CoinMarketCap’s H1 2023 report says Q2 was a ‘lost quarter’

Sectors like virtual and augmented reality soared 704% in year-to-date growth, while artificial intelligence and big data expanded 323%.

Crypto data aggregator CoinMarketCap has released its “According to CMC: Crypto Market Analysis H1 2023” report. Within the report, the coin information website described the second quarter of 2023 as a “lost quarter” due to several factors, including the lack of a strong market narrative compared to the first quarter of the year. A few areas, however, experienced strong growth and resilience, the report notes.

According to the report, Q1 2023 showed more positive developments, such as Bitcoin (BTC) doubling in price and the rise of layer-2 scaling solutions like Arbitrum and zero-knowledge proofs. In addition, Q1 also showed a strong nonfungible token (NFT) market that was driven by product updates and the issuance of NFT marketplace Blur’s token.

The data aggregator also noted that Q2 “failed to produce” groundbreaking developments. Notwithstanding trends that showed Q2 to be a memecoin season and the popularity of the new BRC-20 token standard, CoinMarketCap argued that Q2 simply did not generate the excitement that Q1 delivered. 

Despite this, the data company said some positive events did occur during Q2. This includes the Crypto Fear & Greed Index — a metric that aims to illustrate overall crypto market sentiment — showing a score of 52, which is considered neutral. This result is much better than its score of 32 at the start of the year, indicating fear in the market.

Related: Altcoins ‘bled’ as Bitcoin gained dominance in Q2: CoinGecko

Even though the market was challenging, CoinMarketCap noted that specific sectors showed resilience and growth in their year-to-date (YTD) market capitalizations. These include virtual and augmented reality showing 704% growth, with artificial intelligence and big data showing 323% growth.

Meanwhile, decentralized finance projects and infrastructure have also started to make a comeback. According to the data, lending and borrowing increased by 149%, derivatives increased by 75%, storage increased by 86% and interoperability increased by 58%.

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