Stablecoin Market Cap Reaches $20 Billion: Same as Crypto Market Cap in February 2017

The combined stablecoin market recently topped a valuation figure of $20 billion. Apparently, this was the total market value of all cryptocurrencies in the pre-bull run month of February 2017. Also, stablecoins together are contributing to $26 billion worth of trading volume.

The Crypto Stablecoin Market Is Booming

As per the latest statistics, the total market cap of all stablecoins in circulation has topped $20 billion. This, as per crypto Twitter commentator, Dan Romero, was the value of the entire cryptocurrency market cap in February 2017.

At $20B, the market cap of stablecoins is now greater than the combined market cap of all cryptocurrencies in February 2017. pic.twitter.com/DRa1tVBYFf

— Dan Romero (@dwr) October 3, 2020

With a market cap of $15.6 billion, Tether (USDT) is still the dominant crypto stablecoin. It is followed by USDC that clocks $2.6 billion on the market cap meter. The wide valuation gap between the two shows just how much more popular USDT is. So much more that, it is the third-ranked cryptocurrency on the leaderboards.

DAI is gradually inching towards the $1 billion market cap mark, with Binance USD (BUSD) doing almost $600 million.

USD Stablecoins Rule The Roost

CoinGecko’s stablecoin data also shows that USD based fiat collateralized cryptocurrencies constitute the majority. Amongst 28 odd stablecoins, US Dollar pegged coins are 18 in number namely, USDT, USDC, BUSD, True USD (TUSD), Paxos Standard, HUSD, sUSD, mStable USD, USDK, Gemini Dollar (GUSD),  EOSDT, Reserve, Stably Dollar (USDS), Origin Dollar (OUSD), PieDAO USD++ (USD ++), Nubits (USNBT), unified Stable Dollar (USD), DeFiDollar (DUSD).

US dollar-based stablecoins account for around 65 percent of the entire stablecoin market. But amongst this plethora of USD pegged fiat-crypto coins, some have even ‘lost their peg.’  Because of this, cryptocurrency assets like PieDAO USD++, NuBits, Stably Dollar are currently ‘underwater.’

Apart from USD stablecoins, cryptocurrencies pegged to other fiat currencies also exist in circulation. Some of them are BiLira (TRYB), EURBASE (EBASE), status euro (EURS), Bitcny (BITCNY), Binance GBP (BGBP), and Binance KRW (BKRW).

Tether (USDT) Usage Is Surging

Stablecoins have experienced massive growth and adoption this year due to the ongoing DeFi craze, especially in the Eastern Asian part of the world. But apart from the yield farming mania, stablecoins, especially USDT is facilitating large scale capital flow according to this recently released Chainalysis report.

Tether is by far the most popular stablecoin in East Asia, making up 93% of all stablecoin value transferred by addresses in the region.

But why Tether? Primitive Ventures founder Dovey Wan in conversation with Chainalysis, said that:

Many popular cryptocurrency influencers in China have historically been big proponents of Bitfinex, whose parent company also owns Tether. Many of those influencers became wholesalers of Tether, selling the stablecoin to a large network of OTC traders around China. Those OTC traders in turn sell Tether to the masses. “It’s very decentralized”.