One of the main narratives of hope for cryptocurrency investors is the belief that there will be a significant shift in public perception that will trigger a new wave of capital from both retail and institutional investors.
Unfortunately for hopeful bulls, data indicates that the opposite has been happening for almost a year, as evidenced by the decline in the search rate for the term 'bitcoin' on Google.
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A similar pattern is visible when looking at the search interest for the second-largest cryptocurrency, ethereum, whose peak interest occurred during the second week of May 2021, and has been declining since then. The search interest for ethereum is currently at its lowest level since December 2020.
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Based on this information, it is time for crypto investors to reassess where the next major market stimulus will come from, as it is clear that retail interest is largely tied to significant price movements.
Weak Volume on Crypto Exchanges
Additional evidence of declining interest in cryptocurrencies can be found when looking at the total trading volumes on major exchanges. According to data from Blockchain.com, this metric was $165.8 billion on April 19, the lowest level since October 2020.
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The growth of the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector and decentralized exchanges (DEX) is also declining, according to data from Dune Analytics.
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As shown in the chart above, the volume on DEXs is currently below the amount traded in January 2021 when the bull run had just begun, and the DeFi sector was emerging.
NFTs Continue to ‘Sizzle and Fizzle’
One source of hope across the entire cryptocurrency ecosystem can be seen in the non-fungible token (NFT) sector, which has begun to record an increase in daily trading volume on OpenSea, the largest NFT marketplace, after hitting a low in early March, according to data from Dune Analytics.
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As activity in the NFT market begins to rise, so do the floor prices of some of the top projects, suggesting that momentum for the NFT sector is increasing. This could be partially due to the attention that projects like the Bored Ape Yacht Club and its recently launched ApeCoin are receiving in mainstream media.
It remains to be seen whether the hype and speculation in the NFT market can spill over into an increased influx into the cryptocurrency ecosystem as a whole, or if the emerging sector is destined to fizzle out like the ICO cycle of 2017-2018.
On the main adoption front, it seems that crypto investors are still searching for that killer decentralized application (Dapp) or use case that will spark the next round of market inflows.
