Crypto market review January 2025: BTC still dominates

Market Overview

BTC Leads the Discussion

In November 2024, the price of Bitcoin (BTC) managed to break out from its previous all-time high of $70,000 to reach the $100,000 level just a few weeks later. Over the past two months, BTC’s price has entered a consolidation phase between a lower bound around $90,000 and an upper bound around $108,000.

January 2025 was marked by a return of volatility in the cryptocurrency market. BTC surged by 10%, corrected by 13%, rebounded by 22%, and finally dropped again by 16%. During each of these "bearish" phases, the rest of the altcoins suffered significantly, with some dropping by several dozen percentage points.

→ Also check out our market report on Bitcoin (BTC) in 2024:

Still No Altseason in Sight

The ratio between Ether (ETH) and BTC is an interesting indicator to observe. When BTC touched the upper bound for the first time, ETH was around $4,000. When it touched it for the second time, ETH had dropped to around $3,300.

Additionally, it is interesting to note that BTC dominance dropped by more than 10% at the beginning of December 2024. However, as we mentioned in our last analysis, a break below the 54% level was necessary to confirm a reversal of the bullish trend. This did not happen, as dominance rebounded from this level and eventually surpassed 60% again. In other words, there is still no formal indicator to anticipate an altseason.

TRUMP Token Shakes Up Solana

January 2025 was also marked by the launch of TRUMP, Donald Trump’s memecoin — and MELANIA, Melania Trump’s memecoin. In just 48 hours, the TRUMP memecoin climbed into the top 10 cryptocurrencies by fully diluted valuation (FDV).

While this launch had a positive impact on on-chain activity on the Solana network—DEX transaction volume skyrocketed from $4.5 billion to nearly $36 billion on the day of the launch—it also had the effect of sucking up a large portion of the available liquidity on Solana, particularly affecting memecoins and AI Agents.

→ Check out our analysis of TRUMP's memecoin:

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Bitcoin & Ethereum Spot ETFs

Despite BTC’s price consolidation, Bitcoin spot ETFs continued to experience strong demand in January 2025, with a net total inflow of $5.2 billion. BlackRock’s IBIT once again led the pack with $3.2 billion in net positive inflows, while Grayscale’s GBTC recorded the largest net outflows (-$394 million).

Notably, the day with the highest total ETF inflows was January 17, the launch date of the TRUMP memecoin, with over $1 billion in total inflows. Conversely, January 8 saw the worst outflows, with $568 million exiting.

In January 2025, the total assets under management (AUM) in Bitcoin spot ETFs increased by $16.4 billion to reach a total of $122 billion. Unsurprisingly, IBIT saw the largest AUM increase, with a gain of $7.92 billion.

Regarding Ethereum spot ETFs, inflows were significantly lower than those for Bitcoin. Over the course of January, total inflows amounted to approximately $100 million. Once again, BlackRock’s ETHA dominated the sector with $612 million in inflows, while Grayscale’s ETHE saw nearly $300 million in outflows over the past month.

→ Dive into our report on spot ETFs in 2024 and our forecasts for 2025 :

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Stablecoins

Stablecoins are an excellent indicator of the liquidity available for cryptocurrency investment. When their supply increases, it indicates that more investors are demanding liquidity to enter the crypto market.

In January 2025, the total stablecoin supply increased from $213 billion to over $226 billion, a net increase of $12.5 billion (+5.9%). Notably, at the time of Donald Trump’s election in early November 2024, this figure stood at approximately $173.5 billion.

Looking at it with more granularity, USDT still dominates the sector with a total valuation of approximately $140 billion. Tether’s stablecoin growth is moderate but stable, around +1.7%. The most significant expansion was seen in Circle’s USDC (+20.9%), pushing its market capitalization to $53 billion.

Ethena’s USDe remains in third place with $5.93 billion (with weak growth of 0.9%), while MakerDAO’s DAI is regaining strength following issues related to the protocol’s rebranding. The decentralized stablecoin of the protocol, now known as Sky, has reached a capitalization of $4.7 billion (+7.2%), while its counterpart USDS has doubled its market cap to $2.6 billion.

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DEX vs CEX

Since the end of 2024, decentralized exchanges (DEXs) have been making a strong comeback compared to centralized exchanges (CEXs). Whether due to the trading volume generated by memecoins on Solana or the emergence of the Hyperliquid platform, the result remains the same: DEXs are breaking records across all categories.

First, the ratio of trading volume on DEXs versus CEXs surged in January 2025, surpassing 20% for the first time in DeFi’s history. Additionally, the trading volume on perpetual DEXs also set a record, exceeding 10% in January 2025.

In total, DEXs processed more than $313 billion in trading volume in January 2025. While Uniswap remained relatively stable ($86 billion), Raydium continued its sharp growth and now accounts for over $200 billion in volume. This represents more than 62% of the market share in the sector.

Regarding perpetual DEXs, the sector is now overwhelmingly dominated by Hyperliquid, which holds a 70% market share. The exchange processed $195 billion in volume, out of a total of $285 billion across the entire sector in January. In second place, Jupiter accounted for "only" $35.3 billion, maintaining its trend from previous months.

This final data point, combined with the ratio of futures volume on DEXs versus CEXs, suggests that Hyperliquid has attracted traders from centralized exchanges rather than competing DEXs.

→ Also check out our market report on CEXs and DEXs in 2024: