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Monthly cryptocurrency trading volume falls to $6.58 trillion for first time in seven months | Currency News | Financial and economic news
- Cumulative monthly spot and derivatives trading volume slumped 43.8%, CCData said.
- Binance spot market volume recorded its first decline since September 2023.
Cryptocurrency trading volume cooled in April, posting its first decline in seven months as rising geopolitical tensions and slowing inflows into U.S.-listed spot ETFs weighed on the digital asset market.
According to a report by London-based digital asset data provider CCData, cumulative volume in spot and derivatives markets fell 43.8% to $6.58 trillion, a sharp retracement from the record high of March of $9.12 trillion.
Derivatives again fell out of favor with investors as activity in the futures and options market fell 47.6% to $4.57 trillion. Meanwhile, spot market volume suffered a relatively measured decline of 32.6% to $2.01 trillion.
“This decline followed unexpected macroeconomic data, an escalation of the geopolitical crisis in the Middle East, and negative net flows from US bitcoin spot ETFs, which led major crypto assets to retrace gains made in March,” CCData said in a relationship shared with CoinDesk.
Bitcoin {{BTC}}, the leading cryptocurrency by market value, fell nearly 15% to below $60,000 last month, snapping a seven-month winning trend. The sell-off came as an overheated bull market collided with broad-based risk aversion characterized by renewed tensions in the Middle East, the diminishing likelihood of rapid Fed rate cuts this year and the strength of the dollar index.
THE CoinDesk 20 Indexa proxy for the most liquid digital assets, traded up nearly 20% and the total cryptocurrency market capitalization fell 16.8% to $2.177 trillion.
While Binance remained the largest cryptocurrency exchange in terms of volume, its combined spot and derivatives market share fell to 41.5%. Trading volume on the exchange’s spot market slumped 39.2% to $679 billion in April, recording the first decline since September 2023.
“Binance’s decline in market share also coincided with news that its founder and previous CEO, Changpeng Zhao, was sentenced to four months in prison for violating US money laundering laws,” CCData noted.
Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao resigned after pleading guilty to US criminal charges in November and was replaced by Richard Teng. Since then, Binance’s spot market share has increased from 30.8% to 33.8%, CCData said.
This story originally appeared on Coindesk