Bitwise’s Q2 2026 crypto market assessment reveals its 10 Giant Cap Crypto Index dropped 15.4% final quarter, the third straight quarter within the pink and the longest such stretch since 2022.
Nevertheless, the identical report argued that whilst costs fell, the crypto sector, together with stablecoins, tokenized belongings, and prediction markets, has been strengthening.
Crypto Costs Down, However Fundamentals Are Enhancing
In keeping with Bitwise, eight of the index’s 10 constituents completed Q2 within the pink, with the worst performer within the basket being Cardano (ADA), which slipped almost 40% in Q2 and is down greater than 56% yr so far. Ethereum and XRP misplaced 24.66% and 20.79% of their values, respectively, whereas Solana’s dip was extra modest compared at 10.87%, though YTD it registered a extra important 40.61% plunge.
Bitcoin itself simply suffered its worst June in 4 years after falling under $60,000 and was about 49% off its October 2025 all-time excessive of over $126,000 on the time of writing, stretching the downturn to about 9 months.
However there have been two belongings within the Giant Cap Crypto Index that bucked the downward pattern: Hyperliquid (HYPE) and Stellar Lumens (XLM), with the previous going up 79% and the latter over 10%. Nevertheless, year-to-date XLM dumped 6.71% whereas HYPE nonetheless stayed inexperienced, surging by almost 158%.
A separate report from CryptoQuant indicated that about 40% of altcoins are buying and selling close to their all-time lows, a share that climbed towards 45% when BTC broke under the aforementioned $60,000.
Per the Bitwise market assessment, on-chain exercise, buying and selling quantity, and the whole worth locked (TVL) in DeFi additionally slipped. However it was not all doom and gloom, as prediction market volumes reached a report $43.2 billion throughout the quarter, which is nearly 18 instances greater than the yr earlier than.
In the meantime, tokenized real-world belongings have gone up greater than 50% to date this yr to almost $33 billion, and crypto-focused equities have additionally outperformed the broader digital asset market, with the Bitwise Crypto Innovators 30 Index gaining 30.6%.
The asset supervisor additionally famous that stablecoins settled 2.3 instances extra worth than Visa and collectively maintain extra US Treasuries than the likes of Norway, India, Brazil, and Saudi Arabia. Additional, it identified that income technology amongst crypto functions has turn out to be extra concentrated, with Hyperliquid, PancakeSwap, and Aave every producing roughly $900 million over the previous yr.
A Market Twice the Dimension It Was on the Final Backside
When Bitwise in contrast present exercise ranges to the identical level within the 2022 cycle, the distinction stood out away from the worth charts. As an illustration, Ethereum transaction counts ran about 13 instances greater, and DeFi TVL sits greater than 60% above the extent from that interval. Moreover, stablecoin belongings beneath administration have doubled.
In keeping with the report, solely costs have didn’t hold tempo with the growing utilization and infrastructure, with the market now valuing crypto at ranges related to the final bear market, although the trade is working at virtually twice the dimensions it had reached then, and there’s better liquidity and clearer participation from conventional finance corporations.
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