Halfway into 2024, the world saw the US, Australia and China approve Bitcoin ETF, Bitcoin touching an all-time high, and the fourth halving event.

However, after a stellar Q1 (January-March) performance, crypto dipped in
Q2 (April-June). The total crypto market capitalization dropped minus 14.4 per cent (USD 408.8 billion) to end 2024 Q2 at USD 2.43 trillion.

The market was highly volatile in the quarter. Crypto had an annualized volatility of 48.2 per cent, while Bitcoin stood at 46.7 per cent and the S&P 500 at a much lower volatility of 12.7 per cent.

Notably, Bitcoin ended the 2024 Q2 at USD 62,734, down by 11.9 per cent as compared to 2024 Q1. It touched an all-time high of USD 75,830 on March 14, 2024. Since then it has oscillated largely between the USD 58,000 – USD 72,000 marks. The coin trading volume had a daily average of USD 26.6 billion, which was a dip of 21.6 per cent from the previous quarter.

Bitcoin mining’s total hash rate fell by 18.8 per cent in 2024 Q2. It touched an all-time high of 721M TH/s on April 23, 2024. Notably, this marks the first down quarter for Bitcoin’s hash rate since 2022 Q2.

“Despite the drop in mining hash rate, the industry has seen a flurry of developments. Companies such as BitDigital, Hive, Hut 8, Terawulf, and Core Scientific expanded or are looking to expand into AI,” read CoinGecko’s report ‘2024 Q2 Crypto Industry Report’.

Among the most popular narratives in 2024 Q2, Meme Coins, Real World Assets (RWA), and Artificial Intelligence (AI) topped the charts. Meme Coins had a market share of 14.34 per cent, while the three held 35.7 per cent of the market. Interestingly, this was similar to 2024 Q1.

Four out of the top 15 most popular crypto narratives were meme coin-related.

A win for Ethereum, there were only seven days in Q2 in which ETH burns exceeded emissions, while in comparison, the figure stood at 66 days in Q1 Notably, 107,725 ETH were burned, while 228,543 were emitted in 2024 Q2, making the quarter an inflationary one.
Spot trading volume on centralized exchanges stood at USD 3.40 trillion in 2024 Q2, down by 12.2 per cent QoQ. Binance remained the centralized exchange (CEX) with a market share of 45 per cent, followed by Bybit at 12.6 per cent. Among the top 10 spot CEXes, Gate climbed the most at 51.1 per cent (USD 85.2 billion).

In 2024 Q2, the top 10 decentralized exchanges (DEX’s) recorded USD 370.7 billion in spot trading volume, representing an increase of 15.7 per cent QoQ. This surge was due to meme coins and the many airdrops throughout the quarter. Uniswap remained the dominant DEX, ending June 2024 with almost 50 per cent market share.

At the home ground, India awaits its budget after the new government where crypto players remain optimistic about the new financial blueprint.

“Regulatory clarity is one of the most crucial steps towards creating a secure and transparent investment ecosystem for all stakeholders. We are hopeful that the Budget 2024 will propose a collaborative approach between the government and the larger Web3 industry,” said Raj Karkara, COO, ZebPay.

“We anticipate that the newly formed government will address the critical challenges faced by crypto investors in India. Specifically, the one per cent TDS on every transaction and the current inability to offset losses against gains are significant deterrents for investors,” said Edul Patel, CEO and Co-founder, Mudrex.