Crypto down in the first quarter of 2025

The year 2025 opened with a rude awakening for the crypto world. After the euphoria that characterized the end of 2024, the first quarter of the year marked a clear trend reversal, with a significant contraction of the market.

According to the Crypto Industry Report by CoinGecko, updated in April 2025, the overall crypto market capitalization has decreased by -18.6%.

Thus closing the quarter at 2.8 trillion dollars, after having reached a peak of 3.8 trillion on January 18, a few days before the inauguration of President Donald Trump.

The crypto market loses momentum in 2025 

The first quarter of 2025 saw a contraction of over 633 billion dollars in the total market capitalization. The annual high was reached in mid-January, but from that moment on the trend reversed, with a constant decline until the end of March.

The average daily trading volumes also experienced a significant setback, decreasing by -27.3% compared to the previous quarter, dropping from 200.7 billion to 146 billion dollars.

This data highlights a decline in interest and activity from investors. In a bear market context, Bitcoin (BTC) has consolidated its position, increasing its dominance to 59.1%, a level not seen since the first quarter of 2021.

This increase of 4.6 percentage points has occurred at the expense of altcoins, which have suffered more marked losses.

The stablecoin have also benefited from investors’ search for stability. Tether (USDT) has slightly increased its share to 5.2%, while USDC has regained the seventh position in the market ranking, surpassing Dogecoin (DOGE).

On January 22, 2025, two days after Trump’s inauguration, Bitcoin reached a new all-time high of 106,182 dollars, before starting a decline that led it to close the quarter at 82,514 dollars, with a loss of -11.8%.

Despite the decline, BTC still performed better compared to other risky assets like the NASDAQ (-10.3%) and the S&P 500 (-4.4%). The true winner of the quarter was gold, which gained +18%, confirming itself as a safe haven in times of uncertainty.

Ethereum collapses and loses ground

The first quarter was particularly difficult for Ethereum (ETH). Its price fell from 3,336 to 1,805 dollars, recording a drop of -45.3%. This erased all the gains made in 2024, bringing ETH back to the levels of 2023.

Daily trading volumes have also decreased, dropping from 30 billion to 24.4 billion dollars. The days with high volumes coincided with strong price declines, indicating significant selling pressure.

The beginning of the year saw an explosion of interest in meme coin, thanks to the launch of the TRUMP and MELANIA tokens, which sparked a new trend: that of political memecoin. 

However, the enthusiasm quickly faded after the launch of LIBRA, a coin promoted by the Argentine president Javier Milei.

After a tweet from Milei, the value of LIBRA plummeted from 4.6 billion to 221 million dollars in a few hours, due to a rug pull by the developers. 

This event has undermined confidence in the sector, causing the number of daily tokens launched on Pump.fun to plummet by -56.3%, from 72,000 to 31,000.

In the first quarter of 2025, the 10 principali exchange centralizzati (CEX) recorded a total volume of 5.4 trillion dollars, down by -16.3% compared to the previous quarter.

Binance maintained its leadership with a market share of 40.7%, but saw its monthly volumes drop from over 1 trillion to 588.7 billion dollars. The only exchange to register growth was HTX, with an increase of +11.4%.

The worst drop was that of Upbit, which lost -34%, while Bybit suffered a collapse of -52.4% due to a hacker attack in February.

Solana dominates decentralized exchanges

In the segment of decentralized exchanges (DEX), Solana continued to dominate, reaching a share of 39.6% in the first quarter.

In January, during the peak of the political memecoins, it reached 52% of on-chain trades, with a record volume of 184.8 billion dollars.

However, with the decline in interest for meme coins, Ethereum regained the top spot in March, with a share of 30.1%, compared to Solana’s 23.4%.

Two newcomers, Sonic and Berachain, have made their entrance into the top 10, ousting Optimism and Polygon.

The total value locked (TVL) in multichain DeFi has decreased by -27.5%, dropping from 177.4 to 128.6 billion dollars. The decline was mainly caused by the devaluation of altcoins.

Ethereum has lost 35.4% of its TVL, dropping from 112.6 to 72.7 billion, and seeing its dominance decrease from 63.5% to 56.6%. 

Solana and Base also recorded significant declines, of -23.5% and -15.3% respectively.

Against the trend, Berachain, launched on February 6, quickly reached a TVL of 5.2 billion, becoming the sixth DeFi network by locked value. 

The success was driven by the Boyco pre-deposit vaults, which attracted about 2.3 billion dollars in liquidity from the very first day.

The first quarter of 2025 marked a phase of stabilization for the crypto sector, with Bitcoin showing relative resilience, while Ethereum and the altcoin suffered heavy losses. 

Investor confidence has been tested, but the market remains dynamic, with new players like Berachain ready to redefine the balance.

It will be interesting to observe how the landscape will evolve in the coming months, in a global context that is still uncertain but full of opportunities.