The cryptocurrency market jumped above $1.5 trillion today after the recent rally in Bitcoin and Ethereum . The market of digital assets is now more valuable than the entire Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Australia.
Bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency briefly touched $50,000 today after significant institutional demand. As of writing, BTC is trading above $49,000 with a total market cap of more than $916 billion. Bitcoin gained nearly 4% in the last 24 hours.
The cryptocurrency market is up nearly 100% since the start of 2021. The recent Bitcoin rally fueled by Tesla’s announcement and growing institutional interest played a major role in the rise of the crypto market cap.
According to the data published by the World Bank, the total GDP of Australia stands at around $1.4 trillion. Spanish GDP is valued at around $1.39 trillion. The recent jump in the cryptocurrency market cap means that the total value of digital assets is now more than the Australian and Spanish GDP.
The adoption of digital assets has increased substantially in the last few months as major financial firms announced their plans about cryptocurrency assets. Earlier, Finance Magnates reported Mastercard's announcement about the acceptance of digital assets in 2021.
Growth of Altcoins
Bitcoin’s current market dominance stands at around 61%, which is down sharply since the start of 2021 because of a significant jump in the prices of altcoins. Ethereum, Polkadot, Cardano, Stellar, Dogecoin and Litecoin posted strong gains in the last 6 weeks. Ethereum, the world’s second-largest cryptocurrency is up nearly 150% since the start of 2021. As of writing, the digital currency is trading above $1,800 with a total market cap of more than $205 billion.
DeFi tokens have seen phenomenal growth in the last few weeks. Chainlink, Aave, Uniswap, Compound and Synthetix are up more than 200% since the start of this year. The total value locked under DeFi projects crossed $40 billion this week, its highest level on record.
