Aptos stablecoin cap passes Ethereum: So why is APT’s price declining?

Key Takeaways

What’s driving Aptos’s liquidity?

The surging stablecoin supply, which grew by 5.3X in a year, drove Aptos’s liquidity.

Why are APT prices still down? 

Prices were down since fundamentals like DEX volume and TPS were declining on top of a bearish market structure.

Aptos [APT] was accelerating on the liquidity front of the chain even though its price stayed down, about 11% in the past week. Volume was up by 36% but was mainly from sellers.

The stablecoin supply was responsible for the growing liquidity on the Layer 1 blockchain, challenging majors like Ethereum [ETH] and BNB Chain.

Aptos leads against BNB Chain, Ethereum

According to data from Artemis, Aptos’s stablecoin supply rose by more than 5x in the past year. Additionally, Aptos surged ahead of BNB Chain and Ethereum in stablecoin flow in the past 24 hours.

The data showed that the change in Aptos’s stablecoin supply during this period exceeded $500 million. BNB came second with slightly above $400 million.

For Ethereum, the change was $200 million, less than half of what flowed on the Aptos blockchain.

Source: Artemis

The growth in stablecoin supply on Aptos indicated liquidity was continuing to scale. However, this growth was not enough to counter the weak price outlook.

The weak fundamentals! 

The monthly DEX volume of Aptos dropped by more than 3x, as per DefiLlama data.

In October, Aptos processed $4.77 billion, while in November, the volume has dropped to $1.52 billion. This diminution was probably why the price was also struggling.

Midyear, particularly late Q2 and early Q3, had the highest DEX volume, averaging above the $4 billion mark.

Source: DefiLlama

Additionally, APT block times were dropping steadily throughout the year 2025. This translated to slow transactions, from about 225 transactions per millisecond (ms) to less than 100.

The decrease could be attributed to the growth happening on the chain. Usually, chains slow down during scaling. This provides additional reasons for the price struggle.

APT price is still bearish

On the charts, APT price was trading inside a descending trend channel, even though it was starting to show strength.

This was due to the fact APT price was staying above the middle of the channel. The channel has been in place since mid-October.

Still, the structure remained mildly bearish, as seen in the RSI Divergence indicator. The reading was slightly below the neutral zone. However, the On Balance Volume (OBV) was up to $28.76 million.

Source: TradingView

Looking ahead, failure to hold above the midsection of the channel would mean the price heading to $2.20 support. Otherwise, breaking above the upper resistance would potentially hint at a reversal.