Market Insights: Mar 2025 | Week1
Wavebridge Research/
Bitcoin Drops from 7th to 11th in Global Asset Rankings
The price of Bitcoin rebounded sharply after US President Donald Trump spoke of a strategic stockpile of cryptocurrencies. The announcement reversed the overall bearish sentiment in the market. BlackRock's ‘IBIT’, the largest US-based bitcoin spot ETF, reported daily net outflows of $420 million. The net outflows were around 5,000 bitcoins, the largest since IBIT launched early last year. Bitcoin fell from 7th to 11th place in the global asset market capitalisation rankings. Bitcoin experienced its largest single-day net sell-off since May 2021. Bitcoin's hashrate plummeted from around 835.9 EH/s to 771.8 EH/s. Bitcoin's active address count hit a three-month high, surpassing 912,300. This is similar to the pattern seen when BTC prices have bottomed in the past, indicating that the market is likely to rebound. Bitcoin's exchange balance is at its lowest level since November 2018 at 2.76 million BTC, or about 13.7 per cent of the total circulating supply. US-based Bitcoin investment firm Strategy bought another 23,356 BTC, bringing its total holdings to 490,096 BTC. On Polkadot, bets on the likelihood of the US government officially holding Bitcoin reserves by 30 April 2025 have risen to 23%. This is more than double the previous 11%, but the consensus is that it is still unlikely.
Crypto Markets Surge Over 15% Amid Trump’s Reserve Talk
Cryptocurrency markets, which have been in a recent slump following Trump's talk of a strategic reserve, have surged by an average of more than 15%. Ethereum, Ripple, Solana, and Ada are up 12%, 32%, 21%, and 67% respectively. On 1 March, 112,000 Solana tokens will be unlocked from the bankruptcy estate of cryptocurrency exchange FTX. The release will increase Solana's circulating supply by 2.2 per cent, bringing more than $1 billion in value to the market. Galaxy Asset Management and Pantera Capital previously acquired Solana tokens at $64. Weekly trading volume on DEX markets reached $87.1bn, up 14.68% week-on-week. The average daily trading volume reached $11.5 billion, and its share of centralised exchanges increased to 36.8%. Ripple announced major feature updates to XRPL and a roadmap for the future, strengthening the technical foundation for DeFi expansion. These include enhancing the native decentralised exchange and centralised limit order system, introducing automated market makers, adding decentralised identity features, and implementing a protocol-native oracle. Uniswap has partnered with leading payment platforms including Robinhood, MoonPay, and Transact to provide the ability to convert digital assets to fiat. Bitwise Chief Investment Officer Matt Hogan said the meme coin craze is effectively over and the crypto market needs to find new growth drivers.
SEC Classifies Memecoins as Collectibles, Exempt from Securities Regulation
‘I will be pursuing a strategic stockpile of cryptocurrencies, including XRP, SOL, and ADA,’ Trump said on Truesocial. ‘Bitcoin and Ethereum will also be included as core assets,’ he added in a follow-up post just over an hour later. Trump used the term ‘reserve’ in this announcement, rather than ‘stockpile’ as he did in his January executive order. A reserve assumes active purchases of cryptocurrencies on a regular basis, while a stockpile implies that the US government is not selling any of its current holdings. The White House is hosting the first cryptocurrency summit of the Trump administration on 7 July. The summit will bring together crypto industry leaders and policymakers and is expected to be an important step in shaping the US approach to digital assets. The summit is expected to provide details on Trump's recently announced crypto strategic reserve. The SEC has classified memecoin as a ‘collectible’ and excluded it from securities regulation. Consensus and the SEC reached an agreement in principle to drop the Metamask lawsuit. The US Securities and Exchange Commission announced that it is dropping its enforcement action against Coinbase. The US House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee voted 26 to 16 to rescind the Internal Revenue Service's DeFi taxation rules. The IRS approved regulations last December that deemed DeFi protocols to be traditional financial brokers, a move that the industry strongly opposed, saying it threatened the core principles of DeFi and risked including a range of non-broker entities.
Russia Delays Digital Ruble Launch Beyond July 1
The Central Bank of Russia has delayed the launch of the digital ruble. The introduction of the central bank's digital currency will be ‘somewhat later’ than the initially expected 1 July, according to the governor of the Russian central bank. The governor of the Swiss National Bank expressed his negative views on holding bitcoin as a reserve asset for the central bank. He cited Bitcoin's volatility, lack of liquidity, and security risks. El Salvador bought more BTC during the Bitcoin downturn. An analytical report was published stating that 80% of Japanese banks will adopt XRP as an international remittance system by the end of 2025, which will be a strong catalyst for XRP's value. A digital asset ETF in Hong Kong has raised the possibility of providing mainland Chinese investors with a new avenue to invest in digital assets. The analysis suggests that Hong Kong's digital asset ETFs could make it possible for mainland Chinese investors to invest in digital assets using their existing overseas asset investment methods, despite China's strict capital control policies. Japanese firm Metaplanet purchased another 135 BTC of Bitcoin, bringing its total Bitcoin holdings to 2,235 BTC. An affiliate of cryptocurrency exchange OKX agreed to settle with the US Department of Justice and pay a fine of more than $500 million. The company admitted to offering services to US customers without a money transmitter licence and failing to comply with anti-money laundering laws. Stablecoin issuer Circle announced that its flagship asset USDC and euro-based stablecoin EURC have been approved as ‘recognised crypto tokens’ by the Dubai Financial Services Authority. The CEO of Bybit announced that the company has recovered all of the Ethereum damage caused by the hack. Bybit has spent $742 million to buy back 267,000 ETH.