According to the Binance Research report (Market Insights for January 2025), the market capitalization of the cryptocurrency market soared to a historic high of $3.91 trillion in December 2024, driven by regulatory optimism, institutional adoption, and Bitcoin reaching an all-time high of $108,000. However, as the Federal Reserve reduced its interest rate cut plans for 2025 from four times to two, the market saw a pullback at the end of December, with over $0.5 trillion in market value evaporating.
Bitcoin's market capitalization grew by approximately 123.4% over the year, making it the seventh-largest asset in the world, surpassing Saudi Aramco and silver, only behind Nvidia's performance. Key drivers include the approval of spot ETFs, Bitcoin halving, changes in monetary policy, and more supportive regulatory expectations for crypto.
Additionally, the market capitalization of Ethena's USDe has reached $5.9 billion, surpassing DAI to become the third-largest stablecoin, thanks to its high yield and use as collateral on Aave. The trading volume for decentralized spot and perpetual contracts reached historic highs of $326 billion and $356 billion in December, respectively, with decentralized perpetual trading volume growing over 370% for the year, largely driven by Hyperliquid.
The Total Value Locked (TVL) in the DeFi sector has also reached new highs, with lending protocols and liquid staking protocols reaching $55 billion and $71 billion, respectively. AI agents are gradually becoming an emerging hotspot in the crypto space, with related tokens amassing market capitalizations in the billions and an average daily exposure of about 100,000 times, with representative projects including Virtuals, ai16z's Eliza framework, and individual agents like aixbt.
