In March, the cryptocurrency market performed strongly, with Bitcoin reaching a new all-time high. Ethereum saw steady price increases, while the Cancun upgrade significantly reduced transaction costs. The Meme frenzy on the Solana blockchain ignited a wealth effect, which also impacted other public chains like Base.
In terms of driving mass adoption of blockchain, AI, Meme, and TON have been the main forces recently. Meanwhile, public chains are actively expanding the Web3 gaming ecosystem, which is becoming increasingly important for widespread blockchain adoption.
This report is sourced from the Public Chain Research page of Footprint Analytics. The page provides an easy-to-use dashboard with the most crucial statistics and indicators in the public chain field, which are continuously updated.
Cryptocurrency Market Overview
The cryptocurrency market had a strong performance in March, mainly due to expectations of interest rate cuts, despite a strong overall economy. This prospect intensified inflation concerns, making assets like Bitcoin and gold more attractive.
The AI industry became a market focus when Nvidia announced the Blackwell GPU and GB200 superchip at the AI event GTC 2024. This not only ignited enthusiasm in the US and global stock markets but also attracted widespread attention in the cryptocurrency market, driving the rise of the crypto AI sector.
In late March, Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) was sentenced to 25 years of federal imprisonment for fraudulent activities related to the collapse of the FTX exchange and Alameda Research in November 2022. Although the SBF and FTX story may have come to an end, the crypto industry still faces serious regulatory challenges. It is worth mentioning that KuCoin is reportedly facing legal action from the US Department of Justice and other agencies, leading to a significant outflow of funds from KuCoin.
Public Chain Overview
With the end of March, the total market value of public chain cryptocurrencies reached $22 trillion, a 15.8% increase compared to February. Among this growth, Bitcoin, Ethereum, BNB Chain, and Solana performed particularly well, with market shares of 63.2%, 19.7%, 4.2%, and 4.1% respectively.
Bitcoin experienced significant fluctuations between “breakthroughs” and “volatility.” Starting at $61,213 at the beginning of the month, it quickly surpassed the previous high of $69,000 and reached a new all-time high of $73,068 on March 14. Although it briefly fell by 15.1% to $62,047 in the middle of the month, it recovered by the end of the month and closed at $69,656.
The price movement of Bitcoin is closely related to the performance of the Bitcoin spot ETF in the US. The mid-month price decline was mainly influenced by the slowdown in Bitcoin spot ETF inflows and traditional traders reducing leverage. However, the market’s expectations for the Bitcoin halving event in April have maintained its upward trend.
In contrast, Ether’s price increase was relatively steady, starting at $3,344 and closing at $3,648. Although Ether’s increase was slightly lower than Bitcoin’s, it still maintained steady growth, partly due to the uncertain prospects of the approval of the US spot ETF for Ether. The Cancun upgrade of Ethereum on March 13 aimed to reduce transaction costs and promote activities within its ecosystem.
The token prices of BNB and Solana also saw significant growth, with increases of 48.8% and 56.0% respectively, resulting in an approximately 1% increase in their token market share.
In March, AI-related tokens experienced significant growth. The news of Sam Altman rejoining the OpenAI board after being fired and rehired had a positive impact on AI-related tokens. Additionally, market expectations for the Nvidia GTC conference further fueled speculation and brought positive news to projects participating in the conference. It is worth noting that the token price and market value of the NEAR Chain surged by 84%.
The widespread adoption of AI has not only deepened the public’s understanding of AI but also made the concept of “AI + Crypto” more popular and easier to understand and accept. AI concept tokens are attracting more attention, further promoting the widespread adoption of cryptocurrencies.
Meme has also played an important role in driving mass adoption in the crypto world. Recently, Solana gained attention due to the surge in Meme-related activities. Tokens like $BOME and $SLERF quickly rose in price, attracting active participation from community members. This phenomenon fully demonstrates the potential of Meme in creating wealth rapidly and has triggered widespread FOMO sentiment in the market. Meme, as an easily accessible and understandable entry point, helps lower the barriers and attracts more people to explore the Web3 space.
TON (The Open Network) and its closely associated social application, Telegram, have had a significant impact on driving mass adoption. In particular, in March, Telegram announced the expansion of its advertising platform to nearly a hundred new countries. This move is an important part of Telegram’s monetization strategy, allowing public channel owners to earn up to 50% of ad revenue, with all transactions conducted through TON. This has greatly facilitated on-chain activities for TON. In March, the price and market value of Toncoin doubled to reach an all-time high. With the help of Telegram’s large user base and seamless integration of dApps, TON simplifies access to Web3. Combined with Telegram’s powerful marketing capabilities, the TON ecosystem is expected to become a key driver of widespread blockchain adoption.
By the end of March, the Total Value Locked (TVL) in public chains reached $8.13 billion, with Ethereum, Tron, and BNB Chain ranking in the top three.
Solana’s TVL experienced significant growth, reaching $3.59 billion, double that of February. This growth was mainly driven by the Meme frenzy, which greatly increased online activity and attracted a large influx of capital. DeFi dApps on Solana, such as the DEX aggregator Jupiter, received high attention and user engagement.
