CoinGecko Q1 Report: Ethereum experiences deflation for the first time in a quarter, Binance remains unaffected by regulations, market share increases instead of decreases

In his Founder's Note, Bobby Ong, CEO and COO of CoinGecko, mentioned that the crypto market has recovered from the FTX collapse in the first quarter. Despite regulatory events such as BUSD, the market seems to have become more optimistic after the baptism of last year, as if achieving some sort of milestone without major platform or project bankruptcies. Although the worst period has passed, they predict that regulatory challenges and macroeconomics will continue to put pressure on the crypto space.

CoinGecko Q1 Report

CoinGecko: Q1 Major Events Recap

• January 19: Genesis bankruptcy
• January 20: SEC sues Mango attacker
• January 31: Bitcoin NFT protocol "Ordinals" launched
• February 13: Paxos' stablecoin BUSD prohibited from issuance by the New York Department of Financial Services
• February 14: Blur airdrop
• February 17: SEC sues Terraform Labs
• March 6: Yuga Labs releases 300 limited edition Bitcoin NFTs "TwelveFold"
• March 8: Silvergate liquidity crisis begins
• March 10: Silicon Valley Bank run crisis
• March 11: USDC decoupling
• March 13: Signature also taken over by FDIC
• March 15: Uniswap launches against Pancake on Binance Chain
• March 21: Magic Eden launches "Ordinals" market
• March 22: Coinbase receives SEC Wells notification
• March 23: Arbitrum airdrop
• March 24: "zkSync Era" mainnet release
• March 27: Polygon introduces zkEVM
• March 28: CFTC sues Binance

CoinGecko Statistics FTX Bankruptcy Before and After Overall Market Cap

The total cryptocurrency market cap reached a low of $829 billion in January, nearly 50% increase from the $1.2 trillion at the end of the first quarter.

Other highlights:

• Trading volume decreased with Binance's zero fee incentive

• QNT, CRO, and APE dropped out of the top 30 in market cap

• SOL's market cap returned to the top 10 after the FTX crash, ranking 18th previously

CoinGecko: Bitcoin Outperforms Top Five Tokens by Market Cap

• BTC's Q1 growth was 72%, higher than the top five tokens by market cap

• Platform tokens: except for OKX, the growth was similar, with only LEO showing a decline

• HT ranked sixth, possibly due to a 90% drop in early March

CoinGecko: Bitcoin vs. Traditional Assets

In Q1, Bitcoin's growth far outpaced traditional assets, with the Nasdaq Composite Index up 16%, and crude oil down 6%.

CoinGecko: Ethereum Sees First Quarterly Token Deflation

ETH Q1 data:

• Destroyed amount 242,000 ETH

• Issued amount 167,000 ETH

• Quarterly circulation -75,000 ETH

CoinGecko: Ethereum DeFi Dominance Exceeds 60%

Even excluding layer 2 scaling solutions, Ethereum's DeFi market share rose from 61% in October last year to 66% in the first quarter.

Although Solana's TVL slightly rebounded by 18.4% after the FTX setback, including endorsements from figures like Vitalik, Solana's market share dropped from 0.78% to 0.72%.

CoinGecko: Uniswap Dominates Over 70%

Whether it's Uniswap v3 with LP customizable price ranges or CURVE with the ve token model, both have strong supporters in the crypto community. However, in terms of data, Uniswap dominates the entire DEX sector with nearly 72% of the trading volume.

Currently, DEX monthly trading volume is about one-tenth of CEX: $900 billion vs. $90 billion.

The second-quarter data may be more worth noting as Uniswap's license has expired, allowing other developers to fork its code for commercial purposes, as seen with the April launch of PancakeSwap V3.

CoinGecko: LSD Value Surpasses Lending Market

Liquid Staking Derivatives (LSD) TVL increased by 210% in the first quarter, with locked value of $42 billion surpassing the lending market's $3.37 billion.

Decentralized exchanges still dominate with $11.76 billion, while fixed-rate protocols and derivative markets increased by 146% and 125%, respectively.

CoinGecko: NFT Market Blur Accounts for Over 70% of March Trading Volume

Blur became the second-largest NFT trading market before the official airdrop, and skyrocketed after the February airdrop, surpassing OpenSea. In March, it accounted for 71.8% of the trading volume.

The wealth effect from the Blur airdrop brought significant trading volume to the platform and deeper liquidity to the NFT market. However, users actively trading to earn airdrop points incurred significant transaction costs.

It can be seen that users traded more actively after the Blur airdrop, leading to a surge in trading volume, but the volume has since declined daily.

Understanding the Blur airdrop: Trigger for NFT price decline: whales selling, flaws in airdrop mechanism

CoinGecko: Unaffected by Regulation, Binance's Market Share Increases Instead of Decreasing

In the first quarter, despite facing two major regulatory events with BUSD and CFTC lawsuits, Binance's spot market share increased to 64% from 57% in 2022 Q4, while its derivatives market share also reached 61%.

CoinGecko: Stablecoin Market Value Drops by $6.2 Billion

Reasons include SEC investigation into BUSD, USDC decoupling event, etc.

• BUSD event summary: Are stablecoins securities? Regulatory demands to cease issuance? Binance's Zhao Changpeng responds? Is there a connection with USDC?

• Circle stress test: $3 billion USDC burned in the past three days, circulating supply decreased by around 8%

Key data Market cap:

• USDT grew by 20.5%

• TUSD grew by 169.3%

• BUSD declined by -47.3%

• USDC declined by -26.9%

• GUSD declined by -32%