Hassan Maishera
Binance Research, the research arm of the leading cryptocurrency exchange Binance, published its monthly cryptocurrency market report. The report highlighted some of the significant events in the crypto market.
Crypto Market Surged by 9.9% in April
Binance revealed that the cryptocurrency market cap rose by 9.9% in April, marking a strong rebound from the previous month. The 90-day pause on tariffs likely supported the surge. While the temporary suspension (excluding key trade partners such as Canada, Mexico, and China) offered some relief, investor sentiment remains cautious over the long-term implications.
Global trade and business confidence continue to lag, reflecting ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty and persistent trade tensions. Interestingly, Bitcoin shows signs of decoupling from traditional markets. Despite a brief correction to US$75K, Bitcoin rebounded to over US$90K by the end of April, showing its resilience as an asset class.
Bitcoin’s Dominance Surges to a Four-Year High of 63%
In April, Bitcoin's dominance surged to a four-year high of 63%. Amid tight financial conditions and geopolitical uncertainties, Bitcoin's appeal as a hedge against risks could sustain its outperformance over riskier crypto assets.
Driven in part by its "digital gold" narrative and adoption as a reserve asset, institutional interest in Bitcoin is evident, with its ETF attracting significantly more inflows than Ethereum's.
Furthermore, SUI rose by 54.0%, alongside a sustained growth in daily active addresses, hitting the peak of 2.5M in April, and a 40% growth in total value locked (TVL). SOL experienced a 15.2% gain in April following the launch of the first spot SOL ETF in Canada.
BTC rose by 13.2% amid increasing volatility in the traditional markets due to macroeconomic factors and dollar weakness. Investors are increasingly turning to Bitcoin as an alternative investment or hedge amidst these turbulent times, with BTC spot ETF inflows rising to January highs.
Meanwhile, BNB and ETH declined by 0.4% and 2.6% respectively in April, underperforming compared to the other leading cryptocurrencies.
DeFi Total Value Locked (TVL) Rose 3.3% Month-on-Month
Last month, DeFi Total Value Locked (TVL) rose 3.3% month-on-month (MoM), aligning with the broader cryptocurrency market trend and more favorable regulations. In early April, Trump signed a bill nullifying the expanded IRS crypto broker rule, which had expanded the definition of a broker to include decentralized exchanges (DEXes), marking a significant win for the DeFi sector.
Among the top five DeFi ecosystems, only BNB Chain, Solana, and Tron experienced TVL growth, while Ethereum and Arbitrum continue to lose market share. DeFi users increasingly prioritize faster and lower-cost experiences in their trading activities, opting for whichever chain best enables these advantages.
NFT Market Continues to Decline
Last month, the NFT market declined sharply, with total sales volume dropping 16.3%. Despite an upturn in the cryptocurrency markets, the number of unique buyers hit its lowest level since March 2021, reflecting a lack of demand driven by macroeconomic uncertainty and fading speculative interest from investors.
Binance Research added that Ethereum-based NFT sales continue to decline by over 42.7%, despite maintaining its position as the top chain for NFT sales. Closing the lead is Polygon, clinching the second spot in NFT sales largely due to the rise in popularity of RWA-based NFT platform Courtyard, which tokenizes collectible cards as NFTs. Among the top 20 NFT collections, Bored Ape Yacht Club and Mutant Ape Yacht Club saw an uptick in sales by 40%.
Despite the slowdown, OpenSea regained its market lead as the top NFT marketplace, with over 2.1 million wallets engaging with the platform in the past three months.
CeFi Investment On The Rise Amid Shift In Crypto Regulation
Binance Research added that crypto fundraising hit a 12-month high of US$5.08B raised in March 2025 after a slow start to the year. However, the number of fundraising rounds has declined since December 2024. This could mean that while capital may still be available, investors are becoming more selective regarding capital deployment.
Furthermore, CeFi companies accounted for an average of 41.42% of total funds raised from December 2024 to April 2025, up from just 6.07% between April and November 2024. The increase in the proportion of total funds raised for CeFi companies coincided with the shift in the regulatory landscape for crypto following President Trump's election.
Application Layer Fees Now Make Up Over 70% of Total On-Chain Fees
Binance Research reported that application layer fees now make up over 70% of total on-chain fees. In contrast, protocol layer (i.e., base blockchain) fees, totaling US$393.8M in April, now account for just 28.8% of fees, down from $706.7M and a 35.2% share just six months ago.
The shifting fee dynamics have been led by stablecoin issuers, which generated $644.1M in April alone, accounting for a dominant 47.2% of total fees. environment. Decentralized Exchange (DEX) followed with $121.5M (8.9% share), and Liquid Staking came in third at $94.6M (6.9%), though notably down from its 15.2% peak share in January.