Layer 2
With the booming cryptocurrency market and the help of the Cancun upgrade, the on-chain activity and TVL of Ethereum Layer 2 reached new heights. Among them, Arbitrum One and Optimism performed particularly well, with TVL growing by 26.4% and 7.2% respectively, collectively occupying about 70% of the market share.
Base’s TVL achieved an 87.3% growth, and active users (wallets) also increased by 29.6%. This was mainly due to the attractiveness of Meme coins like $DEGEN. Additionally, the launch of Coinbase’s smart wallet further boosted the ecosystem’s activity. This smart wallet simplifies the user registration process through Account Abstraction (AA) technology, integrating touch ID or Google account, greatly enhancing Base’s user acquisition capabilities.
After the Ethereum Cancun upgrade, the average transaction fees on its Layer 2 networks saw a significant decrease. Arbitrum and Starknet reduced on-chain transaction costs by over 95%. This substantial reduction in fees marks the beginning of the “one cent era” for the Ethereum ecosystem.
Discussions about Layer 3 are becoming more intense, with various opinions being expressed. Marc Boiron, CEO of Polygon Labs, recently questioned the necessity of Layer 3 and explained why Polygon decided not to develop Layer 3. Meanwhile, Vitalik Buterin, the co-founder of Ethereum, also expressed his views, pointing out that Layer 3 networks are not primarily used for scalability but rather to provide “customized functionality” for Layer 2 to enhance its performance.
Blockchain Gaming
In March, the ranking of active game players showed that Ronin, Polygon, and BNB Chain had the highest number of active players, accounting for 35.4%, 20.9%, and 10.8% of the market share respectively. It is worth mentioning that Ronin and Polygon further consolidated their leading positions, with their market shares increasing by 6.3% and 7.8% respectively compared to February.
In terms of trading volume rankings, Ethereum, Ronin, and BNB Chain dominated. In March, Ronin’s trading volume reached $81.7 million, a 35.1% increase compared to the previous month, while BNB Chain saw a 13% decline. Despite having less than 10 games, Ronin has shown strong momentum in expanding its market share. With the continuous addition of new games, its growth potential is expected to further increase.
Competition in the public chain field is intensifying, with major public chains increasing their investments to promote the prosperity of the Web3 gaming ecosystem.
The Arbitrum Foundation announced a proposal to distribute 200 million $ARB tokens over the next two years to support gaming projects on its blockchain. Of these, 160 million $ARB will be allocated to game publishers and developers, while the remaining funds are planned to be used for infrastructure improvements. This proposal requires approval from the Arbitrum DAO.
Meanwhile, the Starknet Foundation has taken active steps by establishing a dedicated Gaming Committee to promote the development of the Starknet gaming ecosystem. The committee plans to distribute 50 million $STRK tokens to support committee-approved gaming projects, especially those that incentivize game development and player participation.
You can read more about the gaming industry dynamics in the Web3 Game Report for March 2024 by Footprint Analytics.
Public Chain Investment and Financing
In March, the public chain sector experienced significant growth, with 23 financing events and a total investment of $380 million, a 160.2% increase compared to February. In this wave of investment, Optimism, Berachain, and Eclipse stood out and received huge funding support of $89 million, $69 million, and $50 million respectively.
Among these 23 financing events, the funds were distributed in a “tri-polar” manner: 8 were related to Layer 1, 7 focused on Bitcoin Layer 2, and another 8 primarily focused on Ethereum Layer 2. Although the highest disclosed investment amount for Bitcoin Layer 2 was only $10 million, the Bitcoin ecosystem has been gaining increasing attention.
Token sales are gradually becoming a popular way to obtain investment and financing.
Recently, Berachain successfully completed its financing through a token sale, and its valuation has reached $1.5 billion, making it a unicorn. This platform based on Cosmos and compatible with EVM focuses on DeFi trading and plans to launch its mainnet in the second quarter of 2024.
The Optimism Foundation also announced a private token sale, selling approximately 19.5 million OP tokens. These tokens were sourced from the undistributed OP token treasury and had a total value close to $89 million based on the current market value. The tokens were purchased by an undisclosed buyer and will be subject to a two-year lock-up period.
Key Highlights
With the Meme coin frenzy, the search volume for Solana on Google surged to its peak of 100.
Blast mainnet was launched on March 1st.
Bitcoin Layer 2 project BEVM announced its mainnet release plan.
CyberConnect announced the launch of the Ethereum Layer 2 network Cyber.
Mysten Labs demonstrated the feasibility of linearly scaling blockchain using the technology prototype “Pilotfish” on Sui.
Google has added support for searching Bitcoin, Arbitrum, Avalanche, Optimism, Polygon, and Fantom on-chain wallet addresses.
BNB Chain launched the “Rollup as a Service” (RaaS) solution.
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This article is for industry research and communication purposes only and does not constitute any investment advice. The market carries risks, and investments should be made with caution.
Footprint Analytics is a blockchain data solutions provider. With cutting-edge AI technology, we provide the first no-code data analytics platform and unified data API for the crypto field, allowing users to quickly retrieve NFT, Game, and wallet address fund flow data from over 30 public chain ecosystems.
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Tags:
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Source: https://www.bitpush.news/articles/6591214
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