Shows Strong Momentum and Heightened Activity – Blockchain News, Opinion, TV and Jobs
Bitcoin (BTC) ended the week at about $63,100, soaring 22% from the previous week’s closing price of about $51,725. This week saw particularly active price action in the first half of the year, with BTC seeing significant gains from Monday to Wednesday, peaking at $64,000 on Wednesday. The price then stabilized later in the week, closing around $63,100. As of this writing, BTC has regained momentum and is currently trading above $65,000.
The BTC Spot ETF continues to see strong momentum, recording cumulative net inflows of approximately $1.7 billion last week, bringing total net inflows since inception to approximately $7.4 billion. Leading the way is the Blackrock Bitcoin ETF (IBIT), which surpassed $10 billion in assets under management (AUM) last week, making it the fastest ETF in history to reach this AUM milestone.
Trading volume for the BTC spot ETF surged significantly during the week, totaling $22.3 billion, with average daily volume reaching nearly $4.5 billion. This is a remarkable 265% increase over the average daily trading volume of $1.7 billion recorded since inception. Currently, the cumulative trading volume exceeds $73.9 billion, and the average daily trading volume exceeds $2 billion and currently stands at $2.1 billion.
Similarly, centralized digital asset exchanges also saw a surge in trading volume, reaching $73.4 billion in cumulative trading volume for the week. This is an 80% increase from the previous week’s volume of $40.7 billion and the highest weekly volume since May 2022. This data highlights recent price gains coupled with strong trading activity.
The increase in open interest, which refers to the total number of outstanding derivative contracts for unsettled assets, is driven by centralized digital asset exchanges (e.g. Binance, Coinbase, ByBit, etc.) and traditional financial investor platforms (e.g. CME). This reflects heightened activity from both digital asset native and traditional financial investors.
The strong momentum extends beyond Bitcoin to the entire market, with the total digital asset market cap now at $2.5 trillion, approaching its all-time high of $3 trillion. In particular, the Total3 indicator, which represents the market capitalization of the top 125 capitalized digital assets excluding Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH), surged to $660 billion, recording growth of 19.3% and 31.5% per share. Increased from this year to present. This highlights the far-reaching impact that the BTC Spot ETF has on market momentum beyond BTC’s price action.
Examining the overall stablecoin supply can also provide insight into growing demand. During periods of low demand, the supply of stablecoins typically decreases as investors exchange them for fiat currencies such as USD, GBP, or EUR, reducing the overall circulating supply. Conversely, during phases of increased liquidity injection into the market, the supply of stablecoins tends to expand. Total stablecoin supply currently stands at approximately $145 billion, reflecting a continued upward trend from approximately $129 billion at the end of September 2023. This confirms the continued strong investor demand observed from Q4 2023 to Q1 2024.
