Written by: Glassnode
Compiled by: AididiaoJP, Foresight News
Against the backdrop of current market pullbacks and macroeconomic pressures, we have partnered with Fasanara Digital to release a report analyzing the evolution of core ecosystem infrastructure, including spot liquidity, ETF fund flows, stablecoins, tokenized assets, and decentralized perpetual contracts, in the fourth quarter.
Digital assets are in one of the most structurally important phases of this cycle. Driven by deep spot liquidity, historic capital inflows, and demand for regulated ETFs, Bitcoin has moved beyond its three-year expansion phase. Market focus is shifting: fund flows are concentrating, trading venues are maturing, and derivatives infrastructure is showing greater resilience in the face of shocks.
Based on data insights from Glassnode and trading perspectives from Fasanara, this report traces the evolution of market structure in 2025. We focus on analyzing the liquidity restructuring in the spot, ETF, and futures markets, the scale changes in leverage cycles, and how stablecoins, tokenization, and off-chain settlement are reshaping capital flows. These trends collectively outline a market architecture that is significantly different from previous cycles and continues to evolve. The following is a summary of the core content:
Key points
Bitcoin has attracted more than $732 billion in new funds, exceeding the total of all previous cycles combined, pushing its realized market capitalization to approximately $1.1 trillion, during which time the price has increased by more than 690%.
Bitcoin's long-term volatility has nearly halved, dropping from 84% to 43%, reflecting a continued increase in market depth and institutional participation.
Over the past 90 days, Bitcoin settlements totaled approximately $6.9 trillion, on par with or even exceeding the quarterly transaction volumes of traditional payment networks like Visa and Mastercard. While on-chain activity has shifted somewhat as trading activity moves towards ETFs and brokers, Bitcoin and stablecoins still dominate on-chain settlements.
ETF daily trading volume has grown from a base of less than $1 billion to more than $5 billion, with peak daily trading volume exceeding $9 billion (for example, after the deleveraging event on October 10).
The tokenized real-world assets (RWA) market grew from $7 billion to $24 billion in one year. Its low correlation with traditional crypto assets helps improve the stability and capital efficiency of DeFi.
The decentralized perpetual contract market has experienced explosive growth and continues to grow: the market share of DEX perpetual contracts has increased from about 10% to 16-20%, and monthly trading volume has exceeded $1 trillion.
Venture capital activity remains closely tied to Altcoin cycles, primarily focusing on mature and high-profile areas such as exchanges, core infrastructure, and scaling solutions.
This cycle is led by Bitcoin, driven by spot trading, and supported by institutional funds.
Bitcoin's market share is approaching 60%, indicating a return of funds to highly liquid mainstream assets, while Altcoin are correspondingly declining. Since November 2022, Bitcoin's share has risen from 38.7% to 58.3%, while Ethereum's share has fallen to 12.1%, continuing its trend of consistently underperforming Bitcoin since its merger in 2022.
Bitcoin attracted $732 billion in new funds from its cycle low to its high, exceeding the total of all previous cycles combined. Ethereum and other Altcoin also performed strongly, with gains exceeding 350% at their peak, but they did not outperform Bitcoin as they had in previous cycles.
Liquidity has deepened and long-term volatility has decreased, but the impact of leverage remains.
The Bitcoin market structure has significantly strengthened, with daily spot trading volume increasing from $4-13 billion in the previous cycle to $8-22 billion currently. Long-term volatility continues to decline, with 1-year realized volatility falling from 84.4% to 43.0%. Meanwhile, futures open interest has reached a record high of $67.9 billion, with the CME accounting for approximately 30%, demonstrating significant institutional participation.
On-chain activities are migrating off-chain, but Bitcoin and stablecoins remain the mainstays of on-chain settlement.
Following the approval of US spot ETFs, the number of daily active entities on the Bitcoin blockchain decreased from approximately 240,000 to 170,000. This primarily reflects a shift in activity towards brokers and ETF platforms, rather than a decline in network usage. Despite this migration, Bitcoin still settled approximately $6.9 trillion in value over the past 90 days, comparable to the quarterly processing volume of major payment networks such as Visa and Mastercard. After adjusting for Glassnode entities, the actual economic settlement volume still reached approximately $0.87 trillion per quarter, equivalent to $7.8 billion per day.
Meanwhile, stablecoins continue to provide liquidity support for the entire digital asset ecosystem. The total supply of the top five stablecoins has reached an all-time high of $263 billion. The combined daily transaction volume of USDT and USDC is approximately $225 billion, with USDC exhibiting a significantly higher velocity of circulation, reflecting its greater use for institutional and DeFi-related fund flows.
Tokenized assets are expanding the market's financial infrastructure.
Over the past year, the size of tokenized real-world assets (RWAs) has surged from $7 billion to $24 billion. Ethereum remains the primary settlement layer for these assets, currently holding approximately $11.5 billion worth. BlackRock's BUIDL, the largest single product, has grown to $2.3 billion, more than quadrupling in size this year.
With continued capital inflows, tokenized funds have become one of the fastest-growing asset classes, opening up new distribution channels for asset management institutions. This reflects the expanding scope of asset tokenization and the increasing acceptance of tokenization as a distribution and liquidity channel among institutions.
