The total crypto market capitalization declined by 18.6% ($633.5 billion) in Q1 2025

The market peaked locally at $3.8 trillion on January 18 2025, just two days before Donald Trump’s inauguration, but began a downward trend that continued

The total cryptocurrency market capitalization decreased by 18.6% to reach $2.8 trillion by the end of Q1 2025, marking a decline of $633.5 billion from the previous quarter, according to the latest report by CoinGecko.

The market, which peaked locally at $3.8 trillion on January 18, just two days after Donald Trump’s inauguration, began a downward trend that continued through the rest of the quarter. It started the year with a strong rally, fueled by interest in memecoins and metaverse projects, quickly recovering the losses from 2024. However, despite this initial surge, the market ultimately closed Q1 2025 lower than it began.

The average daily trading volume also saw a sharp drop, falling 27.3% quarter-over-quarter to $146.0 billion, down from $200.7 billion in Q4 2024. This decrease in trading activity might indicate a decline in investor interest and activity in the cryptocurrency market.

Among the top 10 cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin (BTC) experienced a surge early in the year, hitting a new all-time high of $106,182 on January 22 – just two days after Trump’s inauguration. However, that marked its year-to-date peak, as BTC declined by 11.8% to close Q1 2025 at $82,514.

On the other hand, Ethereum (ETH) ended the quarter at $1,805, marking a steep 45.3% drop from its Q4 2024 close of $3,336. This sharp decline wiped out its 2024 gains, bringing ETH back to price levels last seen in 2023. It significantly underperformed compared to other major assets like $BTC, $SOL, XPR, and BNB, which saw milder losses.

$ETH trading activity also slowed, with average daily volume falling from $30.0 billion in Q4 2024 to $24.4 billion in Q1 2025. Notably, price drops often coincided with volume spikes, signaling panic-driven selloffs.

The top 10 centralized exchanges (CEXs) recorded $5.4 trillion in spot trading volume – a 16.3% decline quarter-on-quarter.

Binance retained its position as the leading spot exchange, holding a 40.7% market share by the end of March 2025. While its dominance grew over the quarter, its monthly volume dropped significantly – from over $1 trillion in December to $588.7 billion in March 2025.

The crypto narrative in Q1 2025 was largely driven by artificial intelligence tokens and memecoins, together drawing 62.8% of total investor interest, despite memecoins minted on the popular platform pump.fun experiencing a dramatic drop-off.

AI tokens claimed the top spot in Q1 2025 attracting 35.7% of global investor interest and overtaking memecoins – last year’s leading category – which followed closely with 27.1%.

Among the top 20 crypto narratives for the quarter, six were memecoin-related, while five centered around AI.