The main takeaway:
- With the cryptocurrency market growing by nearly $400 billion since the end of September, many coins have reached new heights
- DYDX, AXS and LUNA have done incredibly well and have reached their ATHs for the past 7 days
With Bitcoin hitting $50,000 again and overall market sentiment turning bullish, we take a look at which crypto assets have managed to break past their previous peak valuations and reach new heights.
dYdX Gaining Momentum To Switch To Decentralized Exchange After Cryptocurrency Ban In China
Central crypto exchanges such as Huobi, KuCoin and OKEx were forced to leave the mainland China market after Beijing’s blanket ban on cryptocurrencies. While the tokens of many centralized trading platforms are facing increased selling pressure, their Decentralized Finance (DeFi) counterparts have been on the rise.
One of the biggest beneficiaries of the newly created trend has been the dYdX decentralized exchange, both in terms of increased trading volume and the overall performance of its digital token. DYDX, the original DEX token, has seen exponential growth since its launch on September 10th. In just under a month, the DeFi token has doubled its value, reaching the level ATH $27.7 on Sep 30, before rebounding to $21.3 at the time of writing.
We’ve covered the trend of Chinese traders streaming DEXes in detail in the latest edition of our weekly Coins to Watch series, which you can find here.
Axie Infinity announces the original decentralized exchange, booms in AXS
The hugely popular blockchain gaming company, Axie Infinity, recently announced its plans to launch a DEX and thus expand the functionality of its platform. The company’s growth leader explained that allowing Axie Infinity’s original assets to be traded on the platform is a necessary step to take towards providing a seamless user experience.
Investors welcomed the announcement with enthusiasm as the price of AXS more than doubled in three days. While the token was trading in the $70 range for the pre-announcement, it managed to hit a new range ATH of $154 by Oct 4. According to recent reports, the developing company behind the highly successful gaming company Sky Mavis is worth $3 billion.
Axie Infinity was the best performing crypto asset this year, enjoying a 21,000% price increase. Currently, AXS has a market capitalization of $7.49 billion, which is a good thing for the 38th place in the list of the largest cryptocurrencies.
LUNA stepped up after the launch of the Columbus-5 upgrade on September 30
Terra is an e-commerce payment platform that combines the functionality of stablecoins with its native LUNA tokens in order to provide the necessary stability for international transactions. The long-awaited upgrade of the network, called Columbus-5, went online on September 30 and brought token burning mechanics and cross-chain support.
Since the mainnet published the new update, the price of the platform’s original LUNA tokens has gone from $33 to one ATH from $49 on Oct 4. Since then, the value of the token has decreased slightly, and it is now trading at $41.
Similar to AXS, LUNA has been a huge success this year. The 6,300% price increase since the start of 2021 is enough to put the Terra in eighth place on the list of the best performing assets of the year.
David is a cryptocurrency enthusiast and an expert in personal finance. He has authored several publications for different platforms. He loves to explore new things, and this is how he discovered blockchain in the first place.