Global crypto market cap tripled in a year and hits $2.43T

three crypto currencies together floating in the air

After a fantastic performance throughout 2020, the world’s leading cryptocurrencies exploded in 2021, causing the global crypto market cap to hit a new record high.

According to data presented by TradingPlatforms.com, the combined value of all crypto coins soared by 220% in the last year, reaching $2.43trn in the first week of May.

ETHEREUM MARKET CAP SOARED BY 1,656% YoY, THREE TIMES THE GROWTH RATE OF BITCOIN

The year 2020 was a fantastic year for all digital coins. The cumulative market capitalization of cryptocurrencies grew around 300% YoY to $758bn in 2020, as investors flocked to crypto coins in times of economic uncertainty caused by the pandemic. This was even above the market cap reached in 2017, considered as the break-out year for Bitcoin and other digital coins.

However, 2021 witnessed even more impressive growth, with many of the major crypto coins reaching their all-time highs. Bitcoin, the biggest digital currency, accounts for 45% of the global crypto market cap. The CoinMarketCap data show its price rallied over 100% this year alone, helping its market cap hit $1.1trn last week. Compared to $178bn in 2020, this represents a massive 515% increase in a year. However, the latest boost in the cryptocurrency market has been equally driven by impressive Ethereum growth. In 2020, the combined value of all Ethereum coins amounted to $23.4bn. Over the last twelve months, this figure soared by 1,656%, three times the growth rate of Bitcoin.

In 2021 only, Ethereum’s market cap surged by nearly 400%, rising from $82.8bn in January to $411.1bn last week.

Besides a surge in market capitalization, Ethereum also witnessed a significant increase in daily transactions worldwide. During the last three months, transactions per day floated around 1.1 million and then hit an all-time high of 1.53 million last week, a 135% increase year-over-year.

Statistics also show that Ethereum’s daily trading volume more than doubled in the last year, rising from $16.7bn to $38.7bn.

DOGECOIN WITNESSED A FIVE-FIGURE GROWTH IN YEAR, BINANCE COIN MARKET CAP SKYROCKETED BY 3,640% YoY

Besides Bitcoin’s and Ethereum’s price rally, which fuelled the global crypto market growth, other leading digital coins also skyrocketed in the last year. In May 2020, the combined value of all Binance Coin tokens amounted to $2.6bn. Since then, this figure surged by 3,642% YoY to almost $97.3bn, pushing the cryptocurrency on third place by market cap globally. However, the world’s fourth most valued crypto coin, Dogecoin, witnessed even more impressive five-figure growth in the last year. The meme-inspired digital currency hit $322.6 million in market cap in 2020. Since then, Dogecoin’s market cap soared by a staggering 30,400% to $91.6bn last week