USDT’s market capitalization has peaked in market value, approaching the $120 billion mark. This figure has grown by just over 24% since the beginning of the year.

Unsurprisingly, Tether continues to maintain its lead in the stablecoin market.

Restaking is not just EigenLayer, Karak, and Symbiotic.

There’s also Picasso and Solayer.

More to come?

Some insights on the current state of Ethereum:

– The 7-day average transaction fee has surged by 314% compared to early September.
– Daily ETH burning increased by 1600% during this period.
– The number of active addresses on Ethereum dropped to a yearly low of 385K.

Investors have shifted from Bitcoin to gold.

Gold prices are reaching record highs, while Bitcoin prices are relatively flat. This negative correlation may be due to investors currently opting for less volatile traditional assets.

The number of stablecoin projects with 10M+ circulating supply hit a record in Q3 2024.

And there is still Q4 ahead and the launch of coins from Revolut and BitGo.

Ethereum remains the leader in the high end NFT market.

15 of the 16 top sales are accounted for by this network. The exception was the BOOGLE on Solana, which sold for $130,000.

Entertainment companies are exploring Web3, but its primary focus remains gaming.

In the video streaming sector, only a few dApps, like Theta, are leveraging the Web3 economy to boost next-generation, real-world applications.

Here’s my overview of their closest competitor, Script Network, launching on mainnet soon.

The number of addresses and transactions on TON DEXs is rapidly growing.

The leading exchange in this ecosystem remains STON.fi, while DeDust and Megaton Finance are currently losing influence.

This is the first time in my 8-year Web3 journey that I feel like we’re lacking a clear direction or thesis.

In the past, we always had dominant narratives to rally around, with a few trends catching up in the background. Now, attention feels completely scattered.

I notice this uncertainty when reading reports from leading Web3 research firms: scattered topics, if/when-based conclusions, fewer deep dives, and more reports focusing on the state of specific sectors.

Nothing groundbreaking.

You might argue: “We’re building the infrastructure for the next generation of consumer, AI, social, and gaming apps. This stage is necessary, and it’s fine.”

That’s true—to an extent.

Look at gaming chains. The competition is fierce, but we have a limited number of promising games emerging. Many teams are betting on high-load applications, but this won’t pay off for most, even if/when gaming becomes the next big thing.

Chain abstraction? Another service-focused development meant to lower barriers for the next wave of apps—but no one really knows what those apps will be.

All these efforts are exciting, but they’re based on assumptions, not facts.

Back in the day, Axie brought tons of users to Web3 without needing complex infrastructure. The same goes for Stepn or even SteemIt (anyone still remember that first popular social platform from 2016?).

So here’s my controversial take: we’re building infrastructure not because it’s urgently needed, but because we don’t know what else to build.

I agree if you disagree.

Top gainers by monthly active users.

Data source: Token Terminal

Interestingly, Bitcoin now shows a higher correlation with Nasdaq than with gold.

Structural changes are occurring, though many have yet to notice.

Gas prices on Ethereum are rising – this may be a result of MEV bot activity.

For example, jaredfromsubway.eth spent $352,127.48 on gas on September 23rd and over $2.6 million in gas last week.

In case you’re watching new infra protocols, Nillion is a great thing to add to your watch list.

Here’s my explainer thread.

$cbBTC already represents 49% of the total wrapped Bitcoin volume 😳

Chain and account abstraction, DeFi, and memecoins were the most mentioned narratives from January to the end of August.

These conclusions were drawn by Kaito AI. According to the platform's data, BRC20 experienced the largest decline, at 72.7%.

A few insights and research findings gathered over the past week ⚡️

General
➖ Binance: Navigating Crypto: Industry Map
➖ Galaxy: Ethereum All Core Developers Consensus Call #142 Writeup
➖ Galaxy: Weekly Top Stories - 9/20

Market
➖ Coinbase: Weekly: The Pivot
➖ Glassnode: Tracing Capital Flows
➖ Galaxy: Fed Initiates Easing Cycle by Slashing Rates by 50 Basis Points
➖ Galaxy: The Investable Universe of Digital Assets

Blockchains & networks
➖ Cryptorank: How to Craft a Unique Crypto Protocol: Lessons from Polymarket, Hyperliquid, and TON
➖ 4pillars: Will Drop Protocol and Lido Alliance Drive The Adoption of Liquid Staking?

GameFi & NFTs
➖ CoinGecko: 26 Crypto Sports Sponsorships Signed in 2024, a 38% Drop from 2021
➖ Simetri: Alphaverse: Solana’s New Gaming Handheld

This small iceberg on the right side of the chart is a bit frustrating lol.

Hopefully, we'll be back in the warm zone soon.

The number of newly created wallets on the Bitcoin network continues to grow.

Historically, this indicator has signaled an upward trend and market recovery. When the price of BTC reached peaks, the number of addresses began to decline, as investors lost interest and the market entered a correction.

A very nice Pendle explainer here, in case you’re still not Pending.

Kudos to DeFi Warhol.

Trading volumes of altcoins have sharply increased recently.

Korean investors switched from Bitcoin to altcoins in August, although they had previously shown more interest in Bitcoin.